So Little Time, So Many Regimes to Change
Analysis - By Jim Lobe
http://www.ipsnews.net/interna.asp?idnews=26619

WASHINGTON, Dec 9 (IPS) - The interregnum between November's
election and the formal launch in January of U.S. President George W
Bush's second term has a strange feel.

Perhaps it is that Colin Powell, who until now stayed as close to
Washington as he could to try to prevent Vice President Dick Cheney
or Pentagon chief Donald Rumsfeld from pushing phoney intelligence
and aggressive policy advice policies on the president in his
absence, has been traveling virtually all over the world, assuring
appropriately sceptical foreign leaders that Bush will really --
REALLY -- be committed to multilateralism in his second term.

Now that Powell has been informed his services will no longer be
required, the least-travelled secretary of state in the last
generation is finally getting out to see the sights, even if his
credibility as a spokesman for future U.S. foreign policy is less
than it was for the past four years.

Or perhaps it is the sense of anticipation in some quarters, dread
in others, of what will actually happen in the coming term.

The dread, of course, comes from Democrats, whose somewhat
diminished presence in Congress will make them even more marginal in
the second term than they were in the first.

And it is felt by others who consider themselves on the ''left'' of
the very one-sided U.S. political spectrum, and by ''realist''
foreign-policy analysts who are just hoping against hope that the
over-extension of the U.S. military in Iraq and the rapid depletion
of the U.S. Treasury will force Bush to pursue a less ambitious
international agenda, sooner rather than later.

The eager anticipation, on the other hand, comes from the now-
familiar coalition of nationalist, neo-conservatives and Christian
Right hawks who still believe that Afghanistan and Iraq were just
the 'hors d'oeuvres' to a repast of at least five or six courses.

Like five-year-olds on Christmas Eve who just cannot wait to tear
off the ribbon and wrapping paper that separates their greedy
fingers from their Christmas presents under the tree, these
individuals are so manic and so fidgety that they just cannot
restrain themselves from blurting out or even shouting --
repeatedly -- what they think Santa Claus had better bring them, OR
ELSE!

It is as if they had been told by their parents for months -- as
indeed the hawks had been told by Bush's 'consiglieri', Karl Rove --
that if they keep talking about what they really wanted for
Christmas, Santa would not give it to them.

Similarly, Rove had ordered the hawks to shut up lest they scare the
hell out of the electorate and Bush would lose the election. So,
having bottled it up inside all this time, they are now bursting
forth.

Of course, toy fire engines, Lego and Barbie dolls are not going to
appease this crowd, which has rather bigger things in mind, above
all regime change. Unlike the wish lists that Santa's elves at their
workshops in the fast-disappearing Arctic are toiling overtime to
fill, these lists feature the names of countries and institutions.

Beginning one month ago, when 'ueber-hawk' Frank Gaffney, the
president of the Centre for Security Policy (CSP) and long-time
protege of neo-conservative impresario Richard Perle, published what
he called his ''checklist of the work the world will demand of this
president and his subordinates in a second term,'' prominent hawks
have been pushing their own favourite targets for regime change or
simple confrontation -- from Caracas to North Korea -- on what
sometimes seems like an hourly basis.

Add to that the State Department and the Central Intelligence
Agency, changes that are already in the works.

These calls to action have appeared in all the usual places -- the
editorial pages of the 'Wall Street Journal' and the 'New York
Post', the pages and websites of the 'Weekly Standard' and
the 'National Review', on FoxNews, and the 'Washington Times'.
Somewhat ominously perhaps, they are also reprinted in the
Pentagon's twice-daily 'Early Bird' editions -- compilations of must
reading for senior national-security officials.

What is common to almost all of these effusions is the sense that,
while Iraq might not have gone quite as well as anticipated,
the ''victory'' in Fallujah marked a turning point in the U.S.
occupation and January's elections should permit Washington to begin
drawing down its troop presence in Iraq not long afterwards.

And, while the United States should still be committed to Iraq for
the long haul, it is time that it came to act on the threats posed
by other ''evil'' regimes -- be it by military force, covert
action, ''support for the opposition'', or simple intimidation.

At the top of the list, as they have been for so long, of course,
are Iran and North Korea, whose possession of nuclear weapons is
simply ''unacceptable'', as the administration itself has said. But
others -- Syria, Venezuela, China, even Russia, and the latest
target, the United Nations itself -- are still seen as requiring
policies of active containment, if not ''regime change''.

Recent news reports that quote ''intelligence'' and
sometimes ''military'' sources saying that Syria is now the
financial, logistical and planning hub of the insurgency in Iraq
have prompted right-wingers to resurrect their plans for Damascus,
even as President Bashar al-Assad assures Washington and Israel he
is ready for peace talks without conditions, and might even be
willing to go to Jerusalem and negotiate an agreement with the
United States to secure his border with Iraq.

''The president's goals in Iraq, and elsewhere in the region, will
not be achieved until the Syrians are forced to halt all assistance
to our enemies'', write three officials associated with the
Foundation for the Defence of Democracies (FDD), a neo-conservative
group behind the recent re-creation of the Committee on the
President Danger (CPD), in the 'Washington Times' this week.

Iran, of course, gets the most ink, with a constant drumbeat of
columns underlining the duplicity/hypocrisy/naiveté of Britain,
France and Germany for negotiating a nuclear accord with Tehran and
the necessity of an ultimate confrontation, if not because of its
nuclear programme than because of the regime's alleged infiltration
and subversion of Iraq.

While the hawks concede that a full-scale invasion of Iran is not a
viable option, at least for the moment, they insist not only that
well-targeted air strikes (by Washington or Israel) could, at the
least, significantly retard Tehran's acquisition of a nuclear
weapon.

Similarly, they seize on every report of discontent, such as this
week's heckling by university students of President Mohammed
Khatami, as evidence that, as in pre-war Iraq, Washington is wildly
popular with theologically oppressed Iranian masses who will be
eager, at the very least, to accept money and rhetorical support --
already in the works, according to recent reports -- from the Bush
administration to put an end to the regime, perhaps as peacefully,
even, as in Ukraine.

North Korea is another top-ranking target, with, as in Iran, right-
wingers seizing on even more dubious reports of widespread and
growing discontent with the government to bolster their argument for
regime change and at least the preparation for military strikes,
despite the fact that U.S. intelligence does not have the faintest
idea where key nuclear facilities can be found.

Concern about China, whose failure to ''deliver'' North Korea, along
with its recent multi-billion-dollar energy contract with Iran and
persistent tensions with Taiwan are seen as evidence of potential
enmity, is also being spurred by the hawks, who appear to have
resumed their campaign against ''engagement'' with Beijing after a
three-year hiatus.

Particularly notable in that regard, Dan Blumenthal, until recently
Rumsfeld's senior country director for China and Taiwan, moved
recently to Perle's American Enterprise Institute (AEI) where he
resurrected the notion of China as a ''strategic competitor'' to the
United States.

Venezuela's recent aircraft purchases from Russia have spurred a
series of columns, particularly in the Journal and 'National
Review', reminding readers how close President Hugo Chavez is to
Fidel Castro and how determined he is to curb U.S. influence in the
Americas.

But the newest and easiest target, of course, is the United Nations,
beginning with Annan, whose resignation over the ''oil-for-food''
scandal is being sought by a growing number of Republican lawmakers
in Congress and op-ed hawks whose hatred and contempt for the world
body dates back decades.

To find his head in one of those nicely wrapped packages under the
tree would portend a very happy new year and a terrific second term.
(END/2004)

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Human shreds, human legs, arms, hand, bones and fingers are spreaded
everywhere at Khanyounis refugee Camp.

Words are not enough to express about what has been going on here..
Have a look at what is happening right now at Khanyounis refugee
Camp. Have a look at the result of the international silence towards
what has been going on here. The IOF have called the Incursion "
Violet Iron Incursion".

The children of Khanyounis refugee Camp appeals to you and all free
people to stop what is happening at these moments, in the name of
the "democratic countries".



For more information please visit www.rafahtoday.org and let your
friends , media and everyone around about what is going on here.
please have a look at the online photos that represent "some" of
what is going on here.



========================
Death Stalks the People of Khan Younis
by Mohammed Omer
reporting from Khan Younis, southern Gaza Strip,
Occupied Palestine

It is pitch dark in the al Nimsawi neighborhood of
Khan Younis refugee camp in the southern Gaza Strip,
an area of this city of a quarter-million close to the
Israeli settlement of Neve Dakalim.  Suddenly the
black sky is red with flames, automatic fire from the
circling Apache gunships, then eerie white fire from
the tank shells and mortar fire from state-of-the-art
tanks invading the crowded streets. The white and red
flares give momentary glimpses of wave after wave of
men, women, toddlers, children, and elderly people
fleeing the destruction.

The methods are familiar to everyone in Gaza after
four years of intifada—the loudspeaker announcements
from the Israeli army ordering people to leave their
houses, the machinegun fire from circling Apaches,
even the deaths and injuries are, sadly, very familiar
by now.  Only the names of the incursions—the Israeli
army always assigns names to prolonged attacks—and the
reasons given for them, change.  This one is called
Operation Orange Iron, and, according to the official
announcements, this is a "response" to a Qassam rocket
fired by the militants at Neve Dakalim settlement that
injured an Israeli soldier.

This is the deadliest incursion since the death of
Yassir Arafat on 11 November.  So far, there have been
11 civilian fatalities and 71 injuries—and this
attack, now in its third night, started only hours
after Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon told the
international media of the prospects for peace.

Watching the destruction from a somewhat safe distance
sears nightmare images into the memory—an older man,
not really able to hurry but running nonetheless,
carrying his sandals in his hand as he tries out-run
the tanks over broken pavement;  a little girl,
perhaps 10 years old, winter jacket thrown over her
nightclothes, clutching her schoolbag.  She probably
knows that very shortly, her home will be a pile of
rubble, and her schoolbooks are what she decided to
save.  Close to her is a harried woman holding a baby,
calling to her four children to hurry along.   It's
hard to know which is more haunting—the elderly people
telling their grown sons and daughters to see to the
grandkids and let them manage alone, or the toddler
clinging to his mother with one hand, his toy truck in
the other.

Watching a house demolition is harrowing too. The
background rumble of the massive American-made
bulldozer is almost drowned out by the groans of the
concrete and rebar houses.  There is so much noise as
the walls, floors and roofs slowly buckle and finally
fall that it seems the houses themselves are
protesting their destruction.

In the cold, rainy winter night, this small ocean of
humanity surging toward the center of Khan Younis can
find few safe harbors.  Some of the families took
temporary refuge in a classroom of the UNRWA school.
"This must be what it was like in when the Israelis
forced us out of our homes in El Nakba," said one
father about 30 years old.

"El Nakba"—"the catastrophe"—was the 1948 attack on
Palestinian towns and villages that turned millions of
Palestinians into refugees.  The man who said this is
obviously not old enough to have lived through El
Nakba himself, but no doubt heard about it from his
parents.  Indeed, any school child in Gaza or the West
Bank can explain El Nakba in detail.  And now, even
children like Ahlam, a girl of 11,  are asking
surprisingly adult questions:  "Why," you hear from
Ahlam and many other kids, "why are the soldiers in
our land?  Why are they doing this to us?  Why do they
kill us?  What did we do?"

In last night's attack, the third night of Operation
Orange Iron, some 300 civilians had to flee their
homes.  Tens of houses were destroyed, leaving
hundreds homeless, but the exact numbers will be hard
to get for a few days.  Only a local resident can walk
around and know exactly which pile of rubble was a
one-storey or multi-storey dwelling.  Early reports
say 30, even 40 or more houses flattened, but no one
can be sure till the Israeli Army stops the shelling
and aerial bombardment.   The official Israeli
Occupation Forces announcement says Operation Orange
Iron will continue for several days more, "as long as
necessary" to stop the militants' launching Qassam
rockets from the Al Nimsawi neighborhood.

Many of the adults in Khan Younis, however, suspect
the ferocity of the attack on their city has been
sparked by last Sunday's militant coup against an
Israeli watchtower at the Rafah Terminal crossing.
After digging an 800 meter tunnel over several months,
the militants emplaced some 3000 lbs of explosives
under an Israeli military post that is part of the
Egypt/Gaza border crossing.  The Israeli media
confirmed that the explosion killed 6 Israeli soldiers
and wounded 8 more.  Two Palestinian gunman were then
killed in the firefight that was phase two of the
militant attack.

In a press release soon afterward, the Fatah Hawks,
the militant wing of the Fateh Party, and Hamas,
claimed joint responsibility for the successful
operation.  Ahlam's father told me, "The Israeli army
always seeks a big revenge when the militants kill
their soldiers.  We heard they are killing people in
Rafah too, but they can send their tanks and Apaches
against us easily enough."

The militant groups in Khan Younis have been
retaliating, though vastly outnumbered and outgunned.
So far, one Israeli soldier has been wounded by
anti-tank fire.

Hospitals and Ambulances Targeted

Khan Younis's Nasser Hospital is crowded with
casualties, along with families finding a bit of
floorspace in the hallways and lobby.  In the
orthopedic surgery department, ambulance driver Hassan
Abu Samrah, 45, lies face-down on a gurney while a
doctor treats a gunshot wound in his leg.  Abu Samrah
was trying to rescue two civilians injured by Israeli
tank fire near the hospital, and ended up needing
rescue himself.  "Before I got within sight of the
tanks," he explained, "I turned on the flashing red
lights on the ambulance roof and had the siren going
as loud as possible."  The ambulance is also marked
"AMBULANCE" in huge letters on every flat surface.
"They had to see and hear me," he said, "but they
fired on the ambulance.  Still, I thought I might get
the injured people loaded inside and get away, but
suddenly my face was on the ground and I saw my leg
was bleeding—they'd shot me."  Another ambulance crew
finally got all three back to Nasser Hospital.

The hospital itself—contrary to all
internationally-accepted rules of engagement—has also
become a target.  The Israeli army bulldozers
destroyed the western part of the hospital in the
first few hours of the incursion and has periodically
been shooting at the hospital.  The hospital director,
Dr. Mohia Al Deen Al Faraa, explained, "The shelling
directed at us is ongoing.  Some of our patients are
in danger of being hurt all over again in their
hospital beds.  So far, we have had 11 fatalities
arrive, plus another 71 injured.  Most of the injured
are civilians with wounds in the head and chest."  The
Israeli army snipers have a well-deserved reputation
for accuracy, so all these upper-body injuries suggest
they have orders to shoot to kill.

Journalists Targeted

Journalists and photographers covering these
incursions take all possible pains to identify
themselves very obviously.  A group of five
photographers and journalists were nonetheless
targeted by an Israeli tank.  Despite their helmets
and vests marked "TV" and "PRESS" with big
phosphorescent letters, the tank fired a shell
directly at them, injuring Mahmoud Al Hums of the AFB,
Mohammed Saber of ABI, and Hatem Mussa of the
Associated Press.  Said one of their group who escaped
unharmed, "There's no possible way this was an
accident, no way the tank gunner didn't know we were
press.  Our vests and helmets are all marked in
glow-in-the-dark letters.  But they fired straight at
us, we scattered, but my three colleagues were caught
by the shrapnel."  Two have serious facial and head
injuries and are in guarded condition, the third is
stable, said medical sources.

City-wide Shortages

Although the Al Nimsawi neighborhood has come in for
the worst of Operation Orange Iron, all of Khan
Younis's quarter-million citizens are suffering from
electricity and water shortages.  Almost all the city
has been with without electricity and running water
since the first hours of the three-day-old attack.  As
families run out of bottled water, they cannot be
resupplied by the Red Crescent/Red Cross and other
relief groups due to the Israeli army cordon sealing
off the city.  And there seems to be no end in sight:
"The Forces are prepared to stay in the refugee camp
for as long as it takes to secure quiet in the Israeli
communities," Lieutenant Colonel Ofer Vinter said on
the Israeli Army radio station.

There is an unsettling sense of deja vu throughout
Gaza at these latest incursions.  Just as happened
during "Operation Rainbow" in Rafah, the attack that
killed 40 last May and prompted an international
outcry, besieged Khan Younis is even running out of
space for the dead.  In May, the morgue refrigerators
in Rafah's Al Najjar Hospital were full, the bereaved
families were under fire and could not leave their
homes to bury their dead, and the bodies had to be
stored in commercial vegetable refrigerators.  Now, a
few months later, the same gruesome scenario is
unfolding again, as the mortuary refrigerators in
Nasser Hospital are full to capacity, and the Israeli
attack is targeting the cemetery.  So the bereaved
families cannot bury their loved ones.  In Gaza, even
the dead can be homeless.

Israeli Prime Minister Sharon was talking about peace
in the future mere hours before Operation Orange Iron
started its carnage in Khan Younis.  British Prime
Minister Tony Blair is scheduled to arrive in the West
Bank city of Ramallah this Wednesday to discuss
re-starting the peace process with PLO Chairman
Mahmoud Abbas and Prime Minister Ahmed Qurie—while,
very possibly, the Apaches are still shelling Khan
Younis.  Predictably, the Palestinian Authority has
condemned this latest attack on a civilian population.
"This escalation of aggression will destroy any
chance to proceed with the peace process," said PA
spokesman Nabil Abu Rudinah.

Diplomats in comfortable conference rooms issuing
measured statements while Palestinian civilians die in
the streets is an all-too-familiar situation for the
people of Gaza.  As one elderly man put it, "Sometimes
our fighters kill a soldier or an Israeli
settler—then they kill 10, 20, even a hundred of us.
Is this justice?  Can they imagine for a moment this
makes us less angry?"  Another mother, huddling in the
hospital hallway with her children, said, "We hardly
dream of peace any more—just for a night when we can
sleep till morning without hearing shelling  and
Apaches over our heads, without being afraid we'll be
runing from the tanks."
-------------------------------------------------------------

RAFAH TODAY

21 December 04



" When the sunshine disappears": Questions start chasing the mind of
homeless families, and the most important question that they think
about at the moment is:" Where shall we stay this night after
demolishing our house?"




" Evacuate from your houses" announced by microphone louderspeaker
one of the Israeli soldiers to the people whom are living at Block O
area near the borderline, few minutes later on after that warning a
very loud rocket shake the whole Rafah City leaving two houses
demolished and other 12 shops were destroyed.


The rockets made some kind of miss in the Rafah City, as it's for
the first time that a rocket causes a large number of demolitions.


On the other hand, a 14 years old boy was seriously injured this
afternoon by snipers in Tal Al Sultan area, the body of that boy was
transferred from Abu Youif Al Najjar hospital into the European
hospital for urgent medical operations in the head and the chest.


In Khanyounis, three members of family were injured , Ahmed Abu
Mustafa 17 years old was injured in his head, his brother Fuad in
different parts of his body and their 60 years old mother Ghfrah who
gets also injured in her left arm, medical sources at Nasser
hospital said.


According to eyewitnesses, the three members of that family were
injured by tank shells that were fired this afternoon, when the
soldiers at Never Dekalem Jews settlement shelled at least 6 tank
shells at the houses of the citizens.


Moreover, hundreds of homeless people at Khanyounis are taking the
UNRWA schools classrooms as shelters after their houses have been
destroyed by the Israeli bulldozers and tanks!



-----------------------------------------------------------

18 December 04



10 year old Abeer Abu Shlouf looking at the body of her father,
killed by Israeli snipers during the heavy shelling in Rafah.


A Palestinian policeman inspect what is remain after the apaches
helicopters shelling, targeted a carpentry shop. It has been
reported many times about unexploded rockets that explode later on
after it fired from the apaches

Abeer Abu Shalouf, a little girl ten years old, didn't seem to
understand what was happening during her father's funeral procession
in Rafah. As the mourners carried the body of her father, Saber Abu
Shalouf, 36, to the cemetery, she ran up to the dead body of her
father and tried to shake him awake—as if he were only sleeping.

Abu Shalouf was killed by a bullet to the head while sitting inside
his house in Rafah. Besides little Abeer, he left several other
children.

Abu Shalouf's wife was overwhelmed by grief as she tried to explain
what had happened. "I was inside, and saw my husband lying face-down
on the ground," she said. "I called out and asked, 'Why are you
lying like that?' and there was no answer. After I asked him several
times, I went to him. I tried to move his head and felt liquid
flowing as fast as a water tap turned on full-force. Then I saw it
was blood."

Abu Shalouf was not the only civilian killed in Rafah in the past
few days. The other fatalities are Jehad Abu-amir,14, Shady Al-
haddad, 24, Islam Al-Nabrisy, 21, Khalid Abu 0baida, 22, Ramy Abu
Sidah, 27 Said Abu Alsa'id, 25, and Ahmad Al-Shareef, 20

The doctors at Al Najjar Hospital also report tens of civilians
injured. The most recent was a little girl of 3, Hala Ghrez, who was
injured while standing in front of her house.

Gunfire from the Apache helicopters has been near-constant over
Rafah in the last few days, especially in the many neighborhoods
that abut the Gaza/Egypt border. Through most of the camps, the
electricity has been off almost constantly. Once darkness comes, and
it comes early this deep into winter, the only light in the cloudy
sky is from the automatic fire from the helicopters. It is dangerous
to move around outdoors, and many mobile phones cease to work when
the Apaches are close. Those whose cell phones do work cannot
recharge their batteries. So the sense of isolation of civilian
families huddled indoors is intense. Of course, power is often cut
in Rafah and most families keep candles, but they light them only
when the heavy shutters are closed. It is extremely dangerous to
show a light when the Apaches are circling overhead—any flicker of
light, or a photojournalist's flash, will frequently be targeted by
the machine guns.

This constant shelling of civilian neighborhoods is the
Israeli "response"—they always use the word
"response" as if machine-gun and tank fire were part of a
conversation!--to a Hamas operation where six Israeli soldiers were
killed and another 8 injured when 3000 pounds of explosives in a
tunnel dug under an Israeli outpost at Rafah Terminal were
detonated, followed by gun battle between Palestinian militants and
the Israeli soldiers.

The Fatah Hawk group, the militant wing of the Fatah party, and
Hamas, took joint responsibility for this attack on an Israeli
military target. The occupation army's Apaches were firing missiles
at civilian neighborhoods all along the border areas of Rafah within
an hour or so. Hundreds fled rather than risk being killed inside
their houses. Others felt there was no place to go and chose to stay
in their homes. Day by day, a few at a time, houses are being razed
throughout Rafah. The newly-homeless often have no place to go but
the street. Some take shelter with friends or relatives, but many
families who still have someplace to live have already taken in
homeless relatives and neighbors.

Few days ago, a Palestinian policeman, Samir Khafaja, 25, was killed
in Rafah while on duty near the Gaza/Egypt border. Umm-Samir, his
mother, cried, "I'm sad, I'm sad, oh, people, my heart is very sad.
They took my son Samir from me. May God destroy them!"

This evening, five Palestinians were trapped while trying to dig a
trading tunnel under the razed no-man's land between the houses and
the actual Gaza/Egypt border. The tunnel collapsed and buried them.
Excavations of any sort are very dangerous due to the frequent heavy
rains—the soaked ground is extremely unstable.

The five men are still underground. Some eyewitnesses said they are
dead, while others insist they are still alive. Rafah Municipality
rescue trucks and bulldozers are trying to dig them out, though at
this writing, no one can confirm if they are seeking living men, or
dead bodies.

All of Rafah is within the southernmost closed zone. As often
happens after militants kill or injure Israeli soldiers, Gaza has
been split into three closed areas, the north around Gaza city,
central Gaza, and the Rafah-KhanYounis southern zone. Movement
between zones is impossible. Within the zones, there are many other
checkpoints, demolished roads, and roadblocks.

Rafah Terminal crossing, the only exit and entry point for Gaza's
Palestinian population to travel to and from the world outside
without passing through Israel, is completely closed until further
notice. Now thousands of university students and other travelers are
trapped until the Rafah crossing re-opens. There are no humanitarian
exceptions. Patients needing medical treatment unavailable in Gaza
often travel to Egypt and other foreign destinations. Now that is
impossible.

Normal life is suffocated whenever Rafah Terminal is sealed, as
badly as if a person were being strangled. All kinds of critical
goods, including petrol and medicine, cannot be imported to Gaza,
and already we are starting to feel the shortages. It will only get
worse as the border closure continues.



------------------------------------------------------------------

14 December 04

Breaking News: Heavy shelling targeted Hay Al Salam area, and many
people were killed and injured, ambulances can't reach some injured
people due to the massive shelling. Ten minutes ago, Samir Khafaja
25 arrived to the hospital after being shot in his head by the
Israeli snipers in Rafah. The number of demolished houses gets
increased into 15 during the ongoing Israeli incursion targeted the
Western Camp at Khanyounis City.


Isareli Occupation bulldozers are invading the houses and
agriculture farms at Al Shejaea'a area in the East of Gaza City,
medic reports mentioned about 10 people were injured, most of them
were children.

Dr. Ali Musa, director of Abu Yusuf Al Najjar Hospital in Rafah,
reported five Palestinians killed in and
near the city during the night of 9 December, while others were
injured in several different neighborhoods.

The fatalities were Waled Al Trabin, 24, Rashad Abu Snimah, 23, Iyad
Fayad, 20, Salah Sheikh El Eid, and one other man who has not yet
been identified. In addition, three other injured people were
arrested by the IOF.

The five youngmen were killed by tank shells and rockets fired from
several different Israeli army posts near
the Rafah/Egypt border. The attacks continue a pattern of daily
random shooting into civilian neighborhoods near the border.

In a separate incident, the commander of the Palestinian Resistance
Committee, Jamal Abu Samhadanah, survived a third assassination
attempt when his car was targeted by an unmanned drone and hit by a
rocket while he and two bodyguards were driving from Khan Younis to
Rafah. They were near the European Hospital when their car exploded.
Abu Samhadanah and the other passengers jumped out of the car
seconds before the rocket hit, and the commander sustained only a
slight injury to his face. The bodyguards also received non-life-
threatening injuries.

The Israeli rocket attack on the militant commander took place in a
populated area and four by-standers walking down the street near the
targeted car were also injured.

The Palestinian Resistance Committee is an umbrella organization
comprising a number of militant factions. Mahmoud Abbas and other
Palestinian government officials have asked the Sharon government to
cease these extra-judicial assassinations to further the resumption
of peace talks.



-----------------------------------------------------------------

5 December 04



Thousands, of Rafah's citizens routinely join the funeral
processions that take place nearly every day here. They have become
such a common sight that small children sometimes "play funeral"--
staging their own processions. Children elsewhere imitate
storybook or cartoon characters--our children play at being
mourners.


Elderly father is supported by other family members as he mourns his
murdered son.



It isn't just possessions that are damaged beyond recognition when
the Israeli bulldozers tear through a neighborhood. This woman in
Hay Al Salam and her whole family will have nowhere to go now but a
tent. If they are unusually lucky, perhaps some friend or relative
can find a spot for some or all of them, but after four years of
steady home demolitions, most families with a bit of room have
already crammed in homeless relatives. Now it is becoming difficult
to find relatively safe places to put tents.

From one day to the next, the Israeli aggression continues against
Rafah. The politicians meet in Europe ostensibly to talk peace—or at
least to talk about talking peace!--while more and more civilians
get killed and injured here.

Last Sunday night, on 29 November, Dr. Samier Hejazi, an orthopedist
who works at Nasser Hospital in nearby Khan Younis, was killed by
random tank fire as he walked outside his house. In the same
incident, Motaz Al Rekhawi, 20, was also killed.

The same day, Mahmoud Keshta, 16, died when a suspicious object in
the area near the Rafah/Egypt border exploded. Many residential
areas of the refugee camps are next to the no-man's land the IOF
keeps widening with home demolitions. For many ordinary people here,
it is impossible to stay out of harm's way—even hiding indoors won't
protect the residents of many neighborhoods.

The constant targeting of civilians by heavy arms and tank fire into
civilian neighborhoods, came shortly after the 25 November incursion
into the Hay Al Salam neighborhood which left one person dead, many
injured, seven arrested and seven houses destroyed.

Yesterday, many Rafah residents participated in a funeral for an
unidentified man who had been in the morgue at Al Najjar Hospital
here for 20 days. Dr. Ali Musa, director of the hospital, said an
ambulance crew found the body of an adult man who had been killed by
IOF shelling near the Egyptian border. Among other injuries, he had
lost his arm which was never recovered.. No ID or weapons were found
with the body; the only clue to his identity were some Egyptian
bonds and an Egyptian train ticket in his pocket.

For nearly three weeks, details of his description were widely
announced in both Egyptian and Palestinian media. However, no one on
either side of the border identified him or claimed the body, and a
proper funeral was organized for him. He now rests in Rafah cemetery
in the company of many others killed by the IOF. Now the IOF
soldiers fire so freely there seems to be not only no distinction
between young and old, adult and child, civilian or militant, but no
distinction between Palestinian and Egyptian. Three weeks ago, IOF
shelling killed three Egyptian soldiers in the Egyptian city of
Rafah. They were deployed on patrol on their side of the border as
part of their alliance with Israel. The Sharon government issued a
formal apology, but it was so lukewarm that the families of the
slain soldiers officially refused to accept it.

Now, a night never passes without shelling. On 3 December, 8-year-
old Khalil Berika was seriously injured by a bullet in his ear while
inside his home. Fathia Al Akhras, a woman of 53, was also injured
by random fire in the Hay Al Salam neighborhood. on the evening of
December 4, Al Najjar hospital announced that the ambulances just
brought two more injured civilians to them.

It has become harder to file updated reports since the electricity
transformers were destroyed last week during the shelling. Most
electronic communication comes to a halt, as does much of normal
life, without electricity. Cell phones work only until the battery
fails, and then, of course, recharging is impossible. Night comes
early now, and families sit together in the dark listening to the
Apaches circle and the shells fall with no way to check on the
safety of friends and relatives. The shelling has been so constant
that municipal repair crews could not get to the destroyed
transformers to fix them until now. Of course, there's no way to
tell how long it will be before the IOF will target the equipment
again.

*********************************************************************

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The oil-for-food 'scandal' is a cynical smokescreen

By Scott Ritter

http://207.44.245.159/article7466.htm

12/12/04 "The Independent" -- United States Senators, led by the
Republican Norm Coleman, have launched a crusade of sorts, seeking
to "expose" the oil-for-food programme implemented by the United
Nations from 1996 until 2003 as the "greatest scandal in the history
of the UN". But this posturing is nothing more than a hypocritical
charade, designed to shift attention away from the debacle of George
Bush's self-made quagmire in Iraq, and legitimise the invasion of
Iraq by using Iraqi corruption, and not the now-missing weapons of
mass destruction, as the excuse.

The oil-for-food programme was derived from the US-sponsored
Security Council resolution, passed in April 1995 but not
implemented until December 1996. During this time, the CIA sponsored
two coup attempts against Saddam, the second, most famously, a joint
effort with the British that imploded in June 1996, at the height of
the "oil for food" implementation negotiations. The oil-for-food
programme was never a sincere humanitarian relief effort, but rather
a politically motivated device designed to implement the true policy
of the United States - regime change.

Through various control mechanisms, the United States and Great
Britain were able to turn on and off the flow of oil as they saw
best. In this way, the Americans were able to authorise a $1bn
exemption concerning the export of Iraqi oil for Jordan, as well as
legitimise the billion-dollar illegal oil smuggling trade over the
Turkish border, which benefited Nato ally Turkey as well as fellow
regime-change plotters in Kurdistan. At the same time as US
Secretary of State Madeleine Albright was negotiating with Russian
Foreign Minister Yevgeny Primakov concerning a Russian-brokered deal
to end a stand-off between Iraq and the UN weapons inspectors in
October-November 1997, the United States turned a blind eye to the
establishment of a Russian oil company set up on Cyprus.

This oil company, run by Primakov's sister, bought oil from Iraq
under "oil for food" at a heavy discount, and then sold it at full
market value to primarily US companies, splitting the difference
evenly with Primakov and the Iraqis. This US-sponsored deal resulted
in profits of hundreds of million of dollars for both the Russians
and Iraqis, outside the control of "oil for food". It has been
estimated that 80 per cent of the oil illegally smuggled out of Iraq
under "oil for food" ended up in the United States.

Likewise, using its veto-wielding powers on the 661 Committee, set
up in 1990 to oversee economic sanctions against Iraq, the United
States was able to block billions of dollars of humanitarian goods
legitimately bought by Iraq under the provisions of the oil-for-food
agreement. And when Saddam proved too adept at making money from
kickbacks, the US and Britain devised a new scheme of oil sales
which forced potential buyers to commit to oil contracts where the
price would be set after the oil was sold, an insane process which
quickly brought oil sales to a halt, starving the oil-for-food
programme of money to the point that billions of dollars of
humanitarian contracts could not be paid for by the United Nations.

The corruption evident in the oil-for-food programme was real, but
did not originate from within the United Nations, as Norm Coleman
and others are charging. Its origins are in a morally corrupt policy
of economic strangulation of Iraq implemented by the United States
as part of an overall strategy of regime change. Since 1991, the
United States had made it clear - through successive statements by
James Baker, George W Bush and Madeleine Albright - that economic
sanctions, linked to Iraq's disarmament obligation, would never be
lifted even if Iraq fully complied and disarmed, until Saddam
Hussein was removed from power. This policy remained unchanged for
over a decade, during which time hundreds of thousands of Iraqis
died as a result of these sanctions.

While money derived from the off-the-book sale of oil did indeed go
into the purchase of conventional weapons and the construction of
presidential palaces, the vast majority of these funds were poured
into economic recovery programmes that saw Iraq emerge from near
total economic ruin in 1996. By 2002, on the eve of the US-led
invasion, Baghdad was full of booming businesses, restaurants were
full, and families walked freely along well-lit parks. Compare and
contrast that image with the reality of Baghdad today, and the
ultimate corruption that was the oil-for-food programme becomes self-
evident.

Scott Ritter is a former UN weapons inspector in Iraq (1991-1998)
and the author of 'Frontier Justice: Weapons of Mass Destruction and
the Bushwhacking of America', published by Context Books

© 2004 Independent Digital (UK) Ltd

*********************************************************************

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HELPING DISASTER VICTIMS: How Can I Help?
http://www.islamonline.net/english/In_Depth/DisasterVictims/Articles/
06.shtml

==================================
They never miss a trick, do they?

"The Pentagon said Tuesday that it is establishing a
command center at Utapao, Thailand, to support the
tsunami emergency relief effort and to serve as a
staging base for U.S. military and rescue aircraft."



Tsunami Relief as a Subterfuge?
The Pentagon Scrambles to Reenter its Old Thai Air Base
by Sirinapha
IMC-DC
29 Dec 2004
http://dc.indymedia.org/feature/display/111903/index.php

Is the tsunami aftermath a "window of opportunity" for
bolstering the Pentagon's presence in Southeast Asia?
The Thai people reject the proposed build-up of the
American military at Utapao air base and in the Gulf
of Thailand. The tragedy of the natural catastrophe in
the Indian Ocean should not serve as a pretext for
strengthening the U.S. military presence on land, sea
and in the air in the region.


---
photo:
http://images.indymedia.org/imc/washingtondc/media/image/2/111903_111
896_a_sac_utapao.jpeg
---


#file_1#

The Pentagon has announced it is returning to its old
Vietnam War haunts at Utapao Royal Thai Naval Air
Force Base 90 miles south of Bangkok on the Gulf of
Thailand. In this clear escalation of the American
military presence in Southeast Asia, the ostensible
plan is to set up a "command center" for the tsunami
emergency relief effort. Utapao air base will serve as
a staging base for U.S. military and rescue aircraft.
The emergency relief operations appear to provide a
windfall opportunity for beefing up the American
military presence in Southeast Asia, part of the
expanding Pentagon strategy of "forward positioning,"
establishing sites, so-called "air cargo hubs," where
American forces can stash equipment and enter and
leave as desired.

During the Vietnam War, Utapao functioned from April
1967 as a major staging base for B-52s carrying out
bombing raids over North Vietnam, and KC-35
stratotankers of the Strategic Air Command. Many
American GIs served there [1].

#file_2#

Despite Thailand's neutrality on the war in Iraq, Thai
Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra allowed Utapao to be
used by American warplanes flying into combat in Iraq
last year, and into Afghanistan earlier. There is also
speculation that Utapao, with its infamous facilities
for 'sophisticated interrogation' (a military heirloom
from the Vietnam era), is probably where various
al-Qaeda suspects have been secretly grilled.

The command center will be largely operated by the 3rd
Marine Expeditionary Force. The naval air base, also
now functioning as a local airport, is located a short
drive from the tourist mega-center of Pattaya, whose
roots also go back to the Vietnam era. The U. S. Navy
is also dispatching the USS Abraham Lincoln carrier
strike group and the USS Bonhomme Richard
expeditionary strike group to the immediate area
offshore [2].

Is all this military redeployment to bolster
'humanitarian aid' efforts? The Thai people reject a
build-up of the American military at Utapao air base
and in the Gulf of Thailand. In this hour of calamity,
they are grateful for all support -- but not when
tethered to a huge reentry by the Pentagon onto Thai
soil. The tragedy of the present havoc in the Indian
Ocean should not serve as a pretext for strengthening
the U.S. military presence in this disaster-striken
region.
___________________________________

[1] For sites on Utapao air base and the American
military, see
http://amer-thai2001.tripod.com/id30.html ;
http://www.utapao.org/ (Utapao Alumni Association) ;
http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/facility/utapao.htm

[2] See "Hundreds of Americans Missing,"
http://www.cnn.com/2004/US/12/28/us-quake.ap/index.html


-

http://dc.indymedia.org/feature/display/111903/index.php

======================
Thailand's Muslim Riot Video



Thai MP faces seven years in jail for airing Muslim riot video:
police
AFP
Sunday December 19, 2004
http://sg.news.yahoo.com/041219/1/3pctc.html


---
photo:
Thai MP faces seven years in jail for airing Muslim
riot video: police
AFP Photo
http://sg.news.yahoo.com/041219/1/3pctci.html
---


A Thai opposition parliamentarian could face up to
seven years in prison for airing a video showing
security forces suppressing a riot which led to the
deaths of 87 Muslim protesters.

Democrat MP Thanin Jaisamut has been called in for
questioning and will be arrested if he denies showing
the video of the Tak Bai tragedy while campaigning in
the restive south this month, said police in the
southern district of Langu.

"The video is a violation of national security," Langu
police chief Chote Chaichompoo told AFP, adding Thanin
could spend up to seven years in jail if charged and
convicted of the crime of "violating national
security".

Thai authorities have urged opposition politicians to
stop publicising videos showing security forces
suppressing a riot at Tak Bai near the border with
Malaysia, saying the images damaged national unity.

The October 25 Tak Bai riot led to the deaths of at
least 87 Muslim protesters, most of whom died from
suffocation after being detained, bound and piled into
the backs of army trucks. The tragedy sparked an
international outcry.

