Peace and Justice Post

Patrick Martin, wsws.org, Aug 23, 2010

The World Socialist Web Site denounces the ongoing campaign by the US government and its military and intelligence agencies against WikiLeaks and its founder Julian Assange. The rape charges against Assange, announced Friday by Swedish prosecutors and then withdrawn Saturday, bear all the hallmarks of a US-inspired provocation against the Internet-based organization in retaliation for its exposure of US war crimes in Afghanistan and Iraq.

The Obama administration has evidently exerted enormous pressure on the Swedish government to fabricate the charges against Assange. Not since the Nixon administration compiled its “enemies list” has an American government proceeded so brazenly to target its political opponents for what Assange described accurately as “dirty tricks.”

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When the 4th Stryker Brigade, 2nd Infantry Division rolled out of Iraq last week, the colonel commanding the brigade told a reporter that his soldiers were “leaving as heroes.”

While we can understand the pride of professional soldiers and the emotion behind that statement, it’s time for Americans — military and civilian — to face a difficult reality: In seven years of the deceptively named “Operation Iraqi Freedom” and nine years of “Operation Enduring Freedom” in Afghanistan, no member of the U.S. has been a hero.

This is not an attack on soldiers, sailors, and Marines. Military personnel may act heroically in specific situations, showing courage and compassion, but for them to be heroes in the truest sense they must be engaged in a legal and morally justifiable conflict. That is not the case with the U.S. invasions and occupations of Iraq or Afghanistan, and the social pressure on us to use the language of heroism — or risk being labeled callous or traitors — undermines our ability to evaluate the politics and ethics of wars in a historical framework.

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Middle East Online,  Aug 23, 2010

Refusing to rule out a return to US combat missions

Top US commander in Iraq says American troops could remain in war-torn country beyond 2011.

By Andrew Gully – WASHINGTON

The top US commander in Iraq admitted Sunday that a “complete failure” of Iraqi security forces could oblige the United States to resume combat operations there, but he called this an unlikely scenario.

The last US combat brigade withdrew from Iraq on Thursday. On August 31 combat operations officially end and the role of the remaining 50,000 American troops switches to one of providing advice and assistance.

General Ray Odierno told CNN’s “State of the Union” that the ability of the Iraqi police and army to keep a lid on the violence was improving, but refused to rule out a return to US combat missions if things went sour.

Security advancements meant Iraq was on target to be able to handle its own security after 2011 when the remainder of the US troops are due to be withdrawn, the commanding general of American forces in Iraq said.

“My assessment today is they will be (ready),” he told CNN, speaking from Baghdad. “I think that they continue to grow. We continue to see development in planning, and in their ability to conduct operations.

“The Iraqi people are resilient. They want this. They want to have a democratic country. They want to be on their own. They want to be moving forward and be a contributor to stability in the Middle East.”

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By Tom Perry, Reuters, August 21, 2010

RAMALLAH West Bank (Reuters) – A resumption of Middle East peace talks inspires little hope among Palestinians who say the prospect of an independent Palestinian state alongside Israel seems no more than a dream.

“There has been a lot of talk of peace, but we have seen no results. We no longer have hope,” said 30-year old Luay Kabbah, who was still at school when Palestinian and Israeli leaders first began talking peace nearly two decades ago.

His despondency reflects deep pessimism among Palestinians, mirrored in Israel, on the prospects for a new round of U.S.-mediated peace talks that are due to begin in September.

The talks are the latest chapter in a peace process which, interrupted by several years of violence earlier this decade, has given Palestinians limited self-rule but no state on lands occupied by Israel since a 1967 Middle East war.

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Israeli Government Refuses to Secure Criminal Evidence

by Ann Wright, CommonDreams.org, Aug 22, 2010

Despite appeals from 750 passengers on the Gaza flotilla to their governments to pressure the Israeli government to protect and return their personal belongings that were taken by Israeli commandos on May 31, 2010, when they forcefully boarded the six ships of the flotilla, the Israeli government has left millions of dollars of computers, cameras and cell phones and hundreds of thousands of cash unsecured and un-inventoried.

An Israeli newspaper has revealed that four to six computers among the hundreds that were taken from passengers on the six ships have been sold by an Israeli First Lieutenant to three junior military personnel. On August 18, a second officer was arrested in connection with the theft. An Israeli military official described the case as “embarrassing and shameful.” Eitan Kabel, a member of parliament from the Labour party, told Israeli media: “This is an embarrassing, humiliating and infuriating act.”

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by David Dishneau, Associated Press,  August 20, 2010

HAGERSTOWN, Md. — Michael Moore, the Oscar-winning filmmaker, will contribute $5,000 to help defend the Army private suspected of leaking classified documents to an Internet whistle-blower from serving time in prison.

A champion of liberal and left-wing causes, Moore told The Associated Press in a telephone interview he also hopes to make the public understand that Pfc. Bradley Manning exposed what Moore called “war crimes.”

“He did a courageous thing and he did a patriotic thing,” Moore said.

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Harriet Sherwood, The Observer/UK, Aug 22, 2010

Israeli servicewomen train to become army instructors. Some former recruits have spoken out against the military action in the occupied territories. Photograph: IDF/Polaris ImagesIt was a single word scrawled on a wall at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem that unlocked something deep inside Inbar Michelzon, two years after she had completed compulsory military service in the Israeli Defence Force.

The word was “occupation”. “I really felt like someone was speaking the unspoken,” she recalled last week in a Tel Aviv cafe. “It was really shocking to me. There was graffiti saying, ‘end the occupation’. And I felt like, OK, now I can talk about what I saw.”

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Kashmir Media Service, August 22, 2010

Srinagar, August 22 (KMS): In occupied Kashmir, the authorities continued impose curfew and restrictions in major cities and towns to thwart anti-India demonstrations.

Curfew remained imposed in the area in Srinagar falling under the jurisdiction of nine police stations including Batmaloo, Bemina, Qammerwari, Kralkhud, Nowhatta, Khanyar, Maharajganj, Safakadal, Rainawari, Maisuma and Khotibagh besides Bijbehara in Islamabad and Trehgam in Kupwara. Restrictions were in place in Baramulla, Pulwama, Islamabad and other towns.

However, markets remained closed and transport was off the roads in all parts of the Valley.

Meanwhile, police and CRPF personnel, today, launched a crackdown in Rainawari area of Srinagar.

Kashmir Media Service, August 22, 2010

Mary Schwalm / AP

“I think we really need to give them an opportunity to economically, socially grow,” says Mary Campbell, 56, a Mass. city worker. She joins the growing number of Americans who see no end in sight in Afghanistan.

LAWRENCE, Mass. — A majority of Americans see no end in sight in Afghanistan, and nearly six in 10 oppose the nine-year-old war as President Barack Obama sends tens of thousands more troops to the fight, according to a new Associated Press-GfK poll.

With just over 10 weeks before nationwide elections that could define the remainder of Obama’s first term, only 38 percent say they support his expanded war effort in Afghanistan — a drop from 46 percent in March. Just 19 percent expect the situation to improve during the next year, while 29 percent think it will get worse. Some 49 percent think it will remain the same.

The numbers could be ominous for the president and his Democratic Party, already feeling the heat for high unemployment, a slow economic recovery and a $1.3 trillion federal deficit. Strong dissent — 58 percent oppose the war — could depress Democratic turnout when the party desperately needs to energize its supporters for midterm congressional elections.

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