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:: ONU - XX Assemblea Generale (1965):
La XX Assemblea Generale dell’ONU (1965) dichiara "la legittimità della lotta da parte dei popoli sotto oppressione coloniale, per esercitare il loro diritto all' autodeter-
minazione e all'indipendenza".
Inoltre, l'Assemblea invita "tutti gli Stati a fornire assistenza morale e materiale ai movimenti di liberazione nazionale nei territori coloniali".

:: ONU - Risoluzione 1514
"L'Assemblea Generale dichiara che: la soggezione dei popoli a dominio straniero, conquista e asservimento costituisce una negazione dei diritti umani fondamentali, è contraria alla Carta delle Nazioni Unite ed è un impedimento alla promozione della pace e della cooperazione mondiali.
Tutti i popoli hanno diritto all' autodeter-
minazione; in virtù di tale diritto essi devono liberamente determinare il loro status politico e liberamente perseguire il loro sviluppo economico, sociale e culturale".

:: Convenzione di Ginevra, Protocollo Addizionale I (1977):
La lotta armata può essere usata, come ultima risorsa, come mezzo per esercitare il diritto all' autodeter-
minazione.

:: Tribunale penale internazionale
In base allo Statuto del Tribunale penale internazionale, sono definiti “crimini di guerra”:
(1) attacchi lanciati intenzionalmente contro popolazione civili in quanto tali o contro civili che non prendano direttamente parte alle ostilità;
(4) attacchi lanciati intenzionalmente nella consapevolezza che gli stessi avranno come conseguenza la perdita di vite umane tra la popolazione civile, e lesioni a civili o danni a proprietà civili ovvero danni diffusi duraturi e gravi all’ambiente naturale che siano manifestamente eccessivi rispetto all’insieme dei concreti e diretti i vantaggi militari previsti.

:: Iraq anthem
(click to listen)






Against Push for Peace Talks, Outposts Continue Israeli Land Grab
By Jillian Kestler-D'Amours

May 16 , 2013 - Ibrahim Makhlouf reaches for two wooden planks lying in the hallway and places them expertly in an L-shape along the seams of his front door. "Open [the door]," he beckons, knowing that doing so is nearly impossible. "Every night, we put this here," he explains. "For the settlers."Makhlouf’s home sits on the outskirts of the West Bank village of Asira Al-Qibliya, only 500 metres from the illegal Israeli settlement outpost of Shalhevet Farm, an offshoot of the equally illegal settlement of Yitzhar. Makhlouf told IPS that his house is attacked by Israeli settlers at least two times per week and has been vandalised over 100 times. The windows on Makhlouf’s two-story home all have bars on the outside to prevent them from shattering when settlers throw stones...
  continua / continued avanti - next    [97668] [ 18-may-2013 20:47 ECT ]

Military Resistance 11E10 : Outstanding
Thomas F Barton

May 16, 2013 - ...Regardless of any of this, the U.S. military will issue a statement saying that the bombing shows that the insurgency is increasingly desperate. The Afghan government will issue a news release obliquely blaming Pakistan. And we, the reporters, will start chasing down leads.
Some of us will go after the "color" at the site – touring the blown up building and writing down details like the clothes on the corpses or the shattered glass on the street and hoping to find someone who saw it all happen...
  continua / continued avanti - next    [97667] [ 18-may-2013 16:49 ECT ]

Eyal Checkpoint, Qalqilya: A Testament of Human Resilience
By Sam Gilbert
16q20130516055129.jpg

May 16, 2013 - The sun has not yet risen on Eyal checkpoint in the northwestern city of Qalqilya. Already hundreds of Palestinians queue up and wait to cross into Israel and begin the workweek. In the coming hours, roughly four thousand Palestinians from the Qalqilya region and the northern West Bank will pass through the encaged L-shaped corral, through the single turnstile all destined for work in Israel’s cities and towns. 42-year-old Erak is eating his breakfast and drinking his morning coffee, each purchased from one of the many makeshift food vendors that line the road leading up to the checkpoint. Noticeably tired but relentlessly friendly, Erak describes a routine that echoes the lives of many of the Palestinians waiting to cross over ..
  continua / continued avanti - next    [97666] [ 18-may-2013 16:41 ECT ]

Patriotic Yardsticks for Unpatriotic Giant Corporations
by Ralph Nader

May 16, 2013 - Why are big, global U.S. corporations so unpatriotic? After all, they were created in the U.S.A., rose to immense profit because of the toil of American workers, are bailed out by American taxpayers whenever they’re in trouble, and are safeguarded abroad by the U.S. military. Yet these corporate Goliaths work their tax lawyers overtime to escape U.S. taxes. Many pay less than you do in federal income taxes. Imagine corporations, like General Electric, have not paid federal income taxes on U.S. profits for years. Mega corporations have abandoned U.S. workers by entrenching "pull-down" trade agreements that make it easier than ever to ship jobs and whole industries to fascist and communist regimes abroad which keep their workers near serfdom. Remember, the U.S. has run large trade deficits for the past 30 years as a result of anti-American trade deals pushed by these global companies. These Goliaths are pressing for the Trans-Pacific Partnership, a trade agreement that will further pull down our economy...
  continua / continued avanti - next    [97665] [ 18-may-2013 15:43 ECT ]

Israel’s Deficit Cure: New Taxes on Occupied Palestinians
Jason Ditz

May 16, 2013- Ongoing budget talks in Israel have begun to coalesce around a scheme to unilaterally amend the Oslo Accords with a provision allowing the Israeli Defense Ministry to impose "tolls" on Palestinians in the occupied territories for allowing them to import and export goods. The tolls would be justified, according to officials, because of the intense "inspection" process Israel puts anything that enters the occupied West Bank through. That this service isn’t requested nor desired by the Palestinian Authority appears to be irrelevant...
  continua / continued avanti - next    [97664] [ 18-may-2013 15:26 ECT ]

Dutch probe sends warning to firms abetting Israel’s crimes
Salma Karmi-Ayyoub
16west-bank-wall.jpg

May 16, 2013 - This week sees the conclusion of a three-year criminal investigation into the Dutch crane company, Riwal, accused of complicity in war crimes and crimes against humanity in the occupied West Bank. The case is unprecedented as it is the first time a company has been criminally investigated for involvement in the Israeli occupation. Although the case has not resulted in a prosecution, it is nonetheless an important step for those seeking justice for human rights abuses committed against Palestinians. The case sends a clear message to the corporate sector: complicity in Israel’s occupation potentially carries the risk of criminal prosecution...
  continua / continued avanti - next    [97663] [ 18-may-2013 14:46 ECT ]

After 65 Years of Nakba, Hope In New Palestinian Generation
Clovis Maksoud

May 16, 2013 - .. The right of return, if the memory from 65 years ago is constantly being perpetuated and growing, it's no longer impossible that the right of return could become a long-awaited reality. The Palestinian refugees cannot last and should not have to last any longer. What, at this moment, might be dismissed as "impractical," the growing knowledge base will lead this generation and the coming ones to be emboldened and retrieve their homes in their new homeland: a secular, democratic Palestinian state where cohabitation replaces discrimination, exclusion, and denial of internationally recognized human and national rights for the Palestinians...


  continua / continued avanti - next    [97662] [ 18-may-2013 05:19 ECT ]

Israel seeks to legalise four settlement outposts in the West Bank
Middle East Monitor

May 16, 2013 -The Israeli Peace Now movement has revealed plans by the Israeli authorities to start legalising four settlement outposts built on private land in the occupied West Bank. According to Peace Now, the Israeli government has submitted a formal response to the organisation's petition to the Supreme Court against six illegal outposts in the West Bank. "The government has declared its intention to legalise four outposts," said the movement.Peace Now feels betrayed by the previous government, it said. "The former government had promised to remove the illegal construction built on private land, but had not declared its intention to legalise the outposts."...
  continua / continued avanti - next    [97661] [ 18-may-2013 05:16 ECT ]

Hunger strike reinvigorates movement to close Guantánamo
Jake Olzen
16jake.preview.jpg

May 16, 2013 - In the aftermath of the Boston bombings, it is quite shocking that the renewed vigor to close Guantánamo has found the footing that it has. Even though many of the terrible myths started by the Bush administration’s War on Terror rhetoric linger, especially regarding the so-called "worst of the worst" at Guantánamo, Boston Globe columnist James Carroll recently added his name to the growing list of citizens and institutions calling for an end to America’s most infamous gulag. Carroll wrote that "if Americans want this spectacle to end — if they want to tell Congress and President Obama that Guantánamo must be shut down — now is the time for them to make their voices heard. But how?" The situation is stark and quickly deteriorating with more than 130 of the prison’s 166 detainees on hunger strike in protest of their treatment. ..
  continua / continued avanti - next    [97660] [ 18-may-2013 05:11 ECT ]

WATCH: Remi Kanazi’s new poem, "Nakba," about his grandmother’s expulsion in 1948
Nora Barrows-Friedman

May 16, 2013 - We will return.
That is not a threat
not a wish
a hope
or a dream
but a promise.

