Press TV – December 28, 2009 13:44:47 GMT
A poll shows that the German public now has less faith in their political system than at any other time since World War II, mainly due to the financial crisis.
The survey conducted by Bertelsmann Foundation found on Sunday that about 70 percent of those questioned did not feel that they could count on their political and business leaders, or the education system and the social welfare network.
Nearly fifty percent of respondents said they have reservations about representative democracy as a political system.
“Even the social market economy is far from being seen as positively as it once was,” opinion researcher Peter Kruse said of Germany’s system of free markets with a strong social safety net.
The loss of faith is believed to be mainly due to what Germans see as their government’s inadequate attempt to revive the slumping economy.
The poll also shows that the EUR 8.5 billion (USD12.2 billion) tax relief package passed by parliament this month has unsettled Germans at a time of record public debt.
December 28, 2009
Posted by aletho |
Corruption |
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American Zionist fear monger David Harris campaigns for Iran’s destruction
By Paul J. Balles
26 December 2009
Never let it be said that Zionists can’t run an effective propaganda campaign. They’re at it again, giving all to stimulate fear with clever patterns of deception.
David Harris is spreading his fear-mongering widely. For European audiences, his propaganda is targeting Germany through Der Tagesspiegel and Italy through L‘Opinione.
His article on “Iran policy: what price failure” also spreads the message of fear through the Huffington Post to Americans.
To begin his fear stimulus, Harris writes, “Among today’s many foreign policy challenges, Iran’s nuclear programme may be the most daunting.” What better way to stoke fear than call the object of your attack “daunting”?
His next fear-prodding statement reads, “An Iran capable of producing – and delivering – nuclear weapons would have major global consequences.”
An American voice for Israel, Harris tries to drum up global fear of Iran, a signatory to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, while Harris knows full well that Israel has over 200 nuclear warheads and Iran has none.
Harris ignores the fact that Israel has been in attack-mode since its beginnings – ethnic cleansing of Palestinians, invasion and sponsorship of Sabre and Shatilla murders in Lebanon’s refugee camps, slaughter in Gaza, military theft of the Golan Heights from Syria.
On the other hand, Iran’s military history has involved only defence. Harris chooses to ignore this damning fact. Actually, Harris, Director of the American Jewish Committee, started pumping fear of Iran into the heads of his readers some time ago.
Carrying on, Harris claims: “Iran would wield enormous power in the most strategically vital and energy-rich part of the world. And its influence could extend far beyond, including in Latin America, where it has established close ties with Bolivia, Ecuador Nicaragua and Venezuela.”
To strike more fear in the hearts and minds of the Middle East, Harris adds, “Already, some neighbouring states may be exploring their own nuclear options.” It’s amazing how a major Zionist voice in America can churn up fear-producing packages.
“Would Iran share its nuclear and missile technology with others? Very likely. North Korea and Pakistan certainly did.” If you’re not afraid of what Iran might do on its own with nuclear power, just direct your fear to how it might share its nuclear secrets.
Trying to debunk the truth, Harris asks, “Does Iran only want civilian nuclear energy to prepare for a decline in its vast oil and gas reserves?” His response: “Nonsense.”
Then he plays with this: “Intelligence from a variety of countries confirms that Iran’s nuclear programme reflects a clear desire to achieve, at the very least, breakout capacity, allowing it to weaponize in short order.”
The countries aren’t named, but they certainly include Israel. From this line of fear mongering, there’s no way that Iran could be trusted with any nuclear development.
What better way to stoke fear than this claim of uncertainty: “We cannot be certain that the current Iranian regime will act rationally.” One might aver the same uncertainty about Israel, but that’s verboten.
One of the most telling statements by Harris is this: “…countries derive power from merely possessing nuclear weapons, regardless of their possible use.” That could easily refer to Israel, with its cache of nuclear weapons at Dimona.
