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New Federal Indictment Over Iran Sanctions Breach Demonstrates Reach of Nuclear Disinformation

United States Attorney for the District of Massachusetts Carmen Oritz
By Nima Shirazi | Wide Asleep in America | April 6, 2014

A brief news story posted by Reuters at 3pm on Friday afternoon reported that Sihai Cheng, a Chinese national is facing criminal charges brought by the U.S. government for allegedly having conspired to export “pressure transducers,” sensors that translate the application of pressure into electrical signals, to Iran in violation with sanctions that restrict trade of scientific equipment and technology to that country.

Cheng was arrested at Heathrow airport two months ago and the indictment was brought by Boston field offices of the FBI, Department of Homeland Security, Department of Commerce, and the Department of Justice’s Massachusetts District Attorney.

Following the publication of the Reuters report, the news traveled fast with outlets like Bloomberg News, AFP, Telegraph, and BBC all picking it up, and inevitably tying the news to the ongoing international nuclear negotiations taking place between six world powers and Iran.

Pressure transducers have myriad industrial and scientific uses; their use in the translating pressurized gas in centrifuges to an analog electrical signal is but one of these applications. A statement released by the U.S. Attorney’s office declares, “Pressure transducers can be used in gas centrifuges to enrich uranium and produce weapons-grade uranium.”

Unmentioned is the fact that, not only can transducers be used for thousands of other reasons, but also that Iran’s enrichment of uranium is legal, Iran’s enrichment facilities are under strict IAEA monitoring and inspection, and Iran has never even been accused of enriching uranium to weapons-grade levels. It’s like arresting someone over trading light bulbs, which can be used in automobiles, which can be used to run people over.

The prosecution of people accused of breaching the aggressive U.S.-led sanctions regime is nothing new; just last month, Mohammad Reza Nazemzadeh, a prolific and respected medical research scientist in Michigan was inexplicably indicted for trying to send a refurbished coil for an MRI machine to a hospital in Iran. However, certain language used in press reports to describe the indictment of Cheng – in bold below – is curious.

Reuters reported that Cheng had “supplied thousands of parts that have nuclear applications to Eyvaz, a company involved in Iran’s nuclear weapons program, in violation of U.S. sanctions on Iran, federal prosecutors said.”

Bloomberg News used the same formulation:

From November 2005 to 2012, Cheng allegedly supplied thousands of parts that have nuclear applications to Eyvaz, an Iranian company involved in the development and procurement of parts for Iran’s nuclear weapons program.

“Iran’s nuclear weapons program.” Read that again. “Iran’s nuclear weapons program.” The ubiquity of this phrase in the press and political speechifying belies the fact that Iran does not actually have a nuclear weapons program and is thus, not only deliberately deceiving, but patently false.

It should now go without saying that, for years now, the United States intelligence community and its allies have long assessed that Iran is not and never has been in possession of nuclear weapons, is not building nuclear weapons, and its leadership has not made any decision to build nuclear weapons. Iran’s uranium enrichment program is fully safeguarded by the IAEA and no nuclear material has ever been diverted to a military program. Iranian officials have consistently maintained they will never pursue such weapons on religious, strategic, political, moral and legal grounds.

This assessment has been reaffirmed year after year by the U.S. Director of Intelligence James Clapper, most recently in mid-February before the Senate Armed Services Committee. The intelligence has maintained for nearly seven years a high level of confidence that Iran has no nuclear weapons program.

Nevertheless, this phraseology goes frequently unchallenged in the mainstream media – despite repeated appeals by ombudsmen and public editors for more careful and measured writing by their reporters.

The reports of the Cheng case, however, are a bit more revealing. The specific claim referencing an Iranian “nuclear weapons program” did not originate with the Reuters wire service or Bloomberg‘s own cribbed report. In fact, the phrase in its entirety came from the U.S. Attorney’s own press release about the indictment, which was posted Friday by the “Boston Press Release Service,” and has still (as of this writing) not appeared on the website for the U.S. Attorney for the District of Massachusetts.

That the offending phrase – “Iran’s nuclear weapons program” – was literally copied-and-pasted directly from a government statement by professional reporters for major news outlets, without a shred of skepticism, scrutiny or fact-checking, is sadly par for the course in a media landscape wherein the press simply parrot the government line as a matter of policy.