In the above video, posted today, on Nakba Day — when Palestinians mark the anniversary of expulsion and exile from their homeland — New York-based poet and activist Remi Kanazi performs a moving new poem entitled "Nakba." In an email to The Electronic Intifada, Kanazi said the poem is an "intimate piece that focuses on the dispossession of my grandmother in 1948 and some of the realities the Nakba produced...
  continua / continued avanti - next    [97658] [ 18-may-2013 05:01 ECT ]

Why Obama Can & Should Close Guantanamo NOW
by Debra Sweet

May 16, 2013 - While promoting the message to Close Guantanamo that we are raising funds to publish in The New York Times, we have been hearing, especially in the Twitterverse, that people think, because Obama promised to close Guantanamo, and says that Congress is not allowing him to do that, the main problem is with Congress...Obama repeated, in remarks at a press conference last month, that it is Congress who refuses to let him release prisoners who have been cleared for release. 86 prisoners were cleared, some back to 2006, by the Bush administration, and then again by a task force of Obama’s own creation in 2009, after what he’s called a very "thorough review."
There are 3 main reasons the ball is in Obama’s court on Guantanamo: 1. Obama put in place the ban on transferring the 56 Yemeni prisoners, out of the 86 who have been cleared for release...
  continua / continued avanti - next    [97657] [ 18-may-2013 04:55 ECT ]

SF Pride CEO Resorts to Lies as Scandal Around Honoring Bradley Manning Continues
By: Kevin Gosztola
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May 16, 2013 - A member of the San Francisco Board of Supervisors, Supervisor David Campos, has spoken out on the ongoing scandal involving San Francisco Pride’s decision to not honor Pfc. Bradley Manning as a Grand Marshal of the Pride parade. He has urged Pride to hold a public meeting before this year’s parade and celebration on June 30 instead of after. Pride CEO Earl Plante is also outright lying or, at best, deliberately misrepresenting Pride’s actions in interviews with media. These developments are the latest in a controversy that began back in April when the gay soldier, who disclosed information to WikiLeaks and is facing a US military prosecution, was announced as a Grand Marshal only to have Pride put out a statement retracting the award as a "mistake."...
  continua / continued avanti - next    [97656] [ 18-may-2013 04:51 ECT ]

Six Americans Among 16 Killed in Massive Kabul Suicide Attack
Jason Ditz

May 16, 2013 - A suicide car bomber has launched a major attack in the Afghan capital city of Kabul today, killing at least 16 people and wounding 40 others. Among the slain are two US soldiers and four American contractors. Nine Afghan civilians and an interpreter were also killed. Hezb-e Islami spokesman Haroon Zarghon claimed credit for the attack, saying it was carried out by a 24-year-old operative for their faction. The attack occurred during rush hour on a crowded highway, causing the large number of civilian dead and wounded...
  continua / continued avanti - next    [97655] [ 18-may-2013 04:46 ECT ]

Iraq snapshot - May 16, 2013
The Common Ills

May 16, 2013. Chaos and violence continue, the US talks good about press freedom even if it doesn't believe it, the IRS scandal continues, pouty babies dismiss the AP scandal as a "yawn," Saleh al-Mutlaq steered a meet-up with Iraqi protesters that looked like an accomplishment but then came reality, the Hawija massacre continues to dominate Iraqi outlooks, the Baghdad judiciary oversteps their role and announces they're investigating the Hawija massacre, Article 140 of the Iraqi Constitution is noted, and more. ..
  continua / continued avanti - next    [97654] [ 18-may-2013 04:43 ECT ]

Coalition says investigations into campus Palestine activism chill student speech rights
by Alex Kane
16ps-sjp.jpg

May 16, 2013 - Prolonged federal investigations of Palestine solidarity activism on campuses are chilling students’ constitutional rights to organize and speak out, a coalition of civil rights groups has charged in letters to the U.S. Department of Education (DOE). The civil rights and advocacy groups are asking the federal government to take a number of steps to remedy what they say is the problem of investigations that are having a chilling effect on students’ speech...
  continua / continued avanti - next    [97653] [ 18-may-2013 04:25 ECT ]

What We Know is Bad; What's Behind It is Worse!
The AP Seizures and the Frightening Web They've Uncovered

by: Alfredo Lopez

May 16, 2013 - "Paranoia," said Woody Allen, "is knowing all the facts." By that measure, we're becoming more and more "paranoid" every day. This week, we learned that the Obama Justice Department seized two months of records of at least 20 phone lines used by Associated Press reporters. These include phone lines in the AP's New York, Washington and Hartford, Conn offices as well as the main AP number in the House of Representatives press gallery, the private phones and cell phones belonging to AP reporters and a fax line in one AP office. The government effected this massive seizure "sometime this year" according to a letter from the Justice Department to AP's chief counsel this past Friday (May 10). The letter cites relevant "permission" clauses in its "investigative guidelines" and makes clear that it considers the action legal and necessary...
  continua / continued avanti - next    [97652] [ 18-may-2013 04:19 ECT ]

‘My grandmother thought it was temporary’ — Huffpo features Nakba discussion with 5 Palestinians
by Philip Weiss

May 16, 2013- Yesterday Huffington Post had a video conference on the Nakba led by Ahmed Shihab-Eldin, a Palestinian-American, featuring four Palestinians commenting on the history and meaning of the catastrophe.I found it incredible for the deep civility of the conversation. The calmness in the face of tragedy, the reasonableness of all the participants as they say it is time for democracy between the river and the sea, Shihab-Eldin's grace note about a "Jewish right to a homeland," and the lovely respect that he shows to the lovely Nina Saah: Did you think it was temporary? That's what my grandmother tells me when she left. That she thought it was temporary.And yes, Nina Saah also thought it temporary. She was separated from her fiance, her neighbor, and met him by chance in 1963 and then started a family...
  continua / continued avanti - next    [97651] [ 18-may-2013 04:16 ECT ]

Hunger games: Critical health fears as Gitmo strike marks Day 100
RussiaToday

May 16, 2013 - Five critical, 30 force-fed, 102 to 130 taking part – data that makes for grim reading as the Guantanamo hunger strike enters its 100th day. More information on their ill health has been made public as detainees’ lawyers speak out. Lawyers of the Guantanamo Bay prison detainees have been increasingly worried that the inmates condition, particularly overwhelming weight loss, is life threatening. This concern comes as the longest hunger strike in the prison’s history has long exceeded the point of what experts describe as irreversible health risks – and coincides with reports of prison authorities allegedly hampering the inmates’ communication with their attorneys...
  continua / continued avanti - next    [97650] [ 18-may-2013 03:59 ECT ]

Weekly Report On Israeli Human Rights Violations in the Occupied Palestinian Territory (08 - 15 May 2013)
The Palestinian Centre for Human Rights (PCHR)
16pcwr-w20.jpg

May 16, 2013 - Summary: Israeli violations of international law and international humanitarian law in the oPt continued during the reporting period 09 – 15 May 2013. Shooting: During the reporting period, Israeli forces wounded 8 Palestinian civilians, including a child, in the West Bank; 4 civilians were wounded during Israeli dispersal of gatherings of Palestinian civilians protesting against Israeli forces' attacks in the Palestinian residential areas, while the 4 others, including 2 photojournalists, a paramedic and an 18-year-old boy, were wounded during peaceful protests against settlement activities and the annexation wall.On 10 May 2013, Israeli forces wounded a 21-year-old young man by a bullet in the right knee when Israeli forces moved into the southwest of Hebron...
  continua / continued avanti - next    [97659] [ 18-may-2013 04:51 ECT ]

The Mavi Marmara Murders
Craig Murray

May 16, 2013 - I can claim to have had a small hand in instigating the legal complaint to the International Criminal Court by the Comoros Islands against the murders by Israeli troops on the Mavi Marmara. The Washington Post writes: In a filing, lawyers from the Istanbul-based law firm Elmadag argued that the events that took place on the Mavi Marmari should be considered as having occurred on the territory of Comoros. As though this were in any sense a matter of dispute. That crimes committed on any ship outside of territorial waters are under the jurisdiction of the flag state of the ship, is both customary international law of ancient standing and a fundamental provision of the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea. ..
  continua / continued avanti - next    [97647] [ 18-may-2013 03:44 ECT ]

For All the Deluded and/or Stupid People (which is most people), and a Second Iron Law
Arthur Silber

May 16, 2013 - ... By the way, I refer to the current stories as "scandals" with quotes because they are not "scandals" in any manner at all, if we use that term to designate events which are truly shocking and unexpected. Whether we speak of Benghazi, or the IRS behavior, or the AP surveillance, we are speaking of behavior that is entirely typical of the State, especially of this State. And it was only last week that I reminded my readers once again of the overwhelming fact that "the U.S. Government already possesses the power to do whatever it wants, whenever it wants, to whomever it wants." I regard those people who profess to be shocked! and outraged! by these recent stories in the same way I regard adults who are devastated to discover that Santa Claus doesn't actually deliver their Christmas presents. ..
  continua / continued avanti - next    [97646] [ 18-may-2013 03:42 ECT ]

Israel, Hawking and the Pressing Question of Boycott
By Ramzy Baroud
16stephen-hawking-in-chair.jpg

May 16, 2013 -It is an event 'of cosmic proportions’, said one Palestinian academic, a befitting description regarding Stephen Hawking’s decision to boycott an Israeli academic conference slated for next June. It was also a decisive moral call which was communicated on May 8 by Cambridge University, where Hawking is a professor. Hawking is a world-renowned cosmologist and physicist. His scientific work had the kind of impact that redefined or challenged entire areas of research from the theory of relativity, to quantum mechanics and other fields of study. This towering figure is also wheelchair-bound – suffering from complete physical paralyses caused by amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) disease. For Hawking, however, such a painful fact seems like a mere side note in the face of his incredible contributions to science, ones that are comparable to only few men and women throughout history...

  continua / continued avanti - next    [97645] [ 18-may-2013 03:23 ECT ]

Obama's Legacy
Secrecy, Drones, Prisons and Kill Lists

by ALYSSA ROHRICHT

May 16, 2013- ... From the very start of Obama’s presidency, he and his administration have managed to take the Bush-era attack on civil liberties and not just continue them, but in many cases, significantly expand them (Lena Groeger and Cora Currier of ProPublica have created a fantastic interactive list here). The AP phone records story, while certainly significant, is not the first time the Obama administration has acted above the law. Glenn Greenwald wrote for a piece in The Guardian."And then there are the two War on Terror presidents. George Bush seized on the 9/11 attack to usher in radical new surveillance and detention powers in the PATRIOT ACT, spied for years on the communications of US citizens without the warrants required by law, and claimed the power to indefinitely imprison even US citizens without charges in military brigs. His successor, Barack Obama, went further by claiming the power not merely to detain citizens without judicial review but to assassinate them….

  continua / continued avanti - next    [97644] [ 18-may-2013 02:54 ECT ]

