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This week we rounded up all the top hot spot lists for 2009, and reveal our pick for the best destination of the year. Get your travel horoscope. And bizarre travel gadgets. Plus more vacation ideas and travel deals. Get all the links at www.triponadeal.comhttp://wwwtriponadeal.com
This week we rounded up all the top hot spot lists for... more
Annually, the Edinburgh Tattoo in Scotland entertains thousands of spectators. One event that has grown over the last decade is the Taste of the Tattoo, a free one hour show:
Since 1945, by deed and by example, the US has overthrown 50 governments, including democracies, crushed some 30 liberation movements and supported tyrannies from Egypt to Guatemala (see William Blum's histories). Bombing is apple pie. Having stacked his government with warmongers, Wall Street cronies and polluters from the Bush and Clinton eras, the 45th president is merely upholding tradition. The hearts and minds farce I witnessed in Vietnam is today repeated in villages in Afghanistan and, by proxy, Pakistan, which are Obama's wars.
Liberals say that the United States is once again a "nation of moral ideals", but behind the façade little has changed. With his government of warmongers, Wall Street cronies and polluters from the Bush and Clinton eras, Barack Obama is merely upholding the myths of a divine America.
Mourn On The 4th of July
By John PilgerSince 1945, by deed and by example, the US has overthrown 50 governments, including... more
Israeli Occupation Forces have kidnapped 21 Human Rights workers aboard the Free Gaza boat, Spirit of Humanity, including Nobel laureate Mairead Maguire & former U.S. Congresswoman Cynthia McKinney.
ISRAEL ATTACKS JUSTICE BOAT; KIDNAPS HUMAN RIGHTS WORKERS; CONFISCATES MEDICINE, TOYS AND OLIVE TREES
“Israel’s deliberate and premeditated attack on our unarmed boat is a clear violation of international law and we demand our immediate and unconditional release.”Israeli Occupation Forces have kidnapped 21 Human Rights workers aboard the Free Gaza... more
Displaced
Sri Lankan Civilians Denied Their Freedom
Throughout the gruesome finale of the civil war, the government of Sri Lanka claimed to be engaged in the largest hostage rescue mission ever, to release civilians in the Vanni who were being held against their will by the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE). Yet the vast majority of these civilians are still not free. So what exactly has been happening?
Sri Lankan Tamil Detainees Give
Eye-Witness Accounts
By WSWS Correspondents
It is now more than one month since the Sri Lankan military detained the final batch of Tamil refugees fleeing the northern war zone on May 19. They joined more than a quarter of a million civilians already incarcerated in camps set up near Vavuniya and on the Jaffna Peninsula during the last phase of the war. About 160,000 people are interned in four units in the biggest camp, known as Manik Farm
The U.S. Federal Budget Pipeline:Displaced
Sri Lankan Civilians Denied Their Freedom
Throughout the... more
Jun 24, 2009 22:46
UN's Gaza war crimes probe to screen hearings live
The United Nations team which is investigating alleged war crimes committed during Operation Cast Lead, last January, announced on Wednesday that it would broadcast the hearings it plans to hold with Palestinian and Israeli victims live.
The team, led by veteran war crimes investigator Richard Goldstone, will hold the hearings in Gaza City on Sunday and Monday, UN officials said.
Spokeswoman Doune Porter said that the hearings would be broadcast and the media would be allowed to view them from a separate room.
She said Wednesday that the team also would hold hearings in Geneva on July 6-7 under the same conditions.Jun 24, 2009 22:46
UN's Gaza war crimes probe to screen hearings live
The... more
France: Launch of Broad Campaign against Agrexco « U.S. Campaign ...
By marcy/مارسي newman/نيومان
Millions of people demonstrated to denounce Israeli army war crimes. Richard Falk, UN observer for Human Rights in the Occupied Territories since 1967, claimed at the end of the war that the weapons used and the attacks against ...
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THE ANTI-HUMAN RIGHTS POLICY OF THE STATE OF ISRAEL CONDEMNED BY THE EUROPEAN PARLIAMENT
In 2002, the European Parliament voted for the freezing of Europe’s Association Agreements with Israel, due to Israel’s failure to respect Human Rights, in Palestine but also in Israel with respect to Israeli
Arabs.
On 4 December 2008, underlining the persistence of the problem, most members of the European parliament voted against the “upgrade” of the Association Agreements with Israel.France: Launch of Broad Campaign against Agrexco « U.S. Campaign ...
