Fidel Castro and the FARC

July 9, 2008

Eight Mistaken Thesis of Fidel Castro

By James Petras

08/07/08 “ICH” — – I have been a supporter of the Cuban Revolution for exactly fifty years and recognize Fidel Castro as one of the great revolutionary leaders of our time. But I have never been an uncritical apologist: On several crucial occasions I have expressed my disagreements in print, in public and in discussions with Cuban leaders, writers and militants. Fidel Castro’s articles and commentaries on the recent events in Colombia, namely his discussion of the Colombian regime’s freeing of several FARC prisoners (including three CIA operatives and Ingrid Betancourt) and his critical comments on the politics, structure, practices, tactics and strategy of the FARC and its world-renowned leader, Manuel Marulanda, merit serious consideration.

Castro’s remarks demand analysis and refutation, not only because his opinions are widely read and influence millions of militants and admirers in the world, especially in Cuba and Latin America, but because he purports to provide a ‘moral’ basis for opposition to imperialism today. Equally important Castro’s unfortunate diatribe and critique against the FARC, Marulanda and the entire peasant-based guerrilla movement, has been welcomed, published and broadcast by the entire pro-imperialist mass media on five continents. Fidel Castro, with few caveats, has uncritically joined the chorus condemning the FARC and, as I will demonstrate, without reason or logic.

Eight Erroneous Theses of Fidel Castro

1. Castro claims that the ‘liberation’ of the FARC political prisoners “opens a chapter for peace in Colombia, a process which Cuba has been supporting for 20 years as the most appropriate for the unity and liberation of the peoples of our America, utilizing new approaches in the complex and special present day circumstances after the collapse of the USSR…” (Reflections of Fidel Castro, July 4, 2008).

What is astonishing about this thesis (and the entire essay) is Castro’s total omission of any discussion of the mass terror unleashed by Colombia’s President Uribe against trade unionists, political critics, peasant communities and documented by every human rights group in and out of Colombia in both of his recent essays. In fact, Castro exculpates the current Uribe regime, the most murderous regime, and puts the entire blame on ‘US Imperialism’. Since the “collapse of the Soviet Union”, and under the US-led military offensive, a multitude of armed revolutionary movements have emerged in Lebanon, Palestine, Iraq, Afghanistan, Nepal, and other pre-existing armed groups in Colombia and the Philippines, have continued to engage in struggle. In Latin America, the “new approaches” to revolution were anything but peaceful – massive popular uprisings overthrowing corrupt electoral politicians in Argentina, Bolivia, Ecuador, Venezuela…costing many hundreds of lives.

Continued . . .

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U.S. mercenaries in Iraq

July 9, 2008

Jeremy Scahill | Socialist Worker, July 9, 2008

Jeremy Scahill, an investigative journalist and author of the award-winning book Blackwater: The Rise of the World’s Most Powerful Mercenary Army, spoke at Socialism 2008 on the spread of privatized war corporations and the struggle against them.

Blackwater's heavily armed security forces

I GAVE a talk the other day in San Francisco in front of an audience primarily of military people. I was invited by the Marines’ Memorial Association of San Francisco, and I was actually introduced by Major Gen. Mike Myatt, who was one of the commanders of the 1991 Gulf War.

This was hardly an antiwar crowd, but as an indication of how serious the problem of mercenaries and private forces in Iraq has become, many from within the established military are now starting to speak out about it.

So I was honored to be in a room full of people, regardless of their perspective on the war, who take this issue seriously enough to do something about it–who realize that this is an incredible problem. We didn’t share the same global outlook and certainly not the same opinion about the U.S. occupation of Iraq, but on this issue, we’re hearing more and more voices coming from the established military.

Series: From Socialism 2008

Some 1,000 people from across the U.S. gathered for a weekend of left politics and discussion at the Socialism 2008 conference on June 19-22 in Chicago. SocialistWorker.org will be publishing some of the presentations from the weekend, so stay tuned for more.