13 year-old Palestinian boy shot and beaten by settlers, leg broken
International Solidarity Movement

May 16, 2013 -At about 2pm on 16 May, a 13 year-old boy was shot at and beaten by settlers; he broke bones in his leg running from the shots at him and from being beaten. After falling, the boy was threatened with his life by settlers, but soldiers arrived and stopped the settlers from killing him before threatening the young boy with three guns while he lay injured and immobile on the ground.Initial medical attention was not allowed during the time Israeli soldiers had taken the boy into their custody, implying that he would be treated in an Israeli ambulance. However, three hours later, the boy had to be picked up, untreated, by the Red Crescent and taken to Rafidia hospital in Nablus...
  continua / continued avanti - next    [97643] [ 18-may-2013 02:43 ECT ]

Syria News - May 15, 2013 (Warning: Graphic Videos)
Local Coordination Committees of Syria + Videos
15maggio-sw593650_n.jpg

May 15, 2013 - By the end of Wednesday the Local Coordination Committees were able to document 90 martyrs including 6 woman and 7 children: 28 martyrs were reported in Aleppo; 21 martyrs in Homs; 19 martyrs in Damascus and its suburbs; 7 martyrs in Hama; 5 martyrs in Idlib; 4 martyrs in Raqqa; 3 martyrs in Deir Ezzor; 2 martyrs in Daraa and one martyr in Qunaitra.The Committees have documented 321 shelling points in which shelling with warplanes was reported in 19 points where the fiercest were reported in Meliha, Raqqa and Halfaya; Cluster bombs were reported in 4 districts in each of Jandoul Square in Aleppo, Halfaya, Hama, Banyas and Haylan; Vacuum bombs were reported in Halfaya in Hama; surface to surface missiles were reported in Hayan in Aleppo; artillery shelling was reported in 103 points; Rocket shelling was reported in 98 points while mortar shells were reported in 95 points across Syrian cities and towns...
  continua / continued avanti - next    [97642] [ 18-may-2013 01:49 ECT ]

Children bear the brunt of Israeli incursions into Kfur Qaddoum
Defence for Children International-Palestine Section

May 15, 2013 - Ten children, among them 6-year-old Ali, required medical attention after a tear gas canister landed in the room where they had taken shelter during clashes between Kfur Qaddoum villagers and Israeli soldiers. Night-time incursions, home invasions and arrests by the Israeli military occur frequently in the Palestinian village of Kfur Qaddoum near the West Bank city of Nablus. One young villager, Hanan, 17, visibly shakes while recalling the story of the three nights during which Israeli soldiers raided her home. Woken up at 3 am by the sound of loud banging on the front door, Hanan was 12 the first time that soldiers entered her house to arrest a member of her family, her brother. The soldiers, she said, were kicking the door with their feet and rifles and entered the house with three dogs. "They were barking and they scared us."...
  continua / continued avanti - next    [97641] [ 17-may-2013 22:03 ECT ]

Spies "R" Us
by Stephen Lendman

May 15, 2013- A previous article discussed institutionalized spying on Americans. Anyone can be monitored for any reason or none at all. Manufactured national security threats, silencing dissent, targeting whistleblowers, and challenging press freedom subvert constitutional rights. Doing so is worse than ever now. Obama bears full responsibility. He governs by diktat authority. He's waging war on humanity. He's spurning fundamental rights. He's targeting press freedom. James Madison understood the threat, saying: "A popular government without popular information or the means of acquiring it is but a prologue to a farce or tragedy, or perhaps both."..
  continua / continued avanti - next    [97640] [ 17-may-2013 21:59 ECT ]

“If you wanted to live, you left”
The Palestinian Centre for Human Rights (PCHR)
15vh15-05-n1.jpg

May 15, 2013 - Today is Nakba Day, the day on which Palestinians mourn the loss of their homeland in 1948. 65 years ago, in May of 1948, Ghatheyya Mifleh al-Khawalda was a carefree 15-year-old girl who lived with her mother and sister in the village of al-Qastina in Mandatory Palestine, when they were forced, along with the rest of their village, to flee in the face of imminent threat from Jewish militias. For some time, the people of al-Qastina had received word of terrible attacks against other villages nearby, in which many had died. Fearing a similar fate, they left their home, and would never return to live there again. They became victims of what is referred to as the Nakba, meaning 'catastrophe’, the mass forced displacement of Palestinians from their homes in order to make way for citizens of the Jewish State of Israel which would be established soon afterwards...
  continua / continued avanti - next    [97639] [ 17-may-2013 21:54 ECT ]

IDF Agrees to Forego Use of White Phosphorus…Sorta
Richard Silverstein

May 15, 2013 - ..The State wants to appear to have renounced use of white phosphorus while not really doing so. Note those "two narrow exceptions." I’m trying to ascertain what they are. They have been conveniently omitted from any court filings or documents. But I’m guessing they may be wide enough to drive a Mack truck through. Also note the State affirms that the policy is only temporary and may be changed at the discretion of the army itself. Further, the army makes a big deal out of the fact that while this is a change of policy, it isn’t a legally binding agreement forced upon it. This is the equivalent of the defendant who cops a plea without an admission of guilt...

  continua / continued avanti - next    [97638] [ 17-may-2013 20:22 ECT ]

CAGEPRISONERS EXCLUSIVE: Fortress of War: how one Guantanamo prisoner survived a massacre
Moazzam Begg

May 15, 2013 - "The rooms were filled with corpses of brothers, their blood, excrement and waste. The water began to slowly rise and we had nowhere to escape. Anyone injured who could not stand up just drowned, right in front of us." It was Ramadan 2001. The US had already begun its bombing campaign of Afghanistan against Al Qa’idah and the Taliban following the September 11 attacks two months earlier. In the Northern Afghan city of Kunduz several hundred foreign Taliban soldiers, who had been fighting against the anti-Taliban Northern Alliance for years became the target of US airstrikes. Under incessant carpet bombing, which included the use of 15,000-pound BLU-82 "daisy cutters" and after a promise that they would be allowed to return home, the Taliban fighters agreed to surrender. Amongst these men was Waleed al-Hajj. In one of the most powerful interviews ever published by CagePrisoners Moazzam Begg talks to former Guantanamo prisoner Waleed al-Hajj about the harrowing six days he spent surviving the ensuing Qala-i-Jangi massacre...


  continua / continued avanti - next    [97637] [ 17-may-2013 19:52 ECT ]

Radicalized = Weaponized = Kill at Will
Glen Ford
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May 15, 2013 - Like all advanced police states, the U.S. national security regime has begun speaking its own, degenerate language. It is a mode of speech that simultaneously defines the "enemy" and justifies his or her destruction. The soulless, bureaucratic roots of National Security Speech belie the ruthless intent, which is to make the utter destruction of the targeted group or individual appear to be the natural order of things. "Self-radicalization" is one of the terms coined by national security speakers. To people like President Obama, a guy who adds targets to his Kill List every Tuesday, "self-radicalization" represents a grave threat to the American state. "One of the dangers that we now face," said Obama, in the wake of the Boston Marathon bombing, "are self-radicalized individuals who are already in the United States," because it is difficult to prevent them from carrying out "plots."...

  continua / continued avanti - next    [97636] [ 17-may-2013 19:41 ECT ]

Gunmen attack Baghdad liquor stores, 12 killed
Reuters

May 15, 2013 - Gunmen using silenced weapons attacked at least nine liquor stores in Baghdad on Tuesday, killing 12 people, police and medical sources said.Police sources said the attack targeted a row of stores selling alcohol in Zayona district of eastern Baghdad, which has a majority Shi'ite population.Even though most people shun alcohol, forbidden under Islamic law, Iraq is a generally less conservative Muslim society than neighbours such as Saudi Arabia and Iran, thanks to its mix of Shi'ites, Sunnis, ethnic Kurds and Christians. But Islamist parties have risen to the fore since the fall of Saddam Hussein in 2003 after the U.S.-led invasion and many fear they could encourage hardline Islamists to exert more influence over aspects of Iraqi life...

  continua / continued avanti - next    [97635] [ 17-may-2013 19:35 ECT ]

New Guantanamo policy: Genital "pat down"
Jason Leopold

May 15, 2013 - A new policy has been implemented at Guantanamo that calls for prisoners to submit to a "pat down" of their genitals and buttocks when they leave the detention camps to meet with their lawyers, an official here confirmed Tuesday.Navy Captain. Robert Durand, a Guantanamo spokesman, told Al Jazeera the new procedures were introduced about two weeks ago in an effort to stave off the alleged flow of "contraband" into the detention camps. It’s one of several new strict protocols that went into effect at the detention facility since February. David Remes, a Washington, DC-based human rights attorney who represents more than a dozen Yemeni prisoners, said the new policy amounts to "religious humiliation" and is a clear-cut attempt to break the nearly four-month-old hunger strike involving at least 100 prisoners...
  continua / continued avanti - next    [97634] [ 17-may-2013 19:19 ECT ]

Does This Not Outrage You?
The Revolting Syrian-يلا إرحل يا بشار
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May 15, 2013 - Much has been said over the past two days in the world press about a sick video showing an FSA commander tearing the heart out of a dead Hezbullah fighter (sent to murder Syrians) in Qusayr, Homs and then eating it.
The video is vile. The act is vicious. The cannibalism is inexcusable. However, the 'outrage’ over this video has been proclaimed by Human Rights Watch to be "the most disgusting atrocity filmed in the Syrian Civil War". Human Rights Watch is also quoted in dozens of the world’s most widely read newspapers, television programs and news media networks stating the same. The media in general has taken the same attitude, saying that this single video, is the worst thing to have befallen the Syrian Revolution (they incorrectly call it a civil war). Honestly? This video is the worst you people have seen come out of Syria? If that’s the case, then allow me to educate you for a moment.Countless keyboard pontificators, armchair generals, faux-leftists and of course, Assad’s supporters have pounced on this video, waved it like a flag in the wind, and declared that every Syrian who is not on Assad’s side of the massacre (again, not civil war) is a 'dirty cannibal terrorist’. And yes, they apply that label to babies, children, women, the elderly and the 90,000+ martyrs that Assad’s forces have killed since March 2011...
  continua / continued avanti - next    [97632] [ 17-may-2013 19:09 ECT ]