“The indictment alleges that between in or about November 2005 and 2012, Cheng supplied thousands of parts that have nuclear applications, including U.S. origin goods, to Eyvaz, an Iranian company involved in the development and procurement of parts for Iran’s nuclear weapons program,” the release reads.

The government prosecutor responsible for the indictment is Massachusetts’ U.S. Attorney Carmen Ortiz, who herself has a sordid history of overly-aggressive prosecution, in one case leading to the suicide of computer programmer and online activist Aaron Swartz in January 2013.

In this indictment, Ortiz has thus made an assumption about Iranian actions and intentions that directly contradicts the consensus of 16 American intelligence agencies.  Furthermore, the prosecution itself is part of the Obama administration’s own economic war on Iran.

Just two weeks after Iran and the P5+1 signed their Joint Plan of Action in late November 2013, the U.S. State and Treasury Departments specifically named Eyvaz Technic Manufacturing Company among companies targeted “for evading international sanctions against Iran and for providing support for Iran’s nuclear program.”

The recent indictment and accompanying press release present a clear indication that the decades-long disinformation campaign about Iran’s nuclear program is far more powerful and sustaining than facts and evidence. And that’s bad news when the propaganda comes straight from the Department of Justice.

April 6, 2014 Posted by | Deception, Economics, Mainstream Media, Warmongering, Progressive Hypocrite | , , , , | Leave a comment

Israeli soldiers attack girl’s schools in Salfit

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International Solidarity Movement | April 7, 2014

Salfit, Occupied Palestine – Two educational institutions were attacked with tear gas and stun grenades by the Israeli army yesterday morning in Salfit. At least ten female students required medical attention after suffering from excessive tear gas inhalation.

At 12:30 yesterday afternoon, Salfit’s female elementary school was empty. Only a few staff remained, attempting to clean the walls after Israeli soldiers threw tear gas and stun grenades in an attack earlier in the morning. According to the headmistress of the school, the attack took place at approximately 9:30 am. At this time, the classrooms were full of female students between the ages of six and 12-years-old. The soldiers shot the tear gas from the street and it landed in the playground, school corridors and on the roof, with the tear gas itself drifting into the classrooms.

Staff from the school reported that ten young students required medical attention on site; two of them temporarily lost consciousness due to the inhalation of tear gas. When the headmistress was reassured that the Israeli army had left Salfit, at approximately 11:30 am, she began evacuating the girls. Both the school psychologist and headmistress agree that the girls were in shock, many of them crying when the attack began and after were afraid of leaving the school by themselves. The girls were planning for tomorrows’ Childrens’ Day celebration, which has been delayed until next Thursday because of the attack. The school psychologist expects that at least half of the students will not attend the following day after this experience from the Israeli army.

A female secondary school is located just meters away from the elementary school. Fortunately, no one was injured in that institution despite some exposure to the gas, but it did eventually close early as a precaution.

Witnesses reported that Israeli forces have also harassed neighbours to the school who photographed the attack. That is the case with Ahmed Zubuydi, aged 21. He was working in a nearby shop when a military jeep stopped in front of him and interrogated him for 20 minutes. He was asked to show his ID and was thoroughly searched. The commander of the Israeli soldiers began asking personal questions, such as where Ahmed worked, where he studied, and where he spends the money he earns. Ahmed reports that this is not the first time he has been interrogated by the Israeli army.

The headmistress of the girl’s elementary school reported that this is the second time this year that this sort of attack has occurred, with the first taking place in January. The school fears that these attacks may become systematic and will therefore seek training from the Fire Department to help cope with future incidents.

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April 6, 2014 Posted by | Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Subjugation - Torture | , , , , | Leave a comment

10 Facts About Fluoride

Attorney Michael Connett summarizes 10 basic facts about fluoride that should be considered in any discussion about whether to fluoridate water. To download the flyer that accompanies this video, visit: http://www.fluoridealert.org/uploads/…. To watch Michael debate two advocates of fluoridation, see: http://www.wpsu.org/conversationslive….

