it's not that you're israeli, it's that you're wrong

Israel/America - A Rambling Poem

Every time I think of 9/11
I see burning flesh dripping off the bones of Iraqi children in Fallujah
Now Gaza
I tend to memorialize the forgotten
The collateral damage eclipsing our unpunished crimes

Maybe it’s because I’m a numbers guy
Because if I had a dollar for every time an Iraqi died since 2003
I’d be a millionaire

And don’t get me wrong
Sometimes I don’t know who I hate more
The governments in the West
Or the politicians in the East
Who sell their souls quicker than the oil they export
Straw men who use Palestine as a tool to line their pockets
And don’t give a nickel to their people
Quisling governments
Who stitch mouths shut for a check from Washington and AIPAC
How can you be their prototypical anti-Semite
If you are signing peace accords to oppress your own people?

And then Orientalists and idiots talk about how
We can’t have democracy in the Middle East
Because of what happened in Gaza
A Hamas boogyman wrapped in democratic elections
Rahm Emanuel wants to educate me and my people about democracy gone wrong
Why doesn’t he try implementing one in Israel first?
Instead of bowing down to terrorists like his father and the IDF
Lauding a third rate, racist, European society that’s imploding quicker
Than its moral standing in the world
Enlightened like 1950s Afrikaners and slave traders
Just because the house is beautiful
Doesn’t mean the bones you built it on have fully decomposed

The Israeli left is about as alive as Ariel Sharon
I’m sick and tired of asking for permission to resist
From antiquated leftists and progressives
Who care more about keeping it Kosher than moving things forward
I put down my pen and waving fist to resist with college kids and Palestinians
Boycott and divest!
Because who cares about preserving a living when governments are killing civilians
Complicity by silence and reserve units bombing Gaza
Your academics and scholars, theater groups and practitioners, are part of the problem

And if logic doesn’t fit into your long term plan of rejecting
My right to return, I’m sorry
Maybe one day you’ll return to reality
Where my people have babies quicker
Than Zionists can concoct Jordanian options

I don’t want your sympathy or introspective confessions
Won’t sit on my hands till they loose oxygen
Like the people of Balata and Rafah
Vote for Barack Obama
And pretend that his 22 day silence was golden
While emaciated children starved to death
Surrounded by their parent’s corpses

This can’t be America the Beautiful
A criminal with a few positive attributes
Doesn’t alleviate genocide
Bombing Afghanistan, Pakistan, and Iraq
Into oblivion doesn’t make you historic
It makes you as blind and bloodthirsty
As the white men that came before you
Apathetic hipsters now excited about a president
Who broke history, but not poverty, occupation, or corporate interests

I’d rather proudly walk through the graveyard of peace accords
And failed dialogue sessions
Than see my people just as occupied or third class citizens
We are the gavel that will slam down like a verdict
We are not waiting for Israel or America or the Supreme Court to approve it
We’ll boycott Lev Leviev, Caterpillar and your apartheid companies
We’re taking back the right of return and the keys to a country
Because we never asked you to go back to Europe or sit in open air prisons
I’m not asking for your advice, I’m explaining the decision
You can stay here, with us, but only as equals
It’s not that you’re Israeli, it’s that you’re wrong
That’s why I fight for my people!

Remi Kanazi is the editor of the recently released collection of poetry, Poets For Palestine. He will be touring the US and Canada this fall on the upcoming Poets For Palestine tour.

THIS is why israel hearts ahmadinejad

How Convenient Is THIS?????? Really? Could he *possibly* lay Iran more carefully on the sacrificial altar? Then again, what did he actually say? Could we please have the full text and a translation? Apparently it's all so "sketchy" except for the part where he says the most inflammatory things, that part is apparently not "sketchy." Weird, huh? - Ed.

amid protests, iran leader calls holocaust a myth

LONDON — Courting renewed international criticism, President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad of Iran on Friday called the Holocaust a myth as his country marked an annual pro-Palestinian demonstration amid reports of clashes between his supporters and opposition protesters.

With sketchy accounts filtering past official media controls.....

....Details of the reported clashes on Friday remained sketchy.

...

In a speech to a pro-Palestinian rally, which also fell on the eve of the Jewish New Year, Mr. Ahmadinejad called confrontation with “the Zionist regime” a “national and religious duty,” news reports said.

Several reports quoted him as saying the Holocaust was false pretext for the establishment of Israel in 1948. “It is a lie” based on an unprovable and “mythical claim,” he was quoted as saying in the speech.

Mr. Ahmadinejad said the Israeli “regime has no future. Its life has come to an end,” Reuters reported.

Mr. Ahmadinejad made similar remarks after his first election as president in 2005. But, coming only days before scheduled talks between his government and western powers, his latest denial of the Holocaust seemed likely to cast a cloud over those discussions.

...

She [CLINTON] said the meeting, to be held Oct. 1, would fulfill President Obama’s pledge to engage with Iran. But she insisted that the United States would not be drawn into a lengthy and fruitless diplomatic dance with Iran, as some analysts have warned.

“We have no illusions about the Iranian government,” Mrs. Clinton said. “The point is to meet and explain to the Iranians, face to face, the choices that Iran has, and to see whether Iran is prepared to engage.”

end

They seem to know already that diplomacy will be FRUITLESS. So once the 10/1 meeting takes place they can express "regret" that diplomacy failed, as prearranged, and then proceed to attack Iran, because of course there will be "No Choice," seeing as Ahmadinejad made all these terrible threatening remarks, *again.* - ed.

NATO proposes new era of cooperation with russia

BRUSSELS (Reuters) - NATO proposed a new era of cooperation with the United States and Russia on Friday, calling for joint work on missile defense systems after Washington scrapped a planned anti-missile system.

Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin described as "correct and brave" President Barack Obama's decision to drop the missile shield planned for Europe by predecessor George W. Bush. Russia's NATO envoy welcomed the NATO co-operation proposals.

Some military experts saw the moves as a sign of weakness by Obama, that Moscow hardliners would want to exploit further. Putin called in a speech on Friday for Obama to follow up with concessions on trade and technology transfer.

Others described abandonment of the system as a bold gesture that could improve frosty relations between the West and Russia.

"I do believe that it is possible for NATO and Russia to make a new beginning and to enjoy a far more productive relationship in the future," NATO Secretary-General Anders Fogh Rasmussen said in a speech in Brussels.

...

Critics accused the White House of dangerous weakness.

Senator John McCain, the Republican presidential candidate who lost to Obama in 2008, called the move "seriously misguided" and former U.S. ambassador to the United Nations John Bolton, a leading Bush-era hawk, was scathing.

read more @ reuters

no you may not relax

The United States said Thursday it plans to replace its European missile defense project with a more flexible system following a downgrading of the “long-range missile threat posed by Iran”. “The previous design was predicated on the belief Iran was determined to develop an ICBM (intercontinental ballistic missile) program,” said Pentagon spokesman Geoffrey Morrell.

However recent intelligence reports have shown “that they (Iran) are much more focused on developing short- and medium-range capabilities.” A senior US defense official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said the new system gets away “from the huge radar huge missile shield concept and focuses much more on a versatile adaptive system”.

peter chamberlain analysis:

[This latest move should give Iran great cause for concern. It is not possible that Washington would suddenly throw in the towel, after they have given Iran until the end of the month to negotiate and then Iran announces that any talks will not cover the nuclear issue. The missile shield was never aimed at Iran, it has always been planned to block Russia. Announcing that there will be no shield and tying the decision to do this to Iran (not even linking it to Iranian actions) is a final warning to Iran. Iran understands more than most nations that whatever America publicly says, it means the opposite. If, out-of-the-blue the US reaches-out to Iran, then the Iranians had better head for shelter.]

source: there are no sunglasses

newsweek (of all places): intelligence agencies say no iran nukes

The U.S. intelligence community is reporting to the White House that Iran has not restarted its nuclear-weapons development program, two counterproliferation officials tell NEWSWEEK. U.S. agencies had previously said that Tehran halted the program in 2003.