Right of Return still key – Nakba Day demonstrations violently suppressed by Israeli forces
International Solidarity Movement

May 15, 2013 - The 15th May marks the 65th anniversary of the expulsion of 750,000 Palestinians from their homes and the destruction – and massacre in some cases – of more than 500 Palestinian villages by Zionist forces in 1948. 65 years on, the same Zionist project of expelling the indigenous population of Palestine continues. House demolitions, land confiscation, settlement expansion, military occupation, restriction of movement and systematic bombing of the Gaza Strip are aimed at ethnically cleansing Palestine for the sake of the Zionist dream: Greater Israel. Palestinians from different villages and cities across the West Bank, Jerusalem, the Gaza Strip and refugee camps in neighbouring Arab countries have commemorated the 65th anniversary of the Nakba, claiming once again their right of return to their land, their homes and their history...
  continua / continued avanti - next    [97631] [ 17-may-2013 18:31 ECT ]

Watch: “From Al-Araqib to Susiya” - Palestinians highlight Israel’s ongoing efforts to expel them
Ali Abunimah

May 15, 2013 - Today, 15 May, Nakba Day, Palestinians everywhere mark the 65th anniversary of their continuing expulsion and exile from their homeland.A new short film, released to mark this date, features Palestinians talking about their experiences of ongoing forced removal from their lands and homes by Israel.The film "documents a journey between the two villages and two communities, whose very existence on their land is under threat today" according to Adalah, the Legal Center for Arab Minority Rights in Israel, which produced it."It also demonstrates how, in the face of a single Israeli policy to forcibly displace Palestinians on both sides of the Green Line, the people are drawing on deep reserves of courage and steadfastness to remain on their land."...
  continua / continued avanti - next    [97630] [ 17-may-2013 18:10 ECT ]

US drone strikes: 'deadly and dirty' warns new book
Richard Norton-Taylor
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May 15, 2013- Not long after he was elected president, Barack Obama arranged what senior US officials called "Terror Tuesdays". On the agenda were "kill lists" — names of individuals whose perceived threat to America's security made them targets for assassination by unmanned drone attacks in Pakistan, Yemen, and Somalia. The kill lists, scrutinised personally by Obama at the weekly meetings, were soon expanded to become what US journalist Jeremy Scahill, author of Dirty Wars, calls a form of "pre-crime" justice where individuals are considered fair game if they met certain life patterns of suspected terrorists...
  continua / continued avanti - next    [97629] [ 17-may-2013 17:46 ECT ]

65th Commemoration: Ongoing Nakba and Secondary Forcible Displacement
BADIL - Resource Center for Palestinian Residencyand Refugee Rights

May 15, 2013- Of the 11.4 million Palestinians worldwide, 66% are forcible displaced, (refugees and internally displaced people) and over half live in the Shatat (forced exile). Instead of an event relegated to history, the Nakba continues into its 65th year – the central source for the annual increase of these displacement statistics.In the past year, for example, Israeli colonization, occupation and apartheid have targeted the indigenous presence of Palestinians particularly in Jerusalem, Area C of the West Bank, the Gaza Strip Buffer Zone and the Naqab. On 6 May 2013, Israel approved the Prawer Plan, which threatens to forcibly displace up to 70,000 Palestinian Bedouin in the Naqab. On the same day, Israel issued 11 home demolition orders in Deir Nidham village near Ramallah, which, if carried out, will make 40 Palestinians homeless. On large and small scales, the displacement of the ongoing Nakba repeats the original crime and tragedy producing Palestinian refugees and Internally Displaced Persons annually...

  continua / continued avanti - next    [97628] [ 17-may-2013 17:41 ECT ]

The major sea change in media discussions of Obama and civil liberties
Glenn Greenwald

May 15, 2013- Due to the controversies over the IRS and (especially) the DOJ's attack on AP's news gathering process, media outlets have suddenly decided that President Obama has a very poor record on civil liberties, transparency, press freedoms, and a whole variety of other issues on which he based his first campaign. The first two paragraphs of this Washington Post article from yesterday, expressed in tones of recent epiphany, made me laugh audibly: "President Obama, a former constitutional law lecturer who came to office pledging renewed respect for civil liberties, is today running an administration at odds with his résumé and preelection promises. "The Justice Department's collection of journalists' phone records and the Internal Revenue Service's targeting of conservative groups have challenged Obama's credibility as a champion of civil liberties - and as a president who would heal the country from damage done by his predecessor." You don't say! The Washington Post's breaking news here is only about four years late...
  continua / continued avanti - next    [97627] [ 17-may-2013 17:35 ECT ]

How the US Turned Three Pacifists into Violent Terrorists
by Fran Quigley
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May 15, 2013- In just ten months, the United States managed to transform an 82 year-old Catholic nun and two pacifists from non-violent anti-nuclear peace protestors accused of misdemeanor trespassing into federal felons convicted of violent crimes of terrorism. Now in jail awaiting sentencing for their acts at an Oak Ridge, TN nuclear weapons production facility, their story should chill every person concerned about dissent in the US. Here is how it happened. In the early morning hours of Saturday June 28, 2012, long-time peace activists Sr. Megan Rice, 82, Greg Boertje-Obed, 57, and Michael Walli, 63, cut through the chain link fence surrounding the Oak Ridge Y-12 nuclear weapons production facility and trespassed onto the property. Y-12, called the Fort Knox of the nuclear weapons industry, stores hundreds of metric tons of highly enriched uranium and works on every single one of the thousands of nuclear weapons maintained by the U.S...
  continua / continued avanti - next    [97626] [ 17-may-2013 17:27 ECT ]

On Political Preconditions
Richard Falk

May 15, 2013- To the extent that diplomacy solves international problems it depends on the satisfaction of the political preconditions that must be met for negotiations betweensovereign states to reach sustainable and benevolent results. To clarify the point, in situations where there is a clear winner and loser, political preconditions are irrelevant, as the winner can dictate the terms, either imposing them as was done after World War II in response to the unconditional surrender of Germany and Japan, or offering proposals on a 'take it or leave it’ basis. This is what Israel has attempted to do over the course of the twenty years that the Oslo Framework, the Roadmap, and the Quartet, have provided the ground rules for diplomacy with respect to Israel/Palestine negotiations. Israel has performed as if the winner, and expected Palestine to act as if the loser, but so far this scenario has not produced the desired outcome, a 'peace’ essentially framed in accordance with Israel’s priorities (retaining settlements by critical land swaps, annexing the whole of Jerusalem, maintaining access to West Bank aquifers, ignoring refugees, de-linking Gaza)...
  continua / continued avanti - next    [97625] [ 17-may-2013 05:15 ECT ]

Without return, Palestine will not be free
by Abir Kopty

May 15, 2013- Many often express solidarity with Palestinians speaking only about ending the occupation that started in 1967, ignoring the root of the problem: the ethnic cleansing of 78% of historic Palestine in 1948. The occupation in 1967 was simply a completion of the plan.Palestinian refugees (5.3 million) along with the internally displaced Palestinians, citizens of Israel who are not allowed to go back to their villages (250,000), compose about half of the Palestinian nation (11.6 million). Does it make sense to be in solidarity with a nation by ignoring rights of half of them? ..
  continua / continued avanti - next    [97624] [ 17-may-2013 05:08 ECT ]

Nakba 2013: The Palestinian Youth Movement Commemorates 65 Years of Al Nakba (Introduction)
by Jennifer Moghannam & Palestinian Youth Movement
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May 15, 2013 - The fifteenth of May 2013 marks the sixty-fifth commemoration of the day the oppressive Zionist state came into being. It also marks sixty-five years from the beginning of our collective fragmentation and simultaneous resistance. This current period that we are living also marks a significant shift in our history not only as Palestinians, but as Arabs, colonized, and young people of today’s world. While there are strong sentiments of brokenness and rupture of Palestinian and Arab communities, we also must recognize, reflect on, and celebrate our histories of resistance and use these narratives as fuel for creating a new and strong resistance for our generation and those that follow. While this current period might be among the most difficult to navigate, it also creates flexibility and possibilities for a creative resurgence of a legacy that will lead us to our liberation and return. ..
  continua / continued avanti - next    [97623] [ 17-may-2013 05:03 ECT ]

Why doesn't Syria retaliate against Israel?
Omar Kosh

May 15, 2013 - .. . The Syrian government has not responded to any of these attacks on its sovereignty, opting to limit itself to strong statements condemning Israel, including the caveat that "Syria reserves the right to respond at the right time and place". Subsequent inaction is defended by the claim that "Israel is trying to drag Syria into a war", code for "the government is alert and won't fall into an Israeli trap".Such inaction by the regime in Damascus can be explained very easily by the fact that the Israeli attacks were not meant to overthrow the government and what is of prime importance to Bashar Al-Assad is to maintain power and keep his regime intact. As such, attacks on the people of Syria and the country itself can be tolerated as long as the regime is not threatened....It should be obvious, therefore, that the Syrian regime no longer cares for attacks on the territorial sovereignty of the country and is concentrated on tackling internal opposition. This gives Israel a free hand to attack at will in its own interests, safe in the knowledge that it will neither be criticised in the international arena nor will it face any retaliation from the regime in Damascus...
  continua / continued avanti - next    [97622] [ 17-may-2013 04:57 ECT ]

Facebook closes accounts commemorating Palestinian Nakba
Middle East Monitor

May 15, 2013 -The social networking website Facebook has closed down accounts opened by Palestinian-Israelis to commemorate the Nakba (Catastrophe) of 1948. Pages established by the Jaffa Youth Movement were targeted specifically.Aljazeera.net reported that Facebook had earlier this year blocked and closed the accounts of youth from Jaffa over their role in promoting the Palestinian cause via the social network. The activists have been documenting events in Clock Square, which has witnessed popular demonstrations to revive Palestinian national occasions. The activists have issued warnings about the blocking and closure of websites which express solidarity with the Palestinian people on the pretext that they "incite racism against Jews and hostility to Israel"...
  continua / continued avanti - next    [97621] [ 17-may-2013 04:54 ECT ]

