Saturday, May 12, 2007

Open Letter to the Members of the US Congress who Oppose the War on Iraq


To members of the European Parliaments who Oppose the War

by Hassan Jum'a Awwad
(Head of the Iraqi Federation of Oil Unions)

"Peace be upon you and greetings to you all,

We wish to clarify certain matters relating to events in Iraq for our friends among the members of the US Congress. It is common knowledge that the occupation spared neither the old nor the young, and that Iraq is passing through the most difficult of times because all and sundry are hounding it and covet a share of its riches. We see no good reason for linking the passing of the feeble Iraqi oil law to the withdrawal of the occupation troops from Iraq.

Everyone knows that the oil law does not serve the Iraqi people, and that it serves Bush, his supporters and the foreign companies at the expense of the Iraqi people who have been wronged and deprived of their right to their oil despite enduring all difficulties.

We ask our friends not to link withdrawal with the oil law, especially since the USA claimed that it came to Iraq as a liberator and not in order to control Iraq's resources.

The general public in Iraq is totally convinced that Bush wants to rush the promulgation of the oil law so as to be leaving Iraq with a victory of sorts, because his project is failing every day and the occupation is collapsing in all parts of Iraq.

We wish to see you take a true stance for the children of Iraq, and we always say that history will remember those who advance peace over war.

With my regards,"

Iraq attack kills five US soldiers; three are missing


"Five US soldiers were killed and three went missing when their unit was attacked south of Baghdad, the US military has said.

The attack on a patrol of seven US soldiers and an Iraqi interpreter occured early on Saturday morning.

The US military said the attack took place at 4:44am near Mahmudiya, about 30km south of the capital.
Mahmudiya is a stronghold of Sunni Arab fighters opposed to the US-backed government in Iraq.

Troops who arrived later found five of the soldiers dead and the other three remained missing, according to a statement from Major-General William Caldwell, the chief US military spokesman in Iraq.

"The quick reaction force reported finding five members of the team killed in action and three others whose duty status and whereabouts are unknown," Caldwell said......"

Collaborators Under a New Name Are Still Collaborators


Iraqi Party For Shi'ite 'Revolution' Changes Name

"May 12, 2007 -- One of Iraq's most powerful Shi'ite political parties has dropped the word "revolution" from its name.

The Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq (SCIRI) will henceforth be known as the Supreme Islamic Council of Iraq.

Party leader Abd al-Aziz al-Hakim, a top Shi'ite cleric, announcing the name change at a news conference today, said the word "revolution" has become "unnecessary."

The party, which was founded as an opposition movement in exile in Iran in 1982, is one of the most powerful blocs in the Iraqi government."

***

There was never a "Revolution" in SCIRI to start with! It was nothing but empty and useless rhetoric to cover up its collaboration. The same applies to the father and creator of SCIRI, namely the "Islamic Revolution" of Iran. What revolution? They are the most reactionary silent collaborators with the Great Satan.

The Voice of Palestinian Collaborators who are Liquidating Palestinan Rights as we Speak


Fatah spokesperson welcomes visit by King Abdullah II

"Bethlehem – Ma'an – Fahmi Za’arir, the spokesperson of the Fatah movement on Saturday welcomed tomorrow's visit of King Abdullah II to the Palestinian territories.

King Abdullah will discuss the political developments which face the Palestinian cause with President Mahmoud Abbas, "especially given the reactivation the Arab Peace Initiative in Riyadh".

The spokesperson stated that "the Palestinian –Jordanian relations remain strong and the Jordanian role is always welcomed."

He asked for Jordan to continue their efforts for dissolving the siege.[Hell, they are an integral part of the siege!]

"We appreciate the support of King Abdullah for the Palestinian issue, and his visit to have a summit with President Mahmoud Abbas."

Za'arir stated that the meeting will also discuss ways to support the reactivated Arab peace initiative, "which is the main thing to discuss following the Riyadh summit," he concluded."

By Mike Luckovich

Arab Puppet Meeting With Israel to the Palestinian: Son, We are Older and Wiser than You and You Must Listen!
By Hamed Najeeb

Hamas deplores Arab meetings with Israel


"NABLUS, (PIC)-- The Hamas Movement on Saturday lashed out at Arab official meetings with Israel, saying that the Arab countries should rather focus their efforts on breaking the siege imposed on the Palestinian people.

A West Bank spokesman for the Movement said in a press release that the Arabs should have rather opted to lift the political and economic siege imposed on the Palestinians.

He underlined that the meeting of Jordanian and Egyptian foreign ministers with their Israeli counterpart was providing the Hebrew state with the help it direly needed at present to overcome the impact of the Winograd report, which held the Israeli political and military leaders responsible for the defeat in their war waged against Lebanon last summer.

The spokesman recalled that Israel ever since the Arab peace initiative was voiced in the Beirut summit in 2002 had declared its absolute rejection of it as evident in former Israeli premier Ariel Sharon's words that the initiative was not "worth the ink it was written with".

However, the present Israeli political leadership chose to invest the Arabs' insistence on this initiative to seek normalization of relations with the Arab and Islamic countries without having to pay any price in return, he opined.

The spokesman advised the Arab countries to make use of the apparent weakness of American hegemony in the region and the deteriorating internal Israeli conditions and to seek other alternatives to achieve the Arab people's interests."

***

Of course Hamas does not say a word about its partner in the "unity government," namely the Palestinian Karzai Abbas. He is guilty of far more than Egypt and Jordan; he is supposed to represent Palestinian interests after all.

For how long will Hamas continue to speak from both corners of its mouth?? The Palestinian people can't take Hamas seriously while it is in bed with traitors.

When the Liars Deny, it Must be True


Jordanian Prime Minister rejects talk of confederation with Palestinian territories

"Bethlehem – Ma'an – The Jordanian Prime Minister, Dr Ma'rouf Al-Bakhit, stated on Friday that "the time is not now ripe for any talks about a confederate or federated union between Jordan and Palestine, or any form of formal relation". He maintained that such discussion "is harmful for the interests of both sides"......

An Israeli newspaper reported that the former Jordanian premier, and also the head of the negotiating delegation between Jordan and Israel, Abdus-Salam Al-Majali, had suggested a Jordanian peace plan to Israeli Prime Minister Olmert.

The plan was allegedly based on the annulment of the decision to cut the union between Palestine and Jordan, ratified in 1988. In addition, Jordan expressed readiness for "a confederate union with the Palestinian Authority", which the newspaper claimed would be announced before the establishment of an independent Palestinian state."

Friday, May 11, 2007

Former collaborator discloses details of US-ordered assassinations, sectarian bomb attacks targeting Iraqi civilians

uruknet.info

"An Iraqi who asked not to be identified had disclosed some of the US activities such as assassinations and bombings in markets that aim at sparking sectarian fighting among Iraqis so as to facilitate the partition of the country.

He pointed out that he that he worked with the US occupation troops for about two and a half years and then was able to flee from them to an area outside Baghdad where, he hopes, the Americans will not be able to get to him......

The former collaborator said that the Americans have a unit for "dirty jobs." That unit is a mix of Iraqis, Americans, and foreigners and of the security detachments that are deployed in Baghdad and other Iraqi cities. This unit doesn’t only carry out assassinations, but some of them specialize in planting bombs and car bombs in neighborhoods and markets. This unit carries out operations in which wanted people whom the American army does not want killed are arrested.

The former collaborator said that "operations of planting car bombs and blowing up explosives in markets are carried out in various ways, the best-known and most famous among the US troops is placing a bomb inside cars as they are being searched at checkpoints. Another way is to put bombs in the cars during interrogations. After the desired person is summoned to one of the US bases, a bomb is place in his car and he is asked to drive to a police station or a marked for some purpose and there his car blows up."

The testimony of the former collaborator is consistent with some western reports that have disclosed the involvement of US military personnel in bombings that target Iraqi civilians. The British reporter Robert Fisk, AMSI noted, had recently met with Iraqis in Syria concerning such "black operations" carried out by the Americans......"

