Friday, September 28, 2012

Only ten percent of Gaza life-line tunnels still operating

Palestinian men stand behind a net where migrant quails are snared on the beach of Khan Yunis in southern Gaza Strip on September 25, 2012. Palestinians erect hundreds of meters of yellow silk nets along the coastline in the Gaza Strip to hunt migratory birds, mainly quails, which start arriving to the coasts of the Mediterranean in the second half of September of each year. AFP PHOTO/ SAID KHATIB

Just 10 percent of Gaza's smuggling tunnels to Egypt are still in operation after bearing the brunt of an Egyptian military crackdown in recent months, according to Ma'an news agency.

An August 5 militant attack on Egyptian policemen in the Sinai peninsula which killed 16 prompted the government to close most of Gaza's nearly 1,000 tunnels.

Authorities said they suspected the militants had been sneaking into Egypt from Gaza via the tunnels, which they had previously turned a blind eye to.

Tunnel owners said the tunnels have fallen under the sway of Egyptian and Palestinian authorities who insist on identifying people using the tunnels, and controlling the quality of goods passing through.

When security conditions permit, fuel and construction materials are allowed to freely pass into Gaza, a tunnel owner who called himself Mahmoud said.

Gaza's ministry of national economy said monthly imports of basic foodstuffs had fallen by 31 percent, and construction materials had declined byy 45 percent since the tunnel closures.

Israel's blockade on the Gaza strip, aided by Egypt's frequent closures of the Gaza-Egypt Rafah crossing, set off a humanitarian crisis in the strip, turning the tunnels into a veritable lifeline for its 1.7 million residents.

Eyewitnesses told Ma'an that Egyptian bulldozers remained on the Egyptian borders with the Gaza strip, and were continuing to destroy the tunnels.

 Source

Fisherman Killed By Israeli Navy Fire


by Saed Bannoura

Palestinian medical sources in the Gaza Strip reported, Friday, that a Palestinian fisherman was killed by Israeli navy fire west of Beit Lahia, in the northern part of the Gaza Strip. The fisherman’s brother was wounded in the attack.

Dr. Ashfar Al-Qdura, spokesperson of the Ministry of Health in the Gaza Strip told the Maan News Agency that Fahmi Salah Abu Rayyash, 22, was shot and seriously injured by Israeli fire on Friday morning, and died of his wounds at a local hospital on Friday evening.

Al-Qudra added that Fahmi was shot by one round of live ammunition in his abdomen and another round in his right foot.

Yousef, the brother of Fahmi, suffered mild injuries and received the needed medical treatment.

The attack is part of ongoing violations carried out by the Israeli army and navy against Palestinian fishermen in the coastal region; these attacks led to dozens of casualties, while dozens of fishermen were also kidnapped by the army.

Since 2000, fishermen have been denied their right to sail and fish, as Israel reduced the area of fishing from 20 nautical miles, which was established upon in the agreements signed between Palestinian and Israel, to 6 nautical miles in 2008.

However, Israeli forces have continued to prevent fishermen from going beyond 3 nautical miles since 2009.

As a result, fishermen are prevented from reaching areas beyond that distance where fish are abundant. Sometimes, Israeli forces also chase fishermen within the 3 nautical mile area.

Consequently, Palestinian fishermen have lost 85% of their income, because of limiting the fishing area.


 Source

Report: “More Than 75.000 Arrests Made By Army Since Sep. 2000”

by Saed Bannoura

Former Political Prisoner, Palestinian Researcher, Abdul-Nasser Farawna, issued a report marking the 12th Anniversary of the Al-Aqsa Intifada (September 28 2000), and said Israeli soldiers conducted more than 75.000 arrests, and deported hundreds of residents. 

 Farawna said that more than 9000 children were kidnapped by the army in addition to nearly 940 women, including four who gave birth in prison; the army also kidnapped dozens of disabled and wounded Palestinians, in addition to dozens of elected legislators, ministers and officials.

Israel also issued more than 22.000 Administrative Detention orders to forcibly imprison thousands of Palestinians without charges.

He added that, currently, there are 4500 Palestinians who are still imprisoned by Israel including 198 children, eight women, 14 legislators, 115 Administrative detainees and hundreds of ailing and disabled Palestinians.