Notorious massacres of Palestinians between 1937 & 1948
Middle East Monitor
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May 15, 2013 - According to hundreds of Palestinian, Arab, Israeli, and Western sources, both written and oral, Zionist forces committed dozens of massacres against Palestinians during what was called the 1948 "war". Some of these are well-known and have been published while others are not. Below are some of the details of the most notorious massacres committed at the hands of Haganah and its armed wing, the Palmach, as well as the Stern Gang, the Irgun and other Zionist mobs.
  continua / continued avanti - next    [97620] [ 17-may-2013 04:49 ECT ]

How Baghdad Fuels Iraq's Sectarian Fire
By SARAH LEAH WHITSON

May 15, 2013 — The Iraqi government has hurled the country to the brink of a new civil war. In under a month, Baghdad launched a vicious assault on a Sunni protest camp, resulting in 44 deaths; executed 21 alleged Sunni terrorists in one day, and suspended the licenses of 10 satellite channels, 9 of them deemed pro-Sunni. Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki’s message to his country’s extremely disaffected Sunni minority, which resists with an increasing sense of futility joining the battles between Maliki’s forces and extremists? "Bring It On!"...The government has failed to address any of the major grievances of the Sunni — and even some Shia — communities. Those include ongoing exclusion from the political process, with regular delays in elections; no real reforms in the punitive, wildly overbroad "De-Baathification" and antiterrorism laws; increasingly centralized power in the hands of the prime minister; and brutal policing, with mass arrests, unfair trials and endemic torture in Iraqi prisons. ..
  continua / continued avanti - next    [97619] [ 17-may-2013 04:40 ECT ]

New revelations of torture and murder of Afghan civilians by US Special Forces
By Thomas Gaist

May 15, 2013 -Zakaria Kandahari, a member of a US Special Forces "A Team," has been accused by Afghan officials of carrying out and directing the torture of 15 civilians detained in recent raids in Warduk province. Afghan officials say Kandahari is an American of Afghan descent and a leader of the Special Forces unit.Of the 15 prisoners, seven are confirmed dead, with the other eight missing. The body of one of the prisoners, Mohammad Qassim, was found dumped in a trash pit outside a US installation shortly after the detentions.US forces have long conducted bloody counter-insurgency operations in the province, just west of Kabul, prompting repeated accusations by local villagers that they torture and murder civilians. In February, responding to popular outrage, President Hamid Karzai demanded Special Forces cease operations in province...
  continua / continued avanti - next    [97618] [ 17-may-2013 04:36 ECT ]

Palestinian Nakba: The Young Will Never Forget
By Ramzy Baroud
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May 15 , 2013 -...In fact, al-Nakba is not a specific date or an estimation of time, but the entirety of those 65 years and counting. The event must not be assigned to the shelves of history, not as long as refugees are still refugees and settlers continue to rob Palestinian land. As long as Netanyahu speaks the language of Ben Gurion, other 'catastrophic’ episodes will follow. And as long as Palestinians hold on to their keys and deeds, the old may die but the young will never forget...
  continua / continued avanti - next    [97617] [ 17-may-2013 04:32 ECT ]

Thousands mark Nakba Day in the West Bank and Gaza
Ma'an news

May 15, 2013- Thousands of people in the West Bank and Gaza Strip on Wednesday marked the 65th anniversary of the Nakba, an event which saw hundreds of thousands of Palestinians displaced from their homes in what is now Israel.Sirens were sounded for 65 seconds in the West Bank to mark the start of celebrations, with thousands of people gathering in Ramallah, Nablus, Qalqiliya and other West Bank cities."The right to return does not become invalid or ineffective as time passes, because this right is the core of the Palestinian plight," PLO official Wasil Abu Yousif said while addressing crowds at Yasser Arafat's tomb...
  continua / continued avanti - next    [97616] [ 17-may-2013 04:25 ECT ]

Egyptian teacher accused of insulting Morsi over 'sheep' question
Ahram Online

May 14, 2013 -Ihab El-Islamboly, an English teacher in Alexandria, was questioned by police on Tuesday for setting a "politicised" exam question that "insulted" President Mohamed Morsi.The question that angered some members of the Alexandria teachers' syndicate, which El-Islamboly says is dominated by the Muslim Brotherhood, included the quote, "In the animal kingdom, a sheep cannot be king." El-Islamboly told Al-Ahram Arabic news website that he had not intended to insult the president, who hails from the Brotherhood, and the quote is part of the curriculum. "What part of this quote has anything to do with the president or politics?" asked El-Islamboly. Critics often accuse Muslim Brotherhood members of acting like sheep for slavishly following the orders of the group's supreme-guide...
  continua / continued avanti - next    [97615] [ 17-may-2013 04:19 ECT ]

Syria News - May 14, 2013 (Warning: Graphic Videos)
Local Coordination Committees of Syria + Videos
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May 14, 2013 -
By the end of Tuesday, Local committees documented 70 martyrs including 4 women, 10 children and 8 martyrs under torture: 20 martyrs were reported in Damascus Suburbs; 11 martyrs in Homs; 10 in Idlib; 9 in Hama; 9 in Aleppo; 4 in Deir Ezzor; 2 in Daraa; 2 in Raqqa; in Lattakia and 1 in Sweida. The Local coordination committees documented 352 points of shelling where Warplane shelling was reported in 26 points, the fierecest was in Helfaya in Hama and Mlaiha in Damascys suburbs; shelling with surface-to-surface missiles in 4 points in Kafrklain in Aleppo, the old ariport road in Deir Ezzor and Joret Shayah in Homs; sehlling with 3 explosive barrels in Raqqa; A vacuum bomb in Helfaya, Hama; Shelling with artillery was reporeted in 113 points, rocket shelling in 107 points; and finally shelling with mortars in 98 points, across different cities and towns in Syria...
  continua / continued avanti - next    [97614] [ 17-may-2013 02:50 ECT ]

Syria News - May 14, 2013 (Warning: Graphic Videos)
Local Coordination Committees of Syria + Videos
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May 14, 2013 -
By the end of Tuesday, Local committees documented 70 martyrs including 4 women, 10 children and 8 martyrs under torture: 20 martyrs were reported in Damascus Suburbs; 11 martyrs in Homs; 10 in Idlib; 9 in Hama; 9 in Aleppo; 4 in Deir Ezzor; 2 in Daraa; 2 in Raqqa; in Lattakia and 1 in Sweida. The Local coordination committees documented 352 points of shelling where Warplane shelling was reported in 26 points, the fierecest was in Helfaya in Hama and Mlaiha in Damascys suburbs; shelling with surface-to-surface missiles in 4 points in Kafrklain in Aleppo, the old ariport road in Deir Ezzor and Joret Shayah in Homs; sehlling with 3 explosive barrels in Raqqa; A vacuum bomb in Helfaya, Hama; Shelling with artillery was reporeted in 113 points, rocket shelling in 107 points; and finally shelling with mortars in 98 points, across different cities and towns in Syria...
  continua / continued avanti - next    [97613] [ 17-may-2013 02:50 ECT ]

Taliban statement
Declaration of the Islamic Emirate regarding the incidents in the border regions with Iran and Pakistan

Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan

May 14 , 2013 -The Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan strongly condemns the killing and affliction of our vulnerable oppressed countrymen by the Iranian border security forces and considers it the explicit violation of the human and neighborhood rights. The Afghans might have illegally crossed the Iranian border, but there are various other techniques to halt the unauthorized people from crossing the border instead of killing or torturing them. We pray for patience for those families whose relatives have incurred losses, urgent recovery for the injured ones and especially lofty status for the martyred ones....

  continua / continued avanti - next    [97612] [ 16-may-2013 19:49 ECT ]

Close Guantanamo Now!
by Stephen Lendman

May 14, 2013 - As president and commander-in-chief, Obama has legal authority to do so. On May 3, New York City Bar president Carey R. Dunne wrote him. He did so on behalf of the organization he heads.He called indefinite detention "legally and morally indefensible." He said 25 retired military flag officers said it's "an effective recruiting tool for our enemies."He urged "concrete steps to restart the process toward closure."On May 7, the New York City Bar said "Obama has the authority to close (Guantanamo) under Section 1028 of the National Defense Authorization Act of 2013."..
  continua / continued avanti - next    [97611] [ 16-may-2013 18:17 ECT ]

Among the ruins of Lifta, memory of the Nakba persists
By Fatima Masri
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May 14, 2013 - Standing within the boundaries of the holy city, Lifta is one of the 68 villages surrounding Jerusalem that were ethnically cleansed during the Israeli systematic attack in 1948. Unlike the others, it is the only Arab village that has not been destroyed since. Israel confiscated the village land under the Absentee Property law in 1950, despite recognition by the Fourth Geneva Convention of the right of refugees to be repatriated. Some of its inhabitants found shelter a few hundred meters away, certain of soon being able to return to their former homes, while others fled to the West Bank and are now unable to visit their village due to the severe restrictions on Palestinian movement imposed by the Israeli government...
  continua / continued avanti - next    [97610] [ 16-may-2013 18:03 ECT ]

Military Resistance 11E9 Murder and Torture
Thomas F Barton

May 14, 2013 - The authorities in Afghanistan are seeking the arrest on murder and torture charges of a man they say is an American and part of a Special
Forces unit operating in Wardak Province , three Afghan officials have confirmed... The Afghan officials say they have substantial evidence of American
involvement. They say they have testimony and documents implicating Mr. Kandahari and his unit in the killings or disappearances of 15 Afghans in Wardak. Mr. Kandahari is of Afghan descent but was born and raised in the United States,they say. Included in the evidence, the Afghan officials say, is a videotape of Mr. Kandahari torturing one of the 15 Afghans, a man they identified as Sayid Mohammad...
  continua / continued avanti - next    [97609] [ 16-may-2013 17:53 ECT ]