Video from the riot in the Muslim-dominated southern
province of Narathiwat emerged on the open market
recently. Officials have reportedly accused
politicians of doctoring the footage to tarnish the
government's reputation before national elections next
February 6.

Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra has slammed the
video saying its distribution could lead to further
division within the kingdom, which is mainly Buddhist.

A government appointed independent commission on
Friday implicated three senior officials in the
deaths, but said the tragedy was due to officials
mishandling the situation and not to deliberate acts
to kill or harm protesters.

Muslims represent about five percent of the
overwhelmingly Buddhist population but have long
complained of discrimination.

The riot came as a separatist insurgency was rekindled
in January and has since claimed more than 560 lives.

http://sg.news.yahoo.com/041219/1/3pctc.html


---


(2)

Rights probe blames senior Thai officials for Muslim
deaths
AFP
Saturday December 18, 2004
http://sg.news.yahoo.com/041218/1/3pcdy.html


---
photo:
Rights probe blames senior Thai officials for Muslim
deaths
AFP Photo
http://sg.news.yahoo.com/041218/1/3pcdyi.html
---


Three senior Thai officials have been blamed for the
deaths of more than 80 Muslims in the kingdom's
restive south by a human rights commission
investigating the incident, media reported Saturday.

The government-appointed independent commission
focused on the events of October 25, when security
forces broke up a riot in southern Narathiwat, one of
three provinces bearing the brunt of an Islamist
insurgency that has left more than 560 people dead
this year.

At least 87 Muslim protesters died, including 78 in
custody. Most suffocated after being bound and piled
into the backs of army trucks.

"Among those responsible are Fourth Army Region
commander Lt-General Pisarn Wattanawongkeeree,
assistant national police chief Lt-General Wongkot
Maneerin and Interior Ministry deputy permanent
secretary Siva Saengmanee," commission chairman Pichet
Soonthornpipit was quoted as saying in the Nation
newspaper.

He said the deaths were due to officials mishandling
the situation and not to deliberate acts to kill or
harm protesters and warned some other unnamed senior
figures also shared the burden of responsibility.

The incident sparked widespread international concern
and accusations that the government had used excessive
force to quell the riot.

Human rights groups have charged that the detained
protesters were stacked onto the backs of flat-bed
military trucks, occasionally five deep, and
suffocated on the hours-long journey to a military
base.

The commission has not indicated what action should be
taken towards officials implicated in its report,
which Pichet said was unlikely to be made available to
the public in its full-form.

Apart from the 78 who died during transport, he said
seven protesters were shot during the breakup of the
riot, while seven others were missing.

Video of the riot suppression has emerged in Thailand.
The government has accused opposition MPs of publicly
screening the footage to gain political capital before
elections next February.

Thailand's sporadic separatist insurgency sparked back
into life in January and since then Buddhists,
officials and security forces have been targeted by
militants.

Muslims represent about five percent of the
overwhelmingly Buddhist population but have long
complained of discrimination.

http://sg.news.yahoo.com/041218/1/3pcdy.html

=============================
Islamic Relief Busy In Indonesia

HELPING DISASTER VICTIMS: How Can I Help?
http://www.islamonline.net/english/In_Depth/DisasterVictims/Articles/
06.shtml

---


Editorial: A crisis in Muslim lands
An editorial
Capital-Times (Madison, Wisconsin)
December 30, 2004
http://www.madison.com/tct/opinion/index.php?ntid=22876


---
photo:
A Muslim woman gives money to a volunteer collecting
money for the relief of tsunami victims, at Ongole, in
the southern Indian state of Andhra Pradesh, on
Thursday. (AP Photo/Mustafa Quraishi)
http://www.madison.com/images/articles/tct/2004/12/30/11042_thumb.jpg
---


The tsunamis that swept out from the epicenter of the
historic earthquake near Indonesia did not make
distinctions regarding the race, ethnicity or religion
of their victims. Because the waves hit tourist areas,
residents of dozens of countries outside the region
were killed. But the greatest loss of lives so far,
and the greatest potential threat of more losses in
coming weeks, has been seen in countries where the
dominant religions are Hinduism, Buddhism and Islam.

While there is a tendency to associate Islam with the
Middle East, the country with the largest Muslim
population in the world is Indonesia. And Indonesia
has suffered horribly. The images that are beginning
to emerge from the city of Banda Aceh, near the
epicenter of the earthquake that caused the tsunamis,
are horrifying. And Indonesian officials now estimate
that, when all the victims are found, as many as
50,000 people will have died in that country alone.

As the details of this disaster become more clear, the
devastation of another predominantly Muslim country is
only now being revealed.

The tsunamis whipped up by the largest earthquake the
world has seen in 40 years reached all the way to the
eastern coast of Africa. Now, according to the United
Nations World Food Program, as many as 50,000 Somalis
need immediate relief aid. Many are without shelter or
food and clean water. U.N. aides who reached one of
the towns on the Somali coast, Hafun, describe a scene
of "total desolation."

"The 4,500 inhabitants seem to have lost all their
possessions," reports the World Food Program office.
"Most of the houses in town have been destroyed.
Personal belongings lay scattered around town. Boats
are beached in the middle of town. Even money is
strewn on the ground."Many public and private aid
groups are rushing assistance to the region and to
other devastated areas.

But today we want to highlight the work of Islamic
Relief USA. One of the most respected aid
organizations in the United States, Islamic Relief USA
has been awarded with a 4-star rating by Charity
Navigator, the largest charity evaluator in the
country. Through its contacts with Islamic Relief
Worldwide, it is well positioned to deliver aid in
devastated regions with large Muslim populations.

Already, an assessment team from Islamic Relief's
Indonesia office has arrived in the region where the
earthquake damage is most severe and is helping to
coordinate relief efforts. The organization's partners
in India have arrived in the hard-hit region of
Chennai and are performing a needs assessment. The
group's representative in Sri Lanka has put out the
call for medical supplies, tents and sanitation
facilities. And Islamic Relief, which already has
charitable projects in place in Somalia, can be
counted on to be in the forefront of efforts to
provide emergency aid and long-term assistance there.

Islamic Relief USA has set up a Southeast Asia
Earthquake Emergency fund. To donate, send a
contribution to the group at PO Box 6098, Burbank, CA
91510. It is also possible to donate by phone with a
call to 888-479-4968 or by going online to
www.irw.org/asiaquake.

http://www.madison.com/tct/opinion/index.php?ntid=22876

=====

Indonesia Needs Help, Death Toll Expected To Exceed
400,000
Bernama
December 30, 2004
http://www.bernama.com/bernama/v3/news_lite.php?id=111574

KUALA LUMPUR, Dec 30 (Bernama) -- The death toll in
Acheh, the region worst hit by last Sunday's tsunami,
may exceed 400,000 as many affected areas could still
not be reached for search and rescue operations,
Indonesia's Ambassador to Malaysia Drs H. Rusdihardjo
said Thursday.

He said the estimate was based on air surveillance by
Indonesian authorities who found no signs of life in
places like Meulaboh, Pulau Simeulue and Tapak Tuan
while several islands off the west coast of Sumatera
had "disappeared".

He said the latest death toll of more than 40,000 in
Acheh and northern Sumatera did not take into account
the figures from the other areas, especially in the
west of the region.

"Aerial surveillance found the town of Meulaboh
completely destroyed with only one buiding standing.
The building, which belonged to the military, happens
to be on a hill," he told reporters after receiving
RM1 million in aid for Indonesia's Tsunami Disaster
Relief Fund here Thursday.

Rusdihardjo said there were about 150,000 residents in
Meulaboh, which was located 150km from the epicentre
of the earthquake while Pulau Simeuleu had a
population of 76,000.

The contributions were from several corporate giants.

Permodalan Nasional Berhad (PNB), represented by
Chairman Tan Sri Ahmad Sarji Abdul Hamid, gave
RM200,000; Guthrie, represented by Chief Executive
Officer Datuk Abdul Wahab Maskan, gave RM200,000;
Golden Hope Plantations Berhad, represented by Group
Director for Corporate, Legal and Public Affairs
Norlin Abdul Samad, gave RM200,000; Maybank,
represented by Head of Public Affairs Wan Norhiyati
Ibrahim, gave RM200,000 and Sime Darby Group's Motor
Division, represented by Director Yip Jon Khiam, also
gave RM200,000.

Ahmad Sarji also handed over a PNB contribution to
Utusan's Tsunami Disaster Relief Fund, which was
received by Utusan Melayu (Malaysia) Executive
Chairman Tan Sri Hashim Makarudin to help Malaysian
tsunami victims.

Ambassador Rusdihardjo said a combination of
earthquake and tsunami had left 80 to 100 per cent of
infrastructure in Acheh province, such as hospitals,
health centres, transport and communication networks
and homes, destroyed.

"Looking at the scale of destruction, it's difficult
to say when the search and rescue operations can be
mounted in all affected areas," he said.

He said rescue efforts were hampered by transportation
difficulties and lack of fuel.

Rusdihardjo said that at this time international help,
especially in the form of medicines, clean water, food
and clothing, were desperately needed by Indonesia to
aid survivors in Acheh.

"Now we are worried about the outbreak of diseases
such as cholera, the work of disposing corpses and the
absence of clean water following the contamination of
water sources," he said.

It would take years before the situation returned to
normal, he said, adding that the Indonesian government
was not able to estimate losses caused by the tragedy
as yet.

He expressed his gratitude to Malaysia's help although
the country itself was hit with 66 lives lost so far
and property to the tune of millions of ringgit
destroyed.

"We are deeply touched," he said.

Rusdihardjo said Indonesia was also seeking Malaysia's
cooperation to mount search and rescue operations from
its shores because of the close proximity of the two
countries.

-- BERNAMA

http://www.bernama.com/bernama/v3/news_lite.php?id=111574

=====

5 000 000 displaced by tsunami
AFP
30/12/2004 09:07  - (SA)
http://www.news24.com/News24/World/Tsunami_Disaster/0,,2-10-
1777_1641426,00.html

Hong Kong - Up to five million people have been
displaced by the devastating tsunamis that pummelled
large tracts of Asia over the weekend, the World
Health Organisation said on Thursday.

"We estimate that up to five million people have been
displaced and are at risk across the region," Harsaran
Pandey, spokesperson for the WHO in South Asia, said.

The global health body said between one and three
million of those affected were in Indonesia, with
another one million in Sri Lanka. The rest were spread
between India, the Maldives and other nations.

The estimate was given five days after an earthquake
of terrifying proportions sent towers of water
crashing into 11 countries across Asia and Africa.

More than 80 000 people are confirmed dead and the
toll is expected to rise sharply with disease
threatening the lives of survivors.

http://www.news24.com/News24/World/Tsunami_Disaster/0,,2-10-
1777_1641426,00.html

====

"The State Department claimed to have notified India,
but the Indian government said it received no such
warning in the two hours that elapsed between the
quake off Sumatra and the tidal wave that hit the
Indian coastline in the southern province of Tamil
Nadu. Nor did the Sri Lankan government receive a
warning. But one Indian Ocean island was promptly
warned—the US military base on the British-controlled
island of Diego Garcia, the site from which US bombing
raids have been staged on both Afghanistan and Iraq.
The US base, about 1,000 miles south of India,
directly in the path of the tsunami, reportedly
suffered no damage."

HOW CAN I HELP?
http://www.islamonline.net/english/In_Depth/DisasterVictims/Articles/
06.shtml


---


Bush's response to South Asia disaster: indifference
compounded by political incompetence
By Patrick Martin
30 December 2004
http://www.wsws.org/articles/2004/dec2004/bush-d30.shtml

President Bush briefly interrupted his vacation on
Wednesday to issue a public statement, after three
days of silence as the greatest natural disaster of
the last half-century unfolded on the television
screens of the world. He made a perfunctory and
semi-coherent statement to the press corps assembled
at his Crawford, Texas ranch, shortly after the
administration had announced a doubling of the US
government's contribution to disaster relief efforts
in South Asia.

The initial US pledge of $15 million was widely
derided in the international media—one commentary
noted that this was less than the cost of a single
F-16 fighter jet. It brought a pointed response by the
emergency relief director for the United Nations, Jan
Egeland, who criticized the "stingy" response of
unnamed Western countries. The Scandinavian diplomat
later denied he was referring to the United States,
after the US Agency for International Development
added another $20 million to the aid package.

Outgoing Secretary of State Colin Powell was trundled
out to rebut the charge that the US was ignoring the
disaster. "The US is not stingy," Powell declared. "We
are the greatest contributor to international relief
efforts in the world." (He was silent on the fact that
the two largest US-financed "relief" efforts, in Iraq
and Afghanistan, are in support of stooge regimes
established through the US conquest of sovereign
countries).

Even the increased $35 million contribution represents
a minimal gesture, given the monumental scale of the
tragedy and the enormous resources of the United
States. The donation amounts to half a day's spending
on the war in Iraq. It is less money than will be
expended on the parties and official festivities
surrounding Bush's January 20 inauguration.

The US government relief effort can be measured by
another yardstick—its response to the hurricanes that
hit Florida this year. The Federal Emergency
Management Agency alone has pumped $3.17 billion into
the state, nearly 100 times more than the proposed US
contribution for the South Asian tsunami. The four
Florida hurricanes combined killed 116 people,
compared to over 100,000 dead in the South Asian
disaster. According to the brutal calculus of American
imperialism, a human life in the United
States—especially in a battleground state in the
months before a presidential election—is worth
infinitely more than a human life in Sri Lanka or
Indonesia.

Media criticism of the White House reached its peak in
a front-page article published by the Washington Post
December 29, only a few hours before Bush made his
appearance in Crawford. The Post commented: "Skeptics
said the initial aid sums—as well as Bush's decision
at first to remain cloistered on his Texas ranch for
the Christmas holiday rather than speak in person
about the tragedy—showed scant appreciation for the
magnitude of suffering and for the rescue and
rebuilding work facing such nations as Sri Lanka,
India, Thailand and Indonesia."

Noting the "international outpouring of support after
the attacks on the World Trade Center and the
Pentagon," the Post reported that "even some
administration officials familiar with relief efforts
said they were surprised that Bush had not appeared
personally to comment on the tsunami tragedy. `It's
kind of freaky,' a senior career official said."

Here the Post gave expression to concerns within the
state apparatus itself, not so much with Bush's
indifference to the loss of life, but with his
inability to conceal this attitude behind the
humanitarian posturing typical of more skilled
spokesmen for imperialism, like British Prime Minister
Blair or former President Bill Clinton.

Bush hardly dispelled this concern with his comments
to the press corps. His remarks were delivered in a
fashion that suggested the president could hardly wait
to get back to more pressing tasks—such as bicycling
and "clearing brush," two of his major activities at
the Crawford ranch.

Bush declared his support for the construction of a
worldwide warning system against natural disasters
like the earthquake and tsunami, modeled on the one
already built by the United States, Japan and other
wealthy countries to cover the Pacific basin. He was
not asked why no such network yet exists, although the
total cost of a worldwide alert system is estimated at
only $150 million—a comparative pittance, less than
the cost of four days of war in Iraq.

There is already evidence that the US government had
ample warning of the earthquake-driven tsunami, but
did not communicate the information to the countries
involved. US press reports indicate that the Pacific
Warning Center in Hawaii, a facility of the National
Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, detected the
earthquake when it occurred and immediately warned of
the likelihood of tidal waves generated by one of
largest temblors ever recorded.

Charles McCreery, director of the center, confirmed
that his team had transmitted warnings to the US Navy,
the US State Department and the government of
Australia. The State Department claimed to have
notified India, but the Indian government said it
received no such warning in the two hours that elapsed
between the quake off Sumatra and the tidal wave that
hit the Indian coastline in the southern province of
Tamil Nadu. Nor did the Sri Lankan government receive
a warning.

But one Indian Ocean island was promptly warned—the US
military base on the British-controlled island of
Diego Garcia, the site from which US bombing raids
have been staged on both Afghanistan and Iraq. The US
base, about 1,000 miles south of India, directly in
the path of the tsunami, reportedly suffered no
damage.

Bush's press statement in Crawford did contain one
indisputable truth. "This has been a terrible
disaster," Bush said. "It is beyond our
comprehension."

The speechwriter who crafted those words revealed more
about Bush than he perhaps intended. This failure to
grasp the dimensions of the south Asian disaster—and
anticipate the public reaction to a display of
indifference—is a measure of the moral and
intellectual cretinism of Bush and his cohorts.

The administration's callous and barely concealed
indifference to the suffering of millions of people
says a great deal about the corrupt oligarchy whose
interests it serves. The Bush administration, and the
occupant of the White House himself, are body and soul
the creatures of a ruling elite that has descended
into criminality and unbridled greed.

The New York Times, for example, found nothing
untoward in publishing on the front page of its
December 28 edition articles and photographs on the
death and devastation in South Asia alongside a
lighthearted report on the multi-million-dollar
Christmas bonuses awarded by Wall Street firms to
their top executives ("That Line at the Ferrari
Dealer? It's Bonus Season on Wall Street").

If great events take the true measure of men, the
enormous tragedy on the shores of the Indian Ocean has
provided another yardstick of the vicious and
small-minded man who occupies the White House. Bush
personifies the ignorant and reactionary character of
American imperialism.

See Also:
Tsunami death toll rises to 60,000 amid warnings of
epidemics [29 December 2004]
http://www.wsws.org/articles/2004/dec2004/tsun-d29.shtml
Devastating tidal wave kills more than 13,000 in
southern Asia [27 December 2004]
http://www.wsws.org/articles/2004/dec2004/tsun-d27.shtml

-

http://www.wsws.org/articles/2004/dec2004/bush-d30.shtml

==========
Prayers Replace New Year's Eve Joys in Malaysia
Islam Online
December 29, 2004
http://www.islamonline.net/English/News/2004-12/29/article04.shtml


---
photos:

"Let us also pray that that those facing hardship will
have the fortitude to overcome their losses," Badawi
said.

http://www.islamonline.net/English/News/2004-12/29/images/pic04.jpg

Badawi, center, during his visit to the
tsunami-stricken village of Permatang Damar Laut in
Penang. (AFP)

http://www.islamonline.net/English/News/2004-12/29/images/pic04a.jpg

Rescue personnel conduct a search for victims of
tsunami tidal waves near the beach in Penang.
http://www.islamonline.net/English/News/2004-12/29/images/pic04b.jpg
---


SUNGAI PETANI, Malaysia, December 29 (IslamOnline.net
& News Agencies) – Expressing his country's readiness
to offer relief aid and work with other Asian
countries to come up with warning systems, Malaysian
prime minister Abdullah Badawi declared Wednesday, 29
December that prayers for the thousands of Asian
victims will, this year, replace celebrations, to
usher in the new year.

The government would cancel all entertainment programs
on New Year's Eve in respect for the victims, Badawi
said during a visit to Kampung Kepala Jalan, Kota
Kuala Muda here during a tour of the tsunami-hit
areas, according to Bernama News Agency.

"We will replace it with a day of prayers. We will
pray that the country will not face such a problem
again. I appeal to all races to pray in their own way
so that Malaysia will be a peaceful and vibrant
country."

Badawi, who cut short a European holiday to return
home following the disaster, hoped that through the
prayers, the country would be protected from future
disasters and tragedies.

"Let us also pray that that those facing hardship
(following the tsunami) will have the fortitude to
overcome their losses," he said.

"We hope that those who have suffered damage and loss
of livelihood will strive even harder to ensure that
their sources of income are restored."

The Prime Minister also called on mosques throughout
the country to conduct sermons related to the
catastrophic event and to reach out to the tsunami
victims to help them overcome their grief and
hardship.

As for Non-Muslims, Abdullah called on them to also
pray for whatever would be for the best of the people
and the country according to their own practices and
beliefs.

Aid Increased

During the visit, the Prime Minister announced that he
agreed with the proposal by Second Finance Minister
Tan Sri Nor Mohamed Yakcop for aid to the tsunami
victims be increased, Bernama said.

He said that for every house damaged, an additional
payment of RM2,000 would be given while RM5,000 would
be given for every house which was destroyed.
Fishermen whose lost their boats will be given RM1,000
for smaller boats and RM3,000 for bigger boats.

Abdullah also thanked the mainstream newspapers which
had organised a fund-raising drive for the tsunami
victims and praised the generosity of Malaysians
during difficult times.

He said that the assistance would be disbursed
according to a fair and just formula to avoid any
problem in the future. He also called on the victims
to provide accurate information including their
addresses, identity card numbers and other
particulars.

Badawi also asked government agencies to hand out
assistance as quickly as possible, adding that aid
would not be the same for all the victims or their
next-of-kin because the assessment would be based on
the sustained loss of life or loss of property.

The Malaysian Premier urged donors to channel their
contributions directly to the committees set up in the
areas hit by the tsunami Sunday. This was to avoid any
unfair distribution of the aid, the prime minister
said.

He said that he was not questioning the motive of the
donors but if the disbursement was not done properly,
the good intention would turn bad and unfairness would
cause dissatisfaction besides marring the good
intention.

"As such, channel the aid directly to the committees
that have been set up because only these committees
know who are eligible for aid," he said at the
presentation of aid to Kuala Muda residents whose
loved ones perished in the tsunami, at Sekolah
Menengah Kebangsaan Kota Kuala Muda.

Badawi, chosen along with his Turkish counterpart by
this week's edition of the Newsweek Magazine as
"shining examples of Muslim leaders" [
http://www.islamonline.net/English/News/2004-12/27/article05.shtml
], also urged the police to step up security in the
affected areas following reports of items missing from
the victims' houses.

On the health aspect, he hoped that the relevant
parties like the Health Department would act fast to
provide the vaccinations and medications needed by the
victims to prevent the spread of diseases.

"Miracle Baby"

Malaysia can lay claim to be the "miracle baby" of
Sunday's disaster that began with a massive earthquake
off Indonesia and triggered a tidal wave that killed
tens of thousands of people in eight Asian countries,
Agence France-Presse (AFP) said.

Although it lies closer to the epicenter of the
earthquake, Malaysia suffered far fewer deaths than
other countries. But families have still been ripped
apart and homes destroyed.

Most of the 65 deaths Malaysia suffered were on the
resort island of Penang.

Abdullah said many people had asked him if the
authorities could have warned the public about the
tsunami.

"We never expected this huge wave. We never
experienced this before," he said.

Malaysia was spared the worst of the waves because it
was sheltered by Sumatra island which bore the brunt,
experts say.

http://www.islamonline.net/English/News/2004-12/29/article04.shtml

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American Muslims Fingerprinted By U.S. at Canadian
Border; CAIR Calls for 'Profiling' Probe, Says
Incident Chills Religious Freedom
CAIR
12/29/2004 12:40:00 PM
http://releases.usnewswire.com/GetRelease.asp?id=41075

---------------------------------------------------------------------

To: National Desk, Legal Reporter

Contact: Ibrahim Hooper, 202-488-8787 or 202-744-7726,
or Ihooper@...; or Rabiah Ahmed, 202-488-8787
or 202-439-1441, or Rahmed@..., both of
Council on American-Islamic Relations

WASHINGTON, Dec. 29 /U.S. Newswire/ -- A prominent
national Islamic civil rights and advocacy group today
called for a formal investigation by the Department of
Homeland Security (DHS) into an incident at the
Canadian border in which American Muslim citizens were
apparently singled out for special security checks
based on their attendance at an Islamic conference and
then held until they agreed to be fingerprinted.

The Washington-based Council on American-Islamic
Relations (CAIR) said the incident was a disturbing
example of religious profiling that would have a
chilling effect on the constitutional rights of
American Muslims, particularly the right to the free
exercise of religion, freedom of speech, peaceful
assembly, and the right to be "secure in their
personsagainst unreasonable searches."

A number of the up to 40 Muslims who were singled out
for questioning and fingerprinting told CAIR that they
were returning from a weekend Islamic conference of
more than 10,000 in Toronto when they were stopped by
U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) officials at
the Lewiston Bridge crossing near Niagara Falls, N.Y.
(CBP is part of the Department of Homeland Security.
For conference details, see:
http://www.revivingtheislamicspirit.com/ )

Several of the Muslim citizens held at the border for
up to six hours on Sunday night and Monday morning
told CAIR they objected strenuously to being
fingerprinted, but were informed by CBP
representatives that "you have no rights" and that
they would be held until they agreed to the
fingerprinting procedure. One person was allegedly
threatened with arrest if she attempted to leave the
detention area without being fingerprinted.

CBP officials on the scene cited "orders from above"
to justify their actions. One CBP official reportedly
agreed with a Muslim traveler that "it would not look
good" if the news media saw the detention area filled
exclusively with Muslims in Islamic attire. CAIR is
investigating similar reports of demands for
fingerprinting of conference attendees at other border
crossings.

When contacted by CAIR, a CBP spokesman in Washington,
D.C., initially said fingerprinting of American
citizens would be a "violation of policy." He later
said fingerprinting would be allowed "if there was a
law enforcement reason for doing so," but would not
state what that reason might be.

Media reports on the incident quote CBP officials as
saying some of the Muslim citizens who were
fingerprinted had names similar to those on watch
lists. But that claim does not explain why everyone in
the group of conference attendees, even Muslim
converts, were fingerprinted.

SEE: "Muslim-Americans Say Border Inspections Were
Unwarranted"
http://www.wkbw.com/morenews/morenews.asp#8

Local DHS officials now say they will hold a community
meeting next week to address the concerns of those who
were forced to be fingerprinted.

"The image of a room full of American Muslim citizens
apparently being held solely because of their faith
and the fact that they attended an Islamic conference
is one that should be disturbing to all Americans who
value religious freedom," said CAIR Executive Director
Nihad Awad. "This incident must be investigated to
determine what the policy on fingerprinting Muslim
citizens is and who is behind it."

Awad also urged anyone treated in a similar manner to
contact CAIR's Civil Rights Department by calling
202-488-8787 or e- mailing Civilrights@....

------

CAIR, America's largest Muslim civil liberties group,
has 30 offices and chapters nationwide and in Canada.
Its mission is to enhance understanding of Islam,
encourage dialogue, protect civil liberties, empower
American Muslims, and build coalitions that promote
justice and mutual understanding.

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*War Crime*

*by Paul Craig Roberts

12/08/04 "Creators Syndicate
<http://www.lewrockwell.com/roberts/roberts83.html"* --

On December 6
Pentagon boss Donald Rumsfeld promised four more years of death and
destruction in Iraq. Assuming the war continues to cost the US
taxpayers $6 billion per month – not including reconstruction costs,
fat no-bid contracts for the Bush administration's major
contributors, and replacement costs of the military equipment that
is being blown apart and worn out – that comes to $288 billion. Add
that sum to the $149 billion the war has already cost US taxpayers
for a total of $437 billion.

Turning to the human toll, from March 20, 2003 to December 7, 2004
(approximately 21 months) the Pentagon says 1,280 US troops have been
killed and 9,765 wounded in Iraq. The Pentagon's wounded figure
conflicts with the report from the US military hospital in Landstuhl,
Germany, that as of Thanksgiving week the hospital has treated almost
21,000 Americans injured in Iraq. According to the hospital, more
than half were too badly injured to return to their units.

Assuming no escalation in the insurgency, a continuation of four more
years of war would result in another 2,925 US troops being killed
for a total of 4,205. Using the Pentagon's wounded figure, 22,320
more US troops would be injured for a total of 32,085. Using the US
military hospital's figure, another 48,000 US troops would be
wounded for a total of 69,000.

Assuming the US is able to keep 138,000 US troops in Iraq during
Bush's second term, US dead and wounded (Pentagon figure) would
comprise 26% of the US force in Iraq. Using the military hospital's
figure, US dead and wounded would comprise 53% of our entire army in
Iraq.

The present military manpower system cannot provide replacements for
these losses. Current troop strengths are being maintained by
calling up reserve and national guard units and by extending
soldiers' tours of duty beyond the contractual period, a practice
that US troops are contesting in court. Tens of thousands of
careers, marriages, and family finances are being disrupted and
destroyed by the commitment of reserve and national guard units to
war in Iraq.

What is Bush achieving in return for such horrendous costs?

Bush has destroyed our alliances and the good will of a half century
of US foreign policy.

Busy has created an insurgency where there was none.

Bush has destroyed US prestige in the Middle East and reduced
America's support among Middle Eastern populations to the single
digits.

Bush has made Osama bin Laden a hero and recruited tens of thousands
of terrorists to his ranks, while simultaneously alienating Middle
Easterners from the secular puppet rulers we have imposed on them.

At a minimum Bush is responsible for between 14,619 and 16,804 Iraqi
civilian deaths during the 21 months since the invasion. Compiled
from hospital, morgue, and media reports, these figures understate
civilian deaths. In keeping with Islam's quick burial requirement,
many Iraqis were buried in sports fields and in back gardens during
protracted US assaults on urban areas. A recent report in the
British medical journal, The Lancet, estimates that 100,000 Iraqis
have been killed since March 20, 2003. This figure does not include
the large number of Iraqi deaths from the embargo and US bombing for
more than a decade prior to the US invasion.

Projecting the reported Iraqi civilian deaths for four more years of
US occupation produces a figure of 51,621 civilians killed
as "collateral damage." Projecting the Lancet's figure produces a
figure of 328,571 civilian deaths by the end of Bush's second term.

Then there are the civilian injured, for which there appear to be no
figures. If we assume the same ratio of killed to wounded for
civilian deaths as holds for the US military, the reported death
figure gives a civilian wounded figure of 392,320. The Lancet
estimate gives a wounded figure of 2,497,139.

The ratio of 7.6 wounded US troops for each soldier killed is
probably low for calculating civilian Iraqi wounded. US forces
travel in armored vehicles, are protected with helmets and body
armor and are not on the receiving end of artillery and massive
bombs that kill everything in a quarter mile radius. The ratio could
easily be 10 or 15 wounded Iraqi civilians for every one killed.

Did the Americans who reelected Bush know that the president who will
admit to no mistake is locked on a course that will squander a half
trillion dollars for no purpose other than to kill and wound between
36,290 and 73,205 US troops, with "collateral damage" to Iraqi
civilians ranging from 443,941 to 2,825,710 dead and wounded?

If Saddam Hussein is a "mass murderer," what does that make President
Bush and those who reelected him?

December 8, 2004

Dr. Roberts <PCRoberts@... <mailto:PCRoberts@...
John M. Olin Fellow at the Institute for Political Economy and
Research Fellow at the Independent Institute. He is a former
associate editor of the Wall Street Journal, former contributing
editor for National Review, and a former assistant secretary of the
U.S. Treasury. He is the co-author of The Tyranny of Good Intentions.

Copyright © 2004 Creators Syndicate

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INDEFINITE JAILING OF 6 IN CANADA TESTS LEGAL SYSTEM
Doug Struck, Washington Post, 12/1/9/04
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A10779-2004Dec18.html

For a long time, Mona el-Fouli lied to her young children. Their
father was working, she told them at first. He was on a trip, she
said later. But when she took her boys, 5 and 7, to see their father
behind a glass partition, they knew he was in jail.

"Please mom, can I break this glass and go inside to play with my
dad?" pleaded the 7-year-old, she recounted.

For 41/2 years, el-Fouli's husband, Mohammed Zeki Mahjoub, has been
imprisoned in Toronto without being charged, without facing trial,
and without being fully told what evidence is being used to keep him
there. The government has said he is a potential terrorist. His wife
and defenders say the authorities should prove it or let him go.

Mahjoub is one of six men being held in Canada as security risks on
secret evidence. In a country that boasts of its tolerance and
respect for legal rights, the jailings present an awkward dilemma
for judges, lawmakers and some members of the public...

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Israeli Sexpionage in the McGreevey, Condit and Clinton Affairs

http://www.the7thfire.com/new_world_order/zionism/mossad/israeli_sexp
ionage.htm


by Ernesto Cienfuegos, La Voz de Aztlan, Los Angeles, Alta
California - August 17, 2004 - (ACN)

  The current Governor James McGreevey homosexual scandal is actually
the result of yet another Israeli sexpionage operation
targeting "sexually loose" Democratic Party government officials.
Two other recent operations, that should be fresh in the memories of
the American people, are the Congressman Gary Condit and the
President Bill Clinton Affairs.

In the parlance of the shadowy underworld of international
espionage, the use of "sex" by foreign spies to obtain information
or concessions from government officials is called "sexpionage". The
sexual seduction of high level government officials by foreign spies
is usually of the illicit category which provides foreign operatives
the added advantage of being able to better bribe the targeted
victims which may be married with children. The operation may
involve compromising the government officials through the use of
professional prostitutes, underage girls (or boys) or by providing
homosexual lovers to not yet "out-of-the-closet" targets, as was the
case with Governor James McGreevey of New Jersey.

Sexpionage has a very long history. One of the most notorious cases
was that of a Dutch spy known as Mata Hari. The seductress was
a "nude dancer" who operated as a double agent for both the French
and German armies during World War I. The British Security Service
claim that Mata Hari was a Jewess who's real name was Margaretha
Geertruida Zelle. She was executed in 1917 by a French firing squad.

A more recent "sexpionage" case occurred in 1963 in Great Britain.
The scandal brought the entire Harold McMillan government down. The
case involved the Secretary of State for War, John Dennis Profumo.
Profumo, a Tory and a married man, was compromised by an illicit
affair with a London cabaret showgirl by the name of Christine
Keeler. The problem was that Christine Keeler was also sleeping with
Eugene Ivanov, a naval attache at the Soviet Embassy. It was widely
claimed, at the time, that Keeler was passing British defense
secrets, obtained from Profumo, to the Soviets.

Today, after the "Cold War against the Soviets" and the beginning of
the "War of Civilizations against Islam", Israeli covert sexpionage
operations are on the increase in the USA and around the globe. In
fact, a significant number of ex-Soviet sexpionage agents of Jewish
descent, who once worked for the KGB and the Stasi, have emigrated
to Israel. They now work for the Zionist government. These
sexpionage agents were well trained in special Soviet spy schools, a
practice that continues to this day in Israel. A secret training
ground for many of these Zionist sexpionage agents is the Israel
Institute of Technology in Haifa. Among the papers in the archives
of the Israel Institute of Technology is one authored by Golan
Cipel, Governor McGreevey's lover, titled "Shabtai Shavit Identified
as Outgoing Mossad Chief".

In the parlance of the Israeli intelligence services, female
sexpionage agents are called "Swallows" and males who are trained to
compromise women or other men are called "Ravens." Under this
nomenclature, the Israeli who was former Chief of Homeland Security
for New Jersey, Golan Cipel, can be properly called a "Raven", and
the Jewesses Chandra Levy and Monica Lewinsky, which I will discuss
later, can be called "Swallows".

Zionist Israel places great importance in its "symbiotic"
relationship with the USA. In fact, the State of Israel would be
unable to exist without the vast amounts of aid, both military and
social welfare, that is sent yearly to prop up the Zionist
government. This total amount is estimated to be more than 5 Billion
dollars per year. In addition, Israel survives and depends on
critical technology transfers that are obtained both through
cooperation and covertly. For example, Israel now possess
thermonuclear bombs and missiles, thanks to an American Jew,
Jonathan Pollard, who stole the "nuclear secrets" while working as a
US Naval Analyst. Pollard, it was admitted by the Israeli
government, was a MOSSAD spy. He is presently doing a life term in a
US Federal Prison for his crime.

The success and effectiveness of the Israel/USA symbiotic
relationship depends on many factors. One is massive propaganda
through the US based Zionist press that keeps the American people in
a constant stupor about certain political and economic realities.
Another is the near total subserviency of corrupt politicians,
especially of the Democratic Party, who do not speak up because they
are on the take. Another is the massive infiltration into government
of what are nothing less than Israeli agents. Israeli agents in the
Pentagon, for example, has caused the USA dearly in terms of the
costs of the "War on Iraq" and in terms of its "hated image" around
the world.

Lastly, a factor that is very important for Israel in keeping a
profitable symbiotic relationships with the USA is effective
sexpionage. Sexpionage is so important to Israel, that it has opened
an office for this purpose right smack in the center of US political
power -- Washington D.C. The office fronts as a post 911 anti-
terrorism institute and is located at 3811 N. Fairfax Drive, Suite
720 Arlington, VA 22203. The Chief of the office is non other that
the immediate former Director of the Israeli MOSSAD, Shabtai Shavit.

The current scandal in New Jersey concerning the "Raven" Golan Cipel
is a classic example of an Israeli sexpionage operation. James
McGreevey, a Catholic, was a rising Democratic Party politico when
he was introduced, about four years ago, to Golan Cipel while on
a "Jewish Junket" to the Tel Aviv suburb of Rishon Le-Zion. Cipel
had been conveniently placed on the staff of the Mayor of Rishon Le-
Zion by the MOSSAD, which has its headquarters in Tel Aviv, for this
very purpose. The MOSSAD keeps extensive "dossiers" on a large
number of US politicians and McGreevy, who the MOSSAD probably
already knew was a sodomite, had been targeted.

The American people would be very surprised at the huge number of US
politicians who are taken, all expenses paid, to Israel for
political indoctrination. One of these Democratic Party politicos is
Antonio Villargairosa (aka Tony Villar) whom we call the "Chicano
Manjewrian Candidate". Tony is running for mayor of Los Angeles for
the second time.

During the period between meeting James McGreevey and the revelation
of the scandal, Golan Cipel moved from assignment to assignment with
the ease that only an Israeli sexpionage operative could have.
According to official documents, Cipel worked for the Israeli
Parliament, the Israeli Embassy in New York, the Simon Wiesenthal
Center, and ultimately as Chief of Homeland Security for the US
State of New Jersey at a salary of $110,000 per year, even though he
was an Israeli illegal alien.

The allegations by Cipel of "sexual harassment" by Governor
McGreevey is only a ruse to cover up the real purpose of the
operation. The allegation by Cipel that he was sexually assaulted by
the governor "twenty times" is preposterous and only the dumbest
Americans will believe it. In fact, Golan Cipel allowed the governor
to buy him an apartment a mere few blocks from the condominium where
McGreevey lived with his so called wife. The scandal involves much
more than just the outing of a "queer governor"! We may never know
how much damage to US interests this Israeli sexpionage operation
has or will cost the country and the American people.

Another recent sexpionage operation was that involving the now
ousted Congressman from California Gary Condit and the Jewish
sexpionage agent Chandra Levy. This operation, however, went
terribly wrong resulting in the disappearance of the 24 year
government intern Chandra Levy on April 30, 2001. Levy remains were
found 13 months later in a park in Northwest Washington D.C. and not
far from the home of than Democratic Party Congressman Gary Condit.
The official cause of death was ruled "a homicide" though no one was
ever charged or prosecuted for the murder.

The target in this sexpionage operation was the married Gary Condit,
who was a senior member of the House Permanent Select Committee on
Intelligence. As member of the this committee, Condit was privy to
highly classified information of much interest to Zionist Israel.
The MOSSAD leaned on their "sleeper and sexpionage agent" Chandra
Levy to obtain the secret US government information that the Israeli
government needed. The MOSSAD arranged for Chandra Levy, than a US
government intern, to meet Congressman Condit. Soon, the married
Condit was having a sexual affair with the voluptuous 24 year old
Chandra Levy.

