The Weekly Rehbar, May 29, 2011
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Indian-held Kashmir: An overview of the murders of Aasia and Neelofar, Urdu weekly
May 31, 2011
Afghan killings by U.S. and NATO
May 31, 2011arabnews.com, May 31, 2011
This war is only fueling anti-Western anger in the region and across the Muslim world
A single death is a tragedy; a million deaths a statistic, argued the late Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin. For the United States and its NATO allies, the killing of 52 Afghan civilians, at least 12 of them young children and two women, Saturday night in another airstrike is merely another statistic in the “war on terror.”
And if the killing of civilians in the bombing of a residential compound in Helmand drew angry protests and “warnings” by President Hamid Karzai, they were predictably followed by “sincere apologies” by the coalition saying “top priority is given to prevent civilian casualties and it takes such cases very seriously.” Karzai thunders he has repeatedly warned the coalition against air raids that kill innocents and this is his “last warning” to the coalition. And White House says it takes “Afghan concerns very seriously,” adding, “We work very hard to avoid civilian casualties.”
The Syrian regime must go…now
May 31, 2011Khalid Amayreh, MWC News, May 29, 2011
The gruesome images and horrifying accounts that keep coming from Syria defy linguistic description. They go beyond the pale of human decency.
A few weeks ago, Hamza al Khatib, a vivacious and charming boy from Dira’a was abducted from his home by the regime’s Shabbiha thugs or death squads, for allegedly taking part in an anti-regime demonstration.
A few days later, his body, riddled with bullets, and bearing indescribable scars of torture of all kinds, was handed over to his family.
According to eyewitnesses and human rights operatives who examined the body, the agents of the regime also severed the boy’s sexual organ before turning in the body for burial.
Obama, Israel, and Palestine
May 31, 2011by Gulamhusein A. Abba, Dissident Voice, May 30th, 2011
From the frenzy that was let loose on President Barrack Obama referring to the 1967 borders in his Middle East speech, one would think that he had announced a major shift in US policy on the Israel/Palestine issue, had abandoned Israel and was now pandering to the Palestinians!
Former Massachusetts Gov. and GOP’s leading presidential candidate Mitt Romney screeched that Obama had “thrown Israel under the bus”. Talk show hosts outdid one another in claiming that Obama was letting down Israel. Glen Beck denounced Obama for “betraying” Israel. Matt Drudge claimed that Obama had sided with the Palestinians. Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich called it “the most dangerous speech ever made by an American president for the survival of Israel.”
Netanyahu went over the top and immediately issued a statement, just one day prior to his meeting with Obama, rejecting the President’s proposal! His performance, when he did meet the President, was described in the media as “lecturing” to the President. . .
U.S. Role in the Arab Counterrevolution
May 31, 2011Revolutionary Flowerpot Society, May 26, 2011
Keep formation; Await further instruction!
This is the fourth article in a series analyzing the Arab Revolution, written by M.R. Shalgooni, writer/analyst/activist with Raah-e Kargar (Worker’s Path). This installment focuses on the role played so far by the U.S. in relation to the Arab Revolution.
[The original article can be read, in Persian, here. English translation of the first article in the series is available here, the second article is here, and the third here.]
Revolution and Counterrevolution in the Arab World – 4
by Mohammad-Reza Shalgooni / May 22, 2011
When any revolution starts, the ruling political system usually proceeds to turn to more violent and more widespread methods of oppression and crackdown. In other words, every revolution instigates a counterrevolution against itself, and it is in the process of this facing off, this struggle, that the fate of the revolution is determined. It is with reference to this reality that Antonio Gramsci says: Every revolutionary condition/situation is simultaneously a counterrevolutionary situation as well. Therefore, in order to analyze the horizons of a revolution it is not enough to look at who the revolutionary forces are and what they want; additionally, we must consider what forces constitute the counterrevolution and what their plans and capabilities are.
Twelve children killed in another US massacre in Afghanistan
May 30, 2011By Patrick O’Connor, wsws.org, 30 May 2011
American forces in Afghanistan killed twelve children and two women in a night-time bombing of two houses in Nawzad district of Helmand province Saturday. The incident, one of several involving civilian deaths recently, is yet another atrocity committed by the US-NATO forces engaged in the illegal occupation.