Harris’s solution is typical of a fear-monger’s: destroy Iran economically, politically and militarily, but make the prescription sound pleasant while referring to a “UN-defying, human-rights-abusing, Holocaust-denying, vote-rigging president?”
Americans, bought and sold by Israeli lobbyists like Harris, will, of course, buy the propaganda and respond to their Harris-made fears.
It’s time to expose the post-9/11 model for fear mongering before propagandists like Harris use it to bring destruction to another country and its people.
Paul J. Balles is a retired American university professor and freelance writer who has lived in the Middle East for many years.
December 27, 2009
Posted by aletho |
Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Illegal Occupation, Subjugation - Torture, War Crimes |
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December 27, 2009
Hezbollah Secretary General Sayyed Hasan Nasrallah gave a speech in Beirut’s southern suburb Dahiyeh on Sunday. “Today in Dahiyeh… we declare that the American scheme of hegemony threatens our nation, values, and the future of our peoples. We condemn its schemes and wars on our countries and peoples. We condemn its full partnership with Israel in those crimes. We also call upon the nation to be aware of the real nature of this enemy and this plot and not to be mislead by the fake slogans about freedom.”
Nasralah continued with warnings about collaboration with Zionism. “There are millions of Palestinian refugees living away from their homes and there are more than 11 thousand prisoners in Israeli jails…We call on the ummah not to confuse between the friend and the foe and not to listen to US and Israeli proxies who want to exchange this enemy with a brother. We call for ending the siege of Gaza. What kind of ummah is this, an ummah of 1.4 billion Muslims watching 1.5 million Palestinians living in harsh conditions due to the siege? A year ago, we told Egypt a word of truth and we were railed at. Today, in addition to the siege, there is the iron wall and the flow of water in tunnels to finish off the rest of the narrow veins that give some hope to Gaza. Today, I call on Egypt to stop building this wall and the break the siege. This should be condemned by all honest Arabs. Silence cannot continue at the expense of a whole people, regardless of the pretexts.”
Lebanon’s achievement in overcoming division was noted. “And what had been schemed for Lebanon was frightening in terms of wars, seditions, and divisions as well as a suspicious role for Lebanon in the new Middle East; the sectarian, ethnic, and conflicting Mideast that would yield to Israel. Today we have crossed this stage and we are entering a new one with fixing ties with Syria being one of its most important characteristics. Today we have a national unity government that comprises most of the powers and this gives us a chance to move forward to solve our country’s problems.”
The Hezbollah leader addressed the Christian community in Lebanon. “I call on them for a quiet dialogue away from ardent rhetoric; a dialogue among themselves over their present and future options. I call them to recall past experiences and conclude whether bargaining on Israel, by some parties, was good for Lebanon or was it the contrary. I call on them to review the bargaining of some on the American administration. Today, we have 150 thousand American soldiers in Iraq and they did not provide security for the Christians who can’t even gather in their churches to mark the birth of Christ. Can the United States provide security? I tell them that the interest of the Christian community in Lebanon lies in Lebanon, not anywhere else. It’s in their interest to cooperate with the rest of the Lebanese. Today the Lebanese have the chance to acknowledge one another; and this is a chance that must not be wasted.”
December 27, 2009
Posted by aletho |
Progressive Hypocrite |
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By Wahida C. Valiante | December 26, 2009
So much has appeared in the international press and on the Internet that it would seem to be an exercise in redundancy to offer a perspective on the tragedy that befell the people of Gaza last year, especially the Gazan children. A devastating and colossal tragedy it certainly was; the Israeli attacks by sea, air and land were more brutal than anything the inhabitants of Gaza had ever endured previously.
The pictures that flooded television screens around the world showed a gruesome parade of young corpses and wounded children being loaded into and unloaded from the trunks of private cars that transported them to the only hospital in Gaza worthy of being called a hospital. People of conscience all over the world found these images horrifyingly explicit and they brought home to us both the magnitude of the death and destruction unleashed by Israel’s brutal assault against helpless and innocent Gazan children who had nowhere to run or hide. This latest orgy of air strikes and armed incursions by Israeli military forces turned the besieged and starved Strip into an unbearable inferno – literally into the Killing Fields of Gaza.
