Bringing the Troops Home

Cartoon by Mr. Fish (click on it to enlarge)
Contributed by Datta

[Notice the name, FULAYTER = F.U. later?]

Squeezing Palestinians into Impossible Mission

by Nicola Nasser

Global Research, April 11, 2007

".......The security chaos was highlighted by the kidnapping of BBC reporter, Alan Johnston, 44, in Gaza city on March 12th, in the longest captivity a foreign journalist has endured in Gaza over the past three years. The Dogmush family, who is thought to have a militia of about 2,000 men, is suspected of abducting him and was blamed for the abduction of two Fox TV journalists held for two weeks last summer; the family denied these accusations. “This has become a country of mafia,” said Hani Habeeb, a sociologist with Gaza's al-Azhar University......

But there remains the overall violence-breeding incubator of the prevailing security chaos.

First, the blurred national role of the PA security apparatus is eroding public confidence in this role. Externally what is the point in having more than 80,000 of national security personnel when they could not stand up to the IOF to defend their people or at least make their daily onslaughts with a price? Internally, according to Hassan Khraisheh, deputy speaker of the PLC, “What's the point in having 85,000 security officers if they can't free a foreign journalist who has been held in the Gaza Strip for three weeks?” The PA has become the most heavily policed territory in the world, with an officer-to-resident ratio of 1:50; compared to 1:400 in the United States, according to one estimate.

Second, disarming all but the government is a security prerogative, but it will not certainly be a very popular move by the PA to disarm people of personal and overwhelmingly primitive self-defence weapons while they are still under Israeli occupation and their “national” security forces are practically unable and politically committed not to defend them against the ongoing military incursions, extra-judicial assassinations (dubbed by the Israelis “targeted killings”), house demolitions and mass arrests.

Third, the absence of what the US Administration and PA officials have been recently fond of describing as “political horizon,” the deadlocked “vision” of a two-state solution, Israel’s undermining of the Road Map and her rejection of the Arab Peace Initiative are all factors contributing to a destabilizing no-war-no-peace situation that is playing on an already edgy Palestinian nerves and their collective sense of insecurity......."

Ah......Those Geniuses of Hamas Still Wondering About U.S. Motive.....Duh!

Hamas questions US motives behind $60m aid pledge to presidential security; Fayyad calls for $1.3 billion in PA aid

"The Hamas movement has criticized the United States Congress' decision to give financial aid to the Palestinian presidential security forces and cover expenses for other security purposes.

A spokesman of the movement issued a statement in which he said, "The US administration does not work for the good of the Palestinian people."

"It is always biased towards the Israelis and their colonialist plans, and that is why such aid to the presidential security bodies must have bad intentions."......

The US Congress authorized on Monday $60m in funds to improve the state of Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas's security staff, Reuters news agency reported.

The funds are expected to be spent on Abbas' presidential guard, security at border crossings and equipment.

"This has also been done with Israeli agreement and understanding," the US State Department official was quoted by Reuters as saying......

The Hamas spokesman added in his statement, "The presidency should explain its position in terms of this latest aid, which is a suspicious aid." He also said, "It aims to contain the resistance and service the Israeli army".

The statement confirmed, "If the US administration cares about the Palestinian people, they would have ended the siege, released the Palestinian money in the banks".

The spokesman also said that "the ministry of finance is the address that the money should be transferred to; sending the money to anywhere else is suspicious and raises a lot of questions."......"

***

HAMAS should be celebrating the "gift" of $60 millions to strengthen "Brother Abu Mazen." He is its partner in the "unity government" after all is said and done. HAMAS is just blowing smoke in our eyes to make us believe that their position is different from that of the Usraeli stooge. It is trying to have its cake and eat it too; this is an old and transparent game. This will lead to plummeting trust in HAMAS. If it is serious about having a different program from that of the stooge, then it will have to dissolve the PA and refuse to be a partner with a traitor.

Enough game playing, HAMAS!

Taha MK accuses Israel of targeting all Palestinian leaders inside Israel

"Ramallah - Ma'an - Amid the fierce Israeli campaign against the member of the Israeli Knesset, Azmi Bishara, who is a Palestinian citizen of Israel, another Arab member of the Knesset, Wasil Taha, told Ma'an News Agency that, "We know that there is a programmed campaign planned by the Israeli intelligence and security establishment against the [Palestinian] national movement and its leaders inside Israel."

Speaking to our correspondent in Ramallah, Taha described how the National Democratic Assembly (NDA) and Dr Bishara, like all other parties and national leaders defending the Palestinian citizens' rights, criticize the state of Israel and struggle to make the Israeli state a state for all its citizens and not only for its Jewish citizens. "This trend is annoying the [Israeli] security establishment," Taha said.