Pressure Cooker Scare: Saudi Held At Airport
Sky News

May 14, 2013 — A man from Saudi Arabia has been arrested in the US after being found with a pressure cooker in his luggage at Detroit Airport...The man's nephew, Nasser Almarzooq, said he asked his uncle to bring him the pressure cooker so he could make some lamb stew.The Ohio student said two devices he bought for himself in the US were "not good at all", and said the ones available in Saudi Arabia were of a higher quality... Mr Almarzooq vehemently denied any wrongdoing."If I wanted to do something stupid like this, should I just take my uncle from Saudi Arabia to buy me a pressure cooker?" he said. "It's legal here." Dawud Walid, from the Michigan branch of the Council of American-Islamic Relations, also urged caution. "I hope that our government is not criminalising people if they travel and have cooking items just because they are Muslim or come from the Muslim world," he told the Detroit News...

  continua / continued avanti - next    [97608] [ 16-may-2013 17:13 ECT ]

FBI surrounds house of Saudi student after sightings of him with pressure cooker pot - only to discover he was cooking RICE
By Martin Jay
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May 14, 2013 - A Saudi student living in Michigan was questioned in his home by FBI agents after neighbours saw him carrying a pressure cooker and called the police. Talal al Rouki had been cooking a traditional Saudi Arabian rice dish called kabsah and was carrying it to a friend's house.The Saudi journal, Oukaz reported on the story of the Saudi student who had FBI agents come to his home, following a tip-off from neighbours that he was seen moving about with a pressure cooker bomb. While armed agents surrounded his apartment block, other agents, asked a 'nervous' Mr al Rouki if they could come in to question him...




  continua / continued avanti - next    [97606] [ 16-may-2013 16:53 ECT ]

3 U.S. soldiers killed in roadside bombing in Afghanistan, NATO says
Associated Press

May 14 , 2013 -A roadside bomb struck a U.S. convoy in southern Afghanistan Tuesday, killing three American troops, while a motorcycle bomb in a crowded village market killed at least three Afghan civilians, officials said.NATO spokesman Col. Thomas Collins said the blast hit the American convoy in the Zhari district of Kandahar province, the spiritual heartland of the Taliban and one of the most volatile regions in Afghanistan. Collins originally said four U.S. troops were killed in the blast, but Capt. Luca Carniel later said NATO had revised the death toll to three US service members...
  continua / continued avanti - next    [97605] [ 16-may-2013 16:44 ECT ]

Justice Department's pursuit of AP's phone records is both extreme and dangerous
Glenn Greenwald

May 14, 2013 - Associated Press on Monday revealed that the Department of Justice (DOJ) "secretly obtained two months of telephone records of [its] reporters and editors", denouncing it as a "massive and unprecedented intrusion" into the news gathering process. In a letter sent yesterday to Attorney General Eric Holder, AP's President, Gary Pruitt, detailed that the phone records cover more than 20 telephone lines used by AP journalists, including their homes, offices and cell phones. He said the phones for which the DOJ obtained records also include ones at the AP bureaus in New York City, Washington DC, Hartford, and at the House of Representatives...
  continua / continued avanti - next    [97604] [ 16-may-2013 16:34 ECT ]

Buckling to Bigotry: The Newseum Dishonors Murdered Palestinian Journalists
Nima Shirazi
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May 14, 2013 - Just two days before Palestinians commemorate the 65th anniversary of the Nakba, the names of two Palestinian cameramen targeted and killed by Israeli air strikes in Gaza last November were dropped from a dedication ceremony held to honor "reporters, photographers and broadcasters who have died reporting the news" over the past year. The move followed an Israel lobby pressure campaign led by anti-Palestinian organizations such as the Anti-Defamation League, the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies and the American Jewish Committee, efforts that were openly supported by the Israeli government..
  continua / continued avanti - next    [97603] [ 16-may-2013 16:27 ECT ]

U.S. Military ‘Power Grab’ Goes Into Effect
Pentagon Unilaterally Grants Itself Authority Over ‘Civil Disturbances’

Jed Morey

May 14, 2013 - The manhunt for the Boston Marathon bombing suspects offered the nation a window into the stunning military-style capabilities of our local law enforcement agencies. For the past 30 years, police departments throughout the United States have benefitted from the government’s largesse in the form of military weaponry and training, incentives offered in the ongoing "War on Drugs." For the average citizen watching events such as the intense pursuit of the Tsarnaev brothers on television, it would be difficult to discern between fully outfitted police SWAT teams and the military. The lines blurred even further Monday as a new dynamic was introduced to the militarization of domestic law enforcement. By making a few subtle changes to a regulation in the U.S. Code titled "Defense Support of Civilian Law Enforcement Agencies" the military has quietly granted itself the ability to police the streets without obtaining prior local or state consent, upending a precedent that has been in place for more than two centuries...
  continua / continued avanti - next    [97602] [ 16-may-2013 16:07 ECT ]

U.S. Guilty of Genocide in Guatemala Should be Real Headline
Ajamu Baraka
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May 14, 2013- Now that former Guatemalan president Efrain Rios Montt has been convicted of genocide, it’s time for the "hegemonic puppeteer," the United States, to be put on trial. "U.S. officials were fully aware of the pogrom against the Ixil people in the mountains of Guatemala at the very moment that the U.S. government was involved in training and arming the Guatemalan military."...
  continua / continued avanti - next    [97601] [ 16-may-2013 16:00 ECT ]

Patriarchs Condemn Israeli Police Measures, Violations of Christians' Rights to Worship at Holy Sites
Palestine News Network

May 14, 2013 -The Heads of Churches and Patriarchs in Jerusalem condemned in a statement the brutal treatment of the clergy, people, and pilgrims in the Old City of Jerusalem during Holy Saturday last week, Holy Land Christian Ecumenical Foundation said in a press release. "A day of joy and celebration was turned to great sorrow and pain for some of our faithful because they were ill-treated by some Israeli policemen who were present around the gates of the Old City and passages that lead to the Holy Sepulcher," Heads of Churches said in a statement....

  continua / continued avanti - next    [97600] [ 16-may-2013 06:49 ECT ]

Newseum honors newsman who ran guns for ethnic cleansing of Palestine
by Matthew Taylor

May 14, 2013- It's not surprising that the Newseum has chosen to step back from honoring Palestinian journalists killed in the line of duty, given that the institution glorifies the ethnic cleansing of Palestine, Hasbara-style. On one of the top floors there's a shrine to deceased Las Vegas Sun publisher and armer of Zionist militias Hank Greenspun -- his family is one of the founding partners of the Newseum. The shrine reports that Hank, who supposedly "had a celebrated career as a leading public advocate and crusader for justice," ran guns to Zionist militias in the 1940s, in violation of the neutrality act...
  continua / continued avanti - next    [97599] [ 16-may-2013 06:17 ECT ]

“Torture is for Torture, the System is for the System”: Shaker Aamer’s Letters from Guantánamo
Andy Worthington
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May 14, 2013 - The quote in the title of this article is from 1984 (aka Nineteen Eighty-Four), George Orwell’s dystopian masterpiece, published in June 1949, which Shaker Aamer, the last British resident in Guantánamo, described as being "probably the book I’ve read more than any other but the Holy Koran" in a recent letter to his family from Guantánamo.I recently wrote about the latest developments — or the lack of them — in Shaker’s case, which continues to be a transatlantic game of political football, in which responsibility for his continued detention, six years after he was first cleared for release, is bounced from Washington to London and back with no regard for Shaker’s ongoing suffering or the injustice of holding a man who has long been cleared for release. Shaker’s suffering — and the injustice of holding a man long cleared for release — are part of a much bigger story, of course, in which a prison-wide hunger strike at Guantánamo, involving the majority of the 166 prisoners still held, is now in its fourth month, and 85 of those men — in addition to Shaker — are also being held despite being cleared for release ....
  continua / continued avanti - next    [97598] [ 16-may-2013 06:12 ECT ]

FBI files reveal Anti-Defamation League spied on Arab students
Grant F. Smith

May 14, 2013 - In 1969, the Anti-Defamation League infiltrated and spied on a national gathering of Arab students in the United States, newly released Federal Bureau of Investigation documents show.Obtained in April after an Institute for Research: Middle Eastern Policy (IRMEP) freedom of information request, and reviewed by The Electronic Intifada, one declassified file [PDF] contains Anti-Defamation League reports held by the FBI. The documents reveal how ADL surveillance against the Organization of Arab Students (OAS) in 1969 coalesced into plans for infiltrating the OAS national organization in New York. The files also give an insight into why the entire effort eventually backfired, ultimately leading to raids on ADL offices involved in intelligence-gathering through illegal means, and a lawsuit against ADL in the early 1990s — ultimately settled out of court in 2002...
  continua / continued avanti - next    [97597] [ 16-may-2013 06:09 ECT ]

Iraq snapshot - May 14, 2013
The Common Ills

May 14, 2013. Chaos and violence continue, Exxon Mobile is said to reach a deal with the KRG, unions and journalists continued to be suppressed in Iraq, the Associated Press reveals more about the US government's attack on their organization and the First Amendment, the IRS scandal gets worse, Dennis Kucinich explains why Benghazi matters, Thomas Pickering reveals that he wasn't really snubbed (despite what he's claimed publicly for the last few days), Pakistan's new leader may mean an end to Barack's Drone War in that country, and more...
  continua / continued avanti - next    [97596] [ 16-may-2013 06:06 ECT ]

Life "no longer bearable" in Syria, says Palestinian refugee
Rami Almeghari
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May 14, 2013 - One of the most distressing scenes that Redwan Amayra witnessed in Syria was of a woman being shot as she carried some bread. After warplanes hit Yarmouk, a Palestinian refugee camp near Damascus, last November, Amayra decided to flee.A 60-year-old teacher employed with the UN agency for Palestine refugees (UNRWA), Amayra had just registered with the Palestinian Authority’s embassy in Cairo. It is not the first time that his family has been uprooted: they were forced to leave Safed, a town in the Galilee region of historic Palestine, when it was attacked by Zionist forces in 1948...


