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Glenn Greenwald: U.S. drones targeting rescuers and mourners

February 7, 2012

Glenn Greenwald, uruknet.info, Feb 6, 2012

6border-drones-460x307.jpg

Images from a Predator B unmanned aircraft are seen on a monitored at the Naval Air Station, in November, in Corpus Christi, Texas. (Credit: AP)

(updated below – Update II – Update III)

On December 30 of last year, ABC News reported on a 16-year-old Pakistani boy, Tariq Khan, who was killed with his 12-year-old cousin when a car in which he was riding was hit with a missile fired by a U.S. drone. As I noted at the time, the report contained this extraordinary passage buried in the middle:

Asked for documentation of Tariq and Waheed’s deaths, Akbar did not provide pictures of the missile strike scene. Virtually none exist, since drones often target people who show up at the scene of an attack.

What made that sentence so amazing was that it basically amounts to a report that the U.S. first kills people with drones, then fires on the rescuers and others who arrive at the scene where the new corpses and injured victims lie.

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Get the Data: Obama’s terror drones

February 6, 2012

 by , Bureau of Investigative Journalism, Feb 4, 2012 

The remains of a house destroyed by a CIA drone strike in Waziristan / Noor Behram

The remains of a house destroyed in a CIA drone strike in Waziristan, April 2009 (Noor Behram)

As part of its ongoing investigation into the US covert war the Bureau has examined thousands of credible media reports relating to more than 310 Central Intelligence Agency drone strikes in Pakistan.

These incidents were reported by the New York Times, the Washington Post, the Los Angeles Times, the Guardian, CNN, ABC News, Reuters, Associated Press, AFP, the BBC, Al Jazeera, and reputable Pakistani media (see bottom table).

CIA drone strikes tend to be reported on a case-by-case basis. Yet it became clear to the Bureau that a number of specific tactics were being deployed. These included multiple attacks by drones on rescuers attempting to aid victims of previous strikes. There were also a number of credible reports of funerals and mourners being attacked by CIA drones.

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Hundreds of slaughtered civilians isn’t a ‘huge number’ for Obama

February 2, 2012

 Russia Today, Feb 1, 2012

1-1-1drones.jpg 
On Monday afternoon, Barack Obama became the first president to host a virtual town hall live on the Internet. While that might be a feat worthy of the record books, President Obama did something else during his address that America has become accustomed to: he lied to the world.

Speaking Monday during a live web-chat hosted by Google, the president took on a series of issues submitted by the American people. Over the span of 45 minutes, President Obama addressed the Stop Online Piracy Act while refusing to side with either end of the argument, admitted to the world that he isn’t all that swell of a dancer and took a query from a professional puppeteer. In between ignoring the real issues or offering any sort of solid solution to the nation’s biggest problems, the president did put something rather important out for the world to ponder: America’s ongoing drone missions aren’t really all that bad.

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Khader Adnan Mohammad Musa: Israeli Prisoner of Conscience

February 2, 2012

By Stephen Lendman , War Is  A Crime.org, February 1, 2012

In 1948, brute force established Israel. In 1967, militarized occupation of one-fifth of former Palestine followed.

An entire people suffer. Collective punishment is official policy. So are torture, violence, land theft, apartheid, injustice, and other forms of state-sponsored terror.

They include imprisoning Palestinians for wanting to live free on their own land in their own country. As a result, since June 1967, over 750,000 Palestinians have been imprisoned.

Arrests occur regularly. Middle-of-the-night raids terrorize nonviolent men, women and children. Alleged “ticking bomb” ones are held in the name of “security.” So are various other type political prisoners. Denied all rights, they’re brutalized for praying to the wrong God.

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Badri Raina: Rage (a poem)

February 2, 2012

Rage

by Badri Raina

 

The rich, they rage together,

The rich are unionised;

The poor have separate religions,

The poor are well advised.

 

The rich, they say they want no state,

But  know they are the state;

The poor, how they need a state

That might turn round their fate.

 

The rich, their grievance never ends,

They never have enough;

The poor, they are ready to go

With the least crumb in the trough.

 

The gods, they do not advocate

Equality, justice, peace;

They  favour or disfavour,

Depending upon the fees.

 

Caring  ones write articles,

But what article has worth

If the writer be not  of the set

Rich in social girth.

 

Thus how the tree in my steady ken

Seems always to know better;

As I write of a world in whirl,

Rooted remains his letter.

 

——-January 31, 2012

 

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Arab Intelligence Agencies Collaborate With Mossad to Detain, Extradite Hamas Activist to Israel

February 1, 2012

Richard Silverstein, Tikum Olam, February 1st, 2012

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Imprisoned Palestinian engineer, Jafar Daghlas

In a story reminiscent of the kidnapping of Dirar Abusisi, a Palestinian engineer known for his activities in support of Hamas, has been arrested and interrogated for long periods by the Mukhabarat in both the United Arab Emirates and Jordan:

Was Israel behind the overseas arrest of a Palestinian engineer suspected of ties with Hamas? The arrested man thinks it was – but Hamas blames the Palestinian Authority.