According to local Afghan officials, the fourteen civilians died as they slept in two family compounds in a small farming community about 80 kilometres north of Helmand Province’s capital, Lashkar Gah. Six others were reported wounded in the airstrike, though differing accounts have emerged of the total number of dead and wounded. President Hamid Karzai’s office said that 10 children, two women, and two men were killed, while NATO officials said nine civilians had died.
Who’s Afraid of the Israel Lobby?
May 30, 2011Obama’s Capitulation
By ANDREW LEVINE, Counterpunch, May 30, 2011
Seldom has any country been as dependent on another as Israel is on the United States, and never in American history has the United States been as servile towards another country as it is towards this beneficiary of its diplomatic, economic and military largesse. Are geopolitical considerations the decisive factor joining the United States and Israel or is American domestic politics to blame?
These are not mutually exclusive options; the difference is one of degree. It bears mention too that domestic and international considerations interact, and that circumstances are always in flux. This is why there is no simple answer to the question. However, at particular moments in the history of American, Israeli and Palestinian relations, the present one especially, the question becomes more tractable.
Behind the Netanyahu Spectacle
May 30, 2011By bouncing up and down, again and again, Democrats and Republicans in Congress demonstrated their support for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu even as he criticized the Mideast policies of President Obama and essentially shut off prospects for serious peace talks. Lawrence Davidson looks at what was behind this curious congressional spectacle.
By Lawrence Davidson, Consortium News, May 29, 2011
According to a May 19 story in the Wall Street Journal, the American Zionists are starting to turn the screws on President Barack Obama and the Democratic Party.
“Jewish donors and fund raisers are warning the Obama re-election campaign that the president is at risk of losing financial support because of concerns about his handling of Israel,” the article said.
If you doubt that this tactic can work, just watch the video of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s address to Congress. Those 20-plus “sustained and standing ovations” did not come from mere true believers.
They came from the thoroughly bought and bullied.
The Zionists have a strikingly successful and very longstanding vote-buying operation and they are, of course, applying it to the President and his reelection campaign.
Egyptian journalists to be questioned tomorrow by military for denouncing the torture of activists
May 30, 2011Tomorrow blogger Hossam El-Hamalawy and Reem Maged will be interrogated by the military prosecution for criticising Egypt’s ruling military on air; protests are expected
Salma Shukrallah, Ahram Online, May 30, 2011
Blogger Hossam El-Hamalawy in Reem Maged’s TV show
Blogger Hossam El-Hamalawy and television host Reem Maged were given a summons on Monday to appear before military prosecution after Maged screened on her show on Thursday Hamalawy criticising the role of military police, holding the head of the military police responsible for torturing activists.
The questioning will start tomorrow at 11am, and there has already been a call for demonstrations in front of the military prosecutor’s building.
Journalist Nabil Sharaf El-Din was also summoned on the same day after he criticised on OnTV Friday the way the military was handling the transition period.
Sharaf El-Din claims that the military’s approach makes many suspect that there is a transfer-of-power deal with the Muslim Brotherhood.
The same programme aired a very critical phone call with Mamdouh Shahin, member of the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces (SCAF), who attacked both OnTV and Sharaf El-Din.
The SCAF has criticised what it calls “irresponsible media,” arguing that it is creating a national split between the military and the people. The SCAF has decided to hold a forum 5 June to discuss the Egyptian media with the country’s various political forces.
Obama’s Hypocrisy: Insulting Our Intelligence
May 30, 2011By Joe Catron, The Palestine Chronicle, May 24, 2011
Barack Obama wants it both ways. Like every United States president since Bill Clinton, who partially brokered the now-defunct Oslo Accords in 1993, he aspires to act as a trusted intermediary in the 63-year old conflict between Israelis and Palestinians, while simultaneously pandering to America’s massive pro-Israel lobby. These clashing goals have spurred him to propose an array of conflicting claims and positions that, aside from being fundamentally incompatible, are often simply painful to observe.
Over the course of four short days in mid-May, he managed, in three separate addresses – at the US State Department, with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in the White House briefing room, and at the annual policy conference of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, the powerful flagship of the Israel lobby – to offer blatant discrepancies, of policy or omission, on nearly every aspect of the conflict. This jarring discord did nothing to bolster Washington’s role in the situation and, to careful listeners, reinforced its ultimate irrelevance to any genuine resolution of it.
Peace and Justice Post 