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Answers in Absolute for ‘Why 9/11?’

By Sibel Edmonds | Boiling Frogs | August 12, 2011

Why ‘some’ Still Question, Seek Answer(s) & Accountability
For ‘some’ reason I have been receiving more than a few ‘eye-rolling’ responses when I mention our theme for the month leading up to September 11- the tenth year. You and I know where the conscious but mostly subconscious eye-rolling and in some cases eye-aversion reactions come from. A very few bold ones are courageous enough to actually put this reaction into words. They ask ‘why can’t some people just let it go?’ They comment, ‘enough already with this 9/11 subject!’ Many of these same people are actually very outspoken and active in combating civil liberties related issues and abuses such as NSA Illegal Domestic Wiretapping, Rendition and Torture, FBI National Security Letters, TSA’s outrageous abuses …and the long list goes on. However, for ‘some’ reason they see ‘this 9/11 thing’ as a pointless nuisance, and wonder why some people don’t give up and keep bringing ‘it’ up. After all, the majority of these people consider 9/11 as ‘case closed,’ and a few regard it as a ‘cold case.’

I am not going to get into the ‘some’ reasons for this post; although, I have plenty to say on the subject. Instead, for the purpose of this piece, and for those audiences, I am going to answer the ‘whys.’ Why ‘some’ still question and seek answer(s) and accountability on 9/11.

Why 9/11? Because ‘they’ claim that’s what gives them the right to override our Constitution and all other laws guaranteeing our liberties and privacy.

Why 9/11? Because that’s what ‘they’ claim as justification for every one of our many wars.

Why 9/11? Because that’s what ‘they’ say is the reason for us having to be violated, humiliated, groped and fondled for the ‘privilege’ of travel.

Why 9/11? Because that’s when ‘they’ began the illegal eavesdropping of all our communications.

Why 9/11? Because that’s how ‘they’ legitimize excessive secrecy.

Why 9/11? Because that’s the excuse ‘they’ use to implement torture and severe human right violations and escape all liabilities.

Why 9/11? Because that’s the rationalization ‘they’ use to expand ‘their’ size and power.

Why 9/11? Because ‘they’ have successfully made it a means to justify many unjustifiable ends.

Why 9/11? Because that holds answers to many questions ‘they’ don’t want you to ask.

Why 9/11? Because that’s the question ‘they’ don’t want ever answered.

Why 9/11? Because maybe that is what ‘they’ really wanted.

Why 9/11? Because ‘they’ should not get away with it.

August 15, 2011 Posted by | False Flag Terrorism | 2 Comments

Social media at the mercy of UK government

Press TV – August 15, 2011

Social networking firms Facebook, Twitter, and Research in Motion (RIM), maker of BlackBerry, have welcomed the forthcoming meeting with the British government.

British Home Secretary, Theresa May, is to hold a meeting with the executives of social networking firms to discuss the possibility of shutting down social media during future unrest in Britain.

Moreover, British Prime Minister, David Cameron, asserted that the unprecedented unrest across Britain had been mostly arranged through social media. Cameron acknowledged that “the police, the intelligence services and industry” cooperated with the government during the widespread unrest.

Cameron maintained that the British government had been looking at ways to prevent people from communicating with each other via social media when any sort of unrest threatens the country.

RIM, whose BlackBerry application has been a thorn in British government’s side, has announced it would observe “both UK privacy laws as well as the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act.”

Facebook has also expressed approval of the forthcoming meeting asserting that it took measures to make sure Facebook would be “a safe and positive platform for people in the UK” during the widespread unrest.

Furthermore, a report in the Financial Times said that Twitter looked forward to discussing the issues with May.

Meanwhile, Open Rights Group executive director, Jim Killock, has condemned government’s plans to ban social media asserting that such measures infringe upon people’s right to freedom of expression.

Killock said that the police should not be able to suspend individuals from using social media and any suspension decision should be made at courts.

All these measures by the British government come as the British media accuses the Iranian government of blocking access to the Internet and violating freedom of expression while the online version of almost all British newspapers have created a link to Facebook for an unfiltered access to the Iranian users.

Nevertheless, social networking sites, like Facebook, have become a national security concern after Britain faced widespread unrest which some analysts believe was a direct result of the government’s policies.