  continua / continued avanti - next    [97595] [ 16-may-2013 06:03 ECT ]

Are Israelis Now Appropriating the Nakba?
By Susan Abulhawa

May 14, 2013 -Al Jazeera Stream contacted me a few days ago asking if I would participate on a show commemorating the Nakbe. I would be the only Palestinian, the producer said, "to balance things out" amidst various Israeli voices. Here’s the exact excerpt of the email: "We are looking for a unique angle with which to cover this and one we were thinking of was looking at the Nakba through Israeli eyes and competing Israeli perspectives. We would also like to have a Palestinian guest join us on set however, to balance things out. As you noted, it would be 3-4 Israelis and just the one Palestinian – but as I said, the Israeli’s will include those very critical of Israeli society on this issue. We certainly wont have anyone in the discussion who flat out denies the Nakba."...

  continua / continued avanti - next    [97594] [ 16-may-2013 05:58 ECT ]

Will the Church of Scotland Cave in to Zionist Bullies?
By Stuart Littlewood

May 14, 2013 - "The political and humanitarian situation in the Holy Land continues to be a source of pain and concern for us all," says the introduction to the Church of Scotland’s report The inheritance of Abraham? A report on the 'promised land’.It is the Church’s latest reflection on the "questions that need to be faced". The report was intended for discussion at the Church’s General Assembly this week and it questions the assumption many Christians and Jews that the Bible supports an essentially Jewish state of Israel. Current Israeli policies towards the Palestinians, it suggests, have "sharpened this questioning". The report goes on to examine the issues in a measured and non-inflammatory way...
  continua / continued avanti - next    [97593] [ 16-may-2013 05:53 ECT ]

Iraq's invisible refugee crisis
Dahr Jamail
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May 14, 2013 - Maki al-Nazzal, a 57-year-old Iraqi from Fallujah, returned to Amman a week ago from a visit to his home city in Iraq. Having lived in Jordan since 2007, Nazzal, like most refugees, wants nothing more than to return to his home country.He had returned to test the waters, after having to flee in 2007 under threat to his life from having been first an outspoken critic of the US occupation of Iraq, and more recently having been critical of the regime of Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki."When you tell the truth about what is happening in Iraq, this puts you in danger," Nazzal, a political analyst who has frequently appeared on television, told Al Jazeera. "After two of my sons were arrested in Fallujah, I left Iraq. I had no choice but to leave."..
  continua / continued avanti - next    [97592] [ 16-may-2013 05:48 ECT ]

JFO: Press freedom is the worst in Iraq
Shafaq News

May 14, 2013 -Journalistic freedoms Organization (JFO) considered that freedom of press in the country in the past year is the worst since the fall of Saddam Hussein's regime in 2003.JFO said in a report briefed by "Shafaq News" that "the Iraqi government initiated 2012 with strict measures against the Iraqi media". "The government has used military and security forces to limit the work of journalists, especially against foreign journalists, most of who are deprived from entering Iraq and prevent others from covering the protests that took place in some cities"...
  continua / continued avanti - next    [97591] [ 16-may-2013 05:44 ECT ]

Saudis overtaking Qatar in sponsoring Syrian rebels
Hassan Hassan

May 14, 2013- Last week, a 12-member delegation from the Syrian opposition visited Saudi Arabia, for an unprecedented two-day official meeting.Saudi authorities had consistently declined to meet the opposition, despite repeated requests. This was partly because the kingdom has opposed Muslim Brotherhood dominance in the Syrian National Council and then the National Coalition, owing to the Brotherhood's alliance with Qatar and Turkey and opposition to inclusivity.But last week, surprisingly, the Saudi foreign minister, Saud Al Faisal, met Syrian Brotherhood deputy leader Mahmoud Farouq Tayfour, in one-to-one talks.The Brotherhood had previously been confident in its alliance with Qatar and Turkey, and saw no need to offer concessions to engage other countries, including Saudi Arabia. So this meeting, which came after an "eager appeal" from the Brotherhood, suggests a shift in regional dynamics.Two separate sources close to the opposition say Mr Tayfour assured the Saudi minister that "Syria's Brotherhood will definitely not be like Egypt's Brotherhood"....
  continua / continued avanti - next    [97590] [ 16-may-2013 05:39 ECT ]

Top 10 Facts You Probably Didn’t Know About the #Nakba
By Yousef
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May 14, 2013 - 1. Nakba is the Arabic word for catastrophe. It is used to describe the Palestinian loss of land and property during the depopulation of Palestine from 1947-1949 and does not refer simply to the declaration of a state of Israel. 2. 212 localities depopulated and at least half of the refugees created during the Nakba were created prior to May 15th, which is, prior to the entry of armies of other Arab states. The largest Palestinian cities at the time, Yaffa and Haifa, were emptied of the vast majority of their inhabitants before May 15th, 1948. The idea that refugee creation happened only after, or only as a result of, the mobilization of Arab armies is patently false...
  continua / continued avanti - next    [97589] [ 16-may-2013 05:35 ECT ]

Marwan Barghouthi: “Right Of Return, A Sacred Right”
Saed Bannoura

May 14, 2013 - In a statement released from his prison cell, detained Palestinian political leader, Marwan Barghouthi, stated that May 15, marks the 65th anniversary of the Nakba, when Israel was established in the historic land of Palestine, over the ruins of hundreds of displaced and destroyed villages and towns, and added that on this day, the Palestinians reaffirm their legitimate inalienable Right of Return to their homeland. The Fateh leader said that the Palestinian people will never abandon their legitimate rights, and insist on the implementation of all related international resolutions, including United Nations General Assembly Resolution #194 regarding the Right of Return of the Palestinian refugees to their homeland...
  continua / continued avanti - next    [97588] [ 16-may-2013 05:31 ECT ]

US Denies April Air Strike Deaths in Afghanistan
by Jason Ditz
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May 14, 2013 - US commander Gen. Joseph Dunford has officially denied that the April 6 air strikes against the Kunar Province, which killed a number of civilians, including at least 11 children, were the US’ fault. Rather, Gen. Dunford claims that all of the civilians slain must’ve been killed by the Taliban since "no US, no coalition forces were involved in the deaths." It is a bizarre claim since the Afghan government has repeatedly confirmed the deaths were caused by air strikes...
  continua / continued avanti - next    [97587] [ 16-may-2013 05:23 ECT ]

Israel plans construction scheme to facilitate Bedouin land confiscation
Middle East Monitor

May 14, 2013- Israeli media sources reported on Monday May 13, that the Israeli government plans to construct a city in the West Bank's Jordan Valley for Palestinian Bedouins.Palestinians are of the opinion that the scheme will indirectly allow Israel to control vast areas of land where the Bedouin have lived and worked for decades. It will also free the Occupation from the embarrassment caused by the series of prosecutions, assaults and acts of displacement that the Israeli authorities carry out against Bedouin families and farmers in order to displace them....
  continua / continued avanti - next    [97586] [ 16-may-2013 05:20 ECT ]

The Justice Department’s Seizing of AP Phone Records: A Continuation of Attacks on Freedom of the Press
By: Kevin Gosztola

May 14, 2013- The US Justice Department’s secret seizure of phone records of reporters and editors at the Associated Press is nothing less than a continuation of attacks on freedom of the press that have been ongoing under the administration of President Barack Obama. Carl Bernstein, famed investigative journalist who broke the story on the Watergate scandal with Bob Woodward, appeared on MSNBC’s "Morning Joe" and declared this is a "matter of policy." It goes right up to the president and the people who surround him, the very officials who have waged an unprecedented war on whistleblowers and leaks...
  continua / continued avanti - next    [97585] [ 16-may-2013 05:18 ECT ]

Shaker Aamer, Abandoned in Guantánamo
Andy Worthington
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May 14, 2013- Although the prison-wide hunger strike at Guantánamo is still raging, and President Obama spoke eloquently last week about the need for the prison to be closed, it remains painfully true that, for the 86 prisoners (out of 166 in total), who were cleared for release by an inter-agency task force that President Obama established in 2009, there is still no easy route out.The case of Shaker Aamer, the last British resident in the prison, ought to be the easiest to resolve. One of the 86, his return has regularly been requested since August 2007 by the British government, and the legislative obstacles raised by Congress to prevent the release of prisoners to countries they regard as dangerous doesn’t apply in Shaker’s case — the UK, after all, where his wife and children live, and are all British citizens, is America’s staunchest ally in the "war on terror," and more than capable of keeping Shaker under surveillance if that were to be requested....
  continua / continued avanti - next    [97584] [ 16-may-2013 05:14 ECT ]

The criminalization of political dissent in America
Tom Carter

May 14, 2013- In a series of prosecutions, precedents are being established for the criminalization of political dissent in America. Last week, Massachusetts high school student Cameron D’Ambrosio was arrested and charged under "terrorism" laws merely for posting lyrics on Facebook that make reference to the Boston Marathon bombings. He faces 20 years in prison. A string of similar "terror" prosecutions around the country take aim at the First Amendment protection of free speech and political expression.The authorities have already branded select participants in Occupy Wall Street and anti-NATO protests as "terrorists."....
  continua / continued avanti - next    [97583] [ 16-may-2013 05:11 ECT ]

ICC prosecutor opens initial probe into Gaza flotilla
AFP

May 14, 2013 -- The International Criminal Court has opened a preliminary probe into Israel's deadly raid on a Gaza-bound flotilla in 2010, the prosecutor's office said Tuesday. "My office will be conducting a preliminary examination in order to establish whether the criteria for opening an investigation are met," Fatou Bensouda said in a statement issued from the court based in The Hague.Nine Turkish nationals were killed when Israeli commandos staged a botched pre-dawn raid on a six-ship flotilla seeking to bust Israel's naval blockade of the Gaza Strip on May 31, 2010...
  continua / continued avanti - next    [97582] [ 16-may-2013 05:06 ECT ]