In November 2000, the Globe and Mail published my article “Who are the victims here?” in which I described the living conditions of Palestinian children in the Gaza Strip during my stay in the occupied territories in 1999:
“I recently observed the effects of the ‘peace process’ when I visited the children of Jenin, Nablus, Ramallah, Gaza, Rafah and East Jerusalem. These children know first-hand the effects of military and economic oppression. There is hardly a family that has not experienced torture, imprisonment or economic hardship.
“Most of these children live in refugee camps in houses with corrugated roofs and cramped living spaces. Often, they do not have running water. The children lack adequate schools, health-care facilities, hospitals, social services, public parks, swimming pools, or recreation facilities. In the camps, the streets are their playgrounds, often with open sewers and waste flowing freely. They have seen no other reality.”
It is sad that what seems so obvious to the rest of the world escapes the minds of apologists for Israeli state terror.
Children make up more than half of crowded Gaza’s 1.4 million people and are the most defenseless victims of Israeli siege of Gaza. Israel’s harsh security measures come at an enormous humanitarian cost and the stark reality is that under Israeli occupation, entire generations of Palestinian children and youth have suffered a litany of horrific, traumatizing events for thirty years. In addition to almost-daily home demolitions, they have witnessed intimidation, humiliation, fear, insecurity, poverty, closures, and the menacing presence of armed settlers.
With all their healthy socializing structures destroyed by the Israeli military, these children have never known peace or security, or the freedom to roam the streets and playgrounds. Gaza’s children, like their parents, continuously face hardship in simply going about their lives; they are prevented from living in peace and security, going to school, or doing things that make up the daily fabric of most people’s existence. Their parents have not known peace and freedom either, and cannot even dream about a safe and productive future for their children, and the children to come after them.
Ever since the moribund Oslo peace accord, they have been living in large prison camps. Now, locked up and besieged in Gaza by an Israeli army that happens to be one of the most powerful in the world, these children are under attack in their own land, in their own homes, and are being subjected to economic, psychological, physical and emotional terror from the air, sea and ground. Indeed all of Gaza has become a danger zone where children’s homes have been demolished, bombed, and shelled, killing children inside. Other children have been killed while riding in cars with their parents, while playing in the streets, while walking to school, visiting friends, and even while taking refuge in a UN Shelter.
Imagine the psychological and emotional terror experienced by children who grow up knowing that their parents cannot protect them from helicopter gunships, ground missiles, or snipers’ bullets. These children have no escape routes, no options, because the Israeli army and invading settlers are the ones who determine which child, which family, will be shot; which houses and trees will be bulldozed and uprooted; which street or alleyway will be hit by the sharpshooters. Their basic human rights are being trampled on by deliberate policies of the Israeli government whose obscene actions have denied these innocent children education, safety, health, economic well-being and all the amenities of normal life.
This nightmare of the children of Gaza is best described in the pages of Franz Kafka:
Lawrence Davidson in Counter Punch writes that, “In Kafka’s world, the prevailing theme is uncertainty and unpredictability. There are no set rules for behavior and the orders given by authorities seem arbitrary and even contradictory. You do not know what the laws are. The ‘authorities’ in Kafka’s work sit in their fortresses and periodically intrude upon the lives of the confused and apparently helpless protagonists.”
Similarly, nothing is predictable for Palestinians. Israel’s rules can change from one day to the next without notice or explanation. They live in an arbitrary environment, continuously adapting to circumstances they cannot influence and which increasingly reduce the range of their possibilities. No one really knows how many Palestinian children will continue to re- experience the horrors of conflict psychologically and emotionally throughout their lives.