August 15, 2011 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Full Spectrum Dominance | Leave a comment

Ahmadinejad: Europe & US need freedom most of all

RussiaToday | August 14, 2011

In an exclusive interview with RT, Iran’s President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad pointed out that the 21st century is about knowledge, while nukes are the means of the past.

Commenting on the dispute over Iran’s nuclear program, Ahmadinejad said, “We do not want nuclear weapons for a few reasons… This weapon is inhumane. Because of our faith, we are against it. Our religion says it is prohibited, and we are religious people.”

“Nuclear weapons have no capabilities today. If any country tries to build a nuclear bomb, in fact, they waste their money on resources and, secondly, they create a big danger to themselves,” he stated.

No country possessing nuclear weapons has benefited from it, Ahmadinejad said, adding, “The Americans have nuclear bombs and nuclear weapons. Could they win in Iraq or in Afghanistan? Could nuclear weapons help the Zionist regime win in Lebanon and Gaza? Could nuclear weapons help the former Soviet Union avoid collapse?”

August 14, 2011 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Militarism, Video | 2 Comments

UK detains 3,000 people in unrest

Press TV – August 14, 2011

Latest reports indicate that the British security forces have detained nearly 3,000 people since an unprecedented wave of unrest hit the United Kingdom.

The British courts are said to have worked around the clock over the weekend to process a third of the detainees.

Some reports put the number of those arrested during the ongoing unrest at 4,000.

A teenager and a young man have been charged with the murder of three Muslim men who were protecting their neighborhood in Birmingham.

Meanwhile, senior British officers are furious over British Prime Minister David Cameron’s decision to appoint an American police chief to advise them on crushing the wave of unrest and street gangs across the country.

President of the Association of Chief Police Officers Sir Hugh Orde has openly criticized Cameron’s appointment of former New York police commissioner Bill Bratton.

The unrest in Britain began on August 6 in the north London suburb of Tottenham, after a few hundred people gathered outside a police station to protest against the fatal shooting and killing of a black man, Mark Duggan, by the police.

Thereafter, violent protests erupted in major cities like Birmingham, Liverpool, and Bristol, contributing to Britain’s worst unrest since the 1980s.

London’s Metropolitan Police has announced that 16,000 police officers will be deployed on London streets. Deputy Assistant Commissioner Stephen Kavanagh also confirmed the prospects of police using baton rounds and plastic bullets.

August 14, 2011 Posted by | Aletho News | 1 Comment

Pakistani Drone Attack Victims

August 14, 2011 Posted by | Progressive Hypocrite, Video, War Crimes | Leave a comment

French journal of record peddles Zionist propaganda

By David Cronin – The Electronic Intifada – 08/14/2011

Is it impossible to escape from Israel-related propaganda?

Yesterday, I was in a Brussels coffee shop, where I picked up a copy of Le Monde. In a section marked “The laboratories of the future”, the French daily had a full-page feature about the Israeli Institute for Technology in Haifa, which is better known as the Technion.

Described by the paper’s headline writer as a “high-tech Eden”, the university was lavished with praise for its innovative work on treating Parkinson’s disease and sending microsatellites into Space. Peretz Lavie, the university’s president, was quoted as arguing that the Technion was a model for coexistence between Israeli and Palestinian students and that there would be peace in the Middle East if everyone else could follow the Technion’s example. Indeed, the only hint that the region’s problems may encroach on the campus was in a paragraph about how students sometimes have to drop their books to fight Israel’s wars (such as the attack on Lebanon in 2006).

It seems clear that Laurent Zecchini, the author of this piece, either relied entirely on the university’s authorities for information or had no interest in exploring its military links further. For if he did a little googling, he should have easily found a comprehensive study on the Technion by Tadamon!, a Palestine solidarity organization based in Canada.

Harmony in Haifa?

That study confronts the Technion’s official drivel. Far from being a place of harmony, Palestinian students in Haifa have been treated in an overtly racist manner. Last year, 10 such students were arrested when they staged a protest against Israel’s murder of nine activists on the Gaza Freedom Flotilla. Yet there were no arrests of Zionist students who organized a larger counter-demonstration, which unlike the Palestinian one, was not authorized by the police.