Taha added that former Israeli minister of education Shulamit Aloni said previously that the Israeli establishment were preparing all the files needed to accuse Bishara.

Taha also said that the Israeli intelligence agency, the Shin Bet/ Shabak, and the statements they make in regard to the Arab citizens of Israel, reflect the fact that they consider the Arab citizens as more dangerous than a nuclear bomb inside Israel."

Decision Time

By Tom Toles

Rulers and the ruled: Dangerous disconnect

By Noam Chomsky

AsiaTimes

"......This "debate" is a typical illustration of a primary principle of sophisticated propaganda. In crude and brutal societies, the Party Line is publicly proclaimed and must be obeyed - or else. What you actually believe is your own business and of far less concern. In societies where the state has lost the capacity to control by force, the Party Line is simply presupposed; then, vigorous debate is encouraged within the limits imposed by unstated doctrinal orthodoxy. The cruder of the two systems leads, naturally enough, to disbelief; the sophisticated variant gives an impression of openness and freedom, and so far more effectively serves to instill the Party Line. It becomes beyond question, beyond thought itself, like the air we breathe.

The debate over Iranian interference in Iraq proceeds without ridicule on the assumption that the United States owns the world. We did not, for example, engage in a similar debate in the 1980s about whether the US was interfering in Soviet-occupied Afghanistan, and I doubt that Pravda, probably recognizing the absurdity of the situation, sank to outrage about that fact (which American officials and the US media, in any case, made no effort to conceal). Perhaps the official Nazi press also featured solemn debates about whether the Allies were interfering in sovereign Vichy France, though if so, sane people would then have collapsed in ridicule......

These facts suggest a possible way to prevent the current crisis from exploding, perhaps even into some version of World War III. That awesome threat might be averted by pursuing a familiar proposal: democracy promotion - this time at home in the United States, where it is badly needed......

Democracy promotion at home, while no panacea, would be a useful step toward helping the United States become a "responsible stakeholder" in the international order (to adopt the term used for adversaries), instead of being an object of fear and dislike throughout much of the world. Apart from being a value in itself, functioning democracy at home holds real promise for dealing constructively with many current problems, international and domestic, including those that literally threaten the survival of our species."

هل هناك إمكانية للسلام بين العرب والعدو الصهيوني؟

ناجي علوش

"هل هناك إمكانية لسلام بين العرب والكيان الصهيوني؟ هذا موضوع مختلف فيه، لا من أيام منظمة التحرير الفلسطينية فحسب، بل من قبل ذلك، في أيام الهيئة العربية العليا والحاج أمين الحسيني.

فقد انفجر الخلاف بين المجلسيين والمعارضين عام 1936، حين كان المجلسيون بزعامة الحاج أمين الحسيني مع الثورة واستخدام السلاح، وكان المعارضون وعلى رأسهم راغب النشاشيبي والمحامي أحمد صدقي الدجاني ولويس شحادة صاحب جريدة "مرآة الشرق"، ضد الثورة.

واشتد الصراع حتى قامت حركة اغتيالات اغتيل فيها النشاشيبي وأحمد صدقي الدجاني، لأنهم كانوا يدعون إلى التفاهم مع الإنجليز واستتباعا عمليا مع الصهيونيين.

وعندما طرحت قضية التسوية والحل المرحلي بعد 37 عاما في 1973، أثار نايف حواتمة الموضوع ولام الحاج أمين الحسيني لأنه لم يتجه إلى التسوية.

وكان من رأي حواتمة أن الحاج أمين أخطأ لأنه لو اتجه إلى التسوية لكانت هناك دولة فلسطينية اليوم، ولما كان شعبنا الفلسطيني في الشتات.

ونرى من الضروري أن نعود إلى المشكلة وأن نسأل: هل كانت حقا ثمة إمكانية لسلام؟

ونحن نقول لا إمكانية لسلام بين العرب والصهاينة، لا لأن العرب لا يريدون سلاما، بل لأن فهم القيادات الصهيونية للسلام مختلف عن فهم العرب له، وكان ذلك هو موقف بريطانيا، ثم الآن الولايات المتحدة ومن يأخذ برأيها.

فكل ما طرح من مشاريع للتسوية، بما في ذلك تقسيم 1947 كان استدراجا للتنازلات الفلسطينية والعربية، وإعطاء الشرعية للهجرة الصهيونية وقيام الكيان الصهيوني، بينما كان قادة المشروع الصهيوني يرون أن الكيان "الدولة" لا يقوم إلا باغتصاب الأرض وتهجير السكان، لأن قرار التقسيم لم يكن قابلا للتطبيق، إذ كيف تقوم دولة يهودية أغلب أرضها ملك للعرب وأغلب سكانها من العرب.

