[wvns] ‘I’LL REVEAL IDENTITY OF BOMBER’

The lawyer acting for the freed Lockerbie bomber is flying to Libya to prepare for the release of a dossier of evidence "proving" his client's innocence.

Lockerbie bomber: Megrahi's lawyer to release dossier 'proving' his innocence
By Andrew Alderson, Chief Reporter
29 Aug 2009

Tony Kelly, a Scottish solicitor, said that Abdelbaset Ali Mohmed al Megrahi, 57, who returned to his homeland ten days ago after being released from prison on compassionate grounds, remains determined to show his guilty verdict was unjust.

Megrahi, who has terminal prostate cancer, withdrew his second appeal against conviction just two days before he was allowed to return to Libya.

Those close to him say he did so reluctantly because he was convinced it would improve his chances of being freed from a Scottish jail, eight years after being convicted of murdering 270 people.

The disclosure will further enrage critics of the decision to free Megrahi, the only man convicted of the atrocity.

It also raises the likelihood of further embarrassment for Scotland over the handling of the original trial and it could lead to fresh questions over whether Megrahi was innocent and, if so, who was really behind the bombing.

Mr Kelly intends to fly to Tripoli, the Libyan capital, within days to receive instructions from his client.

Mr Kelly said: "Mr Megrahi wants all the information that has been gathered made public at some point.

"But how and when this takes place is ultimately a matter for him to decide. It is my intention to travel to Tripoli in the course of the next week or so to obtain his instructions on this."

The lawyer said he had been unable to discuss this issue with Megrahi after his release because things were "fraught" and the Libyan had been rushing to get a plane to his homeland.

Mr Kelly confirmed that Megrahi had left the relevant legal documents supporting his second appeal in the UK rather than take the evidence back with him to Libya.

Although Mr Kelly declined to reveal the new evidence which would have been presented to appeal hearing, it is understood that Megrahi's legal team had planned to list some 20 grounds why his conviction was unsafe, including:

Potentially crucial evidence was deliberately withheld from Megrahi's first trial.

One crucial witness was paid $2 million (£1.25 million) for his suspect evidence.

Allegations of tampering with key evidence.

American intelligence believed Iran – not Libya – was responsible for Lockerbie

Several relatives of the Lockerbie victims are also convinced of Megrahi's innocence, including Dr Jim Swire, now 73, whose daughter, Flora, 24, died in the terror attack.

Dr Swire said he welcomes any new evidence relating to the bombing being made public.

"The way for Scotland to move forward is for it to drive a coach and horses through the sanctity of this [guilty] verdict," he said.

Professor Robert Black QC, the lawyer who was the architect of the Lockerbie trial, said Megrahi had been caught in a difficult position prior to his release.

This was because Kenny MacAskill, the Scottish Justice Secretary, was considering either releasing him on compassionate grounds or as part of a prisoner exchange programme between Britain and Libya that was first agreed by Tony Blair and Colonel Muammar Gaddafi, the Libyan leader, two years ago.

Megrahi could have been released on compassionate ground without dropping his appeal – but he could not have been freed under the exchange programme if legal action was ongoing.

"Megrahi was reached a stage where he was so concerned to get back to Libya to die that he was prepared to do even unpalatable things [drop his appeal] to achieve that objective," Professor Black said.

He added that the new evidence relating to Megrahi's second appeal ought still to be made public – initially through a limited inquiry in Scotland into the entire Lockerbie criminal case.

He said there was also a chance of a larger EU or United Nations investigation into the case.

Christine Grahame, a Scottish National Party MSP who visited the Libyan in prison, said that Megrahi had been "leaned on" by the Scottish authorities to drop his second appeal. She welcomed any new evidence being made public.

Megrahi's second appeal had been permitted in 2007 after the Scottish Criminal Cases Review Commission uncovered six separate grounds for believing the conviction may have been a miscarriage of justice.

Under Scottish law, provided the appeal was ongoing, Megrahi's family could have continued it after his death, but the legal action was halted by the appeal being withdrawn.

Many people, including President Barack Obama and US families of the Lockerbie victims, have criticised Mr MacAskill's decision to allow Megrahi to return to Libya. They wanted him to die in jail in Scotland.

In a statement issued at the time of his release, Megrahi said: "I have been faced with an appalling choice: to risk dying in prison in the hope that my name is cleared posthumously or to return home still carrying the weight of the guilty verdict, which will never now be lifted."

===

Megrahi fights on to clear his name
August 31, 2009 .

LONDON: The Scottish lawyer acting for the freed Lockerbie bomber is to fly to Libya to prepare a dossier of evidence ''proving'' his client's innocence.

Tony Kelly said Abdel Basset al-Megrahi remains determined to show the guilty verdict at his trial in 2001 was unjust.

Megrahi was freed and returned to Libya two days after he withdrew his second appeal against his conviction. He did so reluctantly because he was convinced it would improve his chances of being freed.
Mr Kelly plans to fly to Tripoli, the Libyan capital, within days to receive instructions from his client.

The disclosure will further enrage critics of the decision to free Megrahi. It also could lead to fresh questions over whether Megrahi was innocent and, if so, who was behind the 1988 bombing.

===

`I'LL REVEAL TRUE IDENTITY OF BOMBER'

Megrahi is to point the finger

Sunday August 23,2009

By Ben Borland

AN AMERICAN citizen is to be named by the Lockerbie bomber as the man who really carried out the terrorist attack on Pan Am Flight 103.

Megrahi's early release from prison on compassionate grounds.

Lawyers for the bomber were to argue that an "elusive" terrorist codenamed Abu Elias planted the bomb in December 1988, causing the deaths of 270 innocent people.

Megrahi is now expected to identify the man behind this alias.

The Scottisch Sunday Express tracked this man down to his home in the US, and he strongly denied having anything to do with the atrocity.

However, we can reveal that he has connections to at least two international terrorists and a Palestinian terror group, as well as links to the US intelligence services.

The man, who works as a schools engineer for the US government, was to become the central figure in Megrahi's aborted appeal.

`Elias', a commander in a Palestinian terror organisation, was identified as the CIA's primary Lockerbie suspect but was never caught.

Megrahi set to name US ­citizen as prime suspect who hid behind terror alias of Abu Elias

Sources close to Megrahi believe he may actually have been a double agent working for the FBI or the CIA.

Last night the man, who we have chosen not to name, said: "Sorry, I don't think that I can help in this case. It is a clear case of either mistaken identity and/or fabrication.

"I don't wish my name to be mentioned in any capacity in the press. I am sure you understand the sensitivity of this matter since I have a family and children."

However, Christine Grahame MSP, who visited Megrahi in Greenock prison and campaigned for his release, is believed to be considering naming the man in the Scottish Parliament chamber.

She said: "It is apparent that US intelligence has known or must have known the primary suspect of the Lockerbie bombing was alive and living safely in Washington.

"There has been a suggestion made that he is in some way an `intelligence asset' for the US and that is why he has been allowed to live in peace.

"He must be deeply relieved that Megrahi was forced to drop his appeal and that he will never face justice for this atrocity."

Yesterday, Megrahi promised that before he dies he will present new evidence gathered for the appeal which will exonerate him. He said he will call on the British and Scottish people "to be the jury".

The man Megrahi believes was Abu Elias now lives in a suburban neighbourhood near Washington's Dulles airport, just a few miles from the White House and the Lockerbie memorial at Arlington National Cemetery. He even has his own Facebook social network page.

He is the nephew of Syrian terror warlord Ahmed Jibril, the founder of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine – General Command (PFLP-GC).

Jibril was allegedly paid $10million by Iran to bomb an American passenger jet in retaliation for the US Navy accidentally shooting down an Iranian plane earlier in 1988, killing all 298 pilgrims on board.

The man is also related to Nezar Hindawi, a Syrian currently serving a 45-year sentence in Whitemoor high-security prison in Cambridgeshire for plotting to blow up an Israeli jet flying from Heathrow to Tel Aviv in 1986.

A document submitted to the appeal court by Megrahi's lawyers states: "The FBI had apparently investigated `X' and knew he was the nephew of Ahmed Jibril.

