CIA secret program helped Colombia kill FARC leaders: Report
Press TV – December 22, 2013
US intelligence agencies have secretly helped the Colombian government kill at least two dozen leaders of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC), a report says.
On Saturday, the Washington Post published the report revealing that both the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) and the National Security Agency (NSA) provided the Colombian government with technology to terminate the rebel leaders.
The report was based on interviews with more than 30 former and current American and Colombian officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity since the program is classified and ongoing, the newspaper said.
According to the report, Washington provided Colombia with Global Positioning System (GPS) equipment that can be used to transform regular munitions into so-called smart bombs.
These explosives can accurately pinpoint specific targets, even if the objects are located in dense jungles.
In addition, the NSA provided “substantial eavesdropping help” to the Colombian government, the report stated.
In one of its operations, Colombian forces killed top FARC commander, Raul Reyes, in March 2008, while he was in a FARC-operated jungle camp in neighboring Ecuador. The newspaper reported that a US-made smart bomb was used in the killing.
Colombian President Juan Manuel Santos commented on the report, telling the newspaper that the CIA has been “of help, providing Colombian forces with “better training and knowledge.” The CIA, however, did not want to give any comments regarding the revelations.
The report also revealed that the multibillion-dollar program was secretly funded on top of the nine billion dollars in aid that the US has openly provided to Colombia, mostly in military assistance. The covert program was authorized by President George W. Bush and has continued under President Barack Obama.
The Colombian government and FARC have been holding peace negotiations since November last year in Cuba.
The two sides have agreed upon the matter of land reform and rural development, while four others issues still remain unsolved, including FARC’s participation in politics.
FARC is Latin America’s oldest insurgent group and has been fighting the government since 1964.
Bogota estimates that 600,000 people have been killed and more than 4.5 million others have been displaced due to the fighting.
The state of American pro-justice activism
By Dr. Sarah Marusek | MEMO | December 22, 2013
As the New Year approaches and we step back to reflect upon 2013, it becomes increasingly obvious that cracks are emerging in Israel’s most special relationship.
While the occupation of Washington continues uncontested, more and more Americans are carving out other spaces of resistance that challenge the hegemony of the Zionist narrative and confront Israeli occupation and apartheid. These efforts are starting to rupture the deeply entrenched political and ideological frameworks that enable the US government to spend vast public resources to help Israel oppress the Palestinian people, without any public backlash.
There is still an extremely long way to go, but there is no doubt that Zionists in the US and Israel are beginning to see that the writing is indeed on the wall.
Last week, members of the American Studies Association (ASA) voted to endorse the boycott of Israeli academic institutions by a margin of two to one. While largely a symbolic move, the decision generated widespread media coverage debating the issue from both sides, with mainstream newspapers like the New York Times calling it a “milestone achievement” for the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) movement launched by Palestinian civil society in 2005.
The newspaper quoted a leading Israeli scholar who said: “It’s almost like a family betrayal… It’s very grave and very saddening that this [has happened], particularly so in the US.”
In response, Brandeis University and Penn State University at Harrisburg have withdrawn their membership of the ASA. Last month Brandeis also suspended its relationship with Al-Quds University after the Palestinian university’s condemnation of a student rally deemed offensive to Israelis was, well, not quite condemnatory enough. Subsequently, a group of Brandeis faculty involved in the partnership issued a report in favour of Al-Quds President Sari Nusseibeh’s handling of the matter and the university’s ethics board has recommended that it should resume the academic partnership.
Only days after the ASA endorsement, the Native American and Indigenous Studies Association announced that it was following suit. Last April, the Asian American Association was the first to respond positively to the Palestinian Campaign for the Academic and Cultural Boycott of Israel.
But it is not only American professors who are mobilising increasingly in solidarity with Palestinians struggling for equal rights and justice. The number of American students who are taking an active stand against occupation and apartheid is also on the rise.
Although students continue to face harsh punishments for standing up for Palestinian rights, as I have previously reported for MEMO here and here, Al Jazeera English noted earlier this month: “A sort of backlash to the backlash is gaining momentum. Over the past couple years there has been an upsurge in pro-Palestinian human rights activism on college campuses across the US.”