Jordan’s Abdullah may fly to Ramallah Sunday for talks with Mahmoud Abbas on new plan, first revealed Friday in DEBKAfile Exclusive


An Interesting Story

The plan to link Jordan and West Bank was presented to Israel and Palestinians last week by a high-ranking Jordanian emissary

"......Earlier, our Middle East sources revealed: Amman proposes a new state framework linking Jordan and the Palestinian Authority to be established before the rise of an independent Palestinian state. Amman is not thinking in terms of confederation or the West Bank’s reversion to annexed Hashemite territory, the status it held before Jordan’s 1967 war defeat.

Former Jordanian prime minister Abdul Salem Majali, who led the negotiations which culminated in the 1994 peace accord with Israel, presented the outline to Israeli and Palestinian leaders. It also calls for Jordanians to be part of the Palestinian team holding final-status negotiations with Israel. Amman is acting out of concern for the shaky Palestinian Authority.......

The king, he said, had not yet signed off onto the project whose exact shape has yet to be determined. It was gaining support among the heads of Jordan’s security services as a strategy for fortifying the kingdom against the shocks of the US troop withdrawal from Iraq, which would leave the kingdom exposed on two fronts: Iraq, where Amman expects the US military to start pulling out in late summer, and the West Bank, where the Palestinian Authority is on its last legs. Its breakdown would engulf the territory in the sort of chaos and violence which has swept the Gaza Strip.......Sources close to Israeli security circles doubt the tottering Palestinian Authority will survive long enough to see the final shape of the Jordanian plan. Amman will then have to choose another Palestinian partner, an alternative to Abbas."

Abu Mahjoob (Imad Hajjaj)

العرب وسحر السيدة ليفني

A Great Editorial (Arabic)

عبد الباري عطوان

".....الحصار المالي فرض علي حكومة حماس لانها تعتبر ارهابية في نظر الولايات المتحدة وباقي الدول الاوروبية السائرة في فلكها وفلك اسرائيل، وها هي حماس تتخلي عن هذه الحكومة عمليا، والمناصب الرئيسية فيها، علي امل القبول بها، وهي الفائزة في انتخابات ديمقراطية شرعية اشادت امريكا نفسها بنزاهتها، ولكن كوفئت بالمزيد من المقاطعة وشاهدنا دولة بلجيكا تطرد احد وزرائها بطريقة مهينة (باسم نعيم وزير الشباب والرياضة) وتمنعه من المرور في اراضيها، او حتي اجواء منطقة الشينغن الاوروبية جميعا.
قالوا لقادة حماس يجب ان تتخلوا عن وزارات السيادة، الواحدة تلو الاخري، فالمالية حتي لا تستخدموا خزائنها في تمويل عمليات الارهاب ، فقدمتها علي طبق من ذهب للسيد سلام فياض الصديق الشخصي للسيدة كوندوليزا رايس، واقترحوا التنازل عن وزارة الخارجية لانه من غير اللائق ان يتولاها شخص غير حليق يكون من صميم واجبات عمله اللقاء مع نظرائه الاوروبيين الانيقين وروائح البخور تنبعث من ملابسه وليس العطور الفرنسية الراقية، فتنازلت مكرهة. ثم جاء دور وزارة الداخلية، والتي اعتبرتها حماس حقا من حقوقها، فتعطلت عملية تشكيل الحكومة لعدة اسابيع، وبدأت التهديدات الرئاسية بحل الحكومة والعودة الي نغمة الاستفتاء او الدعوة الي انتخابات مبكرة، مترافقة بتهديدات امريكية برصد 86 مليون دولار لدعم الحرس الرئاسي. وعندما رضخت حماس لكل هذه الابتزازات، وقبلت بوزير داخلية طيب مسالم، يمكن ان تزوجه ابنتك، خرج السيد محمود عباس رئيس السلطة بمرسوم الغي هذه الوزارة عمليا وحوّل صلاحياتها الي مستشار الامن القومي العقيد محمد دحلان، الشخص الذي يحتل رأس قائمة الكراهية بالنسبة الي الغالبية الساحقة من كوادر حماس، ناهيك عن قياداتها في الداخل والخارج علي حد سواء. فلم تجمع حماس علي كراهية رجل غيره.
الجامعة العربية بدأت التطبيع مع حكومة اولمرت بالتقسيط المريح. اليوم وزيرا خارجية مصر والاردن، وغدا رئيس وملك البلدين، وبعد غد يتوسع الوفد التطبيعي ليشمل دولا اخري لم تقم علاقات دبلوماسية او تجارية مع الدولة العبرية، والمقصود هنا الامارات العربية المتحدة والمملكة العربية السعودية صاحبة النسخة الاصلية من المبادرة، والعنوان هو خلق اجواء ملائمة للسلام علي حد توصيف السيدة رايس اثناء اجتماعها بنظرائها وزراء خارجية الرباعية العربية .
هذه المواقف العربية الرسمية الرخوة والمستجدية للسلام من حكومة اسرائيلية منهارة وفاقدة الشعبية، ومنقسمة علي نفسها، ما كان لها ان تتم لولا وجود سلطة فلسطينية ضعيفة برئيس مستكين، ورئيس وزراء متساهل، وفلتان امني مخجل بكل المقاييس.
الرئيس عباس قال انه سيحل السلطة اذا لم يرفع الحصار عن الشعب الفلسطيني، والسيد اسماعيل هنية حدد مهلة ثلاثة اشهر لحل الحكومة التي يرأسها. ولا نعتقد ان أيا من الرجلين جاد في تهديداته، فلو كانا جادين فعلا ويفعلان ما يقولان، لما وصلنا الي درجة ان هذه السلطة واكثر من مئة عنصر امني وميليشيات تابعة لها باتت عاجزة عن تحرير صحافي اختطفته عائلة فلسطينية في غزة.
عندما كنا نطالب بحل هذه السلطة المهزلة في زمن كانت احواله واحوال الشعب الفلسطيني افضل كثيرا، وكان هناك زعيم لا يساوم، ولا يهرب من الارض المحتلة، ويقبل ان يموت تحت الحصار الاسرائيلي، اتهمنا السيد عباس، والمحيطون به بأننا ضد المشروع الوطني الفلسطيني ومكتسباته. الآن، وبعد خراب مالطا يهدد السيد عباس بالشيء نفسه.
التطبيع العربي الرسمي بدأت عجلته في الدوران، والمبادرة العربية بدأت تعود الي طبعتها الاصلية، اي التطبيع الكامل قبل ان يتحقق الانسحاب الكامل، والسبب هو غياب القيادة العربية الشجاعة، وانعدام الحرص علي المصالح العربية الاستراتيجية. والا بماذا نفسر خوف جميع القيادات العربية، ورضوخها لأوامر رئيس امريكي يلفظه الكونغرس، وسعادة وزيري خارجية دولتين عربيتين باللقاء مع نظيرتهما الاسرائيلية، وبحضور حرس الاخيرة في الصورة، وكأنها لا تثق بالدولة العربية الاكبر التي تستضيفها.
الرد علي هذا التطور الخطير والمهين، اي اقدام القيادات العربية علي حماية نفسها امريكيا، بالتفريط بالحقوق العربية والاسلامية الاستراتيجية، والتطبيع مع الدولة العبرية، يجب ان يأتي فلسطينيا اولا، لان الشعب الفلسطيني هو الذي سيدفع ثمن هذا التوجه. علي السيدين عباس وهنية ان يكفا عن خض الماء والغرق في تفاصيل تافهة علي حساب القضايا الاساسية، وعقد مؤتمر صحافي عالمي، يعلنان فيه سويا مشاركة حقيقية في القرار الأهم، وهو حل هذه السلطة وجميع مؤسساتها اليوم، وليس بعد ثلاثة اشهر، فهذا العمل هو ارفع انواع المقاومة واشرفها، وعلي العالم ان يتحمل المسؤولية، مسؤولية قراره بتجويع هذه الاسود الفلسطينية."

Nasrallah: Arab peace plan is lifeline for Olmert


Hizbullah leader says Saudi peace initiative rescues Israel from difficult situation after last summer 'defeat'

"Hizbullah leader Hassan Nasrallah accused the Arab world of running to Israel's rescue following its "defeat" at the hands of his group in last summer's war by renewing a land-for-peace offer to the Jewish State.