"`X' had met with FBI special agents [an appointment was in his diary for August 1988] but neither `X' nor the Department of Justice would disclose who the agents were or the precise purpose of the recorded meeting. `X' admitted the meeting had taken place. It is inconceivable that he did not produce his Syrian passport for examination. Only extracts from his US passport were revealed.

"Once again, the hand of the US government appeared to be guiding matters behind the scenes."

`Elias' was also connected to Mohammed Abu Talb, an Egyptian named by Dumfries and Galloway Police as their chief suspect less than a year after the bombing. The true identity of `Elias' first came to light during a closed hearing at the Lockerbie trial in Holland in 2001, which led to Megrahi's conviction.

However, the defence claim that attempts to investigate further were dismissed as a "fishing" exercise by the then Lord Advocate, Colin Boyd.

There is further evidence to link the PFLP-GC to the disaster, as first reported by the Scottish Sunday Express in 2004.

In October 1988, following a tip-off from the CIA, German police raided a PFLP-GC safe house in Neuss and discovered a bomb in a Toshiba cassette player, identical to the one which exploded on board Flight 103, as well as a Pan Am timetable.

Codenamed Autumn Leaves, the raid resulted in 16 arrests including that of cell leader Hafez Dalkamoni, later convicted for a bombing campaign on German railways, and ­Marwan Khreesat, a double agent for the Jordanian intelligence service.

Khreesat said in an interview with an FBI agent that he had been introduced to a man called Abu Elias, an explosives and airline security expert who had been "giving orders".

Another member of the terror cell, Mobdi Goben, later disclosed Elias's true identity in a deathbed confession which became known as the Goben Memorandum during the Camp Zeist trial. Goben claimed `Elias' placed a bomb in the luggage of Khaled Jafar, a Lebanese/American from Detroit who died on board Pan Am Flight 103.

A source close to Megrahi said yesterday that `Elias' could have been spying for the Americans.

The source said: "Not only was Abu Elias known to the Americans, but what if he was working for them? The guy comes into the US from the former Soviet Union, he's the nephew of Ahmed Jibril – the Bin Laden of his day – and he just strolls into the US?

"I think they turned him, and I think he operated as a double agent.

"Khreeshat said if they had waited one more day they would have got Elias in the Autumn Leaves raid.

Goben says Elias put the bomb into Jafar's case without his knowledge.

"Abu Elias was a prime suspect. An American double agent was responsible for bringing down an American plane. How good a reason for a cover-up would that be?"

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[wvns] Ethiopian troops seize central Somalia town from Islamists

Ethiopian troops seize central Somalia town from Islamists
2009-08-29

MOGADISHU, Aug. 29 (Xinhua) -- Hundreds of Ethiopian troops on Saturday took control of a main central Somali town from an Islamist rebel group, residents said.

Residents woke up to the presence of Ethiopian troops who crossed over the border into the central Somali town of Beledweyn, provincial capital of Hiran, 300 km north of the Somali capital of Mogadishu.

The rebels from the hard line Islamist group of Al Shabaab reportedly fled the town without fighting as the troops closed in to the western part of the city where the rebels were mainly based, residents in the town said.

"The Ethiopian troops and Somali government forces took up positions around the main buildings in Beledweyn," said Salah Mohamed, a local resident in the town, "They were heavily armed".

Somali government security officials remained tight-lipped about the presence of the Ethiopian troop in the town which fell to the rebels just a week ago following fierce battles.

This would be the first time that Ethiopian troops fully captured territory in Somalia following their withdrawal from the war-torn East African country in January this year after two-year presence.

Islamist rebels control most of south and central Somalia while Somali government forces backed by peacekeepers from the African Union run parts of the Somali capital and central Somalia.

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[wvns] U.S. Invades, Occupies Pakistan

[PakAlertPress] The U.S. Invades and Occupies Pakistan

By Talha Mujaddidi

We are watching it happen in the streets. The recurring nightmare has become a grim, new reality for the people of Pakistan. After watching the horrors of the U.S. invasions and occupations of Iraq and neighboring Afghanistan for 8 years, the “war on terror” has finally arrived in The Land of the Pure. Obama is fulfilling his campaign promise to Pakistan. The sudden arrival of U.S. marines, U.S. military Hummers, the hired killers of Blackwater, houses barricaded for U.S. personnel in Islamabad and the construction of the world’s largest U.S. ´Embassy¡ are terrorizing this nation of 180 million people. The U.S. slaughter and destruction in Iraq and neighboring Afghanistan for the last 8 years warn them of what may lie in store for them, their families, their land.

On 9/21/08 a bomb ripped through the Marriott Hotel in Islamabad killing scores of people and injuring hundreds. Prior to the bombing, U.S. marines off-loaded steel boxes from a truck, by-passed security and took them to the 4th floor of the building. US officials refused to cooperate with the government’s attempts to investigate their activities. One year later, U.S. Marines are leading the occupation of Pakistan.

[To read the rest of this article, click here.]

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[wvns] When Muslims Saved Jews

The article below indicates some of the complexity that Zionists have been trying to cover up in Berlin. Unfortunately, Gershman appears to be a participant in an ongoing effort to bring Holocaust religion to Arabs and Muslims.

If the vast majority of Jews (at least 80%) were not so thoroughly enmeshed or indoctrinated in Zionism (Jewish Nazism), more Jews would act like decent human beings by demanding

• the abolition of the State of Israel,
• the repatriation of the native population,
• the reconveyance of property to its rightful owners,
• the payment of compensation (at exemplary damage rates) to the native Palestinian population, other Arabs, or other Muslims for sufferings inflicted through direct or indirect Zionist violence, and
• the transfer of Zionist leaders to the Hague for trial in Nuremberg-style tribunals.

BESA…When Muslims Saved Jews

By Dina Rabie

CAIRO — Norman Gershman has become accustomed to the reactions from people who see his photos and read his stories about Muslims sheltering Jews and saving their lives during the Holocaust.

"I had people say 'Muslims save Jews! How is that?'" the American Jewish fine art photographer told IslamOnline.net in a telephone interview.

Gershman has been engaged in a 5-year project that honors stories of Albanian Muslims' heroism in saving thousands of Jews, who either lived in Albania or sought refugee there, during World War II.

The "BESA… a code of honor" project began when he was seeking out photographs of righteous, non-Jews who helped Jews during the Holocaust, in New York.

Gershman was amazed to find among them Muslim names that he was told belongs to Albanians.

His quest then took him to Yad Vashem, the holocaust museum in Jerusalem, where he found more Albanian names.

"I traveled all through Albania and Kosovo where I met the rescuers' children, who are in their sixties or even older, the rescuers' widows, and in some cases the rescuer himself."

After more than four years of collecting stories and shooting black and white photos, Gershman's first exhibition was held last November at Yad Vashem.

The exhibition then went the UN headquarter in New York before starting a world tour.

A full length documentary is in progress along with a fine art book of the heroic profiles of Muslims saving Jews in Albania and Kosovo.

The premier of the film worldwide is expected in 2009.

"I am proud and happy to show this story to the world," Gershman says
Qur'anic BESA

Albanian Muslims saved Jews from the Nazis "to go to paradise."

People usually ask Gershman about the title he chose for the fruit of his painstaking five-year efforts.

"BESA is a tribal Albanian culture that goes back to thousands of years," he explains.

"What BESA says is that if some one knocks on your door you have an absolute obligation – no matter who that person is – to save their lives."

There is no any evidence that any Jew was turned over to Nazis in Muslim-majority Albania.

There were ten times more Jews in Albania after WWII than before.

"In fact, Albania is the only Nazi occupied country that sheltered Jews," says Gershman.

"They came in as guests. They were given Muslim names, they were living with Muslim families."

From the saviors' tales, Gershman found that Albanian Muslims considered BESA a manifestation of the Islamic teachings of keeping the promise and protecting the weak.

"I remember that some of them said 'there is no BESA without the Qur'an.'"

Gershman believes that to Muslim Albanians, the idea of not saving Jews from the Nazis was inconceivable.

