1.31.2009

Israeli war criminals in Pagatonia

Like their Nazi forebears, the ZioNazi criminals seem to prefer South American countries for their hidey-holes. While you visit Kawther's site, check out the hate mail from Mary Jacobs. Classy. - Ed.

The Israeli war criminals who participated in the so-called “Operation Cast Lead”, the offensive launched by the Israeli Occupation Forces (IOF) on the Gaza Strip between 27 December and 18 January 2009, in which they killed and murdered 1350 and injured over 5000, in addition to the demolition of thousands of homes, industrial and commercial facilities, and the displacement of tens of thousands of Palestinian citizens who were left without a home, continue traveling in large groups and even in complete military units to Patagonia in the south of Chile and Argentina, for bad and unknown purposes.

Read more @ Kawther Salam

Israel hopes to colonize parts of Iraq as 'greater Israel'

By Wayne Madsen

(WMR) -- Israeli expansionists, their intentions to take full control of the West Bank and the Gaza Strip and permanently keep the Golan Heights of Syria and expand into southern Lebanon already well known, also have their eyes on parts of Iraq considered part of a biblical “Greater Israel.”

Israel reportedly has plans to relocate thousands of Kurdish Jews from Israel, including expatriates from Kurdish Iran, to the Iraqi cities of Mosul and Nineveh under the guise of religious pilgrimages to ancient Jewish religious shrines. According to Kurdish sources, the Israelis are secretly working with the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) to carry out the integration of Kurdish and other Jews into areas of Iraq under control of the KRG.

Read more @ SOS

Just thought you should know: Exxon smashes profit record

US oil colossus Exxon Mobil has brushed off a 33% drop in fourth quarter income to record the largest ever annual profit by a publicly listed company.

Read more @ SKY News

Governments across Europe trembling

France paralysed by a wave of strike action, the boulevards of Paris resembling a debris-strewn battlefield. The Hungarian currency sinks to its lowest level ever against the euro, as the unemployment figure rises. Greek farmers block the road into Bulgaria in protest at low prices for their produce. New figures from the biggest bank in the Baltic show that the three post-Soviet states there face the biggest recessions in Europe.

Read more @ Guardian

Israeli ambassador telegraphs timeline for problems with Iran: the upcoming month

1.30.2009

Say what? Military to pledge oath to Obama, not Constitution?

Conservative News and Reporting
"News for the Rest of Us"
Michele Chang

Secretary of Defense Robert Gates is extremely frustrated with orders that the White House is contemplating. According to sources at the Pentagon, including all branches of the armed forces, the Obama Administration may break with a centuries-old tradition.

A spokesman for General James Cartwright, the Vice Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, states that the Obama Administration wants to have soldiers and officers pledge a loyalty oath directly to the office of the President, and no longer to the Constitution.

Read more @ Jumping in Pools

Organized Jewry Opposes Free Speech

by Kevin MacDonald

It is something of an axiom of Jewish life that "Is it good for the Jews?" remains the litmus test of Jewish communal activity - in other words, interest over principles. A good example is free speech. There can be little doubt that the organized Jewish community sees free speech as a problem because it may be used to criticize the behavior of Jewish organizations and especially Israel.

Read more @ Rense

The Cruxifiction of Bishop Williamson

An outstanding read, including comments. - Ed.

As I observe the vilification of Bishop Williamson occurring in the Catholic blogosphere, I can’t help but recall the gospel account of the crucifixion of Christ Himself. For with the exception of the Blessed Mother and St. John, the rest of His apostles had abandoned Him, quaking in their boots “for fear of the Jews” (John 19:38).

Fast forward 20 centuries and something eerily similar seems to be happening again. Only this time, the person being abandoned and crucified is Bishop Richard Williamson of the Society of St. Pius X. And what was his crime, pray tell? It seems His Excellency has a penchant for speaking the truth to power, something Our Lord Himself was not afraid to do, including the following flamer - right to the Pharisees’ faces (John 8:44):

Read more @ Truth Is Beauty


Greenwald: Increasing even-handedness in the Middle East

It's now rather clear that the debate in the U.S. over Israel and the Middle East is becoming increasingly more balanced and open, and there are even some very preliminary though encouraging signs that the Obama administration will take a more even-handed approach. As I wrote about the other day, the truly excellent report by 60 Minutes' Bob Simon, focusing on the destructive impact of expanding West Bank settlements, was a startling departure from the rules governing what normally would be aired in such venues with regard to Israel.

Read more @ Salon

WSJ: Gaza tensions erupt at Davos session

DAVOS, Switzerland -- High-level tensions over the Gaza conflict spilled into the spotlight when Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan of Turkey stormed off a stage at the World Economic Forum after a passionate exchange with Israeli President Shimon Peres.

Read more @ WSJ

Turkish PM storms off stage at Davos

Turkey's prime minister has stormed off the stage at the World Economic Forum in Davos after a heated debate on Gaza with Israel's president.

Recep Tayyip Erdogan clashed with Shimon Peres, whose voice had risen as he made an impassioned defence of Israel's actions, jabbing his finger.

Mr Erdogan said Mr Peres had spoken so loudly to conceal his "guilt".

Read more, watch video @ BBC News


Bibi fires up the scaremonger machine

Just when the world thought it was stepping back from the brink with the success of Barack Obama’s presidential campaign, the world now finds itself again facing the prospect of having an aggressive and militarist nation being led by a right-wing nationalist madman intent on creating more living space for those that think they are God’s chosen people at the expense of those they think are inferior. (Gee, haven’t we all heard this stuff before somewhere?!)\

Read more @ Telling the History of the 21st Century As It Really Is

Bibi: Iran threat trumps economic crisis

Keeping Iran from obtaining nuclear weapons ranks above the economy in the challenges facing leaders in the 21st century, Likud head Binyamin Netanyahu told the World Economic Forum on Thursday. [OH REALLY??!!??]

Netanyahu said the global financial meltdown was reversible but the acquisition of nuclear weapons by a "fanatic radical regime" was not. "We have never had, since the dawn of the nuclear age, nuclear weapons in the hands of such a fanatical regime," he added. [EXCEPT FOR ISRAEL!!!]

The Likud leader also spoke forcefully on the need to lower taxes and increase competitiveness in the Israeli economy if he emerges as prime minister after the February 10 elections.

Earlier Thursday, Netanyahu told Israel Radio that Israel did not complete its attack on Hamas in IDF Operation Cast Lead in the Gaza Strip, and said that it was up to Israel to respond to the roadside bomb which killed an IDF soldier on the Gaza border on Tuesday.