Farawna stated that the arrests carried out by the army targeted all sectors of the Palestinian society, including wives and mothers of political prisoners, and added that these arrests are not concentrated in one area. and are carried out on a daily basis.

He said that Israel is still holding captive the remains of dozens of Palestinians killed during the Al-Aqsa Intifada and hundreds who were killed before the Intifada started.

The researcher added that the arrest ratio dropped over the last five years, yet, the violations carried out against the detainees witnessed a serious escalation.


Israel also reopened several prisons such as the Negev detention camp and Ofer, and built new prisons, such and Ramon; these prisons are used to detain hundreds of detainees under strict and harsh conditions. The large number of arrests also pushed Israel to expand existing prisons.

Farawna stated that there are 23 detainees who were kidnapped and imprisoned since more than 20 years, including some detainees who have been detained since more than 25 and 30 years.

79 detainees have died in prison since the beginning of the Al-Aqsa Intifada due to torture, medical negligence, excessive use of force by the soldiers and interrogators, in addition to several detainees who were executed by the arresting officers.

A total of 202 detainees died or were killed in Israeli prisons since 1967; dozens of detainees also died after they were released due to diseases they encountered in prison or due to complications resulting from extreme torture and bad conditions in prisons.

Farawna further stated that the Prisoner Swap deal that was carried out in October of 2011, managed to secure the release of 1027 detainees in exchange for the release of Israeli corporal Gilad Shalit.

He also saluted the repeated hunger strikes and the ongoing struggle carried out by the detainees demanding their internationally guaranteed rights. 


Also, Israel deported more than 280 West Bank detainees to the Gaza Strip, in addition to dozens of detainees who were forced into exile.

Although the Israeli Authorities deported dozens of detainees throughout the years since Israel occupied Palestine, the occupation stepped-up its illegal policy on May 2002 when it forced into exile 39 detainees who were taken prisoner after taking shelter in the Nativity Church in Bethlehem when Israel surrounded the church for 40 days.

13 of the exiled detainees were sent to a number of European countries, and 26 were deported to the Gaza Strip under a Palestinian-Israeli deal that ended the siege, but its full details were never made public despite the fact that 10 years have passed since then.

Following the deal, Israel reinstated its illegal deportation policies and forced into exile 40 detainees who were released under the Shalit swap deal, and addition to 163 West Bank detainees who were deported to the Gaza Strip.

Farawna voiced an appeal to human rights groups around the world to intervene and act on obliging Israel to respect International Law and the Fourth Geneva Convention.

It is worth mentioning that the Israeli army, and armed settlers, shot and killed more than 5000 Palestinians since the beginning of the Al-Aqsa Intifada, including 1077 children and 244 women. Two Egyptians were killed by Israeli army fire in 2002, two international peace activists killed in 2003, one British activist was killed by Israeli fire in 2004, and two Egyptians killed in 201. Dozens of thousands of Palestinians were wounded, including thousands who suffered permanent disabilities.

The ongoing Israel assaults since September 2000 led to the total destruction or more than 5694 homes and caused partial damage and destruction of approximately 8000 homes. 


 Source

What Really Matters!

   
                                               When all gets dark
 

And life loses its colours


When evil tightens the grip


And the wicked leads the way


When fall falls before its time


and frost grows around 


When your heart is torn and worn,


and you feel like throwing it away


Don't give up, just wait a little while, 


 Turn your back 


Close your eyes and


Remember what you have forgotten


Try to find if you've lost, 


Apologize if you've hurt,


Forgive if you have been hurt,


Caress if you've been deprived,


 Pursue, if you have dream


Share if you've been bereft,


Giggle if you've been aggrieved,


Embrace if you've been shun,


Give if you've been denied,


Excel if you've been scorned,

Feed if you've tasted hunger


Rejoice if you've felt somber


Accompany those who know 
 

 
Hold on tight to those you love,


Cherish those who care for you,


Because life is too short



and it is full of wonder




Nahida-Exiled Palestinian

Iran Bomb: The Ever-Burning Fuse

Wile E Coyote, Prime Minister of Israel, uses a diagram of a bomb to describe Iran's nuclear program while delivering his address to the 67th United Nations General Assembly meeting 27 September 2012 at the United Nations in New York. (Photo: AFP - Don Emmert)
Published Friday, September 28, 2012
 
On Thursday, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu addressed the United Nations General Assembly and spoke of the need for a “clear red line” on Iran’s nuclear program, hinting at military action against the Islamic Republic. This seemingly escalatory tone against Iran is nothing new as Netanyahu and others have been crying wolf on Iran’s nuclear weapons for decades.