Whatever classified information Levy was able to obtain, on
her "sexpionage mission", was at the cost of her life. One day
before she was to return to California, she disappeared without a
trace. The Washington D.C. police searched Congressman Condit's
apartment for clues to no avail. Thirteen months later the "skull
and bones" of Chandra Levy were found at Washington's Rock Creek
Park even though the park had been repeatedly searched during the
early phases of the investigation.

Everyone reading this report should be acquainted with the President
Bill Clinton and Monica Lewinsky affair. This has been called "The
Mother of all Sexpionage Scandals" because it almost toppled a US
presidency. Generally less known is the fact that Monica Lewinsky
was actually a "sexpionage agent" working on behalf of the Israeli
government. She was, and probably still is, what the MOSSAD calls
a "Swallow".

It is believed that Lewinsky's primary mission was to sexually
compromise Bill Clinton in order to bribe him to release the Israeli
spy Jonathan Pollard. The timing and unfolding of the "White House
Sex Scandal" coincided with the efforts and meetings by the than
Israeli Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu with President Bill
Clinton in the White House.

The mission for Israel failed but it ended giving the Zionist state
some peripheral benefits. In an effort by Clinton to rid himself of
the "Swallow", he transferred her to the Pentagon with the
highest "security clearance" possible and which is only afforded to
top brass and a few high level government officials. Soon Monica
Lewinsky was cavorting with Admirals and Generals and became
pregnant. She says she aborted the baby.

No one knows what Pentagon secrets Lewinsky was able to pass on to
the Zionists, but perhaps Paul Wolfowitz' great success in involving
the USA in the War against Iraq may be the results of Monica
Lewinsky's efforts on behalf of Israel. Sexpionage pays and it is
paying big for Israel.

As you hear the spin, by the Zionist press, given to the current
sexpionage scandal involving "The Queer Governor of New Jersey",
hopefully this report will provide just the right facts to enable
you to see clearly through all their lies.

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Somerville Effort is Bitter Sweet for Movement
by Tom Wallace
http://www.divestmentproject.org


It is not difficult to find the silver lining in the very sad and
infuriating conclusion (temporary) to the issue of divestment in
Somerville, MA. After a long process and sometimes rancorous debate,
the aldermen caved to pressure from powerful Jewish groups who
blindly support Israel; as one woman said to me "no matter what, no
matter what, no matter what" with her eyes closed and shaking her
head poetically. That the Somerville Divestment Project got as far
as it did towards passing a divestment resolution  is nothing less
than spectacular. They were extremely successful in raising public
awareness of Israeli oppression and human rights violations as well
as the plight of the Palestinian people, and most importantly,
Somerville's role in that plight.



Like many other American cities, towns, states and labor unions,
Somerville is directly, albeit unwittingly, contributing to the
oppression, dispossession, humiliation, and overall suffering of the
Palestinian people. Many did not know this and when they found out,
they could not understand why. But now that they do know, the issue
will not go away. Somerville residents are claiming the right to
determine how their money is spent and invested. And they have vowed
to continue to claim that right. As the discussion continues so will
the free flow of information. This is not a good trend for
oppression and ethnic cleansing. It's much easier to continue when
no one knows about it.



On Thursday night the Aldermen ignored 1500 residents who had signed
a petition calling on the City to encourage divestment from Israel
bonds. They also ignored overwhelming numbers of supporters, a large
number of whom were Jewish, who came out for every meeting. They
clearly did not set out to do this, so what happened? What changed
and why?



Initial discussions painted a picture for the Aldermen of the
reality on the ground in Israel and Palestine, as well as
Somerville's relationship to that reality. When discussion was based
on fact, issues and truth, the aldermen were divided into two
groups; eight supported divestment and 2 opposed it, with 1
abstention. As discussion moved away from the reality of the
situation and from human rights violations to a discussion of
whether "Israel is being singled out" or "the issue is too big and
too complicated for the board," support for the resolution
declined.   Once again the discussion was moved from substance to
veiled accusations of anti-Semitism. However, the fact that the
accusations have to be veiled indicates that the armor of the
accusation is wearing out.



What Happened

The resolution was introduced and cosponsored by eight aldermen. The
Aldermen's original statements supporting the resolution were based
on human rights, international law and requests from Somerville
residents. There was one Alderman who made a statement in opposition
to the process. Alderman White thought it should be sent to
committee. He made it clear that he would not block the vote but
that the other side should be heard from in the form of Israel's
Consul General. One of the many ironies throughout this process is
that in killing the resolution, many of the Aldermen said that the
City of Somerville and the board of aldermen have no business in
foreign affairs. Yet it was those most opposed to the resolution who
sought the Israeli Consul General. What business does a foreign
Consul General have determining what Somerville residents do with
their money?



  At the second hearing, the aldermen were treated to a display of
power by the opposition, including the Israeli Consul General, the
Mayor of Somerville, a State Senator, and labor representatives. The
opposition argued that Israel was being singled out and that
therefore the resolution was anti-Israel. They argued that Israel is
a democracy and is our friend. They also argued that the issue was
too big for the Aldermen to take up, that they should not be
involved in foreign affairs. They did not argue with the claims of
human rights violations; rather than addressing the core issue—
whether or not the city of Somerville should be invested in foreign
governments guilty of human rights violations—the opposition
reframed the debate with a new set of language: namely, "anti-
Israel" and "singled out."

Supporters then spoke passionately about witnessing and experiencing
the occupation of Palestine. They talked about human rights,
international law, and about how Israel continually violates 29 of
30 articles from the International Declaration of Human Rights.
They pointed out the important fact that Israel is the only country
in which Somerville is directly invested by owning Israel Bonds. So
contrary to being singled out for some sort of punishment, Israel
had been granted a special status with favored treatment. Also, if
the Aldermen believed that Somerville should not be involved in
foreign affairs then they should divest. As things stand, Somerville
is taking Israel's side.



At the same time, people were making calls, sending letters, emails,
books and all kinds of information to the aldermen,  The Somerville
Divestment Project continued organizing and were endorsed by the
Green Rainbow Party of Massachusetts. They held a fundraiser,
continued to hand out flyers and collect signatures for the
petition. The JCRC was also organizing with the help of the ADL,
AIPAC, Harvard Hillel, the Isreali Consulate and  Jewish and Israeli
media.



By the third meeting, which was the committee meeting, one of the
original supporters had already caved into the pressure of the
opposition using the new language: "the issue is divisive and too
big for the Aldermen." The aldermen on the legislative committee
voted  3 to 0 (with 1 aldermen absent and 1 aldermen excused herself
out of disgust) to recommend against divestment to boos and cheers
of the audience who turned out roughly 4 or 5  to 1 in favor of
divestment.



At the final meeting, the full board of aldermen would vote to
accept the recommendation or reject it.  By accepting the report of
the committee, they would be accepting their recommendation and the
resolution would be dead. They would then be able consider the
alternative resolutions submitted by aldermen and which were on the
agenda. They voted to accept the report, thus killing the
resolution.



They allowed the opposition to successfully reframe the debate with
gross inaccuracies—the divestment resolution would have restored
balance and even-handedness to the City's role in the Middle East,
but instead, by not passing the resolution, the Aldermen have chosen
to endorse investments in human rights violations.



As soon as they did Ron Francis and Christina Bolton stepped up to
the podium and began singing the Anthem of the African National
Congress. Simultaneously, other supporters began placing a statement
from Desmond Tutu and poet Mahmoud Darwish in front of the
Aldermen.  The action connected the divestment struggles of
different generations, showed the moral and urgent nature of the
effort in a spiritual way, and also showed Aldermen that the people
had power too and will use it one way or the other.



Denise Provost, the one supporter from the committee and President
of the Board was chairing the meeting and standing at the microphone
screaming that "you have been offered every courtesy by this
board", "officers please remove … . Several police officers
carefully escorted Ron and Christina out of the hall while roughly
30 others walked out with them. From the hall they spontaneously
began chanting  "Free Free Palestine".



Ms. Provost herself was about to be undermined and humiliated by one
of the detractors, Alderman Bill Roche.  He motioned that discussion
of all alternative resolutions be filed. One after the other of the
aldermen agreed with him using the newly adopted language of "Israel
being singled out" and "this is too divisive and too big an issue
for the aldermen"



With that, the power brokers in the Jewish community had their
victory. But it was as bittersweet as SDP's loss. The city of
Somerville has not resolved the issue and is far more knowledgeable.
Until now the only force to be reckoned with was the pro Israel
Jewish lobby, which obviously represents only one Jewish voice.
Nowhere was that more obvious than in the media coverage which
completely (and I think deliberately) ignored the Jewish voice
supporting this resolution.



Several factors converged to facilitate the defeat of the Somerville
Divestment Resolution not the least of which was media combined with
the fill weight of the Jewish establishment.  But it is important
first to note what worked.



  The success of the campaign was rooted in its effective grassroots
organizing model. It took several years to build, but the time was
invested and it paid off. SDP canvassed door to door, they organized
film nights, education events, and they met with most of the
aldermen individually in residents' homes to educate them prior to
introducing the resolution . They tabled in the town center and
spoke to anyone who would listen while collecting signatures for the
petition. As a result, there is growing grassroots support for
justice in Israel Palestine, at least in Somerville, Mass. And
because of that success, it can and will be repeated elsewhere.



The Role of Media

Events in Somerville were covered by the Somerville Journal, the
Boston Globe, the Jerusalem Post, most of the Jewish newspapers and
websites, the Electronic Intifada and Israeli television. The most
influential was the Boston Globe.



With the exception of the Somerville Journal, all news media covered
the issue from the same pro Israeli angle. The effect was to create
enormous support for the pro Israel lobby. However, the Jewish
Advocate, which is not supposed to be objective, at least ran
several pro-divestment letters written by prominent members of the
Jewish Community. By contrast, Electronic Intifada was the only
media supportive of Palestinians to cover Somerville. Neither The
Palestine Monitor, the Palestine Chronicle or Al Jazeera ever
responded. One reporter from Al Jazeera tried to help me get
coverage but both of us failed.



The Boston Globe played its part by presenting one side of the
issue. Its reporter, Benjamin Gedan included and excluded facts that
I think was a deliberate attempt to influence opinion and paint
those in favor of divestment with an unstated smear of anti
semitism. One example is to emphasize the notion that Israel was
being "singled out." As the aldermen caved, this became their
mantra, in addition to the fact that it was an issue of foreign
policy and out of their jurisdiction. In three long articles, Mr.
Gedan never mentioned that Israel was the only country that
Somerville is invested in. He mentioned the accusation of Israel
being "singled out" in every one.



He also framed the issue as one of Jewish groups versus pro
Palestinian groups. He deliberately left out the Jewish groups and
the large Jewish presence in favor of divestment.  He couldn't have
missed them. They held large signs that read "another Jew for
divestment". In addition, many including an Israeli attorney Shamai
Liebowitz and Larry Miller  former President of the congregation
B'nai B'rith, testified at the public hearing. . Mentioning Jewish
supporters would have taken the sting out of the insinuation of anti-
Semitism. At one point Gedan  actually provided a quote from each
Jewish group represented and opposed to the resolution: ADL, AIPAC,
JCRC. Even Alan Dershowitz got a mention because he donated his book
to the Aldermen.



The net effect of these two failings is that anyone who read the
Globe articles would conclude that the issue of human rights,
whatever the truth, is irrelevant because the motive of the
divestment campaign was to single out Israel and was therefore
rooted in anti-Semitism. The Globe ombudsman was made aware of this
following the first article when it was apparent that is was a one
sided report and the Globe sent Gedan back twice more.

The Ultimate irony was a statement by Alderman White at the final
vote where he had introduced one of the alternative resolutions
(that would not be heard). He acknowledged that the Palestinian
people were the most oppressed people on earth. At the same time,
his resolution was written by the opposition. He truly believed that
any criticism of Israel was and is anti-Semitic. In fact he seemed
to believe that any criticism of anything with a Jewish name is anti
Semitic. I don't know who he thinks is oppressing the Palestinians.
I also don't know how to address such insanity other than to just
expose it. I do know that we must find a way.

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FBI E-Mail Refers to Presidential Order Authorizing
Inhumane Interrogation Techniques
ACLU
December 20, 2004
http://www.aclu.org/SafeandFree/SafeandFree.cfm?ID=17216&c=206


FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Contact: media@...

Newly Obtained FBI Records Call Defense Department's
Methods "Torture," Express Concerns Over "Cover-Up"
That May Leave FBI "Holding the Bag" for Abuses

NEW YORK -- A document released for the first time
today by the American Civil Liberties Union suggests
that President Bush issued an Executive Order
authorizing the use of inhumane interrogation methods
against detainees in Iraq. Also released by the ACLU
today are a slew of other records including a December
2003 FBI e-mail that characterizes methods used by the
Defense Department as "torture" and a June 2004
"Urgent Report" to the Director of the FBI that raises
concerns that abuse of detainees is being covered up.

"These documents raise grave questions about where the
blame for widespread detainee abuse ultimately rests,"
said ACLU Executive Director Anthony D. Romero. "Top
government officials can no longer hide from public
scrutiny by pointing the finger at a few low-ranking
soldiers."

The documents were obtained after the ACLU and other
public interest organizations filed a lawsuit against
the government for failing to respond to a Freedom of
Information Act request.

The two-page e-mail that references an Executive Order
states that the President directly authorized
interrogation techniques including sleep deprivation,
stress positions, the use of military dogs, and
"sensory deprivation through the use of hoods, etc."
The ACLU is urging the White House to confirm or deny
the existence of such an order and immediately to
release the order if it exists. The FBI e-mail, which
was sent in May 2004 from "On Scene
Commander--Baghdad" to a handful of senior FBI
officials, notes that the FBI has prohibited its
agents from employing the techniques that the
President is said to have authorized.

Another e-mail, dated December 2003, describes an
incident in which Defense Department interrogators at
Guantánamo Bay impersonated FBI agents while using
"torture techniques" against a detainee. The e-mail
concludes "If this detainee is ever released or his
story made public in any way, DOD interrogators will
not be held accountable because these torture
techniques were done [sic] the `FBI' interrogators.
The FBI will [sic] left holding the bag before the
public."

The document also says that no "intelligence of a
threat neutralization nature" was garnered by the
"FBI" interrogation, and that the FBI's Criminal
Investigation Task Force (CITF) believes that the
Defense Department's actions have destroyed any chance
of prosecuting the detainee. The e-mail's author
writes that he or she is documenting the incident "in
order to protect the FBI."

"The methods that the Defense Department has adopted
are illegal, immoral, and counterproductive," said
ACLU staff attorney Jameel Jaffer. "It is astounding
that these methods appear to have been adopted as a
matter of policy by the highest levels of government."


The June 2004 "Urgent Report" addressed to the FBI
Director is heavily redacted. The legible portions of
the document appear to describe an account given to
the FBI's Sacramento Field Office by an FBI agent who
had "observed numerous physical abuse incidents of
Iraqi civilian detainees," including "strangulation,
beatings, [and] placement of lit cigarettes into the
detainees ear openings." The document states that
"[redacted] was providing this account to the FBI
based on his knowledge that [redacted] were engaged in
a cover-up of these abuses."

The release of these documents follows a federal court
order that directed government agencies to comply with
a year-old request under the Freedom of Information
Act filed by the ACLU, the Center for Constitutional
Rights, Physicians for Human Rights, Veterans for
Common Sense and Veterans for Peace. The New York
Civil Liberties Union is co-counsel in the case.

Other documents released by the ACLU today include:

*An FBI email regarding DOD personnel impersonating
FBI officials during interrogations. The e-mail refers
to a "ruse" and notes that "all of those [techniques]
used in these scenarios" were approved by the Deputy
Secretary of Defense. (Jan. 21, 2004)
*Another FBI agent's account of interrogations at
Guantánamo in which detainees were shackled hand and
foot in a fetal position on the floor. The agent
states that the detainees were kept in that position
for 18 to 24 hours at a time and most had "urinated or
defacated [sic]" on themselves. On one occasion, the
agent reports having seen a detainee left in an
unventilated, non-air conditioned room at a
temperature "probably well over a hundred degrees."
The agent notes: "The detainee was almost unconscious
on the floor, with a pile of hair next to him. He had
apparently been literally pulling his own hair out
throughout the night." (Aug. 2, 2004)
*An e-mail stating that an Army lawyer "worked hard to
cwrite [sic] a legal justification for the type of
interrogations they (the Army) want to conduct" at
Guantánamo Bay. (Dec. 9, 2002)
*An e-mail noting the initiation of an FBI
investigation into the alleged rape of a juvenile male
detainee at Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq. (July 28, 2004)

*An FBI agent's account of an interrogation at
Guantánamo - an interrogation apparently conducted by
Defense Department personnel - in which a detainee was
wrapped in an Israeli flag and bombarded with loud
music and strobe lights. (July 30, 2004)

The ACLU and its allies are scheduled to go to court
again this afternoon, where they will seek an order
compelling the CIA to turn over records related to an
internal investigation into detainee abuse. Although
the ACLU has received more than 9,000 documents from
other agencies, the CIA refuses to confirm or deny
even the existence of many of the records that the
ACLU and other plaintiffs have requested. The CIA is
reported to have been involved in abusing detainees in
Iraq and at secret CIA detention facilities around the
globe.

The lawsuit is being handled by Lawrence Lustberg and
Megan Lewis of the New Jersey-based law firm Gibbons,
Del Deo, Dolan, Griffinger & Vecchione, P.C. Other
attorneys in the case are Jaffer, Amrit Singh and Judy
Rabinovitz of the ACLU; Art Eisenberg and Beth
Haroules of the NYCLU; and Barbara Olshansky and Jeff
Fogel of CCR.

The documents referenced above can be found at:
http://www.aclu.org/torturefoia/released/fbi.html.

http://www.aclu.org/SafeandFree/SafeandFree.cfm?ID=17216&c=206


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The road to Damascus is the key node in the Bush/neo-con roadmap for
a new Middle East.

Evildoers, here we come
by Pepe Escobar
http://207.44.245.159/article7493.htm


"Far more than the overthrow of Saddam Hussein, the defeat of the
mullahcracy and the triumph of freedom in Tehran would be a truly
historic event."

- Michael Ledeen, neo-conservative and member of the American
Enterprise Institute, June 2003

Comment by Pepe Escobar

12/6/04 "Asia Times" -- Iran is very much in the US spotlight at
present over concerns that it is developing nuclear weapons, with
much talk of "regime change". Over the next four years of the second
George W Bush term, any of a number of countries could come into the
crosshairs - Syria, Saudi Arabia and "axis of evil" original North
Korea.

Ralph Peters, a former lieutenant-colonel responsible for "future
warfare" at the Office of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) and
deputy chief of staff for intelligence before he retired,
commented, "It's really difficult to exactly delineate who our
enemies are, but they number in millions. They're Arab and
Muslim ... Our enemy is the majority of the people who live in what
we think of as the large Arab nations, plus certain other groups.
Our enemy is concentrated in Egypt, Libya, Jordan, Iraq, Saudi
Arabia and Syria, plus the Palestinians are part of it."

Bush has admitted on the record that the "minds" of his
administration are "borrowed" from the right-wing think-tank
American Enterprise Institute (AEI), which rents office space in
Washington to the Project for the New American Century (PNAC) - the
people who conceived the Iraq war (see This war is brought to you
by ... of March 20, 2003).

Vice President Dick Cheney's concentration of power under Bush II
will be even more complete. Pentagon chief Donald Rumsfeld - despite
Guantanamo, Abu Ghraib, the quagmire in Iraq - remains in place. The
CIA under Porter Goss has been through a Soviet-style purge and is
being turned into an ersatz Office of Special Plans (OSP), which
everyone remembers was a Rumsfeld-sponsored operation that
specialized in fabricating false pretexts for the invasion of Iraq.
The OSP was directed by neo-conservative Douglas Feith (who now
wants the US to attack Iran). The new CIA is Feith's OSP on
steroids. Goss' job is to make sure the CIA agrees with everything
Bush and the neo-conservatives say. Expect more wars.

The road to Damascus
The road to Damascus is the key node in the Bush/neo-con roadmap for
a new Middle East. Some may think the road starts in Baghdad. Wrong.
It starts, simultaneously, in Washington, Jerusalem and Beirut. And
neo-con think-tanks, the Christian Right and ultra right-wing
Zionists are busy mapping it. A key player to watch is neo-con David
Wurmser, who has been a member of Cheney's staff since September
2003 and who has for years called for a strike against Syria.

Bush and the neo-cons must implicate Syria by all means available.
This week Bush warned both Syria and Iran against "meddling in the
internal affairs of Iraq" - as if Baghdad was the capital of Ohio.
On a more serious note, Pentagon military intelligence officials
suddenly discovered a few days ago that the Iraqi resistance "is
being directed to a greater degree than previously recognized from
Syria" and funded by "private sources in Saudi Arabia and Europe".

The "evidence" was a global positioning system receiver found in a
suspicious "bomb factory" in Fallujah with directions "originating
in western Syria". This, Pentagon neo-cons say, proves that Syria
hosts Iraqi "terrorists" - who are basically those same
Ba'athist "remnants of Saddam Hussein's regime".

Jordan is not on the neo-con hit list. Of course not: Jordan is a
neo-con ideal. The Hashemite monarchy is endlessly pliable; never
emphasizes its Islamic credentials; has an acceptable degree of
truculence (martial law has been in place for decades); has a very
effective Mukhabarat (secret police); and never criticizes Israel's
excesses in Palestine. King Abdullah is always a dependable
propaganda asset: he has been insisting lately that "foreign
fighters are coming across the Syrian border [towards Iraq], they
have been trained in Syria". The king also blamed Syria not long ago
for being behind a huge al-Qaeda chemical weapons plot to bomb the
US Embassy in Amman that, if successful, would have killed about
20,000 people. The US State Department was quick to add that the
bombers were Abu Musab al-Zarqawi's people. So not only does Syria
host Iraqi "terrorists", but it is also behind al-Qaeda.

King Abdullah also went on the record saying he does not welcome the
inevitable Shi'ite government that will emerge from the Iraqi
elections after January's elections, implying that a majority of
Iraqis are Iranian agents. His father, King Hussein, would never be
that sectarian. Of course it's a coincidence Abdullah said these
words shortly after a meeting with Bush. The influential Hawza - the
clerics at the Shi'ite "Vatican" in Najaf - responded in kind,
basically accusing Abdullah and his family of always supporting
Saddam and being submissive towards the Americans, adding sharply
that the era of free oil from Iraq to Jordan (when Saddam was in
power) is over.

Lebanon is often a neo-con target because of Hezbollah and because
it's considered a Syrian satellite hostile to Israel. But now the
Lebanese are taking matters in their own hands. All opposition
forces are now united. Former president Amin Gemayel said this week
the atmosphere was just like in 1943, "when all Lebanese fought side
by side to get independence" from the French mandate. The leader of
the socialist bloc, Walid Jumblatt, said he was "ready to go to
Syria" to convey the message: the Lebanese want a "sovereign and
independent state", which means a recognized political role for
Hezbollah and no interference from Syria.

The neo-cons refuse to acknowledge the fact of a Sunni Iraqi war of
national liberation. It's much easier to blame it all on elusive
Syrians, evil Ba'athists still devoted to Saddam and Zarqawi - a
renegade Jordanian. Ba'athists are only one component of the
resistance, as they were the military establishment under Saddam.
Moreover, the antagonism between Assad's and Saddam's Ba'athist
regimes has always been visceral. Syria as a regime does not support
the Iraqi resistance: a few individual Syrian jihadis do.

The road to Tehran
"Iran has replaced Saddam Hussein as the world's number one exporter
of terror, hate and instability," Israeli Foreign Minister Silvan
Shalom told the United Nations General Assembly last September. This
is Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon and the neo-con Likud agenda
at work. One month later, Sharon said that "Iran is making every
effort to arm itself with nuclear weapons, with ballistic means of
delivery, and it is preparing an enormous terrorist network with
Syria and Lebanon." This was, of course, the same Sharon who in
February 2002 told the Rupert Murdoch-controlled London Times
that "Iran is the center of 'world terror', and as soon as an Iraq
conflict is concluded, I will push for Iran to be at the top of
the 'to do list'."

In August, incoming secretary of state Condoleezza Rice was already
bombarding the European Union's dialogue with Iran, saying "the
Iranians have been trouble for a very long time. And it's one reason
that this regime has to be isolated in its bad behavior, not quote-
unquote, 'engaged'." The same Rice on September 2002 alarmed the
world about Iraq's supposed weapons of mass destruction, with
her "we don't want the smoking gun to be a mushroom cloud".

It's the same old script, or excuse for war: first Iraq, now Iran.
Last month, outgoing Secretary of State Colin Powell even alarmed
the world by saying Iran was working on nuclear missiles. He was
relying on a single walk-in source with unverified documents.
European intelligence officials in Brussels are certain the source
was an Iranian exile briefed by neo-cons Richard Perle and John
Bolton.

It doesn't matter that Iran has agreed - at least temporarily - to
stop enriching uranium, in exchange for security arrangements,
trade, investment and support for World Trade Organization admission
offered by the European "Big 3" of Germany, France and Britain. In
the neo-con master plan, Iran is doomed to be "shocked and awed" by
2006. The chatter at the AEI, the PNAC and other think-tanks has
been thunderous for quite some time: Iran could be bombed from
American bases in Iraq, in Pakistan, or from warships in the Persian
Gulf. There are no illusions about it at the European Union
headquarters. According to a EU diplomat in Brussels, "This bitter
controversy over the Iranian nuclear program works as a smokescreen.
The neo-conservatives are obsessed with Iran as a fundamentalist
Islamic regime bound on exterminating Israel." Another diplomat adds
that the question is not Iran's virtual nukes, per se, but how to
cripple Iran as a military power: "It's the same agenda for Israel,
the Pentagon and the White House National Security Council."

Neo-cons privilege a pre-emptive strike with missiles fired from
warships in the Gulf against the Natanz and Arak plants south of
Tehran. European intelligence has also identified another huge
underground complex "with 1,000 gas centrifuges and components for
the manufacture of 50,000 further centrifuges". Russian engineers
are helping to build a heavy water plant at Arak. Other plants are
at Arkadan, east of Natanz, and near the beautiful, historic city of
Isfahan. The leaders in Tehran swear the whole program is developed
for civilian use.

In another striking parallel to Iraq, the CIA does not know much
about the current status of Iran's nuclear program, certainly not as
much as the Europeans. But it seems to have successfully penetrated
the roughly 800,000-strong Iranian diaspora in southern California,
to the extent that a coterie of wealthy Iranians are eagerly
plotting their return home as "liberating" heroes.

One strident player to watch is neo-con Frank Gaffney, who wrote on
the National Review online that "regime change - one way or another -
  in Iran and North Korea, [is] the only hope for preventing these
remaining 'axis of evil' states from fully realizing their terrorist
and nuclear ambitions".

Long and winding roads
The road to Tehran starts both in Kabul and Baghdad. This requires
examination of the Afghan "model" and the Iraqi "model".

Afghanistan's new democracy rests on the shoulder of the world's
most expensive mayor (US$1.6 billion a month and counting), Hamid
Karzai, who barely controls downtown Kabul protected by 200 American
bodyguards, 17,000 American troops and a North Atlantic Treaty
Organization contingent. Without all this heavy metal, Karzai would
never last. The country is essentially ruled by the Tajiks and
Uzbeks of the former Northern Alliance - who now control most of the
world's supply of heroin - powerful regional warlords and the
Taliban (in the south and southeast). So much for Afghan "democracy".

As for the Iraqi "model", the crucial point is that the Americans
managed to turn Iraq into a replica of Palestine - the same ghastly
litany of occupation, suicide bombings, streams of refugees and
death and destruction. Not only was the Iraq war entirely based on
neo-con lies: these lies led, among other disasters, to Iraq's
infrastructure being completely destroyed and the US alienating the
Muslim world. Fallujah and Baghdad are replicas of Gaza and the West
Bank. A measure of the daily ordeal is offered by these lines
written by Iraqi girl blogger Riverbend:

People are wondering how America and gang [ie Prime Minister Iyad
Allawi, etc] are going to implement democracy in all of this chaos
when they can't seem to get the gasoline flowing in a country that
virtually swims in oil. There's a rumor that this gasoline crisis
has been concocted on purpose in order to keep a minimum of cars on
the streets. Others claim that this whole situation is a form of
collective punishment because things are really out of control in so
many areas in Baghdad - especially the suburbs. The third theory is
that this is being done purposely so that the Iraq government can
amazingly bring the electricity, gasoline, kerosene and cooking gas
back in January before the elections and make themselves look like
heroes.
As for the elections, it's fair to say Riverbend echoes the overall
sentiment in secular Baghdad, according to our sources: "We're
watching the election lists closely. Most people I've talked to
aren't going to go to elections. It's simply too dangerous and
there's a sense that nothing is going to be achieved anyway. The
lists are more or less composed of people affiliated with the very
same political parties whose leaders rode in on American tanks. Then
you have a handful of tribal sheikhs. Yes - tribal sheikhs. Our
country is going to be led by members of religious parties and
tribal sheikhs - can anyone say Afghanistan? What's even more
irritating is that election lists have to be checked and confirmed
by none other than [Grand Ayatollah Ali al-]Sistani. Sistani - the
Iranian religious cleric. So basically, this war helped us make a
transition from a secular country being run by a dictator to a
chaotic country being run by a group of religious clerics. Now, can
anyone say 'theocracy in sheep's clothing'?"

The crucial Iraq-Iran-Afghanistan trio lies at the heart of the
Pentagon-denominated "arc of instability" which runs from the
Maghreb in Africa to the Kazakh-Chinese border. Of course it's just
a coincidence that the arc holds the majority of the world's
reserves of oil and gas.

Our way or the highway
European diplomats confirm that when they got together with their
American counterparts in Washington last October to discuss Iran,
there was simply nothing to discuss. Under Secretary of State John
Bolton - a man who, on the record, wants the US to invade Iran -
simply read aloud a text where the US refused to back any European
Big 3 negotiations, and wanted Iran immediately dragged to the UN
Security Council. European diplomats remain wary: "The Americans may
be paralyzed at the moment - by the lack of international support
and because they are trapped in Iraq. But we cannot underestimate
the neo-conservatives, and especially Dick Cheney. He might end up
convincing Bush of the need of a pre-emptive strike against Iranian
nuclear sites." Another diplomat adds that "the Americans complain
all the time about our dialogue with the Iranians, but they are
incapable of formulating an American strategy".

A "strategy" has been formulated by neo-con Danielle Pletka of the
AEI. She says that in exchange for Iran handing over all its (non-
existent) WMDs and halting support for "terrorist" groups,
Washington should renew diplomatic relations and remove unilateral
sanctions. It's an "our way or the highway" proposition, no
negotiations involved.

Both Iran and the EU have a tremendous stake in the success of the
new round of negotiations, which started this week and will,
according to European diplomats, last for many months. For Iran, a
deal with the EU is a major twofold strategic victory: it amplifies
the political abyss between Washington and Brussels, and from the
point of view of Iranian consumers, it's good for business. For the
EU, it's above all good for big business in the oil and gas
industry. A who's who of European majors - Royal Dutch-Shell, Total-
Fina-Elf, Agip, British Gas, Enterprise, Lasmo, Monument - already
has and looks forward to expanding Iranian contracts. Not to mention
the Chinese, who last month assured the Iranians in Beijing, after
signing a major oil-and-gas deal, that they would block any move by
the International Atomic Energy Agency to take the nuclear impasse
to the UN Security Council.

Ideologues like Reuel Marc Gerecht of the AEI are unfazed, and keep
pushing heavily for a pre-emptive strike. Gerecht boasts that "you
have to be crystal clear with them that whatever they dream up, we
can dream up something much, much worse". These ideologues are
obviously unaware of the fact that a strike will inevitably alienate
the fiercely nationalistic Iranian population, will lead them to
rally en masse in support of the government, and will be disastrous
for business from a oil major/corporate American point of view. And
even with a pre-emptive strike, experts agree Iran could rebuild its
nuclear program before 2008 - as Iran learned very well from the
Israeli pre-emptive strike that destroyed Iraq's nuclear reactor at
Osirak in 1981.

Both the CIA and the Defense Intelligence Agency have extensively
war-gamed the possible consequences of a pre-emptive strike. The
results were disastrous. The neo-cons dismiss it as perceptions of
the so-called "reality-based community".

Neo-cons obviously don't read political scientist Chalmers Johnson,
the author of Blowback, who explained how the CIA in the 1950s
coined the term "blowback" to refer to "the unintended and
unexpected negative consequences of covert special operations that
have been kept secret from the American people and, in most cases,
from their elected representatives". Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini
rising to power in Iran in 1979 was blowback for the CIA toppling
the elected government of Mossadegh in Iran in 1953 and the American
cozying up to the Shah regime. The rise of al-Qaeda was in part
blowback for the CIA arming the mujahideen in the anti-Soviet jihad
in Afghanistan in the 1980s.

Sharon is an expert in provoking an "excuse" for starting a regional
war - a favorite neo-con tactic. That's what he did in 1982 as
Israeli defense minister, when he invaded Lebanon in "regime change"
mode. Blowback was inevitable: the invasion of Lebanon led to
Hezbollah, the first intifada, Hamas, suicide bombers, etc.

European diplomats stress that "Pakistan proliferated nuclear
technology to North Korea, Libya and Iran, while Iraq was invaded
because it was not fast enough to acquire its own WMDs. The regime
in Tehran certainly took notice." It's a given in the corridors of
the EU that the regime in Tehran may cultivate a nuclear program -
but exclusively for defensive purposes. It's also a given that
having lied so consistently and for so long - aluminum tubes, yellow
cake uranium in Niger, al-Qaeda in secret meetings in Prague, Osama
bin Laden and Saddam sleeping in the same bed, etc - neo-cons have
little chance of convincing the EU that Iranian nuclear missiles
will soon wreak havoc on London, Paris and Berlin.

The road to Pyongyang
The neo-cons believe the Pentagon should also bomb Kim Jong-il's
North Korea. Bill Kristol, neo-con and chair of the PNAC, escalated
the stakes when he recently faxed a statement, "Toward Regime Change
in North Korea", to a select group of "opinion leaders" in
Washington, alerting on the emergence of "serious dissident
activity" in the country and urging Bush to promptly deal with it.

Compare it with the sober assessment of Han Ho Suk, director of the
Center for Korean Affairs, "North Korea is one of the few nations
that can engage in a total war with the United States. North Korea's
war plan in case of an US attack is total war, not the 'low-
intensity limited warfare' or 'regional conflict' talked about among
the Western analysts ... If the US mounts a pre-emptive strike on
North Korea's Yongbyon nuclear plants, North Korea will retaliate
with weapons of mass destruction: North Korea will mount strategic
nuclear attacks on US targets. The US war planners know this ...
North Korea has succeeded in weaponizing nuclear devices for missile
delivery. North Korea has operational fleets of ICBMs [inter-
continental ballistic missiles] and intermediate-range missiles
equipped with nuclear warheads. And North Korea's Dong 2 missile may
be capable of hitting the West Coast of the United States, as well
as Alaska and Hawaii."

The player to watch in this particular "axis of evil" segment is
Victor Cha, recently appointed as Asia director in the National
Security Council. He will be the man responsible for American policy
towards North Korea.

It's interesting to compare the neo-con approach with Selig
Harrison, director of the Asia Program at the Center for
International Policy. He visited North Korea in the spring of 2004.
His assessment is that although the leadership is "very eager for a
settlement" with the US, they are "not prepared to do it in the way
the Bush administration is asking them to do it. The North Koreans
say that Washington wants them to, in effect, simply roll over and
disarm unilaterally." Harrison criticizes the Bush
administration's "very rigid position, not prepared to trade
anything". And this only increases the "risk of war. The point is,
the administration's objective is really regime change in Pyongyang."

The man in charge of this "very rigid position" is none other than
Cha. Cha has argued that "engagement is the best practical way to
build a coalition for punishment tomorrow. A necessary precondition
for the US coercing North Korea is the formation of a regional
consensus that efforts to resolve the problem in a non-
confrontational manner have been exhausted. Without this consensus,
implementing any form of coercion that actually puts pressure on the
regime is unworkable." Cha qualifies this policy as "hawk
engagement". It essentially means that any multilateral talks are
destined to fail, because that's the premise of "hawk engagement" -
building support for an attack. So the whole multilateral ballet in
the next few months will consist of how China, South Korea, Russia
and Japan will be able to control the neo-con ideologues before they
snap it and decide on a "Shock and Awe" against Kim.

The road to Riyadh
Many were abuzz in Washington before the American presidential
election when someone leaked what Bush had said at a donors'
luncheon: "Osama bin Laden would like to overthrow the Saudis ...
then we're in trouble. Because they have a weapon. They have the
oil." In the neo-con roadmap, Syria and Iran may be short-term
targets, but only on the way to a big prize, Saudi Arabia. Osama and
al-Qaeda are more than on track to eventually stage a coup in Saudi
Arabia. Simultaneously, European intelligence confirms there are now
even more detailed war plans than in the 1970s for an American
invasion of Saudi oilfields , most of them situated in Shi'ite-
populated areas.

European diplomats in Brussels hope that this day will not come. The
joint negotiation with Iran has been one more indication of what
these diplomats see as the EU's gradual emergence as a global
political player - a historical inevitability. The EU will
eventually have a collective military force - and then NATO's
existence will be pointless. The EU has already questioned the neo-
con equivalence of "pre-emptive war" with "just war". The EU -
unlike Bush and the neo-cons - heavily supports the UN, as well as
the World Court and the International Criminal Court. The EU is
multilateral - a concept that is anathema for the neo-cons.
Nonetheless, this all leads a diplomat to be overtly
pessimistic: "Iran must prepare for an air attack from Israel and
the US. This time, no one - the United Nations, the European Union,
not even Britain - will be consulted."

Nuke them all
The Balkanization of the Arab and Muslim Middle East is a follow-up
to the "divide and rule" of British colonialism. It's in the heart
of the neo-con agenda. Arab nationalism has to be smashed. And
Persian nationalism as well.

The neo-con dream is a stable Iraq by the end of 2005 so the US can
concentrate on attacking Iran. With the US still bogged down in a
dreadful Iraqi quagmire, the well-oiled neo-con propaganda machine
is already full speed ahead manufacturing its trademark brand of
fear: Iranian nukes are coming to get us unless we pre-emptively
attack (echoes of Ronald Reagan's "Nicaraguan Sandinistas about to
invade Texas" come to mind). In the weeks and months ahead fear in
the US will be multiplied by myriad echo chambers - right-wing talk
radio, corporate media, Christian rapture congregations, hardcore
militarists still bent on avenging the debacle in Vietnam by winning
what is a de facto war against Islam.
An American "Shock and Awe" could turn into a nightmare as Iran is
fine-tuning a dizzying array of asymmetrical warfare options (See
How Iran will fight back Dec 16). Iran has installed sophisticated
anti-ship missiles on the island of Abu Musa, thus controlling the
critical Strait of Hormuz. In a pre-emptive strike, Iran could
easily shut down the Strait of Hormuz - where all Persian Gulf oil
tankers must pass. The immediate result: $100 or more for a barrel
of oil - with all the consequences this would entail. Neo-cons don't
bother with reality though: they only see that whoever controls
Persian Gulf oil controls the world economy.