"After the murder of the soldier at Kissufim, I said to the prime minister, 'Act immediately, strike powerfully and immediately, [Israel] needs a strong, immediate response,'" he said. "The next government will not have a choice but to finish the job, and to remove terror bases located next to Ashkelon and [close to] Tel Aviv."

On economic matters, Netanyahu said that Israel was entering the global financial crisis in a better state than most countries. He surmised that Israel would be able to overcome the situation quickly if the matter is dealt with in a decisive manner.[WHICH IS ALL HIGHLY SUSPICIOUS FOR PEOPLE WHO USE THEIR BRAIN CELLS]

He reiterated his opinion that taxes must be lowered in order to deal with the meltdown.

From the Jerusalem Post

http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1233050202246&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull


C. Story: Obama being used as a false front by the crooks

Latest update. It's not looking so good for us. People need to be ARRESTED. - Ed.

Read the report @ Global Analysis

Why didn't the Palestinian chickens cross the road? Because the IOF killed them.

Israel’s devastating war on Gaza claimed the lives of more than 1,335 persons and left at least 5,500 other wounded. In addition tens of thousands of utilities, houses, businesses, and factories were partially or totally destroyed. The war caused psychological damage for thousands of people especially children. I reported on the war daily and my focus was on the human toll. However, I recently came across a story that changed my focus completely a revealed to me the true nature of Israel’s soldiers and their intent in invading Gaza.

Read more @ Desert Peace

Cryptogon puts together some strange dots in family suicide

Just go read. I don't know where to begin...

Russian finance minister offers to save the world

Russia’s Minister for Finance, Aleksey Kudrin, released a sensational statement Wednesday. Speaking at the World Economic Forum in Davos, the Russian minister offered to mitigate the world credit crisis with the help of Russia’s reserves. Kudrin stated that Russia was an “island of stability in the sea of the world crisis.”

Read more @ Pravda

Open letter to Barack Obama

Dear Mr. President,

I did not vote for you in the Presidential Election because I am Malaysian. But, I consider myself one of your constituents because what you do or say will affect me and my country as well. I welcome your promise for change. Certainly your country, the United States of America needs a lot of changes.

Read more @ Watching America

1.29.2009

Dazed and confused? That's because you're being mugged.

by Simon Davies and Donald Hunt at SOTT

Excerpts:

What is important is that we understand that we are in a controlled Phase Transition. It may seem chaotic to us but there is an underlying order to it. We are being taken to a new economic phase or Economic Order. The separation between the state and big business is long gone, we find ourselves with increasingly narrow options as our environment changes around us in ways increasingly unfamiliar. We have to apply ourselves in seeking to understand as exactly as possible the new economic environment so as to be better able to navigate our way through it.

We are moving, without doubt, towards totalitarian government first on a national, then regional and ultimately global scale. Totalitarianism has to be resisted on the street, in the market place and in our hearts and minds. Protest is crucial to resistance for it shows us that we are not alone. Similarly economic boycotts at an individual level seem as a drop in the ocean but when added together the economic actions we all take are the economy; if we all boycott a country's products then there will be no market for them; if we all take our bank deposits from the banks there will be a real banking crisis.

and...

We don't have the data access, resources or tools to prove what is happening but if our hunch is right then we have an extraordinary situation. The Fed is having the US government borrow vast sums through the issuance of Treasury Securities issued to the Fed by the government in exchange not for cash but for a data entry in the government's accounts with the Fed, the Fed then takes this non-cash money, this data entry, from the government's account and credit's it to the accounts of it's crony banks who immediately give it back to the Fed in exchange for the Treasury Securities issued by the government to "fund" the injection into the banks. So the US government runs up vast debts, the banks get to rebuild their balance sheets and, to the extent this is fully mirrored at all levels, absolutely no money goes into the economy whatsoever. America is being scammed and, ironically, Obama's "tough restrictions may only exacerbate the scam.

Read more @ SOTT

Fed to Consumers: Damn, you look good!

Washington, D.C. – “Wow, really, just…wow,” said Federal Reserve Board Chairman Ben Bernanke to American consumers in a Tuesday morning press release. “Have you been working out? Cause it shows.”

Analysts are suggesting that this particular press release was intended to combat the ongoing problem of low consumer confidence. Declining confidence has been indicated as the driving force behind the current economic slump. The Reserve board is hoping reassuring words will provide some solace.

Read more @ Monkey Breath
h/t Kenny's Sideshow

Is financial chaos all a big plot?

Riots in Latvia, Greece and Iceland with more civil unrest simmering in global flashpoints, including Ireland. Never has the phrase, "out of chaos will come order" been more apt.

One wonders if this financial meltdown hasn't been contrived.

Why hasn't the world's elite of bankers, politicians and industrialists not met to steer a way out of this turmoil?

There is no reason why the highly influential Bilderberg group could not bring forward its annual conclave from the end of May to the present time.

Or is it, as one suspects, that it shares the three-legged stool approach, as advocated by its sister policy group, the Trilateral Commission, whereby the economies of America, Asia and Europe are being deliberately nobbled so that we all end up with the same GNP and GDP as the continent of Africa, along with a single monetary unit and low interest rates, all managed by the IMF?

The net result being that corporations grow wealthier while the rest of us become enslaved. If this is the New World Order I will gladly settle for the old order any day.

John Finegan Bailieborough, Co Cavan

Source: Independent.ie


Governments turn to barter deals as credit to secure food dries up

By Javier Blas in London

Published: January 27 2009 02:00 | Last updated: January 27 2009 02:00

Countries struggling to secure credit have resorted to barter and secretive government-to-government deals to buy food, with some contracts worth hundreds of millions of dollars.

In a striking example of how the global financial crisis and high food prices have strained the finances of poor and middle-income nations, countries including Russia, Malaysia, Vietnam and Morocco say they have signed or are discussing inter-government and barter deals to import commodities from rice to vegetable oil.

Read more @ FT


Gates: Cash cows of war running dry

In his first appearance before the Senate Armed Services Committee as a member of President Barack Obama's cabinet, Defense Secretary Robert Gates today issued more words of warning to the defense industry and Pentagon bureaucracy.

"One thing we have known for many months is that the spigot of defense funding opened by 9/11 is closing," he said. "With two major campaigns ongoing, the economic crisis and resulting budget pressures will force hard choices on this department."

Read more @ Wired


Gilad Atzmon, no choice but to speak out

Now a resident of London, Gilad Atzmon is a world-renowned saxophonist and the author of two novels, which have been translated into 22 languages.

by Martin Gibson

He left Israel in 1994 after service in the Israeli military convinced him Israel had become a racist, militarised state that was a danger to world peace.