"I tell the Arab world, 'Israel is spread out before you. You are welcome to learn its strengths and weaknesses.' But at a time when Israel is so weak, the Arabs are renewing the Arab Peace Initiative in order to save (Prime Minister Ehud) Olmert," Nasrallah said.....

"If another war breaks out we will fight better than we did in July," he said, referring to the 34-day conflict that erupted on July 12 when Hizbullah gunmen abducted two Israeli soldiers in a cross-border attack.

Nasrallah ridiculed Peretz who has said in the past that Israel would push the Shiite group north of the Litani River in southern Lebanon,
saying Hizbullah never left the area south of the river.

"I laughed when I heard Peretz saying 'We will prevent Hizbullah from returning south of the Litani River.' Did we ever leave this area? All the area's residents are our supporters," Nasrallah boasted.......

"Israel's disrespect and arrogance in Lebanon lead to its defeat … by the willingness and wisdom of the resistance," he carried on.

Another War Pimp Alert: Radical Iraqi Cleric Said to Be in Iran


"The United States knows for certain that radical Iraqi cleric Muqtada al-Sadr is still living next door in Iran, a senior State Department official said Friday, disputing aides to the anti-American religious and political leader.

"We know he's out of the country, we don't (merely) think" so, said David Satterfield, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice's top adviser for Iraq. "He's in Iran, which is where he has been since mid-January.".....

"I can't speculate on why Muqtada al-Sadr has chosen to reside in Iran," Satterfield said. "I can only note the political circumstances."

U.S. officials have said that al-Sadr slipped out of Iraq during preparations for President Bush's 12-week-old troop buildup and a joint U.S.-Iraqi security sweep that was focused on chaotic Baghdad.

They have not provided photos or other proof, generally citing the sensitivity of intelligence-gathering in Iraq....."

War Pimp Alert: Contingencies for nuclear terrorist attack


"As concerns grow that terrorists might attack a major American city with a nuclear bomb, a high-level group of government and military officials has been quietly preparing an emergency survival program that would include the building of bomb shelters, steps to prevent panicked evacuations and the possible suspension of some civil liberties.....

The efforts to prepare a detailed blueprint for survival took a step forward last month when senior government and military officials and other experts, organized by a joint Stanford-Harvard program called the Preventive Defense Project, met behind closed doors in Washington for a day-long workshop.

The session, called "The Day After," was premised on the idea that efforts focusing on preventing such a strike were no longer enough, and that the prospect of a collapse of government order was so great if there were an attack that the country needed to begin preparing an emergency program......"

Dead Men Posing


These are the faces of militants from the Al Aqsa Martyrs' Brigades who will be murdered next by Israel. Here they pose with their weapons during a rally in the West Bank city of Nablus, Friday, May 11, 2007. (AP Photo/Nasser Ishtayeh)

THIS IS NO RESISTANCE! THE COMMANDERS OF THESE POOR YOUTH ARE CRIMINALS FOR EXPOSING THEIR IDENTITY AND ARE GUILTY IN THE CRIME OF THEIR FUTURE DEATH, AS MUCH AS ISRAEL IS. IT IS TIME FOR THE FIGHTERS NOT TO OBEY THEIR STUPID COMMANDERS AND TO LOOK OUT FOR THEMSELVES. THEY SHOULD START LEARNING ABOUT GUERRILLA RESISTANCE ON THEIR OWN, BECAUSE THEIR COMMANDERS WILL NOT TEACH THEM.

Countdown for the Attack on Iran: the Dick is Threatening from the Deck of the USS Stennis


Cheney warns Iran to keep sea lanes open

"ABOARD USS JOHN C. STENNIS - From an aircraft carrier in the Persian Gulf, Vice President Dick Cheney warned Iran on Friday the U.S. and its allies will keep it from restricting sea traffic as well as from developing nuclear weapons.

"We'll keep the sea lanes open," Cheney said from the hangar deck of the USS John C. Stennis as it steamed about 150 miles from the Iranian coast.

Cheney is touring the Middle East asking Arab allies to do more to help Iraq and to curb Iran's growing power in the region.....

The vice president made clear the United States' intentions on the rivalry. "We'll stand with others to prevent Iran from gaining nuclear weapons and dominating this region," he said......

With two U.S. carrier groups now in the region, the vice president declared, "We're sending clear messages to friends and adversaries alike. We'll keep the sea lanes open."

The carrier was in the Gulf about 20 miles off Abu Dhabi in the United Arab Emirates. Cheney is spending time there after a two-day tour of Iraq.

Standing in front of five F18 Super Hornet fighters and a huge American flag in the cavernous hangar deck — one flight below the carrier's flight deck — Cheney sounded a hard line both on holding firm in Iraq and confronting Iran if necessary.....

"We'll stand with our friends in opposing extremism and strategic threats. We'll disrupt attacks on our own forces," he added. U.S. officials have said that some of the sophisticated roadside bombs used against U.S. troops in Iraq have come from Iran......"

More Farting on Tile Floor (Thrat 'Ala Balat)



هنية يدعو العرب والمسلمين إلى تسديد تعهداتهم المالية للشعب الفلسطيني

"وجّه رئيس الوزراء الفلسطيني إسماعيل هنية، نداء للأمتين العربية والإسلامية، لتسديد التعهدات المالية التي التزم بها الجانب العربي والإسلامي للشعب الفلسطيني، لمساعدته على كسر الحصار الجائر المفروض عليه.

وفي كلمة هاتفية ألقاها خلال مهرجان "حق العودة"، الذي نظمته حركة المقاومة الإسلامية "حماس" في رام الله, اليوم الجمعة (11/5)؛ شدّد هنية على أنه لا يمكن التنازل عن حق العودة أو التفريط به، باعتبار حق اللاجئين في العودة إلى ديارهم من أهم الثوابت الوطنية الفلسطينية.

وأضاف رئيس الوزراء الفلسطيني "إننا لا نقبل بأنصاف الحلول، ولن نساوم على حق العودة المقدس"، كما ورد في كلمته التي قوبلت بهتافات حارة من الجماهير الفلسطينية المحتشدة.

وكان رئيس الوزراء الفلسطيني إسماعيل هنية قد خاطب يوم السبت الماضي نحو خمسة آلاف شخص من وفود فلسطينيي أوروبا، وتعهد لهم في مؤتمرهم السنوي المنعقد في مدينة روتردام الهولندية، بصيانة حق العودة وعدم إتاحة المجال للمساومة عليه.
"

British Author Tariq Ali on the Resignation of Tony Blair: “The Fact That He’s Leaving is Because He’s So Hated”


Democracy Now!
With Amy Goodman


".....AMY GOODMAN: We return now to London to Tariq Ali, historian and one of the editors of the New Left Review, as well as author of many books, including Rough Music: Blair, Bombs, Baghdad, London, Terror. He joins us from a London studio. Welcome to Democracy Now!, Tariq.....

AMY GOODMAN: Tariq Ali, President Bush in Washington, D.C., said he'll miss Tony Blair and that he's ready to work with his presumed successor, Gordon Brown, confident that he, quote, “understands the consequences of failure in Iraq.” Talk about that statement and also who Gordon Brown is.

TARIQ ALI: Well, I think Bush is right. He will miss Blair. I mean, you can't have a more loyal politician in Europe than Blair. I mean, he's done virtually everything the United States has asked for, and not just after 9/11. Even prior to that, he was extremely pro-Washington in everything. He never raised any questions. So I think Washington will miss him. Mercifully, very few people in this country will.

Now, as to his successor, Gordon Brown, he backed the war in Iraq, as he himself said yesterday, and it was felt it was necessary. He backed the war in Afghanistan, felt that that was completely necessary -- and think that they wiped out all the problems with this. But they're completely wrong. On all the central issues of the day, there is no difference between Blair and Brown. The tone Brown adopts will probably be marginally less aggressive, but in terms of substance, there's nothing to choose between them.

And this is essentially yet another New Labour trick: OK, we’ve got rid of the big bad war monger, and we’ve got a decent prime minister again. But this guy is also a war monger. The difference is he is more intelligent than Blair....."

Current Al-Jazeera (Arabic) Online Poll


The question is:

Do you expect major changes in British policy towards Iraq after the replacement of Blair?