والسلام بالنسبة للولايات المتحدة ليس سلاما بين العرب والكيان الصهيوني، بل هو سلام أميركي يفرض على العرب والوطن العربي كله. ولو كان الموضوع يتعلق بالفلسطينيين لكان الأمر سهلا.
.......
........"

Hizbullah accuses US of secret war and arming opponents

· Cheney sanctioned covert operations, says leader
· Militant group does not rule out clashes with Israel

Clancy Chassay in Beirut
Wednesday April 11, 2007
The Guardian

"Washington is waging a covert war against Hizbullah, according to the militant group, which accuses the US administration of arming anti-Hizbullah militias and seeking to undermine the Lebanese army in moves which could plunge the country back into civil war. "Dick Cheney [US vice president] has given orders for a covert war against Hizbullah...there is now an American programme that is using Lebanon to further its goals in the region," Sheikh Naim Qasim, Hizbullah's deputy secretary general, told the Guardian in an interview in a safe house deep in Beirut's Hizbullah-controlled southern suburbs......

But Hizbullah accused the Lebanese government of arming groups across the country. "This happens with the knowledge of the prime minister and is facilitated by the security forces under his command," said Sheikh Qasim......

Sheikh Qasim rejected the accusation, claiming Washington had scuppered attempts by the Lebanese government and the Hizbullah-led opposition to reach a compromise. "We think that if it wasn't for America's interference, we would have resolved the issue of participating in the government a long time ago," he said.

"America is forcing the government forces to prolong this crisis, because they want a price for it... They want to tie Lebanon into negotiations that benefit Israel and their plan for a new Middle East."......

Sheikh Qasim said Hizbullah did not rule out another confrontation with Israel this summer and confirmed that the group was rearming: "We are prepared for the possibility of another adventure or the demand of American policy that might push the IDF [Israeli Defence Force] in that direction.""

The Iran War Theater's "Northern Front": Azerbaijan and the US Sponsored War on Iran

by Prof. Michel Chossudovsky

Global Research, April 9, 2007

"In a timely decision, Azerbaijan recently (mid-March) granted NATO the permission to use two of its military bases and an airport to "back up its peace-keeping operation in Afghanistan" including support for NATO's "supply route to Afghanistan". NATO's special envoy Robert Simmons insists that the agreement has nothing to do with US plans to wage aerial bombardments on Iran.

Media sources in Baku have intimated that this timely agreement is directly related to ongoing US-Israeli-NATO war plans. Its timing coincides with US naval deployments and war games in the Persian Gulf.

The airport and two military bases are slated to be "modernized to meet NATO standards". Washington has confirmed in this regard that it would "support the modernization of a military airport in the framework of the Individual Partnership Action Plan (IPAP) signed between Azerbaijan and NATO......

"A lot of planes overfly Georgia and Azerbaijan on the way to Afghanistan. Should it prove necessary, we would like to be able to use an airfield in Azerbaijan," the US diplomat said, answering a question concerning the modernization of a military airfield in Azerbaijan with the Americans' help. (Nezavisimaya Gazeta, April 2, 2007)......

Azerbaijan is also strategic in view of its maritime border with Iran in the Caspian sea. In this regard, the U.S. Navy is involved in supporting the Azeri Navy, in the area of training. There is also an agreement to provide US support to refurbish Azeri warships in the Caspian sea.

The US sponsored Caspian Guard Initiative was launched in 2003 to "coordinate activities in Azerbaijan and Kazakhstan with those of U.S. Central Command and other U.S government agencies to enhance Caspian security." The initiative was implemented under the cover of preventing narcotics trafficking and counter- terrorism, Its ultimate objective, however, is to provide USCENTCOM with a strategic naval corridor in the Caspian sea basin......."

America's plan for Baghdad

Divide and rule. A new counter-insurgency strategy to carve up the city into sealed areas. The tactic failed in Vietnam. So what chance does it have in Iraq?

An Informative Article

By Robert Fisk

"Faced with an ever-more ruthless insurgency in Baghdad - despite President George Bush's "surge" in troops - US forces in the city are now planning a massive and highly controversial counter-insurgency operation that will seal off vast areas of the city, enclosing whole neighbourhoods with barricades and allowing only Iraqis with newly issued ID cards to enter.

The campaign of "gated communities" - whose genesis was in the Vietnam War - will involve up to 30 of the city's 89 official districts and will be the most ambitious counter-insurgency programme yet mounted by the US in Iraq.

The system has been used - and has spectacularly failed - in the past, and its inauguration in Iraq is as much a sign of American desperation at the country's continued descent into civil conflict as it is of US determination to "win" the war against an Iraqi insurgency that has cost the lives of more than 3,200 American troops. The system of "gating" areas under foreign occupation failed during the French war against FLN insurgents in Algeria and again during the American war in Vietnam. Israel has employed similar practices during its occupation of Palestinian territory - again, with little success.......