For example, despite being targeted by the California State Assembly, which passed a resolution in August 2012 equating criticism of Israel with “hate speech”, students in California have continued to organise events critical of Israeli rights abuses and campaigns in support of BDS.
In November 2012, the student council at the University of California at Irvine voted unanimously in favour of the college pulling its investments from Israeli companies. This year, student councils at the Universities of California at Berkeley, Riverside and San Diego also voted to divest.
Challenging the hegemony of Christian Zionism, US churches are also proving to be spaces of resistance against occupation and apartheid. In May 2012, the General Conference of the United Methodist Church decided to call for an explicit boycott of all Israeli companies operating in the occupied Palestinian territories. The following July, the Presbyterian Church (USA) voted to boycott all products from Israeli settlements and in May of this year, the United Church of Canada launched a campaign to support a boycott of all products produced in the settlements.
A small space of resistance even emerged in Hollywood this year, when the 86th Academy Awards nominated Five Broken Cameras for an Oscar. The celebrated film offers a first-hand account of Palestinians’ nonviolent protests against the separation wall in Bil’in, in the West Bank.
At the same time, more and more American Jews are becoming disenchanted with an apartheid state that refuses to end its occupation of Palestine and continues to build illegal settlements, all the while claiming that it is acting on behalf of Jewish people around the world. Two recent developments, in particular, stand out.
Earlier this month, the Hillel chapter at Philadelphia’s Swarthmore College sent shockwaves throughout the Zionist community when it declared in an open letter that it would not comply with its parent organisation’s policy of censoring speech critical of Israel. Hillel, the Foundation for Jewish Campus Life, is the largest Jewish student organisation in the world and a staunch supporter of the State of Israel. With an annual budget of tens of millions of dollars, every year Hillel organises travel to Israel for thousands of students and participation in various training programmes in the US; it also coordinates national tours for pro-Zionist speakers to speak on college campuses.
The Swarthmore letter is worth quoting at length: “Across the country, Hillels’ suppression of the freedom to speak and believe things that are not narrowly pro-Zionist are the direct result of Hillel International’s Israel Guidelines. Right after stating in their ‘Political Pluralism’ section that they object to excluding ‘students for their beliefs and expressions’, they declare that they ‘will not partner with, house, or host’ – in other words, they will exclude – groups and speakers that espouse certain beliefs about Israel. These contraband beliefs include denying the right of Israel to exist as a Jewish and democratic state and supporting boycotting, divesting, or sanctions against Israel. They also ban those who ‘delegitimize, demonize, or apply a double standard to Israel.’ No further explanation is provided to clarify these guidelines, but their ambiguity has done nothing to ease the stifling effect they have on individual Hillels’ freedoms of speech, belief, and association.”
The letter continues: “Therefore, we choose to depart from the Israel guidelines of Hillel International. We believe these guidelines, and the actions that have stemmed from them, are antithetical to the Jewish values that the name ‘Hillel’ should invoke. We seek to reclaim this name. We seek to turn Hillel – at Swarthmore, in the Greater Philadelphia region, nationally, and internationally – into a place that has a reputation for constructive discourse and free speech.”
The letter concludes that Swarthmore Hillel declares itself to be an Open Hillel. “All are welcome to walk through our doors and speak with our name and under our roof, be they Zionist, anti-Zionist, post-Zionist, or non-Zionist. We are an institution that seeks to foster spirited debate, constructive dialogue, and a safe space for all, in keeping with the Jewish tradition.”
The Open Hillel movement was launched in November of last year after the Hillel chapter at Harvard University refused to host an organisation supportive of the BDS movement. However, Swarthmore Hillel is the first chapter to actually declare itself to be an Open Hillel.
Responding to this declaration, Hillel International President Eric D. Fingerhut insisted that no organisation that welcomes “anti-Zionists” would be permitted to use the Hillel name.