The officials, who asked for anonymity when discussing sensitive information, said that U.S. intelligence agencies have informed policymakers at the White House and other agencies that the status of Iranian work on development and production of a nuclear bomb has not changed since the formal National Intelligence Estimate (NIE) on Iran's "Nuclear Intentions and Capabilities" in November 2007. Public portions of that report stated that U.S. intelligence agencies had "high confidence" that, as of early 2003, Iranian military units were pursuing development of a nuclear bomb, but that in the fall of that year Iran "halted its nuclear weapons program." The document said that while U.S. agencies believed the Iranian government "at a minimum is keeping open the option to develop nuclear weapons," U.S. intelligence as of mid-2007 still had "moderate confidence" that it had not restarted weapons-development efforts.

One of the two officials said that the Obama administration has now worked out a system in which intelligence agencies provide top policymakers, including the president, with regular updates on intelligence judgments like the conclusions in the 2007 Iran NIE. According to the two officials, the latest update to policymakers has been that as of now—two years after the period covered by the 2007 NIE—U.S. intelligence agencies still believe Iran has not resumed nuclear-weapons development work. "That's the conclusion, but it's one that—like every other—is constantly checked and reassessed, both to take account of new information and to test old assumptions," one of the officials told NEWSWEEK. It is not clear whether U.S. agencies' confidence in this judgment has grown at all since the 2007 statement.

This latest U.S. intelligence-community assessment is potentially controversial for several reasons, not the least of which is that it is at odds with more alarming assessments propounded by key U.S. allies, most notably Israel. Officials of Israel's conservative-led government have been delivering increasingly dire assessments of Iran’s nuclear progress and have leaked shrill threats about a possible Israeli military attack on Iranian nuclear facilities.

Former U.N. weapons inspector David Albright, an atomic-weapons expert who follows Iranian nuclear developments closely, said the U.S. government's current judgments will continue to provoke contention and debate. "People are looking at the same information and reaching different judgments," he said. "Given all the developments in Iran, these assessments are hard to believe with any certainty. Nobody's been able to bring total proof either way."

Israel is not the only American ally that has circulated assessments that contradict the U.S. intelligence conclusion that Iran is not currently pursuing nuclear-bomb development. According to German court documents released earlier this year, Germany's foreign intelligence service, known as the BND, reported in 2008 that “development work on nuclear weapons can be observed in Iran even after 2003."

A European counterproliferation official, who also requested anonymity, said that assessments like the one provided by the BND relied significantly on information collected by German and other intelligence agencies about efforts by suspected Iranian agents and front companies to purchase hardware and technology from Western firms that can be used to design or build nuclear weapons. Such equipment and know-how often has "dual uses"—both peaceful and military applications. But some Iranian purchases have appeared highly suspect. German authorities have been pursuing criminal charges against a German-Iranian businessman who allegedly tried to purchase for Tehran ultrahigh-speed cameras and radiation sensors that are built to withstand extreme heat—equipment that experts believe would be quite useful for nuclear-weapons development, though it could also be used for more benign purposes. The Institute for Science and International Security, run by Albright, recently published a paper on the German investigation.

When it first was made public, the November 2007 NIE was criticized by American and Israeli hardliners for playing up conclusions about Iran's having stopped work on nuclear-weapons development while playing down Iranian advances in its efforts to produce highly enriched uranium, which is the most critical, but difficult to manufacture, element of a primitive nuclear bomb. The NIE said that even though Iran had halted its nuclear-weapons program, it had made "significant progress" during 2007 in installing centrifuges used in uranium enrichment, though U.S. analysts believed that, as a result of technical problems with these machines, Iran probably could not produce enough highly enriched uranium for a bomb before 2010 at the earliest. The Iranians have consistently claimed that they are enriching uranium only for civilian purposes. Low-enriched uranium, which is all that Iran has made so far, is a common fuel for civilian power plants.

U.S. and European counterproliferation experts believe that Iran's centrifuge program has already produced enough low-enriched uranium, an essential precursor to the production of bomb-grade material, to provide feedstock to produce enough highly enriched uranium to make a bomb. However, that is an arduous and technically complicated process. Many U.S. and European experts say that Iran is still experiencing technical problems with centrifuges it would use to produce bomb-grade uranium, which could delay any Iranian bomb program for years.

An Obama administration official says that top policymakers are being told that there is no significant disagreement among U.S. intelligence agencies and experts about the latest assessments regarding Iran's nuclear effort. That may encourage the White House's efforts to continue to try to engage Iran in diplomatic dialogue, including discussion of Iran's nuclear ambitions. A spokesperson for National Intelligence Director Dennis Blair's office, which is responsible for producing NIEs and updates on Iranian nukes, had no comment.

http://www.newsweek.com/id/215529

flashback 3/09: obama offered deal to russia, it had nothing to do with bibi's visit

from cryptogon:

Via: New York Times: MARCH 2009

President Obama sent a secret letter to Russia’s president last month suggesting that he would back off deploying a new missile defense system in Eastern Europe if Moscow would help stop Iran from developing long-range weapons, American officials said Monday.

The letter to President Dmitri A. Medvedev was hand-delivered in Moscow by top administration officials three weeks ago. It said the United States would not need to proceed with the interceptor system, which has been vehemently opposed by Russia since it was proposed by the Bush administration, if Iran halted any efforts to build nuclear warheads and ballistic missiles.

The officials who described the contents of the message requested anonymity because it has not been made public. While they said it did not offer a direct quid pro quo, the letter was intended to give Moscow an incentive to join the United States in a common front against Iran. Russia’s military, diplomatic and commercial ties to Tehran give it some influence there, but it has often resisted Washington’s hard line against Iran.

iran: back on the front burner?

excerpt:

On the surface, the way relations between the US and Israel seem to be strained at the moment over the issue of settlements in the West Bank, it may appear to some observers that Israel, indeed, may have to act alone. However, this would be burying ones head in the sand in order to avoid reality. The fact is, despite relations appearing to be strained, the US Congress, firmly in the pay and clutches of the Israel Lobby, will ultimately support the Israelis. However, the Israelis will not at all be able to act without the active connivance of the US. The job that Israel feels it needs to do can not be done without US ordnance and, even if the Israelis were to gain clearance to pass through Saudi Arabian airspace in order to avoid overflying Iraq and the diplomatic problems involved, the massive amounts of military jet fuel required to mount such an operation (an out and back trip of several thousand miles necessitating in-flight refuelling) would also have to be supplied by the US.

read more @ telling the history of the twenty first century

analysis: demise of us shield may embolden russia hawks

MOSCOW, Sept 17 (Reuters) - Washington hopes that by backing away from an anti-missile system in east Europe, it will get Russian cooperation on everything from nuclear weapons cuts to efforts to curb Iranian and North Korean nuclear ambitions.

But will Moscow keep its side of the bargain?

The U.S. move on the shield -- due to be announced later on Thursday but already flagged by Czech and Polish officials -- removes at a stroke the biggest outstanding obstacle to bilateral relations between the former superpowers and will be hailed by the Kremlin as a big victory.

...

Diplomats here say Moscow hardliners could read the shield backdown as a sign of Washington's weakness. Far from doing the bidding of the United States, they may instead press for further gains to shore up Russian power in the former Soviet bloc.

Ukraine, Georgia and other Kremlin foes in the ex-Soviet Union may be the first to feel the consequences.

...

Obama went out of his way to praise Medvedev during his visit, spending a total of eight hours with him against only two for Vladimir Putin. He criticised Putin before his visit as a man with one foot stuck in the past, contrasting him unfavourably with Medvedev.

The missile shield move marks another attempt by Obama to shore up what Washington sees as a more liberal, pro-Western strand in the Russian government personified by Medvedev.

But with hardliners increasingly in the ascendant in Moscow, and Putin openly talking about returning to the top Kremlin job at the next election, it is far from clear whether Russia's next international moves will be the ones Obama intended.

read more @ kyiv post

oh phew just one dose will be enough

* Annual vaccine production substantially less than forecast

* Single dose should be enough, clinical trials show

* Current supplies of pandemic vaccine inadequate for world

(Recasts, add new death toll, byline)

By Stephanie Nebehay

GENEVA, Sept 18 (Reuters) - Production of H1N1 vaccine over the next year will be "substantially less" than the 4.9 billion doses previously forecast but one dose should provide adequate protection, the World Health Organisation (WHO) said on Friday.