With more than 2,500 responding so far, 82% said no.

Afghan Furor Shows We’re Slipping Into US Orbit


by Linda McQuaig
The Toronto Star

"It was almost enough to revive one’s faith in Canada as a functioning democracy, not to mention a member of the civilized world.

After two weeks of unrelenting pressure – led by the media and the opposition parties in Parliament – the Harper government was forced to abandon a deal that made Canada complicit in torture in Afghanistan.

Before we go farther, let’s emphasize that the much-improved deal governing the treatment of our detainees in Afghanistan came about despite the sustained and determined efforts of the Harper government to thwart such monitoring of human rights.

For more than a year, the Conservatives had been content to hand over detainees to Afghan custody, despite ample evidence – including from Canadian officials – that Afghanistan routinely tortures those in its custody.....

Globe and Mail columnist Lawrence Martin wrote last week that the “new Canada has abandoned the independent strain we had” and that, in our growing closeness to Bush’s America, we are “consorts now.”

That sort of subordinate role is clearly what the Harper government, as well as some elite military and media types, have in mind for us.

But it doesn’t seem to be what the Canadian public is willing to accept.

This Afghan saga reminds me of the case of Maher Arar, the Canadian engineer tortured in Syria. In both cases, Ottawa tried to downplay a growing scandal about Canadian complicity in torture. But Canadians demanded accountability and eventually forced Ottawa to abide by the rule of law, not the lawless ways of the Bush administration.

It seems that, while our political leaders may be comfortable accommodating Bush, most Canadians have yet to develop a taste for toadying."

Israel’s holocaust-in-the-making against the Palestinians


By Khalid Amayreh

"“I didn’t know that in order to protect a few people, farmland had to be confiscated and crops had to be destroyed; I didn’t know that in order to provide security for a few people, hundreds had to be kept waiting at checkpoints and roadblocks before being allowed to return home exhausted, that is if they are not killed.” Portuguese Nobel Laureate Jose Saramago, March 28, 2002, during a visit to the West Bank......

And in case a murder is not committed, a home is demolished, a school child is crippled by a Jewish sniper’s indifferent bullets, a farm is bulldozed, a grain field is torched, or a new colony is started on stolen Arab land seized at gunpoint from its lawful proprietors, all in the name of Jewish nationalism.

It is more than the wide Wild West here; it is actually very much like pre-war Germany when the Third Reich effectively encouraged Germans to have a free season on Jews, on their lives, homes and businesses.

Let us have just a few examples of what the so-called “chosen people” did in the West Bank in the past 48 hours.....

True, these crimes don’t yet constitute a fully-fledged holocaust. However, the collective accumulative effect of these crimes which have been going on for nearly sixty years and are continuing unabated will ultimately have the effect of a holocaust. Yes, the brutal ugliness of the Israeli occupation, despite its all its criminal manifestations, may not be exactly identical to what the Third Reich did more than sixty years ago.

But the Israeli occupation is not a static phenomenon or a one-time episode, but an ongoing process the ultimate purpose of which is to obliterate the Palestinian people, either through physical genocide, or at least a partial physical genocide, or by making the daily life of ordinary Palestinians unbearable (as a result of the brutal persecution meted out to them), so much so that Palestinians would either immigrate or succumb to Israel’s genocidal designs.....

However, it is abundantly clear that Israel’s undeclared strategy is to uproot every single Palestinian from Palestine in order to fulfill Zionism. And if genocide, or at least a partial genocide, is what it takes to achieve this criminal goal, there is no doubt whatsoever that Israel will, when the time allows, resort to the wildest possible scenarios to achieve its goals. After all, genocide is part and parcel of the Zionist ideology which is based on East European fascist traditions.....

I am saying this because when one listens to Zionist leaders, such as Elie Wiesel and Benyamin Netanyahu, for example, one will easily get a feeling that Zionism, which is drifting menacingly to right-wing religious and jingoistic fascism, are effectively asking the world, especially the west, to compensate Jews for the holocaust by allowing them to commit a holocaust against the Palestinians.

Indeed, there are a number of European countries, such as Germany, that are already effectively consenting to this macabre equation, which explains European complicity in starving millions of Palestinians by blocking their access to food and work, and by saying next to nothing about the unlawful and immoral seizure by Israel of Palestinian tax revenue money.

In conclusion, I believe that what Israel is doing to the Palestinians should be treated at least as a holocaust-in-the-making, if only to forestall the possibility of it evolving into a fully-fledged holocaust. I know and the world knows that the holocaust didn’t begin with Auschwitz and Bergen Belsen and the ovens. It began with the enactment of racist laws against Jews, with a book, a kristlnacht and similar acts, the kind of which Israel and her terrorist soldiers and Gestapo-like settlers have been doing to the Palestinians."

The Clown King Propping Up the Palestinian Karzai


Jordan's king to meet with Abbas next week in Ramallah

By Haaretz Service and DPA

"Jordan's King Abdullah II is due to visit Ramallah Sunday for talks with Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas, officials in Abbas' office said on Friday.

A Palestinian senior official said that the king would arrive by helicopter, and would hold a short visit in Ramallah with Abbas.

The official said that the two would discuss the political situation in the region, and Arab countries' efforts to promote regional peace, including the Arab Peace Initiative.....

An Arab League delegation is also due to pay an unprecedented visit to Israel to discuss the plan, the sides announced Thursday.

Three weeks ago, Israeli and Jordanian officials said Prime Minister Ehud Olmert had invited Abdullah to make a historic visit to Jerusalem in mid-May and the king was weighing the invitation......."

This perfect storm will finally destroy the neocon project


Americans are sick of the unrepentant arrogance of this elite. But the realisation has come at a very heavy cost

Geoffrey Wheatcroft
Friday May 11, 2007
The Guardian

".....And yet to visit the US at present, as I have done, is to experience an overwhelming sensation of drastic impending change. It's not merely that President Bush, to whom Blair so disastrously tethered himself, is "in office but not in power". Most Americans can't wait for him to go, Congress is beyond his control, and the Senate majority leader, Senator Harry Reid, has told him that the war in Iraq is lost - for which statement of the obvious Reid was accused of "defeatism" by the vice-president, Dick Cheney.....

Along with the collapse of Bush's authority, all these episodes are connected to the great disaster in Iraq. And all illustrate the hubristic, impenitent arrogance of the people who have been guiding America's destiny - as well as ours, alas - for the past six years. What one senses so acutely are the conditions building for a political perfect storm, which will engulf and destroy the whole neoconservative project.

In Washington I took part in a debate with Christopher Hitchens, my old sparring partner and drinking companion (mots justes, all of them), who supports Bush with a defiance worthy of a better cause. He surpassed himself by insisting that his friend Wolfowitz is a wronged man. A World Bank committee reportedly disagrees, and has found that Wolfowitz did violate the bank's rules in the matter of his lady friend's salary......

....One who did understand is Matthew Parris, the former Tory MP. Before the 2004 presidential election he said he wanted Bush re-elected: his presidency was halfway through an "experiment whose importance is almost literally earth-shattering" and should be played out to its inevitable failure.

But that failure must be demonstrated beyond contradiction. "The theory that liberal values and a capitalist system can be spread across the world by force of arms... should be tested to destruction ... The president and his neoconservative court should be offered all the rope they need to hang themselves
."

His wish has come true; neocons are dangling all around us. In a flicker of self-knowledge, Wolfowitz told a recent World Bank meeting: "I understand that I've lost a lot of trust, and I want to build that trust back up." But it's too late, for him and all the other courtiers. They never really enjoyed the trust of most Europeans, let alone Africans and Asians, and they have now lost the trust of the American people.

All the readings on the barometer and the wind gauge say the same thing. The perfect storm is gathering. Unfortunately the collapse of the neocon project comes at a very heavy cost, not only to the people of Iraq but to all of us. "

By Steve Bell, The Guardian

South African Intelligence Minister Kasrils: Israel's behaviour worse than apartheid


"PRETORIA – South African Intelligence Minister Ronnie Kasrils Thursday accused Israel of conducting a policy against the Palestinians that was worse than apartheid.

Speaking on the sidelines of a UN meeting on the situation in the Palestinian territories, Kasrils said South Africa’s townships had never been attacked by helicopter gunships and tanks, in contrast to the military means employed by Israel.