The second development worth noting is the audience response to a “community discussion” last week that was organised by the 92nd Street Y in New York City on the question of “What it means to be pro-Israel in America”. Founded in 1874, the 92nd Street Y is a well-known cultural and religious institution in Manhattan that served initially as a Jewish association for men. Today the organisation is guided by Jewish principles, but serves people of all races and faiths.
As Haaretz blogged, “based on the course of the debate, ‘being pro-Israel in America’ means ideological chasms, professional rivalries, frayed nerves, inflamed tempers, one of the participants storming out in a huff and then exchanging barbs and insults on the internet with the moderator.”
The participant who stormed out was John Podhoretz, editor of the right-wing Commentary magazine and a former presidential speechwriter. He left after being booed by the audience when he attacked Jeremy Ben Ami from J Street, the liberal Zionist lobby in Washington, for contextualising the ASA decision to boycott Israeli academic institutions by pointing out critically, “Israel’s own policy of continuing occupation” and its ill treatment of Palestinians. Shortly after Podhoretz left the event, he blogged that the audience was “hostile”.
A tiny but vocal group of far right supporters of Israel has also been holding monthly rallies outside the 92nd Street Y to protest against its hosting of “Israel-haters working to destroy the Jewish State”.
In fact, Israel’s problem with Americans Jews may be even worse than we know. In October, a report commissioned by the Jewish Council for Public Affairs found that 30 per cent of American rabbis who were surveyed said that they are afraid to reveal their true opinions about Israel, with the majority of these rabbis supporting more progressive views than they feel they are able to express. The survey also found that these progressive-leaning rabbis are experiencing a much greater fear of reprisal and censure than those rabbis who hold more hawkish views.
In what may be regarded as a sad irony, there are so many American Jews who oppose Israel these days, that some in the US solidarity movement have started rightfully to critique the over privileging of Jewish voices in the struggle for equal rights for Palestinians. After all, our inspiration has always been the resilience and courage of Palestinians themselves.
In any case, the growing resilience of Palestine solidarity activists, not only in the US but also around the world, coupled with the rising disenchantment among American and international Jewry, is definitely creating fear and desperation in Israel.
The Associated Press reported earlier this week that more than 100 Israeli leaders gathered with Jewish-American counterparts in Jerusalem last month “with a daunting mission: to save Jewish life in North America.” AP pointed out that Israeli leaders are increasingly aware that they “cannot ignore the alienation that many Americans feel over perceived religious intolerance, Israel’s construction of West Bank settlements and the continued control over millions of Palestinians.”
The wire service described how participants at the meeting, which was organised by the Israeli prime minister’s office, spent two days brainstorming ways to bring young “unaffiliated Jews back to their roots”. Adding that the gathering was part of a campaign “to strengthen Jewish identity among young Jews and solidify their connection to Israel”, AP noted that some 120 representatives from Jewish organisations around the world, mostly from North America, and a number of Israeli government ministries pledged to formulate a plan by next year “to address assimilation”.
In addition to spending $125 million on bringing Jews around the world to Israel, the government has also formed a task force to reverse the disenchantment trend.
Other efforts that illustrate the growing sense of desperation in Tel Aviv include a related initiative of the prime minister’s office to establish covert units at Israeli universities to engage in online public diplomacy, or hasbara. As Haaretz reported in August, “A diplomacy group will be set up at each university and structured in a semi-military fashion.” Those students who head each group are to receive full government scholarships while other students are paid stipends.
When a government has to pay its own youth secretly to counter the increasingly negative image of its country abroad, pro-justice activists can take courage in the struggle in the year to come. Despite it being a long road ahead, it really does look like the beginning of the end.
Related articles
- Anti-boycott academics demonstrate lack of excuses in supporting Israel (alethonews.wordpress.com)
- Noam Chomsky and ‘Left’ Apologetics for Injustice in Palestine (alethonews.wordpress.com)
Judge Chastises Obama Administration for Using “Secret Law” to Withhold Documents
By Noel Brinkerhoff | AllGov | December 20, 2013
The Obama White House has been ordered (pdf) by a federal judge to release a copy of an unclassified presidential directive after it tried to use “secret law” to keep it out of the hands of a government watchdog group.