"They did this in the name of their religion. They absolutely had no prejudice what so ever.

"I asked them 'why did you do this? What was in the Qur'an that you did this?' They would only smile.

"Some of them said 'we have saved lives to go to paradise.'"

Message to West

Gershman believes the Albanian Muslim heroism is of extraordinary significance.

"In one way it's a small story because we are not talking about hundreds of thousands of people being saved. But it's an important story," he insists.

"It says that there are good people in the world, and they come from every religion."

Gershman says believes that the stories of Albanian religious tolerance left a legacy that runs in the face of stereotyped portrayal of Muslims.

"My message to the Western world is that there are so many good people in the world and so many of them are Muslims," he maintains.

"If you see my pictures and the stories, there is no question that these are good people.

"I defy if anybody sees my pictures, especially in the West, and say that these people are militants or supporters of violence."

The Jewish American, who has studied Sufism, says Islam is not what many Westerners think.

"To me Islam is poetry, is science, is to be with the divine. Islam is beauty."

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[wvns] Treating People Like Dogs

Weaponizing Psychology - Treating People Like Dogs

28 Aug, 2009 Peter Chamberlin

Nearly all of the Pentagon’s counter-insurgency warfare doctrine has been based on distortions of the pirated theories of former president of the American Psychological Association, Prof. Martin Seligman. Now we learn that post traumatic stress disorder(ptsd) treatments for war veterans have been developed from his work as well. The US military has totally embraced Seligman’s controversial theories, twisting them to suit their deadly purposes, basing their computer-modeled psyops plans, plans forhomeland security, even their recruitment strategies, upon his theories of “learned helplessness,” looking for ways to bring-about its most debilitating form, learned hopelessness. Every one of these programs is geared towards finding and exploiting the human breaking point. Seligman’s core observation is that people and animals tend to basically just give-up, when besieged by inescapable pain and cruel, relentless uncertainty—to quote another controversial work, “Silent Weapons for a Quiet War,” they reached a point of “capitulation.”(for those who categorically dismiss this “conspiracy theory” document, because of its iffy history, it nevertheless remains the defining explanation of the theory of econometric warfare and the accompanying psychological concept of “capitulation.”) Investigative journalist Jane Mayer (author of The Dark Side) has revealed that Seligman’s work also inspired the CIA’s controversial torture/interrogation program. Mayer has traced the lineage of the ideas behind the “water-boarding” mentality (specifically, the electro-shocking of prisoners and treating them like dogs), proving that they were reverse-engineered from Seligman’s work. In Six Questions for Jane Mayer, Author of The Dark Side, Scott Horton’s interview with Jane Mayer: “You have patiently traced the torture techniques used by the CIA back to two psychologists, James Mitchell and John Bruce Jessen—you describe them as ”good looking, clean-cut, polite Mormons”—who reverse-engineered their techniques out of the SERE (survival, evasion, resistance, escape) program used to train U.S. pilots in self-defense. In Dark Side, you identify an approach called “Learned Helplessness” as the model they used, and you note that its author, Prof. Martin Seligman, made a visit to the SERE school… Seligman and colleagues at the University of Pennsylvania pioneered work on a theory he called “Learned Helplessness.” He did experiments with dogs in which he used electric shocks to destroy their will to escape… He and colleagues conducted experiments on caged dogs, in which they used electric charges to shock them randomly. He discovered that the random mistreatment destroyed the dogs emotionally to the point where they no longer had the will to escape, even when offered a way out. Seligman’s theories were cited admiringly soon after by James Mitchell, the psychologist whom the CIA put on contract to advise on its secret interrogation protocol. Eyewitnesses describe Mitchell as quoting Seligman’s theories of “Learned Helplessness” as useful in showing how to break the resistance of detainees’ to interrogation. One source recounts Mitchell specifically touting the experiments done on dogs in the context of how to treat detainees…the detainees have described other ways in which they were treated like dogs—the use of dog cages and of a collar and leash.” Now the Army has begun a traumatic shock and stress-related treatment program for all servicemen, based on Seligman’s treatment for “learned helplessness,” which basically amounts to a system for teaching auto-suggestion to the troops. It is teaching the opposite of helplessness, teaching the troops and their families to unlearn human nature and the exhaustion brought-on by the siege. The wise men sitting safely on the Potomac think that real “men” and real “patriots” can just get over the trauma that they have witnessed or inflicted upon others, through a contrived simplistic form of auto-hypnosis. This is the same macho thinking common to all American military leaders and the entire population in general, during World War II and Korea, which led directly to the use of torture methods that were copied from the Nazis to treat ptsd and to break the wills of “inadequate” soldiers.” Once the Real Warriors Campaign is fully operational, it is hoped, the stigma will have been removed from seeking psyche care and both the unstable as well as the unmanly soldiers who have been traumatized by the shock of modern warfare (organized slaughter) will learn to become “resilient” soldiers and veterans, always able to “suck it up” for God and country. Maybe then, the stain left by weak-willed returning veterans committing suicide and others going on shooting sprees will have been removed from the US Army’s image. Otherwise, our all-volunteer force will find it impossible to meet recruiting the goals required to expand the terror war. The Pentagon has not had much success with their adaptations of Seligman’s work so far, there is no reason to think that the “resiliency” therapy is any more sound. The torture/interrogation regimen developed by CIA geniuses has produced no revelations or star witnesses to the 911 attacks, just as a large percentage of rehabilitated inmates from Guantanamo have again taken-up arms against US forces. The bastardization of Prof. Seligman’s work has given military planners either a faulty understanding of the concept of “learned helplessness,” or mistaken notions of turning a form of temporary insanity into a useable weapon. Bringing together two virtual reality engineers from India, Dr. Alok R. Chaturvedi (an early developer of the sims program) andShailendra Raj Mehta, with an Israeli psychologist Daniel Kahneman, an expert in behavioral economics, to adapt computer-modeling to the weaponized theories of Seligman, the result was SEAS, (synthetic environment for anlaysis and simulation). The SEAS program is a hopelessness predictor. Running scenarios for the military, determining probabilities, it theorizes the outcomes of psychological warfare operations, predicting when people would be ready to break-down emotionally and when they were just borderline unstable. The Sentient World Simulation (SWS) is a “synthetic mirror of the real world with automated continuous calibration with respect to current real-world information.” The SWS computer simulation allows military leaders to: “develop and test multiple courses of action to anticipate and shape behaviors of adversaries, neutrals, and partners. By applying theories of economics and human psychology, its developers believe they can predict how individuals and mobs will respond to various stressors.” Homeland Security and the Defense Department are already using it to simulate crises. They try to anticipate how stressed-out populations can be manipulated by increasing the fear and anxiety-induced helplessness, through the introduction of panic-causing events, like earthquakes, tsunamis and terrorist attacks. Sound familiar, to anyone? Sounds like the fear-mongering basis of the whole “war on terror,” doesn’t it? “The intent is to ‘…test multiple courses of action to anticipate and shape behaviors of adversaries, neutrals, and partners. By applying theories of economics and human psychology, its developers believe they can predict how individuals and mobs will respond to various stressors…” They try to anticipate how stressed-out populations can be manipulated by increasing the fear and anxiety-induced helplessness, through the introduction of panic-causing events. The Pentagon gamers have replicated the entire city of Baghdad in their simulated world. (See: Baghdad reduced to bytes) This program is the centerpiece of the new counter-insurgency program administered by Special Forces Gen. McChrystal is being used to anticipate sniper points and blind spots, as well as for predicting the breaking points of local Afghans and Pakistanis. By deftly predicting and avoiding terminal hopelessness in the locals, as well as predicting beforehand change points, when peaceful-seeming actions can be taken that might win over the locals and take advantage of the opposite breaking points by motivating “moderate” Taliban to give-up on the other end of the equation. American planners would be well advised to take all of these psychological warfare programs that are based on exploiting and avoiding hopelessness a little less seriously. Perhaps they should further consult even more Israeli computer-modeling specialists and psychologists, to see how the computer-based psy-war programs of the IDF have worked-out so far. Both the 2006 invasion of Lebanon and last year’s destruction of Gaza were based on projections made by these experts. Israel failed to decisively win either war and emerged from each of them with their world image darkly stained, the only attainments being a temporary weakening of their adversaries. Psychological warfare has replaced the need for real total war in the geostrategic calculations. The Silent Weapons technology which has been developed, has been employed as an economic weapon and a psychological weapon of terror, to herd the nations of the earth in America’s direction. A nation that would develop such technology with a malicious intent to use it upon the rest of humanity is capable of unspeakable evil. This moves us beyond the realm of conspiracy theories into historical reporting of actual unfolding events, documenting crimes against humanity as they are, in fact, taking place. The fact that the beast which gave birth to this abomination allows word of it to circulate in the world airways is stark testimony that the adversary of humanity has grown bold, smelling the blood in the water of our anticipated capitulation. Either the elite planners of mankind’s future have grown so confident in their coming victory that they have grown sloppy, or the inevitable free-flow of information that the Internet has made possible has become a torrent that they can no longer fully control. If this is the case, then they are running scared, fearful that all that they have invested in controlling the minds of Americans and the world have been wasted. Either truth means that they have become even more dangerous.always intended to create a state of learned helplessness, to be followed quickly by a state of mass hopelessness, the capitulation stage. The more that we learn about the weapons that have been deployed against us the greater our odds become of defeating those weapons and destroying those who would dare to wage silent war upon us. Fight the capitulation!