Furthermore, the Technion has a history of close cooperation with the Israeli arms companies Rafael and Elbit, both of which supplied weapons used in the offensive against Gaza in 2008 and 2009. Technion has even joined forces with Rafael to run a business administration course specifically geared for that company’s managers.

Had Zecchini felt inclined to do a little more homework, he might also have got in touch with the Alternative Information Center, a campaign group working in Jerusalem and the West Bank. It has drawn attention to how Technion’s inventions include a remote-controlled bulldozer, designed to help the Israeli military demolish Palestinian homes.

The Technion, incidentally, is taking part in numerous EU-financed scientific research activities. And these activities have been enjoying some uncritical media attention of their own lately.

Mesmerized by murder

Home in Dublin last month, I saw an article in The Irish Times celebrating how the EU will be devoting a mammoth €7 billion to research in 2012. As the author of the article, Conor O’Carroll from the Irish Universities Association, didn’t acknowledge that Israel (including its arms industry) will be among the beneficiaries of this largesse, I contacted the paper’s editors asking if I could write an opinion piece rectifying this omission. Not a chance, I was told; the news agenda is way too crowded at the moment.

Somehow, though, The Irish Times has been able to find space in the not-too-distant past to promote Israel’s scientific triumphs. In May, it ran a puff piece about how Israel has “the highest density of start-ups in the world” and how it has been able to turn its “intermittent wars” to its advantage. “Military units often act as incubators for tech start-ups,” journalist Ian Campbell wrote. Mesmerized by this success story, Campbell forgot to trace how the products of this enterprising culture end up as tools of oppression.

Both Le Monde and The Irish Times are considered journals of record in their respective countries. It is a measure of how amenable they are to Israeli spin, that they are happy to present Zionist canards as undisputed facts.

Reading them often reminds me of my favorite comment from George Orwell: “Political language is designed to make lies sound truthful and murder respectable and to give an appearance of solidity to pure wind.”

August 14, 2011 Posted by | Deception, Mainstream Media, Warmongering | 2 Comments

Israel to deploy drones in north Iraq

Press TV – August 13, 2011

The Israeli army has stepped up its military activities in Iraq’s autonomous Kurdistan Region and is planning to station a number of unmanned aerial vehicles in the area in northern Iraq.

Israel plans to deploy new equipment, including six drones, in the region in cooperation with the Kurdistan Democratic Party, a Press TV correspondent in northern Iraq reported on Saturday.

Four of the aircraft will be stationed at the Khalidiyah airbase in the northern oil city of Kirkuk and two others will go to the airport in the city of Mosul, the capital of Nineveh governorate.

Israeli intelligence agents and military advisers, equipped with special transmission devices, are also being sent to Mosul to train security forces in the Iraqi Kurdistan Region.

Iraqi Kurdistan Regional Government President Massoud Barzani has reportedly agreed to the concession in return for the admission of a number of Iraqi Kurd students to Israeli universities.

Barzani gave Israel the green light to deploy military drones in northern Iraq without gaining the approval of the Iraqi central government in Baghdad, which has no diplomatic ties with Tel Aviv.

August 13, 2011 Posted by | Wars for Israel | 3 Comments

Pakistan: Inspector General rejects HRW report

Sinister design to destabilise Pakistan

By Mohammad Jamil | The Nation | August 12, 2011

The Human Rights Watch (HRW) claims to be the world’s leading independent organisation dedicated to defending and protecting human rights.

According to its mission statement, HRW is committed to safeguard the rights of people around the world, upholding political freedom, protecting the masses from inhumane conduct in wartime, and bringing offenders to justice. But in reality HRW does not focus on human rights violations when the big and mighty like the US invade Iraq and Afghanistan, where thousands of people were tortured and killed. It did not raise its voice against the oppressors accountable for their crimes. Thus, it emboldens the separatists, rebels and criminal elements, who challenge the writ of the state like in Pakistan.

The HRW has released a 132-page report titled We can torture, kill, or keep you for years: Enforced disappearances by Pakistan security forces in Balochistan. There is a perception that it has been done on the behest of those powers that are out to denigrate Pakistan military and ISI, and to destabilise Pakistan.