Jafar Daghlas, 27, a resident of the West Bank town of Burka who until recently lived in Abu Dhabi, has been questioned by two different Arab security services recently – those of the United Arab Emirates and Jordan. He suspects Israel was trying to get him extradited here

The victim enlisted the support of a professional engineering association in Jordan and Friends of Humanity, a human rights NGO which intervened on his behalf to prevent what he expected would be his extradition to Israel.  It appears too that if he had been extradited and imprisoned in Israel, this would’ve been doing the PA’s bidding as well, since it accuses him of fundraising and arms trafficking on behalf of Hamas.  It’s quite a cozy, comfy relationship all these mukhabaratnikim (there probably isn’t even such a Hebrew word, but I like the sound of it) have with each other.

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Libya: When yesterday’s rebels become today’s torturers

February 1, 2012
Rupen Savoulian, Antopodean Atheist,   Jan 30, 2011

The United Nations Convention against Torture (CAT), adopted back in 1984, specifies that no person should be subjected to any kind of torture, cruel or degrading treatment. This convention follows on from the 1975 adoption of the Declaration on the Protection of All Persons from Being Subjected to Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment. Article One of the United Nations Convention Against Torture defines it as the intentional infliction of physical and mental pain for the purpose of obtaining information from a person, or coercing them into confessing to a crime, or forcing them to incriminate a third party to confess to any alleged crime that person may have committed. Such pain and suffering is inflicted with the express knowledge or tacit consent of a person or group acting in a legal and official capacity. Article Two states that there are no exceptional circumstances that may be invoked by any party to justify the application of torture. States of emergency, civil unrest, warfare and so on cannot be used as pretexts to legitimise the use of torture.

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Mikhail Gorbachev: Is the World Really Safer Without the Soviet Union?

January 30, 2012

A man waves a Russian flag during a rally November 21, 1988 (MF/AA/REUTERS Pictures)

 
Virtually all American commentary about the end of the Soviet Union extols what the West is believed to have gained from that historic event. On this twentieth anniversary of the breakup, The Nation presents three writers who focus instead on what may have been lost. Mikhail Gorbachev, the Soviet Union’s last leader and first constitutional president, argues that a chance for a more secure and just world order was missed. Stephen F. Cohen, a historian and longtime Nation contributor, reminds readers of the political, economic and social costs to Russians themselves. And Vadim Nikitin, a US-educated Russian journalist, presents a new interpretation of pro-Soviet nostalgia.   —The Editors

Since the breakup of the Soviet Union twenty years ago, Western commentators have often celebrated it as though what disappeared from the world arena in December 1991 was the old Soviet Union, the USSR of Stalin and Brezhnev, rather than the reforming Soviet Union of perestroika. Moreover, discussion of its consequences has focused mostly on developments inside Russia. Equally important, however, have been the consequences for international relations, in particular lost alternatives for a truly new world order opened up by the end of the cold war.

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Pentagon Requests Mightier Bomb to Attack Iran

January 29, 2012

The 30,000-pound bunker-busters are designed to penetrate Iran’s underground nuclear facilities

by John Glaser,  Antiwar.com, January 28, 2012

The Pentagon has decided that its largest conventional bomb isn’t capable of destroying Iran’s underground nuclear enrichment facilities and has ordered efforts to make it more powerful.

The 30,000-pound “bunker-buster” bomb, known as the Massive Ordnance Penetrator, was designed to penetrate deeply buried targets, like some of Iran’s nuclear facilities. But tests of the bomb led the Pentagon to believe it may not fully destroy the facilities, and so this month they secretly submitted a request to Congress additional for funding to build a bigger, more destructive bomb.

Already more than $330 million has been spent to develop about 20 of the bombs, which are built by Boeing Co. The Pentagon is now seeking about $82 million more to enhance it.

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Stephen Lendman: Profile of a Rogue State

January 28, 2012

by Stephen Lendman, opednews.com, Jan 27, 2012

America’s unmatched globally. However, pound for pound, based on size, its policies, and regional threat, Israel stands out.

Daily, its crimes against humanity continue. On January 23, Jerusalem police arrested two Palestinian officials, Khaled Abu Arafeh and Mohammed Totah.

Police spokesman Micky Rosenfeld said both men were wanted for unspecified “Hamas activities” with no further comment.

Hamas, of course, is Palestine’s legitimate government. Israel and America spuriously call it a terrorist organization. Hamas spokesman Mushir al-Masri said arresting both men was a “Zionist crime.” Palestine’s parliament hasn’t functioned since Hamas and Fatah split in 2007.

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