"I was born in a place that happens to be very strategically crucial to quite a few empires, and I was indoctrinated to take part in these idiotic wars and I managed to escape eventually. When I was there I started to see the scale of the atrocities that are committed on my behalf by the Israelis in the name of the Israeli state, with the support of the Jewish people around the world.

"Now and then you hear about one Jew here and one Jew there who is against it, but institutionally this war is supported by world Jewry inside-out."

While he believes people run a risk speaking out against Israel, Gilad Atzmon says he has no choice.

Read more @ The Gisborne Herald

Bibi yet to unclench the Israeli fist in pursuit of power

Excerpt:

At a Zionist cocktail party the other night, I listened as a voice of impeccable New Jersey cadence proclaimed that the state's fatal flaw was that most Israelis had not moved to live in West Bank settlements. The struggle with the Palestinians often overshadows the interestingly fractured character of this beleaguered democracy. But the swirl of influences on its domestic debate encompasses a global span of attitudes and prejudices.

Read more @ Telegraph.co.uk

Bibi: AQ to blow up holiest Christian site

Benjamin Netanyahu, the favorite to win the upcoming Israeli election, says al Qaeda terrorists will destroy Jesus Christ's burial site.

Netanyahu, who claims he had predicted an Islamic extremists attack on the World Trade Center six years before the actual attack, said terrorists will target Church of the Holy Sepulchre also known as the Church of the Resurrection - Christianity's holiest site.

Read more @ Press TV


Controversial bestseller shakes the foundation of the Israeli state

What if the Palestinian Arabs who have lived for decades under the heel of the modern Israeli state are in fact descended from the very same "children of Israel" described in the Old Testament?

And what if most modern Israelis aren't descended from the ancient Israelites at all, but are actually a mix of Europeans, North Africans and others who didn't "return" to the scrap of land we now call Israel and establish a new state following the attempt to exterminate them during World War II, but came in and forcefully displaced people whose ancestors had lived there for millennia?

Read more @ Alternet


Auntie Ziona: Pope and theater industry target the Jewish people

When do the Jewish people have to renounce the vicious, racist, anti-Christian teachings of the Talmud? - Ed.

Oy, these anti-Semitic meshuggenah stage artists are now refusing to work for the BBZ (British Broadcasting Zionists).

I am so happy because this really leaves us with our Mark'le Thomson and his wife to take care of our interests and the organization.

Who needs these actors anyway? They are not the real thing, they just pretend for a living.

The goyim really do not like us anymore, just because we killed a few islamofacists in Goyza.

Read more @ Auntie Ziona

Pope, expressing solidarity with Jews, reacts to uproar over a Holocaust denier

When to the Jewish people have to renounce the vicious, racist, anti-Christian teachings of the Talmud? - Ed.


ROME — Pope Benedict XVI on Wednesday addressed for the first time the uproar over his decision to rehabilitate a Holocaust-denying bishop, expressing solidarity with Jews and strongly condemning Holocaust denial. In his weekly audience with the public on Wednesday, Benedict said he “renewed with love” his “full and indisputable solidarity” with Jews, whom he called “our brothers of the first covenant.”

Read more @ NY Times

Chief Rabbinate breaks Vatican ties

When do the Jewish people have to renounce the vicious, racist, anti-Christian teachings of the Talmud? - Ed.

JERUSALEM, Jan. 28 (UPI) -- The Chief Rabbinate of Israel says it has suspended ties with the Vatican following the pope's decision to lift the excommunication of a Holocaust denier.

Chief Rabbinate Director-General Oded Weiner wrote in a letter to Vatican officials that because of Pope Benedict's decision to reinstate Britain's Bishop Richard Williamson "without a public apology and recanting, it will be difficult to continue the dialogue," The Jerusalem Post reported Wednesday.

Read more @ UPI


Jewish leaders condemn Pope over Holocause bishop

When do the Jewish people have to renounce the vicious, racist, anti-Christian teachings of the Talmud? - Ed.

Leading members of Britain's Jewish community have joined in condemnation of the Pope's decision to lift the excommunication on a bishop who denies the Holocaust at the same time as the nation commemorates the six million Jews murdered in the Nazi death camps.

Read more @ Times UK

Egypt attacks Iran and allies in Arab world

This is what we get for our money. Egypt is the second largest recipient of US aid after you-know-who, and we basically pay Egypt to behave like this, which helps you-know-who. - Ed.

CAIRO (Reuters) - Egypt aired its grievances against Iran, the Palestinian Islamist movement Hamas and the Lebanese Shi'ite group Hezbollah, saying they worked together in the fighting over Gaza to provoke conflict in the Middle East.

"(They tried) to turn the region to confrontation in the interest of Iran, which is trying to use its cards to escape Western pressure ... on the nuclear file," Foreign Minister Ahmed Aboul Gheit said in an interview with Orbit satellite channel broadcast Wednesday.

Read more @ Reuters


Former CIA station chief target of rape inquiry

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- A former CIA station chief in Algeria is under investigation by the State and Justice departments after being accused of raping at least two women while he held the post, a source confirmed to CNN on Wednesday.

Read more @ CNN.com

Labour MPs fear Brown 'is losing it'

He doesn't look so good in the picture. - Ed.

CONFIDENCE in Gordon Brown’s leadership is collapsing among Labour MPs and ministers, party insiders revealed yesterday.

Backbenchers have warned Government whips that voters are becoming increasingly frustrated with the Prime Minister over the tidal wave of job cuts and threatened tax rises.

Read more @ Daily Express

Palin sets up a PAC in sign she'll be around in 2012

Insert forehead slap here. - Ed.

WASHINGTON — Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin opened a political action committee Tuesday, a move that may not outright confirm her intentions of running for president in 2012 but indicates she intends to remain a regular on the national political stage.

Read more @ McClatchy

Officials: Firm knew about salmonella, shipped anyway

Operators of the Georgia peanut-processing plant at the center of a nationwide salmonella outbreak knew of bacteria at the facility as early as 2007, but continued to ship their peanut butter and paste to dozens of companies, federal health officials said yesterday.