April 6, 2014 Posted by | Science and Pseudo-Science, Timeless or most popular, Video | , , , , , , | 1 Comment

‘100% sure Berkut police didn’t shoot people in Kiev’ – ex-Ukrainian interior minister

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Police officers on Maidan Nezalezhnosti square in Kiev, where clashes began on February 19, 2014 (RIA Novosti / Andrey Stenin)
RT | April 5, 2014

Berkut riot police were targets – not shooters – during the Maidan standoff, ex-Ukrainian Interior Minister Vitaly Zakharchenko said, adding that a fair investigation of the tragic events in Kiev is impossible under the biased, coup-imposed government.

During his interview with Russia’s Channel One, Zakharchenko stressed that he is “100% sure that it wasn’t the police” who used firearms against the people during the February Maidan standoff.

“Berkut riot police were without their service weapons. On February 18 and 1,986 police officers were wounded by gunshots. Fourteen of them died. They were internal troops, military, Berkut, and traffic police, who were shot at their post checkpoint,” he said.

On February 20, Berkut forces and internal troops encountered point shooting in Kiev’s center and “that’s why they actually, began retreating,” the former interior minister explained.

“It’s clear for any reasonable person that if it were the law enforcement officers who opened fire, they would’ve probably been advancing. That would’ve been the reason to use firearms. Meanwhile, they began retreating after the killing of their troops began,” he said.

According to Zakharchenko, the servicemen that were brought to Kiev hospitals had gunshot wounds from 9mm pistols, hunting rifles, buckshots, and smooth-bore weapons.

The ex-minister stressed that the snipers – who fired at both police and demonstrators – were stationed in three buildings, which were under the control of Maidan protestors.

“It was a provocation staged with only one motive – to launch another attack on law enforcement, launch an attack aimed at seizing the governmental buildings and institutes. That’s the logic behind all those events,” he said.

February 20 became the bloodiest day of the Ukrainian coup, with 42 people killed in Kiev.

Zakharchenko believes the self-proclaimed government in Kiev is biased, and is therefore incapable of pursuing a fair investigation of the shootings in country’s capital.

He added that no one is investigating the gunshot wounds received by law enforcement officers during the Maidan standoff.

“Without a nonpartisan international investigation team that would undertake a thorough inquiry into the events that occurred in Ukraine, we won’t get such an objective investigation,” the ex-minister said.

According to Zakharchenko, Western nations – which fully supported the Ukrainian coup – were aware that Maidan radicals had firearms in their possession.

“I had meetings with various international representatives, including the US ambassador to Ukraine, as well as with EU ambassador Jan Tombinski. I repeatedly called them and said that there were firearms at Independence Square,” he said.

The identity of the ‘Maidan snipers’ is a hot topic in Ukraine and abroad. Twelve Berkut officers were detained earlier this week for allegedly being part of the so-called ‘Black Company,’ which was given sniper rifles to provide cover for its retreating comrades on February 20.

Coup-appointed Prime Minister Arseny Yatsenyuk says that ousted President Yanukovich is the one who should answer for the killings of Maidan protesters.

Meanwhile, a phone conversation leaked last month between EU foreign affairs chief Catherine Ashton and Estonian Foreign Minister Urmas Paet contains strong suspicion that the snipers were hired by Maidan leaders.

In his interview, Zakharchenko also criticized the National Guard – the new security force put together by the coup-imposed Ukrainian authorities. The force was created from interior troops and Maidan self-defense forces.

“There is a feeling that they came up with this National Guard in order to create… something like stormtroopers to legalize the militants who don’t want to surrender their weapons, so that they’d carry the real power – thus matching them against the police and the army and restoring order with its own revolutionary forces,” he said.

The National Guard has already recruited 30,000 soldiers, according to Kiev.

RIA Novosti is citing sources in the Ukrainian Defense and Interior Ministries, who say the creation of the National Guard is treated by them as a symbol of distrust from Kiev authorities.

But Zakharchenko has serious doubts about the National Guard’s ability to work effectively.

“Well, I just can’t understand, for example, how they will execute guard duties or how this will look like at all. How can they ensure the rule of law if they were engaged in debacles, if they killed law enforcement officers, attacked them and burned with Molotov cocktails. How much trust will the population have towards those guards? Whom will they be defending?” he said.