Yet, as the world witnessed the organized, ruthless killing and maiming of these Palestinian children, there was only deafening silence from our “humane” Canadian government. If Prime Minister Harper so greatly respects the dignity of human life as he stated during his recent visit to China he would have asked Israel long ago to cease its murderous onslaught on the children of Gaza.
During my stay in the occupied territories, I was often asked by Palestinians why the world ignored their sufferings and their right to self-determination. I had no answer then. But today I can tell them that they are not alone; the world is outraged at what it witnessed in Gaza and for the “first time since the establishment of the State of Israel, an international campaign calling for sanctions against Israel for its innumerable violations of International Law has been very successful in drawing huge public attention and initiating a great number of mobilizations and initiatives around the world.” (Michel Warschawski)
No amount of “anti-Semitic” or “self-hating” labels pasted on people of conscience who criticize the Israeli occupation can stifle that debate; it is a debate now spreading throughout the world, focusing unavoidable scrutiny on Israel and its brutal occupation of Palestinian territories.
When the dust settles, history will record that the atrocities repeatedly committed by Israel against defenseless Palestinian children in Gaza was a turning-point in the long ordeal of Palestine’s occupation. Things can never be the same again in Palestine because the world knows more of the truth about Israel’s’ cruel agenda than ever before.
(Mrs. Wahida Valiante is national president of the Canadian Islamic Congress. She is a retired professional family counselor who visited Palestine as part of a fact-finding medical team. While there, the team visited refugee camps, health care clinics, hospitals, orphanages, children’s schools, local and international charities and women’s refugee centers, as well as speaking extensively with social workers and local Palestinian families.)
Source
December 27, 2009
Posted by aletho |
Illegal Occupation, Subjugation - Torture, War Crimes | Gaza, Israel, Wahida C. Valiante |
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Press TV – December 26, 2009 – 23:22:41 GMT
Preliminary reports say that at least three people have been killed and five others injured as an explosion hits the southern suburbs of the Lebanese capital, Beirut, where the Shia Hezbollah movement has its headquarters.
The explosion occurred as Hezbollah was organizing a mourning ceremony to commemorate the martyrdom anniversary of the third holiest figure of Shia Islam, Imam Hussein.
Those killed in the blast were the members of the security services. They were reportedly trying to defuse an explosive device planted in a car belonging to a high-ranking Hamas official based in Lebanon. Hezbollah’s security forces have cordoned off the entire area, and the Lebanese army has been deployed to the scene, a Press TV correspondent reported.
The incident came after Hezbollah Secretary-General Seyyed Hassan Nasrallah delivered a televised speech on the eve of Ashura, calling on Lebanon’s Shias to take part massively in Sunday’s ceremony which will include a huge march across the southern suburbs.
Rocked since 2005 by assassinations and an Israeli attack, Lebanon has enjoyed greater stability recently and formed a unity government last month.
December 27, 2009
Posted by aletho |
False Flag Terrorism, War Crimes |
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27/12/2009 – 16:26
London – Ma’an – Egyptian security forces detained 38 participants of the Gaza Freedom March from a hotel in Al-Arish on Sunday at noon, according to a statement issued by the event’s organizers.
“Egyptian security forces detained a group of 30 internationals in their hotel in el-Arish and another group of 8 at the bus station. They also broke up a memorial action commemorating the Cast Lead massacre at the Kasr al Nil Bridge,” the statement asserted.
The Freedom March plans to bring more than 1,000 international protesters to Gaza this week to denounce the blockade of the Palestinian territory.
The detainees include Spanish, French, British, American and Japanese nationals. Another group of eight people, including citizens of American, British, Spanish, Japanese and Greece, were detained at Al-Arish bus station in the afternoon of December 27, the organizers said.
“The Egyptian security forces eventually yielded, letting most of the marchers leave the hotel, but did not permit them to leave the town. When two younger delegates, a French and Japanese woman, attempted to leave Al-Arish, the Egyptian authorities stopped their taxi and unloaded their luggage,” it stated.