I’m going to spend time talking about what’s at stake not just with mercenaries in Iraq, but also with the election. But I want to begin by telling a story that makes up part of a substantial investigation I did for the update of my book Blackwater. I have over 110 new pages of material in this book, and I also went through and substantially updated it based on some of the important investigations that have been conducted and are ongoing into Blackwater’s activity.

I open the book with a new investigation of an incident that I know everyone in this room remembers well–the Nisour Squre shootings last September. What I want to do right now is begin by giving you a narrative overview of what exactly happened there–what we understand from eyewitness testimony and from investigations that have been done. Because it really is a horrifying story. I think it’s important not just that we know that Blackwater killed 17 Iraqi civilians, but the nature of that crime, and what the response of the Bush administration was after it.

– – – – – – – – – – – – – – – –

ON THAT morning of September 16, 2007, a young 20-year-old Iraqi medical student, Ahmed Haithem Ahmed, was with his mother and father. Ahmed was driving; his mother Mohassin was in the passenger seat. They dropped off his father at the local hospital where he worked, and then they went to go run some errands.

What else to read

Jeremy Scahill’s Blackwater: The Rise of the World’s Most Powerful Mercenary Army climbed into the New York Times best-seller list on its release. Now the book has been republished in paperback, with indispensable additional materials.

Scahill documents Blackwater’s latest venture, a private spy company run by the shadowy J. Cofer Black, in “Blackwater’s Private Spies” in the Nation. Scahill’s “Blackwater: From the Nisour Square Massacre to the Future of the Mercenary Industry” is an extended interview with Amy Goodman on Democracy Now!

For more on the rise of the mercenaries, see “Blackwater’s Heart of Darkness” in the International Socialist Review, an article based on an earlier speech by Scahill.

Among the errands that they were running was dropping off college applications for Ahmed’s younger sister. This was an extraordinary family. They very much had medicine in their DNA; they were a family of doctors. They had an opportunity to leave Iraq when the U.S. invasion was imminent, but they ultimately decided as a family that they were going to stay in their country, because they felt that more than ever in the history of their nation, the country was going to need doctors because of the incredible violence and bloodshed that was going to be unleashed. So they stayed in Iraq.

Ahmed and his mother were driving, and they pulled into an area of Baghdad known as the Monsour district. I had been there many times in my travels to Iraq. It used to be an upscale section of the city, where there were markets and cafes and restaurants. Now it’s a hollow shell of its former self.

Continued . . .

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Russia threatens military response to US missile defence deal

July 9, 2008

The Times, July 9, 2008

David Charter, Europe Correspondent

Russia threatened to retaliate by military means after a deal with the Czech Republic brought the US missile defence system in Europe a step closer.

The threat followed quickly on from the announcement that Condoleezza Rice signed a formal agreement with the Czech Republic to host the radar for the controversial project.

Moscow argues that the missile shield would severely undermine the balance of European security and regards the proposed missile shield based in two former Communist countries as a hostile move.

“We will be forced to react not with diplomatic, but with military-technical methods,” the Russian Foreign Ministry said in a statement.

The ministry did not detail what its response might entail.

Dr Rice, the US Secretary of State, hailed the agreement as a step forward for international security.

After 14 months of negotiations, the US is struggling to clinch agreement with its other proposed partner – Poland – where it hopes to locate the interceptor missiles designed to shoot down any incoming rockets.

Washington insists that the system will not be targeted at Russia, but will act as a safeguard for Europe against regimes such as Iran. The plan was endorsed by Nato in April.

Continued . . .

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Human rights: Saudis treat domestic staff like ‘virtual slaves’

July 9, 2008

· Migrant women routinely abused, says watchdog

· Call for labour law to protect household staff

Asian domestic workers in Saudi Arabia face routine human rights abuses that in some cases amount to slavery, with employers often escaping any punishment, according to a new report.

