Bartholomew's Notes

Glenn Beck’s “end-times prophet” Joel Richardson has a new article at WorldNetDaily, explaining how turmoil in Libya will lead to the rise of the “Neo-Ottoman Caliphate”, as facilitated by Obama. Although he avoids theological discussion this time, Richardson famously believes that this new Caliphate is predicted in the Bible as the means by which the world’s Muslims will be brought under the control of a coming Islamic Anti-Christ:

The World Tribune has reported that Turkey has floated the idea of invading Libya to establish peace and stability in that nation. According to the report, the one stipulation however, as set forth by Prime Minister Erdogan, is that the European Union must immediately welcome Turkey into its warm embrace. And then comes the zinger: “The sources said the United States, particularly President Barack Obama, supported the Turkish proposal.” Bingo. President Obama is virtually rolling out the red carpet for the emerging Neo-Ottoman Caliphate…

Richardson’s close associate Walid Shoebat concurs, quoting the same World Tribune report and adding:

For years, I have said that some day Turkey will invade Libya. Daniel 11 tells us:

“He will gain control of the treasures of gold and silver and all the riches of Egypt with the Libyans and Nubians in submission.” (Daniel 11:43)

Turkey currently has its eye on Libya and is using Barack Hussein Obama to gain support for his invasion of Libya and he got it. Whether Turkey will invade or not is only a matter of time…

Various apocalyptically-minded websites have reposted this rumination.

Although the report cited by Shoebat and Richardson is billed as “special to the World Tribune“, the Tribune piece in turn credits the Middle East Newsline and it is essentially a cut-and-paste from an article there. This article is paywall-protected, but Middle East Newsline is unlikely to mind: the site is run by an Israel-based journalist named Steve Rodan, who is also the World Tribune’s Middle East editor.

Middle East Newsline’s information is purportedly from “diplomatic sources” and “a Western diplomat”. Along with details about Erdogan’s offer and Obama’s alleged support of it, we are also given information about a third president’s supposed reaction:

The sources said French President Nicolas Sarkozy opposed the Erdogan proposal despite U.S. pressure.

“What Sarkozy said is unprintable, but basically that the United States is not a member of the EU and cannot dictate who should be a member,” the diplomat said.

The fact that Obama and Sarkozy are at odds over Turkey’s membership of the EU is actually old news from 2009.

Alas, however, the claim that Turkey plans to invade Libya has been contradicted by other reports that cite actual people, as opposed to shadowy “sources”. Richardson  nevertheless is undeterred:

Thankfully, the Turkish newspaper Hurriyet has followed up with a report that both Erdogan and Turkish Foreign Minister Davutoglu have categorically ruled out such a Turkish-led invasion of Libya – but not before Obama had the opportunity to reflexively support such an idea.

In other words, the “sources” who revealed the “Turkish proposal” have turned out to have been wrong, but we should still believe the bit about Obama having “reflexively supported” the proposal that was never made.

Rodan writes for publications such as Jane’s Defence Weekly and the Jerusalem Post. World Tribune, meanwhile, was profiled by the New Yorker in 2003:

It is a Web site produced, more or less as a hobby, in Falls Church, Virginia… Its editor and publisher, Robert Morton, is an assistant managing editor at the Washington Times and a former “corporate editor” for News World Communications, the Times’ owner and the publishing arm of the Unification Church, led by the Reverend Sun Myung Moon. (Morton and his wife, Choon Boon, are themselves followers of the Reverend Moon.)

…Morton said last week via e-mail that he founded the site as an experiment, back in 1998, while serving as a media fellow at Stanford’s Hoover Institution, a conservative think tank.

…it is part of a loose network of mostly conservative sites… whose dispatches sometimes serve as the journalistic equivalent of trial balloons: a story may not be based on knowable facts, but it nevertheless may occasionally turn out to be right.

Also:

…World Tribune.com, in concert with the subscription-driven weekly intelligence briefing Geostrategy-Direct.com (a partner site), has paid for itself.

World Tribune describes itself, alongside this partner site and a third site called East-Asia-Intel.com, as belonging to the “media division” of a private company called East West Services, Inc (or EWS, Inc). The website’s footer contains a strange detail:

Legal Counsel: Roy M. Cohn (1927-1986) Backup Paralegals: Hammer, Rude, Hussein, Nasty and Tong

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