“The analogy between apartheid and Israel’s occupation of Palestine is often made. It is not the same thing. The occupation is absolutely worse,” Kasrils told reporters.

It is important that we tell the Israeli authorities they are behaving like fascists when they do certain things, although we are not calling it a fascist state.”
Kastrils called on the United States and European Union to lift their economic and political embargo of the Palestinian Authority now that Hamas and Fatah have joined in a government of national unity.

He said the meeting would, among things, prepare for demonstrations marking the 40th anniversary year of the Israel occupation of the West Bank and Gaza.

Riyad Mansour, the Palestinian observer at the United Nations, said the gathering had been organised in Pretoria to deliver lessons from South Africa about how it had dismantled apartheid.

An unjust system was defeated here and they have been elsewhere. We can do it in Palestine too,” he said...."

The Sardines Have More Backbone than ALL Arab Leaders


Feature: Gaza's fish break the blockade

"Gaza - Yousef Alhelou - Joy has filled the hearts of hundreds of Palestinian fishermen in the Gaza Strip this week as they expressed their happiness over the most plentiful fishing season in 40 years, especially in the shadow of the Israeli navy restrictions on fishing off Gaza's coast.

There are some 433 boats registered at Gaza's port, but only a few of them are seaworthy; fewer still risk the Israeli-imposed ban on Gaza's fishermen. Collectively, Palestinian fishermen have seen their monthly catch drop from 823 tones in June 2000 to as low as 50 in late 2006.

The number of registered fishermen has also dropped significantly, from as many as 5,000 in the 1980s to less than 3,000 today, according to the UN. At least 35,000 Gazans directly rely on the fishing industry for subsistence, amid poverty levels that the UN pegs at more than 80 percent in Gaza......

Palestinian fishermen are routinely arrested and shot at by the Israeli navy. In the past year, four fishermen have been killed after being attacked by Israeli forces. Dozens have been arrested.

Palestinians are often compelled to fish within a few hundred meters of the beach, or even cast their homemade nets from the shoreline.

Under current restrictions, Palestinians are allowed to fish only up to six nautical miles off the Gaza coast, whereas a deal in 2002 between the UN and Israel allowed for fishing up to 12 miles off the coast and the Oslo Accords of 1993 gave fishing rights for up to 20 miles.

This spring was a surprise for fishermen and drew smiles on their faces as their nets yielded sardines, which Gazans always crave for.....

Munir Al-Hessi, fisherman, said: "I'm very excited. This season is a surprise for all of us. Other fishermen and I are subject on a daily basis to the Israeli gunboats and vessels and we risk our lives to feed our families, but today, I earned $500! Finally, I will be able to support my family."

Hani Gandil, 48, said while buying sardines: "I usually buy frozen fish but when it comes to sardines, I buy them fresh. This season, the sardines seem bigger and more numerous. May God protect the fishermen, who risk their lives to carry out their job in order to feed their children and bring us these sardines."

Hamdi Baker, 42, fisherman, said: "Today the sardines broke the blockade!"....."

UN meeting in South Africa addresses Palestinians' inalienable rights, the deepening humanitarian crisis, and apartheid


"Bethlehem - Ma'an - Diplomats, parliamentarians, representatives of the United Nations and other intergovernmental organizations, along with civil society and media personnel, gathered on Wednesday in Pretoria, South Africa for the UN African Meeting on the Question of Palestine.

The two-day meeting, which was sponsored by the UN Committee on the Exercise of the Inalienable Rights of the Palestinian People-Africa, aims to bolster African solidarity with the Palestinian people, as well as build on recent international and regional momentum to bring the Israeli and Palestinian sides back to the negotiating table," according to press statements.

“South Africa firmly believes in the Palestinian peoples’ inalienable right to self-determination and the fact that there was no military solution to the conflict,” Essop Pahad, a minister in the office of President Thabo Mbeki, said opening the meeting on Wednesday, according to a press statement. He added that South Africa firmly believes that there can be no peace in the Middle East unless a sustainable solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is found......

Apartheid

"We believe that the country of Oliver Tambo, of Nelson Mandela and other renowned freedom fighters is the appropriate venue for holding this meeting,” the Senegalese chairman of the Committee on the Exercise of the Inalienable Rights of the Palestinian People, Paul Badji, said at the meeting, taking place in post-apartheid South Africa.

Many other participators did not hesitate to draw parallels between apartheid-era South Africa and the situation today in the occupied Palestinian territory.

Mr. Pahad of the South African president's office said, "Comparing the situation of Palestinians in the Occupied Territory with the situation of South Africa’s during apartheid, while Israel denied such intention or purpose, its oppressive actions -- closures, checkpoints extrajudicial killings, among others -- in contravention of international humanitarian and human rights law, certainly belies that stance."

The press statement added, "In a poignant address Gideon Levy, columnist for Ha'aretz, Tel Aviv, said it was very unpleasant to sit and hear accusations against one's country, but it was much more unpleasant to sit and listen to such accusations knowing that they were justified."

Levy also said that the similarities between the occupation and apartheid, as well as the differences, should rightly be on the table. “Roads” in the occupied Palestinian territory are not really roads, he said, because they are impassable. Israel's legal system metes out different punishments to different people and there are different rules for Palestinians and different rules for Israelis, he added.

Yasmin Sooka, the executive director of the Foundation for Human Rights in Pretoria, said the situation of the Palestinian people had a huge resonance with South Africans, "for those who had lived under apartheid had believed that the Israeli-Palestinian conflict would have been solved long before the back of apartheid had been broken," the press statement said. However, she had hope, she said, particularly since the world had witnessed “old enemies” in Great Britain and Ireland sitting down at the same table after so many years of tension. She stressed that the solution to the question of Palestine should be based on the search for justice.

The two-day meeting will be followed on Friday 11 May by the UN Public Forum in Support of Israeli-Palestinian Peace, to be held at the University of Pretoria. "

(Click on cartoon to enlarge)
By Tom Toles

An Israeli-Produced Pacifier for Palestinian Babies
By Baha Boukhari

'The cultivation of life'


By Pepe Escobar
Asia Times

"BAGHDAD - Popular wisdom in Iraq rules that Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, with a simple fatwa, or even a single word, could bring the US occupation to an abrupt end. So why doesn't he?......

Sheikh Mohammed al-Roubaie is a top cleric with the Imam al-Rabani organization, affiliated with the marjaiyya (highest-ranking clerics) , which he defines as "the government of the people". He insists there is "no separation between religion and politics". He blames the current "crisis" on the fact that "people are not following the religious leaders. Religious thinking is responsible for solving people's problems. But not all learned men who put on a turban are truly religious." .....

The Sistani question
Roubaie said Sistani is like the principal in the marjaiyya. His rulings are obeyed "in general, but there are also the followers of individual marjas". Roubaie candidly admitted, "There are differences among the marjas. Some think it's better for the Americans to stay, otherwise there will be civil war. Others think they should leave. There is no united opinion." Personally, he feels "bad" about the divergences.

Roubaie explained why Sistani cannot issue a fatwa to get rid of the occupation: "He doesn't have such a privilege, he knows that a lot of people would die. The only one who would have such a privilege is Imam Mahdi." As the Prophet Mohammed and the Imam Mahdi (prophesied redeemer of Islam) "are not situated in real life now and are thinking about more important things", it's unlikely Sistani will directly tell President George W Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney to pack up and go.....

Roubaie let it escape that "only Sistani and al-Hakim" have a close relationship with the government of Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki - an observation that is a political treatise in itself. It means that what Sistani wants is the consolidation of the political power of the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq (SCIRI), which is led by Abdul Aziz al-Hakim......."

Thursday, May 10, 2007

Investigation: Israel executed 8 Palestinians in Jenin in past 3 months


Report, Al-Haq, 10 May 2007

"Over the course of the last three months, Al-Haq has documented four incidents, the facts of which are summarised below, involving the extrajudicial executions of eight Palestinians in the Jenin area. The number of incidents, all of which involved disturbingly similar facts, indicates that, far from being isolated acts, the extrajudicial execution of Palestinians continues to be a widespread practice. Indeed, during the last year, Al-Haq has documented numerous other deaths attributable to Israeli extrajudicial executions......"