Based on clinical test results from some 25 drugmakers, weekly production of the new vaccine will be less than 94 million doses, WHO spokesman Gregory Hartl said.

read more @ reuters

ingredients found in spermicides, cleaners, etc. found in experimental vaccine

Jeffry John Aufderheide
VacTRUTH
09/11/09

(*** EDITORS NOTE: THIS JUST IN, FDA APPROVES SWINE VACCINE PRIOR TO CHILDREN SAFETY STUDY BEGINNING!!!! SEE ARTICLE HERE. )

See for yourself the study presented at the end of article. Please spread the word and make this go viral… no pun intended. Kindly reference and link to VacTRUTH!

(vactruth.com) Trials for the experimental H1N1 Swine flu vaccine commence Tuesday, September 15th in Thornton, Colorado. Novartis, a bio-pharmaceutical company that manufactures the vaccine, is recommending that children participating in the trial receive two doses of an experimental vaccine which contain ingredients found in spermicides, cleaners, and cosmetics along with thimerosal and squalene (MF59). Everyone should have a sense of concern as the only safety checks for these children are a few blood draws and follow-up phone calls. No neurological testing. No kidding.

Official opinions from federal agencies, such as the CDC, insist that the new vaccine will be safe and effective. Experts say we can trust the new H1N1 experimental vaccine because the technology used to create the vaccine is time tested. Experts argue that the only variable changing from the ‘normal’ flu vaccine and the H1N1 experimental vaccine is the novel A/H1N1 antigen. In other words, the same vaccine ‘technology’ is used but with the new virus.

However, this is the furthest thing from the actual TRUTH. As will be demonstrated, the following information was obtained through enrolling a family member into the study to gain an understanding as to what the ingredients would be. After finding out the the information I am about to share, enrollment in this trial has been canceled.

read more @ vactruth

propaganda, magical thinking, and failed offensives

by charles hugh smith

The Evil Empire of the Fed, Treasury and Wall Street are "declaring victory"-- "the recession is over. Can magical thinking and propaganda conquer reality?

The rural residents of Japan who lived far from the war were shocked to learn that the Japanese Empire had lost World War Two. After all, the only news they received was of one victory after another.

"Good Germans" and "good Japanese" alike were also shocked to learn that their respective Empires were Evil. After all, the propaganda which had dominated their media and lives had promoted the idea that their conquests were "freeing the oppressed peoples of the Earth."

Lest you think their belief in propaganda and their shock at the Evil perpetrated by their dictatorships naive, I direct your attention to the propaganda machine and magical thinking behind "the recession is over." Oh, and our financial Dictatorship is Evil, too.

Does saying it so make it so? That's magical thinking. When it's a child of five believing in the magic of incantations, we think it's cute. But when Ben Bernanke and the rest of the Financial Dictatorship spew their incantations ("the recession is over, the recession is over, now click your heels together three times...") then their motivation is Evil: to pesuade the populace their domination is total and they've "won the war"--that is, credit and debt can continue expanding three times faster than the economy forever.

Why? Their dominance, power and wealth depend on the populace's naive belief that "the system" works to their benefit. That is the Big Lie--the system works to the Financial Dictatorship's benefit, not to the citizenry's.

read more @ charles hugh smith

'we still have the same disease'

by Margaret Wente

On the anniversary of the spectacular collapse of Lehman Brothers, Nassim Nicholas Taleb is one of those people who can say, “I told you so.” For the past decade, he's been warning that the global economy has become far more vulnerable to unpredictable events that can cause vast disruption. He famously foresaw the credit crunch that brought the financial system to its knees.

Mr. Taleb is a Wall Street derivatives trader who became an academic specializing in the study of randomness and probability. In May of 2008 he published The Black Swan: The Impact of the Highly Improbable. It argued that most economists and bankers live in a dangerous fantasy world in which they imagine they can control the future. The book takes its name from the fact that all swans were once believed to be white – until black swans turned up in Australia. He loathes bankers, central bankers, and economists, not necessarily in that order, and thinks that banks should be run like public utilities. “My major hobby is teasing people who take themselves and the quality of their knowledge too seriously,” he says. He has advised British Conservative Leader David Cameron, and last week testified before the U.S. Congress on the financial crisis.

read more @ globe and mail

DOD and DHS expanding info-sharing at fusion centers to combat (so-called) domestic terrorism

what could possibly go wrong? - ed.

IMMEDIATE RELEASE No. 713-09
September 14, 2009
DoD Announces New Information-Sharing Access to Help Fusion Centers Combat Terrorism

The Departments of Defense (DoD) and Homeland Security (DHS) today announced an initiative to grant select state and major urban area fusion center personnel access to classified terrorism-related information residing in DoD’s classified network.

Under this initiative, select fusion center personnel with a federal security clearance will be able to access specific terrorism-related information resident on the DoD Secret Internet Protocol Router Network (SIPRNet)—a secure network used to send classified data. This classified data will be accessed via DHS’ Homeland Security Data Network (HSDN). DHS will be responsible for ensuring that proper security procedures are followed.

read more @ cryptogon

from 2/2009: truth about enriched uranium

by Cheryl Rofer, 2/20/09

As I put the tea water on to boil and turned on the tv this morning, I was assaulted by the claim that seems to be everywhere. Maybe you've seen it in the New York Times, or the Los Angeles Times, or heard the same CBS report that I did, or even read it on Kevin Drum.

It's a lie.

Much as I hate to do so, because psychology tells us that repetition will help to fix the erroneous message in our minds, I will quote the most egregious statement of this "news."

Iran has enriched sufficient uranium to amass a nuclear bomb – a third more than previously thought – the United Nations announced yesterday.

Ah yes. And if you live in Boulder, Colorado, or in Connecticut, or New York City, you have enough U-235 under your house (or perhaps block) to amass a nuclear bomb! Or, Kevin, all that sea water lapping up against the California coast has uranium in it too! I have a call in to the IAEA to inspect your homes!

The issue here is concentration. Mining uranium concentrates it from the ore. Purification and conversion to UF6 concentrates it further. The purpose of the enrichment centrifuges is to concentrate the fissionable U-235.

Concentration is not that hard to understand, but in our science-challenged society (yes, we all hated chemistry, where it was discussed in the first week), it seems not to be a consideration. See also this post from earlier this week.

The concentration of U-235 is 3.49% in the enriched uranium that the Natanz plant is turning out. The IAEA has found no evidence (Download Iran 0902) that any higher enrichment is being produced. 3.49% is not enough to make a bomb. Iran is not in a position to make a bomb, unless there is a bunch of hidden stuff that nobody has found, involving big buildings that can be seen by satellite surveillance.

It would take a reconfiguration of the Natanz facility that the inspectors would notice to produce bomb-grade uranium (concentration of U-235 of 90%). The inspectors also take environmental samples to verify the concentration of U-235. They would have to be kicked out of the facility and their video cameras taken down for Iran to do this.

read more @ whirled view

evidence, please

By Daniel Luban

Following up on Jim’s post about the new Robb/Coats/Wald op-ed pushing preparations for a military strike against Iranian nuclear facilities, one line from the piece jumped out at me: “At its current pace, Iran’s nuclear program will be able to manufacture enough highly enriched uranium for a nuclear weapon in 2010.”

This is a critical claim for the authors’ argument. Although they gloss over the fact that Iran would not be able to immediately produce a usable bomb even after acquiring enough highly enriched uranium (HEU) — for that, it would need a weapons program, and there is no evidence that Iran has had one since 2003 — the 2010 HEU estimate naturally supports their contention that there is no time to waste in dealing with Iran’s nuclear program. Yet the authors do not cite any source or evidence for this estimate.