U.S. District Judge Ellen Segal Huvelle also admonished the administration for the “unbounded nature” of its claim and thinking it had a “limitless” view of its power to withhold presidential communications from the public.
“The government appears to adopt the cavalier attitude that the President should be permitted to convey orders throughout the Executive Branch without public oversight—to engage in what is in effect governance by ‘secret law,’” Huvelle wrote in her opinion.
The case began after the nonprofit Center for Effective Government filed a lawsuit under the Freedom of Information Act to obtain a copy of Presidential Policy Directive 6, which deals with U.S. foreign aid (pdf).
The group argued that “PPD-6 is not protected by the presidential communications privilege because it was not made in the course of making decisions, but instead is the final decision itself….”
Huvelle, who was appointed to the federal bench by President Bill Clinton, made a point of personally examining the document rather than rely on the Obama administration’s characterization of it. After doing that, she determined that it “is not ‘revelatory of the President’s deliberations’ such that its public disclosure would undermine future decision-making.”
The White House insisted it could withhold the document, even though it was “a widely-publicized, non-classified Presidential Policy Directive,” according to Huvelle.
She also noted: “Never before has a court had to consider whether the [presidential communications] privilege protects from disclosure under FOIA a final, non-classified, presidential directive.”
Julie Murray, an attorney with Public Citizen and counsel for the Center for Effective Government, applauded the decision.
“We are pleased to see that the court recognized the government’s position in this case for what it is: a remarkable and unlawful attempt to keep secret a broad federal policy,” she said in a prepared statement.
“The court’s decision is a resounding win for the principle of government openness and a reminder to the Obama administration that its commitment to transparency must come not just in words, but in deeds,” Murray added.
To Learn More:
Court Rebukes White House Over “Secret Law” (by Steven Aftergood, Secrecy News)
Judge Orders Release of Presidential Policy Directive (Center for Effective Government)
Memorandum Opinion: Center for Effective Government v. U.S. Department of State, et al. (U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia) (pdf)
Obama Administration Hiding Details of Presidential Policy Directives (by Matt Bewig, AllGov)
11 Secret Documents Americans Deserve to See (by David Wallechinsky, AllGov)
Classified Documents on the Rise Despite Obama Talk of Transparency (by Noel Brinkerhoff and David Wallechinsky)
Tax loophole saved $100 billion for richest Americans
Zionist billionaire Sheldon Adelson
Press TV – December 21, 2013
The wealthiest Americans are exploiting a tax loophole to avoid paying billions in estate or gift taxes, contributing to the soaring income inequality in the United States, according to a report.
The loophole has cost the US government more than $100 billion since 2000, the Bloomberg reported.
The popularity of the tax avoidance maneuver, known as the Walton grantor retained annuity trust, or GRAT, shows how easy it is for the wealthy to bypass estate and gift taxes, the report said.
Even Richard Covey, the lawyer who pioneered the tax maneuver, which involves rapidly churning assets into and out of trusts, says it makes a mockery of the US tax code.
“You can certainly say we can’t let this keep going if we’re going to have a sound system,” Covey said.
Covey’s technique is one of several common devices that together make the estate tax system essentially ineffective as a brake on soaring economic inequality, says Edward McCaffery, a professor at the University of Southern California’s Gould School of Law.
Zionist billionaire Sheldon Adelson has given at least $7.9 billion to his heirs while legally avoiding about $2.8 billion in US gift taxes since 2010, according to calculations based on data in Adelson’s US Securities and Exchange Commission filings.
Shares of Adelson’s Las Vegas Sands Corp. are at a five-year high, making the gambling billionaire one of the world’s richest men in the world, worth more than $30 billion.
Since 2009, President Barack Obama and some Democratic lawmakers have made fruitless proposals to narrow the GRAT loophole.
Covey has suggested one reason for the lack of action is that wealthy campaign donors and politicians want to keep the loophole in place.