Meanwhile, in Cairo, Egyptian security police broke up a commemoration ceremony marking the anniversary of the Israeli invasion of Gaza organized by the Gaza Freedom March at the Kasr An-Nil Bridge.
“As a nonviolent way of commemorating the more than 1,300 Palestinians killed in the Israeli assault on Gaza that began a year ago on December 27, 2008, Gaza Freedom Marchers tied hundreds of strings with notes, poems, art and the names of those killed to the bridge,” the group said.
“We’re saddened that the Egyptian authorities have blocked our participants’ freedom of movement and interfered with a peaceful commemoration of the dead,” said Medea Benjamin of CODEPINK, one of the March’s organizers.
Benjamin added that the Gaza Freedom March participants are continuing to urge the Egyptian government to allow them to proceed to Gaza.
They visited the Arab League asking for support, various foreign embassies and the Presidential Palace to deliver an appeal to President Mubarak. They are calling their supporters around the world to contact Egyptian embassies and urge them to free the marchers and allow them to proceed to Gaza, the statement concluded.
December 27, 2009
Posted by aletho |
Full Spectrum Dominance, Solidarity and Activism |
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By Spero News | December 25, 2009
Just days before the first anniversary of the Israeli Cast Lead military operation which cost the lives of 1,400 Palestinians, Richard Falk, the UN Special Rapporteur for the Occupied Palestinian Territories, has urged the Western powers to insist that Israel immediately end its blockade of the Gaza Strip, threatening to enforce economic sanctions.
Falk also urged that the Goldstone Report’s recommendations, which suggest that Israel and Hamas have perpetrated war crimes possibly amounting to crimes against humanity, be fully and swiftly implemented. Falk said that “people having common sense, anywhere in the world, should become conscious of the dramatic situation in Gaza, where the suffering of over 1.5 million people, half of them children, has carried on without any formal objection from governments and the UN”.
In the UN annual report, published last month, UN secretary general Ban Ki-moon has asked Israel to end the embargo on Gaza and to cease demolitions of Palestinian homes. “In particular, the Israeli government should allow access for humanitarian (and non-humantarian) aid in Gaza, such as to allow the rebuilding of housing and infrastructure that were destroyed,” said the Secretary General.
“So far there are is no tangible evidence of a coordinated diplomatic process to end the blockade and ensure that Israeli officials, who have been suspected of perpetrating war crimes be brought to justice” said Falk, adding that “this constitutes a tragic failure of the international community and the UN”.
The Goldstone report usrged the creation of inquiry commissions to determine whether or not war crimes had been committed during the 22-day long Cast Lead offensive in Gaza in 2008, which had already been under a three year long embargo.
December 26, 2009
Posted by aletho |
Illegal Occupation, War Crimes |
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IslamOnline.net & Newspapers
“The United States government, one of their goals now, is to make sure southern Sudan in 2011 is a viable state,” Gatkuoth said. (Washington Times)
12/25/09 — CAIRO — The United States is pouring hundreds of millions of dollars into the pocket of South Sudan government to help it prepare for secession from the North.”The United States government, one of their goals now, is to make sure southern Sudan in 2011 is a viable state,” Ezekiel Lol Gatkuoth, representative of South Sudan in Washington, told The Washington Times Friday, December 25.
Washington offers $1 billion in annual aid to South Sudan.
The majority of the money is used to build roads, train police and professionalize a separate army in preparation for the Christian-majority region’s secession in 2011, said Gatkuoth, who also heads South Sudan’s mission to the UN.
Southern Sudanese will vote in a referendum in 2011 on whether to secede from the Muslim north.
The referendum is part of the 2005 north-south peace deal, which ended a two-decade civil war between the north and south.
The accord established an interim period, with a coalition government between the Muslim north and mostly Christian south and the sharing of oil wealth.