Zakharchenko served as Ukraine’s interior minister from November 7, 2011 to February 21, 2014, when parliament removed him from office.

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5 unanswered questions surrounding Kiev killings

April 6, 2014 Posted by | Deception, False Flag Terrorism, Video, War Crimes | , , , , | Leave a comment

Russia will not import GMO products – PM Medvedev

RT | April 6, 2014

Russia will not import GMO products, the country’s Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev said, adding that the nation has enough space and resources to produce organic food.

Moscow has no reason to encourage the production of genetically modified products or import them into the country, Medvedev told a congress of deputies from rural settlements on Saturday.

“If the Americans like to eat GMO products, let them eat it then. We don’t need to do that; we have enough space and opportunities to produce organic food,” he said.

The prime minister said he ordered widespread monitoring of the agricultural sector. He added that despite rather strict restrictions, a certain amount of GMO products and seeds have made it to the Russian market.

Earlier, agriculture minister Nikolay Fyodorov also stated that Russia should remain free of genetically modified products.

At the end of February, the Russian parliament asked the government to impose a temporary ban on all genetically altered products in Russia.

The State Duma’s Agriculture Committee supported a ban on the registration and trade of genetically modified organisms. It was suggested that until specialists develop a working system of control over the effects of GMOs on humans and the natural environment, the government should impose a moratorium on the breeding and growth of genetically modified plants, animals, and microorganisms.

Earlier this month, MPs of the parliamentary majority United Russia party, together with the ‘For Sovereignty’ parliamentary group, suggested an amendment of the existing law On Safety and Quality of Alimentary Products, with a norm set for the maximum allowed content of transgenic and genetically modified components.

There is currently no limitation on the trade or production of GMO-containing food in Russia. However, when the percentage of GMO exceeds 0.9 percent, the producer must label such goods and warn consumers. Last autumn, the government passed a resolution allowing the listing of genetically modified plants in the Unified State Register. The resolution will come into force in July.

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April 6, 2014 Posted by | Economics, Environmentalism | , , , | Leave a comment

AGW has most of the characteristics of an “urban legend”

By Roy W. Spencer, Ph. D. | Watts Up With That? | October 24, 2009

About.com describes an “urban legend” as an apocryphal (of questionable authenticity), secondhand story, told as true and just plausible enough to be believed, about some horrific…series of events….it’s likely to be framed as a cautionary tale. Whether factual or not, an urban legend is meant to be believed. In lieu of evidence, however, the teller of an urban legend is apt to rely on skillful storytelling and reference to putatively trustworthy sources.

I contend that the belief in human-caused global warming as a dangerous event, either now or in the future, has most of the characteristics of an urban legend. Like other urban legends, it is based upon an element of truth. Carbon dioxide is a greenhouse gas whose concentration in the atmosphere is increasing, and since greenhouse gases warm the lower atmosphere, more CO2 can be expected, at least theoretically, to result in some level of warming.

But skillful storytelling has elevated the danger from a theoretical one to one of near-certainty. The actual scientific basis for the plausible hypothesis that humans could be responsible for most recent warming is contained in the cautious scientific language of many scientific papers. Unfortunately, most of the uncertainties and caveats are then minimized with artfully designed prose contained in the Summary for Policymakers (SP) portion of the report of the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). This Summary was clearly meant to instill maximum alarm from a minimum amount of direct evidence.

Next, politicians seized upon the SP, further simplifying and extrapolating its claims to the level of a “climate crisis”. Other politicians embellished the tale even more by claiming they “saw” global warming in Greenland as if it was a sighting of Sasquatch, or that they felt it when they fly in airplanes.

Just as the tales of marauding colonies of alligators living in New York City sewers are based upon some kernel of truth, so too is the science behind anthropogenic global warming. But there is a big difference between reports of people finding pet alligators that have escaped their owners, versus city workers having their limbs torn off by roving colonies of subterranean monsters.

In the case of global warming, the “putatively trustworthy sources” would be the consensus of the world’s scientists. The scientific consensus, after all, says that global warming is… is what? Is happening? Is severe? Is man-made? Is going to burn the Earth up if we do not act? It turns out that those who claim consensus either do not explicitly state what that consensus is about, or they make up something that supports their preconceived notions.