The Good American


By Scott Ritter

".....It’s a shame for these Legionnaires that the Iraqis couldn’t have turned out to be blond, blue-eyed Germans who looked like us, and whose women could be wooed with chocolate and nylon stockings by the noble American liberator and occupier. Or, short of that, passive Japanese, who freely submitted their women to the massage parlors and barracks of their American conquering heroes while their men rebuilt a shattered society. The simplistic approach of many of the American Legion’s most hawkish advocates for the ongoing disaster in Iraq seems to be drawn from a selective memory which seeks to impose a carefully crafted past experience dating back to the last “good war” (i.e., World War II), expunged of all warts and blemishes, onto the current situation in Iraq in a manner which strips away all reality.

It turns out that the Iraqis aren’t like German or Japanese people at all, but rather a fiercely independent (if overly complex) nation deeply resentful of a so-called liberation which has brought them nothing but pain and agony, primarily at the hands of those who have, unbidden, “freed” them from their past. The fact that the Iraqis resent the ongoing American occupation, and choose to express this resentment through violent resistance instead of submissive passivity, is in turn resented by many of the Legion’s membership......

Thus, in a blind effort to find meaning in her son’s death, this mother is willing to inflict suffering on other American families. This may sound like a harsh indictment, but she indicts herself. The same mother concludes the article with the following quote: “I told President Bush last summer that the biggest insult anyone could hand me would be to pull the troops out before the job is complete. If we’re going to quit, at that point I’ll have to ask, ‘Why did my son die?’ ” The question she should have been asking long before his death was, of course, “Why might my son die?” That she failed to do so, and now seeks to send others off to their death in a cause not worthy of a single American life, is where she and those of her ilk stop receiving my sympathy and understanding.

The American Legion magazine, in its May 2007 issue, belittles those who speak out against the war. “While our forefathers gave us the right and privilege to challenge our leaders,” one father of a fallen Marine writes, “the manner and method that some people have chosen to use at this time only emboldens the enemy.” Reading between the lines, freedom of speech is treasonous if you question the motives and actions of those who got us involved in the Iraq war. Alan Dershowitz can only wish that there had been more “good Germans” speaking out about the policies of Adolf Hitler before the Holocaust became reality.

I yearn for a time when “good Americans” will be able to stop and reverse equally evil policies of global hegemony achieved through pre-emptive war of aggression. I know all too well that in this case the “enemy” will only be emboldened by our silence, since at the end of the day the “enemy” is ourselves. I can see the Harvard professor shaking an accusatory finger at me for the above statement, chiding me for creating any moral equivalency between the war in Iraq and the Holocaust. You’re right, Mr. Dershowitz. There is no moral equivalency. In America today, we should have known better, since we ostensibly stand for so much more. That we have collectively failed to halt and repudiate the war in Iraq makes us even worse than the Germans."

Bahrain preparing for a U.S.-Iran war


"ABU DHABI — Bahrain has reported preparations for a war between Iran and the United States.

Bahraini officials said the Gulf Arab kingdom has been working with Western allies to protect strategic sites from Iranian missile strikes amid any war with the United States. They said Bahrain has been introducing measures to protect against Iranian infiltration and respond rapidly to any missile or insurgency strike.
On April 25, Al Khalifa was quoted as telling the official Bahrain News Agency that the kingdom established a committee to plan for war, Middle East Newsline reported. He said the panel would prepare for emergency supplies and strategic facility protection.

"We at the Interior Ministry have made plans to deal with the possible threats," Bahraini Interior Minister Rashid Bin Abdullah Al Khalifa said.

Al Khalifa said he hoped that Iran would not be attacked. At the same time, the interior minister said Bahrain applied for membership of the International Atomic Energy Agency in an effort to acquire early warning of a nuclear threat.

In late April, Bahrain and the United States conducted the largest emergency response exercise in the Gulf Cooperation Council state. The exercise envisioned an Iranian missile strike on the headquarters of the U.S. Fifth Fleet, which contains about 3,000 sailors and Defense Department staffers.....

Vice President Richard Cheney's trip to the region is meant to reaffirm U.S. commitment to Gulf and Arab security.

Cheney plans to meet UAE President Khalifa Bin Zayed Al Nahyan, Saudi King Abdullah, Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak and Jordan's King Abdullah. Officials said the trip was decided in late April amid tension with the Saudi leadership......"

Former 'LA Times' Baghdad Chief Says Iraqis Are 'Humiliated'


"NEW YORK Former Los Angeles Times Baghdad Bureau Chief Borzou Daragahi says he doubts the "surge" in Iraq will work, and describes Iraq citizens as "hostile" and "humiliated" after four years of war.

Asked by Brian Lamb, in a forthcoming C-SPAN interview, about his personal views on the war, he replied: "I think at this point, it just – it seems like it’s become a disaster. I mean, I don’t think anyone could dispute that. It’s just going very, very, very, very badly." He said he had mixed feelings about the invasion but "As time wore on, though, as the bodies mounted, it just seems more and more like a really bad mistake."

The interview will be broadcast Sunday night.

Daragahi, a Pulitzer finalist in 2005, admits to deceiving his family, and editors, on some occasions about life in the war zone.....

--On why he believes the military surge won't work:

"Because there is not - even according to General Petraeus' own guidebook for fighting counterinsurgencies, they're not using soldiers, they're not using enough troops to accomplish their goals...But also, more fundamentally, I don't think that they can do this militarily. I don't think the fundamental problems in Iraq right now are military problems."

-- On why Iraqis feel humiliated:

"Iraqis are rather hostile and feel humiliated. And that's the key thing that maybe some of our policymakers don't understand. The presence of the U.S. soldiers is very humiliating to the Iraqis. Even those who, in their minds know that it's necessary to have the soldiers there, at least some kind of force there preventing an all-out civil war from getting even worse...I don't think they appreciate American culture."....."

Windbag du Jour


Mousa Abu Marzook: Assistant to Chief Windbag, Mash'al

Progress Report: Redefining Forward Motion in Iraq


A Good Piece

by Chris Floyd

"Are you confused by the ever-shifting terminology employed by the Masters of War and their frequent banquet buddies, the Media Mavens, when conveying the overarching geostrategic sociopolitical complexities of the Dear Leader's liberation of Iraq? Well, fear not, befuddled reader; your humble correspondent is here to help, with this handy-dandy update of The Newspeak Lexicon.

Today's phrase is: "Political Progress." This sinuous and supple little passage has greased many a clumsy reality over the transom of public discourse, allowing both purveyors and consumers of conventional wisdom to ignore the incontinent, pustulous, blood-smeared elephant of aggressive war standing there stinking up the well-appointed drawing rooms of the American Establishment......

Thankfully, the New York Times is on the case. In a prominent story there today, we learn that "political progress" in Iraq now consists of one of the major parties in the government deciding not to quit. Yet.......


So there you are. We have American casualties swelling with the still-rising wave of the Bush-McCain-Romney-Giuliani-Lieberman surge, with even more deaths expected as the escalation crests. We have American soldiers flung into the brutal service of the Bush Regime's criminal enterprise becoming more brutalized and criminalized themselves – with thousands of troops admitting that they have beaten or despoiled innocent civilians, and tens of thousands embracing the torture of prisoners and rejecting the very notion that the people they have come to "liberate" should be treated with dignity and respect, according to the Pentagon's own examination of the fraying mental health of its forces. We have Iraqi citizens cowering in fear of the American-trained "security" forces of their own government. We have the ghetto-building campaign by the occupying liberators sealing whole quadrants of Baghdad into open-air prisons whose inhabitants are left to the tender mercies of the violent sectarians locked in with them, creating "mini-Islamic republics," as one Iraqi government official admitted to The Independent. We have literally millions of Iraqis fleeing their homes, eating the bitter bread of exile in foreign lands or else on the run from ethnic cleansing inside Iraq – one of the greatest population displacements since World War II. We have a never-ending hellstorm of death and chaos, lies and looting, incompetence and arrogance – and unfathomable, unendurable human suffering – all of it spawned by the illegal, immoral and unnecessary war of aggression launched at the order of George W. Bush, and championed or countenanced for years by the "great and the good" of American society.