Read more @ Newsday.com

1.28.2009

Congress seeks to authorize and legalize FEMA camp facilities, HR 645

by Lee Rogers

1-26-09

A new bill has been introduced in the U.S. House of Representatives called the National Emergency Centers Act or HR 645. This bill if passed into law will direct the Secretary of Homeland Security to establish national emergency centers otherwise known as FEMA camp facilities on military installations. This is an incredibly disturbing piece of legislation considering that the powers that be have already set in motion an agenda to setup a nationwide marital law apparatus through U.S. Northern Command and the Department of Homeland Security. Apparently, the fusion centers, militarized police, surveillance cameras and a domestic military command is not enough. Even though we already know that detention facilities are already in place, they now want to legalize the construction of FEMA camps on military installations using the ever popular excuse that the facilities are for the purposes of a national emergency. With the phony debt based economy getting worse and worse by the day, the possibility of civil unrest is becoming a greater threat to the establishment. One need only look at Iceland, Greece and other nations for what might happen in the United States next. With this in mind, it appears as if these so called national emergency centers will be used in a national emergency but only if the national emergency requires large groups of people to be rounded up and detained. If that isn’t the case, than why have these national emergency facilities built in military installations?

Read more @ fourwinds10.com


Financial Terrorism 2009

Project Humanbeingsfirst

Excerpt:

And there you have it once again, within the short span of 6 weeks. Henry Kissinger floats the same trial balloon as Gideon Rachman previously did in 'And now for a world government', Financial Times, December 8 2008. Project Humanbeingsfirst's response to the Gideon Rachman's oped also applies to unraveling Dr. Kissinger's disingenuous “Now disillusionment with the United States' management of it is widespread” and “The alternative to a new international order is chaos.” Especially, when his globalist financial cohorts, and 'full spectrum dominance' Zionist advocates, are the very ones who have calculatingly planted, germinated, nurtured, fully grown, and now ready to harvest, those very seeds of chaos as per CFR's 1974 paradigm argued in 'The Hard Road To World Order':

In short, the ‘house of world order’ will have to be built from the bottom up, rather than from the top down. It will look like a great ‘booming, buzzing confusion’ to use William James’ famous description of reality, but an end run around national sovereignty, eroding it piece by piece will accomplish much more than the old-fashioned frontal assault.”

So they diabolically manufacture the cataclysms, and then propose exactly the solutions they prefer that would fulfill their globalist agendas! It once again brings to full circle implementation these ominous words of G. Edward Griffin from 'The Capitalist Conspiracy': “Create conditions so frightful at home and abroad, that the abandonment of personal liberties and national sovereignty, will appear as a reasonable price for a return to domestic tranquility and world peace.”

What more proof does one need, with tortuous events continually repeating and always serendipitously being conforment to the requirements of their desired solutions that only make them richer, more powerful, and owning greater and greater combines, that there is a diabolically orchestrated conspiracy for one-world government by the financial oligarchs, and that it is now brazenly 'breaking surface'?

Read more @ project humanbeingsfirst

FISA: Grill the Executives

by emptywheel

Threat Level has posted an intriguing interview with Russell Tice from 2006. Tice provides a better idea of how some of the sorting might have happened.

Tice: Say you're pretty sure you're looking for terrorists, and you're pretty sure that the percentage of women terrorists as opposed to men is pretty [small]. So you just filter out all female voices. And there's a way to determine whether the signature of the voice is male or female. So, boom, you get rid of 50 percent of your information just by filtering there. Then from your intelligence work you realize that most terrorists never talk more than two minutes. So any conversation more than two minutes, you immediately filter that out. You start winnowing down what you're looking for.

Q: Without really knowing what it is you're looking for?

Tice: Right. And if you can develop a machine to look for the needle in the haystack and what you come out with from having the machine sift through the haystack is a box of straw, where maybe the needle's in there and maybe a few bonus needles, then that's a whole lot better than having humans try to sift through a haystack.

Sounds like a pretty easy system for determined terrorists to game.

Read more @ emptywheel


UPI: Kuwait orders nuclear emergency pills

MOORESVILLE, N.C., Jan. 23 (UPI) -- The government of Kuwait has contracted Internet-based radiation emergency products suppler Nukepills.com for a citizen protection initiative.

U.S. company Nukepills.com was awarded the contract from the Kuwaiti Ministry of Health. Under the approximately $1.4 million deal, Nukepills.com will supply 5.4 million of its trademarked ThyroShield potassium iodide doses.

Kuwait awarded the contract for the ThyroShield doses as part of an effort to stockpile nuclear radiation emergency protections. Officials say the ThyroShield is a liquid medicine that has thyroid-blocking capabilities to prevent thyroid cancer during radiation emergencies.

"This sale is the first large-scale order of ThyroShield from a foreign government," Troy Jones, Nukepills.com president, said in a statement.

"We are currently working on additional potassium iodide orders from other countries in the Middle East, Europe and Asia. We hope the new U.S. administration follows Kuwait's lead and reinstitutes the potassium iodide distribution plan to protect its citizens."

Source


"US and Iran share an equal monopoly on violence"

Read the whole thing. - Ed.

Excerpt:

IPS: Regarding Ross's positions on certain issues in the Middle East and particularly Iran over the past decade, how will Obama be able to adopt a new foreign policy path in the region?


RB: Well, he [Obama] needs the backing of the Democratic Party to get these things through politically, and that's why he has brought in people like Dennis Ross and Denny Blair, the Director of National Intelligence, simply because he needs that political backing. He cannot bring in untried people and run them against the Democratic Party, because if there is an opening with Iran, there will be a connivance of Israel, maybe a silent one, simply because the Israelis have to go along.

In American politics, you can't do anything in the Middle East without the approval of Tel Aviv, at least on some level. It's impossible. I mean, I cannot think of a country that is so beholden to a small country like this, even a superpower, in all of history. I can't even think of it.

IPS: And why is that?

RB: Look at New York City. Look at the major newspapers. They have a Zionist agenda. They do. I'm not Jewish. I'm not anything. I don't care about the Israelis. And I'm not anti-Semitic. It's just a fact. I suggested to my publisher writing a book on Israel, and he said forget it. You can't talk about the reality of Israel. The only place you can talk about the reality of Israel is in Israel. They tell you things you will never hear in the United States.

IPS: Like what?

RB: For instance, why are people on Gaza so unhappy? Well, if you had to live in a prison, wouldn't you be unhappy? You would never get that in the New York Times. Look at the New York Times; it's almost an extension of Israel.

Read more @ IPS News
h/t Atheo News

A Bibi-Barack Collision?

Don't hold your breath. - Ed.

by Patrick J. Buchanan

Where there is no solution, there is no problem," geostrategist James Burnham once wryly observed.

Ex-Sen. George Mitchell, the latest U.S. negotiator to take up the Palestine portfolio, may discover what it was that Burnham meant.

For Israel's three-week war on Gaza, where Palestinians died at a rate of 100 to one to Israelis, appears to have been, like Israel's wars in Lebanon, another Pyrrhic victory for the Jewish state.