If the consensus is that the presence of humans on Earth has some influence on the climate system, then I would have to even include myself in that consensus. After all, the same thing can be said of the presence of trees on Earth, and hopefully we have at least the same rights as trees do. But too often the consensus is some vague, fill-in-the-blank, implied assumption where the definition of “climate change” includes the phrase “humans are evil”.

It is a peculiar development that scientific truth is now decided through voting. A relatively recent survey of climate scientists who do climate research found that 97.4% agreed that humans have a “significant” effect on climate. But the way the survey question was phrased borders on meaninglessness. To a scientist, “significant” often means non-zero. The survey results would have been quite different if the question was, “Do you believe that natural cycles in the climate system have been sufficiently researched to exclude them as a potential cause of most of our recent warming?”

And it is also a good bet that 100% of those scientists surveyed were funded by the government only after they submitted research proposals which implicitly or explicitly stated they believed in anthropogenic global warming to begin with. If you submit a research proposal to look for alternative explanations for global warming (say, natural climate cycles), it is virtually guaranteed you will not get funded. Is it any wonder that scientists who are required to accept the current scientific orthodoxy in order to receive continued funding, then later agree with that orthodoxy when surveyed? Well, duh.

In my experience, the public has the mistaken impression that a lot of climate research has gone into the search for alternative explanations for warming. They are astounded when I tell them that virtually no research has been performed into the possibility that warming is just part of a natural cycle generated within the climate system itself.

Too often the consensus is implied to be that global warming is so serious that we must do something now in the form of public policy to avert global catastrophe. What? You don’t believe that there are alligators in New York City sewer system? How can you be so unconcerned about the welfare of city workers that have to risk their lives by going down there every day? What are you, some kind of Holocaust-denying, Neanderthal flat-Earther?

It makes complete sense that in this modern era of scientific advances and inventions that we would so readily embrace a compelling tale of global catastrophe resulting from our own excesses. It’s not a new genre of storytelling, of course, as there were many B-movies in the 1950s whose horror themes were influenced by scientists’ development of the atomic bomb.

Our modern equivalent is the 2004 movie, “Day After Tomorrow”, in which all kinds of physically impossible climatic events occur in a matter of days. In one scene, super-cold stratospheric air descends to the Earth’s surface, instantly freezing everything in its path. The meteorological truth, however, is just the opposite. If you were to bring stratospheric air down to the surface, heating by compression would make it warmer than the surrounding air, not colder.

I’m sure it is just coincidence that “Day After Tomorrow” was directed by Roland Emmerich, who also directed the 2006 movie “Independence Day,” in which an alien invasion nearly exterminates humanity. After all, what’s the difference? Aliens purposely killing off humans, or humans accidentally killing off humans? Either way, we all die.

But a global warming catastrophe is so much more believable. After all, climate change does happen, right? So why not claim that ALL climate change is now the result of human activity? And while we are at it, let’s re-write climate history so that we get rid of the Medieval Warm Period and the Little Ice age, with a new ingenious hockey stick-shaped reconstruction of past temperatures that makes it look like climate never changed until the 20th Century? How cool would that be?

The IPCC thought it was way cool… until it was debunked, after which it was quietly downgraded in the IPCC reports from the poster child for anthropogenic global warming, to one possible interpretation of past climate.

And let’s even go further and suppose that the climate system is so precariously balanced that our injection of a little bit of that evil plant food, carbon dioxide, pushes our world over the edge, past all kinds of imaginary tipping points, with the Greenland ice sheet melting away, and swarms of earthquakes being the price of our indiscretions.

In December, hundreds of bureaucrats from around the world will once again assemble, this time in Copenhagen, in their attempts to forge a new international agreement to reduce greenhouse gas emissions as a successor to the Kyoto Protocol. And as has been the case with every other UN meeting of its type, the participants simply assume that the urban legend is true. Indeed, these politicians and governmental representatives need it to be true. Their careers and political power now depend upon it. And the fact that they hold their meetings in all of the best tourist destinations in the world, enjoying the finest exotic foods, suggests that they do not expect to ever have to be personally inconvenienced by whatever restrictions they try to impose on the rest of humanity.