By... more
With the lack of medical services in Gaza, critically ill patients must travel into Israel for treatment. Many are asked to collaborate with Israeli intelligence services before they receive aid. It has been alleged that if they refuse to become informers they are refused medical treatment. http://informationclearinghouse.info/article22821.htmGaza: No Right To Life
Must Watch 7 Minute Video Report
With the lack of... more
PCHR's report bears testimony to Israel's contempt for international laws, its imperial agenda, culture of violence, disdain for peace, genocidal intentions, disparagement of Arabs and Islam, and its scorn for Palestinian lives and welfare
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Introduction
Since the September 2000 Second Intifada, Israeli forces killed 1179 children, including 865 in Gaza as part of a decades-long policy of collectively punishing millions of Palestinians in the Occupied Territories, mostly civilian men, women, and children.
Israel calls self-defense "terrorism" and justifies its actions as responses to militant missile or other attacks. PCHR's investigations "have consistently undermined these claims," and condemns all killing, especially of children.
In September 2006, the London Independent's Donald Macintyre headlined his story: "Gaza: The children killed in a war the world doesn't want to know about." He wrote about more than 37 children under 18 killed since June 25 during Israel's Operation Summer Rain, according to PCHR figures, out of an overall 228 total, mostly civilians.Israeli War Crimes Against Children
During Operation Cast Lead
By Stephen Lendman... more
Tel Aviv has 936 lawsuits against them for Gaza assault
Israel was set to face an avalanche of war crimes lawsuits from Palestinian lawyers who accused Tel Aviv of dozens of crimes five months after its three week assault on the Gaza Strip, the German daily Der Spiegel reported Saturday.
A group of Palestinian lawyers filed 936 lawsuits against Israel's Defense Forces (IDF) and the cases will soon be heard in Spain's National Court under universal jurisdiction, Iyad al-Alami, head of the Palestinian Center for Human Rights (PCHR), said.
PCHR's attorneys are collecting evidence of human rights violations and war crimes committed against unarmed civilians.Israel set for blizzard of war crimes charges
Tel Aviv has 936 lawsuits against... more
Muslim rage is stoked because we station tens of thousands of American troops on Muslim soil, occupy two Muslim nations, make possible the illegal Israeli ...
Muslim rage is stoked because we station tens of thousands of American troops on Muslim soil, occupy two Muslim nations, make possible the illegal Israeli ...
Muslim rage is stoked because we station tens of thousands of American troops on Muslim soil, occupy two Muslim nations, make possible the illegal Israeli ...
Did they play Barack Obama’s speech to the Muslim world in the prison corridors of Abu Ghraib, Bagram air base, Guantanamo or the dozens of secret sites where we hold thousands of Muslims around the world? Did it echo off the walls of the crowded morgues filled with the mutilated bodies of the Muslim dead in Baghdad or Kabul? Was it broadcast from the tops of minarets in the villages and towns decimated by U.S. iron fragmentation bombs? Was it heard in the squalid refugee camps of Gaza, where 1.5 million Palestinians live in the world’s largest ghetto?Muslim rage is stoked because we station tens of thousands of American troops on... more
War exposes the lies we tell ourselves about ourselves. It rips open the hypocrisy of our religions and secular institutions. Those who return from war have learned something which is often incomprehensible to those who have stayed home. We are not a virtuous nation.War Is Sin
By Chris Hedges
War exposes the lies we tell ourselves about... more
yOU CAN ALL READ THIS BOOK ON HERE AND YOU CAN ALL USE IT TO DEBATE AGAINST THE ENORMOUS PROPAGANDA IN OUR MEDIA, AND ON CURRENT.COM
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THE ISRAEL LOBBY AND U.S. FOREIGN POLICY
John J. Mearsheimer
Department of Political Science
University of Chicago
Stephen M. Walt
John F. Kennedy School of Government
Harvard University
March 2006 RWP06‐011
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The two authors of this Working Paper are solely responsible for the views expressed in it. As academic institutions, Harvard University and the University of Chicago do not take positions on the scholarship of individual faculty, and this article should not be interpreted or portrayed as reflecting the official position of either institution.
An edited and reworked version of this paper was published in the
London Review of Books Vol. 28, No. 6 (March 23, 2006), and is available online at www.lrb.co.uk
THE ISRAEL LOBBY AND U.S. FOREIGN POLICY
U.S. foreign policy shapes events in every corner of the globe. Nowhere is this truer than in the Middle East, a region of recurring instability and enormous strategic importance. Most recently, the Bush Administration's attempt to transform the region into a community of democracies has helped produce a resilient insurgency in Iraq, a sharp rise in world oil prices, and terrorist bombings in Madrid, London, and Amman. With so much at stake for so many, all countries need to understand the forces that drive U.S. Middle East policy.
The U.S. national interest should be the primary object of American foreign policy. For the past several decades, however, and especially since the Six Day War in 1967, the centerpiece of U.S. Middle East policy has been its relationship with Israel. The combination of unwavering U.S. support for Israel and the related effort to spread democracy throughout the region has inflamed Arab and Islamic opinion and jeopardized U.S. security.