Last month, South Sudan President Salva Kiir publicly called for secession from Sudan.
Though southern officials have not concealed their intention to vote for secession, the region still lack the basics of a viable state.
The region is also plagued by tribal clashes, which have killed at least 2,500 people and displaced more than 350,000 others this year.
The International Crisis Group on Tuesday criticized South Sudan police for failing to keep security and end tribal clashes in the region.
War Again
Gatkuoth accused the Khartoum government of stumbling efforts of the South to secede.
“I do not think the North is ready to allow the South to go and have its independent state,” he said.
The southern official said that the next 12 months would be crucial in determining the fate of the country.
“In 2010, we either make it or break it,” he said.
“An election can lead to war if you feel cheated.”
The ruling Sudanese National Congress Party (NCP) and the Sudan People’s Liberation Movement (SPLM) agreed Wednesday to review a disputed law on the 2011 referendum.
Parliament has passed the law even though SPLM walked out of the assembly objecting to an amendment allowing southerners living in the north to vote in the January 2011 referendum.
Gatkuoth threatened that the South will take up arms again if Khartoum government tried to postpone the 2011 referendum.
“Even if you postpone that for one day, the people of southern Sudan will not accept it.” 
December 26, 2009
Posted by aletho |
Mainstream Media, Warmongering, Wars for Israel |
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December 26th, 2009 | By Ziad Khalil Abu Zayyad
Six Palestinians were killed in two separate incidents by the Israeli forces in Gaza and the West Bank. Three of the Palestinians were assassinated in Nablus at the West Bank. According to Israeli sources, Ghasan Abu Sharkh, Raed Sarkaji and Anan Suboh took part in the last attack which resulted in killing an Israeli settler in the West Bank.
The Israeli troops entered Nablus while being directed by the Israeli Intelligence Service “Shabak” in order to assassinate the three Palestinians who are known as leaders of Fatah movement in the Palestinian territories. Israel considered this operation a success since it came only 48 hours after the attack on the Israeli’s car in the West Bank. The Palestinian authority considered this operation another act made by the Israeli government in order to destroy the peace process and the efforts made by the United States and the international community in order to renew the negotiations.
In another incident Israel killed three Palestinians in Gaza who were trying to infiltrate through Erez Checkpoint into the Israeli territories. According to Aljazeera correspondent the three Palestinians were Bedwins searching for metal and building material in order to get it back for recycling and use in Gaza.
The Israeli operation in the West Bank is considered a serious development in the area since it may bring more reactions from the Palestinian side and end in a new round of violence between the two sides. Although the Palestinian security forces are applying everything which was asked from them in matters of security, Israel continues to take law in its hands and even implements public executions claiming that this is a legal punishment for those who were involved in terrorist attacks against Israelis.
In Israel’s operation in the West Bank anti tank rockets and heavy weapons were used to target buildings full of civilians. The Israeli forces stormed into Anan Suboh’s house and stayed inside it for several hours before executing him which leaves more questions about the real Israeli intentions for this operation. The mission was not to arrest the Palestinian activists but instead to investigate with them and immediately execute them no matter what. Ghasan Abu Sharkh did not show any kind of resistance and despite this he was shot at his head immediately. Raed Sarkajy’s wife was injured while she was sleeping beside him on their bed. The Israeli forces attacked the room and shot both of them although there wasn’t any kind of resistance from inside the house.
The whole operation sends one message which Israel wants the Palestinians to understand clearly: Israel is ready to execute anyone without a court or a respect for the Palestinian authority’s presence at the West Bank. The Israeli assassinations were criticized by several International organizations for its ruthlessness and illegality. Israel is not only violating the security arrangements and attacking civilian areas but it also starts such operations with a target of killing those who are considered suspects ignoring the part of court of law and justice.