The accusation that Iran has been militarizing its nuclear energy program dates further back than most people realize: in fact, it first surfaced during the final years of pro-Western Shah Mohammed Reza Pahlavi’s reign.

Since then, Israeli and Western government officials and political pundits have routinely predicted the “imminent” construction of an Iranian nuclear weapon, frequently contradicting assessments by their own intelligence agencies and other international experts. The depiction of the menace and the sense of urgency stoked by such claims have only increased in recent years – the latest of which forecasts the possible development of an Iranian nuclear weapon in a mere matter of weeks.

Timeline of The Iran Bomb


 Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad waves before entering an airplane upon his departure to the United States to attend the UN General Assembly, at Tehran's Mehrabad Airport, on 22 September 2012. (Photo: AFP - Atta Kenare)Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad waves before entering an airplane upon his departure to the United States to attend the UN General Assembly, at Tehran's Mehrabad Airport, on 22 September 2012. (Photo: AFP - Atta Kenare)

Inextricable from this doom-saying over Iran’s nuclear program are sales of weapons and military equipment to Iran’s foes in the region, as well as an increase in belligerent activities against the Islamic Republic, including economic sanctions and assassinations. These tactics have in turn fermented Iran’s own concerns, motivating it to double-down and push forward with a nuclear program Tehran insists is for peaceful use only.

And so a self-fulfilling pattern is spawned, leaving the region’s inhabitants perpetually on the brink of an avoidable catastrophe.

Nuclear Beginnings

The Iranian state initiated its nuclear energy program in 1957 with close cooperation from the United States under the “Atoms for Peace” program, first envisioned by American President Dwight D. Eisenhower in 1953. A small research nuclear reactor was purchased by Iran from the US in 1960. It became active seven years later, with the US providing enriched fuel.

Soon after, Iran signed on to the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty (NPT) and established the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran to oversee the development of this project.

Today, Western pressures are based on holding Iran strictly accountable for a treaty signed by a repressive government that was eventually overthrown; while Israel, which is widely believed to actually possess a nuclear weapons arsenal, is granted incredible leeway by Western states under the justification that it has not signed on to the treaty and therefore is not governed by its rules. This double standard is one of the fundamental points of disagreement, which continue to incite mistrust and skepticism from Iran's side.

Prior to his overthrow, Pahlavi was reportedly involved in negotiations with the US, France, and West Germany to develop 20 nuclear reactors and perhaps help with a clandestine nuclear weapons development program in the works.

The Shah, likely motivated by news that India had successfully tested its own nuclear bomb, told Le Monde in 1974 that one day “sooner than is believed, [Iran would be] in possession of a nuclear bomb.” It was an ambitious, brazen statement that was quickly retracted by the Iranian embassy in France. 


Nevertheless, it suggested that among the higher echelons of the Iranian state, possessing nuclear weapons was at the very least being contemplated.

Iranian attempts to develop a full nuclear fuel cycle, a key component of weaponization, were adamantly opposed by much of the American establishment despite Iran being a vital ally. Nuclear power symbolizes independence and strength and the knowledge itself tends to be jealously guarded by those already in possession of such capabilities.

Concerns over Iran’s ambitions were reflected in a number of memos sent by American defense and energy departments at the time, which warned, in hyperbolic fashion, that “the annual plutonium production from the planned 23,000 MW Iranian nuclear power program will be equivalent to 600-700 warheads.”

Undeterred by such fears, Iran had allies within the administration, including Donald Rumsfeld and Dick Cheney. Both individuals, who in a twist of fate later came to view Iran as a major enemy, lobbied in support of the Iranian nuclear program under the pretext that it would secure Iran’s future energy needs, and more importantly, would be highly lucrative for American corporations.

A deal was struck in 1978: in return for helping Iran develop its nuclear program, Washington secured the right to the return and storage of spent reactor fuel from all reactors built in Iran. This way, Iran’s nuclear weapons program would be restricted and controlled according to the whims of the Americans. However, fickle fate had other plans.

In 1979, the Shah was ousted by a popular uprising and all ties between Iran and the Western countries were severely downgraded or out-right terminated, replaced by mutual antagonism and overt hostility.