Abuses include months or years of unpaid wages, forced confinement and physical and sexual violence, while some workers suffer imprisonment or lashings for spurious charges of theft, adultery, or “witchcraft”, says Human Rights Watch.

Saudi households employ an estimated 1.5 million domestic workers, mostly from Indonesia, Sri Lanka, the Philippines, and Nepal. Thousands of complaints of abuse are made every year.

“In the best cases, migrant women in Saudi Arabia enjoy good working conditions and kind employers, and in the worst they’re treated like virtual slaves. Most fall somewhere in between,” said Nisha Varia, senior researcher in HRW’s Women’s Rights Division. “The Saudi government should extend labour law protection to domestic workers and reform the visa sponsorship system so that women desperate to earn money for their families don’t have to gamble with their lives.”

Excessive workloads and unpaid wages, for periods ranging from a few months to 10 years, are among the most common complaints. The Saudi labour law excludes domestic workers, denying them rights guaranteed to other workers, such as a weekly rest day and overtime pay. Many domestic workers must work 18 hours a day, seven days a week.

A restrictive sponsorship system ties workers’ visas to their employers, which means employers can prevent workers changing jobs or leaving the country. Employers often take away passports and lock workers in the home, increasing their isolation and risk of psychological, physical and sexual abuse. After interviewing 86 foreign domestic workers, HRW concluded that 36 faced abuses that amounted to forced labour, trafficking, or slavery-like conditions.

Poor investigations and criminal proceedings that often last for years mean that abusive employers are rarely punished. For example, after three years of proceedings, a Riyadh court dropped charges against the employer of Nour Miyati, despite the employer’s confession and medical evidence. Miyati, an Indonesian domestic worker, had her fingers and toes amputated as a result of being starved and beaten daily by her employers.

Haima G, a Filipina, said her employer called her into his bedroom soon after she had arrived and told her she had been “bought” for 10,000 riyals (£1,350). “The employer raped me many times. I told everything to madam. The whole family, madam, the employer, they didn’t want me to go. They locked the doors and gates,” she told HRW.

Rather than seeing their abusers brought to justice, domestic workers are more likely to face counter-accusations of witchcraft, theft, or adultery, said the report. And in such cases, domestic workers often face severe delays in getting access to interpreters, legal aid, or consular assistance, or are denied help.

Witchcraft and moral crimes such as being in the presence of unrelated men are punishable by up to 10 years’ imprisonment and 60 to 490 lashes, so many women decide not to seek justice.

Continued . . .

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BBC Hit Piece Edits Silverstein Comment In Dirty Tricks Scam

July 8, 2008

Glaring and damning errors already apparent in new BBC WTC 7 hit piece

No BBC, WTC 7 Did Not Collapse “Due To Fire” & The Final 9/11 Mystery Is Not Solved

Movies I Made To Counter The BBC’s Argument That “The Final Mystery Of 9/11″ Has Been Solved

WTC 7 isn’t the final mystery, it is one in a row of mysteries

BBC Set To Launch New Smear Attack On 9/11 Truth

Paul Joseph Watson | Prison Planet | Tuesday, July 8, 2008

The BBC’s embarrassing attempt to dig itself out of a hole that keeps getting deeper was again exemplified during their latest yellow journalism hit piece on 9/11 truth, in which they played Larry Silverstein’s “pull it” comment but edited out the most important part of the statement, and in doing so changed its context altogether.

An army of informed truth activists are almost tripping over each other to point out the gargantuan number of errors, ad hominem smear tactics, bias and shoddy investigative techniques displayed in the program which aired Sunday in the UK.

Just one such example concerns WTC complex leaseholder Larry Silverstein’s infamous “pull it” comment which can be viewed in its entirety below with other clips included for context in confirming that the term “pull it” is industry jargon for deliberately demolishing a building.

Watch the clip.