Read more @ Antiwar.com


Hasbara Spam Alert

by Richard Silverstein

The hasbara brigade strikes again! You always hear about Israeli attempts at media manipulation. Everyone knows it's going on but usually the process happens through cyber insurgents like those involved with Giyus (and its media monitoring software, Megaphone). Now, we know that the Israeli foreign ministry itself is orchestrating propaganda efforts designed to flood news websites with pro-Israel arguments and information.

Read more @ Guardian.co.uk

Israeli jets hit Gaza Rafah border

Israel's response to losing a trained soldier: randomly kill whoever happens to be handy. - Ed.


Israeli warplanes have carried out at least three airstrikes at the Rafah border between the Gaza Strip and Egypt, witnesses say.


Some Rafah residents fled their homes in panic as an Israeli aircraft hit the area three times, Hamas officials said. There was no immediate report of casualties.

The Israeli army claimed that the airstrikes were carried out against "Hamas tunnels" in response to a Tuesday remote-control bomb attack along the Gaza border where one Israeli soldier was killed.

Israeli forces had responded to the airstrikes by killing a 24-year-old Palestinian farmer near the Kissufim crossing on the Gaza Strip border.

Read more @ Press TV

US missile strikes in Pakistan will continue - Gates

WASHINGTON, Jan 27 (Reuters) - The United States will continue to carry out missile strikes against al Qaeda militants in Pakistan, Defense Secretary Robert Gates said on Tuesday.

Pakistani officials have complained publicly about the attacks from unmanned U.S. aircraft in tribal areas, saying they are a violation of sovereignty and increase resentment towards both Pakistan's government and the United States.

Read more @ Reuters

Palestine, Pilger, Kosher Conspiracy

The editor of the New Statesman, Jason Cowley, has decided "to usher some established columnists, including John Pilger, out of the door."

(19 January 2009, troubled times at the New Statesman.)

This is the John Pilger who, on 8 January 2009, in the New Statesman, wrote a stunning article revealing the truth about Palestine:

Read more @ aangirfan

America is a Jewish Colony

By Bob Finch

How have America’s commentators reacted to Olmert’s confession?

Abraham Foxman defends Olmert

Abraham Foxman, national director of the Jewish fascist organization the Anti-Defamation League, defended Olmert by likening the incident to a private squabble between two friends. "I have no problem with what Olmert did," said Abraham Foxman, national director of the Anti-Defamation League. "I think the mistake was to talk about it in public. This is what friendships are about. He was not interfering in political issues. You have a relationship, and if you don’t like what is being done, then you go to the boss and tell him." (Nathan Guttman ‘Olmert’s Boast of ‘Shaming’ Rice Provokes Diplomatic Furor’ January 15, 2009).

This is just blatant spin. A person does not publicly boast about revealing his friend’s stupidity (i.e. Bush didn’t know the content of the resolution); he doesn’t enjoy boasting about humiliating a friend (Bush); nor relish shaming another friend (Rice).

Read more @ Atheo News

First Blood: Pictures from life's other side

by Chris Floyd

Already, Gaza has faded from the front pages of the Western press. Already it is yesterday's news, yesterday's massacre, just another in a long, long, endless line of human debauchery. After all, the Western press, the Western establishments, indeed, Western popular opinion, have often countenanced -- even championed -- far worse atrocities. The establishments and power structures of most Arab nations are also hastening to forget, to downplay, to bury, once again, the suffering of the Palestinians, in the interests of political gamesmanship, both domestic and diplomatic.)

Read more @ Empire Burlesque

One down: Obscenely decadent war profiteer hauled off in handcuffs

America's most ostentatious war profiteer is no longer a free man. In a long-anticipated move, FBI agents arrested bulletproof vest maker David H. Brooks in his Manhattan apartment at dawn on Thursday. In the tradition of Al Capone, Brooks was nabbed on allegations of financial shenanigans, despite strong suspicions that the defense contractor has much more serious crimes on his hands.

Read more @ Alternet

Hedge fund manager Arthur Nadel turns himself in

TAMPA, FL. - Sarasota hedge fund manager Arthur Nadel turned himself into authorities at 9:45 a.m. Tuesday.

According to Agent David Couvertier with the FBI, Nadel, accompanied by two attorneys, was place under arrest at the FBI field office in Tampa.

Nadel, head of Scoop Management, was overseeing six hedge funds valued at more than $300 million. He is accused of operating an investment scheme much like the ponzi scheme connected to investor Bernie Madoff.

Read more @ WWSB ABC 7 Florida

Thais admit boat people set adrift

More racist killing. - Ed.

A Thai naval officer has confirmed claims that ethnic Rohingya boat people from Myanmar, detained along Thailand's south-western coast, have been taken back out to sea and set adrift.

The naval officer, who declined to be identified, told Al Jazeera: "We have to take the engines off the boats or they will come back.

"The wind will carry them to India or somewhere."

Humanitarian groups have accused Thailand of systematically abusing migrants from the Muslim minority Rohingya.

The allegations of abuse came after accounts emerged of a group of Rohingya being beaten before being towed back out to sea after being intercepted off Indonesia.

Read more @ Aljazeera.net


Media averts eyes from subpoenas to Obama's top staff

Thomas Lifson – American Thinker January 25, 2009

That's how Doug Ross of Director Blue puts it, describing the import of the story the media chose to ignore. In the deadest news hole of the week, Saturday, the list of subpoenas served by Patrick Fitzgerald was released. It contained:

“A veritable "who's who" of Obama staffers, surrogates and affiliates were among those served with subpoenas. Put simply, within one week of President Barack Obama's administration taking office, it is already under significant legal scrutiny that will – at a minimum – take precious time away from dealing with the country's monumental economic and foreign policy challenges.”

If this had happened to Bush 43, do you suppose the media would have ignored it? The meme of Karl Rove being frog marched out of the White House would have been born immediately.

Read more @ The Truth Seeker

1.27.2009

The Corruption Scramble

David Axelrod and Valerie Jarrett, among others, subpoenaed in the Blagojevich scandal.

Geithner confirmed as Treasury Secretary, starts job by tackling lobbyist influence over TARP.

Conyers subpoenas Rove to testify on 2/2/09 re: US Attorney scandal.

Paulson starts new job at John Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies this week, where he will be a "distinguished visiting scholar" and "fellow" at the Bernard Schwartz Forum on Constructive Capitalism. [snort]

Clues to how the NSA spies on Americans & possible immunity for telecoms for helping gov spy

Those who like to read tea leaves to figure out how the Administration actually captures Americans' emails and phone calls without a warrant may have gotten a more cups to look at this week, even as telecom lobbyists are reportedly working hard to have Congress let them off the hook from pending lawsuits for their participation.