Israel may decide to stage a "Shock and Awe" of its own - using its
precious collection of high-tech fighter-bombers. Last September,
Israel bought 52 F-16Is from Lockheed Martin. Israel also
bought "nearly 5,000 bombs in one of the largest weapons deals
between the allies in years", including "500 bunker busters that
could be effective against Iran's [as of yet unproven] underground
nuclear facilities", as Israeli security sources told Reuters.

Muslims ask how could Israel get away with it. As far as the Arab
world is concerned, Arabs could not be more impotent - or more co-
opted at this historical juncture. Incompetence and corruption
prevails in Cairo, Riyadh, Damascus and Amman. Arabs hold no
significant political, economic or military power on the world
stage. As for the Iranians, descendants of the Persians, a hugely
sophisticated and influential civilization, they are still feared.
In 2002, Israel was saying that Iran could complete its first
nuclear weapon by the end of 2004. Nobody called Israel's bluff
then, nobody is calling it now.

With the American military in its current state, Bush and the neo-
cons cannot possibly reshape the Middle East to suit the neo-
con/Likud agenda. Washington is faced with two options. It could
restore the draft - provoking a minor social earthquake in the US.
Or it could develop - and deploy - tactical nuclear weapons, mini-
nukes. Fallujah - flattened by "conventional" means - was just a
test. On the road to Damascus, the road to Tehran, the road to
Riyadh, the neo-cons would be much more tempted to go nuclear.

Copyright 2004 Asia Times Online Ltd.

*********************************************************************

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Ralph Nader on the Ohio Recount, Bush's Cabinet Reshuffle and the
White House
"Lowballing" of U.S. Casualties in Iraq

http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=04/12/14/1459205

As the Ohio delegation to the Electoral College cast its votes for
President Bush despite calls for a review of voting irregularities,
we speak with independent presidential candidate Ralph Nader about
the Ohio recount, the future of the Democratic Party, the
reshuffling of Bush's cabinet, the occupation of Iraq and much more.
[includes rush transcript]

-------------------------------------------------------------------

The Ohio delegation to the Electoral College cast its votes for
President Bush on Monday, but not before a coalition of groups asked
the state Supreme Court to review the outcome of the state's
presidential race.

The challengers, led by the Rev. Jesse Jackson, cited widespread
allegations of voting irregularities, voter suppression and fraud in
Ohio on Nov. 2nd and questioned whether President Bush won the key
swing state by 119,000 votes as certified by Secretary of State
Kenneth Blackwell last week.

The court did not act on the request before the ballots were cast
yesterday and the 20 GOP electors voted unanimously for Bush and
Vice President Dick Cheney. If the court decides to hear the
challenge, it can declare a new winner or throw out the results.

Third party candidates, David Cobb of the Green Party and Michael
Badnarik of the Libertarian Party are paying for recounts in each of
Ohio's 88 counties that will begin this week.

Blackwell spoke to reporters inside the Ohio statehouse yesterday
about the recount.


Kenneth Blackwell, Ohio Secretary of state speaking to reporters,
December 13, 2004.

Independent candidate Ralph Nader was ready to initiate a recount in
Ohio in the days following the election but could not, since only
candidates appearing on the Ohio ballot have legal standing to do
so. Nader was blocked from appearing on the ballot in Ohio by
Democratic Party efforts. Nader did successfully seek a recount in
New Hampshire in precincts where Diebold voting machines were used.

Ralph Nader, 2004 independent presidential candidate. His new book
is called "The Good Fight : Declare Your Independence and Close the
Democracy Gap by Ralph Nader."

-------------------------------------------------------------------

RUSH TRANSCRIPT
This transcript is available free of charge, however donations help
us provide closed captioning for the deaf and hard of hearing on our
TV broadcast. Thank you for your generous contribution.
Donate - $25, $50, $100, more...

AMY GOODMAN: Blackwell spoke to reporters inside the Ohio State
House yesterday about the recount.

KENNETH BLACKWELL: It is the generosity of Ohio law that allows them
to request this recount; and we are in fact are going to abide by
Ohio law and give them that recount. Now, no matter how much they
protest, no matter how many lawsuits they file, I have the fullest
of confidence in the integrity of our system.

AMY GOODMAN: That's Secretary of State Kenneth Blackwell of Ohio,
speaking with reporters. Independent candidate, Ralph Nader, was
ready to initiate a recount in Ohio in the days following the
election but couldn't, since only candidates appearing on the Ohio
ballot have legal standing to do so. Ralph Nader was blocked from
appearing on the ballot in Ohio by Democratic party efforts. Nader
did successfully seek a recount in New Hampshire in precincts where
Diebold voting machines were used, and he joins us in Washington
studio. Welcome to Democracy Now!, Ralph Nader.

RALPH NADER: Good morning, Amy.

AMY GOODMAN: It's good to have you with us. First, can you comment
on the electoral college vote in Ohio?

RALPH NADER: Well, there were a lot of irregularities, but most of
them so far occurred before election day. This was a Katherine
Harris production by Kenneth Blackwell, to depress the minority vote
or the vote in heavily Democratic areas. One of the most notable
ways was to reduce the number of voting machines in areas where
there were heavy minority, pro-Democrat voters. We pointed all this
out to Kerry-Edwards a few days after the election, chiding them for
conceding too early and running out the back door and ignoring their
repeated promise during the campaign that they were going to make
sure every vote was going to be counted. So, it's good that there's
going to be recount. How rigorous and fair it is and how upstanding
the courts will be remain to be seen. The Ohio Supreme Court,
notably in our case, ignored a clear U.S. Supreme Court decision in
Pennsylvania that had exact parallels in Ohio to keep us off the
ballot, so it's not very hopeful from the judicial point of view;
but it's important that the coalition do what it's doing.

AMY GOODMAN: You had a strange situation at night, election night,
when John Edwards came out and said: "Don't worry, every vote will
be counted, be patient," and then hours later, the same John Edwards
coming out, this time with John Kerry, conceding the election
without many more votes counted. There is reports that there was a
major split between them that morning -- of the morning after. What
about that, Ralph Nader?

RALPH NADER: Yeah. My understanding is that John Edwards didn't want
to concede that quickly, and there was a argument of sorts before
the one o'clock concession on November third about raising the issue
of every vote being counted, especially in Ohio. But the consultants
to Kerry prevailed. I guess they didn't want him to appear to sour
grapes or appear that he wasn't going out in a classy way.

AMY GOODMAN: Well, what about how the media now deals with this
issue? Very much the media, you know, expressing the spectrum
between the Democrats and the Republicans, but when the Democrats
agree with the Republicans, then the media doesn't pursue things
further. They very quickly -- The New York Times had a major piece
on the conspiracy theories around any kind of electoral fraud. Your
comment on that.

RALPH NADER: Yes, well, the media -- the general media will not move
on this until the Democratic Party takes a strong role. Kerry did
send some observers in there. The party, the D.N.C., did file along
with the coalition in one of the legal proceedings; but the media
has made up its mind that there's nothing there. They don't know
what they don't know. I mean, nobody knows what's there. That's why
there's going to be a recount. There are very sufficient, probative
irregularities that occurred before, during the election that
warrant a recall. Some of those are described on our website,
votenader.org which is trying to keep up with this recount
situation. Others are reflected in John Conyers' recent hearing on
Capitol Hill, which was blacked out by the mass media. This is so
far more an independent media focus.

AMY GOODMAN: What about what happened in New Hampshire, and where
did you get a recount?

RALPH NADER: Well, we got a recount in a few wards in New Hampshire,
which came out okay. New Hampshire has a Secretary of State that's
been there for many years, very non-partisan, very professional. And
they have a paper trail. And one of the things that we proved in New
Hampshire as -- people who want more detail can go to our web site
votenader.org -- is that the system worked there because there was a
paper trail. But in Maryland and other states where there was not a
paper trail, there's no way to make that kind of quick parallel
connections.

AMY GOODMAN: Do you think it's possible that John Kerry won? I mean,
with reports in Ohio, for example, one precinct having 638 voters,
about 4,000 votes going to Bush in that case and another when they
were counting them at the end of the day, the county commissioner
locking down, not allowing any observers, and when they were
criticized over the next few days, she ended up saying that
Department of Homeland Security and F.B.I. had approached her right
before the election and said there was a 'number ten national
security threat in the area,' and so she said she thought she
responded appropriately. The F.B.I. and Homeland Security then said
they never made this call or they had never sent an agent to
approach them.

RALPH NADER: Well, in addition to examples like that, and there were
52,000 votes more than there were voters in Cuyahoga County, which
was automatically corrected, so that's not -- That's just probative
of a climate that there's something there: A very partisan Secretary
of State (sort of a Katherine Harris wannabe), a Republican
legislature, a Republican governor. The stakes were enormous. You
have 11,500 precincts, ten vote a precinct on the average. Anything
is possible with an honest recount.

AMY GOODMAN: I wanted to ask you about what's happening with the
Democratic Party right now, and who will become head of it. I wanted
to turn to Howard Dean, a clip of what he had to say as he runs to
head up the Democratic Party.

HOWARD DEAN: Here in Washington, it seems that every time we lose an
election, there's a consensus reached among decision-makers in the
Democratic Party that the way to win is to be more like Republicans.
I suppose you could call that a philosophy, and this is the name of
that philosophy: If you don't beat them, then join them. I'm not
going to make a prediction, but if we accept that philosophy this
time around, then four years from now another Democrat will be
standing right here, giving the same speech. We cannot win by being
Republican-lite. We've tried it. It does not work.

AMY GOODMAN: Howard Dean. Your response, Ralph Nader.

RALPH NADER: Well, it's a mixed response. I mean, he's quite right
in what he says, but he spent the last few months being the hatchet
man trying to get us off the ballot, one of the people that the
Democratic party assigned, and that's the way he restored his
credentials with the established Democratic Party. That cost us over
a million dollars and we're still in debt on this, and as you can
see from our website, votenader.org, we're trying to offer
memorabilia and other ways to get out of debt, because they violated
our civil liberties, something that will be a more compelling issue
in the coming months. The idea of the Democrats saying every vote
should be counted, but there are certain candidates that are not
going to be allowed on the ballot if we can hire enough corporate
Republican law firms and harass them and file phony lawsuits. He was
all part of that. But, just hearing what he has to say, he's right
on. And the established Democratic Party now is getting ready again
to gang up on Howard Dean and defeat him for the D.N.C. chair, just
the way they ganged up on him in the primary. This is not a party in
decay, Amy. This is a decadent party. A decaying party ends up going
out of the way. It's replaced. A decadent party remains, loss after
loss, after loss, for the last ten years at the local, state and
national level, to the worst of the Republican Party. And there's no
major insurgency, except what is attempted by Howard Dean. And my
prediction is that he's simply not going to make it. There's going
to be another bland, monetized mind running the D.N.C. and curtsying
to the Democratic Leadership Council, which is really the corporate
Democrats that have run this party into the ground over the last
decade.

AMY GOODMAN:We're talking to independent, Ralph Nader. We're going
to go to a break and then come back with him.

[break]

AMY GOODMAN: Our guest is Ralph Nader, joining us in Washington,
D.C. Ralph ran for president in this election. Now the election is
over. Just to clarify did you say that you think it is possible John
Kerry might have won? I mean --

RALPH NADER: In Ohio, yes.

AMY GOODMAN: In general?

RALPH NADER: No. I mean, nobody knows, but there's so many
suspicious situations, so many gigantic mistakes that were made in a
number of precincts which were corrected to warrant looking at the
other 11,000-plus precincts. But worse than that, of course, is that
Secretary Blackwell, who is a republican, tried to discourage
registration forms from being accepted, when the Cleveland Plain
Dealer recommended that people fill out a coupon in the newspaper.
He said that wasn't thick enough paper. There were just a lot of
things that he did before the election that he's going to get away
with because doing these kinds of shenanigans by the Secretary of
State is considered politics. The republicans are in control in some
states, democrats control the others. It's not considered the
Constitutional crime that it really is. So a lot of the damage, Amy,
was done before election day. That's not going to be recovered with
a recount, but there certainly is enough evidence, certainly enough
eyewitness accounts, as Harvey Wasserman has pointed out and others
in his daily dispatches, to warrant a recount, and that recount will
occur, but it has got to occur under vigilance.

AMY GOODMAN: Ralph Nader, right now the nominees of President Bush
and also the agenda around issues like Social Security and where the
democrats stand.

RALPH NADER: Well, I don't know where some of them stand. They're
not coming back fighting except Harry Reid, the new minority leader
for the democrats in the Senate from Nevada, very clearly took a
stand on Social Security. That was very refreshing. But Mrs. Pelosi,
for example, Nancy Pelosi, she says, well, it's tough that I have to
be on the table. You don't deal that way with Social Security. There
is no crisis in Social Security. It's absolutely solvent until 2052,
according to the Social Security trustees, who are pretty
conservative. The slightest changes can continue it on for the rest
of the century. Medicare is the one with sky rocketing corporate
health costs that is in trouble. But Wall Street and the republicans
and the ideologues, including George W. Bush, have got their eyes on
these private accounts. That's the first way to undermine Social
Security, to weaken its ability to respond to the post-baby boomers,
and to pour that money into Wall Street. The democrats just have to
all get together in Congress and have a bright line where they say
to the republicans, "You're not getting across this line. We're
going to block you on this, this, and this, and we're going to have
our own proposals for living wage; for universal health care; for
how to get out of Iraq; for a systematic adequately budgeted
crackdown on corporate crime, fraud and abuse; for the conversion of
our country into solar and renewable energy…" A lot of the things
which I tried to point out in my new book, The Good Fight, which is
designed to say that the issue in politics today is -- the central
issue is the concentration of corporate power. Too much corporate
power over too many of our institutions, from elections to
government to universities to childhood. That's where the democrats
have to stand, and that's where they can win. Too much corporate
power, something recognized even by BusinessWeek magazine and many
others in the business press that have been chronicling this
overwhelming epidemic of corporate abuse.

AMY GOODMAN: What about Carlos Gutierrez, head of commerce, now Mike
Leavitt moving over from E.P.A. to head Department of Health and
Human Services, a Utah Mormon, fiercely anti-choice. It might not
have been as relevant head the Environmental Protection Agency, but
certainly when it comes to H.H.S.

RALPH NADER: This is bringing crony cabinets to a new level of
unprecedented intensity. I think Bush, of course, never admits to a
mistake. Bush has never met with an anti-war group in the Iraq
invasion, before, during or after. 13 of them from the National
Council of Churches to veterans to former intelligence officials to
peace groups all tried to meet with him before the invasion. He
turned them down. Now he's placing all of his cronies in all of
these cabinet positions because he doesn't want candid commentary
and candid advice. This is a closed-mind messianic militarist, who
can be vulnerable politically, if you had a steadfast Democratic
Party who knew what it stood for. Because the old story, refusing to
bend, he broke, will apply to Bush in politics, because he is
setting himself up for being advised by sycophants. This is like a
royal court, being advised by sycophants. But the democrats have got
to begin to develop their public policy, otherwise they're going to
continue to lose and lose, as they abandon whole regions in the
country that they call red states, one of the most mischievous
notions in political circles.

AMY GOODMAN: Ralph Nader, you wrote an open letter to President Bush
regarding the destruction of Fallujah mosques, and have also written
a letter about the state of the anti-war movement in this country.
Can you comment on both?

RALPH NADER: Yes. I mean, first of all, Bush is deliberately low-
balling U.S. casualties. If there are injuries in non-combat
situations, even though it's hostile territory in Iraq, large
numbers of diseases like sandfly disease, severe mental trauma, none
of these are mentioned. So, the actual injured casualty toll, if you
include diseases is more than triple the official amount. And I have
been going after the White House for six-seven months on this;
there's been no response. I sent it to the Kerry campaign saying
that you should run with this. No response. The media -- White House
media is not asking these questions. You ought to go down once in a
while and be part of that White House media, Amy. Teach them how to
ask some tough questions. As far as the mosques are concerned, Bush
keeps saying he wants to win the hearts and minds of the Iraqi
people. Yes, the mosques have been used as base for resistance in
more than a few instances, but if you win the tactic by destroying
the mosque, and you lose the strategy, it's like winning the battle
and losing the war. With all of his messianic statements, a lot of
Muslims believe that this is a religious war against them. Half of
the mosques in Fallujah, which is known as the City of Mosques, were
destroyed or badly damaged, and now soldiers are running into major
mosques, such as one in Baghdad, looking for suspects, and they did
at one right after prayer time on a Friday, very recently, for which
the U.S. military mildly apologized. But I basically asked Bush,
what is your position here? Where are your guidelines? Where are
your rules? So you don't further inflame the very people that you
are trying to persuade to be on your side. But this is all part of
Bush's so-called war on terrorism, which is you pursue it in a way
like invading Iraq that will produce more terrorists and more
terrorism, endangering America in ways that the republicans -- the
democrats and John Kerry decline to point out in their insufferable
obeisance to the wartime president.

AMY GOODMAN: It's interesting --

RALPH NADER: This will be elaborated further. I think the anti-war
movement went on hibernation because of anybody-but-Bush syndrome
for a year, and severely weakened itself. It needs to reassert
itself.

AMY GOODMAN: In the last few days, the news headlines, they have
said that ten U.S. Marines have died in the al Anbar province.
That's unusual. They usually say where. Of course, Fallujah is right
there. What do you think of this fact that we're getting less and
less information right now?

RALPH NADER: Well, I think the military over there has been
interviewed by people, members of Congress and one of them came back
and said, not one of the military officers said that the U.S. was
winning over there. So, obviously, there's a sugar-coating going on,
as occurred in the Vietnam War, that needs to be explored. I mean,
the best scenario for Bush now is a puppet regime with candidates
who are pre-cleared for running for the elections in January. They
have to have good character, not have been involved in any
disruptive activity, and had a certain level of education, which is
obviously so discretional -- discretionary that it's like a pre-
selection process for a puppet regime, with the oil industry in
control of their basic natural resource. This is not a prescription
for a peaceful transition. It's not a prescription for any kind of
modest, democratic society. Of course, that's one reason why the
Iraq insurgency is growing. There's simply not enough attention on
Paul Bremer's 100 dictatorial decrees that he left behind, including
extending Saddam Hussein's ban on workers forming trade unions for
which they can be arrested and put in jail and have been under the
occupation when they were demonstrating. There's a long tradition of
oil industry workers in trade unions before Saddam Hussein, and now
his decree, this dictator's decree, was extended by Paul Bremer's
dictatorial decrees. I would urge people to look up these Bremer
decrees, and just see what a puppet regime is going to inherit and
will be unable to change if there is an election in January.

AMY GOODMAN: Today Paul Bremer, George Tenet and Tommy Franks are
all being awarded the nation's highest award, the Medal of Freedom
by President Bush. Finally, speaking of presidents, are you going to
run for president in 2008, Ralph Nader?

RALPH NADER: I don't know. I do know that there has got to be more
voices and choices. The two-party system has got to be broken up. We
have to break out of this 220 year prison called the electoral
college, winner take all, two-party elected dictatorship. It's just
getting worse and they're converging more and more and surrendering
corporate power -- surrendering our government to corporate power.
We want a lot of alternative candidates, green, independent,
libertarian at the local, state and national level. If you want to
see -- Amy, if you want to see the trajectory of what I see in this
country, because of unbridled corporate power, it's in the book, The
Good Fight, which I urge people to read.

AMY GOODMAN: Ralph Nader, independent presidential candidate, author
of The Good Fight, joining us from Washington. Thank you.

RALPH NADER: Thank you, Amy.

To purchase an audio or video copy of this entire program, click
here for our new online ordering or call 1 (800) 881-2359.

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Gilad Atzmon www.gilad.co.uk on Israeli humanitarianism (ha, ha!):

in reference to the article:
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/521450.html


"The Israeli rescue teams in Thailand split up Thursday: One team
worked on identifying bodies in Krabi, while another worked on the
same task in Phuket...However, the Israeli crews - from the police
and Zaka (a non-profit group that specializes in identifying victims
of disasters) - are trying to locate dead Israelis before they are
buried".

As it seems,  the 'altruistic' Jews sent their 'rescue team' to
trace the bodies of their lost (Jewish) brothers. They are in a
state of panic, as we all know, dead Jews are precious, they deserve
a special burial. The fact that 5-10 Jews might be lost forever
among some other 125.000 gentiles is pretty horrifying, I am sure
you can see it. I am sure that you understand and support. But it
isn't only about that, There is a real Israeli genuine humanitarian
effort as well:

"The IDF is considering sending another planeload of humanitarian
aid to Sri Lanka, but no decision has yet been made".

For sure they can't decide.  It isn't that easy to choose whether to
send a rescue team to Sri Lanka , Indonesia, India or may be just to
Gaza. Apparently,  11 Palestinians died in the last 24 hrs as a
result of the never ending 'Jewish Tsunami'. Israelis are very good
at it, as soon as an event captures world attention, they would turn-
on their killing machine.


I suggest that we should all ask the Israelis to send their
humanitarian aid to Gaza.

We can't believe their humanitarian  initiatives anyway.

===============
Tsunami in Gaza
By Israel Shamir
http://www.israelshamir.net

While the whole world had sent aid to the tsunami-hit South East
Asia, Israel forwarded a team entrusted with unique task. Not many
Israeli tourists were swept away by the giant waves – official death
toll stands at three, with some twenty missing; not many comparing
with hundred thousand Indonesians or even with three thousand
Swedes. Still the Israeli teams were very active on the ground. The
highly trained experts led by Rabbi Meshi Zahav did not go to save
trapped survivors or alleviate suffering of millions; their job was
to save dead Jews from fate worse than death – that is to be buried
with the goyim in the same grave. The Haaretz daily[1]
reported: "The Israeli rescue teams in Thailand split up Thursday:
one team worked on identifying bodies in Krabi, while another worked
on the same task in Phuket. The Israeli crews - from the police and
Zaka (a non-profit group that specializes in identifying victims of
disasters) - are trying to locate dead Israelis before they are
buried".

They pressed upon the Thai government to postpone the mass
entombment, though it was necessary to prevent spread of epidemics;
and Bangkok gave in. Every dead Jewish body should be taken to
Israel, or at least buried separately from impure non-Jews. Witty
Gilad Atzmon remarked: "the `altruistic' Jews … are in a state of
panic, as we all know, dead Jews are precious, they deserve a
special burial. The fact that 5-10 Jews might be lost forever among
some other 125.000 gentiles is pretty horrifying, I am sure you can
see it."

This is a part and parcel of Jewish faith, the pinnacle of "The
Nation Shall Dwell Alone" commandment – Jews are not supposed to
live or to die with non-Jews. Their separate burial is necessary to
guarantee their bodily resurrection when Messiah comes. A Jewish
body defiled by gentile proximity won't be resurrected, according to
the Jews. Even irreligious Jews follow this separation rule without
giving it a second thought.

This squeamish attitude is particularly unpleasant: whenever the
Jews discover that a person of doubtful Jewishness is buried among
their lot they remove the body and dump it elsewhere. It happened to
an Israeli citizen Teresa Angelowitz. She was buried in the Jewish
cemetery; later on the religious authorities discovered that she was
a wife of a Jew, but not a Jew. They exhumed her body at the dark of
the night and re-buried on the dumping ground. It happened to many
Russian soldiers who died defending the Jewish character of Israel
and were refused the burial. Now, in face of the huge tragedy in
South East Asia, this insistence of `not being counted among the
goyim" is especially offensive, bordering on denial of our common
humanity. What is so bad about Thais, French, Chinese and other
people who found their death in the catastrophe that you can't leave
your dead lying next to them?

This nasty exclusiveness has to be taken into account while trying
to comprehend the long-running show of Israeli redeployment in Gaza.
Sharon's government wants to withdraw its troops from within the
strip to its perimeter. Fine and good: this is a reasonable (from
his point of view) decision: it is cheaper to keep Gaza under lock
and key, surrounded by Israeli troops. The redeployment is not good
neither bad for the Palestinians – the Jews will be able to kill
whoever they wish from their bases outside the narrow strip, but
this act is presented as an important step on the way to creation of
a Palestinian state.

Now, instead of redeployment, Israelis discuss the fate of some
(probably two thousand) Jewish settlers in Gaza strip. Sharon wants
to evacuate them and pay them hefty compensation; they object to
evacuation. The whole Israeli society discusses whether they can be
removed; how much force should be applied; whether `Jews may remove
Jews'; whether the ruling of the Rabbis forbidding the evacuation
takes precedence over the government decision.

Nobody, but absolutely nobody is ready to consider an obvious (for a
non-Jew) solution: remove the army and leave the settlers where they
are. If they want to stay in Gaza, let them. Do not pay a penny for
their removal: they are free men and women; they knew what they did
when they accepted the lands and houses in Gaza. There are hundreds
of American Jews who want to buy their houses, there are
Palestinians who will be willing to buy – so there is no problem,
whoever wants stays, whoever wants to leave sells his house and
leaves. If they will be nasty to their neighbours, they will flee;
if they will be good neighbours, they will flourish.

Indeed, when the British Empire left Palestine, or India, or Africa,
they did not evacuate their citizens by force. Whoever felt that he
caused too much grief to the natives, left for England; whoever
preferred to stay – stayed.

Kenya is a good case to consider. The country had a sizeable English
settler community; there was also very active Mau-Mau native
resistance, much more violent than the Palestinian; still, when
Kenya was granted independence, the settlers stayed. I have met them
in the Highlands near Lake Rudolf: prosperous farmers, strong and
sunburned, similar to old-style Israelis, they speak local language,
are involved in local life. Many of them have their small airplanes
and pop into Nairobi for an evening drink whenever they get tired
from watching pink flamingos at the lakeside. The settlers try to be
good neighbours to the native people – after all, the political
power in hands of native Kikuyu; and RAF is not likely to defend
them.

This is the example for the Israeli settlers to emulate, while the
Israeli government should not tell them what to do and where to
live. Their settlements won't be `for Jews only'. They will have
native neighbours, not only farm hands, but native officials, native
police and native judges – but this consideration did not stop
thousands of Brits and French, Portuguese and Spaniards, Russians
and Germans to remain in the newly independent countries. The
evacuation discourse that brought Israel to the verge of civil war
can't be comprehended outside of the general nasty picture of Jewish
exclusiveness.

Only people who can't bear the thought of being buried in one grave
with a goy, can't imagine the possibility of staying as equals
without the army and colonial administration to enforce their
superiority. Azmi Bishara, our MP from Nazareth, was right when he
refused to support Sharon's initiative; while the Labour party of
Peres and Barak added another shameful deed to its long roll of
shame when they joined Sharon's government to carry on
the `disengagement'. The case of the Gaza settlers may be used to
undermine and destroy the "Jewish character of the state". There is
no reason to play into the game of Jewish exclusivity, whether in
Thailand or in Gaza.


-------------------------------------------------------------------

[1] http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/521450.html

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US backing precludes Alexander Downer from the top disarmament job,
writes Marian Wilkinson.

Iran: The coup that never came off:
http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2004/12/16/1102787210175.html
December 17, 2004


Alexander Downer should be counting his blessings. If some
hardliners in the Bush Administration have their way, next year the
Australian Foreign Minister could find himself being asked to
deliver the rationale that would justify a pre-emptive military
strike against Iran's nuclear facilities.

The extraordinary plan by some US officials to back Downer as the
next director-general of the International Atomic Energy Agency is,
in great part, being driven by the nuclear crisis in Iran. The Bush
Administration wants more options to confront the crisis and is
frustrated with the cautious approach being taken by the current
agency chief, Mohamed ElBaradei.

And, much to the alarm of America's European allies, there is
serious debate in Washington over whether ultimately the US should
launch a limited bombing raid on Iran's nuclear sites.

The Bush Administration knows ElBaradei is unlikely to produce a
report that could be used to justify such drastic action. So far, he
has not produced a report that has allowed the US to force the
crisis to the Security Council where it wants to push for sanctions.

The White House decided months ago it needed a more supportive
candidate at the agency. Downer was near the top of Washington's
list. But the revelations this week of the crude intelligence
operation to help oust ElBaradei has all but ended this ambitious
plan and any hope of Downer moving to Vienna.

Reports that US officials were combing the transcripts of bugged
telephone conversations between ElBaradei and Iranian officials
searching for damaging material has greatly boosted his chances of
staying on for a third term.

"What the US was doing was childish and counterproductive," an
Iranian specialist, George Perkovich, who believes that ElBaradei
will now almost certainly be re-elected, told the
Herald. "Australia, Israel and a few loyal allies might be
sympathetic," said Perkovich, "but the rest of the states are not in
any mood."

The Europeans are particularly worried about John Bolton, the
hardline Under Secretary of State for Disarmament and now one of the
most powerful voices in the Bush Administration on the twin crises
of Iran and North Korea.

He is strongly supported by the Vice-President, Dick Cheney, and
both have little time for ElBaradei.

Cheney famously slammed ElBaradei's finding before the Iraq war that
Saddam Hussein had no active nuclear weapons program. ElBaradei was,
of course, proved correct but this did not help him in Washington.

What is still unclear is just what role Australia is playing in the
moves to oust ElBaradei and whether we, too, would ultimately
support a pre-emptive strike against Iran. Downer's ducking and
weaving this week told us very little about where Australia stands
either on ElBaradei or how heavily we are backing the US strategy
for dealing with Iran.

After days of silence Downer conceded he had spoken to US officials
about ElBaradei's job but revealed nothing of the
conversations. "I've not taken up the opportunity to demonstrate a
great deal of interest in this job," was the convoluted answer on
what was said in his discussions with unnamed US officials.

Downer now says: "I would rule it out. I don't think there is a
circumstance where I would go for a job like that." But this is
academic. Now Downer, as the US-backed candidate, would be unlikely
to have a chance.

Two big questions remain unanswered. One concerns the intelligence
operation against ElBaradei. No one in Washington or at the atomic
energy agency headquarters is surprised that ElBaradei's telephone
is bugged. Eavesdropping is routinely carried out against senior UN
officials by the US National Security Agency in co-operation with
Britain's GCHQ and Australia's Defence Signals Directorate. Details
of a similar bugging operation on Kofi Annan were leaked by a GCHQ
translator before the Iraq war.

What is more dubious, as James Bamford, an expert on the National
Security Agency, pointed out, is using the product not for national
security purposes but to manipulate the selection of a senior UN
official. Downer brushed aside the bugging operation at a press
conference this week, saying the story was "just an attempt to
attack the Bush Administration".

No it was not. US officials leaked the story and it exposed an
intelligence operation that most likely used Australian assets for
an end that potentially involved Downer.

While no one seriously expects Downer or any Government official to
discuss the bugging operation, the Howard Government's position on
whether ElBaradei should stay or go should be clear. Downer saying
Australia "was not getting involved" is bizarre.

We almost certainly knew of the intelligence operation against
ElBaradei and we are on the IAEA board and where we will most likely
vote is as a loyal US ally.

Australia's position on ElBaradei is, more importantly, vital to
understanding to our position on Iran.

US officials, including Bolton, are deeply upset by ElBaradei's
efforts with the agency board that led to Britain, France and
Germany signing an accord last month with Iran, offering economic
inducements in exchange for Iran freezing its nuclear program.

The US has refused to endorse that accord. On November 29, it
delivered its response to the deal in a lengthy statement that said,
in part: "We believe Iran's nuclear weapons program poses a growing
threat to international peace and security and the global
nonproliferation regime."

It warned the agency board and the Europeans that the US
reserved "all its options" to go to the Security Council on Iran. It
concluded: "We are all obliged to do whatever we can to persuade
Iran to make the right choice."

At the same time, US officials leaked a string of damaging stories
on ElBaradei accusing him of withholding evidence damaging to Iran
from the agency board and "whitewashing Iran". The leaks appear to
be based, at least in part, on the bugged phone conversations.

Perkovich believes ElBaradei may have "trimmed" some of the
reporting on Iran. But he may have felt completely justified in
doing so. "Other states are worried about what might flow from a
negative report on Iran. The US has been such bullies that much of
the rest of the world is afraid of what the US is planning to do on
Iran."

ElBaradei denies keeping any detail out of the reporting on Iran
that was relevant. But there is no doubt his reports and his efforts
have kept Iran in the diplomatic game and forestalled a crisis.
While he has angered the US, he has left many other countries
relieved.

In reality, there are few good military options for dealing with the
Iranian crisis.

Key nuclear sites are hidden, the bombing would likely kill hundreds
of innocent civilians, unite the country behind the hardliners and
prompt Tehran to retaliate, probably in the form of terrorist
attacks.

Yet despite these obvious drawbacks, in Washington the military
option appears to be gaining some ground. And if push comes to
shove, will Australia support a pre-emptive US military strike
against Iran? It is critical to know where the Howard Government
stands in this crisis whether or not the Foreign Minister goes to
Vienna.

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World Tribunal on Iraq
Premeditated Death and Destruction Unleashed Against a Sovereign
Nation and
People

by Niloufer Bhagwat

Opening statement before the Iraq tribunal hearings at Tokyo
http://207.44.245.159/article7475.htm

11 Dec 2004


Honorable Judges , Prosecutors , Amici Curiae , witnesses of the
satanic death and destruction of the people of Iraq , of homes and
livelihood , of hospitals , schools and places of worship; concerned
citizens of Japan .

We live in strange times. For even as a war rages fiercely in Iraq
which in epic terms can be compared to a "Mahabharat" , a fierce war
between the forces of right and wrong , justice and injustice ,
occupation and national liberation ; we resume this trial in the
dark shadows of an "Apocalypse" which is the continuing military
occupation and the reduction of the entire population of Iraq into
the inmates of a vast concentration camp unmonitored even by the Red
Cross and other UN and other International humanitarian
organizations. Unprecedented in the annals of legal history,
evidence is being recorded in this trial even as crimes continue to
be committed with impunity, bringing home to us the reality of human
existence, that words are never enough to defeat a brutal tyranny
and even those of us who use words as tools are speechless in the
face of the deliberate and premeditated death and destruction
unleashed against a sovereign nation and people ,a member state of
the United Nations waged solely to capture its oil resources and
with that objective to subjugate and eliminate its population
through one strategy or another.

Millions of people in the world including in the United States ,
even before the aggression and military occupation commenced , much
before we commenced our slow and painstaking examination of evidence
and precedents , sensing imminent and unprecedented danger to the
peoples of the entire world including to soldiers recruited to
defend Republics and parliamentary democracies proceeded to
pronounce their verdict against the doctrine of "continuous war "
against one nation or another ;against the conversion of domestic
economies into "war economies" even as thousands and thereafter
millions were rendered unemployed .The people across continents
opposed the policy of "blood for oil" and declared their rejection
of this strategy of pre-emptive war for the control of resources of
other societies and nations .

The International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War had
estimated before the military onslaught that a fresh attack against
Iraq would result in the deaths of anywhere between 48,000 to
260,000 Iraqi citizens and that post-war effects could take the
lives of an additional 200,000 Iraqis excluding those killed in the
1991 attack on Iraq and those dead because of illegal sanctions
imposed on the civilian population of Iraq by the Security Council
and issue which I had dealt with in detail at Kyoto, quoting
extensively from the statements of Mr. Dennis Halliday a former
International Civil Servant of rare integrity who had resigned on
the issues of sanctions claiming that it amounted to an illegal
declaration of war on the civilian population.

Now in the 19 month of the occupation by the military forces mainly
drawn from the United States and UK along with other smaller
contingents all members of the coalition of the aggressors ; Lancet
Online Medical Journal based in the UK has published a study by
American health experts and researchers at the John Hopkins School
of Public Health, Columbia University and al Mustansiriya University
Baghdad on the deaths of Iraqi civilians under the military
occupation. The study confirms that : " Violent deaths were
widespread….and were mainly attributed to coalition forces. Most
individuals reportedly killed by coalition forces were women and
children…"

The report went on to say that: "Making conservative assumptions ,
we think that about 100,000 excess deaths , or more have happened
since the 2003 invasion of Iraq. Violence accounted for most of the
excess deaths and air strikes of coalition forces accounted for most
violent deaths."

Les Roberts and Gilbert Burnham who collaborated on the research
published informed the media that they had evidence of the use of
air power in populated urban areas. Richard Horton editor of the
Lancet in an editorial emphasized that the "findings also raise
questions for those far removed from Iraq – in the governments of
the countries responsible for launching a pre –emptive war". The
mounting evidence of the human catastrophe in Iraq not seen since
the days of the Second World War prima facie indicates that the
death toll may be more but not less than 100,000 and even the Lancet
report however sincere has underestimated the death toll from all
facets of the Occupation.

In assessing the extent of Genocide it is necessary to focus on the
destruction and attack on hospitals and health clinics to deny
medical relief to those who could be saved if the Iraqi health
service was not destroyed . This strategy was visible in the policy
of organized looting and destruction of Iraqi hospitals in the weeks
and months after the attack .The deliberate bombing of water pipes,
the cutting off of water supplies to cities and town under siege by
US, UK and other forces , destruction of sewage pipes and sanitary
facilities , of electricity and heating have condemned millions in
Iraq to consume contaminated water and food ,as a consequence the
old, the feeble, and the children have been dying of diarrhea and
related diseases caused by contamination of food and water with lack
of medicines and health care leading to an increase in mortality.
This is an indicator that apart from death by violence the
Occupation has condemned people to death from malnutrition and lack
of food , and water and food borne diseases with inadequate health
care directly caused by the Occupation .

The intrepid reporter Dahr Jamail reporting for a weekly in Alaska
has disclosed that from what he had seen in six months in Iraq at
close quarters , it was difficult to find any family in Iraq who had
not had a member killed on account of the conditions arising from
the Occupation. And what of the heroic city of Fallujah which dared
to resist the mercenaries of US and UK Security Companies and
Agencies, who have no combatant status under the Geneva Convention
in any armed conflict , yet are to-day high profile in one war after
another in Bosnia, in Kosovo , in Afghanistan and other theatres
including in the trafficking in human beings as slaves .On 14th
October 2004 sensing that the city of 300,000 was to be singled out
for destruction as it had become a symbol of Resistance against the
Occupation ; the people of Fallujah through several organizations of
Teachers, Tribal Leaders, the Shura Council , the Bar Association,
through the President of the Study Centre of Human Rights and
Democracy forwarded an urgent appeal to the Secretary General of the
United Nations in these words:

" Your Excellency, It is obvious that the American forces are
committing crimes of genocide every day in Iraq .Now while we are
writing to Your Excellency , the American warplanes are dropping
their most powerful bombs on the civilians in the city , killing and
injuring hundreds of innocent people . At the same time their tanks
are attacking the city with their heavy artillery…" "On the night of
13th October alone American bombardment demolished 50 houses on top
of their residents. Is this a genocidal crime or a lesson about
democracy? It is obvious that the Americans are committing acts of
terror against the people of Fallujah for one reason only : their
refusal to accept the Occupation."