The latest "security" plan, of which The Independent has learnt the details, was concocted by General David Petraeus, the current US commander in Baghdad, during a six-month command and staff course at Fort Leavenworth in Kansas. Those attending the course - American army generals serving in Iraq and top officers from the US Marine Corps, along with, according to some reports, at least four senior Israeli officers - participated in a series of debates to determine how best to "turn round" the disastrous war in Iraq.......

A former US officer in Vietnam who has a deep knowledge of General Petraeus's plans is sceptical of the possible results. "The first loyalty of any Sunni who is in the Iraqi army is to the insurgency," he said. "Any Shia's first loyalty is to the head of his political party and its militia. Any Kurd in the Iraqi army, his first loyalty is to either Barzani or Talabani. There is no independent Iraqi army.......

The senior generals who constructed the new "security" plan for Baghdad were largely responsible for the seminal - but officially "restricted" - field manual on counter-insurgency produced by the Department of the Army in December of last year, code-numbered FM 3-24.......

"Once the additional troops are in place the insurrectionists will cut the lines of communication from Kuwait to the greatest extent they are able," he told The Independent. "They will do the same inside Baghdad, forcing more use of helicopters. The helicopters will be vulnerable coming into the patrol bases, and the enemy will destroy as many as they can. The second part of their plan will be to attempt to destroy one of the patrol bases. They will begin that process by utilising their people inside the 'gated communities' to help them enter. They will choose bases where the Iraqi troops either will not fight or will actually support them.

"The American reaction will be to use massive firepower, which will destroy the neighbourhood that is being 'protected'."......."

Habila Lets You Choose Which "Minister" You Want to Deal With, Since it is a "Unity Government".....What a Joke! The Idiot Doesn't Control Anything

"......As for lifting the siege, Haniyeh said that government officials will hold several meetings and visit European Union countries which have decided to deal with Palestinian ministers selectively. He explained that the government will give its ministers the chance to take personal roles without forcing foreign countries to deal with the unity government as a whole. Haniyeh pointed out that Minister of Finance Dr Salam Fayyad will start an international tour on 11 April......."

***

The idiot is naked, and everyone knows it; however he still thinks that he makes decisions! For how long are the Palestinians going to put up with this farce?

EXCLUSIVE…Two Explosive Books Tell the Inside Story of the Forged Iraq-Niger Docs That Helped Build the Case for War

Democracy Now!
With Amy Goodman

"......It was one of the key justifications for the U.S. invasion of Iraq.
President Bush: “The British Government has learned that Saddam Hussein recently sought significant quantities of uranium from Africa.”
President Bush made the statement in his January 2003 State of the Union. Those sixteen words were central to the administration’s claims that Saddam Hussein was seeking weapons of mass destruction and served as a basis for launching the Iraq invasion less than two months later. Bush’s declaration was based on an intelligence document that provided evidence about Iraq’s purchase of uranium from the African country of Niger. But there was one problem: the document was a fake.....

Today, a Democracy Now! broadcast exclusive: two explosive new books. Carlo Bonini is the Italian reporter who broke the story. His new book is called “Collusion: International Espionage and the War on Terror.” He is an investigative journalist with La Repubblica newspaper of Rome, and he joins us in our firehouse studio. Peter Eisner is a veteran foreign correspondent and is currently an editor at the Washington Post. His new book is “The Italian Letter: How the Bush Administration Used a Fake Letter to Build the Case for War in Iraq.” He joins us from Washington, D.C.
Peter Eisner. Veteran foreign correspondent. He is currently an editor at the Washington Post. He is co-author of “The Italian Letter: How the Bush Administration Used a Fake Letter to Build the Case for War in Iraq.”

Carlo Bonini. Investigative journalist with La Repubblica newspaper of Rome. He is co-author of “Collusion: International Espionage and the War on Terror.”......"

Click Here to Watch, Listen or Read Transcript

Arab Puppet (holding a banner demanding end of the siege of the Palestinians) Telling the U.S., "I am doing this for show, to avoid blame."

How Syria Helped US in "War on Terror"

And How Bush Said "Thanks"

By JAMES G. ABOUREZK
CounterPunch

"About five years ago I had a visit with Syrian President Bashar Al Asad, a visit when he told me that his intelligence services had uncovered a plot by Al Qaeda that would have killed American servicemen in the Middle East. He turned over the information to the U.S., which was then able to stop the operation, saving the lives of the Americans who were being targeted.

When I asked him what operation that was, he replied that, "The Americans asked me not to talk about it, but if they keep calling us a terrorist state, I will talk about it."

After I left his office, I asked the U.S. Ambassador to Syria if what he had said was true. His reply was that not only was it true, but that President Asad had been able to stop more than one Al Qaeda attack on American interests.