Read more @ Wired

Bush's Warrantless Spying Program Cast Far Wider Net Than Previously Thought; Media, Journalists & Bloggers Targeted

Former U.S. Intelligence Official Reveals Bush Administration Indiscriminately Eavesdropped on All Americans' Telephone, Internet and Fax Communications Without Court Warrants -- Far Exceeding the Scope of a Similar 1970s Program Under Nixon That the Supreme Court Declared Unconstitutional

Read more @ Skeeter Bites Report

25 people at the heart of the meltdown

The worst economic turmoil since the Great Depression is not a natural phenomenon but a man-made disaster in which we all played a part. In the second part of a week-long series looking behind the slump, Guardian City editor Julia Finch picks out the individuals who have led us into the current crisis.

Alan Greenspan, chairman of US Federal Reserve 1987- 2006

Read more @ Guardian UK

UN Crime Chief Says Drug-Money Is Saving Banks

Do drugs....ruin lives....save a bank....ruin more lives....descend into misery.....do drugs..... - Ed.

The idea that illegal drug money is tied in with the central banks and that this 'cash flow' has helped keep them afloat and in power in not new. Some have been saying this for years.

What's interesting is that an official of the UN has now talked about drug money in the context of the current global financial crisis.

Can anyone now doubt that controlling the drug trade in Afghanistan for the benefit of the occupiers and the central banks is not a big part of that war? One reason for the coming 'surge' there?

The 'War on Terror', the 'War on Drugs' and the financial war on the citizens are intimately linked.

Read more @ Kenny's Sideshow

Mexican 'stew maker' dissolved 300 drug war victims in acid

He was known as El Pozolero — The Stew Maker — but his ingredients were less than savoury.

The job of Santiago Meza López was to dispose of the enemies of a notorious drug baron by dissolving them in tubs of acid. Over several years he claims to have “disappeared” 300 enemies of Teodoro García Semental, a former henchman for one of the largest cartels in Mexico and now in a bloody struggle for supremacy over the trade.

Read more @ Times Online UK


Netanyahu maintains edge in Israel election race

By Jeffrey Heller

JERUSALEM (Reuters) - Israel's election race is back in full swing following the Gaza war and front-runner Benjamin Netanyahu has moved quickly to deflect allegations his victory could mean conflict with new U.S. President Barack Obama.

Claiming some of the middle ground in Israel occupied by the ruling Kadima party, Netanyahu told Middle East envoy Tony Blair that a government headed by his right-wing Likud party would not build new Jewish settlements, though would expand existing ones.

[snip]

With the vote now two weeks away on Tuesday, polls show Likud firmly in the lead after Israel's Gaza offensive, trailed by Kadima and with third-place Labor, led by Defense Minister Ehud Barak, gaining support as a result of his role in the war. [??? Since he did such a good job committing war crimes??? - Ed.]

Read more @ Reuters


Gaza, the City of Dead Children

Excerpt:

Mohammad Abu Halima, 16, a cousin of Abdul Rahim, was shot dead by Israeli troops as he tried to take his injured relatives from the burning house in Atatra to hospital on 4 January. He was in the house next door when the shell struck and ran to try to help another cousin, Matar, loading up the injured on the back of a tractor. Both boys were killed. "He was still at school," said his father, Hikmat, 42. "He wanted to go abroad after school to study at university. He was a quiet boy, very obedient and did whatever I asked him." Many of the houses in Atatra were left burnt out or destroyed. "They came in here as if they were fighting a country like America," said Mohammad's aunt, Suhaida. 40. "But we're not fighters, just civilians. We're only Gaza."

Read more @ Gaza Holocaust

Names and Photos of Israeli War Criminals in Gaza

by Kawther Salam

I have decided to publish some names and photos of the Israeli military personnel who participated in the so-called "Operation Cast Lead", the offensive launched by the Israeli Occupation Forces (IOF) on the Gaza Strip between 27 December and 18 January 2009. The names of these criminals called my attention since the first day of their criminal attack against the Palestinian civilians in Gaza. I consider each person who took part in this IOF and each one whose name appears in this report as a war criminal who should be requested by an international court of justice, just like all other war criminals who were persecuted before…

My decision is a challenge to the State of Israel, to the Israeli attorney general Mazuz and the military headquarters, who forbade the media from publishing the names of the Israeli officers who lead "Operation Cast Lead" in Gaza, murdering 1310, and wounding over 5600, over 90% of these casualties being civilians, destroying public and the private property in many parts of towns and cities, and completely razing several areas completely to the ground.

Read more @ Uruknet

Don't get taken alive, Israeli soldiers told

Boy, having that one prisoner really rung their bells. The Palestinians, suffering the loss of over 10,000 prisoners, including many children, are infinitely stronger people than these Israeli cowards. - Ed.

Israeli soldiers fighting in Gaza this month were ordered to kill themselves rather than be captured, according to the Israeli newspaper Yediot Achronot. Troops were also told to kill any Israeli soldier they saw being taken by Hamas.
No matter what happens, no one will be kidnapped,” the paper quotes one unnamed company commander as telling his troops before the battle began. “We will not have a Gilad Shalit 2,” he said.

Read more @ Russia Today

Rabbi told Israeli troops 'to show no mercy' in Gaza

JERUSALEM (AFP) — An Israeli human rights group on Monday called for the immediate dismissal of the chief military rabbi, claiming he gave soldiers fighting in Gaza pamphlets urging them to show no mercy.

Read more @ AFP

Livni: Israel should strike Hamas again to halt arms smuggling

Tzipi logic... - Ed.

Excerpt:

"As far as I am concerned, we could hit Hamas with another military blow. The smuggling of weapons into Gaza is the same as firing [rockets] onto Israel, and the world sees that as well," Livni added.

Read more @ Ha'aretz
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1058556.html

The BBC's pact with Israel

Money and ideology behind BBC’s decision not to broadcast Gaza humanitarian appeal

By a special correspondent

27 January 2009

The BBC’s refusal to broadcast a humanitarian appeal for Gaza on behalf of a group of charities is motivated by a desire to appease US advertisers for its commercial TV channel and website, and by Mark Thompson’s own political proclivities.