But the fact that one of the political factions licensed by the conquerors has decided not to leave the government for the time being means that "political progress" is being made in Iraq. So says the supreme arbiter of conventional wisdom in the American press."

Israel's Response to Arab "Peace" Plan


داود جنين قتله الاحتلال ببطن أمه

عاطف دغلس-نابلس

"رصاصة انطلقت من فوهة بندقية الاحتلال أردت داود قتيلا، ولم تدعه حتى يخرج للحياة ويعرف بعدها ما إن كان يستحق القتل أم لا.

ففي جريمة تعد من أبشع الجرائم التي ارتكبها الاحتلال بحق الفلسطينيين، قتل جنود الاحتلال جنينا في بطن أمه في مخيم عين بيت الماء غرب المدينة، فجر اليوم الخميس.

حكاية الجريمة
زوج مها رأفت القاطوني روى للجزيرة نت حكاية قتل طفله قائلا، إن جنود الاحتلال اقتحموا المخيم قرابة الساعة الواحدة بعد منتصف الليل، حيث دارت اشتباكات بينهم وبين المقاومين، فكان الرصاص يدخل كل حدب وصوب.

وأضاف أن زوجته أفاقت على صوت الرصاص، وذهبت كي تخرج أولادها من الغرفة التي ينامون فيها وأتت بهم إلى غرفتها، "وما هي إلا لحظات حتى سمعت زوجتي تصرخ بصوت ضج به المخيم، وبعد ذلك ذهبت لأرى ماذا حدث، فإذا بها تنزف بشكل رهيب، وقد انطرحت أرضا".

وقال "كانت رصاصة واحدة أطلقها جنود الاحتلال، واخترقت جسد زوجتي الحامل في شهرها السابع، واخترقت كذلك رأس طفلي الجنين لتقسمه نصفين، وتخرجه ميتا من بطن أمه قبل أن يرى نور الحياة".

وأشار رأفت إلى أن قوات الاحتلال ادعت أن المقاومين هم من أطلقوا النيران على منزله، لكنه فند ادعاءهم قائلا "الذي أطلق النيران هم جنود الاحتلال، لأنهم كانوا يحتلون بناية الصوصة والتي تقع فوق منزلنا مباشرة، وعندما أطلقت النيران على الجنود، أخذوا يطلقون النيران بشكل عشوائي على منازل المواطنين، حيث كسر زجاج منزلنا نتيجة تلك النيران قبل أن تصاب زوجتي".

وأضاف "لقد طلبنا سيارة إسعاف لإنقاذ زوجتي، لكن جنود الاحتلال منعوها من الدخول إلى المخيم، واستمرت زوجتي تنزف لأكثر من ساعة".

وما زالت مها ترقد على سرير الشفاء بالعناية المكثفة بمستشفى رفيديا الجراحي بمدينة نابلس بعد أن أخرج الأطباء جنينها ميتا.

من جانبها أكدت المصادر الطبية في مستشفى رفيديا أن الرصاصة أطلقت بقصد القتل، لأنها كانت من مسافة قريبة جدا، مشيرة إلى أن الرصاصة استقرت في رأس جنينها، وتم إخراجها بعد إجراء عدة عمليات جراحية لها ولجنينها.

وأوضحت هذه المصادر للجزيرة نت أن مها لم تعد قادرة على الإنجاب في المستقبل، "لأن رحمها تفتتت إلى أجزاء".

....."

Arab Normalization with Israel Through the Back Door


Livni, Mubarak agree Arab League delegation to visit Israel on Saudi plan

"Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni and Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak agreed during a meeting Thursday in Cairo that a team of Arab League representatives will visit Israel in the coming weeks for talks on the details of the Arab peace initiative, first drafted by Saudi Arabia in 2002, and reaffirmed by the Arab League in March.....

During the two-hour session, Livni and Mubarak discussed the security situation in the Gaza Strip, arms smuggling from Sinai into Gaza through the Rafah crossing, the firing of Qassam rockets and the strengthening of Hamas.

Livni said that "the present situation in Gaza is unacceptable" and emphasized that Israel expects the Arab world to support and legitimize the moderate sides of the Palestinian Authority, so that these moderates will have more political flexibility.

Livni, speaking after talks with Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak in Cairo earlier on Thursday, said the meeting with the Egyptian and Jordanian foreign ministers would be a historic first between Israel and representatives of the Arab League. "I do believe that the Arab world when it comes to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is important. It can support the process, it can give Israel a political horizon and it can help the Palestinians make further progress when it comes to future agreements between Israel and the Palestinians," she said.

She did not mention the territorial demands of Syria and Lebanon or the question of Palestinian refugees, which the Arab states want solved as part of their peace package......"

***

Here is the plain English translation of what Livni said:

Israel expects Egypt, Jordan and other Arab countries to control and eliminate any Palestinian resistance to the forthcoming settlement that will be imposed on the Palestinians. Usrael expects the Arab puppets to strengthen the Palestinian Karzai and to arm him. The Arab League is going to provide the Arab cover for the imposed final settlement that will go over the heads of the Palestinians since it will abrogate most of the Palestinian rights. In the meantime Israel demands and expects full normalization with all Arab countries represented by the Arab League.

Adieu, Blair, Adieu


Bush's Zombie Shuffles Off

By TARIQ ALI
CounterPunch

"......A true creature of the Washington Consensus, Blair was always loyal to the various occupants of the White House. In Europe, he preferred Aznar to Zapatero, Merckel to Schroeder, was seriously impressed by to Berlusconi and, most recently, made no secret of his desire that Sarkozy was his candidate in France. He understood that privatisation/deregulation at home were part of the same mechanism as the wars abroad. If this judgement seems unduly harsh let me quote Sir Rodric Braithwaite, a former senior adviser to Blair, writing in the Financial Times on 2, August, 2006:

"A spectre is stalking British television, a frayed and waxy zombie straight from Madame Tussaud's. This one, unusually, seems to live and breathe. Perhaps it comes from the Central Intelligence Agency's box of technical tricks, programmed to spout the language of the White House in an artificial English accent...

Mr Blair has done more damage to British interests in the Middle East than Anthony Eden, who led the UK to disaster in Suez 50 years ago. In the past 100 years--to take the highlights--we have bombed and occupied Egypt and Iraq, put down an Arab uprising in Palestine and overthrown governments in Iran, Iraq and the Gulf. We can no longer do these things on our own, so we do them with the Americans. Mr Blair's total identification with the White House has destroyed his influence in Washington, Europe and the Middle East itself: who bothers with the monkey if he can go straight to the organ-grinder?..."........"

Iraq's own Pentagon (news)papers


By Jim Lobe
Asia Times

"WASHINGTON - In the run-up to the March 2003 invasion of Iraq, the Pentagon planned to create a "Rapid Reaction Media Team" (RRMT) designed to ensure control over major Iraqi media while providing an Iraqi "face" for its efforts, according to a report obtained by the independent National Security Archive (NSA), which released it on Tuesday.

The partially redacted three-page document was accompanied by a longer PowerPoint presentation that included a proposed six-month, US$51 million budget for the operation, apparently the first phase in a one-to-two-year "strategic information campaign"......

Both the paper and the slide presentation were prepared by two Pentagon offices - Special Operations and Low-Intensity Conflict, which, among other things, specialize in psychological warfare, and the Office of Special Plans under then under secretary of defense for policy Douglas Feith - in mid-January 2003, two months before the invasion, according to NSA analyst Joyce Battle.....

The PowerPoint presentation called for the RRMT to identify and vet Iraqi media experts and "anchors", and train a group of Iraqi journalists to staff the new networks.

The RRMT should also "identify the media infrastructure that we need left intact, and work with CENTCOM targeteers to find alternative ways of disabling key sites", including, presumably, those media outlets whose messages were not consistent with the themes the Pentagon wished to convey.

"Evidently, the Baghdad headquarters of the Arab satellite network Al-Jazeera was not part of 'the media infrastructure that we need left intact'," noted the NSA's Battle, who pointed to the April 8, 2003, US missile attack that hit the network's Baghdad bureau, killing reporter Tariq Ayoub. The Pentagon had been extensively briefed on the bureau's location before the invasion, and the offices were well marked as a TV facility.