Related articles
- Accidental Tax Break Saves Wealthiest Americans $100 Billion… (bloomberg.com)
- How Billionaires Like Sheldon Adelson Exploit an ‘Accidental’ Tax Loophole (billmoyers.com)
Pity JP Morgan/Chase
By CHRISTOPHER BRAUCHLI | CounterPunch | December 20, 2013
One has to feel sorry for JPMorgan Chase. Several months ago it thought it had not only paid a sufficient amount in fines to make up for its bad behavior but it had also engaged in a form of penance for some of the bad things it had done. Little did it know.
The penance was reformation of its practices with respect to payday loans. Before the reforms, JPMorgan Chase (and many other institutions dealing with payday lenders) permitted payday lenders to automatically withdraw repayment amounts from the borrowers’ bank accounts and agreed to prevent borrowers from closing their accounts or issuing stop payment orders so long as the payday lender was not fully repaid. As a result a borrower who did not have enough money in the bank to repay the lender the amount due on a given date was charged an insufficient fund fee by the bank each time the lender submitted a request for payment in many cases generating hundreds of dollars in fees imposed on the borrowers. That practice came to an end in May 2013. The fines it paid, in addition to its act of penance were described by Kevin McCoy of USA Today.
Between June 2010 and November 2012 JPMorgan Chase paid more than $3 billion in fines and settlements that related to, among other things, overcharging active-duty service members on their mortgages, misleading investors about a collateralized debt obligation it marketed, rigging at least 93 municipal bond transactions in 31 states, and countless other misdeeds. In August 2012 alone it paid a fine of $1.2 billion to resolve a lawsuit that alleged it and other institutions conspired to set the price of credit and debit card interchange fees. In January 2013 and February 2012 it paid $1.8 billion to settle claims that it and other financial institutions improperly carried out home foreclosures after the housing crisis. Not only did it pay large fines. Jamie Dimon, its unfailingly cheerful, beautifully coiffed CEO, took a pay cut which, including deferred compensation, reduced his daily salary from $63,013 to $31,506. Sadly, those events were not to be the end of its troubles. Indeed, as it turns out they were merely the tip of the iceberg.
In July 2013 it paid $410 million for alleged bidding manipulation of California and Midwest electricity markets. In September 2013 it paid $389 million for unfair billing practices, in September it paid $920 million for actions of the “London Whale” disaster, and in October 2013 another $100 million with respect to the same fiasco. Then came the really big news. On November 19, 2013 it was reported that JPMorgan Chase was going to pay $13 billion to settle what in non-legal terms would be described as a whole bunch of claims that had to do with the mortgage crisis of a few years back. Included in the $13 billion is $4 billion for consumer relief, $6 billion to pay to investors and the remaining $3 billion is a fine. December 13 it was announced that the bank was entering into a $2 billion deferred prosecution agreement with the government because of its role in the Bernie Madoff Ponzi scheme. According to the settlement the bank ignored signs that suggested Bernie Madoff was conducting a Ponzi scheme and cheating his investors.
The payment of almost $20 billion in fines would be enough to spoil the holidays for almost anyone. Happily for the bank, there was a silver lining to its financial cloud. Although $13 billion is a lot of money, Marianne Lake, the Chief Financial Officer of the bank explained that taxpayers will help the bank pay the fine. She explained that of the $13 billion, $7 billion is tax deductible. In addition to that bit of cheery news, no one has to plead guilty to anything bad in connection with the Madoff fine. Although the bank is agreeing to a deferred prosecution no one such as Jamie Dimon, is going to jail. There will, of course, be some public shame for the bank, kind of like being placed in the stocks in a public square. The court filing in which the settlement is finalized will list in detail all the criminal acts committed by the bank for which it will not be punished. There is not a criminal anywhere in the world who would not happily accept a public recital of the crimes committed instead of entering a formal plea of guilty with the attendant risk of going to jail. A bit of embarrassment beats a bit of time in jail every time. Just ask Jamie Dimon or other officers at JPMorgan Chase.
CHRISTOPHER BRAUCHLI is a lawyer in Boulder, Colorado. He can be e-mailed at brauchli.56@post.harvard.edu.
