At issue, say Libyan officials and Western observers, are Qatar‘s deep ties to a clique of Libyan Islamists, whose backgrounds variously include fighting in Afghanistan in the 1980s and spending years in jail under Col. Gadhafi. They later published a theological treatise condemning violent jihad. With Qatar‘s support, they have become central players in Libyan politics. As they face off with a transitional authority largely led by secular former regime officials and expatriate technocrats, their political rivals accuse Qatar of stacking the deck in the Islamists‘ favor.

The battles forced the NTC fighters to pull back, which will give way to NATO‘s aircraft and heavy artilleries aiming at hideouts of the pro-Gaddafi forces, said the source, who asked to remain anonymous.

Occupy Wall Street Protesters Arrested For Attempted Bank Account Closing – Citi Bank Oct 15
NYC Fire codes… You can not lock people indoors!

Recently, Sean Hannity called the #OccupyWallStreet protesters un-American by saying they „hated liberty.“

In response, WeAreTheOther99.com interviewed a few Marine vets at Zuccotti Park.

US Military veteran rants at NYPD over their brutality and reprehensible tactics, including kettling, during the Times Square protest organized by Occupy Wall Street.

Ein US Veterane macht den Polizisten klar, dass sie keine Ehre besitzen: (New York)

To back up it’s claim, that NTC had conqured Bani Walid from the south, Al Jazeera cut in some pictures of street settings with some tanks with NTC flags painted on it, claiming it was „latest pictures.“ But those pictures show no traces of fighting, no bullets on the street and houses without shooting marks, and that despite NATO and NTC were bombing Bani Walid for a couple of months and NTC commanders reported „heavy resistance“ from Bani Walid.

Betrachten wir die Fälschung einmal genauer:
Video auf Al Jazeeras laufendem Programm am Abend des 17. Oktober 2011

An even wider margin, 87 percent, agreed with the protesters‘ right to camp out in Lower Manhattan, as long as they obeyed the law. The movement began staging rallies more than a month ago.

Support for the protests was split down party lines, with 81 percent of the Democrats saying they backed them, while only 35 percent of Republicans said so.

Kenianische Truppen sind bis zu 100 Kilometer weit ins Nachbarland Somalia eingedrungen.

Die Regierung erwarte für das kommende Jahr einen Rückgang des Bruttoinlandsprodukts um 2,8 Prozent, sagte Finanzminister Vitor Gaspar. Er korrigierte damit die bisherige Prognose deutlich nach unten, wonach das Minus auf 2,3 Prozent geschätzt wurde.

President Barack Obama‘s deployment of 100 military advisers to help defeat Uganda‘s notorious Lord‘s Resistance Army (LRA) may yield him a popular foreign policy win but risks triggering more violence if it fails.

(15.10.) Germany and France are spearheading a multi-trillion dollar “shock and awe” programme expected to be agreed next weekend and presented the following week at the G20 summit in Cannes.

It’s no surprise Germany is battling back against the multi-trillion euro package the Mediterranean countries are demanding. But what is incomprehensible is that Germany is repeatedly allowing market expectations for massive bail-out initiatives to rise, only to deflate them abruptly. This sadistic game of bait and switch probably reflects either deep internal divisions between Germany and France or Germany’s inability to form a coherent policy even at this late date.

As soon as market pressures abate, policy makers tend to lose their enthusiasm to make tough decisions.

Fortunately, there are plenty of minefields along the way, ensuring that policy makers should remain on alert.

The prospect of a eurozone endgame has bolstered markets in the last few weeks, but investors could stunt that optimism if they realize that expectations for this weekend‘s summit have been overblown. With EU leaders already downplaying prospects for this meeting, we‘re looking at a cynical start to a busy week in Europe.

How Europe allowed this to happen will no doubt be the subject of many enquiries. Suffice to say that it was an intellectual failure by everybody: lenders, economists, regulators and the European Central Bank. The ECB misread the implications of the global capital surplus in the middle of the last decade (like the Fed) and gunned the M3 money supply at double-digit rates (like the Fed).

This great error further juiced the fatal flood of lending from North Europe to Club Med. Interestingly, it is what US lending did to Germany in the late 1920s. When the music stopped — when Wall Street cut off loans, as Germany has now cut off loans to Spain — trouble ensured within two years. Weimar limped on, but not for long.

Watch out for US Empire manufacturing and speeches from German Finance Minister Schauble that may dominate market action later today.

Data Watch:

13.30 US Empire Manufacturing Index Last -8.8 Exp -4.0

14.15 US Industrial Production Last 0.2 Exp 0.2

14.15 US Capacity Utilisation Last 77.4 Exp 77.5

14.30 EU Schauble speaking

15.35 EU Stark speaking

Mr. Schäuble said he „assumes“ European Union leaders this weekend will agree on a capital ratio of 9% for so-called systemically important financial institutions to limit contagion.

However, some measures to resolve the crisis, including changes to the EU‘s treaties, will take longer to resolve, he said.