Syria News - May 13, 2013 (Warning: Graphic Videos)
Local Coordination Committees of Syria + Videos
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May 13, 2013 - By the end of Monday, local coordination coomitttes documented 81 martyrs including 3 women, 4 children and 2 martyrs under torture: 35 martyrs were reported in Damascus and its suburbs; 14 in Hama; 10 in Aleppo;10 in Homs; 6 in Idlib; 4 in Daraa; and 2 in Deir Ezzor. The committees have documented 415 points of shelling in different Syrian cites and areas among them 47 points were under warplane shelling, and explosive barrels were recorded used in Erbeen, Mleiha, Mseifra, and the perimeter of Menegh Military Airport, also Saraqeb was targeted with cluster bombs and Erbeen with thermobaric bombs, whereas artillery shelling was reported in 143 points, mortar shelling in 115 points, and rocket shelling in 103 points........
  continua / continued avanti - next    [97581] [ 16-may-2013 04:41 ECT ]

Ayad Allawi: Demonstrations Won’t Stop Unless Maliki Resigns
By: Ali Abel Sadah for Al-Monitor Iraq Pulse

May 13, 2013 - Iraqiya List leader and former Prime Minister Ayad Allawi said that the protests in the Iraq provinces that are home to a Sunni majority won’t stop unless Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki's government resigns, thus paving a way for a reduced government to be formed to organize early general elections in which its members cannot participate.During a meeting with a number of Iraqi journalists at his house in the upscale neighborhood of Harthiya in Baghdad, Allawi said, "Maliki did not listen to our advice concerning the need to heed the demands of the demonstrators and attempt to implement as many as possible." He pointed out that Maliki "went in the opposite direction and described the protesters as terrorists and Baathists."...

  continua / continued avanti - next    [97579] [ 15-may-2013 23:40 ECT ]

Israelis Protest Austerity Harshness
by Stephen Lendman

May 13, 2013 - On May 11, thousands of Israelis protested publicly. They did so for social justice. More on that below. In summer 2011, widespread social justice protests erupted. They continued for weeks. Others followed in summer 2012.Several Israelis protested by self-immolation. Moshe Silman's remembered best. He died for justice denied. During a July 14, 2012 protest, he poured gasoline over his body. He set himself ablaze. He left a letter saying:""The state of Israel stole from me and robbed me. It left me helpless." "Two Housing and Construction Ministry committees rejected me, even though I had a stroke."...
  continua / continued avanti - next    [97578] [ 15-may-2013 23:27 ECT ]

Israeli airport sorts passengers with ‘Jewish stickers’ and ‘Arab stickers’
by Philip Weiss
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May 13, 2013- This shocking story-- of yet another "huge humiliation" of a non-Jew at Ben Gurion airport-- was posted by Mira Awad, an Israeli Palestinian singer, on her Facebook page, in Hebrew, today. Ami Kaufman at +972 provided a translation of the entry, and notes that Awad is a celebrity in Israel. Awad in translation: So, I was checked at the airport, they asked the questions, put the stickers on, and I proceeded to the X-Ray machine. Suddenly, the young security man comes to me: "Mira? Mira Awad?" Me: "Yes?" Security man: "Can I see your passport? There’s a mistake with the sticker." I almost told him: "No, you’re not mistaken, I see you put the right one on — the sticker for Arabs", but I didn’t say that (security people have their humor extracted during their preparatory course). I gave him my passport, he opens it, takes off the sticker in the passport and on the suitcase and puts on a new one, different, the same color but smaller. Now the dilemma. On the one hand it’s obvious the young man has just made my life easier by putting on the sticker for Jews. On the other hand, it’s one of the things that it’s hard to say thanks for...
  continua / continued avanti - next    [97577] [ 15-may-2013 23:01 ECT ]

Biden and Bush: Two (Imperialist) Peas in a (Colonialist) Pod
Ben Norton

May 13, 2013 - ...Biden beseeches the aether, in earnest, "Why this terrorist phenomenon at the beginning of the 21 century." Apparently "this terrorist phenomenon," this whole "terrorism" thing, is new in human history, going back only a decade. Native American genocide; scorched earth campaigns in the Philippine-American war; the annexation of half of Mexico; the bombing of Nagasaki, Hiroshima, and Dresden; the My Lai Massacre; the use of Agent Orange on Vietnamese civilians; the use of white phosphorous of Iraqi civilians (before 2003); the NATO bombing of Yugoslavia—none of this was "terrorism." The myopia is astounding. But the innocence in his voice, his incessant interrogative cries, the childlike sincerity, bring us to tears. Why do they hate us, Mommy? Why can’t they just be nice?...
  continua / continued avanti - next    [97576] [ 15-may-2013 22:50 ECT ]

Jeremy Scahill: Other Side of the Barrel of the Gun
by Nozomi Hayase

May 13, 2013- I recently had an opportunity to hear Jeremy Scahill, author of the international best-selling book, Blackwater speak about his new book. Dirty Wars: The World Is a Battlefield has also been made into a documentary directed by Rick Rowley and is scheduled for release across the US in June.In his presentation to a packed audience in Oakland, California, Scahill mentioned the Reagan’s CIA wars and their attempts to recolonize parts of Latin America. He then showed how these Dirty Wars from the 80s are back — in Pakistan, Yemen, Somalia and other corners of the world. Under the post-911 'counter-terrorism’ meme, this impulse of imperial colonization continues in the Middle East and North Africa. Scahill’s investigations uncovered the real-world consequences of brutal foreign policy being carried forward by the Obama administration ...
  continua / continued avanti - next    [97575] [ 15-may-2013 22:43 ECT ]

Egypt's 6 April joins signature drive against President Morsi
Ahram Online
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May 13, 2013- Egypt's 6 April Youth Group has joined the recently launched 'Rebel Movement' campaign, which aims to collect citizens' signatures for a petition calling for a vote of no-confidence in the administration of President Mohamed Morsi. Khaled El-Masry, 6 April spokesman, stated on Sunday that the new signature drive represented a "peaceful, forward-thinking and democratic means by which to oppose the current regime and reveal the extent of its [declining] popularity among the Egyptian public." According to organisers, the campaign is currently active in 19 out of Egypt's 27 governorates and in nine foreign countries... At a Sunday afternoon press conference, a Rebel Movement spokesman stated that a total of 2 million signatures had already been collected. In Cairo alone, he said, 800,000 signatures had been collected, while another 10,000 had been gathered in the Suez governorate...
  continua / continued avanti - next    [97574] [ 15-may-2013 22:29 ECT ]

Attacks on Sunni mosques fuel fears in Iraq
By SAMEER N. YACOUB | Associated Press

May 13, 2013 — A sharp rise in attacks on Sunni holy sites in Iraq is feeding fears that the country could spiral into a new round of sectarian violence similar to the bloodletting that brought Iraq to its knees in 2006 and 2007...At least 29 Sunni mosques were attacked between mid-April and early May, according to Mahmoud al-Sumaidaie, the deputy head of Iraq's Sunni Endowment, which oversees the sect's holy sites. At least 65 Sunni worshippers were killed, according to a tally compiled by The Associated Press from police reports. By contrast, two Shiite mosques were hit in bombings that killed one person over the same period, police and hospital officials said. Dozens of Shiites were killed in attacks by Sunni extremists at places other than holy sites during this time...
  continua / continued avanti - next    [97573] [ 15-may-2013 22:24 ECT ]

The Deepening Shame of Guantanamo
By Ray McGovern

May 13, 2013 - There have been nine congressional hearings on the Benghazi controversy – with more to come – but almost no one in Congress dares put the spotlight on the unfolding scandal surrounding the Guantanamo Bay prison where most of the remaining 166 inmates have opted to "escape" from indefinite detention via the only way open to them – starving themselves to death. One exception to the congressional cowardice is Rep. Jim Moran, D-Virginia, who sponsored a highly instructive panel discussion on the prison at Guantanamo last Friday. Why simply a "briefing," rather than a formal House hearing? Simple. Not one of the majority Republicans who currently chair committees in the House and have the power to call hearings wants Americans to hear the details of this blight on the nation’s conscience...
  continua / continued avanti - next    [97572] [ 15-may-2013 22:01 ECT ]

Guantánamo hunger strikers subject to harsh new method of force feeding
Matt Williams
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May 13, 2013 - Hunger-strikers being force fed at Guantánamo Bay are shackled to a chair, fitted with a mask and have tubes inserted through their nose and into their stomachs for up to two hours at a time, according to revised guidelines in use at the camp. The guidelines, which were updated after the latest protest by inmates began in February, detail the process of involuntary feeding and how after the sessions, detainees are kept in a "dry cell" to prevent them vomiting. News of the 30-page Standard Operating Procedure (SOP) manual – which was first published on Monday, by al-Jazeera, and has since been confirmed to be genuine by the US military – comes amid fresh questions over the ethics of force-feeding protesters at the prison...
  continua / continued avanti - next    [97571] [ 15-may-2013 21:39 ECT ]

Brother and sister arrested without charge in Kufr Qalil
International Solidarity Movement

May 13, 2013 - At 1:30 am on May 12, Israeli soldiers arrested a brother and sister from Kufr Qalil without charge and ransacked their home, terrorizing their family and leaving them with no information about the siblings’ imprisonment. Israeli soldiers arrived at the residence of Abu Mahyoub Mansour in Kufr Qalil in south Nablus as at least five army jeeps surrounded the family home and eighteen soldiers entered looking for his daughter Tahrir, 29 and son Saddam, 27. All thirteen occupants in the house, including two small children, were woken and made to walk downstairs into one room, among them the youngest daughter, 19, who is severely disabled with cerebral palsy. She cannot walk and had to be woken up and carried down, crying in fear...
  continua / continued avanti - next    [97570] [ 15-may-2013 21:33 ECT ]

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