Iran under Siege

 
Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, who would rise to become the religious leader of the Iranian revolution, at first opposed nuclear power and weapons on religious grounds and rapidly took measures against the program. Pre-existing plans for the completion of two semi-finished reactors at Bushehr and two further reactors were immediately scrapped. Yet, this initial opposition to nuclear power and weapons by Iran’s new policymakers was soon reconsidered for two main reasons.

First, major economic losses were incurred because of the unfinished nuclear reactors and Iran needed to secure its future energy requirements.

Secondly, and more crucially, post-revolution Iran was viewed as a threat to American interests in the Gulf. More so, the Iranians were surrounded by states that possessed nuclear weapons or were trying to develop them. Of great concern was Iraq, which had launched an attack against Iran in 1980, only a year after the revolution, deploying chemical weapons against Iranian forces early in the conflict.

A letter reportedly composed by Khomeini close to the end of the Iran-Iraq War sheds some light on his motivation to reluctantly reactivate the country’s nuclear program. Khomeini was driven by defensive rather than expansive considerations; in particular Iraq’s use of chemical weapons during the war, which it had developed with help from the West, influenced his decision.

While Iran was at war with Iraq, American and Israeli military relations entered a new phase, as the two countries conducted their first ever joint sea and air exercises, complemented by the construction of facilities to stockpile American military equipment in Israel in 1984.

Additionally, the Reagan administration authorized a massive arms sale to a number of Gulf States, which were fearful of the Iranian state and its ideology of exporting an Islamic revolution, and were supporting Iraq.

There was no clear decision by Iranian policymakers to construct nuclear weapons in the early 1980s, despite moves to develop the nuclear energy front of the program.

Irrespective of that fact, in April 1984, British defense magazine Jane’s Defense Weekly became the first publication in the West to claim that Iran was “engaged in the production of an atomic bomb, likely to be ready within two years.”

Jane’s prediction apparently stemmed from information gathered by West German intelligence sources after West German engineers visited the unfinished Bushehr nuclear reactor that year. This first public prediction was echoed across the Atlantic by US Senator Alan Cranston’s announcement that Iran was expected to have nuclear weapons as early as 1991.

These embryonic Western prophecies of a forthcoming Iranian bomb, like many others that followed over the years, were not based on concrete evidence. Moreover, they routinely disregarded that Tehran was reacting to a siege on multiple fronts, which only grew in the coming decades.

When the Iran-Iraq war sputtered to a whimpering conclusion, following an estimated loss of over one million lives, the Islamic Republic was granted a moment’s respite, as Western states concentrated on Iraq following Saddam Hussein’s invasion of Kuwait in 1990. This brief respite lasted until the end of the First Gulf War and afforded Iran room to pursue ties with states such as China, Pakistan, Argentina and Russia to help develop its nuclear energy program.

By 1992, Benjamin Netanyahu, then an Israeli parliamentarian, began expressing the belief that Iran could develop nuclear weapons within “three to five years” and therefore must be stopped through “an international front headed by the US.” His statements were reiterated by Israeli Foreign Minister Shimon Peres, but Peres pushed the clock to 1999.

“Iran is the greatest threat [to peace] and greatest problem in the Middle East … because it seeks the nuclear option while holding a highly dangerous stance of extreme religious militantism,” Peres told a French news agency.

Following suit, a task force of the US House Republican Research Committee claimed that there was a “98 percent certainty that Iran had already had all (or virtually all) of the components required for two or three operational nuclear weapons.”

More officials in Washington and Tel Aviv joined in the distressing, but always unsubstantiated contentions.

One notable case involved former Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, who in 1998 reported to Congress that Iran could build an intercontinental ballistic missile with a nuclear or a biological payload that could hit the US within five years. Of course this was mere speculation, but that did not stop such statements from reverberating within the American establishment. 


Rumsfeld’s report to Congress can be seen as the seed for future American foreign policy.

Meanwhile, arms sales to the Arab Gulf countries churned along and grew significantly, correlating with the hysteria towards Iran.

Adding to this, the US promoted security coordination with the Gulf Cooperation Council, pledging to contain any threat from either Iran or Iraq. In the spirit of this policy, the US entrenched its military presence in the Gulf, setting up bases in Saudi Arabia and Kuwait, and proceeding to upgrade its naval forces to fleet status in Bahrain.