If you present these people with evidence that the global warming crisis might well be a false alarm, you are rewarded with hostility and insults, rather than expressions of relief. The same can be said for most lay believers of the urban legend. I say “most” because I once encountered a true believer who said he hoped my research into the possibility that climate change is mostly natural will eventually be proved correct.

Unfortunately, just as we are irresistibly drawn to disasters – either real ones on the evening news, or ones we pay to watch in movie theaters – the urban legend of a climate crisis will persist, being believed by those whose politics and worldviews depend upon it. Only when they finally realize what a new treaty will cost them in loss of freedoms and standard of living will those who oppose our continuing use of carbon-based energy begin to lose their religion.

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April 6, 2014 Posted by | Deception, Timeless or most popular | , , , , | Leave a comment

PA: Israel undermined peace process first with ‘unilateral moves’

Ma’an – 06/04/2014

BETHLEHEM – A spokesperson for Palestinian Authority president Mahmoud Abbas accused Israel on Sunday of undermining the peace process first, minutes after Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu accused the Palestinians of making “unilateral moves” that had harmed the talks.

Nabil Abu Rdeina told Ma’an on Sunday that “it was Israel who took unilateral steps to thwart the peace process,” pointing out that Israel precipitated the current impasse in the talks by refusing to release the fourth batch of veteran Palestinian prisoners jailed before the Oslo Accords as had been previously agreed upon.

Abu Rdeina added that Israel has continued to expand settlements in the West Bank throughout the peace process, which also constitutes a unilateral move to undermine hopes for peace.

The statements came immediately after Israeli prime minister Netanyahu responded to the growing negotiations crisis on Sunday, accusing Palestinians of undermining the talks through “empty declarations” and “unilateral actions” at the beginning of the weekly government cabinet meeting according to Israeli media.

Other Israeli officials also denounced the moves, with strategic affairs minister Yuval Steinitz going so far as to say that Palestinian Authority president Mahmoud Abbas was “spitting” in Israelis’ faces by trying to join international rights conventions.

“Unilateral steps by the Palestinians will be answered with unilateral steps on our part,” Netanyahu was quoted as saying by Israeli news site Ynet, in his first public comments on the deterioration of talks in recent days.

“The Palestinians will get a state only though direct negotiations, and not through empty declarations, nor through unilateral actions that will only keep the peace agreement further away,” he added during the meeting.

The comments come after the Palestinian Authority submitted letters to accede to a number of international conventions after Israel failed to release a group of Palestinian prisoners held in Israeli jails for more than two decades. Israeli leaders condemned the move, decrying Palestinian attempts at international recognition and potential intervention.

“Throughout these talks, we have taken tough steps and demonstrated willingness to continue executing difficult in the upcoming months as well to create a framework to allow ending the conflict.”

“Unfortunately, as we approached the talks’ deadline, the Palestinian leadership rushed to unilaterally join 14 international treaties. Thus the Palestinians significantly violated the agreements that were achieved. The threats to turn to the UN do not affect us. The Palestinians have plenty to lose in a unilateral step.”

Netanyahu’s comments followed remarks from other top Israeli politicians slamming the Palestinian Authority’s move.

Economy Minister and right-wing Jewish Home party chairman Naftali Bennett was quoted by Ynet as saying that the Palestinians “shut down the negotiations by unilaterally going to the UN against all agreements. This is a flagrant violation of the accords, including the Oslo Accords. The negotiations with the Palestinians, even though they only turned unilaterally to the UN, makes the State of Israel a shelter for extortion.”

“If the seller runs off with the merchandise, you don’t need to chase him — cash in hand — begging to buy his goods. In short, if they retract the UN application we’ll negotiate, and if they don’t the negotiations must stop.”

Strategic Affairs Minister Yuval Steinitz joined the critical remarks against the Palestinians, and said: “Truth be told, (Palestinian President) Mahmoud Abbas is spitting in our faces, he tells us he is not interested in peace, he is willing to recognize the existence of the Jewish people and its right to its own state, and now he shuts down the negotiations,” according to Ynet.

“This Palestinian Authority exists thanks to us. Not only because of the Oslo Accords, but because of the funds we transfer them, and the security we give them. Otherwise, Hamas and Islamic Jihad, as they control Gaza, would also taken down Abbas and take over Ramallah.”