Those days are gone now, the heavy handed bad-mouthing of Syria by George W. Bush causing Syria to completely stop its cooperation. Despite the results of that incompetence on the part of the Bush Administration, the denunciations by Bush have continued unabated. Bush and his people have been so anxious to please Israel that what might be good for America is no longer the basis for American actions in the Middle East......"

Chief Wind Bag Breaks More Wind

Mishaal: Just solution for Palestinian question key for stability in ME

"DAMASCUS, (PIC)-- Khaled Mishaal, the head of Hamas’ political bureau, has affirmed that a just solution for the Palestinian issue is the key for peace and stability in the Middle East.

In statement to the Quds Press news agency, the Hamas leader said that the international community is well aware that “without establishing an independent and viable Palestinian state, instability and chaos in the Middle East would persist”.

Highlighting the importance of the Iraqi issue, and acknowledging that the US occupation of that Arab country had negatively affected the Palestinian question, Mishaal, nonetheless, explained that the Palestinian issue will remain the essential issue for Arab and Muslim worlds......."

Pretension of a "Government" With a Traitor at the Very Center

Syria, Elliot Abrams, and the Contras All Over Again

By Jim Lobe

".......Unlike his high-public profile as assistant secretary 20 years ago, Abrams, who now presides over Middle East policy at the National Security Council, is today far more discreet, no doubt in part because his conviction in 1991 for lying to Congress about his role in the Iran-contra scandal has made him an easy target for Democrats.

"He's very careful about not leaving fingerprints," one State Department official told IPS earlier this year.

But there is little doubt among Middle East analysts here that Abrams is playing a lead role in White House efforts to discredit Pelosi for meeting with Assad, just as he did with Wright for meeting Ortega in 1987.

And just as he worked with Reagan hard-liners to undermine the Arias Plan 20 years ago, so he appears to be doing what he can to undermine recent efforts by Saudi King Abdullah to initiate an Arab-Israeli peace process and, for that matter, by Republican realists, and even Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, to push it forward."

The Theater of the Imperially Absurd

by Tom Engelhardt

".......Certainly, many of the top officials of the Bush administration and their neocons allies, dreaming of just such an orderly, American-dominated "Greater Middle East," were ready to settle for a little chaos in the process. If a weakened Iraq broke into several parts; or, say, the oil-rich Shi'ite areas of Saudi Arabia happened to fall off that country, well, too bad. They'd deal.

Little did they know......

Here's the remarkable thing, when you think about it: All the Bush administration had to do was meddle in any country in that arc of instability (and which one didn't it meddle in?), for actual instability, often chaos, sometimes outright disaster to set in. It's been quite a record, the very opposite of an imperial golden touch.

And, on any given day, you can see the evidence of this on a case by case basis in your local paper or on the TV news. You can check out the Iraqi, or Somali, or Lebanese, or Iranian, or Pakistani disasters, or impending disasters. But what you never see is all those crises and potential crises discussed in one place – without which the magnitude of the present disaster and the dangers in our future are hard to grasp.

Few in the mainstream world have even tried to put them all together since the Bush administration rolled back the media, essentially demobilizing it in 2001-2002, at which point its journalists and pundits simply stopped connecting the dots. Give the Bush administration credit: Its top officials took in the world as a whole and at an imperial glance. They regularly connected the dots as they saw them. The post-9/11 strike at Afghanistan was never simply a strike at al-Qaeda (or the Taliban who hosted them). It was always a prelude to war against Saddam Hussein's Iraq. And the invasion of Iraq was never meant to end in Baghdad (as indicated in the neocon prewar quip, "Everyone wants to go to Baghdad. Real men want to go to Tehran"). Nor was Tehran to be the end of the line.

Under the rubric of the "Global War on Terror," they were considering literally dozens of countries as potential future targets. Dick Cheney put the matter bluntly back in August 2002 as the public drumbeat for an invasion of Iraq was just revving up:

"The war in Afghanistan is only the beginning of a lengthy campaign, Cheney noted. 'Were we to stop now, any sense of security we might have would be false and temporary,' he said. 'There is a terrorist underworld out there spread among more than 60 countries.'"......"

Iraqi Refugees Languish in Neighboring Countries

By Dahr Jamail

"DAMASCUS - Salim Hamad, 33, glances at the sprawling buildings of the Yarmouk refugee camp in Damascus and sees business. He has set up a small tea shop at the camp.

"I left everything behind," he told IPS. "I have no idea what became of my house."

Salim, a railways worker in Baghdad, sold his car and furniture to raise money to bring his wife and three children to Damascus five months ago. Syria it had to be, because by then Jordan's government was no longer letting in men his age......

Yarmouk refugee camp, on the outskirts of Damascus, has long been home to more than 100,000 Palestinian refugees. It is a set of tall apartment buildings separated by small alleys stuffed with shops.