"Your Excellency and the whole world knows that the Americans and
their allies devastated our country under the pretext of the threat
of the Weapons of Mass Destruction .Now after the destruction and
the killing of thousands of civilians , they have admitted that
there were no weapons found .But they say nothing about all the
crimes they have committed .Unfortunately everyone is now silent and
will not dignify the murdered Iraqi civilians with words of
condemnation .Are the Americans going to pay compensation as Iraq
has been forced to do after the Gulf War……."

" We know we are living in a world of double standards .In
Fallujah , they have created a new vague target: AL ZARQAWI. This is
a new pretext to justify their crimes, killing and daily bombardment
of civilians. Almost a year has passed since they created this new
pretext and whenever they destroy houses ….they said `We have
launched a successful operation against AL Zarqawi. hey will never
say that they have killed him because there is no such person. And
that means the daily killings of civilians and the daily genocide
will continue."

"At the same time the representatives of Fallujah , our tribal
leader has denounced on many occasions the kidnapping and killing of
civilians , and we have no links to any group committing such
inhuman behaviour." " Excellency , we appeal to you and to all the
world leaders to exert the greatest pressure on the American
administration to stop the crimes in Fallujah and withdraw their
army….the city was quiet and peaceful when its people ran it ….We
simply did not welcome the Occupation. This is our right according
to the UN Charter , International Law and the laws of humanity. If
the Americans believe in the opposite they should first withdraw
from the UN and all its agencies before acting in a way contrary to
the Charter they have signed"

" It is very urgent that your Excellency along with the world
leaders, intervenes in a speedy manner to prevent a new massacre…."
This was the voice of the people of Fallujah appealing to the UN and
to world leaders and what was the response? After the administration
of the United States had taken care of the African-American voters
and others through the Diebold electronic voting machines on the 8th
November commenced the destruction of Fallujah which to the United
States was a symbol of Iraqi resistance throughout the world. There
is hardly a home intact in the city of Fallujah. The first attack by
US forces with the Black Watch Regiments poised on the highways ,
was on the Fallujah hospitals and medical personnel who report the
casualty figures and treat the wounded the messengers of the
devastation and loss of lives .Dr Khamis al-Muhammadi of the
Fallujan General Hospital has informed the media that she was seized
and taken away by Occupation forces even as she was about to cut an
unbilical cord during child birth; several doctors have been
reported to have been killed and all hospitals and clinics
destroyed. AL ZARQAWI like BIN LADEN was never captured despite the
destruction of the entire city. Yet who can destroy the spirit of
Fallujah which has survived many attempts of a whole century to
crush it.

Even as use of Depleted Uranium , of napalm, of banned chemicals
spread throughout the world , Mr . Kofi Anan reacted to the appeal
of Fallujah and pronounced what had already been known to millions
that : "The Occupation of Iraq is illegal…" with the Japan Times
subsequently reporting that the Secretary General of the United
Nations would pay the price for this statement with calls for his
resignation despite past services rendered and though the real price
for the fraudulently conceived `FOOD FOR OIL' program vests with the
Security Council and the entire policy and its implementation was
illegal as it sought to impose control over the resources of anther
sovereign country to regulate production and distribution of Oil.

With the war declared categorically illegal even by the Secretary
General of the United Nations , on what basis does the US
administration plan to increase troop levels .Why has it concealed
from the world that it has already created four military bases in
Iraq with the objective of permanent occupation . And what is the
nature of the liberation of Iraq. Dahr Jamail reports that Baghdad
after 19 months remains in shambles bombed out buildings sit as
insulting reminders of unbroken promises of reconstruction 70 % of
Iraqis at the very minimum are unemployed and there is a five mile
petrol lines in an oil rich country.Engineers and doctors are
unemployed and ply taxis .there are mass graves of innocent
civilians in Fallujah and bodies with skins melted by napalm .bodies
bloated and rotting devoured by dogs in the street after the
complete destruction of the city of Fallujah water supply is
frequently cut off from cities and towns targeted for attack
children lie deformed by Depleted Uranium exposure in shattered
hospitals from lack of treatment or even pain medication the Iraqi
Red Crescent, other relief teams and the Red Cross has been
obstructed in rendering aid mosques are bullet ridden with blood
stained carpets."

Even as governments and heads of State continue to deal with war
criminals we must recall that the assault on Fallujah and other
cities , towns and villages of Iraq are covered by article 6 (b) of
the 1945 Nuremberg Charter and in the trials of the Far East or
Tokyo trials among the war crimes defined include the" Wanton
destruction of cities , towns or villages " crimes for which the
Nazi leaders and other Generals and militarists were tried and
executed .The acts perpetrated by US,UK forces in the onslaught on
Fallujah constitutes a clear violation of the laws of Land War found
in the US army Field Manual 27-10. What of the US, UK soldiers used
as one half of the poor to kill the other half ;recruited from
working class families from isolated and marginalized communities
and towns affected by the economic recession and the downturn
sweeping the United States and England with employment opportunities
steadily decreasing. Christian Bollyn of the American Free Press ,
Washington D.C asked Lt.Col. Joe Yoswa if the US was using Depleted
Uranium in Fallujah and received the reply that " DU is the standard
round on the M-1 Abraham Tanks" which have been used in Fallujah.
Because of the nature of poison gas exploded by the exploded DU
shells, American Free Press asked Yoswa if the troops were protected
from DU poisoning .Lt.Col. Joe Yoswa seemed unaware of the dangers
posed by DU. Marion Falk a retired Nuclear scientist from Livermore
Lab informed the media that US troops in DU contaminated
battlefields are considered "throw away soldiers" who are dispensed
with once exposed , and replaced by others who become throw away in
their turn with risks of cancer ,deformed children from genetic
damage and serious health problems. There is no higher purpose to
fulfil for the "throw away soldiers" than the war and oil profits of
the Corporations at stake from the continued occupation and the fear
and unemployment at home; the bankrupting of the US economy are two
sides of the same coin of which one side is the Occupation and the
other side is the whipping up of fear and frenzy in the United
States. Uranium Weapons

There is a direct connection between the appropriation sought for
the war at the cost of sweeping budget cuts and the steady
elimination of social security funds and post office savings .There
is also a direct connection between the nature of elections held in
the United States , in Kabul where Mr.Hamid Karzai the
representative of the UNOCAL Company cannot stir out of Kabul , and
the elections proposed to be held in Iraq under conditions of
Occupation and coercion .

In all three countries the strategy is the same ; coerce the
electorate and declare an election as "won" after which without a
constitutional mandate enslave the majority of the people by
obfuscating political ,economic and social rights reducing countries
to garrisons .In recognition of these similarities and the impact of
the illegal war on the people of the United States that the anti-war
coalition has supported the "absolute right of the people of Iraq to
resist the occupation of their country" and declared their own
resistance to re-instate the draft and to prepare for resistance if
conscription returns. In what has far reaching consequences for
International Security the movement has declared that "it is
incumbent on us to reject that notion that smaller countries must
disarm and leave themselves defenseless at the demand of Bush and
the Pentagon. Such demands are not only hypocritical , irrational
and unjust , they amount to little more than a pretext for more
invasions and occupations " . In the context of the fact that the
resistance to the Iraq war has more than one front with the the
military front in Iraq and the political front in the Americas it is
necessary in view of the Security Council having acquiesced to the
Occupation despite the fact that it is illegal that the General
Assembly should be moved by a member of the United Nations to
initiate moves for the vacating of the aggression against Iraq under
Article 35 read with article 11 (2 ) . Any organization in which
some powers have the hegemony of the veto can never fulfill the
requirements of a new democratic international order .

Prof. Niloufer Bhagwat

http://www.worldtribunal.org/main.htm

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The environment is in trouble and the religious right doesn't care.
It's time to act as if the future depends on us – because it does.

Bill Moyers: Battlefield Earth
http://207.44.245.159/article7477.htm

Recently the Center for Health and the Global Environment at Harvard
Medical School presented its fourth annual Global Environment
Citizen Award to Bill Moyers. In presenting the award, Meryl Streep,
a member of the Center board, said, "Through resourceful, intrepid
reportage and perceptive voices from the forward edge of the debate,
Moyers has examined an environment under siege with the aim of
engaging citizens." Following is the text of Bill Moyers' response
to Ms. Streep's presentation of the award.

12/08/04 " AlterNet" -- I accept this award on behalf of all the
people behind the camera whom you never see. And for all those
scientists, advocates, activists, and just plain citizens whose
stories we have covered in reporting on how environmental change
affects our daily lives. We journalists are simply beachcombers on
the shores of other people's knowledge, other people's experience,
and other people's wisdom. We tell their stories.

The journalist who truly deserves this award is my friend, Bill
McKibben. He enjoys the most conspicuous place in my own pantheon of
journalistic heroes for his pioneer work in writing about the
environment. His best seller "The End of Nature" carried on where
Rachel Carson's "Silent Spring" left off.

Writing in Mother Jones recently, Bill described how the problems we
journalists routinely cover – conventional, manageable programs like
budget shortfalls and pollution – may be about to convert to
chaotic, unpredictable, unmanageable situations. The most
unmanageable of all, he writes, could be the accelerating
deterioration of the environment, creating perils with huge momentum
like the greenhouse effect that is causing the melting of the Arctic
to release so much freshwater into the North Atlantic that even the
Pentagon is growing alarmed that a weakening gulf stream could yield
abrupt and overwhelming changes, the kind of changes that could
radically alter civilizations.

That's one challenge we journalists face – how to tell such a story
without coming across as Cassandras, without turning off the people
we most want to understand what's happening, who must act on what
they read and hear.

As difficult as it is, however, for journalists to fashion a
readable narrative for complex issues without depressing our readers
and viewers, there is an even harder challenge – to pierce the
ideology that governs official policy today. One of the biggest
changes in politics in my lifetime is that the delusional is no
longer marginal. It has come in from the fringe, to sit in the seat
of power in the Oval Office and in Congress. For the first time in
our history, ideology and theology hold a monopoly of power in
Washington. Theology asserts propositions that cannot be proven
true; ideologues hold stoutly to a world view despite being
contradicted by what is generally accepted as reality. When ideology
and theology couple, their offspring are not always bad but they are
always blind. And there is the danger: voters and politicians alike,
oblivious to the facts.

Remember James Watt, President Reagan's first secretary of the
Interior? My favorite online environmental journal, the ever-
engaging Grist, reminded us recently of how James Watt told the U.S.
Congress that protecting natural resources was unimportant in light
of the imminent return of Jesus Christ. In public testimony he
said, "after the last tree is felled, Christ will come back."

Beltway elites snickered. The press corps didn't know what he was
talking about. But James Watt was serious. So were his compatriots
out across the country. They are the people who believe the bible is
literally true – one-third of the American electorate, if a recent
Gallup poll is accurate. In this past election several million good
and decent citizens went to the polls believing in the rapture
index. That's right – the rapture index. Google it and you will find
that the best-selling books in America today are the 12 volumes of
the left-behind series written by the Christian fundamentalist and
religious right warrior, Timothy LaHaye. These true believers
subscribe to a fantastical theology concocted in the 19th century by
a couple of immigrant preachers who took disparate passages from the
Bible and wove them into a narrative that has captivated the
imagination of millions of Americans.

Its outline is rather simple, if bizarre (the British writer George
Monbiot recently did a brilliant dissection of it and I am indebted
to him for adding to my own understanding): once Israel has occupied
the rest of its "biblical lands," legions of the anti-Christ will
attack it, triggering a final showdown in the valley of Armageddon.
As the Jews who have not been converted are burned, the Messiah will
return for the rapture. True believers will be lifted out of their
clothes and transported to heaven, where, seated next to the right
hand of God, they will watch their political and religious opponents
suffer plagues of boils, sores, locusts, and frogs during the
several years of tribulation that follow.

I'm not making this up. Like Monbiot, I've read the literature. I've
reported on these people, following some of them from Texas to the
West Bank. They are sincere, serious and polite as they tell you
they feel called to help bring the rapture on as fulfillment of
biblical prophecy. That's why they have declared solidarity with
Israel and the Jewish settlements and backed up their support with
money and volunteers. It's why the invasion of Iraq for them was a
warm-up act, predicted in the Book of Revelations where four
angels "which are bound in the great river Euphrates will be
released to slay the third part of man." A war with Islam in the
Middle East is not something to be feared but welcomed – an
essential conflagration on the road to redemption. The last time I
Googled it, the rapture index stood at 144 – just one point below
the critical threshold when the whole thing will blow, the son of
god will return, the righteous will enter heaven and sinners will be
condemned to eternal hellfire.

So what does this mean for public policy and the environment? Go to
Grist to read a remarkable work of reporting by the journalist,
Glenn Scherer – "The Road to Environmental Apocalypse." Read it and
you will see how millions of Christian fundamentalists may believe
that environmental destruction is not only to be disregarded but
actually welcomed – even hastened – as a sign of the coming
apocalypse.

As Grist makes clear, we're not talking about a handful of fringe
lawmakers who hold or are beholden to these beliefs. Nearly half the
U.S. Congress before the recent election – 231 legislators in total –
  more since the election – are backed by the religious right. Forty-
five senators and 186 members of the 108th congress earned 80 to 100
percent approval ratings from the three most influential Christian
right advocacy groups. They include Senate Majority Leader Bill
Frist, Assistant Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, Conference Chair
Rick Santorum of Pennsylvania, Policy Chair Jon Kyl of Arizona,
House Speaker Dennis Hastert, and Majority Whip Roy Blunt. The only
Democrat to score 100 percent with the Christian coalition was
Senator Zell Miller of Georgia, who recently quoted from the
biblical book of Amos on the senate floor: "the days will come,
sayeth the Lord God, that I will send a famine in the land." he
seemed to be relishing the thought.

And why not? There's a constituency for it. A 2002 TIME/CNN poll
found that 59 percent of Americans believe that the prophecies found
in the book of Revelations are going to come true. Nearly one-
quarter think the Bible predicted the 9/11 attacks. Drive across the
country with your radio tuned to the more than 1,600 Christian radio
stations or in the motel turn some of the 250 Christian TV stations
and you can hear some of this end-time gospel. And you will come to
understand why people under the spell of such potent prophecies
cannot be expected, as Grist puts it, "to worry about the
environment. Why care about the earth when the droughts, floods,
famine and pestilence brought by ecological collapse are signs of
the apocalypse foretold in the bible? Why care about global climate
change when you and yours will be rescued in the rapture? And why
care about converting from oil to solar when the same god who
performed the miracle of the loaves and fishes can whip up a few
billion barrels of light crude with a word?"

Because these people believe that until Christ does return, the lord
will provide. One of their texts is a high school history book,
America's providential history. You'll find there these words: "the
secular or socialist has a limited resource mentality and views the
world as a pie ... that needs to be cut up so everyone can get a
piece." However, "[t]he Christian knows that the potential in god is
unlimited and that there is no shortage of resources in god's
earth ... while many secularists view the world as overpopulated,
Christians know that god has made the earth sufficiently large with
plenty of resources to accommodate all of the people." No wonder
Karl Rove goes around the White House whistling that militant
hymn, "Onward Christian Soldiers." He turned out millions of the
foot soldiers on Nov. 2, including many who have made the apocalypse
a powerful driving force in modern American politics.

I can see in the look on your faces just how hard it is for the
journalist to report a story like this with any credibility. So let
me put it on a personal level. I myself don't know how to be in this
world without expecting a confident future and getting up every
morning to do what I can to bring it about. So I have always been an
optimist. Now, however, I think of my friend on Wall Street whom I
once asked: "What do you think of the market?" "I'm optimistic," he
answered. "Then why do you look so worried?" And he
answered: "Because I am not sure my optimism is justified."

I'm not, either. Once upon a time I agreed with Eric Chivian and the
Center for Health and the Global Environment that people will
protect the natural environment when they realize its importance to
their health and to the health and lives of their children. Now I am
not so sure. It's not that I don't want to believe that – it's just
that I read the news and connect the dots:

I read that the administrator of the U.S. Environmental Protection
Agency has declared the election a mandate for President Bush on the
environment. This for an administration that wants to rewrite the
Clean Air Act, the Clean Water Act and the Endangered Species Act
protecting rare plant and animal species and their habitats, as well
as the National Environmental Policy Act that requires the
government to judge beforehand if actions might damage natural
resources.

That wants to relax pollution limits for ozone; eliminate vehicle
tailpipe inspections; and ease pollution standards for cars, sports
utility vehicles and diesel-powered big trucks and heavy equipment.

That wants a new international audit law to allow corporations to
keep certain information about environmental problems secret from
the public.

That wants to drop all its new-source review suits against polluting
coal-fired power plans and weaken consent decrees reached earlier
with coal companies.

That wants to open the Arctic [National] Wildlife Refuge to drilling
and increase drilling in Padre Island National Seashore, the longest
stretch of undeveloped barrier island in the world and the last
great coastal wild land in America.

I read the news just this week and learned how the Environmental
Protection Agency had planned to spend nine million dollars – two
million of it from the administration's friends at the American
Chemistry Council – to pay poor families to continue to use
pesticides in their homes. These pesticides have been linked to
neurological damage in children, but instead of ordering an end to
their use, the government and the industry were going to offer the
families $970 each, as well as a camcorder and children's clothing,
to serve as guinea pigs for the study.

I read all this in the news.

I read the news just last night and learned that the
administration's friends at the international policy network, which
is supported by ExxonMobil and others of like mind, have issued a
new report that climate change is "a myth, sea levels are not
rising," [and] scientists who believe catastrophe is possible
are "an embarrassment."

I not only read the news but the fine print of the recent
appropriations bill passed by Congress, with the obscure (and
obscene) riders attached to it: a clause removing all endangered
species protections from pesticides; language prohibiting judicial
review for a forest in Oregon; a waiver of environmental review for
grazing permits on public lands; a rider pressed by developers to
weaken protection for crucial habitats in California.

I read all this and look up at the pictures on my desk, next to the
computer – pictures of my grandchildren: Henry, age 12; of Thomas,
age 10; of Nancy, 7; Jassie, 3; Sara Jane, 9 months. I see the
future looking back at me from those photographs and I say, "Father,
forgive us, for we know not what we do." And then I am stopped short
by the thought: "That's not right. We do know what we are doing. We
are stealing their future. Betraying their trust. Despoiling their
world."

And I ask myself: Why? Is it because we don't care? Because we are
greedy? Because we have lost our capacity for outrage, our ability
to sustain indignation at injustice?

What has happened to our moral imagination?

On the heath Lear asks Gloucester: "How do you see the world?" And
Gloucester, who is blind, answers: "I see it feelingly.'"

I see it feelingly.

The news is not good these days. I can tell you, though, that as a
journalist I know the news is never the end of the story. The news
can be the truth that sets us free – not only to feel but to fight
for the future we want. And the will to fight is the antidote to
despair, the cure for cynicism, and the answer to those faces
looking back at me from those photographs on my desk. What we need
to match the science of human health is what the ancient Israelites
called "hochma" – the science of the heart ... the capacity to
see ... to feel ... and then to act ... as if the future depended on
you.

Believe me, it does.

Bill Moyers is the host of the weekly public affairs series NOW with
Bill Moyers, which airs Friday nights on PBS.

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Cuba Places Iraq Jail Abuse Photos at U.S. Mission:

Cuba on Friday put up two huge billboards in front of the U.S.
mission with pictures of abused Iraqi prisoners, a swastika and the
word "fascists" in bold red letters.

Photo
http://snipurl.com/bfzt

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Lessons from Wal-Mart and the Wehrmacht:


Team Wolfowitz on Administration in the Information Age
http://www.mepc.org/public_asp/journal_vol11/0406_hudson.asp

Lessons from Wal-Mart and the Wehrmacht: Team Wolfowitz on
Administration in the Information Age

Leila Hudson

Dr. Hudson is assistant professor of Near Eastern Studies at the
University of Arizona. For a printable pdf version of this article,
click here.

Since the attacks of September 11, 2001, the Bush administration has
introduced a panoply of new techniques of government in the areas of
intelligence processing, public relations, data collection and
government secrecy. The blueprint that links many of these
innovations to a unified theory of information and management can be
found in an essay entitled "Military Organization in the Information
Age: Lessons from the World of Business" by Francis Fukuyama and
Abram Shulsky in a 1999 Rand Corporation volume edited by Zalmay
Khalilzad.1 While the essay focuses on corporate self-improvement
tips for the U.S. military, over the last three years these
techniques have crept into the civilian functioning of the executive
branch. There they seem to account for some of the most radical, and
to critics, provocative innovations in domestic security policy and
government management by the Bush administration.

Like the policy statements from the Project for the New American
Century, former Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's "A Clean
Break: A New Strategy for Securing the Realm," and most recently,
Richard Perle's and David Frum's manifesto The End of Evil: How to
Win the War on Terror,2 "Military Organization in the Information
Age" lays out an ambitious and radical agenda that appears to have
influenced the Bush administration. Unlike these other
projects, "Military Organization in the Information Age" is not
specifically about the Middle East region, nor does it lay out
directives for strategy and action in international relations.
Rather it presents a vision for the reformation of the military that
would take advantage of the information revolution in order to
maximize efficiency in corporate style.

Decentralization, specifically the dispersal of authority throughout
the organization, is the predominant principle of the management
style advocated by the authors. They cite management guru Peter
Drucker's credo that "central management needs few if any
specialists. Bottom specialists will direct themselves."3 The
reliance on "bottom specialists" rather than the traditional
vertical hierarchy and central control is reinforced by the
historical experience of a military that effectively used the new
information technologies of its time and had a culture of autonomous
decision making at the bottom of the officer corps: the German
Wehrmacht.

What is striking about the principles articulated by Fukuyama and
Shulsky in the late 1990s is how effectively they foreshadow a
revolution in the post-9/11 world. This is not a "revolution in
military affairs," which might have yielded dramatic successes
rather than embarrassing and dangerous logistical failures in
Afghanistan and Iraq,4 but rather a revolution in civilian
administration and government. The principles articulated in a paper
that might have been subtitled "What We Learned from Wal-Mart and
the Wehrmacht" seem to predict with remarkable efficiency the range
of the Bush administration's domestic policies and internal
practices in the War on Terror that have mobilized critics. The
implementation of the guidelines suggested by Shulsky and Fukuyama
contributes to the further blurring of the boundaries between the
military and civilian spheres, and between the realms of public
policy and legitimate privacy that the declaration of the War on
Terror initiated.

These practices include the funneling of intelligence past agencies
and layers of scrutiny that might have prevented lies, forgeries and
other misperceptions from speeding the invasion of Iraq; the
collection of information on U.S. citizens, residents and visitors
that has alarmed constitutional scholars and privacy advocates; and
the prevalence of no-bid contracting with corporations linked to the
Bush administration in the reconstruction of Iraq.

The empowering aim of corporate decentralization also appears to
explain the so-called "neoconservative" network inside and outside
the administration, as it suggests a personnel policy of keeping
specialists distributed laterally throughout the organization with
autonomy in decision making, "freedom to fail," and rotation between
high-pressure practical and low-pressure theoretical positions.5 The
specialists are not forced to compete against each other for the top
job, but are kept comfortable in intermediate positions. The final
component of the decentralization program calls for the appearance
of strong central control and the activation of rigorous
investigative and punitive procedures when something goes wrong.

The authors are themselves associates of the neoconservative network
that undergirds the Bush administration. According to James Mann's
Rise of the Vulcans, all are particular protégés of the architect of
the Iraq War, Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz,6 Francis
Fukuyama, a member of the Project for the New American Century and
President Bush's Advisory Council on Bioethics, succeeded Wolfowitz
as the dean of the School of Advanced International Studies at Johns
Hopkins University and famously announced "the end of history" after
the fall of the Soviet Union.7 Fukuyama's co-author, Abram N.
Shulsky, is one of the most influential and least known members of
the Bush administration inner circle. He is a scholar of China,
intelligence and philosopher Leo Strauss,8 and heads the Pentagon's
Office of Special Plans, a murky but very important node in the
movement of intelligence in the Bush administration.

The editor of the volume in which the article appeared is the Bush
admini-stration's low-profile special adviser on both Afghanistan
and Iraq, a former Unocal executive and the highest ranking Muslim
in the Bush administration, Zalmay Khalilzad. Like Francis Fukuyama,
he signed the 1998 Project for the New American Century letters to
President Clinton and congressional leaders urging the military
ouster of Saddam Hussein.9 Before they took their positions in the
shadows of the Bush administration, these theorists offered insights
that seem to have structured aspects of military policy in Secretary
of Defense Donald Rumsfeld's Pentagon, from battlefield tactics to
military outsourcing and contracting for the land wars in Asia, but
also in the ultimate "military operation other than war," or MOOTW --
  the Bush administration's War on Terror.

"Military Organization in the Information Age" reviews business
literature for ideas on how to structure military organizations. It
employs information-age buzz-words from the business world such
as "flattening," "informating" and "core competencies" to outline
techniques by which a lean and responsive organization can take
advantage of huge quantities of potentially useful data and skills
without drowning in information or becoming a bureaucratic behemoth.
The dispersal of skills and responsibilities throughout the
organization to maximize access to dispersed bodies of information
is key.

The authors advocate practices that structure the organization to
maximize the speed of information transfer and utility and keep it
flexible and quickly adaptable to new circumstances and experiences.
Flattening the organization means shortening the paths of
information movement from sources and other "bottom specialists" to
decision makers throughout the body. "Informating" means collecting,
storing and mining huge quantities of data by means of advanced non-
human data processing systems with minimal additional labor.
Focusing on "core competencies" like a "virtual corporation"
promotes outsourcing and contracting of functions in which the cost
and efficiency advantage is gained not through competitive bidding
but rather through longer-term -- and not always transparent --
investment in research and development in the private sector.

Underlying the entire program laid out by Fukuyama and Shulsky is
wariness of a wide distribution of knowledge. Applying the corporate
virtue of efficiency and its information-processing techniques to
the military allows Fukuyama and Shulsky to envision a military that
forgoes institutional tradition in order to minimize bureaucratic
confusion and redundancy. This could create tension and friction
within rigid military structures. But applied to the realm of civil
governance, these principles of information efficiency also
compromise commitments to transparency, free-market competition,
constitutional protections of personal privacy, and government
accountability.

FLATTENING ORGANIZATIONAL STRUCTURE: THE "STOVEPIPE"
Fukuyama and Shulsky advocate replacing steep hierarchies of the
traditional military organization with a flatter profile in order
to "speed up the flow of information within the organization and
create proper incentives for its use."10 Flattening
involves "reassigning the functions of one or more layers of middle
management, either downward toward the bottom of the
organization . . . or upward toward senior management,"11 so that
information need not move slowly up and down a hierarchy. This
allegedly avoids distortions created by what each level thinks its
superiors want to hear, and minimizes bureaucratic territoriality
and hoarding of information. As an example, Fukuyama and Shulsky
cite studies of the German Wehrmacht by Martin Van Creveld.12


. . . while the German Blitzkrieg strategy of World War II depended
decisively on the technological advances of the previous decades --
tanks, aircraft capable of providing close air support, and mobile
radios -- it also required certain organizational characteristics.
In particular its fast pace implied that lower echelons had to have
the authority to take the initiative to exploit battlefield
opportunities; they also had to have more direct, and more rapid,
communications with headquarters and other military units that could
support them. Front-line Panzer units, for example, could request
air support directly from the Luftwaffe without having to go through
higher Army echelons. By contrast, the British and French command
structures required unit commanders to go through several
intermediary headquarters to communicate with supporting units.13
This strategy was visible through the fog of war in the early days
of the Iraq invasion in the battles of Um Qasr and Najaf. In the
first case, U.S. Marines pinned down by Iraqi sniper fire after
having failed to secure the port village, directly called in British
and U.S. air support in order to finally take the town. In the
second case, U.S. tanks of the Thirty-seventh Cavalry were able to
secure air cover from Apache helicopters, which resulted in two
aircraft downed and every one of the 30 others hit by gunfire. The
ability of ground forces to independently summon air cover pulled
aircraft away from the larger strategic mission of the aerial
bombing of Baghdad and other Iraqi cities, winning the battles at
the cost of damage to aircraft.14

In a passage that seems to foreshadow the logic behind
the "revolution in military affairs" of the embedded journalism of
the Iraq invasion, Shulsky and Fukuyama discuss some of the risks of
over-shortening the information path, using as an example that:


the actions of a single squad in a Haitian city could have
significant repercussions for the entire operation, especially if
they were to be captured on tape by the Cable News Network and
broadcast to the world. As a result, the White House officials
might, under extreme circumstances, wish to be in direct
communication with units on the ground, both to receive reports
directly (otherwise, they could find themselves in the uncomfortable
position of receiving press inquiries about events of which they had
not yet been informed) and to direct actions on the ground to avoid
unwanted incidents.15
This suggests that embedded journalism had its origins not just in
the reassessment of the ineffective pool journalism of the first
Gulf War,16 but also in the principle of flattening, which would
make reports from the "bottom specialists" on the front lines of
a "military operation other than war" (MOOTW) available to decision
makers at the highest levels.

But flattening has been much more dramatic within the Bush
administration itself than in its battlefield applications. The
process of shortening the trajectories of intelligence and planning
for the Iraq war by the civilians in Secretary Rumsfeld's Pentagon
illustrates this practice. Bypassing established layers of review of
plans and intelligence by career professionals led to the Pentagon's
tension with the State Department in the buildup to war and in
Secretary Rumsfeld's political difficulties with the career
military.17

In the second half of 2003, investigative journalism and insider
accounts focused attention on Abram Shulsky's own Office of Special
Plans (OSP). Seymour Hersh dubbed the new direct information paths
the "stovepipe."18

Accounts from investigative reporters of The Nation, Mother Jones,
The New Yorker and The Guardian depict a Defense Department
intelligence annex that bypasses the CIA and the Defense
Intelligence Agency as a lateral appendage to the office of the
secretary of defense with direct links to the White House and the
office of the vice president. The OSP is outside the hierarchy, the
bureaucracy and the standards of the intelligence establishments yet
directed some of the most problematic intelligence material straight
from Iraqi defectors produced by Ahmad Chalabi's Iraqi National
Congress to the highest levels of the American government.19 The
plans and policies that were cultivated in this 18-person operation
paved the way to the Iraq War, and possibly determined important
aspects of its conduct. The OSP seems a prime example of the kind of
insulated, protected "experimental unit" that Fukuyama and Shulsky
see as a crucial part of an adapting "learning organization."20

These investigations have been confirmed and fleshed out by Lt. Col.
Karen Kwiatkowski in a whistle-blowing series of articles in a
journal on the other side of the political spectrum, the American
Conservative Magazine. The retired Air Force officer and Pentagon
staffer recounts how the Near East South Asia (NESA) branch of the
Pentagon's policy section was flattened using the metaphor of
Africanized bees, which "swarmed over the Pentagon, populating
various hives of policy and planning."21 Her account confirms that
Shulsky's Office of Special Plans is the nexus of the flattened
organization and outlines how it positioned itself as such. She
describes the transformation in late summer 2002 of the NESA Iraq
desk into the Office of Special Plans headed by Shulsky. According
to Kwiatkowski,


. . . we were told that the expanded Iraq desk would become the
Office of Special Plans and would move out. We were told not to
refer to this office as the Office of Special Plans and . . . not to
confirm that it was the expanded Iraq desk . . . . The Iraq-war-
planning aspect would now be isolated from the rest of NESA and
would establish its own rhythm and cadence, separate from the non-
political-minded professionals covering the rest of the
region . . . . "22
Layers of civilian control were removed:


Those who had watched the transition from Clintonista to Bushite
knew that something calculated had happened to NESA. Key personnel,
long-time civilian professionals' hold on the important billets had
been replaced early in the transition. The Office Director, second
in command and normally a professional civilian regional expert, was
vacant . . . . To remove that continuity factor seemed
contraindicated, but at the time, I didn't realize that the
expertise on Middle East policy was being brought in from a variety
of outside think tanks.23
By the winter of 2002, Kwiatkowski accelerated her retirement
process, feeling that


civilian professionals and military officers were largely invisible.
We were easily replaceable and dispensable, not part of the team
brought in from the American Enterprise Institute, the Center for
Security Policy, and the Washington Institute for Near East
Policy . . . .24
The flattening or shortening of communication paths in the Pentagon
extended to military allies from the outside. Kwiatkowski describes
the ease and familiarity with which Israeli generals accessed the
office of Undersecretary Feith (which Secretary of State General
Colin Powell denies calling "the Gestapo office" as reported by Bob
Woodward in Plan of Attack) without observing any of the normal
protocols of escort and signing in.25 The reorganization that
Kwiatkowski witnessed streamlined the information flow between the
former Iraq desk, the office of the secretary of defense and
ultimately the White House.26 The information that flowed through
the pipeline included talking points on the later-discredited
reports of Iraqi agents meeting 9/11 hijacker Mohammed Atta in
Prague, on the alleged purchase by Saddam Hussein of yellowcake in
Niger, and on leaked low estimates of the manpower and troop costs
of the upcoming war.27

"INFORMATING" THE ORGANIZATION
The utilization of information-processing technologies is crucial to
institutional reform in the information age. Fukuyama and Shulsky's
vision of the information-age military sees "informating" or
digitization to decentralize the organization and "facilitate the
collection, processing, distribution and use of more detailed and
more timely information throughout the organization."28 In order to
collect maximum information without succumbing to the burdens of
reporting or information overload,


Information is collected automatically or as a by-product of other
operations. One of the best known examples of this is the Wal-Mart
system, in which the information that a particular product has been
sold, which is obtained at the checkout counter when the bar code is
scanned, is used not only to calculate how much the customer owes
but is also transmitted to a companywide database. Without
increasing the workload of the checkout clerk, and without burdening
other company employees, timely and detailed sales information is
collected for processing and use.29
The military analogue of this digitization process envisioned by
Fukuyama and Shulsky prior to the Afghan and Iraqi wars involved
Global Positioning System (GPS) locating devices, which provide a
constant stream of information to a central data bank to be
extracted and used as necessary within the laterally linked,
flattened organization. According to the authors, because of "the
vast amount of very specific and low-level data reported from each
unit (e.g., the petroleum, oil and lubricant levels for each and
every vehicle), the resulting database contains altogether much more
information than any one user could possibly use,"30 but would allow
instant pinpointing of problems.

The risks of the enormous dependence on non-human processing systems
entailed in Wal-Mart-style informating are considerable. Since the
vision is based on a general idea of information technology rather
than specific technical systems, applications produce unforeseen
complications. One possible negative effect on the battlefield was
the number of friendly-fire incidents reported in the first week of
the Iraq war as fighters dependent on data-processing technology
removed a critical layer of human judgment and often failed to
distinguish targets from allies. A slowly emerging consensus that
the logistics of the war effort were seriously hampered by confusion
and unclear lines of responsibility highlight the danger, recognized
by Fukuyama and Shulsky, of information swamping in a lean,
flattened organization.31

The deployment of new techniques of information collection, storage
and processing in the civilian realm entails different risks than
their use in real time on the battlefield and with wartime
logistics. A prime application of the Wal-Mart-style informating
technique in the civilian realm is the Terrorism (formerly Total)
Information Awareness project spearheaded by pardoned felon Admiral
John Poindexter. Personal and financial data from credit card
companies, banks and mailing lists would be collected in order to
mine patterns for indications of terrorist risks.32 Although this
project was renamed and shelved due to concern about the
constitutionality of data collection on citizens, even in the wake
of the empowerments of the PATRIOT Act, development of data
collection, storage and processing systems continues at the local
level. This is done through corporate initiatives on visitors to the
United States through the U.S. Visitor fingerprinting and
photography program, touted by the Department of Homeland Security
as a mere 15-second delay in the processing of visa holders at U.S.
ports of entry.33

CORE COMPETENCIES
This aspect of the "information revolution in military affairs" has
two parts: focusing on the organization's competitive advantages
and "disencumbering oneself of functions that can be performed
better by others."34 The military, it is argued, can benefit from
outsourcing peripheral and even core functions if the transaction
costs of contracting are less than the costs of integrating the
function in-house. The model of the virtual corporation divested of
all but a few key functions is invoked.

In the invasion of Iraq we see the continuation and escalation of a
decades-long trend -- the use of contractors to assume some of the
key functions of the war.35 Thus Halliburton subsidiaries provide
troop-support services36 and Vinell and Dyncorp provide military and
security training for the new Iraqi police force and army.37 Those,
in turn, would ideally take over from the U.S. military the
frontline role in the War on Terror in Iraq and security enforcement
under the occupation. Since the killing and mutilation of the bodies
of four civilian security workers for Blackwater, the extent of the
provision of security by such private firms in Iraq is beginning to
become apparent.

Peacetime procurement of weapons systems in the information age is
another major instance of focusing on core competencies of the
military organization and outsourcing without the cumbersome process
of bidding:


In an era of rapid technological advance . . . . lead times (for
major weapons systems such as a new fighter or tank) can seriously
hinder the ability of the armed forces to field the most effective
weapon systems possible.38
The authors write almost wistfully about how a government-owned
corporation could bypass federal procurement regulations. Their tone
is even more clearly regretful when they acknowledge that


the underlying view is that a long-term relation on the basis of
which it is possible to share information and expertise, will
produce a better quality and price mix in the long run than will
an "arms-length approach" that constantly forces suppliers to
compete with each other. In general this strategy may not be
available to a government agency . . . The philosophy guiding
government contractors, on the other hand, is very different: In
principle, they are supposed to be open to all bidders regardless of
the costs or benefits involved.39
Shulsky and Fukuyama go on to suggest several ways around the
inconvenience of the open-bidding principle, which holds government
back from corporate-style efficiency. This would have the advantage
of facilitating "timely acquisition and utilization of equipment."
In addition, providing clear examples of what is possible with this
greater efficiency "might change the political climate in ways that
would ultimately make a full-scale reform more feasible."40

The techniques presented to infiltrate, undermine and subvert
procurement regulations include "skunk-works concept,"41 a form of
umbrella contract in which new weapons systems are included under
cover of preexisting contracts.42 They also suggest taking advantage
of wartime exceptions to procurement rules:


In general, opportunities of this type should be sought out, both to
exercise the system so that it will be better able to operate
rapidly in case of war and to highlight the cost of the current
regulatory regime. One might attempt to institute a system whereby,
in the case of any ongoing operation, some amount of money would be
made available for the development and procurement of equipment
under "wartime" rules . . . .43
To the authors, this conveys another secondary advantage: the
mobilization of popular sentiment behind the executive branch for
the state of perpetual war.