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[Canonfire] Jiving the Jesus Voters

I have long seen evidence that Zionist intelligentsia and political-economic have been manufacturing Christian Zionist evangelicals on the analogue music industry creations of rock superstars via marketing hype. I use the term Milli Vanilli Evangelism to describe fake Christian Zionist Evangelism in order to distinguish it from true Christian Evangelism.

I have discussed Milli Vanilli Evangelism in two blog entries:

• Backgrounder on Christian Zionism (4 yrs old but still relevant)
• RJC and CUFI Incite Islamophobia
• [The National] The Muslim scare story that just doesn’t add up
• Aish and Clarion Fund History
• What is The Clarion Fund?
• Mike Huckabee, Christian Zionist
• Spotlight: Center for Islamic Pluralism

The Canonfire blog entry below expresses similar suspicions and provides some new circumstantial evidence. The funding data implies that the Christian Zionist movement was created to discourage the Clinton administration from diverging from Zionist orthodoxy. With Jewish Zionist Neocon domination of US foreign policy during the Bush administration, funding Christian Zionists was less important. Because many Zionists are suspicious of Obama, the funding spigot to Christian Zionists (or Milli Vanilli Evangelicals) has been opened once again.

Jiving the Jesus Voters

I just now found an interesting book on sale at the 99 Cent Store: How to Rig an Election: Confessions of a Republican Operative, by Allen Raymond, an ultra-captious lower-level Rovian who went to jail as a result of the New Hampshire phone jamming scandal. The GOP threw him under the proverbial bus; meanwhile, his boss James Tobin walked. (The story is here.)

The book is a grimly fun read. According to Raymond, all of your worst fears about GOP election scamming are true, true, all too horribly true. Yet I don't see how Dems can take much partisan pleasure in these revelations, since the Obama campaign wallowed in the same sort of filth throughout 2008 -- a fact that many progs are only now beginning to comprehend.

Short and funny as Raymond's expose is, the teabaggers and Jesus voters won't read this book. (Or any other -- not even the Bible, which they possess but do not peruse.) But I wish they'd at least read the following short paragraph about the book, offered by an Amazon reviewer:

Probably the biggest reason that GOP insiders want you not to read this book is that it showcases the in-crowd's complete contempt for their supporters -- "the Jesus-loves-guns crowd" -- "the knuckle-draggers, the gunnies, and the committed ideologue nuts." "The mouth-breathers who who decide GOP primaries might allow people to steal their money and send their children to impossible wars but they'll cut no such slack for baby-killers."

The book hit Barnes & Noble a little over a year ago -- and now it's in the 99 Cent Store, which means that many copies probably were (or will be) pulped. Neat trick. Publishing, like campaigning, is a racket.

Earlier, the Abramoff/Ralph Reed scandal revealed the right's behind-the-scenes contempt for the evangelicals. Yet the fundies continue to be played for fools.

For further evidence, read this piece on the resurgent Promise Keeper movement, which was and is predicated on the dubious proposition that Jesus likes to see huge stadiums filled with testosterone. The movement reached its peak in the 1990s, then withered:

The budget dropped from a peak of $117 million in 1997 to about $34 million in 2001. Gone were the stadium rallies, replaced by much smaller arena events.

Suddenly, the coffers are full again -- and so are those Nuremberg-style rallies. So where did the money come from? You may be able to find a clue or two in the following:

The afternoon’s “Did You Know?” PowerPoint slideshow proclaimed the Jewish people as “the fathers of the faith,” firmly embraced the Jewish roots of Christianity, and soundly rejected Christian supercessionism. God had not abandoned his covenant with Abraham, the voiceover declared, and the Jews are still God’s chosen people.

The modern-day Jews-for-Jesus contingent plays a massive role at these rallies, emphasizing the usual eschatological tripe about Israel's role in the "Last Days."

PK’s reinvention, even if it falls flat, tells us a lot about the reach of Christian Zionism, philo-Semitism, and Messianic Judaism within some quarters of evangelical America. Some of the signs—all abundantly in evidence at Folsom Field—might appear quaint, even sweet in a multi-culti kind of way: Jewish melodies in contemporary Christian music, Israeli folk dancing, the sprinkling of Hebrew words in sermons and media productions (“Shalom!”, “Boker tov!”, “Behold the kavod of the Lord!”)

Yet Christian Zionism, in many of its forms, carries not only significant theological implications but political ones as well, and that is worthy of attention; especially at a time when the prophecy clocks tick louder and louder to those with ears to hear. One indication of the apocalyptic energies in the PK event was the militant language of spiritual warfare that characterized the promotional blitz leading up to the PK 2.0 launch. Much of Christian Zionism, including McCartney’s Road to Jerusalem, reflects the preoccupations of many politically conservative evangelicals in the post-9/11 period; in particular, the hope that a new Judeo-Christian alliance might be the bulwark that saves the West against the threat of “radical Islam.”

Again I ask: If the PKs are flush again, where's the money coming from? Who has a motive to fund this sort of movement?

It's a puzzle. A riddle. Behold, I show you a mystery.

He that hath an ear, let him hear... Sphere: Related Content

[wvns] Lockerbie deal leaves no clean hands

Lockerbie deal leaves no clean hands
By Ian Williams
Aug 26, 2009
Asia Times

United States President Barack Obama owes Libya and Scotland a lot. The release of Abdelbeset Ali Mohmed al-Megrahi was like throwing red meat to the wolves who have been on the president's case. For a week, hysteria about Obama-care, euthanasia, abortion and the rest has been subsumed under a wave of bipartisan indignation about Megrahi.

The America that gave the world the Salem witch trials and the lynch mob ran unabashed and there was the unedifying spectacle of the Obama team running alongside, baying in harmony. (Although perhaps one of the most ill-augured boycott calls ever made is the one to eschew Scotch whisky.)

In contrast, over much of the world, Scotland's decision to release Lockerbie bomber [1] Megrahi on compassionate grounds because he is dying of terminal cancer seems reasonable, as Scottish Justice Minister Kenneth MacAskill so eloquently expounded when giving his decision.

Even so, listening to MacAskill's dithyrambs of self-praise for Scottish judicial compassion would have evoked a guffaw from generations of convicts who were victims of Scotland's vindictively Calvinist prisons in times past. Compassion is a relatively recent official trait in the country, but American furor can make Scotland pride itself on its double independence, cocking a snook at both London and Washington.

However, "compassion", no matter how recent in Scotland, still has no part in the US political or judicial make-up. The American news media were filled with reports about how Britain and Scotland were "on the defensive", and how the victims' families were crying for revenge. But victims' families in Britain supported the release, and the decision created nowhere near the fury in Britain and Scotland that it did on the other side of the Atlantic.