It is one of the better refugee camps. Most refugees have running water, electricity, and other basic services.

Now tens of thousands of Iraqis have flooded into Yarmouk. The exact number is unknown......

"We had 11 engineers from one company detained by the Mahdi Army [the militia of Shia cleric Moqtada al-Sadr]," he said. "We never heard from them again. I knew then that I had to drop everything and run for my life."

Ali does not see himself returning soon. "I don't expect to go back for at least 15-20 years. I have left everything behind, and now I have nothing but a small food store I run here. But it is not enough. Not the UN, nor any government, least of all the Iraqi government, is doing enough to help us."....."

Palestinian faction leaders express their pessimism regarding the Arab summit

"Khan Younis - Ma'an - Many Palestinian faction leaders have said that the recent Arab summit, held in Saudi Arabia in March, failed to do anything for the Palestinian issue, and that the summit came upon an American wish and recommendation in order to reach some kind of harmony between the Arab moderate states and the US administration.

Various leaders also stressed the importance and necessity of studying the benefits of continuing the Palestinian Authority if the siege continues on the Palestinians.......

Nafiz Azzam from Islamic Jihad said that the Arab summit did not result in anything new and just repeated the Arab initiative, which was rejected by Israel. "Presenting again the initiative means that the Arabs have nothing to offer or anything new to present," he said.

He raised the issue of respecting the agreements and said that this point represented a change in Hamas' position. He added that he was not optimistic regarding a break through by this government in the international community. His pessimism was due to American policy, he said......

Sami Abu Zuhri from Hamas confirmed the importance of studying the benefits of preserving the Palestinian Authority if the siege continues to be carried out against the Palestinians......."

AFP photographer wins international award for picture taken of victims of Israeli massacre

Award Winning Photo

"Gaza - Ma'an – Agence France Presse (AFP) photographer in Gaza, Mahmoud Al Hums, won the golden prize in the China international competition for a photo he took of the Atahmna family that lost 17 members during an Israeli air strike in July 2006.

The prize is considered to be one of the most important prizes of its kind, which is granted to photo journalists worldwide. It is held annually by China International Press contest.

Al Hums dedicated the prize to Palestinian martyrs, especially the Atahmna family and expressed his pride in receiving the award.

Al Hums won the bronze medal in 2004 in the same competition.

He will receive the prize at an official celebration in China on the 22nd of May. "

Palestinian Weather Forecast:

The Palestinian meteorological department expects the weather to be partly cloudy on Tuesday with a drop in temperatures expected. There remains a possibility of localized rain. Meanwhile, winds will be westerly to northwesterly and light to moderate.

Rafah crossing open Tuesday and Wednesday in both directions.

(Click on cartoon to enlarge)
By Bendib

Eye on Iraq: The worst mistake

(Click on the map to enlarge)

Good Analysis

By MARTIN SIEFF
UPI Senior News Analyst

"WASHINGTON, April 9 (UPI) -- After four years of war, 3,200 American deaths, 23,000 U.S. troops wounded and possibly in excess of 100,000 Iraqis killed, U.S. policymakers are now making what may prove to be their worst mistake yet: They may be on a new collision course with Moqtada al-Sadr.
U.S. forces backed by Iraqi troops were reported Saturday in fierce clashes with Sadr's Shiite Mahdi Army militia in a bid to wrest control from it of the southern Iraqi town of Diwaniyah.

There is a considerable amount of tactical justification for U.S. forces to clash with Sadr's forces now, especially in Diwaniyah. With a U.S. air strike against Iran's nuclear facilities widely expected in the region, U.S. forces may want to suppress, cripple or intimidate Sadr's militia -- the most pro-Iranian and anti-American of all the Shiite paramilitary groupings in Iraq -- as a preemptive measure.

Also, if Sadr's forces and other allied Shiite groups were to attempt to cut crucial U.S. supply lines from Kuwait and the Persian Gulf up to the main concentration of American forces in Iraq in and around Baghdad, it would also make sense to Pentagon planners to secure Diwaniyah along one of the crucial supply routes first.......

We wrote then, "Although Sadr is extremely anti-American, like other Shiite politicians he realizes that currently the U.S. forces in Iraq are committed to wiping out his main long-term enemies, the Sunni Islamist forces. Therefore he has remained on the sidelines in the current struggle in Baghdad. This has given U.S. forces the chance to cooperate in limited but effective ways with various Shiite militias."

But we also cautioned, "If the United States launches major air strikes against the nuclear facilities in neighboring Iran, then Iran's Revolutionary Guards look certain to use their massive clout with the Mahdi Army, and with other Shiite militias, to get them to cut off cooperation with U.S. forces in Iraq and to attack the Americans instead.......