This situation has no equal in American political history. Why has the United States been willing to set aside its own security in order to advance the interests of another state? One might assume that the bond between the two countries is based on shared strategic interests or compelling moral imperatives. As we show below, however, neither of those explanations can account for the remarkable level of material and diplomatic support that the United States provides to Israel.
Instead, the overall thrust of U.S. policy in the region is due almost entirely to U
continuedTHE ISRAEL LOBBY AND U.S. FOREIGN POLICY
yOU CAN ALL READ THIS BOOK ON HERE... more
the Spanish National Court’s decision to continue investigating suspected Israeli war criminals is welcomed
The victims and their legal team have placed their trust in the criminal justice system, believing that this is the only mechanism whereby accountability can be pursued and Israel’s impunity combated. Judge Fernando Andreu’s judgment indicates that, even in the face of considerable political pressure – including statements made by the Spanish Foreign Minister Moratinos – this trust in the rule of law is justified. This decision confirms the credibility and independence of the Spanish Courts.
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On 22 July 2002, at approximately 11:55 pm, an Israeli Air Force F16 fighter jet dropped a 985 kilogramme bomb on a three-storey apartment building. The attack was intended to kill Salah Shehade, the suspected leader of the Izzidin al-Qassam Brigade, Hamas’ military wing. The apartment building was located within the densely populated Al Daraj district, a residential neighbourhood in Gaza City. At the time of the attack, Shehade was on the upper floor of the building. As a result of the blast impact, eight other adjoining and nearby apartment buildings were completely destroyed, nine were partially destroyed, and another 21 sustained considerable damage. Excluding Shehade and his guard, a total of 14 civilians were killed, including eight children. Approximately 150 civilians were injured.
Israeli Occupation Force (IOF) officials have acknowledged that they decided to drop the bomb on Shehadeh’s house knowing his wife was with him, intentionally killing her as well.the Spanish National Court’s decision to continue investigating suspected Israeli... more
If anyone finds pages of it online please post it here.
On page 67 it says that
in 1917 there were about 57,000 jews in Palestine (the year of the Balfour Decleration) whch amounted to 9.7% of the population.
In 1936 there were 384,000 jews in Palestine, amounting to almost 30% of the population - an unprecedented increase in the history of settlement. To the Palestinians, it seemed evident that, while the politicians offered them bland words of reassurance, the immigrants would continue to arrive in ever greater numbers until Palestine was in their hands.
Although the ambiguity which had characterized the public utterances of Zionist spokesmen before the Balfour Declaration persisted, it became steadily easier to read between the lines and detect the purpose: if the Zionists were to be believed, then the Palestinians were right to be fearful. Indeed, as early as 1921 men like Dr. Eder, the acting chairman of the Zionist Commission, had been quite blunt, statinf before a British Commission of Enquiry with a candour which deeply impressed the British that:
There can only be one National Home in Palestine, and that a Jewish one, and no equality in the partnership between jews and Arabs, but a Jewish predominance as soon as the numbers of the race are sufficiently increased.
Jonathan Dimbleby is the presenter of BBC Radio 4's flagship programme of topical debate Any Questions? and its twin phone-in programme Any Answers?. He has presented ITV's flagship weekly political programme, Jonathan Dimbleby until the show ended on May 7th 2006. He is also ITV's anchorman on every General election night since 1997.He has written a number of best-selling books: RICHARD DIMBLEBY; THE PALESTINIANS, THE PRINCE OF WALES and THE LASTJonathan Dimbleby's book:
THE PALESTINIANS
ISBN: 0704322560
ISBN-13:... more
The oldest fossilized evidence of animals has been unearthed in Oman and reveals that tiny sea sponges were abundant 635 million years ago, long before most of the planet's other major animal groups evolved, according to a new analysis.The oldest fossilized evidence of animals has been unearthed in Oman and reveals that... more
The inhabitants of the area of Oman have long prospered on Indian Ocean trade.
In the late 18th century, a newly established sultanate in Muscat signed the first in a series of friendship treaties with Britain.
Over time, Oman's dependence on British political and military advisors increased, but it never became a British colony.
In 1970, Qaboos bin Said al-Said overthrew the restrictive rule of his father; he has ruled as sultan ever since.
His extensive modernization program has opened the country to the outside world while preserving the longstanding close ties with the UK.
Oman's moderate, independent foreign policy has sought to maintain good relations with all Middle Eastern countries. The inhabitants of the area of Oman have long prospered on Indian Ocean trade.
In... more
Despite the official rhetoric, children continue to be sold into slavery in the Middle East. According to UNICEF reports there are 40,000 child camel jockeys on the Arabian Peninsula alone. Despite the official rhetoric, children continue to be sold into slavery in the Middle... more