Under the rubric of concentrating on core competencies and
increasing efficiency, well-established contracting procedures are
pushed aside for the conduct of and preparation for war, but also
for civilian functions such as the reconstruction of Iraq. Post-
conflict private policing, oil-services and infrastructure-
reconstruction contracts have been awarded to companies with ties to
the Bush administration. They have been denied to corporations from
countries that declined to support the war, and they are also
subject to no-bid procedures.44

Irregularities with the Iraq and Afghan war-contracting process have
begun to register with watchdog groups and to leak into the
mainstream press and even into burgeoning presidential campaign
rhetoric. The recent closure of the investigation into Halliburton's
alleged overcharging of $61 million for oil imports into Iraq
suggests, however, that the principle of concentrating on core
competencies and favorably comparing the financial costs of
outsourcing to the time and opportunity costs of in-house service or
competitive bidding is alive and well in the Bush administration.45
The well-documented cronyism that accompanies no-bid contracting
seems to provide the financial rewards that reinforce the personnel
policies described below by materially rewarding key personnel far
beyond the limitations of any public entity.46

EMPOWERING STAFFING POLICIES: FREEDOM TO FAIL
The Fukuyama and Shulsky essay provides insight into the staffing
policies of the Bush administration, which have drawn attention to a
network of policy makers referred to as "neoconservatives." As is
now well-known, they are a coterie of hawkish pro-Israeli unilater-
alists with association to the late Senator Henry "Scoop" Jackson (D-
WA), the Israeli Likud party, the philosophies of Leo Strauss and
Albert Wohlstetter, and conservative think-tanks, especially the
Project for the New American Century. 47 The management principle of
employee empowerment advocated by Fukuyama and Shulsky is apparently
based on Prussian and German military practices of encouraging
autonomy and responsibility in the lower officer corps inculcated
with a common military culture. In this Teutonic spirit, the "right
and duty of subordinates to make independent decisions" is
emphasized over a vertical hierarchy of command and information
flow. Trusting the discretion and intuition of individual officers
and men requires a general military culture of fraternity,
homogeneity, identity and trust. It also explains the unique
features of the Bush administration, particularly the Pentagon under
Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld, famous for his clashes with the
career-military hierarchy presumably trained in non-Wehrmacht
culture.48

In the January/February 2004 issue of Foreign Policy magazine, the
historian Max Boot argues that accusations of neoconservative
influence on U.S. foreign policy are disproved by the absence of
neoconservatives in the top tier of the Bush administration.49 But
the empowerment and trust placed by higher-ups in second- and third-
rank civilian officials and consultants comes directly
from "Military Organization in the Information Age." An important
component of corporate efficiency through personnel management
involves a wide distribution of skills throughout the organization
rather than a concentration of key specialists at the heart or the
top. The lateral and horizontal tendencies are accentuated by not
requiring that promotion be the reward for success. Modern
management principles cited by the authors keep specialists in place
and do not squander their talents and energies by making them
compete for the few top spots.50

This accounts for the improbable prominence in the Bush
administration of such widely spaced second- and third-tier
appointees as Deputy Secretary of Defense Wolfowitz and Defense
Policy Board former Chairman Richard Perle, but also Deputy
Secretary of State John Bolton, Pentagon Undersecretary for Policy
Douglas Feith, Vice Presidential Chief of Staff Lewis "Scooter"
Libby and National Security Council staff member Elliot Abrams, not
to mention Abram Shulsky himself and other less well-known members
of the network in domestic and international policy formation. There
is no easily identifiable leadership core, but the culture of trust,
common politics and "freedom to fail" that unites key actors across
the organization produces a coherent set of policy tracks.

Shulsky and Fukuyama cite the importance of a "freedom to fail"
personnel policy to encourage taking risks and thinking outside the
box.51 Promotion is to be based on patronage and demand, not on
fairness, routine or supply.52 Similarly, the "freedom to fail"
attitude involves interchanges of personnel between conventional and
experimental postings in order to disseminate ideas and protect
careers.53 Drs. Wolfowitz and Shulsky themselves exemplify the
movement between academic and governmental postings that spreads
their ideas through contact with others in various settings, and the
inconspicuous shifting between the world of theory and the world of
action. This is not unlike the revolving door between government and
industry that the first-tier members of the Bush administration have
made an increasingly prominent feature of the landscape of power.54

The "freedom to fail" policy helps explain the prominence of key
administration political appointees such as Elliot Abrams and
Admiral John Poindexter, for whom pardoned felony convictions were
not a serious barrier to reinstatement.55 The continuing prominence
of neocon-servative ideologue Richard Perle after conflict-of-
interest scandals forced him out of the chairmanship of the Defense
Policy Board to a less noticeable role in the same body suggests
that the cronyism that the virtual corporation promotes actually
finances the "freedom to fail" policy in a very direct manner.56

THE ILLUSION OF TOP-DOWN CONTROL
Shulsky and Fukuyama acknowledge that the larger political culture
requires the appearance of what they call "the pervasive zero-
defects mentality -- which tends to regard every error as a scandal"
and of the "top-down method of control,"57 which seems to the
observer to provide a reassuring measure of unified and accountable
authority:


This appearance may be illusory, but it has its political uses --
when something goes wrong, the existence of a complex set of rules,
not all of which . . . will have been obeyed, means it will be
possible to find someone to blame. Furthermore in the event of a
disaster, one can always add a new layer of regulations or controls
to show that one is doing something to prevent the problem's
recurrence.58
The casual acceptance of the necessity of illusion and outright
deception in the worldview of Fukuyama and Shulsky provides insight
into the culture that produced the Jessica Lynch made-for-TV story
and numerous other fictions about the Iraq war and the larger War on
Terror.59

But the assiduous cultivation of the image of top-down control,
covering for but conflicting with dispersed authority, throughout
the organization was most visible in White House responses to the
potentially disastrous exposure in the summer of 2003 by Ambassador
Joseph Wilson of false allegations that Saddam Hussein attempted to
buy uranium from Niger.60 In this case, stovepiped intelligence
linked to the vice president's office made its way into President
Bush's State of the Union address and the building case for war.61
The subsequent leaks to Robert Novak of the covert position of
Wilson's wife as a CIA operative was a hasty and ill-conceived
response emerging from somewhere in the Pentagon or vice president's
office which itself required the formation of an investigation. Too
much "freedom to fail" by lower-level decision makers seriously
threatened the illusion of central control. CIA chief George Tenet
fell unconvincingly on his sword in an attempt to absorb the blame
for the scandal.

Most recently the WMD intelligence manipulation came to a head with
the acknowledgement by Chief U.S. Weapons Inspector David Kay that
no WMD were to be found in Iraq.62 In these cases, the CIA was very
publicly blamed (and even compromised through the punitive outing of
an operative) for lapses for which it was arguably not responsible.
The highly visible responses by the head of the intelligence agency
make a convincing show of "top-down control" covering for "freedom
to fail."63

CONCLUSIONS
The essay by Shulsky and Fukuyama provides insight into the
techniques that have distinguished the Bush administration: a
flattened architecture of specialists with autonomy and freedom to
fail located laterally throughout the organization, collecting and
mining information and shooting it through stovepipes while other
functions are preferentially outsourced and the appearance of
central control is assiduously maintained. The original model is
corporate, and the only application suggested by the authors is to
the military, but the evidence of these principles in action in the
civilian administration is ominous, as management technique
encroaches on the realm of public accountability. The War on Terror
has allowed corporate and military organizational principles to
creep into civilian administration, but the actual practice has
revealed some major problems.

The application of these techniques in the Bush administration shows
some risks and internal contradictions as well. Even as the
organization is vertically compacted so that information can flow
from bottom to top more quickly, it is laterally expanded, and often
the right hand does not know what the left hand is doing. Cutting
out the middle has led to disastrously faulty intelligence, just as
cutting out human data processing has led to confusion on the
battlefield, and the freedom to fail has outstripped the illusion of
central control as scandals multiply in the ranks of the
neoconservatives. Critics of the Bush administration can hope that
the unfolding scandals resulting from poor information management,
too much dispersed autonomy and freedom to fail in the White House,
the vice president's office and the Pentagon will prevent the
ultimate triumph of a homegrown American military corporatism.

1 Francis Fukuyama and Abram Shulsky, "Military Organization in the
Information Age: Lessons from the World of Business," The Changing
Role of Information in Warfare, ed. John P. White (Santa Monica:
RAND Corporation, 1999).
2 Thomas Donelly, Donald Kagan and Gary Schmitt, "Rebuilding
America's Defenses: Strategy, Forces and Resources for a New
Century" (Washington, DC: Project for a New American Century, 2000);
David Frum and Richard Perle, An End to Evil: How to Win the War on
Terror (New York: Random House, 2004); and Richard Perle, et al., "A
Clean Break: A New Strategy for Securing the Realm" (Jerusalem and
Washington: Institute for Advanced Strategic and Political Studies,
1996).
3 Peter Drucker, "The Coming of the New Organization," Harvard
Business Review, Vol. 66, No. 1, 1988.
4 "U.S. War Machine Nearly Fell Apart, Army Reveals," Sydney Morning
Herald, February 4, 2004.
5 Murray Friedman, "The Rebirth of Neoconservatism," The Forward,
December 13, 2002, Ari Shavit, "White Man's Burden," Haaretz, 2003.
6 James Mann, Rise of the Vulcans: The History of Bush's War Cabinet
(New York: Viking, 2004). See pages 22-26, 75, 113, 209-213 for an
understanding of how the influence of Alan Bloom at
Cornell/Telluride and Leo Strauss and the Wohlstetters at University
of Chicago would flourish through social and professional networks
of protégées rather than directly through intellectual or emotional
proximity to the professors themselves.
7 Francis Fukuyama, The End of History and the Last Man (New York:
Penguin, 1992).
8 Abram Shulsky, Silent Warfare: Understanding the World of
Intelligence, 3rd ed. (Brassey's Inc., 2002), Abram Shulsky and Mark
Burles, Patterns in China's Use of Force: Evidence from History and
Doctrinal Writings (Santa Monica: RAND, 1999), Abram Shulsky and
Gary Schmitt, "Leo Strauss and the World of Intelligence (by Which
We Do Not Mean Nous)," Leo Strauss, the Straussians, and the
American Regime, ed. John Murley (Rowman and Littlefield, 1999).
9 See the Letter to President Clinton and Letter to Trent Lott and
Newt Gingrich (1998) at
http://www.newamericancentury.org/iraqletter1998.htm. The signers of
the two letters are a "who's who" of neoconservatives in academia,
journalism, government and business.
10 Fukuyama and Shulsky, "Military Organization in the Information
Age: Lessons from the World of Business."
11 Ibid.
12 Martin Van Creveld, Fighting Power: German and U.S. Army
Performance, 1939-1945 (Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 1982).
13 Fukuyama and Shulsky, "Military Organization in the Information
Age: Lessons from the World of Business."
14 Al-Jazeera, "Um Qasr and Zubair Resisting the U.S.-UK Invasion,"
2003 (cited March 21, 2003), online at http://aljazeerah.info/News%
20archives/2003%20News%20archives/March%202003%20News/21%20n/Um%
20Qasr%20Iraqi%20border%20town%20invaded%20by%20US-UK%20troops%20%
20aljazeerah.info.htm.
15 Fukuyama and Shulsky, "Military Organization in the Information
Age: Lessons from the World of Business." p. 334.
16 Jacqueline Sharkey, U.S. Military Restrictions on the Military
from Grenada to the Persian Gulf (1991).
17 Jane Perlez, "Bush Team's Counsel Is Divided on Foreign Policy,"
The New York Times, March 27, 2001; and Thomas Ricks, "Desert
Caution: Once Stormin Norman, Gen. Schawarzkopf Is Skeptical About
U.S. Action in Iraq," The Washington Post, January 28, 2003.
18 Seymour Hersh, "The Stovepipe," The New Yorker, October 27, 2003.
19 Julian Borger, "The Spies Who Pushed for War," The Guardian, July
17, 2003; Robert Dreyfuss, "More Missing Intelligence," The Nation,
June 19, 2003; Robert Dreyfuss and Jason Vest, "The Lie Factory,"
Mother Jones, January 26, 2004; Seymour Hersh, "Selective
Intelligence," The New Yorker, May 12, 2003; and Mark
Perelman, "Pentagon Team on Iran Comes under Fire," Forward, June 6,
2003.
20 Fukuyama and Shulsky, "Military Organization in the Information
Age: Lessons from the World of Business," pp. 347-49.
21 Karen Kwiatkowski, "In Rumsfeld's Shop: A Senior Air Force
Officer Watches as the Neocons Consolidate Their Pentagon Coup," The
American Conservative, December 1, 2003.
22 Karen Kwiatkowski, "Conscientious Objector: An Air Force Officer
Watches Civilians Craft the War Plan," The American Conservative,
December 15, 2003.
23 Kwiatkowski, "In Rumsfeld's Shop: A Senior Air Force Officer
Watches as the Neocons Consolidate Their Pentagon Coup."
24 Karen Kwiatkowski, "The New Pentagon Papers," Salon.com, 2004.
25 Ibid.
26 Mike Allen, "Bush Aides Testify in Leak Probe," The Washington
Post, February 10, 2004.
27 Kwiatkowski, "Conscientious Objector: An Air Force Officer
Watches Civilians Craft the War Plan."
28 Fukuyama and Shulsky, "Military Organization in the Information
Age: Lessons from the World of Business." p. 330.
29 Ibid.
30 Ibid.
31 "`Friendly Fire' Hits Kurdish Convoy," BBC News, April 6,
2003, "U.S. War Machine Nearly Fell Apart, Army Reveals."
32 "Report to Congress Regarding the Terrorism Information Awareness
Program," Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, 2003; and Paul
Rosenzweig, "Defending the Pentagon's Information Awareness
Program," Fox News, September 8, 2003.
33 Brian Bergstein, "Several States Embrace Matrix," Associated
Press, February 1, 2004; Ric Feld, "Foreign Visitors to USA Get
Fingerprinted, Photographed," USA Today, January 4, 2004; Sara
Kehaulani Goo, "Northwest Gave U.S. Data on Passengers," The
Washington Post, January 18, 2004; and Pat Kossan, "Phoenix School
First to Install Face Scanners," The Arizona Republic, December 11,
2003.
34 Fukuyama and Shulsky, "Military Organization in the Information
Age: Lessons from the World of Business," p. 330; and Francis
Fukuyama and Abram Shulsky, The "Virtual Corporation" and Army
Organization (Santa Monica: RAND Corporation, 1997).
35 Peter Singer, Corporate Warriors: The Rise of the Privatized
Military Industry (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2003).
36 Jane Mayer, "Contract Sport: What Did the Vice-President Do for
Halliburton," The New Yorker, February 9, 2004.
37 Kevin Baron, "Windfalls of War" Center for Public Integrity, 2003.
38 Fukuyama and Shulsky, "Military Organization in the Information
Age: Lessons from the World of Business," p. 354.
39 Ibid., p. 354.
40 Ibid., p. 354.
41 Ibid., p. 356.
42 Suneel Ratan, "Mars Mission a Trojan Horse?" Wired News, January
16, 2004.
43 Fukuyama and Shulsky, "Military Organization in the Information
Age: Lessons from the World of Business," p. 357.
44 Jackie Spinner, "Halliburton Gets More Iraq Work," The Washington
Post, 2004.
45 Naomi Klein, "The $500 Billion Fire Sale," The Guardian, January
17, 2004; and Sue Pleming, "Army Issues $15 Billion of Building
Deals," The Washington Post, January 13, 2004.
46 Baron, "Windfalls of War"; Mayer, "Contract Sport: What Did the
Vice-President Do for Halliburton"; and Abigail Rayner, "New Inquiry
Examines Hollinger Bonus Plan," London Times, 2004.
47 Friedman, "The Rebirth of Neoconservatism"; and Shavit, "White
Man's Burden."
48 Kwiatkowski recounts hearing General Zinni denounced as a traitor
inside the policy section of the Pentagon, calls for Secretary of
State Colin Powell's resignation from the administration, and
belittling of Admiral Trago. Kwiatkowski, "Conscientious Objector:
An Air Force Officer Watches Civilians Craft the War Plan."
49 Max Boot, "Think Again: Neocons," Foreign Policy, 2004.
50 Fukuyama and Shulsky, "Military Organization in the Information
Age: Lessons from the World of Business," p. 352.
51 Ibid., p. 349.
52 Ibid., pp. 350-1.
53 Ibid., p. 348.
54 Mann (p. 35) points out another instance of this policy, the
effective teamwork of Wolfowitz on the inside and Perle on the
outside through decades of policy work. Mann, Rise of the Vulcans:
The History of Bush's War Cabinet.
55 Ari Fleischer, "Press Briefing, Admiral Poindexter," 2002.
56 {Wolf , 2003 #54}Rayner, "New Inquiry Examines Hollinger Bonus
Plan."
57 Fukuyama and Shulsky, "Military Organization in the Information
Age: Lessons from the World of Business."
58 Ibid., p. 358.
59 Glen Rangwala, The Thirty-Six Lies That Launched a War (Centre
for Research on Globalisation, 2003), online at
http://www.globalresearch.ca/articles/RAN307B.html; and Leslie
Stahl, Bush Sought `Way' to Invade Iraq (CBS 60 Minutes, 2004 [cited
January 11, 2004 2004]), online at
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2004/01/09/60minutes/main592330.shtml.
  Other possible instances of mendacity are emerging in the inquiry
into President Bush's military record from the 1970s. Ralph
Blumenthal, "Move to Screen Bush File in 90s Is Reported," The New
York Times, February 12, 2004.
60 CNN, "Text of CIA Director George Tenet's Statement," 2003.
61 Julian Borger, "Cheney's Future at Stake," The Guardian, February
11, 2004; David Johnston, "Top Bush Aide Is Questioned in CIA Leak,"
The New York Times, February 10, 2004; ABCNet Online, "Pentagon
Offices Face Probe on Iraq Claims," 2004 (cited February 19), online
at http://www.abc.net.au/news/newsitems/s1048656.htm; David
Sanger, "President to Order Inquiry into Iraq Intelligence Lapses,"
The Washington Post, 2004; also Mark Tran, "Pentagon Launches
Halliburton Inquiry," The Guardian, December 12, 2003.
62 Jessica Mathews, et al., WMD in Iraq: Evidence and Implications
(Washington, DC: Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, 2004);
and Greg Mitchell, "Editorials Question Bush's Role in `Cooking' up
a War," Editor and Publisher, January 28, 2004.
63 William Branigin, "Tenet: Analysts Never Claimed Imminent Threat
before War," The Washington Post, 2004; Sanger, "President to Order
Inquiry into Iraq Intelligence Lapses"; and Eric Rosenberg, "`Heads
Should Roll over Iraq' Adviser Wants U.S. Intelligence Chiefs to
Quit," Toronto Star, February 18, 2004.

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INDONESIA: Military Offensive on in Tsunami-Hit Aceh -
Critics
Sonny Inbaraj
IPS
January 3, 2005
http://www.ipsnews.net/new_nota.asp?idnews=26885

BANGKOK, Jan 3 (IPS) - While volunteers, relief
workers and families are busy collecting and searching
for bodies in Indonesia's tsunami-stricken Aceh
province, Indonesian soldiers are continuing their
offensive against separatist rebels, critics say.

This, say international human rights groups, is
hindering the delivery of badly needed humanitarian
aid to survivors of the world's worst natural disaster
in 40 years.

The groups are also urging the Indonesian government
not to let politics override the emergency needs of
the Acehnese people.

Although some reports say that a de facto ceasefire
has been in place between the military and separatist
rebels since the Dec. 26 disaster, there are no signs
yet that the state of civil emergency, which was
imposed on the province in 2004 to quell the
separatist movement, will be lifted.

`'Delays by the Indonesian government in allowing
international access to Aceh may have needlessly cost
precious lives. International and Indonesian
organisations must have unrestricted access to Aceh,''
said the U.S.-based Non-Violence International in a
statement.

As many as 100,000 people may have been killed in the
Indonesian provinces of Aceh and elsewhere in North
Sumatra as a result of the earthquake and tsunami that
struck the region. The Indonesian government initially
kept the international community at bay as it
apparently debated whether to open Aceh up to
foreigners.

Aceh has been almost entirely closed to any
international presence due to military operations
there against the Free Aceh Movement (GAM), which has
been fighting for independence since 1976. More than
10,000 people, mostly civilians, have been killed
since then.

The government put the province under martial law on
May 19, 2003 before reducing this to a state of civil
emergency one year later.

`'Under the civil emergency, the Indonesian military
continue to play a leading role and there has been no
cutback in the level of military operations in most of
the territory,'' said Paul Barber of the Britain-based
human rights group Tapol.

`'Lifting the civil emergency would require the
declaration of a presidential decree but Indonesia's
President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono has shown no
inclination to move in this direction,'' he added.

On Sunday Jan Egeland, the U.N.'s emergency relief
coordinator, told reporters that relief efforts after
the Asian tsunami disaster was falling behind in
Indonesia. `'We're able to reach out in all of the
affected countries except in (Indonesia's) Sumatra and
Aceh at the moment. That is where we are behind,'' he
said.

All eyes are on whether the government can or will
make use of the opportunity for reconciliation
provided by the Dec. 26 disaster to open up Aceh to
Indonesians and outsiders, and how its relief efforts
continue will play a key factor in this.

Many also concede that the military is the institution
with the best reach and logistics to help out in times
of disaster.

At the same time, news reports from Jakarta said
hundreds of Indonesian military troops, known by their
Indonesian acronym TNI, were raiding GAM hideouts
across East and North Aceh, which had been devastated
by the tsunami.

Also, 15,000 extra troops are being rushed to Aceh, on
top of the 40,000 already there, to help with
humanitarian activities.

Lt Col D J Nachrowi told `The Jakarta Post' on
Thursday that the calamity should not be seen as a way
for the military to suspend security operations
against GAM.

`'We are now carrying out two duties: humanitarian
work and the security operation,'' he told the daily.
`'The raids to quell the secessionist movement in Aceh
will continue unless the president issues a decree to
lift the civil emergency and assign us to merely play
a humanitarian role in Aceh.''

Nachrowi's comments infuriated Nasruddin Abubakar, the
president of Sentral Informasi Referendum Aceh (SIRA).


`'The government is still maintaining the civil
emergency and continuing on with military operations
in Aceh despite the fact that the death toll now is
close to 100,000. Is the government not yet satisfied
with the killing?'' he asked in a phone interview with
IPS. `'Are Acehnese not citizens of Indonesia?''

Nasruddin said his group had received news from
volunteers working in the province's devastated
capital Banda Aceh that the military was interrogating
survivors making their way to relief centres,
suspecting them of being GAM members.

`'We want to draw everyone's attention to the need to
save the Acehnese from death,'' he pleaded.

The New York-based East Timor Action Network (ETAN)
urged aid organisations and agencies to work as
closely as possible with local civil society groups
and to resist Indonesian government and military
attempts to keep non-governmental local groups out of
the process.

`'The high level of corruption in Indonesia,
especially in Aceh, and the great distrust of Aceh's
(provincial) government make it crucial that aid
groups be allowed to distribute urgently needed food,
medical supplies, and other assistance outside of
government channels, distributing aid directly and
through local NGOs,'' said ETAN's Karen Orenstein.

Tapol's Barber warned that natural disaster such as
that which struck Aceh a week ago will only serve to
reinforce the military's role under the cover of
becoming involved in humanitarian activities.

`'Following the imposition of martial law in May 2003,
local NGOs fled from Aceh because of intimidation and
the threat of violence against their activists,'' said
Barber.

`'Even now, Acehnese activists based in Jakarta and
neighbouring Malaysia know that they would be taking
great risks if they return to their homeland to help
provide succour for the stricken population,'' he
added.

According to Stratfor Global Intelligence, a security
analysis website, the tsunami disaster could prove to
be a boon to Jakarta in its campaign against GAM.

`'(President) Yudhoyono will send more troops into the
province to rebuild and clean up...If GAM does not
agree to settle the problem peacefully, Yudhoyono will
have more troops on hand to clean them out,'' wrote
the analysts at Stratfor. (END/2005)

http://www.ipsnews.net/new_nota.asp?idnews=26885

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8 die in attempted jail break in Afghanistan:
17 December 2004 16:29
http://www.rte.ie/news/2004/1217/afghanistan.html


At least eight people were killed in Afghanistan after an attempted
escape by inmates from a jail in the capital, Kabul.

An official said Afghan soldiers killed two armed al-Qaeda prisoners
who had barricaded themselves inside the Pul-e-Charki prison after
overpowering and killing their guards.

Two other prisoners and at least four guards and police were killed
earlier when a group of prisoners attempted to break out of the jail
soon after dawn.



Three of the dead prisoners were believed to be Pakistanis and the
fourth was an Iraqi.

------------------------------------------------------------------
Two Turk Al Qaeda suspects extradited
------------------------------------------------------------------
ANKARA, Jan 2: Pakistan on Sunday extradited two Turks suspected
of links to the Al Qaeda network who were immediately arrested and
charged by Turkish authorities, the Anatolia news agency reported.

Mehmet Yilmaz and Mahmut Kaplan, who were arrested in Lahore in
August, were brought before a court in Gaziantep, where they are
wanted for "membership of a clandestine Islamist organisation",
the news agency reported. Pakistani authorities suspect Yilmaz of
having fought alongside Afghanistan's Taliban regime.....(AFP)

http://www.dawn.com/cgi-bin/dina.pl?file=top8.htm&date=20050103

------------------------------------------------------------------
US drone crashes in tribal area
------------------------------------------------------------------
PESHAWAR, Jan 2: An unmanned US surveillance plane crashed near
Pakistan's border with Afghanistan in the rugged tribal terrain of
North Waziristan, officials said on Sunday.

The Predator crashed near the border town of Ghulam Killi facing
the troubled south eastern Afghan province of Khost late Saturday,
they said. "It crashed a few hundred metres inside Pakistan
territory near Ghulam Killi," military spokesman Maj-Gen Shaukat
Sultan said.....

http://www.dawn.com/cgi-bin/dina.pl?file=top9.htm&date=20050103

------------------------------------------------------------------
Coalition encounter leaves 7 suspected Taliban dead :

http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2004-12/15/content_2338045.htm

www.chinaview.cn 2004-12-15 17:50:06

     KABUL, Dec. 15 (Xinhuanet)-- Seven suspected Taliban were killed
in Afghanistan's southeast Khost province on Monday as the US troops
engaged in fire exchange with militias, a US military spokesman said
Wednesday.

     "Members of Khost Provincial Forces (KPF) were attacked by Anti-
Coalition Militia (ACM) Monday night in Khost province. The KPF
requested coalition support and coalition responded by firing
artillery, killing seven ACM," spokesman Mark McCann told
journalists here.

     He denied any casualties on the coalition side, saying "No
coalition forces or KPF were injured in the incident."

     The US-led coalition force which launched its winter offensive
to root out Taliban after the Afghan presidential inauguration on
Dec. 7 had arrested 10 suspected Taliban fighters including three
commanders in the troubled provinces of Urzgan and Kandahar in south
Afghanistan.

     Kandahar, the former stronghold of Taliban was attacked by a
powerful explosion Wednesday morning in which three people were
injured.

===

Kidnapped Turkish Male Killed in Afghanistan -- Witness:

A Turkish engineer abducted by a militant gang in eastern
Afghanistan was found dead on Wednesday, a witness who saw the body
being carried down from a mountainside told Reuters.

http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?
type=worldNews&storyID=7097648

http://snipurl.com/be5d

===

Retired Army colonel, 70, sent to Afghanistan:

Dr. John Caulfield thought it had to be a mistake when the Army
asked him to return to active duty. After all, he's 70 years old and
had already retired - twice. He left the Army in 1980 and private
practice two years ago.

http://www.marionstar.com/news/stories/20041211/localnews/1731211.htm
l

------------------------------------------------------------------
Wanted militant surrenders
------------------------------------------------------------------
By Zulfiqar Ali
PESHAWAR, Dec 28: A wanted militant in the South Waziristan tribal
region, Maulvi Sharif, accepted the government amnesty offer here
on Tuesday.

Maulvi Sharif, who belongs to the Ahmadzai Wazir tribe, was
declared the most wanted militant during the army operation. He
had earlier refused to surrender to the authorities.....

http://www.dawn.com/cgi-bin/dina.pl?file=top8.htm&date=20041229

------------------------------------------------------------------
Madressah searched
------------------------------------------------------------------
By Pazeer Gul
MIRAMSHAH, Dec 28: Army troops searched a madressah in Darpa Khel
Danadai village here on Tuesday night. A large number of army
troops surrounded the village, while Scout Commandant Waheed
Bangash along with assistant political agent and local elders
searched the seminary, but found no suspected person there.

A tribal jirga was convened by the political administration to
take the elders into confidence about the search operation.....

http://www.dawn.com/cgi-bin/dina.pl?file=top9.htm&date=20041229

------------------------------------------------------------------
Kabul hands over bodies of three Pakistanis
------------------------------------------------------------------
PESHAWAR, Dec 19: The bodies of three Pakistani prisoners killed
in a riot at Afghanistan's infamous Pul-i-Charki jail arrived here
on Sunday for burial in their home towns, officials said.

The bodies, handed over to the Pakistan embassy in Kabul early in
the morning, were transported in private vehicles, a border
security official said. The official said a Pakistan embassy
official, Mohammad Akram, accompanied them to the Torkham border
crossing.....(AFP)

http://www.dawn.com/cgi-bin/dina.pl?file=top4.htm&date=20041220

------------------------------------------------------------------
Taliban leaders arrested
------------------------------------------------------------------
KHOST, Dec 19: Two Taliban commanders were arrested along with two
militants late Saturday in south-east Afghanistan by security
forces who also seized a weapons cache, a local official told AFP
on Sunday.

Mullah Noor Mohammed and Mullah Mullai Goloom had been in charge
of planning attacks in the Paktia as well as the other south-
eastern provinces. Security forces also seized seven missiles,
remote-controlled bombs, explosive equipment, a satellite phone
and some documents and maps during the raid.....

http://www.dawn.com/cgi-bin/dina.pl?file=top6.htm&date=20041220

------------------------------------------------------------------
Four Al Qaeda activists arrested in Lahore
------------------------------------------------------------------
Staff Reporter
LAHORE, Dec 20: Police on Monday claimed arresting four suspected
Al Qaeda operatives, including a close associate of top terrorist
Abu Fraj, allegedly involved in two attempts on the life of
President Pervez Musharraf.

The arrested men belonged to banned organizations Lashkar-i-
Jhangvi and Harkat Al Jihad Islami and had been working for the Al
Qaeda network for some years, Lahore police chief (investigation)
Chaudhry Shafqaat Ahmad said at a press conference.....

http://www.dawn.com/cgi-bin/dina.pl?file=top6.htm&date=20041221

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Ghali Hassan: Iraq's Democracy: The El Salvador Model:

  In the March 2004 elections, the US used fear and threat against
the Salvadoran people to promote its preferred candidates, members
of the ARENA party. The Salvadorian people voted with a gun pointed
to their head.

http://207.44.245.159/article7441.htm

12/10/04 "ICH" -- The Bush administration is preparing Iraq
for "democratic elections". The aims are to consolidate the
Occupation, "legitimise" those who serve US interests in Iraq, and
hence prolong the suffering of the Iraqi people. The Central
American nation of El Salvador has been chosen as the best model
of `democracy' to be implemented in Iraq.

It seems that the Bush administration is in a dilemma trying to find
a Vichy regime to install in Iraq. In 1940, in Nazi-occupied France,
German leaders were able to create a regime that was acceptable to
many French. By contrast, in Iraq no one seems to be able to fulfil
the criteria of France's General Philippe Pétain, and provides an
Arab "façade" for the Bush administration.

It was assumed that the best regime that could form the façade in
Baghdad is the current US-appointed Iraqi Interim Government (IIG).
However, this is not the case. The Allawi's "government" is far less
popular among Iraqis than the regime of Saddam, and Allawi is the
most hated individual in Iraq today. Iraqis see all members of the
IIG as collaborator with the Occupation against Iraq interests. Most
of them spent decades outside the country and hold no loyalty to
Iraq.

The core of the IIG are: The Allawi's group of exiles (INA), the
Chalebi's group of exiles (INC), the Peshmergas of the two Kurdish
parties, and the Badir Brigade (Supreme Council for Islamic
Revolution in Iraq, SCIRI), mostly of Iranian origins. Furthermore,
each group has its own mafia-style death squad, and links to the CIA
or the Israeli Mossad agents. As I wrote earlier, since they entered
Iraq with the US invasion, the four groups have taken the law into
their own hands and have killed many innocent Iraqis, including
hundreds of Iraqi scientists and community leaders. The Occupation
authority has never investigated their crimes. They entered Iraq on
the backs of US tanks. Their relations with the Occupation are fully
symbiotic relations. They co-exist in a mutually beneficial
relationship with their US master. They are participating in the
upcoming elections, because they want the Occupation to continue.

In 2003, UN own findings have shown that Iraqis accept free
elections under UN control, and that US troops be replaced by UN
troops from neutral nations. The US and its "coalition of the
willing" were able to hold elections six months after the invasion,
but they refused because they were not interested in a democratic
outcome that could end of the Occupation. UN officials and Iraqi
officials argued at that time that elections were feasible and
possible within six months, but they were intentionally dismissed by
the US. The Bush administration "stifled, delayed, manipulated and
otherwise thwarted the democratic aspiration of the Iraqi people".

It is not possible to hold free elections under martial law and
illegal foreign Occupation. Most Iraqis view the upcoming elections
as a US fig leaf to consolidate the Occupation. The process is very
untransparent. According to Dahr Jamail of The New Standard, Iraqis
are saying: "The Americans won't allow a legitimate election in
their own country, so why would they have one here"! As it stands,
Iraqis do not put great hope on these fake elections, because the
outcome of these elections is a forgone conclusion. The Bush
administration is relying on sectarian forces in order to create a
dependent Iraq and role it indefinitely.

The upcoming elections are not for the sake of establishing
democracy in Iraq; they are being prepared to add another fake
legitimacy to the US Occupation and marginalize the Iraqi people. In
fact, elections are very minor thing of democracy. Democracy is a
collection of institutions that govern an entire nation, and the
purpose of elections is to evaluate the democratic processes.
Elections were the last thing the Bush administration needed.

The best solution is for the US to completely withdraw its armed
forces from Iraq. All Iraqis are in favour of elections as long as
the Occupation forces withdraw from Iraq. According to recent polls,
98 percent of Iraqis want the Americans to leave their country.
Meanwhile a poll conducted by the Chicago Council on Foreign
Relations (CCFR) has reveals that more than two-thirds of both the
US public and US leaders agree than the US should withdraw from Iraq
if a clear majority of Iraqis want it to do so.

The US Occupation of Iraq is the most unpopular occupation in
history. It is a violent occupation where innocent women, children
and unarmed men have been massacred. More than 100,000 innocent
Iraqis have died; thousands are imprisoned and tortured; the lives
of millions more have been wrecked. The conditions of child health
in US-occupied Iraq are now even worse than during the genocidal
years of sanction. Despite that, those who are responsible for this
wanton destruction of human lives have not been indicted for war
crimes or been held accountable by prosecutors. A devastated nation
and broken defenceless people are forced to prepare for an old-
fashion colonial dictatorship, which has its echoes in other foreign
countries under the tutelage of the US administration.

US history of preparing elections in foreign countries is full of
bad examples. In 1984, the US was involved in the El Salvador
elections that brought an assassin (Roberto d A'ubuisson) and a
friend of the US to power. Roberto d'Aubuisson, leader for life of
the ARENA party, that ruled El Salvador since, was named by the UN
Truth Commission report to be implicated in the assassination of
Archbishop Oscar Romero. The Archbishop of El Salvador was
assassinated in March 1980, while giving a mass in a church and just
before sainthood.

The 1984 elections in El Salvador "were little more than a farce
designed to give democratic respectability to a regime that was
perpetuating some of the worst human rights abuses in the
hemisphere", wrote Mark Engler of Foreign Policy in Focus. Those who
seized power in El Salvador with the help of uncle Reagan have
murdered more than 75,000 people. In 1993, the UN Truth Commission
report found that the army and its death squads committed 90% of the
atrocities in the conflict. Among their heinous crimes were the 1989
murder of six Jesuit priests, and the slaughter of hundreds of
villagers. The rebels, led by the FMNL party were responsible for 5
%, and the other 5% remained unknown, said the report.

In the March 2004 elections, the US used fear and threat against the
Salvadoran people to promote its preferred candidates, members of
the ARENA party. The Salvadorian people voted with a gun pointed to
their head. The big loser of the elections are the majority of
people of El Salvador, wrote Joe DeRaymond of Centro de Intercambio
y Solidaridad who monitored the elections.

During the 2004 US elections, Vice President Dick Cheney praised El
Salvador dictatorship as a model for `democracy-building' in Iraq.
One wonders why the US is interested in the El Salvador's model of
democracy and not a Western model of democracy for Iraq? Now, as it
happens, this is something I know quite a bit about. I, for some
reasons have experience living in good democratic nations. I spent
some years in Switzerland, Austria, New Zealand, Scandinavia and
Australia. All these major democratic countries have fairly decent
models of democratic elections. Indeed, the Swiss model of democracy
is the best I have experienced and is very suitable for a
heterogeneous country like Iraq, which has no similarity to El
Salvador.

In 1993, the American analyst, Noam Chomsky commented on the US
approach to `democracy-building' in El Salvador. Chomsky wrote, "[b]
y and large, our approach in El Salvador has been successful. The
popular organizations have been decimated, just as Archbishop Romero
predicted. Tens of thousands have been slaughtered and more than a
million have become refugees. This is one of the most sordid
episodes in US history-and it's got a lot of competition". It is
this successful approach that the US administration is using to
promote America's `democracy-building' posture in Iraq. The US is
more interested in empire-building rather than `democracy-building'.

It should be borne in mind that, the US interference in election
processes around the world is illegal and hypocritical. "The terror
bombing of homes, hospitals and religious buildings by hundreds of
airplanes and helicopter gunships is described by the media
as `securing the city [of Fallujah] for free elections'", wrote
James Petras. The US message for Iraqis is; vote for the Occupation
or you will die. Can you imagine Iran is preparing for a "democratic
elections" of a puppet regime in Iraq with a massive terror campaign
against the civilian population?

Instead of finding an exit strategy to end the violence in Iraq, the
Bush administration is increasing it; using the pretext of
democracy. An exit strategy to end the US Occupation of Iraq is not
impossible. The UN General Assembly, which is less influence by the
US and Britain, is the most preferable body to take over the Iraqi
affairs and helps the Iraqi people achieve sovereignty and freedom.
The UN has an obligation to condemn an act of aggression an illegal
occupation of a sovereign nation.