The report details 45 alleged cases of enforced disappearances – the majority in 2009 and 2010. It also mentions that hundreds of people have disappeared in Balochistan since 2005; whereas dozens of new enforced disappearances have occurred after Pakistan returned to the civilian rule in 2008. In addition, it demands that the Pakistan government should immediately end the widespread disappearances of suspected militants and activists by its military, intelligence agencies, and the paramilitary Frontier Corps in the southwestern province of Balochistan. The report, however, downplayed the target killings of innocent civilians, teachers, professors and security personnel in Balochistan by the Baloch Liberation Army and other militant organisations. The question is: Whether the lives of non-Balochis are less valuable than the lives of Baloch nationalists for the Watch and other human rights organisations? In December 2010, a report from the HRW stated: “The armed militant groups in Balochistan have increasingly targeted non-Baloch civilians and their businesses, police stations, and major gas installations and infrastructure.”

Nobody in his right sense would condone extrajudicial killings, but those who challenge the writ of the state or are responsible for creating rebellion-like situations are prosecuted and punished in any state worth the name. After every murder of a dissident in Quetta and elsewhere, some pseudo intellectuals and media men start accusing the intelligence agencies and military for the killing and disappearances of the persons. While there could be some suspects arrested by the police or intelligence agencies or even deaths during encounters, but one should not rule out the possibility that a number of missing persons could be in Afghanistan and India. According to a news report published by an English daily last year, more than 100 Pakistani Baloch dissidents were sent to India through the Indian Consulate located in Kandahar (Afghanistan) for six month training. Keeping this in view, Pakistan’s apex court had made some observations.

During the proceedings of the missing persons’ case in the court, Justice Javed Iqbal in June 2011 had remarked: “It has become a trend that NGOs exaggerate the figures of missing persons, but fail to provide details about them. These NGOs were just spreading sensationalism and conducting press conferences without obtaining facts on the missing persons.” He asked the representatives of the NGOs to provide complete details of persons they claim are missing. Meanwhile, the officials of the Interior and Foreign Ministries told the court that 103 Pakistanis were languishing in jails abroad, out of which eight have been brought home.

Anyhow, rejecting the latest HRW report, Inspector General of Frontier Corps (FC) Balochistan said that the report tried to malign the law enforcement agencies and project them in bad light. He pointed out that “800 innocent people had lost their lives, while more than 1,300 civilians and law enforcers were injured in rocket and mines attacks during the last 18 months.”

Moreover, it has to be mentioned that tribalism is firmly rooted in Balochistan, as ethnic and tribal identity is a potent force for both individuals and groups in the province with the result that there exists deep polarisation among different groups. Each of these groups is based on different rules of social organisation, which has left the province inexorably fragmented. Tribal groupism has often failed to integrate the state and enforce a national identity. But those who have not weaned off the poison of sham nationalism should take a look at the history of the Balkans, and the fate they met.

In fact, rivalling big powers, and even countries of the region, eye Balochistan avariciously to push it into their own orbits of influence because it is a mineral-rich and strategically-located province. According to political and defence analysts, the US, Russia, and India are either directly or indirectly widening the ethnic and sectarian schisms in Balochistan and FATA with a view to advancing their agendas. There are reports that the US and UK are also supporting the centrifugal forces and insurgents in Pakistan’s largest province.

Undoubtedly, there should be a judicial enquiry for the missing persons. However, the terms of reference should include not only to locate the missing persons held on various charges, but also to trace them from the ferrari camps or detention centres being run by Baloch sardars and insurgents. Investigations should also be conducted to find out how many people have gone underground or to Afghanistan. Likewise, the Human Rights Watch should do a bit of investigation in this regard and instead of giving sweeping statements it should come out with precise details of the cases where human rights were abused, and where the government had taken action to establish the writ of the state. But the question is: Why the HRW does not feel any qualms about what the US and its allies are doing in Libya and expose them for at least what they call collateral damage killing innocent civilians through drone attacks?

The writer is a freelance columnist. Email:mjamil@hotmail.com

August 13, 2011 Posted by | Civil Liberties | Leave a comment

US suspends aid to Gaza

Al-Manar | August 13, 2011

The United States has suspended operations of the aid organizations it funds in the Gaza Strip because the resistance group had demanded confidential information about their work, a US official told Reuters on Friday.