However, in the BBC’s attempt to convince the viewer that “pull it” meant to withdraw firefighters from the building, despite the fact that according to NIST’s WTC collapse lead investigator Shyam Sunder, “There was no firefighting in WTC 7,” and additionally the FEMA report, which stated “No manual firefighting actions were taken by FDNY,” the editors carefully snipped out the last portion of Silverstein’s comments where he states, “and then we watched the building collapse.”

Cycle through to 20 minutes into the clip to spot the edit.

[to be added later]

By deliberately removing “and then we watched the building collapse,” the BBC has performed a hatchet job on the whole context of the statement by censoring the fact that the collapse of WTC 7 was a consequence of the decision to “pull” the building.

The BBC’s zealous efforts to redeem its name by ceaselessly attacking the 9/11 truth movement accelerated after the broadcaster was shamed when footage from 9/11 emerged of their correspondent Jane Standley reporting that WTC 7 had collapsed even as it remained standing in the shot behind her head.

Questions as to how this could have happened and allegations that news corporations, whether wittingly or unwittingly, were being fed a script on the day of 9/11 as it unfolded were met with hostility, and the BBC claimed it had “lost” the tape.

The tape was miraculously “discovered” again on the eve of the broadcast of their latest hit piece but the footage was not shown in the program, presumably to avoid further embarrassment.

Below you can read articles concerning the mountain of other lies contained in the hit piece and watch a discussion about the program with Alex Jones and Jason Bermas.

We will be picking apart the BBC’s latest atrocious effort to claim they have “solved the final mystery of 9/11″ over the course of this week with multiple investigative reports and as we did last time – debunk this latest hit piece as nothing more than the revolting stench of yellow journalism.

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Iran: The Threat

July 8, 2008

The New York Review of Books, Vol. 55, No. 12, July 17, 2008

By Thomas Powers

At a moment of serious challenge, battered by two wars, ballooning debt, and a faltering economy, the United States appears to have lost its capacity to think clearly. Consider what passes for national discussion on the matter of Iran. The open question is whether the United States should or will attack Iran if it continues to reject American demands to give up uranium enrichment. Ignore for the moment whether the United States has any legal or moral justification for attacking Iran. Set aside the question whether Iran, as Secretary of Defense Robert Gates recently claimed in a speech at West Point, “is hellbent on acquiring nuclear weapons.” Focus instead on purely practical questions. By any standards Iran is a tough nut to crack: it is nearly three times the size of Texas, with a population of 70 million and a big income from oil which the world cannot afford to lose. Iran is believed to have the ability to block the Straits of Hormuz in the Persian Gulf through which much of the world’s oil must pass on its way to market.

Keep in mind that the rising price of oil already threatens the world’s economy. Iran also has a large army and deep ties to the population of Shiite coreligionists next door in Iraq. The American military already has its hands full with a hard-to-manage war in Iraq, and is proposing to send additional combat brigades to deal with a growing insurgency in Afghanistan. And yet with all these sound reasons for avoiding war with Iran, the United States for five years has repeatedly threatened it with military attack. These threats have lately acquired a new edge.

President George W. Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney are the primary authors of these threats, but others join them in proclaiming that “all options” must remain “on the table.” The option they wish to emphasize is the option of military attack. The presidential candidates in the middle of this campaign year agree that Iran is a major security threat to the United States. Senator Hillary Clinton in the last days of April threatened to “totally obliterate” Iran—presumably with nuclear weapons—if it attacked Israel. Senator Barack Obama dismissed Clinton’s threat as “bluster” in the familiar Bush style but agrees that Iran cannot be permitted to build nuclear weapons, and he too insists that a US attack on Iran is one of the options which must remain “on the table.” The presumptive Republican candidate, John McCain, takes a position as unyielding as the President’s: Iran must abandon nuclear enrichment, stop “meddling” in Iraq with support for Shiite militias, and stop its sponsorship of “terrorism” carried out by Hezbollah in Lebanon and Hamas in Gaza. Any of these threatening activities, in McCain’s view, might justify a showdown with Iran.

Continued . . .