Murad Eshtewi, head of the Popular Committee of Kafr Qaddum, has been arrested
International Solidarity Movement | December 21, 2013
Kafr Qaddum, Occupied Palestine – Yesterday morning, Murad Eshtewi, the head of the Popular Committee of Kufr Qaddum and leader of the Friday demonstrations was arrested and is still being held by Israeli forces.
At around 3:00 on Friday morning, Israeli soldiers entered the village of Kafr Qaddum, in Qalqilya district, arresting two citizens on the accusation of having taken part in the regular Friday demonstrations held in the village. The men were released the following morning without charges.
The house of Murad Eshtewi, the head of the Popular Committee of Kafr Qaddum, was also raided during the night incursion and he was subjected to aggressive questioning.
Later, at approximately 10:00 on Friday morning, two hours before the demonstration was due to begin, Mr Eshtewi was walking on the outskirts of the village and was ambushed and arrested by soldiers. He did not resist this arrest and yet Israeli forces were extremely aggressive in their use of both pepper spray and stun grenades. He has not yet been released.
His attorney, Lymor Goldstein, stated that, “Contrary to the fundamental principles of due process we have not been presented with the accusations against Murad nor has he been interrogated since his arrest. “
In recent weeks there has been a steady escalation of night raids, increasingly violent repression of Friday demonstrations, flying checkpoints and seemingly arbitrary arrests. In the past month alone there have been more than twenty night raids on houses in the village.
Last month a new army commander responsible for the area gave a verbal warning to villagers stating that, unless they suspend their Friday demonstrations, the military harassment outlined above would be increased.
A typical night raid will involve up to around fifty soldiers surrounding and entering a particular house. Tear gas is often released and live ammunition may be fired into the air to intimidate residents. Israeli soldiers may break windows and doors in order to enter the houses.
Arrestees are blindfolded and handcuffed before being taken for questioning to another location. Interrogation may take place in the back of an army jeep, on the ground at the side of the road, or within the police station. Frequently they are subjected to verbal and physical abuse. When released, the detainees are often left in the road, kilometers from their homes.
The villagers of Kafr Qaddum are currently unable to access much of their land due to the closure by the Israeli army of the village’s main and only road leading to Nablus in 2003. The road was closed in three stages, ultimately restricting access for farmers to the 11,000 dunams of land that lie along either side to one or two times a year. Since the road closure, the people of Kafr Qaddum have been forced to rely on an animal trail to access this area; the road is narrow and, according to the locals, intended only for animals. In 2004 and 2006, three villagers died when they were unable to reach the hospital in time. The ambulances carrying them were prohibited from using the main road and were forced to take a 13 km detour. These deaths provoked even greater resentment in Kafr Qaddum and, on 1 July 2011, the villagers decided to unite in protest in order to re-open the road and protect the land in danger of settlement expansion along it.
Related articles
- Month-old child injured during Israeli raid in Kafr Qaddum (altahrir.wordpress.com)
- Israeli forces attack protests commemorating Mandela across West Bank (altahrir.wordpress.com)
- PHOTOS | Israeli forces open fire on West Bank protests, injuring dozens (occupiedpalestine.wordpress.com)
Mr. Baird: Stop Slandering Richard Falk
By Hanna Kawas, Chairperson, Canada Palestine Association | December 20, 2013
Open letter to John Baird, Canadian Foreign Minister
Mr. Baird:
Your latest call for the removal of Richard Falk, the U.N. Special Rapporteur for the Palestinian Territories, smacks of hypocrisy and racism; it also exposes your (and your government’s) blind support for Israeli war crimes and Apartheid.
While your government officially claims that “Canada does not recognize permanent Israeli control over territories occupied in 1967 (the Golan Heights, the West Bank, East Jerusalem and the Gaza Strip)”, you are nonetheless supporting not only settlement building but also settlement products that are not exempt under the “Canada-Israel Free Trade Agreement (CIFTA)”. You, your Prime Minister and your government also support unconditionally the discriminatory policies of the “Jewish National Fund” (JNF), which is financing illegal Israeli settlements and the infamous Canada Park that is built on the rubble of three Palestinian towns in the occupied West Bank. By doing so, you are violating the Fourth Geneva Conventions to which Canada is a signatory.