“USAID-funded partner organizations operating in Gaza are forced by Hamas’s actions to suspend their assistance work. (They) were put on hold effective August 12,” said the official, who is based in the region.

He added that “through a series of measures (Hamas) has imposed over the past months, it has created an environment which jeopardizes the ability of nongovernmental organizations to provide assistance to Gaza’s most vulnerable residents.”

The official, who declined to be named, said Hamas had demanded access to files and records of NGOs, which would reveal financial and administrative information, details of staff members and information on beneficiaries.

He said that Hamas had shut down the International Medical Corps (IMC) an NGO and USAID partner organization, after its officials objected to “unwarranted audits”.

“We are disappointed that Hamas has once again chosen to put its political agenda ahead of the welfare of the Palestinian people,” the official said, calling on the group “to cease its interference … so that we can resume our humanitarian and development activities in Gaza.”

Hamas administration official Taher al-Nono said an understanding had been reached which would allow independent auditing teams to inspect the files of NGOs, but he added that Hamas had the right to monitor their work in the territory.

The IMC will be allowed to reopen its offices on Saturday or Sunday, he added.

Responding to the USAID decision to suspend its partner organizations’ work, Nono said “Such a decision sounds odd a day after the understanding was reached … we reject any foreign intervention in Palestinian affairs.”

~

Ma’an | August 13, 2011

GAZA CITY — The Palestinian movement Hamas and the US Agency for International Development have reached a compromise to maintain the flow of aid, a senior Hamas official said Saturday.

“We’ve reached a compromise with USAID through the United Nations” to allow the continuation of aid, which was suspended by Washington on Friday, the official of the movement controlling the Palestinian enclave said.

A day earlier, a US official announced that USAID was halting humanitarian assistance to the Gaza Strip over alleged meddling by the Hamas-led government, which the US considers a terrorist group. […]

… a [Hamas] spokesman in Gaza insisted Friday that the government should be able to verify the accounts of NGOs financed by the US Agency for International Development in the Palestinian territories.

“The minister of interior of the government of Hamas intends to exercise its legal rights in the surveillance of all institutions operating in Gaza,” spokesman Taher al-Nunu said.

He complained that “USAID refuses to recognise the government in Gaza,” adding that anyone who “wishes to work in Palestinian territory must obey its laws.”

A similar row was underway in Cairo where a notorious Egyptian intelligence apparatus is probing foreign funding of civil society groups sparking tensions between Washington and Egypt’s ruling generals, judicial sources said.

August 13, 2011 Posted by | Subjugation - Torture | 1 Comment

Robbing Peter to Pay Israel

By Josh Ruebner | Foreign Policy In Focus | August 12, 2011
Jesse Jackson, Jr. shaking hands with former Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon on a 2003 trip to Israel
Jesse Jackson, Jr. shaking hands with former Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon on a 2003 trip to Israel

Nearly 20 percent of the constituents of Rep. Jesse Jackson, Jr. (D-IL) live under the poverty line, and nearly 15 percent are unemployed. Jackson’s congressional district, covering parts of the south side of Chicago and its southern suburbs, has been hit harder than many others by the crises plaguing the economy. Many of his constituents are looking at even more cutbacks in social services, higher prices for food and fuel, and ever scarcer jobs.

During this August congressional recess, Rep. Jackson, Jr. should be at home, meeting with constituents and proposing to them how he will help them cope with their difficult circumstances. Instead, the politician is proudly gallivanting around Israel, in one of three separate congressional delegations heading there this month on all-expense-paid junkets organized by the American Israel Education Foundation (AIEF), a so-called charitable affiliate of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), the most influential of the myriad pro-Israel lobbying outfits.In total, 81 representatives, nearly one-fifth of the entire House, will participate in these jaunts, which, according to The Washington Post, include “a round-trip flight in business class for lawmakers and their spouses (that alone is worth about $8,000), fine hotels and meals, side trips, and transportation and guides.”

Of course, these congressional delegations are not all fun and games. Members of Congress will be expected to sing for their lavish dinners by honoring President Bush’s 2007 pledge to provide the Israeli military with $30 billion of tax-payer-funded weapons between 2009 and 2018. So far, proposed increases in military aid to Israel have been spared from the budgetary chopping block by President Obama and a compliant Congress that treats Israeli militarism as more sacrosanct than medical care for seniors. This despite the fact that Israel misuses the funds, in violation of the Arms Export Control Act, to commit human rights abuses against Palestinians living under its illegal 44-year military occupation of the West Bank, East Jerusalem, and Gaza Strip.