Which may not be surprising, since it directly contradicts the U.S. government’s latest intelligence on the subject. As I reported last month, Director of National Intelligence (DNI) Dennis Blair told Congress in February that Iran is unlikely to be able to produce enough highly enriched uranium for a nuclear weapon until at least 2013 — a full three years after Robb et al’s estimate. Citing the State Department’s Bureau of Intelligence and Research (INR), Blair also noted that there is “no evidence” that Iran has even made a decision to produce weapons-grade uranium in the first place.

read more @ lobe log

how low will israel stoop to win the propaganda war?

by Stuart Littlewood

“The Israel Project”, a US media advocacy group, has produced a revised training manual to help the worldwide Zionist movement win the propaganda war, keep their ill-gotten territorial gains and persuade international audiences to accept that their crimes are necessary and conform to “shared values” between Israel and the civilized West.

It’s a clever document.

The manual teaches how to justify the slaughter, the ethnic cleansing, the land-grabbing, the cruelty and the blatant disregard for international law and UN resolutions, and make it all smell sweeter with a liberal squirt of the aerosol of persuasive language. It is designed to hoodwink us ignorant and gullible Americans and Europeans into believing that we actually share values with the racist regime in Israel and that its abominable behaviour is therefore deserving of our support.

Israel is hoping for a public relations massacre. The other side – the Palestinian Authority and the Palestine Liberation Organization – don’t take communications seriously and have neglected to correct Israeli distortion. They are happy, it seems, for Israel’s one-sided definitions to prevail, which of course makes the task for Israel so much easier. This latest propaganda offensive is potentially the “coup de grace” to finish off the tormented Palestinians. See it here.

And the manual will no doubt serve as a communications primer for the army of cyber-scribblers that Israel’s Ministry of Dirty Tricks is recruiting to spread Zionism’s poison across the internet.

This quote at the beginning sets the tone: "Remember, it’s not what you say that counts. It’s what people hear."

read more @ south lebanon

the israel lobby's global propaganda manual

September 16, 2009

Paul J. Balles views a major public relations manual for Israel lobbyists. Written by Dr Frank Luntz, a US Republican political consultant and pollster, on behalf of The Israel Project, a US media advocacy group, it teaches pro-Israel propagandists how to hoodwink people about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, how to silence critics and how to avoid making statements that produce negative reactions.

More than 50 years ago, Vance Packard shook the commercial world with the publication of his book The Hidden Persuaders. It was, as the book jacket claims, "A revealing, often shocking explanation of new techniques of research and methods of persuasion."

Packard revealed, "If people couldn't discriminate reasonably, marketers reasoned, they should be assisted in discriminating unreasonably, in some easy, warm, emotional way."

Much merchandizing success, according to Packard, "...hinged, to a large extent, upon successfully manipulating or coping with our guilt feelings, fears, anxieties, hostilities, loneliness feelings, inner tensions".

Packard raised serious questions of morality related to the "people-manipulating activities of persuaders … and their ability to contact millions of us simultaneously", giving them "the power to do good or evil on a scale never before possible in a very short time".

Among the most evil of the hidden persuaders are the political propagandists. Their "evil" stems from the fact that they have a political agenda, which discriminates unreasonably and is designed to manipulate emotions.

read more @ uruknet

Israel and the US try to manipulate the IAEA's work

The people who run the news in the US suck. They so suck. They have so much blood on their hands it isn't even funny, and they should be publishing things like this but they won't because they're might lose their paychecks. And more people will die so they can continue to collect their paychecks. - ed.


Yusuf Fernandez
September 14, 2009

In last months, Israel and its agents in the United States have increased their pressure on the International Atomic Energy Agency in order to force the agency to change its conclusions about the Iranian nuclear programme. The IAEA has repeatedly claimed that there is no evidence of military nuclear activities in Iran. However, some countries in the West, spearheaded by the United States and Israel, accuse Iran of pursuing a nuclear weapons programme under the guise of peaceful enrichment activities although the have failed to provide any evidence supporting their accusations.

The AFP agency quoted in July an Israel official who spoke on condition of anonymity as saying that the agency head, Mohamed ElBaradei, had “been quite negligent in revealing all the difficulties that the monitors have in Iran and also in not exposing the full picture of the deception and acceleration of (its) illegal military nuclear activities.” He accused El Baradei of “deliberately withheld incriminating information on Iran's nuclear programme.” Israel has often attacked ElBaradei, who is to step down in December, and demanded his dismissal.

According to Washington TV, diplomatic sources have confirmed that the United States and its European allies have been pressing the UN agency to publish “evidence” that they say would point towards Iranian efforts to acquire a nuclear weapons capability. These circles point out that the US and its European allies, such as the UK and France, need any kind of justification to seek the approval harsher sanctions against Tehran.

Actually, the tensions between ElBaradei and the US Administration date back to ElBaradei's public declaration in March 2003 that the documents on alleged Iraqi efforts to obtain uranium from Niger - later known as the “Niger forgeries” - were not authentic. At that time, George W. Bush´s administration was looking for excuses -the non existent weapons of mass destruction of Iraq- to invade Iraq. These claims were subsequently discredited when no traces of WMD were found in Iraq. However, it did not prevent the Bush administration from using similar tactics against Iran, with both the US and Israel issuing warnings that Iranian nuclear sites might be bombed.

However, ElBaradei has not allowed Israel or the US to blackmail him and has repeatedly asserted in his periodical reports that IAEA inspectors stationed at Iran´s nuclear facilities have found no evidence suggesting that Tehran is developing nuclear weapons. Recently, Iran has allowed UN inspectors broader access to its main nuclear complex in the southern city of Natanz and to a reactor in Arak.

read more @ al manar

Gareth Porter: Iran nuclear leaks 'linked to Israel'

Iran nuclear leaks 'linked to Israel'
By Gareth Porter

WASHINGTON - A report on Iran's nuclear program issued by the United States Senate Foreign Relations Committee last month generated news stories publicizing an incendiary charge that US intelligence is underestimating Iran's progress in designing a "nuclear warhead" before the halt in nuclear weapons-related research in 2003.

That false and misleading charge from an intelligence official of a foreign country, who was not identified but was clearly Israeli, reinforces two of Israel's key themes on Iran - that the 2007 US National Intelligence Estimate (NIE) on Iran is wrong, and that Tehran is poised to build nuclear weapons as soon as possible.

But it also provides new evidence that Israeli intelligence was the source of the collection of intelligence documents which have been used to accuse Iran of hiding nuclear weapons research.

The committee report, dated May 4, cited unnamed "foreign analysts" as claiming intelligence that Iran ended its nuclear weapons-related work in 2003 because it had mastered the design and tested components of a nuclear weapon and thus didn't need to work on it further until it had produced enough sufficient material.

That conclusion, which implies that Iran has already decided to build nuclear weapons, contradicts both the 2007 NIE on Iran, and current intelligence analysis. The NIE concluded that Iran had ended nuclear weapons-related work in 2003 because of increased international scrutiny, and that it was "less determined to develop nuclear weapons than we have been judging since 2005".

read more @ asia times

secret bunkers for israeli leaders

By Dan Williams JERUSALEM, Sept 16 (Reuters) - The orchestrated roar of air force exercises designed to signal Israel's readiness to attack Iranian nuclear facilities are belied, perhaps, by a far quieter project deep beneath the western Jerusalem hills. Dubbed "Nation's Tunnel" by the media and screened from view by government guards, it is a bunker network that would shelter Israeli leaders in an atomic war -- earth-bound repudiation of the Jewish state's vow to deny its foes the bomb at all costs. Lash out or dig in? The quandary Israelis call existential seems close to decision-point. Iran's uranium enrichment has already produced enough raw fuel for one nuclear weapon, U.N. inspectors say, though Tehran denies having military designs. Next month's international good-faith talks offer no clear relief to Israel, which wants world powers to be prepared to penalise Iran's vulnerable energy imports but sees Russia and China blocking any such resolution at the U.N. Security Council. That the Obama administration signed on to negotiating without preconditions -- a potential disavowal of the United States's past demand for an enrichment halt -- may only crank up Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's ticking clock. "The longer the U.S. delays playing hardball with Iran, the sooner Israel is likely to strike," wrote Wall Street Journal columnist Bret Stephens. Yet for every expert or diplomat bracing for an imminent attack, there's another who anticipates that Israel will be forced to stand down, hobbled by tactical limitations and the strategic hazards of ruining its top ally's regional agenda.

read more @ reuters

sarkosy: iran working on nukes TODAY

After Paris warned that new sanctions against Teheran remained an option despite the likelihood of negotiations with Iran, French President Nicolas Sarkozy maintained that the Islamic republic was still working on a nuclear weapons program.