Your comments not only “undermine the fundamental values of the United Nations”, they also deny the terrible suffering and the slow genocide of the Palestinian people since the Zionist ethnic cleansing started in 1947/48. Recently, your spokesperson Rick Roth dismissed the new mini-genocide, the “Prawer Plan” which the Israeli government is planning for the Bedouin Israelis, as an “internal Israeli matter”.
You called for Prof. Falk to be fired “for his numerous outrageous and anti-Semitic statements”. However, it is your statement that is outrageous and libellous considering that he is a Jewish international law scholar that fought all his life for the truth, justice, equality and peace (contrary to what your government stands for). Once again it is you Mr. Baird that is promoting anti-Semitism by claiming that everything Israel does falls on the shoulders of all Jews. We asked you previously, clearly to no avail: “Mr. Baird: Don’t Equate Zionism with Judaism”.
Stop taking your marching orders from Tel Aviv and start, if you care for your dignity and humanity, listening to the vast majority of Canadians who yearn for peace and justice.
Related article
- UN rapporteur accuses Israel of “genocidal intentions” (altahrir.wordpress.com)
GCHQ, NSA Spied On Known Terrorist Haven… UNICEF
By Mike Masnick | Techdirt | December 20, 2013
The latest revelations from the Snowden documents, according to reports in both the NY Times and the Guardian is that the UK’s GCHQ, operating out of a site heavily funded by the NSA, targeted a variety of humanitarian and charitable groups, including the United Nations Children’s Fund, better known as UNICEF. Another target was Médecins du Monde, a well known medical relief group that delivers medicines and medical help to war-torn areas.
The reports also detail spying on various government officials, though, as I’ve said in the past, that kind of stuff isn’t particularly bothersome — as spying on leaders of other countries is typical and expected espionage activity, though it can certainly create some diplomatic awkwardness. Perhaps more interesting is that there’s much more evidence here of economic espionage activity. Among those “targeted” were Joaquin Almunia, the EU commission “competition” boss, who has been investigating anti-trust claims against American companies like Google and Microsoft. The NSA has insisted (and repeated in response to questions from reporters writing the two stories above) that it doesn’t engage in economic espionage — though GCHQ apparently doesn’t have any such restriction, suggesting that the NSA can just hand that kind of activity off to its UK friends, who it funds, and then reap the benefits.
Furthermore, the NSA seems to indicate in its response that while it may not engage in economic espionage in the form of spying on issues and handing that info directly to US companies, it does seem to open up the possibility of engaging in economic espionage to inform US policy makers — meaning it likely gets filtered back to those companies anyway:
“We do not use our foreign intelligence capabilities to steal the trade secrets of foreign companies on behalf of — or give intelligence we collect to — U.S. companies to enhance their international competitiveness or increase their bottom line,” said Vanee Vines, an N.S.A. spokeswoman.
But she added that some economic spying was justified by national security needs. “The intelligence community’s efforts to understand economic systems and policies, and monitor anomalous economic activities, are critical to providing policy makers with the information they need to make informed decisions that are in the best interest of our national security,” Ms. Vines said.
There is some validity in the idea that if there’s going to be some sort of earth-shattering revelation that could have a wider impact on the whole economy, that there’s some value in having intelligence services aware of what’s going on — but it’s a pretty slippery slope from there to simply intercepting direct information that might be helpful for a particular company, and providing them an advantage.
But, going beyond that, targeting groups like UNICEF seems like going way too far. It’s hard to see any legitimate justification for this, unless someone’s going to argue that terrorist groups were somehow co-opting UNICEF, which seems like a huge stretch. To argue that there’s any national security reason to spy on UNICEF seems laughable. It really seems like the NSA and GCHQ were targeting organizations like that because they can.
The Worst Venezuela Articles of 2013?
Venezuelanalysis | December 20, 2013
This is my worst-five list for articles about Venezuela. I couldn’t help but declare ties for a few of the spots, so the “worst five” list actually has more than five articles. I’ve listed them from most horrible to least.