United States Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) director Robert Mueller called the Libyan's release "a mockery of the rule of law" and complained to MacAskill that his decision was "as inexplicable as it is detrimental to the cause of justice".

MacAskill does not need lessons in justice from the US, certainly not from the FBI, with its notorious use of paid informants and provocateurs. When the USS Vincennes indisputably shot down an Iranian Airbus in 1988, killing 290, the crew involved received medals. When the case of dubiously convicted murderer Troy Davis came up before the Supreme Court this month, two justices, fortunately a minority, declared that there was nothing unconstitutional about executing an innocent man as long as he had had a trial.

The US has an incarceration rate more then four times Britain's, almost 10 times that of the European Union as a whole and even higher than Russia's. Clearly, dying in prison has no fears in the US - for those who inflict it. Prisons have had to be adapted for wheelchairs for inmates too old to walk, let alone commit new crimes.

Few people come out with clean hands from the episode. British Prime Minister Gordon Brown certainly knew of the impending release, and did not strive too officiously to avert it, while his protests at Libyan celebrations provide cover against the equally expedient and contrived protests from the White House. British and American oil companies will still be knocking on doors in Tripoli - and finding them opened.

In an oil-short world, Libya has been able to behave with almost Chinese impunity. When I saw that the Swiss president had apologized to Libyan leader Colonel Muammar Gaddafi's son Hannibal, I briefly wondered if it was because his ancestors had mistreated the Carthaginian general's elephants on their way across the Alps.

But no, the Swiss had released Gaddafi's son a year ago after the latter had paid off the domestics who had complained to the police about abuse. However, since Libya ratted on the Irish Republican Army comrades it used to arm and finance, the British government has had no compunctions in cozying up to Gaddafi, and the eagerness of US business to get into the country has been palpable.

It was naive of Brown to expect the notoriously quixotic Gaddafi to abide by the "no public rejoicing" clause in whatever discussions led up to the release. Indeed, it meant that he showed much more loyalty to Megrahi than former president George W Bush did to his convicted aide Scooter Libby, or indeed Brown is likely to show to MacAskill.

Voluntary fall guys are the noblest fools in politics.

Megrahi "volunteered" to go to The Hague and take the rap for Libya to rejoin the world economy. If one overlooks the possibility that dire things might have happened to his family if he hadn't, greater love hath no one ... [2]

His sacrifice is all the more so in view of the strong possibility of his innocence. Totally lost, as so often in the US, is any doubt that someone convicted could possibly be innocent. In fact, it would be a stretch to say that a secret policeman for Gaddafi was "innocent". The regime has proven blood aplenty on its hands, but there is plausible evidence that investigators were so determined to "convict" Libya that they ignored all other leads.

Megrahi's eventual conviction hinged on the confused and contradictory evidence of a Maltese shopkeeper, whose recollections had him aging, rejuvenating, growing and shrinking, depending on who was taking the testimony, and who only finally identified him after his photographs had been widely circulated. The trial as part of the "cleansing" of Libya along with the several billions in blood-money took place in The Hague with Scottish judges, who found his co-accused, on almost identical evidence, not guilty.

Many observers suspect a jury would have thrown both cases out. His release on compassionate grounds was predicated on him dropping his appeal against the conviction, which many felt had a good chance of success. Indeed, he seems to have needed Gaddafi's say-so before dropping the appeal. If Megrahi were guilty, it was because he was acting as an agent for the Gaddafi now being greeted by politicians all over the West. If he were not, then the intelligence agencies of the West framed an innocent man to score political points at Libya.

MacAskill's halo is the only one on the horizon in this murky world.

Notes

1. Pan Am Flight 103 was Pan American World Airways' third daily scheduled trans-Atlantic flight from London's Heathrow Airport to New York's John F Kennedy International Airport. On Wednesday, December 21, 1988, the aircraft flying this route - a Boeing 747-121 named Clipper Maid of the Seas - was destroyed by a bomb, killing all 243 passengers and 16 crew members. Eleven people in Lockerbie, southern Scotland, were killed as large sections of the plane fell in and around the town, bringing total fatalities to 270.
2. "Greater love has no one than this, that he lay down his life for his friends." John 15:13.

Ian Williams is the author of Deserter: Bush's War on Military Families, Veterans and His Past, Nation Books, New York.

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[wvns] Iraqi shoe thrower to be released

Iraqi who threw shoes at Bush to be released early (AP)

August 29th, 2009 AP - An Iraqi journalist imprisoned for hurling his shoes at former President George W. Bush will be released next month after his sentence was reduced for good behavior, his lawyer said Saturday.

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[wvns] Remembering Sayyid Qutb

Today is the 43th aniversary of executon of Sayyid Qutb, Egytian intellectual and writer.

43 years pass after death of Egyptian intellectual Sayyid Qutb
Saturday, 29 August 2009

Today is the 43th aniversary of executon of Sayyid Qutb, imported Egytian intellectual and writer.

Qutb, an Egyptian author, educator, Islamist, poet, became an intelectual leader of the Muslim Brotherhood following the death of Hassan al-Banna in the 1950s and '60s.

Qutb is easily one of the major architects and "strategists" of contemporary Islamic revival. Along with Maulana Maududi, the founder of Jamaat-e-Islami, the revivalist movement in South Asia, and Imam Khomeini, the leader of Iran's Islamic revolution, he gave shape to the ideas and the worldview that has mobilized and motivated millions of Muslims from Malaysia to Michigan to strive to reintroduce Islamic practices in their lives and alter social and political institutions so that they reflect Islamic principles.

The first excerpt comes from an early work, Social Justice in Islam, which he wrote in 1949. (Social Justice in Islam).

Qutb spent the better half of 1949 in Greeley, Colo., studying curriculum at Colorado State Teachers College, now the University of Northern Colorado. What he saw prompted him to condemn America as a soulless, materialistic place that no Muslim should aspire to live in.

Author of 24 books, including novels, literary arts' critique, works on education, he is best known in the Muslim world for his work on what he believed to be the social and political role of Islam, particularly in his books Social Justice and Ma'alim fi-l-Tariq (Milestones).

Qutb builds on the Islamic idea of tawhid (the singularity of God and, therefore, of the universe):

So all creation issuing as it does from one absolute, universal, and active Will, forms an all-embracing unity in which each individual part is in harmonious order with the remainder...Thus, then, all creation is a unity comprising different parts; it has a common origin, a common providence and purpose, because it was produced by a single, absolute, and comprehensive Will...So the universe cannot be hostile to life, or to man; nor can 'Nature' in our modern phrase be held to be antagonistic to man, opposed to him, or striving against him. Rather she is a friend whose purposes are one with those of life and of mankind. And the task of living beings is not to contend with Nature, for they have grown up in her bosom, and she and they together form a part of the single universe which proceeds from the single will.

Alongside notable Islamists like Maulana Mawdudi, Hasan al-Banna, and Ruhollah Khomeini, Qutb is considered one of the most influential Muslim thinkers or activists of the modern era, not only for his ideas but for what many consider his heroic martyr's death

His written works are still widely available and have been translated into many Western languages. Majority of Qutb's theory can be found in his 30-volume Qur'anic commentary Fi zilal al-Qur'an (In the Shade of the Quran).

==

Remembering Sayyid Qutb, an Islamic intellectual and leader of rare insight and integrity
By Zafar Bangash

It is perhaps indicative of the present state of the Ummah that, outside his native Egypt and a small circle of Islamic activists, few Muslims are aware that August 29 marked the fourty-third anniversary of the martyrdom of Sayyid Qutb. He was no ordinary Muslim. A man of impeccable Islamic credentials, he made an immense contribution to Muslim political thought at a time when the Muslim world was still mesmerised by such western notions as nationalism, the nation-State and fathers of nations. Nationalist rhetoric laced with socialist slogans was the vogue.

It was in this atmosphere that Sayyid Qutb raised his voice - indeed his pen - against these false ideologies and in one clean sweep denounced them as the modern-day jahiliyyah (the primitive savagery of pre-Islamic days). In this Sayyid Qutb departed from Maulana Maudoodi's articulation of "partial jahiliyyah" in which the late Pakistani scholar was prepared to concede to the systems prevalent in Muslim societies some room for modification and hence a degree of respectability. Sayyid Qutb would have none of it; he insisted that, being a complete system of life, Islam needs no additions from man-made systems.