By the dawn of the new millennium, the portrayal of Iran as a major threat, painstakingly crafted throughout the 1990s, kicked into high gear.

Becoming Enemy Number One

During George W. Bush’s tenure, Iran was firmly placed as part of the “axis of evil,” even as the reformist Iranian President Mohammed Khatami attempted to reach out to his American counterpart on multiple occasions, including by denouncing the 9/11 attacks and cooperating with America’s invasion of Afghanistan.

As part of this conciliatory approach, Iran allowed the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) to visit its nuclear facilities in February 2003 for the first time. These visitations were not without their complications, but they were goodwill steps toward de-escalation.

While Iran maintained that its nuclear program was entirely peaceful, the IAEA noted small breaches in safeguard agreements and accused the Islamic Republic of a “pattern of concealment.” However, the atomic agency found “no evidence” that Iran was attempting to build an atomic bomb. The IAEA’s conclusion was quickly denounced by the US government as “impossible to believe.” 


Britain, France, and Germany then began a dialogue with Iran, resulting in the Paris Agreement, in which Iran agreed to a temporary suspension of its program pending the progress of further negotiations. This suspension ultimately lasted for three years before Iran restarted its nuclear enrichment activities.

For its part, the US refused to participate in any negotiations with Iran. Despite American embroilment in a worsening quagmire following their invasion and occupation of Iraq and Afghanistan, they maintained their repudiation of international diplomacy and continued to up the ante vis-a-vis Iran.

In the spirit of this aggressive American policy that defined the Bush era, then-Secretary of State Colin Powell claimed in 2004 that Iran had been working on technology to fit a nuclear warhead onto a missile. These allegations came as Powell’s Iraqi weapons of mass destruction assertions were being proven to be unsubstantiated.

"We are talking about information that says they not only have [the] missiles but information that suggests they are working hard about how to put the two together," he declared.

To support Powell’s allegations, a year later the US presented 1,000 pages of designs and other documentation supposedly retrieved from a laptop computer in Iran, which were said to detail high-explosives testing and a nuclear-capable missile warhead. The “alleged studies,” as they have since been called by the IAEA and other international experts, were dismissed by Iran as forgeries by hostile intelligence services.

Conciliatory efforts by Iran largely tapered out with the departure of Khatami in 2005 and the subsequent ascendancy of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, who adopted a more hard-line position as Iranian president. Tensions between Iran and the US grew.

In the midst of this growing rift, Khamenei, who succeeded Khomeini as supreme religious leader, issued his own fatwa forbidding the production, stockpiling and use of nuclear weapons, during a meeting with the IAEA Board of Governors in Geneva in 2005. But this public fatwa did not ease pressures on Iran.

More and more political commentators around the world began to disseminate their own estimates of when or how a war would break out. In the minds of those within American and Israeli political and military circles, the matter appeared already settled. A notable report highlighting this mentality was written by The New Yorker’s renowned investigative journalist Seymour Hersh, who quoted US political and military sources as saying that a strike on Iran was all but inevitable.

Like its predecessors, the Bush Administration coupled this panic towards Iran by bolstering its military relationship with Iran’s enemies. The Gulf Security Dialogue was established in May 2006 as a response to was promoted as a dramatic shift in the regional strategic balance. In addition, Israel attacked Lebanon in the summer of 2006. The assault was widely seen as a precursor for what an assault on Iran would entail and part of an overall strategy to further isolate Iran by weakening its alliances in the region.

Just as tensions appeared to be scaling ever new heights, an unclassified National Intelligence Estimate (NIE), released in November 2007, stated with "high confidence" that Iran had given up any nuclear weapons effort in 2003. 


The report represented the views of America’s 16 spy agencies. What should have been taken as an indicator to reconsider the rhetoric against Iran, was instead promptly ignored or spun in a negative light.

On the diplomatic front, negotiations between the West and Iran were painfully slow and ultimately stalled. The UN Security Council, although not entirely unanimous in its view of the danger posed by Iran, passed four rounds of economic sanctions against Iran between 2006 and 2010. These measures barely dented Iran’s desire for nuclear energy.

When all seemed lost, a sudden, surprising breakthrough occurred in May 2010. Brazilian and Turkish officials were able to broker a deal with Iran to swap nuclear fuel abroad. For a fleeting moment, conflict appeared to have been averted, Western nations, specifically the US, rejected the terms and the deal collapsed.