"It is a certainty to all of our secret services. Iran is working today on a nuclear [weapons] program," Sarkozy told lawmakers from his UMP party on Tuesday, according to Press TV.

"We cannot let Iran acquire nuclear" weapons because it would also be a threat to Israel, he added.

French Foreign Ministry spokesman Bernard Valero had warned that Iran must make "concrete gestures" at the long-awaited discussions. He said the sanctions option remained on the table in case Teheran makes "an error of choice."

more lies @ jpost

http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1251804582184&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull

45% of doctors would consider quitting if congress passes health care overhaul

Well, at least some investors get the truth. Too bad, however, for all the people who rely on the White House, the AMA, NPR and the LA Times, etc. - ed.

Two of every three practicing physicians oppose the medical overhaul plan under consideration in Washington, and hundreds of thousands would think about shutting down their practices or retiring early if it were adopted, a new IBD/TIPP Poll has found.

The poll contradicts the claims of not only the White House, but also doctors' own lobby — the powerful American Medical Association — both of which suggest the medical profession is behind the proposed overhaul.

...

It also differs with findings of a poll released Monday by National Public Radio that suggests a "majority of physicians want public and private insurance options," and clashes with media reports such as Tuesday's front-page story in the Los Angeles Times with the headline "Doctors Go For Obama's Reform."

Nowhere in the Times story does it say doctors as a whole back the overhaul. It says only that the AMA — the "association representing the nation's physicians" and what "many still regard as the country's premier lobbying force" — is "lobbying and advertising to win public support for President Obama's sweeping plan."

The AMA, in fact, represents approximately 18% of physicians and has been hit with a number of defections by members opposed to the AMA's support of Democrats' proposed health care overhaul.

read more @ investors.com

ear-piercing israeli whining over human rights report

choice excerpts from bbc story:

The report "was flawed from A-to-Z", the UN panel was "biased" and some of its findings "ludicrous", said Israeli government spokesman Mark Regev.

Speaking to the BBC, Mr Regev said the panel was "born in sin" because "even the UN" considers the Human Rights Council which commissioned the report "to have a one-side anti-Israeli agenda".

Mr Regev charged that evidence collected in public hearings in the Gaza Strip, where he said witnesses were subject to intimidation from the militant Hamas movement, had the validity of a "show trial".

"In the last six months, the investigations Israel has done into its troops' behaviour in the Gaza Strip is 1,000 times more serious than this investigation," Mr Regev said.


more here:

16/09/2009 Israel called the Goldstone Commission Report “nauseating” and “biased” on Tuesday, saying it created an unjust equivalence of a “democratic state”-the Zionist entity- with a “terror organization”-the Palestinian resistance- and lacked the context of a decade of “terrorist attacks” by Hamas movement.

...The report, which is 574 pages long, and which was released Tuesday at a news conference at the United Nations headquarters in New York at which Goldstone participated, contains harsh criticism of Israel of a nature and scope that surprised senior diplomats, including Israelis, who had anticipated condemnation of Israel but were astounded by the sweeping and unrestrained character of the criticism.

“Exactly what we feared occurred,” Israel’s ambassador to the UN, Gabriela Shalev told Haaretz. “The mandate of the Goldstone Commission,” she said, “was one-sided from the beginning and the initiative to establish the commission came from the UN Human Rights Council, which is known for regularly and routinely condemning Israel.” “We anticipated that the contents of the report would be slanted and one-sided, but we didn’t imagine that it would be so harsh and blunt,” she added.

read more @ there are no sunglasses

is medvedev the new hero because he agrees with "The West" now?

Is this part of the demonization of Putin? As I wrote 10 days ago:

Meanwhile, NPR (Annenberg Foundation/CPB) reports that Conde Nast (Jewish owned, founded by a Russian Jew), which owns GQ, is trying to keep a story about Putin's "Dark Rise to Power" away from Russian readers. As if that could possibly work. As a matter of fact, it would seem to me that NPR doing a story about such a cover-up will pretty much ensure that the information about Putin will get around, and with just enough of a conspiracy patina to convince those who don't normally traffic in conspiracy theories that this one could be true, since the legitimate but left-leaning NPR dug it up. There's a tool for every job.

"But these stories will get out, they will get read in Russia. They're being somewhat naive to believe that by limiting this to their American edition that somehow they're preventing this from being read."

Naive my ass. Maybe they want to build mystery around Vladimir Putin. Maybe it's helpful to certain people if Vladimir Putin has a tarnished reputation. Maybe if some doubt surrounds Vladimir Putin's motives, then he can take some of the blame when something goes down. And anyway, speaking of naive, does anyone think the Russian people are naive about Vladimir Putin or anything else? For pete's sake, the Russian people must be some of the toughest people on earth. Of course Putin has a shady background! And I would imagine that Russians consider it an asset not a liability. So this whole thing doesn't pass the smell test to me. I mean, if anyone is naive on this planet it has to be Americans who believe just about anything as long as they get it from teevee. I think Americans are the mark, as usual.

WSJ has Medvedev throwing Putin under the bus
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB125304798636513405.html

MOSCOW -- President Dmitry Medvedev, in a clear bid to separate himself from Prime Minister Vladimir Putin, on Tuesday outlined a manifesto of change for Russia that is deeply critical of the system Mr. Putin has created.

Mr. Medvedev also said he could run again for the presidency in 2012, when Mr. Putin would be allowed under Russia's constitution to retake the job. "I don't exclude anything," Mr. Medvedev told the Valdai club, a group of international and domestic academics and journalists.

In an ornate hall overlooking the Kremlin, Mr. Medvedev elaborated on his vision to change Russia. Last week, Mr. Medvedev launched a new wave of proposals in an article posted online. During a question-and-answer session on Tuesday that lasted more than 2½ hours, he stood by his withering critique of Russia's "primitive" resource-based economy, systemic corruption and lack of pluralistic democracy. Mr. Medvedev's article had called for more democracy, a crackdown on corruption and a bigger focus on the individual in business and politics.

OH AND LOOK HERE, MEDVEDEV ALSO HINTS AT U-TURN OVER IRAN SANCTIONS!!! JUST IN TIME HE COMES TO HIS SENSES.

President Medvedev gave the first hint yesterday that Russia was prepared to perform a significant policy U-turn and support US moves for sanctions against Iran.

Speaking in Moscow, the Russian leader went out of his way to be more conciliatory with the West before his visit this month to the US where he will attend the United Nations General Assembly meeting in New York and the G20 summit of economic powers in Pittsburgh. A key issue on the agenda will be efforts by America, Britain and France to impose economic sanctions against Tehran if the regime does not agree to curb its nuclear programme.

It is widely expected that President Ahmadinejad of Iran, who will also be in New York, will reject any pressure from the international community. Russia has previously refused to support the imposition of sanctions on Iran, not least because it enjoys strong trade relations with the country.

But yesterday Mr Medvedev said: “Sanctions are not very effective on the whole, but sometimes you have to embark on sanctions and they can be right.”

His remarks contradicted his Foreign Minister, Sergei Lavrov, who last week ruled out sanctions. The possibility of a U-turn will come as a huge relief to Western diplomats who had largely given up on Russia supporting them. Trade sanctions against Iran would need the support of all five permanent members of the UN Security Council — the US, Britain, China, France and Russia. If Russia joined the Western nations, Beijing would be expected to drop its objections.

Reaching an international consensus on Iran is seen by many as the only way to force the regime into serious negotiations and avoid the threat of a unilateral military strike by Israel against Iranian nuclear facilities before the country can build its first atomic bomb.

read more @ times online

a concerted effort against iran -- continued conflation of Israel's agenda with "The West's"

IAEA conceals evidence Iran documents were forged - WHY???