And if other Iraqi Shiite groups, especially those controlled by the Supreme Council of the Islamic Revolution in Iraq, were to rise up and attack U.S. forces in retaliation for any U.S. air strikes against the Iranian nuclear facilities, then Sadr almost certainly would not hesitate to order a general uprising against U.S. forces, if he knew that this time he was not alone, but part of a far broader and more formidable Shiite coalition.

On March 12 we warned, "U.S. strategies for Iraq and neighboring Iran are therefore chaotically entangled already, and even on a collision course." The latest fighting in Diwaniyah unfortunately confirms the continuing accuracy of that assessment. "

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"To: DePaul University
To:
Dennis H. Holtschneider, President, DePaul University
Helmut P. Epp, Provost, DePaul University
and the
Trustees, Deans, Faculty and Students of DePaul University

We are deeply concerned about reports of outside interference into the tenure and promotion case of Dr. Norman Finkelstein, and that as a result he may not be awarded tenure from DePaul University.

One such report is:
Harvard Law Professor Works to Disrupt Tenure Bid of Longtime Nemesis at DePaul U.
By Jennifer Howard, The Chronicle of Higher Education April 5, 2007
http://chronicle.com/temp/email2.php?id=g4gfPKPrmfSXvwhvXzRPxd2Msdzzgrpm

We value Dr. Finkelstein's scholarship, his public talks and debates,
and his well-argued, fact-based critiques of issues relating to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

In our opinion, his association with DePaul University has enhanced DePaul University's reputation.

We understand his department has recommended tenure. We will be troubled if Dr. Finkelstein is denied tenure and will be concerned about the integrity of the tenure process at DePaul University.

We support a fair tenure process for Dr. Finkelstein.

Sincerely, "

Click Here to Sign Petition

Iran: the Threat of a Nuclear War

Analysis of the current state of the conflict with Iran shows that the world faces the possibility of a new war...

by General Leonid Ivashov

Global Research, April 9, 2007

"The US and its allies started the psychological preparation of the world public opinion for the possibility of using tactical nuclear weapons to resolve 'the Iranian problem'. The US propaganda machine is working hard to create the impression that a 'surgically precise' use of the nuclear weapon with only limited consequences is possible. However, this has been known to be untrue since the 1945 US nuclear strikes on Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

After the very first nuclear strike, it will become totally impossible to prevent the use of all of the available means of mass destruction. In the situation of a mass extermination of their nations, the conflicting sides will resort to whatever means they have without limitations. Therefore, not only the nuclear arsenals of various countries, including those whose nuclear status is not recognized officially, will come into play. No doubt, chemical and biological warfare (and, generally, any poisonous substances), which can be produced on the basis of minimal industrial and economic resources, will be used......

Certainly, Washington is aware that the result will be not the strengthening but the loss of the US positions in the world. Consequently, the goal of the US attack against Iran has to be seen in a different light. The nuclear offensive must boost the use of the nuclear blackmail in the global politics by the US and fundamentally transform the world order.....

The coordinated public activities must be organized with the promptness adequate to the war-time conditions. The forces of aggression have already been amassed and concentrated at the starting positions in the state of full combat readiness. The US military do not make it a secret that everything can be a matter of weeks or even days. There are indirect indications that the US will launch a nuclear strike on Iran already in April, 2007. After the very first nuclear blast, mankind will find itself in an entirely new world, an absolutely inhumane one. The chances to prevent this outcome must be used completely."

Al-Jazeera Cartoon

Why Do They Hate Us?

The Ghosts of Deir Yassin

by Sonja Karkar
Women for Palestine

"Israel has long played on its heroic beginnings to stir up support for its less than heroic exploits today. The problem is that those heroic beginnings have always been a fiction. Israel’s bloody birth and subsequent actions were crimes against humanity which continue to this day. The veneer of Israel’s manufactured “legitimacy” cannot hide the rot eating away at the core of its existence - its original sin of violent dispossession and its current colonialist and apartheid policies. And, without acknowledgement of, and reparations for, the atrocities committed against the Palestinians, the ghosts of Deir Yassin and elsewhere in Palestine will continue to loom large in any peace talks.

It was 9 April 1948, that a Jewish terrorist gang entered the quiet rural village of Deir Yassin on the outskirts of Jerusalem with the express purpose of destroying it. There were 750 people living in the village at the time, mostly stonecutters. Their houses had been built from limestone with arched doors and windows and these homes had stood that way for centuries. The villagers knew that massacres had been carried out earlier in the year in other villages and had, therefore, entered into a non-aggression pact with the Jewish Hagana, another terrorist group. But this pact was worthless: Deir Yassin had already been marked for extinction and to avoid being held accountable the Hagana called on two terrorist groups, the Irgun and Stern Gang, to execute the plan......