Al-Jazeera's Kabul bureau, which was in a downtown office building, was also destroyed by two "smart bombs" during the US air campaign in Afghanistan in late 2001. In April 2004, during an extended battle covered by Al-Jazeera - for Fallujah, Iraq - President George W Bush suggested attacking the network's headquarters in Qatar during a meeting with British Prime Minister Tony Blair, according to leaked notes of the talks. "

Leave, or we will behead you


The joys of living in the Iraq that George "liberated," as told by:

Pepe Escobar
Asia Times

".....Convert or else
If you are a Christian and you want to keep living in Dora, you must convert to Islam. Not only that, you must also cooperate with al-Qaeda in Iraq, and must accept al-Qaeda refugees into your house when they are trying to escape hot pursuit. If you refuse, you will be killed.

By some perverted math, al-Qaeda in Iraq has established that if you don't want to convert, you must pay $1,600 per person - plus the assurance that you won't denounce anything concerning al-Qaeda in Iraq's activities. Residents confirm that "some people paid" and are still in Dora. But "some converted"; recently there has been talk of 24 men, six women and three girls who did so. What is certain is that the majority of Christians have left. Amel Zaya paid $7,600 to Jobouri to stay in Dora with her family, and also for "protection". She now runs a restaurant.

So how is the US occupation army reacting to all this madness? The bombastic way. Less than two weeks ago, the Buaitha area of Dora was subjected to an artillery barrage and no fewer than 24 explosions from US Base Falcon - in broad daylight. There's no evidence that al-Qaeda in Iraq has been debilitated by this "tactic" - not exactly the subtlest way to fight confessional cleansing and win hearts and minds. "

Even the Unborn are not Spared Zionist Hate


Violent clashes in Nablus during 4-hour Israeli incursion; unborn baby shot dead

"Nablus - Ma'an - An unborn baby was killed during the Israeli army's latest incursion into the West Bank city of Nablus last night.

During violent clashes in 'Ein Beit Al-Ma' (No. 1) refugee camp in Nablus city on Thursday at dawn, the Israeli forces opened fire on 7-months' pregnant Maha Muhammad Ri'fat Qatuni, 29, as she was inside her house, causing serious abdominal injuries.

Palestinian medical sources told our Nablus correspondent that an Israeli bullet penetrated Mrs. Qatuni's womb and directly hit the unborn baby's head.

The sources added that, once the Israeli authorities allowed the Palestinian ambulance cars to reach a heavily bleeding Mrs. Qatuni, she was transferred to Rafidia hospital in west Nablus in a critical condition. She underwent an immediate surgical operation.


An eyewitness in Nablus told our correspondent that more than 30 Israeli military vehicles broke into Nablus city after midnight on Wednesday......"

The Mickey Mouse "Government" denies banning Mickey Mouse-lookalike TV show


"Bethlehem - Gaza - Ma'an - Palestinian Information Minister Dr. Mustafa Barghouthi has played down the reaction to the news that his ministry has banned the broadcasting of a children's program on Hamas-run Al-Aqsa TV because it conveys political messages.

Barghouthi said in conversation with Ma'an that Al-Aqsa TV stopped broadcasting the program itself after they reviewed the program in regards to its message. Barghouthi also denied issuing an order to end the program.

He stressed the need to be cautious when making children's programs so that these programs would not be exploited by bodies that monitor these programs in order to incite international public opinion against the Palestinian people and harm the Palestinian cause......"

Next: Write His Memoirs, Market a Book (Confessions of a Former Poodle) and Appear on 60 Minutes?

Iraq, An Appeal to the American People


It is time we renounce killing masses of people in order to solve international disputes

by Dr. Mahathir bin Mohamad

Global Research, May 10, 2007

"The war in Iraq is getting worse. More and more American soldiers are being killed. Of course Iraqis are being killed in greater numbers.

This war was started by President Bush and supported by Prime Minister Tony Blair. They had lied in order to invade Iraq.

What has this war gained for America and Britain? Nothing except the unnecessary deaths of American soldiers, destruction of Iraq and higher oil prices. There is no democracy in Iraq, for which American soldiers were supposed to die.

Invading a country today does not end in conquest and subjugation of the people. The occupying forces would be continuously attacked by guerillas and terrorists.

War is no longer an option for even the most powerful countries in the settlement of international disputes.

Killing people to achieve a national objective is primitive and barbaric.

Modern wars kill and destroy more.

The majority of those killed are non-combatants; old people, sick people, children and babies.

War makes a mockery of our claims to be civilised, to care for human life, human rights etc.

War reduces us to being brutish animals.

It is time we renounce killing masses of people in order to solve international disputes. It is time we renounce WAR! Defensive war would not be necessary in the absence of wars of agression. Trillions of dollars would be saved as nations scale down their war machines.

I appeal to the American people to reject candidates in the Presidential primaries and election who do not reject killing people, who do not reject war as a policy option for the United States of America.

Elect only candidates who categorically declare they reject war and killing people.

If the United States does this, then candidates in elections in other countries will have to reject war.

Americans – you have a duty to yourselves – you have a duty to humanity at large.

Please do not fail in this moral duty
."

Dr Mahathir bin Mohamad

Chairman,

Perdana Global Peace Organisation

By Imad Hajjaj

By Tom Toles

Palestinian Interior Minister: "Today's Gaza deployment not part of new security plan"


Please Welcome the Gazastan "Army"

"Gaza – Ma'an – Palestinian interior minister, Hani Al-Qawasmi, on Thursday denied that the deployment of the Palestinian security services in Gaza Strip today marked the start of the implementation of a new security plan. Following his meeting with Prime Minister Haniyeh, he stated, "this is a personal effort by the officers, not any more."

He continued, "I have demanded several things from Haniyeh, in order to set the initial steps for the implementation of the security plan."

The Palestinian security services have on Thursday started deploying across the northern and central Gaza Strip, in preparation for deployment all over the Gaza Strip. This suggested that they were beginning to implement the long-awaited security plan, ratified by Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas and Prime Minister Isma'il Haniyeh, who pledged to offer support for the interior minister's execution of the plan.

A Palestinian security source told Ma'an that "the plan will be implemented in stages, to culminate in completely imposing law and order, after controlling the state of chaos, which currently prevails in the streets".

The source, who spoke on condition of anonymity, added, "The plan started with the deployment of large security forces from the police, the preventive security and the intelligence services, in addition to reinforcements from the national security service in Gaza City and the northern Gaza Strip. These forces established a joint operation room in the headquarters of the police department in Gaza City"."

***

This is Condoleezza's planned deployment, preparing for the putsch; celebrate, NOW!

Wednesday, May 9, 2007

Video: Finkelstein at the Doha Debates at Oxford Union (on the pro-Israel lobby in the US)



Contributed by Datta

"At the latest Doha Debate held at the prestigious Oxford Union in the United Kingdom on May 1st, two-thirds of the student audience approved a motion claiming that Israel's supporters are stifling Western debate about Israel's actions.

The event at the world famous debating society of Oxford University marked the first time the Doha Debates have been held outside Qatar.

The Debate took place amid mounting controversy over the role of the pro-Israel lobby in the United States and accusations that it has suppressed criticism of Israel - a charge that the lobby vigorously denies.

Norman Finkelstein, an American academic and a leading critic of Israeli policies, argued in favour of the motion claiming that the pro-Israel lobby sows confusion to avoid being held to account. The journalist and writer Andrew Cockburn also supported this view, claiming there are "red lines" in discussing Israel that no politician or journalist in the US would dare cross for fear of being demonised or driven out of public life.

Dr Martin Indyk, former US Ambassador to Israel and Director of the Saban Center for Middle East Policy, argued strongly against the motion, saying that the recent 'firestorms' around President Carter's book and the Walt and Mearsheimer report are proof of a lively debate on the subject . His fellow panellist David Aaronovitch, the British journalist and broadcaster, dismissed accusations of conspiracy around the lobby and said that there simply isn't a lobby in the UK in the same way that there is in the United States.

A group of students from universities and high schools in Doha travelled to the UK to join students from Oxford to question the speakers."