The Israeli army and Intelligence may consider this operation a successful one since it proves that Israel is holding the West Bank as it wants. However, the result of such operations will prove that the Israeli policy will only bring failure and more reactions which may return the area into a new circle of violence.
These six Palestinians were killed in the day when the Palestinians remember the 1,600 victims who died in Israel’s war on Gaza. Since the war and until today Israel continues to depend on its security plans in dealing with its conflict with the Palestinians. The only result which they are bringing on the Israeli people is more anger and hatred within the Palestinians who are suffering until today.
Source
December 26, 2009
Posted by aletho |
Civil Liberties, Illegal Occupation, Subjugation - Torture |
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December 26, 2009
Nablus – Ma’an – Family members of the three slain Fatah members gave testimony around the last moments of their loved ones lives on Saturday, hours after the men were assassinated by Israeli forces in their own homes in Nablus.
Home of Raed Sarakji, killed Saturday [MaanImages]
Raed Sarakji, 38
Now a widow, Tahani Ja’ara is 32 years old and seven months pregnant. “We were sleeping in our bedroom, not bigger than 6 square meters, when Israeli soldiers began yelling ‘get out…get out’. I thought I was dreaming. When I heard the Israeli soldiers and their police dogs outside the room, that was when I realized it was real.”
Tahani said her husband told soldiers he would get out of the house, so they started shooting through the door and the windows. “He fell between my hands bleeding. I started crying ‘they killed him…they killed him. Then soldiers broke the door and got in. He was already dead, but they continued to riddle his body with bullets to make sure he was killed.”
Three months before his death, Sarakji opened a used tools shop in the old city of Nablus. He had just been released from Israeli prison in January 2009 after spending seven years in jail, he was trying to re-start his life.
According to a statement from the Israeli military, Sarkaji was involved with the manufacturing of explosives and the establishment of an explosives-manufacturing laboratory in Nablus.
Ghassan Abu Sharkh, 39
Ghassan’s 16-year-old brother Diyaa Abu Sharkh saw him shot dead Saturday morning. “Everything happened very quickly… when we opened the door and saw the soldiers, two masked collaborators pointed to my brother Ghassan who was walking down the stairs. Before I knew it he was being shot. I couldn’t really make sense of what was going on at all. Then an Israeli officer asked me whether the dead man was Ghassan, and I said yes. ‘Good, then ask everybody to leave the house,’ the officer said.”
“I was stading close to Ghassan when they killed him. They could have detained him very easily. [But now he has] He passed to join my brother Nayif who was killed by Israeli forces a few years ago [2004].”
Ghassan Abu Sharkh was a car electrician and owned a small workshop. He left behind a wife, three sons, and a daughter.
Anan Subih, 33
Farid Subih is 45, his brother Anan, was killed Saturday morning in the Ras Al-Ain neighborhood of Nablus. “At 3am, dozens of Israeli troops surrounded our four-story building. They blew open the the main gate then started shooting randomly and throwing grenades in all directions. Anan was inside, and he asked everybody to leave the building to avoid being hurt.”
He continued, “We headed to the nearby house of the Al-‘Amoudi family. Then soldiers entered the house with police dogs, and they started throwing more grenades, and a fire erupted in the warehouse full of plastic chairs and sponge material.
“My brother was not armed, but we could see soldiers continue to ransack the house. For three hours, we didn’t know what was going on. After the soldiers left, we found Anan dead…bullets tore all his body and bones. They could have detained him, and he died believing he had been granted amnesty by Israeli forces. He left behind a widow, two sons, and five daughters,” added Farid.
According to the Israeli military, Annan was killed after an exchange of fire and “found in a hiding place along with weapons and ammunition.”
Anan was an activist within Fatah’s Al-Aqsa Brigades, he was completely pardoned in an amnesty deal between Israel and the Palestinian Authority.