The statements come amid a wider breakdown in negotiations between Israel and the Palestinian Authority that followed Israel’s refusal to release the fourth batch of veteran Palestinian prisoners as promised as part of a trust-building measure to restart US-backed peace talks.

Peace talks between Israelis and Palestinians were relaunched in July under the auspices of the United States after nearly three years of impasse, but over the course of the talks Israel has announced plans to build thousands of homes in illegal settlements across the West Bank, angering Palestinian and US officials.

Israeli officials now fear that the Palestinian Authority may attempt to appeal to international bodies against Israeli policies.

The internationally recognized Palestinian territories of which the West Bank and East Jerusalem form a part have been occupied by the Israeli military since 1967.

April 6, 2014 Posted by | Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Illegal Occupation | , , , , , , | 2 Comments

Over 1,500 Palestinian children killed by Israeli forces since 2000 – PA minister

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RT | April 6, 2014

More than 1,500 Palestinian children have died at the hands of Israeli forces since 2000, the Palestinian Authority’s minister of social affairs, Kamal Sharafi, said Saturday, on Palestinian Children’s Day.

In addition to the 1,520 children that have been killed, another 6,000 have been injured and more than 10,000 arrested, Palestinian news agency Ma’an quoted Sharafi as saying. Two-hundred children are still in detention in Israeli prisons.

“Protecting and supporting children should be a national responsibility,” Sharafi said, urging the Palestinian Authority to approve a law for the protection of minors.

The international community has criticized Israel for the mistreatment of Palestinian minors. In March 2013, a United Nations Children Fund (UNICEF) report concluded that Palestinian children detained by the Israeli military in the West Bank are “systematically” ill-treated, which is a violation of international law.

Each year, some 700 Palestinian children aged 12 to 17 – mainly boys – are arrested, interrogated, and detained by Israel’s army, police, and security agents, UNICEF said in the 22-page document.

According to the report, the ill-treatment often begins at the point of arrest, when children are woken by heavily-armed soldiers and forcibly brought to an interrogation center “tied and blindfolded, sleep-deprived and in a state of extreme fear.”

In June 2013, the UN Committee on the Rights of the Child (CRC) issued a report stating that thousands of Palestinian children were systematically injured, tortured, and used as human shields by Israel.

During the 10-year period examined by UN human rights experts, up to 7,000 children aged 9 to 17 were arrested, interrogated and kept captive, CRC said in the report.

April 6, 2014 Posted by | Aletho News | , , , , | 1 Comment

Israeli sniper shoots Palestinian cameraman at Ofer protest

Ma’an – 06/04/2014

BETHLEHEM – Video emerged on Sunday of the moment an Israeli sniper shot a Palestinian cameraman in the stomach while he was covering a protest at Ofer prison on Friday.

Israeli security forces shot and injured Mohammed Basman Yasin, a volunteer cameraman for the Israeli human rights organization B’tselem, while he was filming a protest in the West Bank city of Beitunia, according to Israeli website +972.

The video, which could not be independently verified, appears to show Palestinian protesters sitting on the road when Israel forces arrive and begin firing tear gas canisters at them.

At times, protesters are seen throwing rocks at Israeli forces, although in other scenes activists can be seen walking towards an ambulance when Israeli forces open fire without warning in their direction.

At 5:30, meanwhile, two activists can be seen throwing rocks at the heavily-armed Israeli soldiers, when the video cuts to a scene showing Yasin, who is at the back of a large crowd watching the scene, being shot in the stomach.

Israeli forces caused severe damage to his internal organs, and according to B’tselem, doctors have said they may be forced to remove his liver and kidneys.

Yasin is currently hospitalized in Ramallah.

The clashes took place near the Israeli Ofer prison, located in the occupied West Bank, in protest against the Israeli government’s refusal to release a fourth group of veteran Palestinian prisoners it had previously agreed to release as part of ongoing US-sponsored negotiations with the PLO.

13 were reported injured during the clashes, including seven with live bullets.

An Israeli army spokeswoman told Ma’an that Israeli forces fired at “rioters” who threw rocks and burning tires at security forces, “lightly injuring” five.

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April 6, 2014 Posted by | Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Full Spectrum Dominance, Subjugation - Torture, Video | , , , , | Leave a comment