Read more @ Redress Information & Analysis

Jewish Lobby gives Obama his marching orders

THE POWERFUL JEWISH LOBBY in Washington is already issuing marching orders to President-elect Barack Obama. One of the most influential voices of the lobby has published an array of “working papers” designed to tell the president how he must maintain the “special relationship” between the United States and Israel, increase pressure on a variety of Arab and Muslim states that are perceived as dangers to Israel, and generally assure that Israel’s interests will always be first and foremost in the conduct of U.S. foreign policy, not only in the Middle East but around the globe.

Read more @ SOS

In America, speaking the truth is a career-ending event

By PAUL CRAIG ROBERTS

"The evidence is sitting on the table. There is no avoiding the fact that this was torture.”

These are the words of Manfred Nowak, the UN official appointed by the Commission on Human Rights to examine cases of torture. Nowak has concluded that President Obama is legally obligated to prosecute former President George W. Bush and former Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld.

If President Obama’s bankster economic team finishes off what remains of the US economy, Obama, to deflect the public’s attention from his own failures and Americans’ growing hardships, might fulfill his responsibility to prosecute Bush and Rumsfeld. But for now the interesting question is why did the US military succumb to illegal orders?

Read more @ Atheo News

Israel's Lies

Please note the blatant intention, published in Ha'aretz for Pete's sake, to forestall the peace process indefinitely. This is a Conspiracy Fact. Israel has no intention of ever making peace with the Palestinians. For anyone who believes that is some kind of slur on Israel, it's time to get real. - Ed.

by Henry Seigman, London Review of Books, 1/29/09

Excerpt:

The greater lie is that Sharon’s withdrawal from Gaza was intended as a prelude to further withdrawals and a peace agreement. This is how Sharon’s senior adviser Dov Weisglass, who was also his chief negotiator with the Americans, described the withdrawal from Gaza, in an interview with Ha’aretz in August 2004:

What I effectively agreed to with the Americans was that part of the settlements [i.e. the major settlement blocks on the West Bank] would not be dealt with at all, and the rest will not be dealt with until the Palestinians turn into Finns . . . The significance [of the agreement with the US] is the freezing of the political process. And when you freeze that process, you prevent the establishment of a Palestinian state and you prevent a discussion about the refugees, the borders and Jerusalem. Effectively, this whole package that is called the Palestinian state, with all that it entails, has been removed from our agenda indefinitely. And all this with [President Bush’s] authority and permission . . . and the ratification of both houses of Congress.

Do the Israelis and Americans think that Palestinians don’t read the Israeli papers, or that when they saw what was happening on the West Bank they couldn’t figure out for themselves what Sharon was up to?

Read more @ The Truth Seeker

A Shameful War: Israel in the Dock

A good summary of the war crimes charges: proportionality, firing into urban areas, white phosphorous, DIME bombs and other unusual weapons, targeting of civilians, humanitarian aid. - Ed.
Raymond Whitaker and Donald Macintyre

Did Israel – or its enemy, Hamas – commit war crimes during 22 days and nights of aerial assault, rocket launches and ground fighting in Gaza? In one sense the question is academic, because Israel will not recognise the conflict as an international one, and has not signed the 1977 Geneva protocol designed to apply to the victims of internal conflicts. But international lawyers say general principles can be drawn from the laws of war, which may have been violated in several ways.

The main issues are these:

Read more @ World Crisis Web

We All Wank On

Hi.

Two times you picked me to be your president. And two times I presidented things the best way I know how. I did what we call in Texas “a real good job”. But now I’m retired, and I will leave it to history to decide if I am more like Abraham Lincoln or Winston Churchill, and then I will wear one of those powdered wigs and be on the million dollar bill. Meantime, I will host these here Golden Winger awards.

Read more @ The Poor Man


1.26.2009

Israeli professor: 'We could destroy all European capitals.'

OK? WTF? At what point does the world do an intervention on the problem child, Israel? - Ed.

Excerpt:

Will Americans ever wake up and realize that their country has been taken over by Zionists and Israeli-Firsters, or will it take mushroom clouds, courtesy of Israel, popping up over America before we come to our senses? [See next entry. - Ed.]

But by then, it will be too late.

Israeli Professor:’We Could Destroy All European Capitals’
By Nadim Ladki

(IAP News) — An Israeli professor and military historian hinted that Israel could avenge the holocaust by annihilating millions of Germans and other Europeans.

Speaking during an interview which was published in Jerusalem Friday, Professor Martin Van Creveld said Israel had the capability of hitting most European capitals with nuclear weapons.

Read more @ Goon Squad

Blackjack II

Via Cryptogon, this slideshow appeared on Telegraph UK (Part 1) a week or so ago. No author given. What is the purpose here? To frighten people? To warn people? Who puts this stuff out there and why? - Ed.

View slideshow.

Israel: Determined to destroy the world

While the world waits patiently. - Ed.

Throughout the world, Israel’s invasion of Gaza was inappropriate and “over the top,” except in America and Israel. The world has typically been at odds with America over Israel. Only one US President has ever “stood up” to Israel, and that was President Dwight D. Eisenhower when he threatened dire consequences to Israel if it did not withdraw from Gaza in 1956.

Since Eisenhower, all subsequent administrations have been sympathetic and supportive with all that Israel does at the very least. The apex of full approval of Israel was on June 8, 1967 when Israel bombed the USS Liberty killing 34 sailors, There is scant evidence that the Obama administration will be any different in general. This is especially true when the long running disputes between Iran and Israel are factored in.

Read more @ OpEd News


Charges filed against 15 Israeli officials

Including the 'moderate' Tzipi Livni!! - Ed.

Palestinian and international efforts continue to institute legal proceedings for the prosecution of Israeli officials in the commission of war crimes.
International attorneys have filed war crime charges against 15 Israeli political and military officials including Ehud Olmert, Tzipi Livni and Ehud Barak.
Palestinian and international efforts continue to institute legal proceedings for the prosecution of Israeli officials in the commission of war crimes.
Although Israeli forces are involved in thousands of cases, local experts such as the Palestinian Centre for Human Rights believe that the recent major attacks on the Gaza Strip will be successfully prosecuted.

Read more @ Iran Daily

International Law and Israel's War on Gaza

by Frances A. Boyle
Global Research, January 24, 2009


Excerpt:

As a condition for its admission to the United Nations Organization, Israel formally agreed to accept General Assembly Resolution 181 (II) (1947) (partition/Jerusalem trusteeship) and General Assembly Resolution 194 (III) (1948) (Palestinian right of return), inter alia. Nevertheless, the government of Israel has expressly repudiated both Resolution 181 (II) and Resolution 194 (III). Therefore, Israel has violated its conditions for admission to U.N. membership and thus must be suspended on a de facto basis from any participation throughout the entire United Nations System.