According to aidtoisrael.org, constituents in Illinois’ 2nd congressional district will be asked to cough up an astonishing $53 million in federal taxes as their pound of flesh for the Israeli military during this 10-year period. With this same amount of money, each year the federal government instead could give 650 low-income families housing vouchers, or retrain nearly 900 unemployed workers for green jobs, or fund early reading programs for nearly 1,600 at-risk children, or provide primary health care to more than 43,000 uninsured people in Rep. Jackson’s congressional district.

Yali Amit, an Israeli-American constituent of Rep. Jackson, Jr. called his office to oppose his participation in the trip to Israel. He was told that Rep. Jackson, Jr. wants to learn what is happening there because of his position on the appropriations subcommittee that approves military aid to Israel. Amit retorted that “you can’t learn what goes on there on a paid trip of a propaganda arm of the Israeli government.”  And you certainly can’t learn about the devastating impact that these U.S. weapons have on unarmed Palestinian civilians, nearly 3,000 of whom were killed by the Israeli military over the last decade.

The House Committee on Ethics should open an investigation to determine if it is even legal for Members of Congress to be participating in junkets organized by AIEF.  The guidelines of the committee are as bright and clear as the midday sun on a Tel Aviv beach in August. “The travel provisions of the gift rule severely limit the ability of Members and staff to accept travel from an entity that employs or retains a registered lobbyist or a registered agent of a foreign principal.” (Emphasis in original.)

Legistorm, which tracks congressional travel, explains that “even though AIPAC’s primary purpose is lobbying, its nonprofit arm [AIEF] appears to provide a loophole for sponsored travel.” However, this eureka loophole that AIPAC uses does not withstand scrutiny. According to the latest publicly available tax return of AIEF, the organization has no paid employees — an astounding feat in itself for an organization that raked in more than $26 million in 2009 and a mind-blowing accomplishment for an organization running three huge congressional delegations in one month.

An examination of AIPAC’s latest publicly available tax return reveals the sleight of hand.  AIPAC reports that in 2009, it very generously contributed more than $3.2 million of employee salaries to cover the staff costs of AIEF.  In other words, a 501(c)(4) organization with registered lobbyists is paying for the staff of a 501(c)(3) organization to run congressional delegations that cannot be funded by an organization that employs registered lobbyists.

Craig Holman, a government affairs lobbyist at Public Citizen who helped draft the new post-Abramoff federal lobbying and ethics reform legislation signed into law in 2007, agrees that something is rotten in state of AIPAC. According to Holman, “The House ethics rules do not provide an exemption for 501(c)(3)s that are controlled and directed by a lobbying entity to pay for travel junkets for members of Congress. When the ethics rules were written in 2007 as part of the Honest Leadership and Open Government Act (HLOGA), an exemption for 501(c)(3)s was written into the Senate rules – which I called the ‘AIPAC’ loophole – but the House under Speaker Pelosi stuck to strict travel rules for its members and declined to poke a comparable loophole into its ethics rules.

“Even if there were such a loophole in House rules,” Holman continues, “which there isn’t, it appears that the 501(c)(3) wing of AIPAC is little more than a front group designed to extend its lobbying activities beyond Capitol Hill. From 2000 to 2006, lobbyist Richard Kessler similarly attempted to evade the ethics rule prohibiting lobbyist- sponsored travel junkets by setting up a 501(c)(3) that he directly controlled to pay for the trips. HLOGA was passed in 2007 to end these types of evasions.”

Constituents should be irate that members of Congress accept fancy trips from AIPAC-affiliates and contributions from AIPAC-inspired political action committee (PACs) that result in the United States prioritizing weapons to Israel above our basic economic rights.  And the Committee on Ethics must investigate AIPAC’s skirting of travel regulations and shut down these trips that it has until now allowed.

August 12, 2011 Posted by | Corruption, Timeless or most popular, Wars for Israel | Leave a comment

Egypt accepts US$2 billion from World Bank

By Sara Nour Eldeen | AlMasry AlYoum | August 11, 2011

The Ministry of International Cooperation has accepted US$2 billion in grants and loans from the World Bank under the Partnership for Development program.