The International Atomic Energy Agency says its present objective regarding Iran is to try to determine whether the intelligence documents purportedly showing a covert Iranian nuclear weapons program from 2001 to 2003 are authentic or not. The problem, according to its reports, is that Iran refuses to help clarify the issue.

But the IAEA has refused to acknowledge publicly significant evidence brought to its attention by Iran that the documents were fabricated, and it has made little, if any, effort to test the authenticity of the intelligence documents or to question officials of the governments holding them, IPS has learned.

read more @ antiwar

Israeli military correspondent for Haaretz...could he possibly be more disingenuous?

http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1113816.html

In the rare moments when it's not preoccupied with the decline of U.S. President Barack Obama in the polls and with the debate over its government's proposed health-care reforms, the American press [a wholly owned subsidiary of Jews] continues to deal almost obsessively with another pressing issue: the deadlock in efforts to stop Iran's nuclear program and the growing likelihood that the endgame will be an Israeli attack on Iran's nuclear facilities.

In the past few weeks alone, an editorial in The Wall Street Journal warned the president that the United States must put a quick halt to the Iranian nuclear program, because otherwise Israel will bomb the facilities.

...An op-ed in The Los Angeles Times states (with some justification) that if Iran does not respond in September to the demands made of it, the world should brace itself for an Israeli attack. However, the author adds (mistakenly) [he's quite the insider, isn't he. - ed.] that in the event of an Israeli strike, Obama "will probably learn of the operation from CNN rather than the CIA."

This month will mark a critical juncture in Iran's race for nuclear capability. The timetable is getting ever shorter: Most Western intelligence services share the assessment that over the course of 2010, Iran will accumulate sufficient fissionable material to produce two or three nuclear bombs. [OH REALLY? - ed] If the Iranians succeed in dispersing this material among a large number of secret sites, it will reduce the likelihood that the project can be stopped.

Iran says ready for any possible gasoline sanction

TEHRAN (Reuters) - Iran is prepared to deal with any possible sanctions on its imports of gasoline that world powers might impose over Tehran's disputed nuclear programme, Oil Minister Massoud Mirkazemi said on Wednesday.

While Iran is the world's fifth-largest crude exporter, it still has to import up to 40 percent of its gasoline supplies as it lacks the refining capacity to meet domestic demand. The United States and its European allies may target fuel imports if Tehran refuses to enter talks over its nuclear programme.

"We are ready to deal with any possible gasoline sanction ... We have stocked relatively enough gasoline and also we have signed deals with some countries to purchase gasoline," Mirkazemi told reporters, state television reported.

The West suspects Iran aims to make nuclear bombs, while Tehran insists it needs atomic fuel to generate electricity.

read more @ reuters

hearing on auditing the fed, 9/11 truth on france 24 teevee

more dead banker types

He seemed, in many ways, like a man from another time, a Gatsbyesque figure who glided through a world of old money, private clubs and pedigree horses, his family name emblazoned on Ivy League halls.

Then, in an instant, he was gone — his privileged life ended, by his own hand, with a single gunshot to the head.

No one can know exactly what Finn M. W. Caspersen, a prominent philanthropist and the heir to the Beneficial Corporation fortune, was thinking when he decided to take his life on Labor Day. Although Mr. Caspersen, 67, was battling kidney cancer, his suicide shocked his family and friends.

But Mr. Caspersen, a patron of Harvard and Princeton who gave away tens of millions of dollars to charity, apparently harbored a secret: He was suspected of dodging many millions in federal taxes. The authorities, it seemed, were closing in.

At the time of his death, investigators were building a case against Mr. Caspersen on suspicion of using secret offshore bank accounts to evade taxes.

read more @ cryptogon

BOSTON (Reuters) - James McDonald, a prominent adviser to wealthy families as chief executive of investment management group Rockefeller & Co, died in an apparent suicide, on Sunday, local authorities said on Tuesday.

McDonald, 56, was found with a single gunshot wound in his car near a strip mall in Dartmouth, Massachusetts on Sunday afternoon. Police are still investigating.

"The preliminary investigation concludes that this was an apparent suicide," said Gregg Miliote, a spokesman for Bristol County District Attorney Sam Sutter.

McDonald was credited with growing Rockefeller & Co, the New York-based family office established by oil tycoon John D. Rockefeller in 1882 to manage the dynasty's assets, into a broader investment management company with roughly $28 billion in assets.

read more @ reuters

and the lucky winner$ are....

official FDA announcement, links removed

http://www.fda.gov/NewsEvents/Newsroom/PressAnnouncements/ucm182399.htm

FDA Approves Vaccines for 2009 H1N1 Influenza Virus
Approval Provides Important Tool to Fight Pandemic

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration announced today that it has approved four vaccines against the 2009 H1N1 influenza virus. The vaccines will be distributed nationally after the initial lots become available, which is expected within the next four weeks.

“Today's approval is good news for [the lucky pharmaceutical companies who will benefit$$$$ from - ed.] our nation's response to the 2009 H1N1 influenza virus,” said Commissioner of Food and Drugs Margaret A. Hamburg, M.D.

[background info on Margaret Hamburg here. - ed.]

“This vaccine will help protect individuals from serious illness and death from influenza.”

The vaccines are made by CSL Limited, MedImmune LLC, Novartis Vaccines and Diagnostics Limited, and sanofi pasteur Inc. All four firms manufacture the H1N1 vaccines using the same processes, which have a long record of producing safe seasonal influenza vaccines.

”The H1N1 vaccines approved today undergo the same rigorous FDA manufacturing oversight, product quality testing and lot release procedures that apply to seasonal influenza vaccines,” said Jesse Goodman, M.D., FDA acting chief scientist.

Based on preliminary data from adults participating in multiple clinical studies, the 2009 H1N1 vaccines induce a robust immune response in most healthy adults eight to 10 days after a single dose, as occurs with the seasonal influenza vaccine.

Clinical studies under way will provide additional information about the optimal dose in children. The recommendations for dosing will be updated if indicated by findings from those studies. The findings are expected in the near future.

As with the seasonal influenza vaccines, the 2009 H1N1 vaccines are being produced in formulations that contain thimerosal, a mercury-containing preservative, and in formulations that do not contain thimerosal.

People with severe or life-threatening allergies to chicken eggs, or to any other substance in the vaccine, should not be vaccinated.

In the ongoing clinical studies, the vaccines have been well tolerated. Potential side effects of the H1N1 vaccines are expected to be similar to those of seasonal flu vaccines.

For the injected vaccine, the most common side effect is soreness at the injection site. Other side effects may include mild fever, body aches, and fatigue for a few days after the inoculation. For the nasal spray vaccine, the most common side effects include runny nose or nasal congestion for all ages, sore throats in adults, and -- in children 2 to 6 years old -- fever.

As with any medical product, unexpected or rare serious adverse events may occur. The FDA is working closely with governmental and nongovernmental organizations to enhance the capacity for adverse event monitoring, information sharing and analysis during and after the 2009 H1N1 vaccination program. In the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, these agencies include the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Vaccines against three seasonal virus strains are already available and should be used. However, they do not protect against the 2009 H1N1 virus.

vaccine: voluntary or mandatory?

If you have been relying on the mainstream media for information about the swine flu vaccine you may be surprised to learn that there is a question about whether it will, in fact, be a matter of choice. But if you've been following what independent online sources are saying on this subject you will know the internet is abuzz with rumours the vaccine will be mandatory.

We decided to look into the issue and we found that while many of the scare stories circulating seem to have little in the way of foundation, it is indeed the case that on paper this novel, fast-tracked and virtually untested vaccine is effectively mandatory in the UK and the rest of the European Union, the United states, Canada, Australia and many other countries.

Shocking, isn't it? [not to some of us - ed.]

Now, the step from this vaccine being mandatory on paper to governments attempting to force it on those who don't want it is a big one, and at this point it seems unlikely it will be taken. In the following report, we present the facts we have discovered regarding the mandatory vaccination risk, and our analysis of those facts.

read more @ organic consumers association

the obama peace plan, following the CFR script

By Haitham Sabbah

A draft of the Obama peace plan, which is expected to be released at the UN Assembly meeting in New York, or at the G-20 Summit in Pittsburgh, has surfaced.