1) It’s a three way tie! Two of the three are very recent articles that referred to Venezuela as a dictatorship. An article on Yahoo.com said Venezuela was “military-style dictatorship”. Another one on MSN.com said Hugo Chavez was a “dictator”. Sadly, these may have been honest mistakes – gross ignorance that results from corporate journalists being over exposed to their colleagues’ work which, in turn, leads them to spread even more ignorance among themselves and countless readers.
The third article sharing the worst spot is an editorial in the UK Independent that appeared just after Hugo Chavez died. The “Indy” editors wrote that Chavez “was no run-of-the-mill dictator. His offences were far from the excesses of a Colonel Gaddafi…” A letter I wrote to the Indy about this editorial was initially accepted but then rejected.
2) Jon Lee Anderson eleven page “slumlord” article in the New Yorker, not only trashed Hugo Chavez’s government but also the majority of Venezuelans who consistently voted Chavista since 1998 as I explained here. Anderson strongly insinuated that a coup (not a free and fair election as actually took place) led to Hugo Chavez first assume office in 1999. As Keane Bhatt pointed out, The New Yorker’s “vaunted fact-checkers somehow permitted the publication” of that falsehood. The article combines disregard for facts with very noticeable amount of class bigotry. I debated awarding it the worst spot but decided that its long-windedness probably mitigated the damage done.
3) This Economist article, which was thoroughly taken apart by Ryan Mallett-Outtrim, comes in third. My favorite part of Ryan’s demolition is the various TV interviews he points to that feature Henrique Capriles – the opposition leader whom the Economist claimed was “ignored” by a “cowed” media in the months prior to recent municipal elections. This lengthy interview with Capriles was shown on Venevision about a month before those elections. Venevision’s news broadcasts have the highest audience share in Venezuela. Capriles droned on and on unchallenged and uninterrupted. He also didn’t say a peep about being ignored by broadcasters which was unsurprising. To do so under the circumstances would have looked quite ridiculous.
4) Arguably, any five randomly chosen AP articles about Venezuela could take up most of the spots on this list. A very partisan op-ed should make some effort to present counterarguments to the views it promotes. AP dispenses with that in news articles where, readers are so often told, reporters have their fabled “objectivity” on display. In this piece I pointed out two recent AP articles that spread the myth of the voiceless opposition and a falsehood about Venezuela’s inflation rate.
5) Given the incredibly dishonest and incompetent reporting about Venezuela, a spot must be reserved for this LA Times article “Nicolas Maduro Gaffes: Top 5 Worst Blunders Made By Venezuelan President In 2013”. Yes, an article that tells readers about things like President Maduro falling off a bike and mispronouncing some words made international headlines. The LA Times could obviously look at itself and its peers for “blunders”, and ones that actually matter. Just consider the other articles on this list.
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Does Kevin Barrett Seek to “Absolve Islam of a Terrible Crime”?
The Kevin Barrett-Chomsky Dispute in Historical Perspective – Last part of the series titled “9/11 and the Zionist Question”
By Prof. Tony Hall | American Herald Tribune | August 28, 2016
Amidst his litany of condemnations, Jonathan Kay reserves some of his most vicious and vitriolic attacks for Kevin Barrett. For instance Kay harshly criticizes Dr. Barrett’s published E-Mail exchange in 2008 with Prof. Chomsky. In that exchange Barrett castigates Chomsky for not going to the roots of the event that “doubled the military budget overnight, stripped Americans of their liberties and destroyed their Constitution.” The original misrepresentations of 9/11, argues Barrett, led to further “false flag attacks to trigger wars, authoritarianism and genocide.”
In Among The Truthers Kay tries to defend Chomsky against Barrett’s alleged “personal obsession” with “vilifying” the MIT academic. Kay objects particularly to Barrett’s “final salvo” in the published exchange where the Wisconsin public intellectual accuses Prof. Chomsky of having “done more to keep the 9/11 blood libel alive, and cause the murder of more than a million Muslims than any other single person.” … continue
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