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The evolution of a conspiracy theory

July 8, 2008

BBC News, July 4, 2008

Twin Towers

A large number of Americans question what happened that day

It wasn’t only the Twin Towers that collapsed on September 11. A third World Trade Center tower that wasn’t hit by the planes also fell. As a report into Tower 7 prepares to publish its findings, Mike Rudin considers how this conspiracy theory got to be so big.

9/11 is the conspiracy theory of the internet age.

Put “9/11 conspiracy” into Google and you get 7.9 million hits. Put in “9/11 truth” and you get more than 22 million.

Opinion polls in the US have picked up widespread doubts among the American people.

A New York Times/CBS News poll in 2006 found that 53% of those questioned thought the Bush administration was hiding something. Another US poll found a third of those questioned thought government officials either assisted in the 9/11 attacks or allowed them to happen.

In the UK a survey by the BBC’s The Conspiracy Files, carried out by GfkNOP in 2006, found that 16% of those questioned thought there was a “wider conspiracy that included the American government”.

For very good reason a lot of people are very suspicious about what went down that day
Dylan Avery
Director of Loose Change

The BBC and the ‘missing’ tape

This summer will be a key moment for those who question the official explanation of what happened on 9/11, the self-styled “9/11 truth movement”.

Nearly seven years after the terrible events of that September day, the US authorities are due to publish the final report on a third tower that also collapsed on 9/11. Unlike the Twin Towers, this 47-storey, 610-foot skyscraper was not hit by a plane.

And Tower 7 has become a key issue for “truthers” like Dylan Avery, the director of the internet film about 9/11 called Loose Change.

“The truth movement is heavily centred on Building 7 and for very good reason a lot of people are very suspicious about what went down that day,” he says.

See World Trade Center 7’s location

Avery points out that Tower 7 housed some unusual tenants: the CIA, the Secret Service, the Pentagon and the very agency meant to deal with disasters or terrorist attacks in New York – the Office of Emergency Management. And some people think Tower 7 was the place where a 9/11 conspiracy was hatched.

FIND OUT MORE…
The Conspiracy Files: 9/11 – The Third Tower is on BBC Two on Sunday 6 July at 2100 BST
Visit The Conspiracy Files website or catch up using the iPlayer

The official explanation is that ordinary fires were the main reason for the collapse of Tower 7. That makes this the first and only tall skyscraper in the world to have collapsed because of fire. Yet despite that all the thousands of tonnes of steel from the building were carted away and melted down.

The way official bodies have investigated Tower 7 at the World Trade Center has made some people think they’re hiding something. Its destruction was never mentioned in the 9/11 Commission Report.

Continued . . .

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MIDEAST: Gaza Locked In Despite Truce

July 8, 2008

By Adam Morrow and Khaled Moussa al-Omrani

CAIRO, Jul 7 (IPS) – Despite a torrent of mutual recriminations, the fragile truce between Israel and Palestinian resistance faction Hamas survived into its third week. Israel, however, has been slow to fulfil its pledge — as laid down in an Egypt-brokered ceasefire agreement — to allow desperately-needed humanitarian supplies into the outdoor prison that is the Gaza Strip.

“Repeated closures of the border crossings (by Israel)…are indicative of Israel’s lack of seriousness regarding the Egyptian ceasefire agreement,” Ismail Heniya, head of Gaza’s ruling Hamas government, told reporters Friday (Jul. 4). “If the ceasefire is to survive, Israel must open the crossings (into the Gaza Strip) and lift its siege.”

After several months of indirect negotiations in Cairo, Israel and Hamas — along with smaller Palestinian resistance factions — accepted a Tahdia, or “calming” of hostilities, early last month. Despite stated reservations by both sides, the truce officially took effect Jun. 19.

The arrangement calls for a halt to Israeli military operations in the Gaza Strip in exchange for the cessation of Palestinian rocket attacks on Israel from positions within the strip. The ceasefire, however, does not extend to the West Bank, governed by the U.S.-backed Fatah movement of Palestinian Authority (PA) President Mahmoud Abbas.