It was this forthright formulation which sent him to the gallows on August 29, 1966 together with two other Ikhwan al-Muslimoon leaders, Muhammad Yusuf Awash and Abd al-Fattah Ismail. The specific charge against Sayyid Qutb was based on his now-celebrated book, Ma'alim fi'l-tareeq ('Sign-posts on the Road', also translated as Milestones). The book denounced the existing order in Muslim societies as jahiliyyah, provides guidelines for Muslim activists, and describes the steps they must take to establish a society based on divine guidance.

The Ikhwan al-Muslimoon is no longer the movement that Sayyid Qutb had joined when he returned from the US in 1950. It has since been reduced to a shell, being little more than a political party with an Islamic flag. Even this mild version of Islamic expression is not tolerated by the pharaohs of Egypt, who are beholden to their masters in Washington and Tel Aviv. Yet it is the Muslim activists who are accused of 'intolerance.'

Sayyid Qutb was a prolific writer. His best works, however, were produced after his sudden return from the US. What disappointed him most there was the infatuation of American society with materialism and the widespread sexual anarchy. He could have gone on to study for his doctoral thesis, but decided instead to return to Egypt and devote his life to the Islamic movement.

If there was one particular moment in his life which proved crucial in this decision, it was his pain at the manner in which Hasan al-Banna's martyrdom was reported in the American press. Crescent International readers will not be surprised at the manner in which the New York Times reported the martyrdom of Imam Hasan al-Banna. It wrote: "In Cairo the leader of the outlawed terrorist Moslem Brotherhood Hasan el-Banna, was killed by an assassin" (February 13, 1949). It went on to say: "Sheikh Hasan el-Banna, 39-year-old head of the outlawed Moslem Brotherhood extremist Egyptian nationalist movement that was banned after authorities had declared it responsible for a series of bombing outrages and killings last year, was shot five times by a group of young men in a car and died tonight in hospital."

The "terrorist" appellation for Islamic activity is not a phenomenon of the eighties or nineties. It has been in circulation for more than 50 years. One can immediately see the emotionally-loaded expressions - "terrorist", "extremist", "outlawed", etc - used for the Ikhwan al-Muslimoon by the mouthpiece of the zionist establishment in America. Qutb's disappointment at seeing the supposedly respectable organs of public opinion indulging in a vicious attacks on the character of a leading Islamic leader can be imagined.

When Sayyid Qutb returned to Egypt, he started working with the Ikhwan al-Muslimoon, which he had not previously been a member of, as well as continuing to think and write. At the time, the Ikhwan were working with the 'Free Officers' plotting to overthrow the monarchy of king Farouk. Among the Free Officers were such figures as colonel Gamal Abd al-Nasser and colonel Anwar Sadat. According to the Sadat's own account, Sayyid Qutb was the main ideologue of the Free Officers' 'revolution.' Had the coup failed, it is clear that Sayyid Qutb would have paid with his life. Sadat, again according to his own account, had gone to the cinema on the day of the coup in order to have an alibi in the event that 'things went wrong.' He went on to become the president of Egypt after Nasser's death from a heart attack in September 1970.

The Free Officers, however, soon fell out with the Ikhwan. That can be no surprise to those with even a superficial familiarity with such institutions as the military in the Muslim world. The coup-plotters were young and inexperienced; they needed a father-figure and an intellectual guide; Sayyid Qutb fit the bill well. But once the coup had succeeded, the Free Officers had other plans.

Within two years of the coup, Nasser had taken full control of the state. He then came down hard on the Ikhwan. Two events in particular contributed to the break: the Ikhwan's insistence on an Islamic constitution and a free press; and their denunciation of the July 1954 Anglo-Egyptian Agreement pertaining to the Suez Canal. This totally exposed Nasser's false revolutionary credentials. The treaty allowed British troops to enter Egypt if British interests were threatened in the Middle East. In fact, it actually permitted the presence of British troops on the Suez Canal.

From the beginning of 1954 until his execution, Sayyid Qutb spent most of his time in prison. In early 1954, when the Egyptian secret service came to arrest him, Sayyid Qutb was running a high fever. They insisted on putting the handcuffs on him and forcing him to walk to prison. On the way, he fainted several times from weakness. Once inside the prison compound, a specially-trained dog was unleashed upon him which dragged him around for more than two hours. He was then interrogated for seven hours without a break.

At his 'treason' trial in 1966, he was accused of plotting to bring about a Marxist coup in the country. This ludicrous charge was made by a regime that was already a close ally of the erstwhile Soviet Union. The rulers of Egypt knew that they were trying a man on wholly false charges. The real reason for the prosecution was Sayyid Qutb's denunciation of the system and regime as jahiliyyah. Nasser knew that if such ideas were allowed to circulate, they would threaten his rule and ultimately lead to his overthrow. Sayyid Qutb had to be eliminated.

Shortly before his scheduled execution, an emissary of Nasser came to Sayyid Qutb asking him to sign a petition seeking mercy from the president. Sayyid Qutb's reply was forthright: "If I have done something wrong in the eyes of Allah, I do not deserve mercy; but if I have not done anything wrong, I should be set free without having to plead for mercy from any mortal." The emissary went away disappointed; Nasser was denied the pleasure of turning down Sayyid Qutb's 'appeal' for mercy.

Sayyid Qutb wrote a number of books, including the well-known tafseer, Fi Zilal al-Qur'an ('In the shade of the Qur'an'), in which he explains Qur'anic ayaat with references to other ayaat of the noble Book. This he compiled during his long confinements in prison on spurious charges. Similarly, his contribution to Muslim political thought was immense. He categorically rejected any borrowings from the west and insisted that Islam is self-sufficient.

That such a worthy son of Islam should be so mistreated and humiliated in a Muslim country shows the depths of depravity to which the regimes in the Muslim world have sunk. Perhaps this was partly the reason that Nasser's army faced such an ignominious defeat at the hands of the zionist forces a year later, in the 'Six Day war' of June 1967.

Sayyid Qutb lives in the hearts of millions of Muslims worldwide. His books have been translated into virtually every language that Muslims read, and remain hugely influential. The main translations into Farsi have been done by the Rahbar of the Islamic Republic, Ayatullah Seyyed Ali Khamenei, himself. This is a great tribute to the martyred scholar of Islam.

[Zafar Bangash is Director of the Institute of Contemporary Islamic Thought (ICIT).]

Biographies
Al-Ghazaly – The Man of Da`wah

"Lack of a sense of culture for a religious scholar is more dangerous than a lack of blood cells for a weak patient. A caller to Allah has to read about virtually everything. He or she has to read the books of belief and the books of atheism, the books of Sunnah and the books of philosophy. In short, to read about all schools of human thought is how one gains experience in life." Alija Izetbegovic

"Do we want the Muslim people to leave their going-around-in-circles, their dependence, backwardness, and poverty? Then we show clearly which path will take us to that goal: establishing Islam in every field in the personal life of the individual, in family and society…and the establishment of a unique Islamic community from Morocco to Indonesia." Bediüzzaman Said Nursi

"There is an apparent burden in worship, but there is an ease and lightness in its meaning that defies description. For in the prescribed prayers the worshipper declares, "I bear witness that there is no god but God." That is to say, he finds the door of a treasury of mercy in everything because he is believing and saying, "There is no Creator and Provider other than Him. Harm and benefit are in His hand. He is both All-Wise; He does nothing in vain, and He is All-Compassionate; His bounty and mercy are abundant." And he knocks on the door with his supplication. Moreover, he sees that everything is subjugated to the command of his own Sustainer, so he takes refuge in Him. He places his trust in Him and relies on Him, and is fortified against every disaster; his belief gives him complete confidence." El-Hajj Malik el-Shabazz (Malcolm X)

"America needs to understand Islam, because this is one religion that erases from its society, the Race problem!" Hasan Al-Banna