Source
December 26, 2009
Posted by aletho |
Civil Liberties, Illegal Occupation, Subjugation - Torture |
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Press TV – December 26, 2009
As Western powers batten down the hatches and prepare sanctions against Tehran, a senior Russian official says there still is no proof of an Iranian nuclear weapons program.
In remarks published on Friday, deputy Russian foreign minister Alexander Saltanov reiterated that Moscow is not convinced that Iran seeks to weoponize its nuclear program, and moreover he has not been shown any corroborative evidence confirming that the country has any such plans.
“Russia has no concrete information that Iran is planning to construct a weapon. It may be more like Japan, which has nuclear readiness but does not have a bomb,” Primakov told The Jerusalem Post.
In order to pressure Iran into halting its nuclear work, Washington and a number of European countries have vowed to push for new UN sanctions early next year.
But the calls for renewed pressure were once again snubbed by China and Russia.
Saltanov said while “Iran has a positive potential” to cooperate with the West on its nuclear case, it is most evident that a military solution against the Tehran government would only make matters worse.
“If Israel attacks Iran it will cause great instability and will only postpone the Iranian program, not end it,” noted the Russian official.
Israel routinely threatens to bomb Iran’s enrichment sites, arguing that the country’s nuclear work is a mortal threat to Tel Aviv, which ironically is reported to have the Middle East’s sole nuclear arsenal and 200 nuclear warheads at its disposal.
This is while Iran, unlike Tel Aviv, is a signatory of the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) and has opened its nuclear facilities to routine inspections by the UN nuclear watchdog.
In response to Israeli war threats, Tehran warns that if Tel Aviv steps out of line, it will close the strategic Strait of Hormuz to maritime traffic, including the 15 or so supertankers that sail through on a daily basis to deliver the world’s oil supplies.
A recent report by the US Office of Naval Intelligence (ONI) has confirmed that if the United States or Israel decide to bomb Tehran’s nuclear sites, Iran’s naval modernization and maritime capabilities have reached a point where it can shut down the strategic Strait of Hormuz.
“Given the importance of the Strait, disrupting traffic flow or even threatening to do so may be an effective tool for Iran,” said the intelligence report, which was revealed by Joseph Farah’s G2 Bulletin in November.
It notes that while Iran’s ability to shut down the Strait of Hormuz may be transitory, the impact would undoubtedly have far-reaching consequences for the already-fragile world economy.
“[World economies would suffer] a serious economic impact from a sustain closure of the Strait of Hormuz due to greatly reduced supplies of crude oil, petroleum supplies and (liquefied natural gas),” ONI said.
December 26, 2009
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Mainstream Media, Warmongering |
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Press TV – December 25, 2009 02:49:46 GMT
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President Ahmadinejad’s interview with Britain’s Channel 4
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President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad says some Western countries are using Iran’s nuclear program as a pretext to put pressure on the Islamic Republic.
In an interview with Britain’s Channel 4, Ahmadinejad said that Iran opposes the expansionist policies being pursued by certain Western countries, adding that this was the real reason behind their animosity towards Iran.
“Some Western countries are using Iran’s peaceful nuclear program as a pretext for imposing sanctions and [passing] resolutions against the Iranian nation,” IRNA quoted Ahmadinejad as saying on Thursday.
“It would be better if they were brave enough to openly declare that they are against the Iranian nation because it is an obstacle to their expansionist policies in the world,” the Iranian president said.
He noted that Tehran had voluntarily offered to buy nuclear fuel from the West to provide them with an opportunity to cooperate with Iran.
“Based on the [IAEA] regulation they are obliged to provide Iran with nuclear fuel without setting any preconditions,” Ahmadinejad added.
Article III of the IAEA Statute clearly states that the agency, if requested to do so, should act as “an intermediary for the purposes of securing the performance of services or the supplying of materials, equipment, or facilities by one member of the Agency for another.”
He noted that the West is setting “political conditions” for a nuclear swap deal with Iran.
December 25, 2009
Posted by aletho |
Wars for Israel |
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