There is no Vichy near Baghdad; there is Fallujah. The US-sponsored
undemocratic elections in Iraq are against the long-term interests
of the Iraqi people. The upcoming elections will not help achieve
democracy and sovereignty for Iraq. The best solution for Iraq is
the end of US Occupation and the true liberation of the Iraqi
people. This will allow the Iraqi people to gain their freedom and
organise their country for free and fair elections.

Ghali Hassan lives in Perth Western Australia: He can be reached at
e-mail: G.Hassan@...

==========================
Mosul election staff quit en masse
al-Jazeera
Friday 31 December 2004
http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/74DCC874-441A-41DC-9598-
14D149909BFD.htm


---
photos:

Electoral commission workers have been routinely
targeted
http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/rdonlyres/74DCC874-441A-41DC-9598-
14D149909BFD/59127/C5035D1BEE7E4A4196FD47B0BCDF65F8.jpg


Anti-US fighters are in control of large parts of
Mosul city
http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/rdonlyres/74DCC874-441A-41DC-9598-
14D149909BFD/59126/315924BAB6414A84BE15C37319788718.jpg

Oil facilities are attacked on a near-daily basis in
Iraq
http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/rdonlyres/74DCC874-441A-41DC-9598-
14D149909BFD/59142/48EE1ADE50E64A63A769D3ACB7CAFF86.jpg
---


The entire staff of Iraq's Independent Electoral
Commission in the northern city of Mosul, amounting to
about 700 employees, have resigned amid growing
violence in the country.

Staff members said on Thursday their resignation
followed threats they received in the past few days.
The withdrawal of the Iraqi Islamic Party from the
election also figured in their decision, Aljazeera has
learned.

In its response, however, the electoral commission has
vigorously denied the report. "That's not true. We
have our staff in Mosul and al-Anbar," Abd al-Hussain
al-Hindawi, the head of Iraq's Independent Electoral
Commission, told AFP.

Al-Hindawi was also referring to the explosive
province of al-Anbar, home to the strife-torn towns of
Ramadi and Falluja. He declined to give staff numbers
for Mosul, but said: "We have a larger staff than we
did before across Iraq."

Legal action

In a related move that could affect the 30 January
elections, Shia leader Muqtada al-Sadr's political
office announced it was taking legal action against
the interim Iraqi government for alleged torture and
murder of its members.

Fadhil al-Shara, an al-Sadr official, said the legal
action focused on the Iraqi police in Hilla, who are
alleged to have arrested 15 al-Sadr supporters in the
town and tortured another four to death.

Mortar attack

On Thursday, violence raged unabated throughout Iraq.
In the southern town of Amara, an explosive device hit
a British convoy and damaged one of its vehicles.

The blast occurred in front of the headquarters of the
British forces, which earlier came under a mortar
attack from unidentified fighters.

In Mosul, a car bomb detonated as a US military convoy
passed the western al-Yarmuk neighbourhood.

Mosul has witnessed intense fighting in recent days,
with the US military announcing that a daylight
assault on one of its compounds had resulted in the
deaths of 25 Iraqi fighters and one US soldier.

Fifteen US soldiers were also wounded in the attack.

Other incidents

Also on Thursday, in Baiji, four Iraqis thought to
have been working with US forces, were found killed
inside their car while another Iraqi was killed by US
fire in the Siniya neighbourhood, north of the town.

In al-Muatasim neighbourhood, south of the town of
Samarra, US forces killed two Iraqis and wounded a
third.

A US Humvee vehicle was destroyed when an explosive
device detonated in the same town.

In Baghdad, two trucks transporting supplies to the US
army were destroyed on the highway leading to
Baghdad's international airport.

In yet another incident, this one in Hiyt, US forces
raided the tomb of Abd Allah Mubarak and arrested four
of the guards.

Oil refinery attacked

Late on Thursday, a mortar strike set fire to
Baghdad's Dura oil refinery, an interior ministry
official said.

Baghdad firemen were struggling to put out the blaze
and called for help at the refinery in the
southwestern Baghdad suburb, the official said.

"We cannot stop the fire so we called other fire
departments from outside Baghdad," the official said.

The attack occurred at 10pm (1900 GMT), the official
said.

The Dura refinery is also home to Baghdad's main power
plant.

The refinery provides fuel for the plant, which
provides electricity for most of Baghdad and outlying
areas.

It was not immediately clear if the fire had affected
the power plant.

In Baghdad and much of Iraq, electricity is erratic,
with households enjoying power sometimes for as little
as three hours a day.


http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/74DCC874-441A-41DC-9598-
14D149909BFD.htm

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Iraqi Women as Victims of the Occupation

By Megan Cornish

Al-Jazeerah, December 3, 2004

aljazeerah.info

In the raging headlines about Iraq's agony, one large question is
being ignored. What is happening to women, who are 65 percent of the
population? In a telephone interview with Nadia Mahmoud in the
London office of the Organization for Women's Freedom in Iraq
(OWFI), this reporter got some chilling answers. Women suffer
unrelenting deprivation and are under horrific attack from the U.S.
occupation, Islamic fundamentalists, and sex traffickers.

But, at the same time, Iraqi women are showing incredible bravery in
organizing against all the enemies they face, and are reaching out
for support.

The social wounds of past wars and U.S. sanctions.

The story of how the situation of women became so dire is a textbook
example of U.S. imperialism at work.

In 1959, long before Saddam Hussein's Baath Party came to power with
the help of the CIA, organizing by Iraqi women won them the most
advanced family civil code in the Arab world.

Initially, because Iraq's expanding economy needed wo-men in the
workforce, Hussein kept and even extended these rights, with
policies that outlawed sex discrimination and provided free higher
education and maternity leave.

But the seven-year Iran/Iraq war, provoked by the U.S., bankrupted
the country and precipitated a steady decline of women's rights.
Then, Uncle Sam's Gulf War in 1991 and 10 years of U.S./UN economic
sanctions sharply worsened both the economy and the position of
women. Many women became jobless, while their freedom of choice in
marriage and right to travel without a male relative were revoked.

As it became harder for women to make a living, prostitution
increased. During 2000-2001, the Hussein regime beheaded 350 women
accused of prostitution. Some were in fact political dissidents.

Occupation entrenches misery.

Since the latest U.S. war and occupation, women in Iraq have become
literally an endangered majority. Violence against them abounds on
several fronts.

Economically, they are hit hardest by the country's nearly 70
percent rate of unemployment. Men are preferred for the few jobs
that exist, even though huge numbers of women are widows and single
heads of households. Before the war, food was rationed, but now it
is every man and woman for themselves.

As casualties of war, women and children are the overwhelming
majority of those wounded and killed by "precision" bombs and
missiles. The number of civilian deaths has become an international
scandal.

What are perhaps the most sadistic acts of the occupation have been
totally covered up by the U.S. government and media. These are
widespread gang rapes and other abuses of women and children
detainees by U.S. and Iraqi jailers. Most of these victims, many of
whom are raped repeatedly, have only been rounded up to be used as
hostages to force male relatives to surrender.

Pictures of brutalized women in Abu Ghraib prison appeared briefly
on the Internet and then disappeared. But this barbarism is widely
known in the Middle East, and it is now being reported by
International Operation Watch, the Iraqi Union of Detainees and
Prisoners, OWFI, the British Guardian newspaper, and the French
Agence France Press. Countless of these women have committed suicide
or have been murdered by relatives to protect the "family honor."

Also rarely reported in the USA is the prominent U.S. role in
strengthening the reactionary religious elements that want Iraq to
become an Islamic republic. These forces were and are strongly
represented in the former governing council and the current interim
government, both creations of the U.S.

In 2003, the governing council attempted to impose Sharia, the code
of law based on backward, anti-woman religious precepts. Its
proposed measure, Resolution 137, failed thanks to angry
demonstrations in Kurdistan, Baghdad, and elsewhere in Iraq and
internationally.

This narrow escape from the formal obliteration of women's rights
nationally underlines how gravely Iraqi women are threatened by a
rollback to medieval mores.

Assault from within

Every day, the occupation intensifies the breakdown of society and
adds more fuel to the fire of repressive Islamic fundamentalism.

Physical violence by fundamentalists against women is growing. OWFI
has documented the recent murders of eight professional and working
women in the city of Mosul. One was beheaded. As a warning that they
could be next, the names of more women were posted in city mosques
along with those of the murdered.

Meanwhile, sources including the UK Guardian and Independent report
that sex traffickers are seizing women and selling them into
prostitution. Some of these women are sold instead of being released
after being kidnapped for ransom or raped; others are apparently
taken at random. Women and girls cannot safely leave home to work,
go to school or lead a normal life.

The violence provides a strong incentive for women to wear veils.
Some schools are beginning to institute compulsory veiling for girls
(who are also being forced to leave school after the sixth grade.)

OWFI's Mahmoud reports that it is extremely difficult for women to
organize under these conditions. Additionally, they live under three
different sets of Islamic rules in the Kurdish, Shiite and Sunni
parts of the country. Each city can have its own rules, making
travel harrowing.

The good news: female resistance.

Nevertheless, women are organizing to fight back. There are reported
to be hundreds of women's organizations in Iraq today, although most
of them are not openly or explicitly feminist. OWFI, which calls for
an end to violence against women and a secular, egalitarian
constitution, is an exception.

OWFI runs two women's shelters, publishes the newspaper Equality in
English and Arabic, and reaches out for international support. It
has organized a number of demonstrations, including an International
Women's Day march and one in September 2004 calling for safe
streets. It has worked with the Union of Unemployed Workers to
demand housing for thousands of families displaced by the bombing,
and jobs or subsistence for the unemployed. The group defended 45
women bank workers who were falsely accused of corruption, and won
their freedom.

Attacks and death threats have been made against OWFI activists
Yanar Mohammed and Sakar Ahmed. But, as Mohammed said recently, that
will not stop them.

OWFI's feminist organizing is desperately needed and profoundly
courageous. But the Freedom Socialist Party does disagree with the
organization about the armed Iraqi resistance, which the FSP
critically supports and OWFI condemns in favor of UN intervention.
(For more on the FSP's position, please see statements and previous
FS articles at www.socialism.com.)

During the Iran/Iraq war, Iraqi women received compulsory weapons
training, and some are now putting it to use by joining the armed
resistance. The Mahdi Army even has recruitment videos and posters
featuring women.

Antiwar movement must act.

Iraqi women urgently require support. The U.S. antiwar movement was
sadly sidetracked for months during the election campaigns. Now it
needs to snap to life and defend the Iraqi people, especially women,
from its murderous government.

Feminists especially can prod the movement into a renewed level of
militancy for ending the occupation. And effective campaigns should
be mobilized to break the media blackout on the rape of women
prisoners.

Here are some proposed demands:

o Reparations to Iraq paid by U.S. war profiteers! Restoring the
economy is essential to restoring public safety. o Release all women
in custody of the occupation or the puppet Iraqi government! -Their
safety cannot be guaranteed. o Stop U.S. support of Islamic
fundamentalists! o U.S. out of Iraq now! o For a fully democratic,
secular government that guarantees complete freedom for women.

This article first appeared on The Freedom Socialist newspaper.

Megan Cornish, whose antiwar activism began with GI support
organizing in the 1960s, can be reached at mcornish@....

Special thanks to Nadia Mahmoud and Yanar Mohammed of OWFI for their
contributions to this article. For more on OWFI or to make a
donation, visit www.equalityiniraq.com.

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Why American Christian Fundamentalist's Support the State of Israel:

In order for most of today's Christians to escape physical death,
two-thirds of the Jews in Israel must perish, soon. This is the grim
prophetic trade-off that fundamentalists rarely discuss publicly,
but which is the central motivation in the movement's support for
Israel.

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article1585.htm

The Unannounced Reason Behind American Fundamentalism's Support for
the State of Israel
by Gary North

With the President meeting this week with Prime Minister Barak of
Israel and Yassir Arafat, it may be time to review a topic that is
baffling for Jews, annoying to Arabs, and unavoidable for American
Congressmen: the unswerving political support for the State of
Israel by American fundamentalists.

Vocal support of a pro-Israel American foreign policy is basic for
the leaders of American Protestant fundamentalism. This has been
true ever since 1948. Pat Robertson and Rev. Jerry Falwell have been
pro-Israel throughout their careers, beginning two decades before
the arrival of the New Christian Right in the late 1970's. These men
are not aberrations. The Trinity Broadcasting Network is equally
supportive. So are the best-selling authors who speak for, and
influence heavily, Protestant fundamentalism, most notably Hal
Lindsey, author of The Late Great Planet Earth (1970), and Tim
LaHaye, the husband of Beverly LaHaye of Concerned Women for
America, which says on its Web site that it is "the nation's largest
public policy women's organization." Rev. LaHaye and his co-author
have each earned some $10 million in royalties for their multi-
volume futuristic novel, Left Behind. They have a very large
audience.

People may ask themselves, "Why this support?" Fundamentalists
earlier in this century were sometimes associated with anti-
Semitism. James M. Gray of the Moody Bible Institute in 1927 wrote
an editorial favorable to Henry Ford's Dearborn Independent series
on Jews. Gray's editorial appeared in the Moody Bible Institute
Monthly. Arno C. Gabelein, a prominent fundamentalist leader,
believed that the Protocols of the Learned Elders of Zion was a
legitimate document. Gabelein's 1933 book, The Conflict of the Ages,
would today be regarded as anti-Semitic.

Other fundamentalist leaders of the pre-War era, while not anti-
Semitic, attempted to maintain neutrality on the issue of Hitler's
persecution of Jews. In his 1977 book, Armageddon Now!, Christian
historian Dwight Wilson cites numerous examples of fundamentalist
theologians in the late 1930's who regarded Hitler's discriminatory
policies against Jews as part of God's judgment on the Jews. He
writes: "Pleas from Europe for assistance for Jewish refugees fell
on deaf ears, and `Hands Off' meant no helping hand. So in spite of
being theologically more pro-Jewish than any other Christian group,
the premillennarians also were apathetic. . . ." [pp. 96-97].

What was it that persuaded almost the entire fundamentalist movement
to move from either hostility or neutrality to vocal support of
Israel? No single answer will fit every case, but there is a common
motivation, one not taken seriously by most people in history:
getting out of life alive.

The Not-Quite Last Things
The Christian doctrine of eschatology deals with the last things.
Sometimes eschatology deals with the personal: the death of the
individual. Usually, however, it has to do with God's final judgment
of mankind.

There have been three main views of eschatology in the history of
the church, which theologians classify as premillennialism,
postmillennialism, and amillennialism. The pre- and post-
designations refer to the expected timing of the bodily return of
Jesus in the company of angels: before (pre-) the establishment of
an earthly kingdom of God, or after (post-) this kingdom has
extended its rule across the earth.

The amillennial view is that the kingdom of God is mainly spiritual.
This became the dominant view of Christianity for over a millennium
after Augustine's City of God, with its distinction between the city
of God, the church (spiritual and permanent) and the political
cities of man (rising and falling). Luther held this eschatological
view. Most of the Continental Protestant Reformers of the sixteenth
century held it. But seventeenth-century Scottish Presbyterians were
more likely to hold the postmillennial view, and they carried it
with them when they emigrated to America. Their postmillennialism
rested in part on their belief that God will convert the Jews to
Christianity as a prelude to the kingdom's period of greatest
expansion, an idea derived from Paul's Epistle to the church at
Rome, chapter 11. Presbyterians are officially commanded to pray for
the conversion of the Jews. [Westminster Larger Catechism (1647),
Answer 191.] The first generation of Puritan Congregationalists in
New England also held similar postmillennial opinions.

The premillennial view was commonly held in the pre-Augustinian
church, although the other views did have defenders. After 1660,
premillennialism became increasingly common within American
Puritanism. Cotton Mather was a premillennialist. But Jonathan
Edwards was postmillennial. In nineteenth-century America, both
views were common prior to the Civil War. After the War,
premillennialism steadily replaced postmillennialism among
fundamentalists. A secularized postmillennialism was adopted by the
Social Gospel movement. Non-fundamentalist Protestants from
Continental Europe, like the Catholics, remained amillennial.
Postmillennialism faded after World War I until the late 1970's,
when it experienced a limited revival.

Basic to the view of both premillennialism and amillennialism is
pessimism regarding the efforts of Christians to build a culture-
wide kingdom of God on earth. Both positions hold that only by
Jesus' bodily presence among the saints can Christians create an
cultural alternative to the competing kingdoms of man. The
premillennialist believes that this international kingdom
construction task will begin in earnest a thousand years before the
final judgment, with Jesus ruling from a literal throne, probably
located in Jerusalem. The amillennialist views this universal
extension of the kingdom of God into culture as possible only after
the resurrection of all humanity at the final judgment, i.e., in a
sin-free, death-free, Christians-only world.

Tribulation and Rapture
Just prior to Jesus' return to set up an earthly kingdom, argue most
amillennialists and all premillennialists, there will be a time of
persecution, called the Great Tribulation. It is here that the great
debate over the Jews begins. Amillennialists believe that Christians
will be persecuted by their enemies. A handful of premillennialists,
referred to as "historic premillennialists," also identify
Christians as the targets. This version of premillennialism has been
insignificant institutionally since the 1870's. The dominant
premillennial view says that Jews will suffer the Great Tribulation.
Born-again Christians will have flown the coop – literally. This is
the doctrine of the pre-tribulation Rapture.

According to pre-tribulation premillennialists, who are known as
dispensationalists, Jesus will come secretly in the clouds and raise
deceased Christians – and only Christians – from the dead.
Immediately thereafter, every true Christian will be transported
bodily into the sky, and from there to heaven: the Rapture event.
The passage cited to defend this view is found in Paul's first
letter to the church at Thessolonica: "For the Lord himself shall
descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel,
and with the trump of God: and the dead in Christ shall rise first:
Then we which are alive and remain shall be caught up [harpazo]
together with them in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air: and
so shall we ever be with the Lord" (I Thes. 4:16-17). Throughout
most of church history, this passage was associated with the final
judgment, but beginning sometime around 1830 in England, it was
linked to the premillennial, pretribulational Rapture – a word that
is not found in the Greek text or in any English translation of the
New Testament. Its Latin root word is in Jerome's Vulgate, a
translation of the Greek "harpazo" – seize, catch, or pluck.

This outlook on the earthly future became increasingly popular among
fundamentalists, beginning in the 1870's. It was formalized in the
footnotes of the Scofield Reference Bible (1909; revised, 1917). In
1930, it became the first Oxford University Press book to reach
sales of one million. It has now sold over five million copies. C.
I. Scofield's system has defined fundamentalism for nine decades.



The Rapture-based escape from history is now universally believed by
fundamentalists to be imminent. Generations of fundamentalists have
believed that they will escape bodily death. They will be
transported into the sky, like Elijah, though without benefit of
chariots.

But when? That has been the great question. The answer: "Soon." But
why soon? Why not a millennium from now? The psychological answer:
Because men do not live that long in this millennium. The main
selling point for fundamentalism's Bible prophecies is to get
insight into what is coming soon. In this case, the issue of
mortality is central. As the slogan says, "Everybody wants to go to
heaven, but nobody wants to die." The doctrine of the imminent
Rapture allows Christians to believe seriously that they can go to
heaven without dying. Millions of Americans believe this today.

But how can they be so sure? Because of the events of 1948. In that
year, the crucial missing piece of the prophetic puzzle – the
restoration of the nation of Israel – seemed to come true. Critics
of the dispensational system could no longer say, "But where is
Israel in all this?" The answer, at long last: "In Palestine, just
in time for the Great Tribulation."

The Grim Fate of Israel
The source of the idea of the Great Tribulation is found in Jesus'
last words regarding Israel, which are recorded in Matthew 24 and
Luke 21.

And when ye shall see Jerusalem compassed with armies, then know
that the desolation thereof is nigh. Then let them which are in
Judaea flee to the mountains; and let them which are in the midst of
it depart out; and let not them that are in the countries enter
thereinto. For these be the days of vengeance, that all things which
are written may be fulfilled. But woe unto them that are with child,
and to them that give suck, in those days! for there shall be great
distress in the land, and wrath upon this people. And they shall
fall by the edge of the sword, and shall be led away captive into
all nations: and Jerusalem shall be trodden down of the Gentiles,
until the times of the Gentiles be fulfilled (Luke 21:20-24).

Throughout most of church history, this prophecy was interpreted as
having been fulfilled by the Roman siege of Jerusalem and the
destruction of the temple in 70 A.D. With the rise of
dispensationalism, however, the fulfillment of this passage was
moved into the future.

Dispensationalism's critics had long asked: "Where is the nation of
Israel? Where are the Jews?" Not in Palestine, surely. So,
dispensationalists tended to apply this prophecy of near-destruction
to Jews in general – only symbolically residing in Israel – until
1948. This was one reason for their silence on Hitler's persecution.
Hitler was just another rung in the ladder of persecution leading to
the inevitable Great Tribulation.

The prophesied agency of the great persecution has shifted over the
years. As Wilson shows in Armageddon Now!, from 1917 until 1977,
Russia was a prime candidate. But, after 1991, this has become
difficult to defend, for obvious reasons. The collapse of the Soviet
Union has created a major problem for dispensationalism's
theologians and its popular authors. But there have been no
comparable doubts about the intensity of the coming persecution.
Here is the opinion of John F. Walvoord, one of dispensationalism's
leading theologians, who served for three decades as the president
of Dallas Theological Seminary (founded, 1924), the movement's main
seminary.

The purge of Israel in their time of trouble is described by
Zechariah in these words: "And it shall come to pass, that in all
the land, saith Jehovah, two parts therein shall be cut off and die;
but the third shall be left therein. And I will bring the third part
into the fire, and will refine them as silver is refined, and will
try them as gold is tried" (Zechariah 13:8, 9). According to
Zechariah's prophecy, two thirds of the children of Israel in the
land will perish, but the one third that are left will be refined
and be awaiting the deliverance of God at the second coming of
Christ which is described in the next chapter of Zechariah. [John F.
Walvoord, Israel in Prophecy (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, [1962]
1988), p. 108.

Nothing can or will be done by Christians to save Israel's Jews from
this disaster, for all of the Christians will have been removed from
this world three and a half years prior to the beginning of this 42-
month period of tribulation. (The total period of seven years is
interpreted as the fulfillment of the seventieth week of Daniel
[Dan. 9:27].)

In order for most of today's Christians to escape physical death,
two-thirds of the Jews in Israel must perish, soon. This is the grim
prophetic trade-off that fundamentalists rarely discuss publicly,
but which is the central motivation in the movement's support for
Israel. It should be clear why they believe that Israel must be
defended at all costs by the West. If Israel were militarily removed
from history prior to the Rapture, then the strongest case for
Christians' imminent escape from death would have to be abandoned.
This would mean the indefinite delay of the Rapture. The
fundamentalist movement thrives on the doctrine of the imminent
Rapture, not the indefinitely postponed Rapture.

Every time you hear the phrase, "Jesus is coming back soon," you
should mentally add, "and two-thirds of the Jews of Israel will be
dead in `soon plus 84 months.'" Fundamentalists really do believe
that they probably will not die physically, but to secure this faith
prophetically, they must defend the doctrine of an inevitable
holocaust.

This specific motivation for the support of Israel is never preached
from any fundamentalist pulpit. The faithful hear sermons – many,
many sermons – on the pretribulation Rapture. On other occasions,
they hear sermons on the Great Tribulation. But they do not hear the
two themes put together: "We can avoid death, but only because two-
thirds of the Jews of Israel will inevitably die in a future
holocaust. America must therefore support the nation of Israel in
order to keep the Israelis alive until after the Rapture."
Fundamentalist ministers expect their congregations to put two and
two together on their own. It would be politically incorrect to add
up these figures in public.

The fundamentalists I have known generally say they appreciate Jews.
They think Israel is far superior to Arab nations. They believe in a
pro-Israel foreign policy as supportive of democracy and America's
interests. They do not dwell upon the prophetic fate of Israel's
Jews except insofar as they want to transfer the threat of the Great
Tribulation away from themselves and their families. Nevertheless,
this is the bottom line: the prophetic scapegoating of Israel. This
scapegoat, not Christians, must be sent into the post-Rapture
wilderness.

Evangelism in Israel


Their eschatology has produced a kind of Catch-22 for
fundamentalists. What if, as a result of evangelism, the Jews of
Israel were converted en masse to Christianity? They would then be
Raptured, along with their Gentile brethren, leaving only Arabs
behind. This scenario would make the immediate fulfillment of
prophecy impossible: no post-Rapture Israelis to persecute. So,
fundamentalists have concluded that the vast majority of the Jews of
Israel cannot, will not, and must not be converted to Christianity.

This raises an obvious question: Why spend money on evangelizing
Israelis? It would be a waste of resources. This is why there are so
few active fundamentalist ministries in Israel that target Jews.
They target Arabs instead. Eschatologically speaking, the body of an
Israeli must be preserved, for he may live long enough to go through
the Great Tribulation. But his soul is expendable. This is why
fundamentalists vocally support the nation of Israel, but then do
very little to preach to Israelis the traditional Protestant
doctrine of salvation by faith in Jesus Christ. Fundamentalists have
a prophetic agenda for Israelis that does not involve at least two-
thirds of the Israelis' souls. Israelis are members of the only
group on earth that has an unofficial yet operational King's X
against evangelism by fundamentalists, specifically so that God may
preserve Israelis for the sake of the destruction of modern Israel
in the Great Tribulation. The presence of Israel validates the hope
of fundamentalists that Christians, and Christians alone, will get
out of life alive.

===

In case you missed it:

The Cult Of Israel : The Christian Zionists Message :

What is the message of the Christian Zionist? Simply stated it is
this: Every act taken by Israel is orchestrated by God, and should
be condoned, supported, and even praised by the rest of us.

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article1586.htm

===

In case you missed it:

Christian Zionism: Dispensationalism And The Roots Of Sectarian
Theology :

Dispensationalism is one of the most influential theological systems
within the universal church today. Largely unrecognised and
subliminal, it has increasingly shaped the presuppositions of
fundamentalist, evangelical, Pentecostal and charismatic thinking
concerning Israel and Palestine over the past one hundred and fifty
years.

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article4531.htm

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Israeli troops storm Gaza
------------------------------------------------------------------
JABALIYA, Jan 2: Israeli troops poured into the northern Gaza
Strip on Sunday in a bid to halt rocket attacks by Palestinian
militants who were rebuked for their tactics by presidential
election favourite Mahmud Abbas.

Around 50 tanks and armoured vehicles trundled into the Beit Hanun
area near the Erez border crossing between Israel and the
Palestinian territory, after a new spate of rocket attacks which
wounded at least three Israelis.....(AFP)

http://www.dawn.com/cgi-bin/dina.pl?file=top14.htm&date=20050103

======

Palestinian Women Triumph at Polls
http://palestinechronicle.com/story.php?sid=20041230030202790
Thursday, December 30 2004 @ 03:02 AM EST

"Female candidates buck societal pressure to run for municipal
seats. More than half of those who are elected win their places
outright.."

YABED, West Bank (AP) — Women faced pressure not to run as
candidates in Palestinian local elections. But they did, and more
than half of them defeated their male opponents in this
conservative, traditional Arab society.

Palestinian women won 51 seats in Thursday's elections, 32 of them
winning their places outright without having to claim seats reserved
for women by Palestinian law.

Maisoun Badarneh, a 44-year-old teacher elected as an independent
candidate to the council in the town of Yabed, said she faced
intense opposition from relatives and neighbors who argued that it
was unacceptable for a woman to hold a position requiring daily
contact with the public.

"The majority of my problems were due to society's inability to
accept the idea of women participating in the municipality,"
Badarneh said, adding that four other women candidates in her town
dropped out before the elections because of family pressure.

The role of women in the Palestinian struggle has seen peaks and
valleys. And Palestinian society has relegated most women to
traditional house-bound roles.

But Hanan Ashrawi, who has had a long career as a Palestinian
spokeswoman, legislator and human rights activist, believes that the
situation is changing for the better.

"We were hoping for more, but this is a beginning," she said of the
elections.

"We're delighted and plan to have a big celebration for the women."

In the West Bank village of Abwein, north of Ramallah, Fatima
Suhweil, 59, received more votes than any of the 27 other
candidates, despite religious-based parties campaigning relentlessly
against her.

Now she will be mayor, representing the mainstream Fatah party,
which won 12 of the 13 council seats.

Suhweil attributed her support, from both men and women, to her
record in building up and running a girls high school.

Source: Los Angeles Times

=======================
Wall Must Be Torn Down, Abbas Says

http://palestinechronicle.com/story.php?sid=20041230041112592
Thursday, December 30 2004 @ 04:11 AM EST

"The PFLP move would improve Barghouthi's showing by attracting a
number of undecided voters, although not enough to upset Abbas.."

QALQILYA, West Bank (AFP) - Palestinian presidential election
favorite Mahmoud Abbas called for the tearing down of Israel's West
Bank wall yesterday, warning that it would never deliver
security. "If we are to coexist with the Israelis, this wall must
disappear," he told supporters while on the campaign trail in the
town of Qalqiliya. "The Berlin Wall was the last racist wall and it
fell. We hope to see this wall fall and that peace and security can
take its place."

The citizens of Qalqiliya have been totally encircled by a
combination of towering slabs of concrete and electronic fencing,
ruled illegal by the UN's highest legal body. Abbas had traveled to
Qalqiliya after addressing a crowd of some 8,000 supporters in the
nearby town of Tulkarm where the wall also came in for fierce
attack.

"Neither settlements, nor the wall will bring peace and security,"
Abbas said during his speech in a football stadium, situated barely
500 meters from the blocks of concrete which make up the barrier in
Tulkarm. "We say to our neighbors (the Israelis) that no matter how
many walls and obstacles you build, they will not bring you peace
and security."

The wall — a montage of concrete, razor wire and electric fencing —
is being built across the West Bank in what Israel says is a bid to
prevent attacks on its territory by Palestinian militants. The
Palestinians, however, regard its route, often jutting deep into
their territory, as proof of its real intent to appropriate land and
prejudge the borders of their promised future state.

The UN's International Court of Justice ruled in July that parts of
the wall built on the Palestinian side of the internationally-
recognized border between Israel and the West Bank are illegal.
Israel vowed to ignore the nonbinding verdict but has modified its
route after rulings from its own Supreme Court.

Abbas, who is standing for the dominant Fatah faction in the Jan. 9
contest to succeed Yasser Arafat as head of the Palestinian
Authority, also reiterated his vision of an independent state on all
the land occupied by Israel since 1967, with east Jerusalem as its
capital.

Before his appearance at the stadium, Abbas also paid a visit to the
local refugee camp where he met the parents of 'martyrs' of the
conflict with Israel and with members of Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades,
an armed offshoot of Fatah. Abbas was accorded a hero's welcome in
the camp, and was carried briefly on the shoulders of one of the
refugees.

A Palestinian group said it would back a leading proponent of
nonviolence running in the election. The endorsement of human rights
activist Mustafa Barghouthi by the Popular Front for the Liberation
of Palestine highlighted a political shift after Arafat's death in
which other militants have decided to back Abbas.

"We call on all members of the PFLP and the Palestinian people to
support and vote for Mustafa Barghouthi," senior PFLP leader Rabah
Muhana told a news conference in Gaza. The PFLP, which has about 2
percent support in opinion polls, is a radical group in the umbrella
Palestine Liberation Organization led by Abbas and opposes peace-
making with Israel in contrast with Fatah, the PLO's mainstream
faction.

Barghouthi, running a distant second to Abbas in the election race,
is a prominent critic of Israeli Army crackdowns in occupied
territory but, like Abbas, wants a halt to bloodshed and talks on a
Palestinian state coexisting alongside Israel. Muhana said the PFLP
and Barghouthi had agreed on key issues such as stressing a "right
of return" of refugees to what is now Israel and rejecting any peace
based on 1990s interim deals that did not require full Israeli
withdrawal from occupied areas.

Asked about being linked with a group that has killed Israelis in
suicide bombings and assassinated an Israeli Cabinet minister,
Barghouthi said he disagreed with some PFLP views but its move would
foster Palestinian unity after Arafat. "We will give maximum effort
to strengthen the popular (nonviolent) nature of the struggle (for
statehood). We will seek to unite the vision of struggle through
dialogue. "(The PFLP endorsement) can be the start of a new
democratic Palestinian coalition," he told Reuters.

Political analyst Hani Habib said the PFLP move would improve
Barghouthi's showing by attracting a number of undecided voters,
although not enough to upset Abbas. It could also raise fear in
Fatah, he said, that Islamists might back an independent like
Barghouthi "to at least prevent Abbas from achieving a big victory"
that he needs for a popular mandate to rein in militants so he can
negotiate with Israel.

The Fatah-affiliated Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades say its gunmen will
vote for Abbas "to give him a chance" because he wants to root out
corruption and carry out democratic reform. But the Brigades, like
Hamas and the PFLP, have resisted Abbas' calls for a truce with
Israel, although violence has abated markedly in most areas since
Arafat died in November.

Source: Agency France Press

===================================
Israeli Occupation Claims 12 More Palestinian Lives
---------------------------------------------------------------

Thursday, December 30 2004 @ 04:05 AM EST
http://palestinechronicle.com/story.php?sid=20041230040549789

"Sharon voiced strong opposition to any EU role in Middle East peace
talks, charging that the 25-nation bloc had an 'unbalanced' approach
to the problem.."

OCCUPIED JERUSALEM - Israeli Occupation Forces (IOF) have killed 12
Palestinians in less than a week, including a 7-year old child, 4
extra-judicially executed, and 4 died in sporadic tank shelling
inside their homes, to vindicate the Arab League chief Amr Mousa's
statement on Tuesday that there is "not a glimmer of hope" for the
creation of a true Palestinian state because he could not see any
change in the positions of Israel and the United States.

There is "not a glimmer of hope" for the creation of a true
Palestinian state, the Secretary General of the Arab League said,
dismissing growing hopes that the moribund peace process is on the
verge of recovery.

Mousa dismissed the UN-adopted "roadmap" was on the verge of
recovery.

"I do not see any change in the positions of Israel, the United
States and their allies or that the situation is going to calm down.
I don't see a glimmer of hope," he told Egypt's Al-Ahram.

He warned against the temptation of giving the Palestinians
statehood that turns out to be based on no more than a rump state.

"I fear that all that is going to be proposed to the Palestinians is
the creation of a rump state of a provisional nature which is just
ridiculous because by consolidating the status quo a time-bomb is
being laid," he said.

"If there is a true desire to establish a Palestinian state in line
with the roadmap then Israel must give the Palestinians 90 percent
of the occupied territories as well as east Jerusalem and it must
stop settlements," he said.

Sharon Rules out EU Role

Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon voiced Tuesday strong opposition
to any EU role in Middle East peace talks, charging that the 25-
nation bloc had an "unbalanced" approach to the problem.

He said the EU would be qualified for a role only when the European
Union pressures Palestinians to stop armed resistance to the 37-year
old Israeli occupation of the West Bank and Gaza strip.

British Prime Minister Tony Blair held official talks with
Palestinian leaders in the West Bank city of Ramallah last Wednesday
after failing to convince Israeli officials to attend a proposed
international conference in London early next year.

Sharon supported convening the London conference provided it
pressures Palestinians "to reform" and refused Israel's
participation in the meeting.

Although Palestinian Foreign Minister Nabil Shaath on Monday
welcomed Blair's deepening involvement in the Middle East peace
process as a way of pressuring Washington to step up its role, 13
Palestinian anti-occupation factions opposed the London conference
as "an interference in Palestinian internal affairs."

"Blair's proposal for the London conference, which was supposed to
discuss the peace process, has been transformed into an interference
in Palestinian internal affairs," the factions said in a statement
Monday.

The Palestine National Authority (PNA) reiterated its demand that
the London conference discusses the final status issues of the
Palestinian – Israeli conflict and to reactivate the "roadmap" peace
plan, which the UN Security Council endorsed in resolution 1515 in
November 20003.

But Israel refused and reiterated its commitment only to its
unilateral plan to re-deploy the IOF troops and the illegal Jewish
settlers from the Gaza Strip.

World Bank President James Wolfensohn announced Monday that
Israel's "Disengagement" plan is insufficient if it does not also
give hope to the Palestinians.

Israeli Foreign Minister Silvan Shalom Monday slammed Chairman of
the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) Mahmoud Abbas, saying
Israel could not ignore his latest statements that Israel must take
down all settlements, return to the pre-1967 borders, accept a
Palestinian state with its capital in Jerusalem and the return of
Palestinian refugees, and release all Palestinian detainees in the
IOF jails.

Shalom ignored Abbas' repeated calls for the demilitarization of the
Palestinian Intifadah.

Abbas told a gathering of business leaders in Ramallah Sunday "it is
impossible to liberate Palestine with the use of weapons because the
balance of power is not with us," adding that independence could
only be achieved through peaceful means.

Abbas however said that a ceasefire with the IOF is a reciprocal
measure.

Israel Justifies Palestinian Resistance

Mahmud Zahar, the leader of Hamas in Gaza Strip, told Egypt's Al-
Ahram the Islamic Resistance Movement had not changed its rejection
of any move to "demilitarize" the Intifada (uprising), citing the
continuing Israeli occupation, military aggression, and extra-
judicial assassinations, demolition of houses as justification for
the Palestinian armed self-defense.

Israel has continued its military attacks and extra-judicial
killings of Palestinian activists, which claimed twelve Palestinian
lives in less than a week.

21-year old Palestinian Eyad Kamel Nabhan died Wednesday of wounds
sustained from IOF gunfire during the Israeli 3-day reoccupation of
western Khan Yunis in southern Gaza Strip last week.

On Tuesday three Palestinian anti-occupation activists survived an
Israeli extra-judicial killing when an IOF missile hit a civilian
car in the southern Gaza Strip town of Khan Yunis, Reuters reported.
Some passersby suffered wounds.

In a statement, the IOF said an aircraft had fired on gunmen blamed
for mortar attacks from Khan Yunis, including 40 in the past week.

Palestinians suspect informers among their ranks of providing
information to the IOF on the movement of Palestinian activists.

Last Tuesday four Palestinians (Ali Shaban, Hussein al-Yaziji,
Ibrahim Abu Taybeh and Ibrahim al-Qahwaji) suspected of
collaborating with the Israeli Occupation Forces (IOF) were
sentenced to prison terms ranging between 10 – 20 years by a
Palestinian court in Gaza City.

Late Tuesday also IOF tanks and bulldozers stormed into the northern
Gaza Strip town of Beit Hanoon, demolishing houses and bulldozing
agricultural land.

Hours after the failed extra-judicial assassination an Israeli tank
shell, fired from the nearby illegal Jewish settlement of Neve
Dekalim, wounded nine Palestinians in the center of Khan Yunis,
witnesses said.

The same day the IOF tanks and military jeeps stormed into the West
Bank city of Nablus and wounded several Palestinian teenagers.