The International Middle East Media Center's website leaked the alleged draft of Obama's peace plan given to them by Palestinian Legislator Hasan Khreisha. Khreisha added that the draft has been widely distributed among Palestinian and Arab leaders and the Egyptian President, Hosni Mubarak, recently discussed the plan during his visit to the White House.

According to Khreisha, the draft includes ten main points detailed as follows:

1. International presence in the Jordan Valley, Palestinian Plains area, and other areas in the West Bank.

2. Annexing some parts of East Jerusalem to remain under Israeli control, while Muslim holy site would be under Arab control.

3. All Palestinian factions would be dissolved and transformed into political parties.

4. Large settlement blocs in the West Bank would remain under Israeli control, while negotiations would be conducted within three months of the plan agreement?, to discuss the future of smaller settlements.

5. Several areas in the West Bank would be disarmed, and Israeli would maintain aerial control.

6. Intensifying the Palestinian-Israeli security coordination.

7. The Palestinian Authority would not be allowed to have military alliances with regional countries.

8. The United States would guarantee the establishment of a Palestinian State in the summer of 2011.

9. Allowing an agreed upon number of refugees to return, and to be settled in the Plains area and other areas in the West Bank, particularly in the cities of Ramallah and Nablus. A special fund for supporting the refugees would also be established.

10. Israel starts releasing the Palestinian political detainees immediately after the peace deal is signed. Three years would be allocated for the release of the detainees.

read more @ haitham sabbah

also see: israel's security: an idea whose time will never come (my analysis of a CFR paper proposing to buy off the palestinians and internationalize the problem)

Do you wonder how all this will end?

Walter Russell Mead, the Henry A. Kissinger Senior Fellow for US Foreign Policy at the Council of Foreign Relations has written a paper called Change They Can Believe In: To Make Israel Safe, Give Palestinians Their Due.

http://tinyurl.com/8o9jg4

I am going to tell you what I think about this paper.

Mr. Mead starts by calling the Middle East peace process a "necessary evil" for US administrations -- "evil because it is costly and difficult."

No. That is not why it is evil. It is evil because US administrations must always arrange the phony "peace process" in a way that subverts justice for the Palestinians. Why? Because that is what Israel demands. Everything else about this situation flows from this core truth. You will see that Israel constantly demands and whines about security. It is the ever elusive goal, always just out of reach. Why is that? Because there is no security without peace, and more importantly, there is no peace without justice. This is the real problem -- the problem of justice. The problem to be avoided, and failing that (you are here now), finessed. So the conversation always revolves around Israel's security, keeping the cart in front of the horse at all times; because when the conversation turns to justice, the burden falls squarely on Israel's shoulders. And naturally, since Israel was literally founded on a grave injustice and refuses to concede that point -- nothing will ever be resolved. This CFR paper outlines an attempt to buy off the Palestinians and to internationalize this problem, but this is simply a clever way for Israel to finesse the demand for justice without actually having to make a real sacrifice. Here we go...

netanyahu rules out freeze on israeli settlements, source says

w a r m o n g e r

JERUSALEM (CNN) -- Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Monday that a complete halt of Jewish settlements will not happen, according to a parliament source.

Netanyahu said at a closed-door Knesset committee meeting that Israel would agree only to a partial reduction of housing construction and for a limited time, not the year the United States would like, said a government official who was not authorized to speak about the meeting and did not want to be identified.

Netanyahu said no agreement had been reached on the length of time for the building hiatus, the source told CNN. Netanyahu has said in the past that a moratorium would not apply to East Jerusalem, which Israel claims as part of its sovereign capital since taking the territory away from Jordan during the Six Day War in 1967. Palestinians want East Jerusalem to be the capital of a future Palestinian state.

read the rest @ cnn

http://www.cnn.com/2009/WORLD/meast/09/15/mideast.talks/

blackwater involved in bhutto and hariri hits: former pak army chief

TEHRAN - Pakistan’s former chief of army staff, General Mirza Aslam Beg (ret.), has said the U.S. private security company Blackwater was directly involved in the assassinations of former Pakistani prime minister Benazir Bhutto and former Lebanese prime minister Rafik Hariri.

Blackwater later changed its name and is now known as Xe.

General Beg recently told the Saudi Arabian daily Al Watan that former Pakistani president Pervez Musharraf had given Blackwater the green light to carry out terrorist operations in the cities of Islamabad, Rawalpindi, Peshawar, and Quetta.

General Beg, who was chief of army staff during Benazir Bhutto’s first administration, said U.S. officials always kept the presence of Blackwater in Pakistan secret because they were afraid of possible attacks on the U.S. Embassy and its consulates in Pakistan.

During an interview with a Pakistani TV network last Sunday, Beg claimed that the United States killed Benazir Bhutto.

Beg stated that the former Pakistani prime minister was killed in an international conspiracy because she had decided to back out of the deal through which she had returned to the country after nine years in exile.

Beg also said he believes that the former director general of Pakistan’s Inter Services Intelligence was not an accomplice in the conspiracy against Benazir Bhutto, although she did not trust him.

The retired Pakistani general also stated that Benazir Bhutto was a sharp politician but was not as prudent as her father.

On September 2, the U.S. ambassador to Islamabad, Anne W. Patterson, intervened with one of the largest newspaper groups in Pakistan, The News International, to force it to block a decade-old weekly column by Dr. Shireen Mazari scheduled for publication on September 3 in which Mazari, the former director of the Islamabad Institute of Strategic Studies, broke the story of Blackwater/Xe’s presence in Pakistan.

The management of The News International dismissed one of the country’s most prominent academics and journalists due to U.S. pressure. She joined the more independent daily The Nation last week as an editor.

On September 9, in her first column in The Nation, Dr. Mazari wrote:

“Now, even if one were to ignore the massive purchases of land by the U.S., the questionable manner in which the expansion of the U.S. Embassy is taking place and the threatening covert activities of the U.S. and its ‘partner in crime’ Blackwater; the unregistered comings and goings of U.S. personnel on chartered flights; we would still find it difficult to see the whole aid disbursement issue as anything other than a sign of U.S. gradual occupation. It is no wonder we have the term Af-Pak: Afghanistan they control through direct occupation loosely premised on a UN resolution; Pakistan they are occupying as a result of willingly ceded sovereignty by the past and present leadership.”

According to Al Watan, Washington even used Blackwater forces to protect its consulate in the city of Peshawar.

In addition, U.S. journalist Seymour Hersh has accused former U.S vice president Dick Cheney of being involved in the Hariri assassination.

He said Cheney was in charge of a secret team that was tasked with assassinating prominent political figures.

After the assassination of Rafik Hariri in 2005, the U.S. and a number of other countries pointed the finger at Syria, although conclusive evidence has never been presented proving Syrian involvement in the murder.

source: tehran times
http://www.tehrantimes.com/index_View.asp?code=203224

the israeli occupation of america

By Hesham Tillawi, PhD

”Israel need not apologize for the assassination or destruction of those who seek to destroy it. The first order of business for any country is the protection of its people.”Washington Jewish Week, October 9, 1997

I came from a country occupied militarily by Israel to the land of “the free and the brave” only to find out it too was occupied politically by Israel.

The Palestinian people, holding on to whatever shred of hope they can, are counting on the day Americans see the error of their ways and change their opinion of the whole Middle East situation and understand it for what it truly is–A conquered, oppressed people living a hellish existence under a maniacal, occupying power and who will then contact their representatives in Congress and have them put the heat on Israel in fulfilling the agreements she made years ago with the PLO such as Oslo, Taba, Camp David, Wye River, the Road Map, or even Annapolis.

The sad fact however is that the Americans–as much as they champion themselves as a “free people”–are in no better shape than the Palestinians. On the contrary, the American position is worse than that of the Palestinians. The Palestinians can identify the enemy–he is the one with the gun and blowing away their loved ones. They KNOW they are occupied and oppressed. They KNOW how Israel occupied Palestine, killed its inhabitants and forced the majority of those who survived the carnage out of their homes and lands to then live as strangers in refugee camps.


read more @ sos

the difference between "may" and "definitely did"

OH HOW SWEET LOOK AT THE OUTPOURING OF SUPPORT:

Swine Flu "may have killed baby"

It is understood that a baby may have become the second person in Northern Ireland to die from swine flu.