Throughout 2010 and 2011, under the administration of Barack Obama, the Americans expanded operations against Iran together with their Israeli and European allies - the US had already initiated hostilities through proxies such as the Party for a Free Life in Kurdistan and Jundallah, as far back as late 2005. This alliance utilized a combination of cyber-warfare, diplomatic provocation, assassinations of Iranian scientists, economic sanctions, a bolstered military presence and unceasing threats of a strike by Israel.

Throughout all this, there was still no evidence of an Iranian nuclear bomb. In fact, the matter exceedingly became an issue of whether Iran was trying to learn how to make a weapon, rather than if it had developed one.

Completing the Cycle

In a June 2011 article in The New Yorker, Hersh emphasized the incredible exploitation of the issue:

“Despite years of covert operations inside Iran, extensive satellite imagery, and the recruitment of many Iranian intelligence assets, the United States and its allies, including Israel, have been unable to find irrefutable evidence of an ongoing hidden nuclear-weapons program in Iran, according to intelligence and diplomatic officials here and abroad.”

The IAEA, which under Mohammed al-Baradei was keen not to repeat the calamity of Iraq, transformed under the administration of his successor, Yukiya Amano.

Reversing its long held position, the atomic agency suddenly asserted that Iran had for years been working on weapons-related activities. It buttressed this new claim by publishing a report last November that was based on more than 1,000 pages of design information, which it says, is corroborated by data from 10 member states and its own investigation and interviews. Among the documents used by the IAEA to craft these new accusations is the disputed evidence provided by the Bush administration in 2005.

Amano’s new direction may be partially explained by a US embassy cable document released by WikiLeaks in December 2010. The cable revealed that Amano was “solidly in the US court on every key strategic decision, from high-level personnel appointments to the handling of Iran’s alleged nuclear weapons program.”

Like clock-work, the growing spotlight on Iran has been followed by major weapons sales. In late 2011, the US and the Gulf monarchies committed to what has been called “one of the largest re-armament exercises in peacetime history.”

The sale amounted to around US$123 billion worth of fighter jets, helicopters, missiles, tanks, and other advanced weaponry. The hysteria was profitable for the US arms trade. Furthermore, The New York Times also noted that the US dominated the arms trade in 2011 with around 78 percent of total arms sold worldwide – most of which were exported to the Persian Gulf region. These sales make the Iran bomb threat, which remains a phantom threat, one of the most profitable ploys for Western defense investors and arms-traders.

On the Iranian side, efforts continue to emphasize the peaceful nature of the nuclear program, while also ensuring that Iran’s rights are not compromised. On a number of occasions, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei reconfirmed his 2005 fatwa, most recently last month during the Non-Aligned Movement’s meeting held in Tehran. The nuclear program has become tied to Iran’s identity as a regional and independent power. Any compromise for the Iranians is deemed a capitulation to foreign aggression.

To date no corroborated evidence exists indicating the development of an Iranian nuclear bomb. A report by Reuters in March of this year reiterated this fact without much fanfare. It noted that privately, US, European and even Israeli officials agree that “Tehran does not have a bomb, has not decided to build one, and is probably years away from having a deliverable nuclear warhead.” 


Nevertheless, the US and EU have recently expanded sanctions to include Iran’s oil and banking sector, and are increasing their military presence along Iran’s shores and borders.

Arab Gulf countries have played their part in the growing hostilities against Iran, whether by privately urging an attack on Iran or by complaining of Iranian meddling in their affairs. One month before the IAEA was to release its November report, a fantastical Iranian plot to assassinate a Saudi ambassador in Washington – involving a used car dealer and a Mexican drug gang – was unveiled. 


Concurrently, the Israelis have persisted in their threats, the latest invoked by Israeli defense minister Ehud Barak and the current Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

Barak alleged that a new classified NIE report optioned that Iran had made surprising headway in developing a nuclear bomb. He added that this new report brings the US position closer to that of Israel and preparations were beginning for an assault.

For his part, Netanyahu reportedly got into a spat with the American ambassador to Israel last month over the Obama administration’s unwillingness to take matters to a more aggressive level. The Israeli prime minister was “at his wit’s end” because, he claimed, Iran was “four to eight weeks” away from a nuclear bomb. A few weeks later, Netanyahu backtracked from this prediction, and pushed the deadline to six or seven months away.