"Wasting time and effort in investigating trivial matters that will not lead to action is prohibited in Islam. This category includes debating minute aspects of rulings in cases which have never occurred, investigating the meaning of the Qur'anic verses which are still beyond the scope of human knowledge (the mutashabihaat verses), and differentiating between the companions (Sahabah) of the Prophet or investigating the instances of disagreement that took place among them. Every sahabi (may Allah be pleased with them all) has the honour and distinction of being a companion of the Messenger of Allah (peace be upon him), and to each is the recompense of his motives." Ibn Qayyim Al-Jawziyyah

"Through patience and poverty one attains leadership in religion. The seeker of Truth needs the will that inspires him and pushes him upward and knowledge that leads and guides him." Khurram Murad

"Our heart beats approximately 67 times a minute, every time it wants to beat, it asks Allah, am I permitted to beat? If Allah says yes, it beats and if He says no then the life ends." Sayyid Qutb

"In the scale of God, the true weight is the weight of faith; in God's market the only commodity in demand is the commodity of faith. The highest form of triumph is the victory of soul over matter, the victory of belief over pain, and the victory of faith over persecution." Syed Abul Ala Maududi

"Islam has not lost its intrinsic values and it is as dynamic today as it was yesterday. Only, the people have lost the understanding of Islam, and they are not conscious of its superiority over other ideologies." Syed Abul Hasan Ali Nadvi

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[wvns] Radioactive US weapons taking toll in Iraq

US-led troops used 320 tons of DU against Iraq during the1991 Gulf war and about 2,000 tons in the 2003 invasion.

Radioactive US weapons taking toll in Iraq
Mon, 24 Aug 2009

Years after the US attacks on Iraq, people in the Persian Gulf state are suffering form the consequences of radioactive contamination caused by the use of depleted uranium.

Iraq's Environment Minister, Narmin Othman Hasan, said Monday that depleted Uranium (DU) weapons used by US-led troops against Iraq during the1991 Persian Gulf War and the 2003 invasion still blight the country.

Othman Hasan said the use of super-tough weapons by the US-led forces had a devastating impact on the nation and has become a serious environmental challenge since they have contaminated several parts of the country.

Armor-piercing shells made of depleted uranium were first used in warfare by US-led troops during the1991 Persian Gulf War and then during the 2003 invasion, turning many parts of Iraq to radioactive toxic wastelands.

Depleted uranium --a radioactive metal twice as dense as lead-- has been blamed for a number of health problems, from cancer to birth defects. DU remains radioactive for about 4.5 billion years.

According to the Iraqi minister only a fraction of tanks and other wartime vehicles contaminated with depleted uranium -- which are radiating nuclear energy-- have been successfully treated and disposed of.

Following the 2003 US-led invasion, over 140,000 cases of cancer has been reported in Iraq, which are believed to be caused by toxic weaponry used by the occupying troops. It is reported that 2,000 tons of (DU) expenditure were used during the invasion of Iraq.

Several Human rights groups have called the US use of the toxic weapons against the people of Iraq as crimes against humanity since they are causing grievous harm and suffering to civilians in contaminated areas.

They have also accused the US-led troops of covering up and denying the damaging health effects of the DU's and blamed them for refusing to release information on the amounts, types and locations of these weapons in Iraq.

Iraq's Environment Minister also warned about the danger posed by the tens of millions of landmines strewn across the country.

"For one person we have one mine planted. We have 25 million mines in Iraq -- one quarter of the world's mines," she said.

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[wvns] Lift US sanctions on Sudan

Abolishing unpopular and unjustified sanctions would not prevent the US airing its concerns on Sudan

Lift US sanctions on Sudan
Ahmed Badawi
guardian.co.uk,
Wednesday 12 August 2009

US congressional hearings about Sudan usually follow the same, stale format: a raft of under-informed testimonies focused solely on condemning loudly the behaviour of the Sudanese government in Darfur (and, earlier, the north-south civil war), and demanding the ratcheting up of US sanctions to force the "right" response by Khartoum.

The US's presidential envoy to Sudan, General J Scott Gration, never a man content to kow-tow to public opinion, has just embarked on what his predecessors knew was the correct course, but were too weary to travel on: swallow hard (very hard), face down the fierce headwinds in US government and civil society and make an impassioned plea for Congress to remove US economic sanctions from Sudan.

Gration must have had his full metal jacket on – and reinforced – for the testimony. He also broke the mould by calling for Sudan's removal from the US state department's state sponsor of terrorism list, which comes with a thicket of US economic sanctions below the iceberg.

The general noted that there was "no evidence" for Sudan's inclusion on the list, which he called a "political" (rather than a national security-related) decision; the CIA has referred to Sudan's
strong record on counterterrorism co-operation as having "saved American lives".

Popular in the US he certainly won't be, but stark raving mad or naive he is definitely not: Gration simply realises that US sanctions make steering Sudan on to the right track tougher, not easier, and have actually damaged US interests by inflicting harm on, the very Sudanese people the US seeks to support.

Take just one example of the Medusa-like micro impact of US sanctions. Millions of ordinary Sudanese families and individuals from the north, south, east and west cannot receive directly the lifeline of foreign exchange remittance inflows from family members working abroad in the US, wreaking havoc on the planning and budgets of millions of households for basics like school fees and medical bills.

Remittances sent from the US can only get to Sudan in two expensive – and delay-ridden – ways: 1) remittances are routed to the recipient via regional money exchange bureaux; and 2) remittances are paid directly to the recipient by a local middleman, once the sender deposits the sum in the US bank account of the middleman.

Both options incur costly "processing fees" and amount to a regressive income tax imposed by sanctions on remittances destined for ordinary Sudanese.

Humanitarian items imported from the US are currently exempted from sanctions. But even here, the lengthy, morale-sapping bureaucratic process in getting approval to import spare parts for hospital machinery has led to numerous needless deaths of ordinary men, women, and infants.

The actions of the Sudanese government during much of the early phase of the Darfur conflict (and in the previous and much longer north-south civil war) were undeniably reprehensible – as Sudan's own official investigation into the conflict, published in 2005, readily acknowledged. Nobody, least of all Gration, is asking Washington to reinvent the wheel, however.

Abolishing US sanctions would not mean becoming mute suddenly on Darfur, CPA implementation, human rights or other matters of concern; the US can walk and chew gum at the same time with Sudan. Rather, Washington could air those concerns privately to Khartoum and use its normal global diplomatic communications modus operandi: dialogue to resolve various snafus and reach key benchmarks for normalisation set by the American government, rather than just tub-thumping with one eye on making tomorrow's US news headlines.

Fortunately, the situation in Darfur on the ground has ameliorated distinctly over the last few months, giving Gration headroom to make the call to lift US sanctions the centrepiece of his congressional testimony. Internally displaced Darfuris are returning home in greater numbers.

The humanitarian situation in Darfur also remains stable, with acting USAid head Earl Gast noting in his testimony that the "gaps have been addressed" following Khartoum's expulsion of 13 international aid organisations in March 2009; in short, nobody is dying of starvation in Darfur's tragic and undignified shelters for the displaced. Similarly, conflict-related killings in Darfur fell to just three in June, according to the latest data from the international peacekeeping force.

Yes, Khartoum can – and must – still do more to give Gration the maximum political space he needs to push through with advocating the lifting of sanctions. For starters, it can speed up the return of USAid-funded assets that were confiscated from its expelled partner NGOs and generally get out of the way of the international humanitarian effort in Darfur. Khartoum must also expedite the stack of outstanding visas for the international peacekeeping force in Darfur.

Yet lifting sanctions should not be about punishing or rewarding the government of President Omar al-Bashir; collective economic punishment is never a smart way to win hearts and minds. Sudan is not apartheid South Africa – sanctions have no support among the local population, Darfur included.