Minister for Planning and International Cooperation Fayza Abouelnaga has signed an agreement for a grant of US$247 million for ministry employees dealing with international and regional organizations and financial institutions. The grant comes from the World Bank’s Institutional Support Fund.

The minister will also sign an agreement for a US$330 million loan from the bank, in order to modernize the 250 km railway line between Beni Suef and Assiut, in addition to another US$100 million loan for modernizing a 200,000 acre irrigation system in the New Valley region.

The World Bank will also give Egypt a loan of US$600 million to finance the North Giza power station, and another two totaling US$219.75 million to connect the Gulf of Suez wind energy station to the main electrical grid.

August 12, 2011 Posted by | Economics | Leave a comment

Sweden, Israel and the banalization of evil

By David Cronin | The Electronic Intifada |  August 12, 2011

Sweden is perceived as being one of the European countries most sympathetic to the Palestinians. Two years ago, some Israelis became so incensed with this alleged bias that they initiated a campaign to boycott Ikea furniture and Absolut vodka.

The reality, as I realized on a trip to Scandinavia earlier this summer, is that the Swedish government has sponsored projects that seek to confer respectability on entrepreneurs who facilitate and profit from Israel’s crimes.

Headquartered in Stockholm, the Palestine International Business Forum (PIBF) is ostensibly focused on stimulating the private sector in the West Bank and Gaza as part of a wider strategy of bringing peace to the Middle East. That “vision” sits uncomfortably with the actual track record of many of the companies taking part in the forum’s activities.

The PIBF’s founders include Yacov Gebhard, chief executive with Partner Communications, a firm that provides telecommunications services to illegal Israeli settlers and the Israeli military. The list of the forum’s corporate members, meanwhile, features such individuals as Rami Guzman, a director of Africa Israel, a company involved in the construction of Israeli settlements, and Shalom Goldstein, a coordinator for the Jerusalem section of Israel’s wall in the West Bank. (Lest we forget, that wall was found to be unlawful by the International Court of Justice in 2004).

Among the other distinguished participants in the PIBF are Moshe Goan, a part-owner of Ahava, the company that produces “Dead Sea mud” cosmetics from an Israeli settlement in the West Bank and Mizrahi Tefahot, the bank that has provided financial support for the Har Homa settlement in East Jerusalem. Jacob Perry, chairman of Mizrahi Tefahot, was previously the chief of Israel’s secret police, the Shin Bet. Evidently not content with having a reputation for authorizing torture of both child and adult detainees in the 1990s, he has applied fresh Palestinian blood to his hands in more recent years as chairman of Magal and as an advisor to Aeronautics, two makers of weapons used by Israel to murder and maim civilians.

The ghastly deeds of these men are at odds with the caring image that the PIBF projects. Its latest newsletter has a touching story about how it organized the first ever exhibition of Gazan flowers in Israel during April.

Eager to find out how the forum can justify this incongruity, I emailed and phoned Margit Vaarala, its secretary-general. Vaarala told me she was too busy to talk this week and couldn’t tell me when she would be available to comment. “I have just returned from vacation and have a lot of things to do,” she said.

So I called the Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency (SIDA), an official government body that gave 19.5 million krona ($3 million) to the PIBF between January 2008 and December 2010. A SIDA spokeswoman explained to me that it has requested a new “conflict analysis and strategy” from the International Council of Swedish Industry, which oversees the PIBF’s activities.

Although the spokeswoman said that the agency wishes to see that analysis before deciding if it will release further funds, she contended that the PIBF had shown “good results” in helping to strengthen the private sector in Palestine.

This explanation chimes with the free market propaganda of the United States, the European Union and institutions they control such as the International Monetary Fund and World Bank. According to the narrative of these aid donors and their “technical experts”, everything will be fine if enough Israelis can be encouraged to do business with Palestinians.

Their collective worldview is so warped that they have no difficulty embracing arms dealers, torturers and other captains of industry hell-bent on dispossessing Palestinians. The truth is that these donors are not helping Palestine to prosper; they are enabling the banalization of evil.

August 12, 2011 Posted by | Deception, Illegal Occupation | 2 Comments

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