There is a growing sense of fatigue over the never-ending, often contradictory prophesying over Iran’s nuclear program. The fact remains that no one, other than the Iranians, really knows the extent of the program.

This fatigue was perfectly articulated by Stephen M. Walt, a prominent American academic and political commentator, writing in Foreign Policy: “[T]hose prophesying war [with Iran] are starting to sound like those wacky cult leaders who keep predicting the End of the World, and then keep moving the date when the world doesn't end on schedule. At what point are we going to stop paying attention?”

Iran accuses Israel, US of "nuclear terrorism"


 Source

Friday September 28, 2012, What We are Not Told

No Shovel Could Ever Uncover the Truth or Bury the Lies

By Gordon Duff, Senior Editor

As a change from what has been done of late by the press, we will attempt some “forthrightfulness and honesty.”  This UN thing, the one that has just ended, sold the point Ahmadinejad made about how the UN has outlived its purpose.

This was pure theatre.  The Netanyahu comic rant was bad enough.  Worse, however, is the failure of the press to cover reactions to Netanyahu, to the lonely “walkout” by Israel and to follow up with the 193 nations, 120 of which chose Iran to represent them as head of the non-aligned nations.

No decent evaluation was done of Obama’s speech.  One was needed.  Obama very rightly chastised those responsible for the violence against American diplomatic missions, walked a careful line, demonstrated some real anger and disappointment and said what was needed but, as this is an election year, stuck to his usual mentions of the holocaust, something the mention of is utterly unproductive.



If the holocaust, whether people choose to believe a version of it or not, as should be allowed by any free people, after all, America didn’t execute those who voted for Bush 43 though from a Darwinian standpoint, such an action might have been justified, happened a long time ago.

The holocaust has been misused as an excuse to bilk money, murder civilians and, we can’t say this enough, do to innocent others what is claimed was done to them many decades ago by people long dead and gone.

Similarly, the Palestinian people see themselves as victims of a continuing holocaust and imprisoned in an apartheid state.  However, examining this issue has been declare a violation of law, though it is a simple issue of free speech, because powerful financial interests has undermined human rights in every western nation.
Here is my approach:
  1. Israel should sign the NPT (Non-Proliferation Treaty) and dispose of her 200 to 400 useless nuclear weapons.  Until that time, any word Israel says about “others” is not credible. 
  1. Israel should adopt a constitution and Bill of Rights as the US has, guaranteeing equal rights to all and become a secular state that recognizes religious freedom.  Attacks on churches and mosques over the past few weeks have been unacceptable and demonstrate that Israel needs to clean house as much as anyone else. 
  1. Israel must establish legal borders as without that, it is impossible for the US to have any binding agreements.  No borders and no constitution and the US is legally prohibited from anything other than “verbal assurances” by law. 
  1. Once borders and a legal system are in place, after over six decades, then the US can formally sign a treaty with Israel or Israel can join NATO if they wish.  There is no nation in the Middle East capable of military action against Israel and no nation has threatened Israel other than Iran who trades threats with Israel four or five times a day. 
  1. An agreement based on the Camp David Accord model should be sought between the US, Israel, Iran and the Gulf States.  We can stop pretending that a hundred billion dollars in illegal trade goes on between these nations and allow regional demilitarization. 
  1. Netanyahu was not wrong when he pointed out yesterday that a number of Islamic nations defy normal human rights.  He failed to place Israel among them.  What we ask of him and of Israel is reasonable to be asked of others despite “religious traditions” and tribal or ethnic differences.  90% of it involves theft of oil money and abuse of slave labor.
However, with all that “finger pointing,” it is impossible for any reasonable person to no demand the United States “re-democratize,” and overturn “Citizens United” and be willing to submit all military actions outside its borders to oversight by a more reputable authority than the United Nations Security Council.



Kudo’s to Sheldon Adelson for having the chutzpah to admit he is buying a president who will keep him out of jail and cut his taxes by 2 billion.  As for Romney:



“W” (Bush 43) was right when he said we would eventually miss him.  However, it was Romney, not Obama that brought it about.  Similarly, I score Adelson low as to vision and “humanity,” but well above Romney as far as honesty goes.  At one point, I was advocating that Romney dump Adelson.