On Monday a Palestinian who was extra-judicially killed by the IOF
in Nablus was identified as Wael Mohammad Riyahi, 35.

Early Sunday IOF killed Mohammad Abdul Salam Abulroos, 24, and
Mohammad Hamdan Abu Jaber, 22 in Al-Buraij refugee camp in southern
Gaza Strip.

The same day 7-year old Tasahil Majdi Al-Hasanat died of wounds
sustained from IOF gunfire on October 13.

Early the day before, Saturday, Thaer Abul-Kamel, 27, was extra-
judicially killed under the rubble of a 4-storey building, which the
IOF demolished in the northern West Bank city of Jenin.

On Friday December 24, the IOF extra-judicially killed 3
Palestinians in the northern West Bank refugee camp of Tulkarem,
namely: Jamal Khaled Aazem, 16, Kamel Abdulah Kamel Sabbarini, 23,
and Iyad Azmi Ghannam, 21.

On Thursday December 23 the IOF tank shells killed Rami Kamel Abu
Eker, 25, and Eid Mohammad Abu Namoos, 25, inside their homes in
Khan Yunis. IOF demolished the walls of Nasser Hospital and Mubarak
Hospital in the town a day earlier.

At least one Palestinian (Mohammad Ashraf Grately, 18) was killed
when IOF tanks and military vehicles stormed into Khan Yunis early
the day before, and demolished several residential buildings.

The latest deaths raised the Palestinian death toll to 3,767 since
the outbreak of the Al-Aqsa Intifada (uprising) against the 37-year
old Israeli occupation on September 28, 2000.

More than 10,000 mourners attended the previous Sunday the funerals
for 12 victims of the IOF three-day invasion of Khan Yunis refugee
camp.

That invasion of the camp left 46 houses demolished and 56 families
homeless.

Meanwhile the IOF continue to close Rafah border terminal between
the Gaza Strip and Egypt since Monday morning, 13 December 2004. The
terminal is the only outlet to the outside world for about 1.5
million Palestinians in Gaza Strip.

Source: Palestine Media Center (PMC) - www.palestine-pmc.com

============
"Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, has admitted that the
arrangements are designed to show that Israel has sole sovereignty
in East Jerusalem.."

Israel Stops Palestinians Voting in Jerusalem
By Conal Urquhart
Thursday, December 30 2004 @ 04:22 AM EST
http://palestinechronicle.com/story.php?sid=20041230042214159

JERUSALEM - Israel was accused yesterday of undermining the election
of a Palestinian Authority president by allowing only a few thousand
Palestinians to vote in East Jerusalem.

More than 100,000 will have to leave the city if they want to vote.

The government has told the Palestinian Election Commission that it
will not allow privacy screens in the voting booths in East
Jerusalem post offices, nor will election officials be allowed to
mark voters with indelible ink to prevent fraud.

The prime minister, Ariel Sharon, has admitted that the arrangements
are designed to show that Israel has sole sovereignty in East
Jerusalem.

Palestinians say it could make the election meaningless and reduce
the credibility of the winner. Amar Dweib, the chief electoral
officer, said that the commission had been told that 5,367 people
could vote at five post offices in East Jerusalem.

"We asked the Israelis to increase the number of polling stations,
but they refused," he said.

"I do not know the precise number of eligible voters in East
Jerusalem, because the Israelis would not allow us to register them,
but we think it is around 120,000.

The rest... will have to undertake long journeys around the
separation wall in order to vote."

Qais Abu Leila, leader of the Democratic Front for the Liberation of
Palestine, whose candidate, Tayseer Khaled, is third in the opinion
polls (on 7%), said the Israeli obstruction would call the result
into question.

"If we agree to go along with this we will be capitulating to the
diktat of the Israelis and helping them deceive the world that they
allowed free and fair elections," he said.

Source: The Guardian

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How Iran will fight back
By Kaveh L Afrasiabi
http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Middle_East/FL16Ak01.html

TEHRAN - The United States and Israel may be contemplating military
operations against Iran, as per recent media reports, yet Iran is
not wasting any time in preparing its own counter-operations in the
event an attack materializes.

A week-long combined air and ground maneuver has just concluded in
five of the southern and western provinces of Iran, mesmerizing
foreign observers, who have described as "spectacular" the
massive display of high-tech, mobile operations, including rapid-
deployment forces relying on squadrons of helicopters, air lifts,
missiles, as well as hundreds of tanks and tens of thousands of well-
coordinated personnel using live munition. Simultaneously, some
25,000 volunteers have so far signed up at newly established draft
centers for "suicide attacks" against any potential intruders in
what is commonly termed "asymmetrical warfare".

Behind the strategy vis-a-vis a hypothetical US invasion, Iran is
likely to recycle the Iraq war's scenario of overwhelming force,
particularly by the US Air Force, aimed at quick victory over and
against a much weaker power. Learning from both the 2003 Iraq war
and Iran's own precious experiences of the 1980-88 war with Iraq and
the 1987-88 confrontation with US forces in the Persian Gulf,
Iranians have focused on the merits of a fluid and complex defensive
strategy that seeks to take advantage of certain weaknesses in the
US military superpower while maximizing the precious few areas where
they may have the upper hand, eg, numerical superiority in ground
forces, guerrilla tactics, terrain, etc.

According to a much-publicized article on the "Iran war game" in the
US-based Atlantic Monthly, the estimated cost of an assault on Iran
is a paltry few tens of millions of dollars. This figure is based on
a one-time "surgical strike" combining missile attacks, air-to-
surface bombardments, and covert operations, without bothering to
factor in Iran's strategy, which aims precisely to "extend the
theater of operations" in order to exact heavier and heavier costs
on the invading enemy, including by targeting America's military
command structure in the Persian Gulf.

After this Iranian version of "follow-on" counter-strategy, the US
intention of localized warfare seeking to cripple Iran's command
system as a prelude to a systematic assault on key military targets
would be thwarted by "taking the war to them", in the words of an
Iranian military strategist who emphasized America's soft command
structure in the southern tips of the Persian Gulf. (Over the past
few months, US jet fighters have repeatedly violated Iran's air
space over Khuzestan province, testing Iran's air defense system,
according to Iranian military officials.)

Iran's proliferation of a highly sophisticated and mobile ballistic-
missile system plays a crucial role in its strategy, again relying
on lessons learned from the Iraq wars of 1991 and 2003: in the
earlier war over Kuwait, Iraq's missiles played an important role in
extending the warfare to Israel, notwithstanding the failure of
America's Patriot missiles to deflect most of Iraq's incoming
missiles raining in on Israel and, to a lesser extent, on the US
forces in Saudi Arabia. Also, per the admission of the top US
commander in the Kuwait conflict, General Norman Schwarzkopf, the
hunt for Iraq's mobile Scud missiles consumed a bulk of the
coalition's air strategy and was as difficult as searching
for "needles in a haystack".

Today, in the evolution of Iran's military doctrine, the country
relies on increasingly precise long-range missiles, eg, Shahab-3 and
Fateh-110, that can "hit targets in Tel Aviv", to echo Iranian
Foreign Minister Kemal Kharrazi.

Chronologically speaking, Iran produced the 50-kilometer-range Oghab
artillery rocket in 1985, and developed the 120km- and 160km-range
Mushak artillery rockets in 1986-87 and 1988 respectively. Iran
began assembling Scud-Bs in 1988, and North Korean technical
advisers in Iran converted a missile maintenance facility for
missile manufacture in 1991. It does not seem, however, that Iran
has embarked on Scud production. Instead, Iran has sought to build
Shahab-3 and Shahab-4, having ranges of 1,300km with a 1,600-pound
warhead, and 200km with a 220-pound warhead, respectively; the
Shahab-3 was test-launched in July 1998 and may soon be upgraded to
more than 2,000km, thus capable of reaching the middle of Europe.

Thanks to excess revenue from high oil prices, which constitute more
than 80% of the government's annual budget, Iran is not experiencing
the budget constraints of the early and mid-1990s, when its military
expenditure was outdone nearly one to 10 by its Arab neighbors in
the Persian Gulf who are members of the Gulf Cooperation Council;
almost all the Arab states possess one or another kind of advanced
missile system, eg, Saudi Arabia's CSS-2/DF, Yemen's SS-21, Scud-B,
Iraq's Frog-7.

There are several advantages to a ballistic arsenal as far as Iran
is concerned: first, it is relatively cheap and manufactured
domestically without much external dependency and the related
pressure of "missile export control" exerted by the US. Second, the
missiles are mobile and can be concealed from the enemy, and third,
there are advantages to fighter jets requiring fixed air bases.
Fourth, missiles are presumed effective weapons that can be launched
without much advance notice by the recipient targets, particularly
the "solid fuel" Fatah-110 missiles that require only a few short
minutes for installation prior to being fired. Fifth, missiles are
weapons of confusion and a unique strike capability that can torpedo
the best military plans, recalling how the Iraqi missile attacks in
March 2003 at the US military formations assembled at the Iraq-
Kuwait border forced a change of plan on the United States' part,
thereby forfeiting the initial plan of sustained aerial strikes
before engaging the ground forces, as was the case in the Kuwait
war, when the latter entered the theater after some 21 days of heavy
air strikes inside Iraq as well as Kuwait.

Henceforth, any US attack on Iran will likely be met first and
foremost by missile counter-attacks engulfing the southern Persian
Gulf states playing host to US forces, as well as any other country,
eg, Azerbaijan, Iraq or Turkey, allowing their territory or airspace
to be used against Iran. The rationale for this strategy is
precisely to pre-warn Iran's neighbors of the dire consequences,
with potential debilitating impacts on their economies for a long
time, should they become accomplices of foreign invaders of Iran.

Another key element of Iran's strategy is to "increase the arch of
crisis" in places such as Afghanistan and Iraq, where it has
considerable influence, to undermine the United States' foothold in
the region, hoping to create a counter-domino effect wherein instead
of gaining inside Iran, the US would actually lose territory partly
as a result of thinning its forces and military "overstretch".

Still another component of Iran's strategy is psychological warfare,
an area of considerable attention by the country's military planners
nowadays, focusing on the "lessons from Iraq" and how the pre-
invasion psychological warfare by the US succeeded in causing a
major rift between the top echelons of the Ba'athist army as well as
between the regime and the people. The United States' psychological
warfare in Iraq also had a political dimension, seeing how the US
rallied the United Nations Security Council members and others
behind the anti-Iraq measures in the guise of countering Saddam
Hussein's weapons of mass destruction.

Iran's counter-psychological warfare, on the other hand, seeks to
take advantage of the "death-fearing" American soldiers who
typically lack a strong motivation to fight wars not necessarily in
defense of the homeland. A war with Iran would definitely require
establishing the draft in the US, without which it could not
possibly protect its flanks in Afghanistan and Iraq; imposing the
draft would mean enlisting many dissatisfied young soldiers amenable
to be influenced by Iran's own psychological warfare focusing on the
lack of motivation and "cognitive dissonance" of soldiers ill-
doctrinated to President George W Bush's "doctrine of preemption",
not to mention a proxy war for the sake of Israel.

This aside, already, Iranians today consider themselves subjected to
the machinations of similar psychological warfare, whereby, to give
an example, the US cleverly seeks to capitalize on the discontent of
the (unemployed) youth by officially shedding crocodile tears, as
discerned from a recent interview of the outgoing Secretary of State
Colin Powell. Systematic disinformation typically plays a key role
in psychological warfare, and the US has now tripled its radio
programs beamed to Iran and, per recent reports from the US
Congress, substantially increased its financial support of the
various anti-regime TV and Internet programs, this while openly
trumpeting the cause of "human intelligence" in a future scenario of
conflict with Iran based in part on covert operations.

Consequently, there is a sense of a national-security siege in Iran
these days, in light of a tightening "security belt" by the US
benefiting from military bases in Iraq, Turkey, Azerbaijan,
Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, Kyrgyzstan, as well as Kuwait, Saudi Arabia,
Qatar, Bahrain, Oman and the island-turned-garrison of Diego Garcia.
From Iran's vantage point, the US, having won the Cold War, has
turned into a "leviathan unhinged" capable of manipulating and
subverting the rules of international law and the United Nations
with impunity, thus requiring a sophisticated Iranian strategy of
deterrence that, in the words of certain Iranian media pundits,
would even include the use of nuclear weapons.

But such voices are definitely in a minority in Iran today, and by
and large there is an elite consensus against the manufacturing of
nuclear weapons, partly out of the conviction that short of creating
a "second-strike capability" there would be no nuclear deterrence
against an overwhelming US power possessing thousands of "tactical
nuclear weapons". Still, looking at nuclear asymmetry between India
and Pakistan, the latter's first-strike capability has proved a
deterrence against the much superior nuclear India, a precious
lesson not lost on Iran.

Consequently, while Iran has fully submitted its nuclear program to
international inspection and suspended its uranium-enrichment
program per a recent Iran-European Union agreement inked in Paris in
November, there is nonetheless a nagging concern that Iran may have
undermined its deterrence strategy vis-a-vis the US, which has not
endorsed the Paris Agreement, reserving the right to dispatch Iran's
nuclear issue to the Security Council while occasionally resorting
to tough saber-rattling against Tehran.

At times, notwithstanding a media campaign in the US, particularly
by the New York Times, through news articles carrying such
provocative titles as "US versus a nuclear Iran", the US continues
its hard-power pre-campaign against Iran unabated, in turn fueling
the national security concern of those groups of Iranians
contemplating "nuclear deterrence" as a national survival strategy.

Concerning the latter, there is a growing sentiment in Iran that no
matter how compliant Iran is with the demands of the UN's
International Atomic Energy Agency , much like Iraq in 2002-03, the
US, which has lumped Iran into a self-declared "axis of evil", is
cleverly sowing the seeds of its next Middle East war, in part by
leveling old accusations of terrorism and Iran's complicity in the
1996 Ghobar bombing in Saudi Arabia, irrespective of the Saudi
officials' rejection of such allegations totally overlooked in a
recent book on Iran, The Persian Puzzle by Kenneth M Pollack (see
Asia Times Online, The Persian puzzle, or the CIA's?, December 3.)

Thus there is an emerging "proto-nuclear deterrence" according to
which Iran's mastery of the nuclear fuel cycle would make
it "nuclear weapon capable" in a relatively short time, as a sort of
pre-weapon "threshold capability" that must be taken into account by
Iran's enemies contemplating attacks on its nuclear installations.
Such attacks would be met by stiff resistance, born of Iran's
historic sense of nationalism and patriotism, as well as by a
counter-weaponization based on quick conversation of the nuclear
technology. Hence the longer the US, and Israel, keep up the
military threat, the more powerful and appealing the Iranian
yearning for a "proto-nuclear deterrence" will grow.

In fact, the military threat against Iran has proved poison for the
Iranian economy, chasing away foreign investment and causing
considerable capital flight, an intolerable situation prompting some
Iranian economists even to call for filing complaints against the US
in international tribunals seeking financial remedies. This is a
little far-fetched, no doubt, and the Iranians would have to set a
new legal precedent to win their cause in the eyes of international
law. Iran cannot possibly allow the poor investment climate caused
by the military threats to continue indefinitely, and reciprocating
with an extended deterrence strategy that raises the risk value of
US allies in the region is meant to offset this rather unhappy
situation.

Ironically, to open a parenthesis here, some friends of Israel in
the US, such as Harvard law professor Alan Dershowitz, an avid
supporter of "torturing the terrorists", has recently inked a column
on a pro-Israel website calling for the revision of international
law allowing an Israeli, and US, military assault against Iran.
Dershowitz has clearly taken flight of the rule of law, making a
mockery of the esteemed institution that is considered a beacon on
the hill in the United States; the same Ivy League university is
home to the hate discourse of "clashing civilizations", another
ornament for its cherished history. Even Harvard's Kennedy School
dean, Joseph Nye, a relative dove, has replicated the US obsession
with power by churning out books and articles on "soft power" that
reifies every facet of American life, including its neutral culture
or entertainment industry, into an appendage or "complement" of
US "hard power", as if power reification of what Jurgen Habermas
calls "lifeworld" (Lebenswelt) is the conditio sine qua non of Pax
Americana.

The ruse of power, however, is that it is often blind to the
opposite momentum that it generates, as has been the case of the
Cuban people's half a century of heroics vis-a-vis a ruthless regime
of economic blockade, Algerian nationalists fighting against French
colonialism in the 1950s and 1960s, and, at present, the Iranian
people finding themselves in the unenviable situation of
contemplating how to survive against the coming avalanche of a US
power led entirely by hawkish politicians donning the costumes of
multilateralism on Iran's nuclear program. Yet few inside Iran
actually believe that this is more than pseudo-multilateralism
geared to satisfy the United States' unilateralist militarism down
the road. One hopes that the road will not wind down any time soon,
but just in case, the "Third World" Iranians are doing what they can
to prepare for the nightmare scenario.

The whole situation calls for prudent crisis management and security
confidence-building by both sides, and, hopefully, the ugly
experience of repeated warfare in the oil-rich region can itself act
as a deterrent.

Kaveh L Afrasiabi, PhD, is the author of After Khomeini: New
Directions in Iran's Foreign Policy (Westview Press) and "Iran's
Foreign Policy Since 9/11", Brown's Journal of World Affairs, co-
authored with former deputy foreign minister Abbas Maleki, No 2,
2003. He teaches political science at Tehran University.

(Copyright 2004 Asia Times Online Ltd. All rights reserved. Please
contact us for information on sales, syndication and republishing.)

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Azmi Bishara: Palestinian State as Israeli Demand
--------------------------------------------------------------------

Thursday, December 30 2004 @ 03:16 AM EST

"One could not help but to be struck by the coincidence between
Sharon's optimism and an Arab optimism of a very particular
stamp..":

By Dr. Azmi Bishara

It is pointless to ask why the British prime minister or why the
chief executive of the World Bank never visited Palestine while
Arafat was alive. No one will answer. But there they were when, on
20 December, George Bush reminded us that he was the first American
president to officially acknowledge the principle of the creation of
a Palestinian state. Yet, the principle was implicit in Clinton's
proposals in Camp David II and even Sharon had declared his
acceptance of the need to create a Palestinian state ahead of Bush.
So, what distinguishes the current diplomatic drive on Palestine,
explicitly, implicitly or otherwise?

The question of Palestine, today, is being presented as the question
of a state, and nothing but a state: a state without borders,
without a capital and without a national cause ñ just a state. There
is a concerted attempt to create the impression that if "a state",
with the emphasis on the indefinite article, is offered to the
Palestinians they cannot refuse. After all, everyone knows that that
is what they have been fighting for, so when it is offered to them
on a platter what more could they ask for?

One could not help but to be struck by the coincidence between
Sharon's optimism and an Arab optimism of a very particular stamp.
Something jarred, and instinctively one's eyes did a double take and
one's ears pricked up. Certainly, both senses couldn't be wrong, or
perhaps one of the two senses had to accommodate to the other.

The Israelis are reading portents of great change in Sharon's
Herzliya speech of 16 December. Certainly, in Israeli language and
substance the speech was upbeat and thus merited being dubbed
the "historical opportunities speech." But, if Sharon is optimistic,
the Arabs have every cause to wonder why; they certainly have no
cause to share the sentiment unless they accept its component parts.

The Israeli optimism that sees "historical opportunities" in
Sharon's speech can only stem from the prospect of an "improvement
in Israel's strategic condition" as Sharon, himself, said in his
speech a major component of which resides in "the most important
accomplishment" of the disengagement plan which was "the
understandings between US President Bush and me." Sharon goes on to
call upon the Palestinian leadership to share his optimism
by "taking a historic decision to stop those who support terror,"
for by taking such a historic decision the leadership will qualify
to be a partner in what? in "coordinating various elements relating
to our Disengagement Plan with a government which is ready and able
to take responsibility for the areas which we leave." Take it as
read that Sharon expects the Palestinians, who had no input in that
plan and refused to respond to it, to regard Israel's readiness to
let a "responsible" PA maintain security on Israel's behalf in the
areas it vacates as a great Israeli compromise, and thus cause for
optimism. Sharon goes on to say that if the PA is successful in this
task this will pave the way to comprehensive peace negotiations ñ
with no question of breaching the ceiling of the understandings
between Bush and Sharon of course Again, Palestinians are to hail
the return to the negotiating table on the basis of these
understandings, which embody the Israeli formula for a permanent
settlement, Israel's major political accomplishment from the
disengagement plan, we recall as a great achievement. This is what
it takes to be optimistic.

If the understandings are the bases for Sharon's optimism it
obviously does not follow that the Arabs should thrill in unison. As
Sharon made so explicit in his speech, Bush pledged to support the
annexation of Jerusalem and Israeli settlement blocs to Israel and
the exclusion of the Palestinian right to return within the
framework of a permanent solution. However, instead of taking this
as impetus to reform the Arab order, to truly work together to
defend Palestinian and Arab rights against Sharon's designs to
swallow up as large chunks as possible of the occupied territories,
to counter his incitement, which was blatant in his speech, against
Syria and against the Palestinian resistance, and other such actions
that would really give us cause for hope, some Arabs and
Palestinians rushed to embrace that artificial patina of Sharonic
optimism that so thinly disguises what should give us (presuming we
have a collective opinion on the matter) cause for the gravest
concern.

These Arab and Palestinian optimists have sought comfort or
justification in the argument that the disengagement plan is part of
the roadmap. Sadly, they are deceiving no one but themselves. Lest
we forget, the author of the roadmap took the trouble to spell out
his perception of where that road would lead. That destination, as
Arab policy makers are perfectly well aware, is not contained in the
roadmap but in the "vision" detailed by Bush in his letter of
guarantees to Sharon. The most telling proof of the fallacy of the
premise that the disengagement plan as part of the roadmap is cause
to join in Sharon's optimism is to be found, firstly, in the stance
the Israeli government took in a recent case before the Israeli
courts. In a dispute between two Israeli settlements, one inside the
Green Line, the other outside, the former claimed that the latter
was expanding illegally. Lawyers for the first settlement argued
that Alfi Manshi ((SP??)), as the settlement outside the Green Line
is called, was constructing what it termed a new neighbourhood
located two kilometers away from the settlement and that this
project was in effect a new settlement and as such violated the
roadmap that Israel had approved. The public prosecutor,
representing the government, countered that the government did not
recognize the legal efficacy or validity of the roadmap. But just in
case we missed this message, Sharon's bureau chief Dov Weisglass was
not so subtle. In his speech at Herzliya, delivered just a day
before Sharon's, he said that the roadmap was not a conception of a
permanent solution but a guide to the phases of the negotiating
process, no more no less. In other words, he is telling us, if the
Arabs want to consider the disengagement plan as part of the roadmap
that is perfectly alright with Israel.

But what about the Palestinian state, some might ask. Didn't you say
that Sharon approved of the idea? And so he did, even before the
roadmap was unveiled. But to Sharon, a Palestinian state means
demographic separation. It means a state on the smallest patch of
land possible containing the largest number of Palestinians
possible, a state constructed on the logic of Elon's historical plan
and of Begin's concept of autonomy. But more importantly to Sharon,
the state has now become a prerequisite for continuing negotiations
over a final settlement. Yes, what since Rabin had been regarded as
a distasteful inevitability of a permanent settlement has become an
Israeli demand that must be fulfilled not just before a permanent
settlement but instead of a permanent settlement To Sharon, a
Palestinian state is another word for a protracted interim period.
Whether this state is created on a little more or a little less than
40 per cent of the occupied territories is not the point; the point
is to make it the cornerstone of a drawn-out interim phase after
which negotiations will take place with a government that has
demonstrated its mettle as a government, which is to say proven its
ability to monopolize the means of violence and to organize its
legal and social affairs. Once this state is in place, according to
Sharon's way of thinking, everyone can relax, because then
negotiations over a the outstanding issues of a final settlement can
proceed in a nice, genteel pace until the end of time if the
negotiating parties so desire, because then the nature of the
conflict will have been transformed into a dispute between two
states. And what outstanding issues might two states have to settle
between them? Borders of course. Niggling details over borders.
Certainly not national rights or other matters pertaining to
national liberation. And certainly not the Palestinian right to
return. Naturally, the Palestinian state established in Gaza and a
portion of the West Bank will have the right to grant passports to
Palestinian refugees if it wants. In fact, it can even grant them
the right to return to the areas within its borders. That would be
its right as a state, which Sharon would gracefully acknowledge or,
if not gracefully, he would object and then grudgingly make
another "painful concession."

This is Sharon's concept of a Palestinian state. It is his
alternative to a fully sovereign state with a capital in Jerusalem,
to the 1967 borders and to the Palestinian right to return. And not
one word of the roadmap contradicts his "vision." It is also his
alternative to having to negotiate with a national liberation
movement. There is a vast difference between negotiating a final
settlement with a state and with a national liberation movement.
Dozens of states have borders disputes; there is nothing
particularly urgent or unsettling about them, unlike national
liberation causes. Sharon has no intention of broaching the latter,
and the Palestinians will forfeit the opportunity to broach them too
if they accept the creation of a state outside the framework of a
just, comprehensive and permanent solution, a state amputated at its
inception and that Sharon intends to make the permanent solution.

Source: Ahram Weekly - 23-29 December 2004; Issue No. 722

http://palestinechronicle.com/story.php?sid=20041230031655315

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"Even if I come home in a box, you should know that I did it for
(all of) you. Take care of the kids. Stay strong," Osbourne told her
spouse.

http://207.44.245.159/article7496.htm
When Mom Goes to War...And Dies

By LISA HOFFMAN
Scripps Howard News Service

12/16/04 "Scripps Howard News Service" --Army Pfc. Lori Piestewa was
not only the first female American soldier killed in combat in Iraq,
she was also the first U.S. military mother to die in the war.

In all, six mothers in uniform have died in Iraq between the start
of the war in March 2003 and the end of November, leaving behind a
total of 10 children. Overall, 27 women troops have died in the war.

Among the mothers were:

Piestewa, 23, who died in the March 23, 2003, ambush in which Pfc.
Jessica Lynch was captured in Nasiriyah. She had two children,
Brandon, 4, and Carla, 3. Both now are being raised by their
grandparents in El Paso, Texas.

Another single Army mother, Spc. Jessica Cawvey, joined the Illinois
National Guard to build a better life for her daughter, Sierra, 6.
In Iraq since February, Cawvey, died Oct. 6 when a roadside bomb
exploded as her convoy passed near Fallujah.

Cawvey, 21, "wasn't the military type," her mother, Sandra Cawvey,
told a local newspaper. She enlisted in the Guard simply to help pay
for college so she could get a decent job. Before she deployed to
Iraq, Cawvey had been living with her parents and Sierra, and
working on a bachelor's degree in accounting at Illinois State
University in Normal, Ill.

The impact of Cawvey's death on Sierra was somewhat cushioned by the
fact that the child is continuing to live with her grandparents in
Mahomet, Ill. "She's doing just fine," said Clarence Cawvey,
Jessica's uncle. "It's more like she lost a sister."

Less than a week after Cawvey died, Army Sgt. Pamela Osbourne was
killed by shrapnel from a rocket attack on her camp in Baghdad. A
native of Jamaica, Osbourne, 38, came to America when she was 14
with two dreams _ to become a U.S. citizen and to serve in the
military.

A medical condition could have kept her out of Iraq duty, but
Osbourne was determined to serve her country, her husband Rohan
Osbourne told a local newspaper in Hollywood, Fla.

While she was deployed, her husband tended to their three children,
ages 9 to 19. A supply specialist, Osbourne managed to call home al
most every day, between 5 a.m. and 6 a.m.

She made her husband promise not to hide anything from the kids if
the worst happened.

"Even if I come home in a box, you should know that I did it for
(all of) you. Take care of the kids. Stay strong," Osbourne told her
spouse.

(E-mail Lisa Hoffman at HoffmanL(at)shns.com.)

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US Accuses Israel of Spying; Second Charge in 4 Months:

Washington allegedly is so furious over the spying allegations that
it has demanded the resignation of Amos Yaron, director general of
Israel's Defense Ministry, according several news sources.

http://www.arabnews.com/?
page=4§ion=0&article=56174&d=17&m=12&y=2004

Barbara Ferguson, Arab News

WASHINGTON, 17 December 2004 — For the second time in four months,
the US has accused Israel of spying against Washington. This week,
the FBI charged the Israeli Defense Ministry of industrial
espionage, and accused its defense officials of trying to access US
top secret technological and intelligence data.

Washington allegedly is so furious over the spying allegations that
it has demanded the resignation of Amos Yaron, director general of
Israel's Defense Ministry, according several news sources.

The report comes just days after the FBI raided the pro-Israel
lobbying group, AIPAC, in Washington and interrogated AIPAC
officials, resulting in four of AIPAC's top officials being
subpoenaed by a federal grand jury. The US has accused a Defense
Department analyst, Lawrence Franklin, of passing classified US
information on Iran to Israel.

Additionally, FBI officials say that Israeli officials who visited
US military sites have tried to steal confidential US technology
information. FBI agents have interrogated a number of Israeli
officials over the past few months, including IDF officers,
diplomats, and military industry officials.

Israel has called the US accusations that Tel Aviv's defense
officials were engaged in industrial espionage "a misunderstanding
based on chutzpah and general nosiness," according to yesterday's
Jerusalem Post.

"High-ranking political sources in Israel reiterated that all the
tension is the result of cultural differences, such as the Israeli
practice of cutting corners or pressuring officials to give up
information. The Americans interpret these in a completely different
way, they said," notes the Post.

Knesset Member Yuval Steinitz, chairman of the Knesset's Foreign
Affairs and Defense Committee denied Israel was involved in
industrial or any other kind of espionage in the United States.

"There is no Israeli espionage in the US. Period," he told Israel
Army radio. "There is a lot of very good cooperation, including
military and security industrial cooperation. There is also a mutual
exchange of information. Both sides contribute information. Perhaps
it is this to which (the Americans) are referring."

But a US defense expert disagrees. He told Arab News yesterday the
Israelis have been spying on US military systems for years - this,
he said is "well-known" within the defense community. "They took our
Arrow, our Patriot missile system, and a knock-off of our F-16, the
Davi and made their versions of it," said the source, who insisted
on anonymity.

"The irony is that they copy our weapons and then turn around and
sell them to countries where we don't want them to go."

"In this case, Pakistan now has a spin-off of the F-16 and is using
US technology that came via Israel and China."

"During Gulf War I, the US stationed their Patriot missiles in
Israel and their experts crawled all over it. They helped themselves
to whatever they could to make a similar weapon, and several of our
Patriots disappeared while there," he said.

==================
Israeli Mossad blamed for Syria blast :

http://tvnz.co.nz/view/news_world_story_skin/464189?format=html

Dec 14, 2004

Syria blamed Israel's Mossad intelligence service for a bombing in
Damascus which a Palestinian source in Beirut said was a failed
attempt to kill a member of the militant Hamas group.

Three people were slightly hurt in the explosion which destroyed the
silver sports utility vehicle owned by the unidentified Palestinian,
who escaped unhurt.

The attack was the second one of its kind in the Syrian capital in
less than two months, and it came one day after Hamas and another
armed Palestinian group killed five Israeli soldiers in a carefully
planned attack on their outpost in Gaza.

"The entity behind it is the Mossad; collaborators with the Mossad
or the Mossad in particular," Interior Minister Ghazi Kanaan told
Syrian Satellite Channel when asked about who was suspected to be
behind the explosion that targeted what he described as a
Palestinian citizen.

A senior Israeli official called the accusation "nonsense".

"Such nonsense does not warrant a comment. Instead of blaming
Israel, the Syrians should be cracking down on the terrorists in
their midst, as required by the international community," the
official, who requested anonymity, said in Jerusalem.

The Palestinian source in Beirut said the bomb, placed under the
driver's seat, blew up shortly after the unnamed Hamas member and
his daughter parked the car and left.

The blast occurred near a hospital and a petrol station which was
not damaged.

Second attack in three months

In September, Izz el-Deen al-Sheikh Khalil, 42, a Hamas official was
killed in a bomb blast in his car in Damascus and an Israeli
television station, citing unidentified security sources, said
Israel was behind the attack.

Israeli security officials had earlier vowed to hit Hamas leaders in
Palestinian areas and abroad in response to twin bus bombings in
that killed 16 people in southern Israel.

The Islamic militant group, behind a wave of suicide attacks that
has killed scores of Israelis over the past four years, is sworn to
Israel's destruction.

Israel has been demanding that Syria crack down on Palestinian
militants as a condition for resuming peace talks deadlocked since
2000.

Israeli Foreign Minister Silvan Shalom said on Monday Syria must act
against Islamic militants on its territory.

"If they (Damascus) would like to make peace, they should close
headquarters there in Damascus, they should shut down the training
camps of the Hamas and the Islamic Jihad that are still open,"
Shalom told a news briefing after meeting EU officials.

"We believe if we are going to have a real peace we can't have
terrorist attacks by day, funerals afternoon and negotiations by
night in nice hotels. No one will accept it in our public opinion."

Syria denies hosting training camps for Palestinians on its
territory and says it backs Palestinian struggle against Israeli
occupation.

The official Syrian news agency SANA confirmed the car belonged to a
Palestinian but gave no details on who he was.

The vehicle was quickly removed by security and rescue teams who
were collecting shrapnel scattered on the street in the Mazze area,
resident said.

"The explosion was so strong that the door blew open in my house and
windows were shattered in the whole building," resident Issam Abdul
Wahid told Reuters.

"There was nobody in the car. I was extinguishing it and there was
nobody in it," he added.

===============
Syria pulls back more troops from Lebanon
------------------------------------------------------------------
BEIRUT, Dec 18: The Syrian army announced on Saturday another
limited pullback of troops in Lebanon, amid mounting international
pressure on Damascus to pull out all of its forces and end
interference in its smaller neighbour.....(Agencies)

http://www.dawn.com/cgi-bin/dina.pl?file=top15.htm&date=20041219

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Police Need Not Say Why Arrest Made:
U.S. High Court Overview
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?
pid=10000103&sid=aervulEx104o&refer=us


Dec. 13 (Bloomberg) -- Police officers don't have to give a reason
at the time they arrest someone, the U.S. Supreme Court said in a
ruling that shields officers from false-arrest lawsuits.

The justices, voting 8-0, threw out a suit against Washington state
police officers who stopped a motorist and then told him he was
being arrested for tape-recording their conversation. Although the
recording was legal, the high court said the arrest was valid
because the man could have been arrested instead for impersonating a
police officer.

In an opinion for the court, Justice Antonin Scalia said the
officers didn't have to provide a reason for arresting the man at
all, as long as they had probable cause to do so.

``While it is assuredly good police practice to inform a person of
the reason for his arrest at the time he is taken into custody, we
have never held that to be constitutionally required,'' Scalia
wrote.

The decision was one of five issued by the court today in
Washington. In a second unanimous ruling, the court said the Florida
Supreme Court was wrong to set aside a death penalty verdict on the
grounds that the defense lawyer didn't obtain explicit client
authorization to concede guilt and focus on the penalty phase of the
trial.

Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, writing for the high court, said that
factor didn't automatically render the lawyer's performance
deficient and warrant a new trial in the murder case.

Rehnquist Plans

Chief Justice William H. Rehnquist, who announced Oct. 25 that he is
being treated for thyroid cancer, didn't take part in either
unanimous ruling.

Court spokeswoman Kathy Arberg said Rehnquist, 80, will abstain from
some of the cases argued during the two-week period that started
Nov. 1. The chief justice, however, will take part in all cases
argued during the subsequent two-week December argument session that
began Nov. 29, she said.

``The chief justice has decided he will not participate in November
cases unless the conference vote without him is 4-4,'' Arberg said.
``He is going to participate in the December cases.''

The news, coupled with the announcement last week that Rehnquist
plans to administer the oath of office to President George W. Bush
at the Jan. 20 inauguration, suggests the chief justice isn't
planning to retire any time soon. Medical experts say Rehnquist, who
has undergone a tracheotomy, chemotherapy and radiation, may have an
especially aggressive form of thyroid cancer.

Superfund Ruling

In other cases, the court:

-- Limited the power of companies to sue other businesses and the
federal government for the cost of cleaning up hazardous wastes. The
justices ruled 7-2 that a disputed section of the Superfund law
doesn't authorize companies to sue for cleanup costs unless they are
facing a federal enforcement action. The decision left open the
possibility that type of suit could be filed under a different
section of the law.

-- Shielded a police officer in Washington state from an excessive-
force lawsuit filed by a suspect who was shot in the back by the
officer while trying to flee in a vehicle.

In the false-arrest ruling, the justices reversed a decision by the
San Francisco-based 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. The appeals
court had said an arrest on an invalid charge can't be upheld unless
police could have filed a different charge over a ``closely related
offense.''

Scalia said the 9th Circuit reasoning would have ``perverse
consequences,'' giving officers an incentive not to give any reason
for an arrest.

Ruling Reversed

The troopers pulled Jerome Anthony Alford over in 1997 after seeing
him stop behind a disabled vehicle on a highway. The occupants of
the disabled car told police they thought Alford was a police
officer because his car had headlights that alternated flashing on
and off.

The troopers said that, when they stopped Alford, they saw that he
had a police scanner and handcuffs. A supervisor arrived and noticed
that Alford had a tape-recorder that was recording his conversation
with the officers.

The officers arrested Alford on a charge of violating Washington's
Privacy Act, which makes it unlawful to record a private
conversation without all parties' consent. Alford told the officers
he had a copy of a court ruling that said the state privacy law
didn't protect police officers on the job.

The charge later was dismissed, and Alford sued the two officers,
claiming false arrest and a civil rights violation.

The case is Devenpeck v. Alford, 03-710.



To contact the reporter on this story:
Greg Stohr in Washington at  gstohr @ bloomberg.net.

To contact the editor responsible for this story:
Glenn Hall at  ghall @ bloomberg.net.

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Police charge Fort Stewart soldier with staging shooting to avoid
Iraq

RANDY PENNELL
Associated Press
Thu, Dec. 16, 2004
http://www.ledger-
enquirer.com/mld/ledgerenquirer/news/politics/10433554.htm


PHILADELPHIA - Police arrested a Fort Stewart, Ga., soldier Thursday
after he allegedly had his cousin shoot him so he wouldn't have to
return to Iraq.

Army Spc. Marquise J. Roberts, of Hinesville, Ga., suffered a minor
wound to the leg from a .22 caliber pistol, police said. He was
treated at a hospital, then arrested after he allegedly confessed to
having made up a story about the shooting.

Police charged Roberts with filing a false report.

Roberts, 23, was on a two-week leave from the Army's 3rd Infantry
Division, which led the assault on Baghdad in 2003 and is scheduled
to return to Iraq within the next few months.

Police said Roberts, who was in Iraq for seven months, was
distraught about having to return to combat duty, and wanted to stay
with his family.

Lt. Col. Cliff Kent, a spokesman for the 3rd Infantry, said Roberts
had been scheduled to return from leave to Fort Stewart this week.

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