Most importantly for Hamas — and the Gaza Strip’s roughly 1.5 million people — the scheme also calls for the gradual reopening of border crossings into and out of the territory. Along with five Gaza-Israel crossings, this includes the flashpoint Rafah terminal, which represents the strip’s sole transit point into Egypt and the outside world beyond.

Ever since Hamas wrested control of Gaza one year ago (after winning elections in 2006), Israel has kept its shared crossings with the enclave hermetically sealed. The Egyptian government, meanwhile, citing the lack of a formal treaty regulating border protocol, put the finishing touches on the blockade by sealing the Rafah terminal as well.

Backed by the U.S. and the EU, the de facto siege has destroyed the Gaza Strip’s economy and deprived much of its population of vital commodities, including foodstuffs and medicine. The situation has prompted a number of commentators to describe the embattled territory as the world’s largest concentration camp.

Continued . . .

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Iraq Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki demands US withdrawal timetable

July 8, 2008
The Times, July 8, 2008

Iraqis want an end to the immunity that US troops have from prosecution

James Hider in Baghdad

Iraq said for the first time yesterday that it wanted to set a timetable for the withdrawal of US troops from its territory.

President Bush has long resisted a schedule for pulling his 145,000 soldiers out, arguing that it would play into the hands of insurgents. Nouri al-Maliki, the Shia Prime Minister, who boasted last week that he had crushed terrorism in the country, suggested that it was time to start setting time-lines.

“The current trend is to reach an agreement on a memorandum of understanding either for the departure of the forces or to put a timetable on their withdrawal,” Mr al-Maliki said during a visit to the United Arab Emirates. He rejected efforts by Mr Bush to hurry through an agreement on vital issues such as the immunity of US troops in Iraq and use of the country’s airspace. Mr Bush had hoped to sign a Status of Forces Agreement (SOFA) by the end of July to establish the basis for a long-term presence of US troops in the country.

The Iraqi parliament has bridled at pushing through such a binding deal with the outgoing and unpopular Bush Administration, saying that the negotiations have been secretive and could undermine Iraq’s sovereignty. “I don’t know anything about this agreement and neither does parliament,” said Ezzedine Dawla, a Sunni MP. “We’re going to pass something we don’t know anything about.”

Continued . . .

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Hebrew tablet ‘predates Bible on resurrection’

July 8, 2008

By Donald Macintyre in Jerusalem | The Independent, Tuesday, 8 July 2008

Change font size: A | A | A

A pre-Christian Hebrew text shows that the idea of a messiah rising from the dead after three days was already in Jewish tradition before the birth of Jesus, a prominent biblical scholar will argue today.

The controversial theory of Professor Israel Knohl, citing his new reading of a tablet inscribed in the 1st century BC discovered nearly 10 years ago, is expected to trigger a new Judaeo-Christian debate over the meaning and origin of the most central tenet of Christianity, the death and resurrection of Jesus.

Professor Knohl, a professor of biblical studies at Hebrew University, Jerusalem, will unveil his interpretation of the text at an Israel Museum conference of scholars, saying that it quotes the Archangel Gabriel telling an earlier “Prince of Princes” that: “In three days you shall live, I Gabriel, command you.”

Using other lines in the text that refer to blood and slaughter as routes to righteousness, along with the overall context of the Jewish revolt against the Romans at the time, Professor Knohl suggests that it refers to the death and resurrection of a Jewish leader.

The tablet, known as Gabriel’s Vision of Revelations because it contains an apocalyptic text ascribed to the angel, has attracted the intense interest of scholars. It came to light after it was bought from a Jordanian antiquities dealer by an Israeli-Swiss collector, David Jeselsohn, who kept it in his Zurich home. The location of the original discovery is not clear, though it may have been in Jordan on the eastern shore of the Dead Sea.

Continued . . .

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