The Health Minister said that he had been informed by a trust of a possible death associated with the virus.

Michael McGimpsey did not confirm the age or sex of the person and said he would not comment further until the results of a post mortem are known.

But a number of MLAs said they wanted to extend their sympathies to the family of the baby.

read more @ bbc

IN MARKED CONTRAST: WHY DON'T PEOPLE IN POWER STAND UP FOR PALESTINIAN CHILDREN'S HUMAN RIGHTS????

THE IOF HAS "D E F I N I T E L Y" KILLED PALESTINIAN BABIES AND CHILDREN.

excerpt from kawther salam's blog:

Has anyone heard of any country in the world where children are torture and incarcerated because of throwing stones at the concrete walls of the concentration camp where they live?

Has anyone heard that a state establish a military court to submit oppressed children to “trials”, because these children dared to express their anger over the violation of their rights by throwing stones at the concrete walls of the concentration camp in which they live?

Has anyone heard about any state which claims that the establishment of a military court was in response to the terms of international conventions on children rights?

Since when do the rights of children call for the establishment of military courts to more effectively prosecute them?

Since when have concrete walls needed armies and military courts to defend them?

This farce and the sanctimonious resolutions and crimes against humanity are taking place only in the zionist “state” called Israel. If this happened in any other country in the world, then the so-called, self-nominated democratic governments would issued a formal and explicit condemnation against that country. But rarely, if ever, do these countries issue such condemnations against Israel, which are governed by war criminals, and psychopath military leaders.

THIS GUY, GADI SHAMNI, IS MUCH MORE DEADLY THAN THE SWINE FLU.

doctor says flu vaccine will cause 60,000 deaths in france alone

Dr Marc Girard, a specialist in the side effects of drugs and a medical expert commissioned by French courts, has said said on French TV that the “swine flu” vaccine could cause 60,000 deaths in France, especially among young people, children and pregnant women.

He also said that the people promoting the “swine flu” vaccine are doing so because they have links with the pharmaceutical company.

The problem with the “swine flu” vaccine is that it is not just “badly developed” but “not developed”, he said, adding that it is being prepared in conditions that endanger the public health.

read more @ prison planet

economics is not a natural science

By Douglas Rushkoff

The marketplace in which most commerce takes place today is not a pre-existing condition of the universe. It's not nature. It's a game, with very particular rules, set in motion by real people with real purposes. That's why it's so amazing to me that scientists, and people calling themselves scientists, would propose to study the market as if it were some natural system — like the weather, or a coral reef.

It's not. It's a product not of nature but of engineering. And to treat the market as nature, as some product of purely evolutionary forces, is to deny ourselves access to its ongoing redesign. It's as if we woke up in a world where just one operating system was running on all our computers and, worse, we didn't realize that any other operating system ever did or could ever exist. We would simply accept Windows as a given circumstance, and look for ways to adjust our society to its needs rather than the other way around.

It is up to our most rigorous thinkers and writers not to base their work on widely accepted but largely artificial constructs. It is their job to differentiate between the map and the territory — to recognize when a series of false assumptions is corrupting their observations and conclusions.

read more @ edge

NANO PARTICLES in the H1N1 vaccine. do you feel like a lab rat yet?

it's always useful when the side effects and auto-immune disorders are vague and non-specific and happen weeks months or years later, so that they can't be easily traced back to the scene of the crime. - ed.

by F. William Engdahl

Vaccines which have been approved by the responsible government authorities for vaccination against the alleged H1N1 Influenza A Swine Flu have been found to contain nano particles. Vaccine makers have been experimenting with nanoparticles as a way to “turbo charge” vaccines for several years. Now it has come out that the vaccines approved for use in Germany and other European countries contain nanoparticles in a form that reportedly attacks healthy cells and can be deadly.

In 2007 researchers at the Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL) announced in an article in the journal, Nature Biotechnology, that they had developed a “nanoparticle that can deliver vaccines more effectively, with fewer side effects, and at a fraction of the cost of current vaccine technologies.” The article went on to describe the effects of their breakthrough: “At a mere 25 nanometers, these particles are so tiny that once injected, they flow through the skin’s extracellular matrix, making a beeline to the lymph nodes. Within minutes, they’ve reached a concentration of DCs thousands of times greater than in the skin. The immune response can then be extremely strong and effective.” 1

There is only one small problem with vaccines containing nanoparticles—they can be deadly and at the least cause severe irreparable health damage.

...

In their report, the scientists concluded something so alarming it is necessary to quote at length:

“Immunological tests, examinations of bacteriology, virology and tumour markers, bronchoscopy, internal thoracoscopy and video-assisted thoracic surgery were performed. Surveys of the workplace, clinical observations and examinations of the patients were conducted. Polyacrylate, consisting of nanoparticles, was confirmed in the workplace. Pathological examinations of patients' lung tissue displayed nonspecific pulmonary inflammation, pulmonary fibrosis and foreign-body granulomas of pleura. Using transmission electron microscopy, nanoparticles were observed to lodge in the cytoplasm and caryoplasm of pulmonary epithelial and mesothelial cells, but are also located in the chest fluid. These cases arouse concern that long-term exposure to some nanoparticles without protective measures may be related to serious damage to human lungs.“3

To date Animal studies and in vitro experiments show that nanoparticles can result in lung damage and other toxicity in animals, but no reports on the clinical toxicity in humans due to nanoparticles prior to the Beijing study had been made.


read more @ global research

the bum's rush into the next war

peter chamberlain's commentary:

[The "urgency" is the closing window of opportunity for a first strike on Iran. Netanyahu is afraid that Israel must "use it or lose its," speaking of its current nuclear monopoly, as he warns the world that Israel may be about to and eliminate Iran's nuclear facilities with its own nukes (Israel's only sure method for eliminating these deep hardened facilities). Israel is prepared to commit a war crime that dwarfs all its past war crimes combined, and American congressmen, like Rep. Berman and Ackerman, are readying support for Israel's actions with a technical embargo of gasoline. More radical friends of Israel support a first strike on Iran, comparing it to the American atomic bombing of Japan. Leaving aside arguments about lives saved by the bombs there is no justification for releasing radioactive clouds over southeast Asia. Iran has not attacked Israel, or threatened to. The only real threat that Iran represents to Israel is a loss of Israeli hegemony in the region, or to Zionist plans for "Greater Israel." Congress would do well to avoid linking our fate to Israeli adventurism in the world and should set its own house in order before it passes judgment on another government. Peace will come to the Middle East when foolish men with notions of national or racial superiority are restrained by the real "civilized world."]

The US Middle East envoy George Mitchell said Washington shared in a "sense of urgency" following talks with Israeli President Shimon Peres.

The US has launched a new effort to finalise terms for fresh negotiations between Israel and the Palestinians.

Mr Mitchell has been discussing the expansion of Jewish settlements in the West Bank - a key stumbling block.

He said: "It is our intention to conclude this phase of our discussions in the very near future."

"This will enable us to move on to the next and really the more important phase," he added.

Meanwhile, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has met Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak in Cairo.

read more @ bbc

talks end 30 year us-iran standoff

a problem for israel's agenda...whatever would we do if peace broke out? - ed.

THE first formal talks between Iranian and American officials since the breaking of diplomatic relations almost 30 years ago have been given the go-ahead by President Barack Obama.

Despite warnings from Tehran that it will not negotiate on its nuclear programme, Obama decided on Friday to accept an offer of face-to-face talks that will also be attended by British, Russian, Chinese and other European officials.

The US decision to resume direct contact with Iran after years of mutual belligerence followed indications from Moscow that Russia would not support any new United Nations sanctions on Iran over its pursuit of nuclear technology.

The talks will be the first substantive contacts since the seizure of 53 hostages in the American embassy in Tehran in 1979.

read more @ times online