Second, any further negotiations with Israel must be conducted on the basis of Resolution 181 (II) and its borders; Resolution 194 (III); subsequent General Assembly resolutions and Security Council resolutions; the Third and Fourth Geneva Conventions of 1949; the 1907 Hague Regulations; and other relevant principles of public international law.

Third, we must abandon the fiction and the fraud that the United States government is an "honest broker." The United States government has never been an honest broker from well before the very outset of these negotiations in 1991. Rather, the United States has invariably sided with Israel against the Palestinians. We need to establish some type of international framework to sponsor these negotiations where the Palestinian negotiators will not be subjected to the continual bullying, threats, harassment, intimidation and outright lies perpetrated by the United States government.

Fourth, we must move to have the U.N. General Assembly impose economic, diplomatic, and travel sanctions upon Israel pursuant to the terms of the Uniting for Peace Resolution (1950), whose Emergency Special Session on Palestine is now in recess.

Fifth, the Provisional Government of the State of Palestine must sue Israel before the International Court of Justice in The Hague for inflicting acts of genocide against the Palestinian People in violation of the 1948 Genocide Convention!

Sixth, An International Criminal Tribunal for Israel (ICTI) can be established by the UN General Assembly as a "subsidiary organ" under article 22 of the UN Charter. Article 22 of the UN Charter states the UN General Assembly may establish such subsidiary organs as it deems necessary for the performance of its functions. The purpose of the ICTI would be to investigate and Prosecute suspected Israeli war criminals for offences against the Palestinian people.

Read more @ Global Research

Israeli commanders in crosshairs for war crimes

Israel has taken measures to protect the identity of Gaza war commanders as the case for war crimes in the populated area gains momentum.

Israeli authorities have issued an order banning the publication of the full name and photographs of the field commanders of the Gaza war, the Haaretz reported.

Read more @ Press TV

60 Minutes fluffs Livni, puts settlers in the crosshairs

What is the purpose here? Tzipi Livni is a moderate? Funny. - Ed.

Time Running Out for a Two-State Solution

(CBS)
Getting a peace deal in the Middle East is such a priority to President Obama that his first foreign calls on his first day in office were to Arab and Israeli leaders. And on day two, the president made former Senator George Mitchell his special envoy for Middle East peace. Mr. Obama wants to shore up the ceasefire in Gaza, but a lasting peace really depends on the West Bank where Palestinians had hoped to create their state. The problem is, even before Israel invaded Gaza, a growing number of Israelis and Palestinians had concluded that peace between them was no longer possible, that history had passed it by. For peace to have a chance, Israel would have to withdraw from the West Bank, which would then become the Palestinian state.

Read more @ CBS News

Netanyahu: Regarding Iran, The Ends Justifies the Means

Excerpt:

"The arming of Iran with nuclear weapons may portend an irreversible process, because these regimes assume a kind of immortality," he says, arguing that the threat of a nuclear Iran poses a much graver danger to the world than the current economic crisis. "[This] will pose an existential threat to Israel directly, but also could give a nuclear umbrella to these terrorist bases."

How to stop that from happening? Mr. Netanyahu mentions that he has met with Barack Obama both in Israel and Washington, and that the question of Iran "loomed large in both conversations." I ask: Did Mr. Obama seem to him appropriately sober-minded about the subject? "Very much so, very much so," Mr. Netanyahu stresses. "He [Mr. Obama] spoke of his plans to engage Iran in order to impress upon them that they have to stop the nuclear program. What I said to him was, what counts is not the method but the goal."

Read more @ WSJ

Obama may visit Russia in April

U.S. President Barack Obama may visit Russia as early as April, a source with close ties to the State Department told the newspaper. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton might come to Moscow in March, to announce the new administration's decision to cut allocations on the ABM program.
The source said the new U.S. president would go to London on April 2 for a summit of G20 industrial countries on ways to deal with the current financial crisis, where he will meet Russian President Dmitry Medvedev for the first time.

Read more @ RIA Novosti

Israel admits using WP in Gaza

They lie, they lie, they lie, and then they are forced to admit the truth. We see this pattern over and over again. Bottom line: THEY LIE. - Ed.

After weeks of denying that it used white phosphorus in the heavily populated Gaza Strip, Israel finally admitted yesterday that the weapon was deployed in its offensive.

The army’s use of white phosphorus – which makes a distinctive shellburst of dozens of smoke trails – was reported first by The Times on January 5, when it was strenuously denied by the army. Now, in the face of mounting evidence and international outcry, Israel has been forced to backtrack on that initial denial. “Yes, phosphorus was used but not in any illegal manner,” Yigal Palmor, a Foreign Ministry spokesman, told The Times. “Some practices could be illegal but we are going into that. The IDF (Israel Defence Forces) is holding an investigation concerning one specific incident.”

Read more @ Times UK


Overcome with grief, UNWRA schoolteacher absent

Gaza – Ma’an – When the schools opened in the Gaza Strip Saturday, Mr Al-Batran was not in his classroom. He has not been home in days, and relatives say he has not seen his one-year-old son since the massacre.

Forty-year-old Issa Al-Batran may never go back home. His surviving mother and son have begged him to come back with them, but he prefers to wander the streets with his memories of Gaza before the onslaught.

He was a teacher at the UN school in the Al-Bureij refugee camp; he was a father of six, a husband and a homeowner.

His wife Manal, three daughters and two sons were killed in the room next to Issa. The family was living in the salon, but he had excused himself to pray in the silence of the adjacent room for a few moments. His infant son, Abd Al-Hadi, crawled after him, which is the only reason he is still alive.

Read more @ Ma'an News Agency

Jews struggle to come to grips with Madoff

Filling many tissues... - Ed.

By Martha Graybow

NEW YORK (Reuters) - For American Jews, the Bernard Madoff scandal has not just caused deep financial pain. It also has been deeply personal.

The accused swindler managed money for numerous Jewish charities and wealthy Jews who are reeling from their monetary losses as well as a sense of betrayal that a fellow Jew could have harmed so many people.

Read more @ Reuters


Dick whines that W should have pardoned Scooter

Well, as W once said to somebody else, "Who cares what you think?" - Ed.

WASHINGTON (CNN) — George Bush should have pardoned I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby, Dick Cheney said after stepping down as vice president this week.

"He was the victim of a serious miscarriage of justice, and I strongly believe that he deserved a presidential pardon. Obviously, I disagree with President Bush's decision," Cheney told Stephen F. Hayes of the Weekly Standard, a leading conservative Washington magazine.

Read more @ CNN Political Ticker