Now I think Adelson should dump Romney.  Nobody is forced to walk into a casino at gunpoint. Nobody has ever done business in China without paying bribes.  Time some realities were accepted and we moved on with less “self righteousness.”

President Erdogan of Turkey pointed out that both China and Russia are largely complicit in the continuing slaughter in Syria.  However, there has long been a “double game” involving Israel, Turkey and Syria that Russia and China have sought to exploit as part of their desire to seem as “saviors of mankind” while being the new “roach infestation” of the world, the real “neo-colonialists.”

Attempts to make heroes out of nations whose history of gamesmanship and exploitation is as bad as any in history will not fly were the entire world to receive balanced and reasonable information on issues of geopolitics.

In the process, we see the fingers of North Korea behind many things but in doing so, we find those fingers attached to a “Chinese hand.”  Were more well informed, such as the CFR and other groups, the huge threat of Japan, China and the Koreas would be more “center stage” than the minor problems of the Middle East.
World War is much more likely there and the stakes are far higher.

A couple of fringe issues here toward the end.  There are several things that also need looking at:
  1. Major powers with capabilities in space have been sending up armed platforms, nuclear weapons, advanced “after next generation” energy weapons and “unusual” satellites.  We either admit that we are out hunting flying saucers or admit that we plan to fight a world war by shooting down each others satellites and dumping bombs on each other.  
  1. There is a flood of information out there recently, the sources are “official but deniable.”  None deny contact with “little green men” but rather steer the dialog as to whether they are all friendly and well mannered or that some might be more than warlike but right out of the film “Independence Day.”  My question is not whether or not any of this is true but why so many who are obviously on government payrolls are saying these things.
Eleven years after 9/11, the majority of educated and competent military and diplomatic professionals who we are in contact with, more than a minor representation, have all been quizzed about their take on “9/11.”

I have asked that this be done with no pressure and with assurance that no names would be used.

Currently, none ascribe to the “hijacker” theories.  About 80% indicate nuclear weapons with the rest actually mentioning Dr. Judy Wood and her theories of a “free energy weapon.”

Of the military, about 15% mention Israel.  None of the diplomats do.
All the rest say “the ‘neocons’ did it.”

However, over 50% of high ranking members of the military say they are wary that Israel is planning an attack either on US forces in the Persian Gulf or major terror attacks in the US scheduled for mid-October.

None openly express hostility toward Israel but most rate Netanyahu somewhere between “liability” to “friggin’ nuts.”

A major issue with all nations is that whoever controls the media and the internet “kill switch” or directs traffic, like “Google” tends to misuse this capability on behalf of that invisible criminal enterprise that is believed by most bipedal hominids to exercise “super-national” powers to an extent that an alien invasion by brain sucking zombies might be a welcomed change.

(I was talking with Jim Fetzer on Skype while Sean Hannity was in the background.  I am beginning to think Hannity is CGI like the old Max Headroom show from MTV)
Toward that end I will credit Michael Shrimpton, who I politically NEVER agree with for his extremely good work in exposing ties between the current German regime, Russian organized crime and terror groups around the world.

It is time we had Merkel’s DNA checked.  Those “in the know” will understand why.
Without sounding like Cato the Elder and his career-long closing remark in the Roman Senate:  “Carthage must be destroyed,” I will add the following:

Simply overturning Citizens United, the greatest attack on American democracy in history isn’t enough.  With drug cartels partnering with certain Mormon elements to detach the Southwestern US and form a Narco-Republic, one already in place in Arizona and $20 billion of the Afghan heroin trade coming to the US, buying officials at every level, bribing police, financing assassinations like the killings of Sheriff Deaver in Cochise County, AZ and the murder of J.T. Ready and his family, two of many, it is time we paid more attention to the Taliban.

They  have been actively looking for an authority in the US that will negotiate with them to end heroin production in Afghanistan.  Nobody will talk with them.

There seems to be more fear of the war ending and the drug shipments being at risk than anything else.

Frankly, more than a few members of America’s congress are terrified their “cut” from the Afghan heroin trade would end if the killing stopped.  To that extent, Afghanistan is perfect, a country willing to remain at war forever, never tiring of blowing up American planes, blowing the legs and arms off our sons and daughters and oblivious to their own casualties.

Gene Khrushchev tells me of his years there.

I listen, few others bother.

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