So, help change Sudan into the country its citizens want it to become, and Americans wish it was. Lift US sanctions from Sudan, Congress – Gration is right, the innocent of Darfur, and all other
ordinary Sudanese, are victims of them, too.

ahmed.badawimalik@gmail.com
http://www.guardian.co.uk/profile/ahmed-badawi

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Zionist Hate Crime in Germany

Zionist Lies Nazify Palestinian History

Zionists never let up from their effort to rewrite history and control discourse

Zionist Indoctrination: Boston Grammar Schools discusses the Zionist effort to brainwash my daughter and her fellow 2nd-graders. I address the malicious and defamatory Zionist eqation of Palestinians and Palestinian leaders with Nazis in Makdisi Overlooks US Journalistic Nazification. The August 28th Jerusalem Post story entitled Hiding the Truth about Husseini (reproduced below) augments the latest Zionist big lie effort to spread this calumny about Palestinians throughout Germany.

Here is my letter of support to Multicultural Center Director Philippa Ebéné, who threw a wrench into this newest Zionist disinformation campaign.

Dear Philippa Ebéné:

I read Benjamin Weinthal's JPost article about the Multicultural Center's exhibit entitled "The Third World during the Second World War." He writes:

The publicly funded Multicultural Center's (Werkstatt der Kulturen) decision to remove educational panels of the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem, Hajj Muhammad Amin al-Husseini, who was an ally of Adolf Hitler, from a planned exhibit, sparked outrage on Thursday among a district mayor, the curator of the exhibit, and the Berlin Jewish community.

The famous photo of Adolf Hitler sitting with Grand Mufti Hajj Muhammad Amin al-Husseini.

SLIDESHOW: Israel & Region | World

The curator, Karl Rössler, told The Jerusalem Post that it is a "scandal" that the director of the Werkstatt, Philippa Ebéné, sought to censor the exhibit.

"One must, of course, name that al-Husseini, a SS functionary, participated in the Holocaust," said Rössler.

The exhibit covers the "The Third World during the Second World War" and three exhibit panels of 96 are devoted to the mufti's collaboration with the Nazis.

I am glad that you removed the "Mufti-collaboration" panels.

I am an Eastern European and Jewish studies expert, who runs an educational organization in Boston.

I have often been puzzled by the claim that "the Mufti of Jerusalem ... helped [the Nazis] raise an SS division in Bosnia" because he spoke neither Serbo-Croation nor German.

Without a doubt, the Bosnian (Bosnyak) `ulama could read Arabic as well as recite Arabic prayers, and, of course, some of the older local ulama (Islamic scholars) may have been able to speak Turkish, which al-Husseini spoke in addition to Arabic. Yet the best and most linguistically proficient Islamic scholars had long been emigrating from the region with the "encouragement" of the Serb-dominated government.

As far as I can tell, al-Husseini spent most of his time in Yugoslavia with a N. African Arabic regiment that had more or less been conscripted to fight alongside the Wehrmacht in E. Europe, and I am not sure that dispatching al-Husseini to one of the most difficult fronts of WW2 indicated that he had much favor from Hitler or high-ranking government officials.

There is no evidence that the Mufti sympathized with the German Nazis except insofar as they were willing to help him drive Eastern and Central European Zionist invaders out of Palestine.

You can find my blog entry on Zionist-Nazi collaboration at Nazi-Zionist Friendship Commemorative Medal. My article Starting a Citation Chain? discusses the Zionist propagandist Joseph Schechtman, who is the source of collaboration accusations against al-Husseini. I have a blog entry addressing Weinthal's tendency to distortion: Factoidalism at Haaretz.

Even though keeping Zionist propaganda out your exhibition is commendable, there would certainly be value in an exhibition addressing collaboration and alliance during WW2 honestly. Such an exhibit could address why Finland allied with Nazi Germany, the nature of the Soviet Regime, actions of liberated Soviet nationalities, Soviet and Polish Tatar Muslims fighting against Germany, Polish Tatar Jews serving in German-sponsored units, and the attempts of both Zionists and the Palestinian resistance to obtain German support.

There is no reason not to respect all soldiers that fought honorably.

I once visited an Alsatian church, which had a plague commemorating congregants, who had been killed while serving in the army since the founding of the church. The plaque did not mention on which side a soldier fought.

North Africans conscripted to fight with the Wehrmacht during WW2 definitely deserve to be memorialized as do German soldiers that fought with honor for the German homeland. While Hitler and Stalin were monsters, no one should assume that every soldier fighting for Germany or the Soviet Union was evil or unworthy of respect.

Sincerely yours,

Joachim Martillo

President

Ethnic Ashkenazim Against Zionist Israel

Boston, MA

USA

Please send Philippa Ebéné an email of support. Below is the original JPost article.

Please note that Benjamin Weinthal, Karl Rössler, the UferHallen Gallery, Maya Zehden, and Heinz Buschkowsky are using lies and defamation to incite hatred against Palestinians, Arabs, and Muslims. These people and the Gallery are thus involved in the commission of a serious hate crime under German law. The German Police should start arresting the perpetrators, shut down the UferHallen Gallery, and seize this criminal exhibit. In the aftermath of the Marwa al-Sherbini murder, Germany has a duty to act swiftly against the Zionist, Arabophobic, and Islamophobic hate-mongers.

Hiding the truth about Husseini

Aug. 28, 2009
BENJAMIN WEINTHAL, Jpost correspondent in berlin , THE JERUSALEM POST

The publicly funded Multicultural Center's (Werkstatt der Kulturen) decision to remove educational panels of the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem, Hajj Muhammad Amin al-Husseini, who was an ally of Adolf Hitler, from a planned exhibit, sparked outrage on Thursday among a district mayor, the curator of the exhibit, and the Berlin Jewish community.

The curator, Karl Rössler, told The Jerusalem Post that it is a "scandal" that the director of the Werkstatt, Philippa Ebéné, sought to censor the exhibit.

"One must, of course, name that al-Husseini, a SS functionary, participated in the Holocaust," said Rössler.

The exhibit covers the "The Third World during the Second World War" and three exhibit panels of 96 are devoted to the mufti's collaboration with the Nazis.

The grand mufti delivered a talk to the imams of the Bosnian SS division in 1944, and was a key Islamic supporter of Nazi Germany's destruction of European Jewry.

Ebéné denied that there was an "agreement " reached with the local German-Muslim community to shut down the exhibit. She termed media queries regarding an agreement as "Eurocentric."

She told the Post that the exhibit was intended as a "homage to soldiers from African" countries who fought against the Nazis.

When asked about her opposition to the inclusion of the mufti panels, she asked, "was there ever a commemoration event in Israel to honor the [African] soldiers?"

Rössler was notified last Friday that Ebéné wanted to take out the panels dealing with the grand mufti, but he rejected her demand to remove them.

Meanwhile, the exhibit in its uncensored version has been relocated to the UferHallen gallery.

Maya Zehden, a spokeswoman for the 12,000-strong Berlin Jewish community, told the Post that Ebéné's rejection of the exhibit showed "intolerance," and a director who is "incapable of acting in a democratic" manner.

Zehden urged that the Berlin government consider replacing Ebéné as director. Zehden also sharply criticized Günter Piening, Berlin's commissioner for integration and migration, for defending Ebéné's decision to censor the exhibit.

Piening told the large daily Tagesspiegel that, "We need, in a community like Neukölln, a differentiated presentation of the involvement of the Arabic world in the Second World War."

Zehden termed his statement "an appeasement attempt" to ignore the fact that "there was no official resistance from the Arabic world against the persecution of Jews" during the Shoah.

She accused Piening of showing a false tolerance to German-Arabs in the neighborhood by not wanting to deal with disturbances from the local community.

Piening issued conflicting statements to the Post. While denying his statement to the Tagesspiegel, he said, however, that his comment was stripped out of a context of quotes.

He said the "reason" for the removal of the grand mufti panels dealt with a "misunderstanding of the background of the exhibit."

In an e-mail to the Post, Heinz Buschkowsky, the district mayor in Neukölln, where the exhibit was originally planned, wrote, it is a sign of "anticipatory obedience to avoid probable protests. I do not consider this position to be good."

He added that Piening's statement is a "repression of the facts dealing with anti-Semitism."

The district mayor wrote that the center by its own "claim to stand for freedom, tolerance, and culture should be careful not to set off suspicion that it is imposing censorship."

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