Today, in the most tasteless, despicable irony, the Israeli museum commemorating the Jewish holocaust, Yad Vashem sits on top of a hill overlooking the graveyard of Deir Yassin, while the limestone buildings of the former Palestinian village are used as an Israeli mental institution. Is it any wonder that the ghosts of Deir Yassin still haunt the collective memory of Palestinians and all those who know that Deir Yassin was the catalyst in the plan to create a Jewish-only state of Israel? In the meantime, the millions of dispossessed in the camps of Gaza, the West Bank, Jordan and Lebanon are waiting to return and/or receive compensation for their immeasurable losses and nobody has the authority to trade away their human rights in order to submit to a racist state born out of Palestinian dispossession and misery. To agree to anything less without their consensus would betray the 60-year Palestinian struggle for recognition and self-determination in defiance of Apartheid Israel. "

Praying for the Apocalypse

The author of “American Fascists” explores the Christian right’s obsession with armageddon and the self-fulfilling holocaust it will produce.


By Chris Hedges

"......Apocalyptic visions like this one have, throughout history, cowed populations and inspired genocidal killers. They have enticed societies into collective suicide. These visions nourished the butchers who led the Inquisition, the Crusades and the conquistadors who swept through the Americas converting and then exterminating the native population. These visions sustained the SS guards at Auschwitz, the Stalinists who consigned tens of thousands of Ukrainian families to starvation and death, the torturers in the clandestine prisons in Argentina during the Dirty War and the Serbian thugs with heavy machine guns and wraparound sunglasses who stood over the bodies of those they had slain in the smoking ruins of Bosnian villages. Those who promise to purify the world through violence, to relieve the anxiety of moral pollution and despair, appeal to our noblest sentiments, our highest virtues, our capacity for self-sacrifice and our utopian visions of a cleansed world. It is this coupling of fantastic hope and profound despair, along with visions of peace and light and absolute terror, of selflessness and murder, which frees the consciences of those who call for and carry out the eradication of those they have banished from moral consideration. When leaders of this movement, such as Jerry Falwell and Pat Robertson, sanction, as they do, pre-emptive nuclear strikes against our enemies, and therefore the enemies of God, they fuel the passions of terrorists in love with the same apocalyptic nightmares. They march us to our own doom cheered by the delusion that once the dogs of war, even nuclear war, are unleashed, hundreds of millions will die, but because Christians have been blessed and chosen by God they alone will arise in triumph from the ash heap........"

Remembering the Ethnic Cleansing of Deir Yassin: April 9, 1948

"Early in the morning of April 9, 1948, commandos of the Irgun (headed by Menachem Begin) and the Stern Gang attacked Deir Yassin, a village with about 750 Palestinian residents. The village lay outside of the area to be assigned by the United Nations to the Jewish State; it had a peaceful reputation. But it was located on high ground in the corridor between Tel Aviv and Jerusalem. Deir Yassin was slated for occupation under Plan Dalet and the mainstream Jewish defense force, the Haganah, authorized the irregular terrorist forces of the Irgun and the Stern Gang to perform the takeover.

In all over 100 men, women, and children were systematically murdered. Fifty-three orphaned children were literally dumped along the wall of the Old City, where they were found by Miss Hind Husseini and brought behind the American Colony Hotel to her home, which was to become the Dar El-Tifl El-Arabi orphanage.

Part of the struggle for self-determination by Palestinians has been to tell the truth about Palestinians as victims of Zionism. For too long their history has been denied, and this denial has only served to further oppress and deliberately dehumanize Palestinians in Israel, inside the occupied territories, and outside in their diaspora.

Some progress has been made. Westerners now realize that Palestinians, as a people, do exist. And they have come to acknowledge that during the creation of the state of Israel, thousands of Palestinians were killed and over 700,000 were driven or frightened from their homes and lands on which they had lived for centuries.

Deir Yassin Remembered seeks similar progress on behalf of the victims of the Deir Yassin Massacre . . .

Mohamed Hasseinein Heikel: The wise man of the Middle East

From Khrushchev to Sadat, many world leaders have felt the venom of Mohamed Hasseinein Heikel's acerbic commentary. Robert Fisk has an audience with the great Egyptian writer

By Robert Fisk

"......"There is a state of polarisation," Heikel continues. "Between the rich and the poor, between revolutionaries and conservatives, between the government and the people. This thing is tearing through the Arab world. When the boys in the universities learn to use computers, they will end at the mosque.

"There is a sea between the authorities and the people - this is the wide sea which has opened. There is no wind now - but when the wind starts ...".......

"There is something serious happening in Egypt. The pressure of the economy, political pressure - we never had it so bad for the poor. I go to the village behind my farm in the Nile Delta and try to help the people there. But some people have never had it so good. They have fabulous palaces. It's amazing - in front of every rich quarter there is a slum. One of our friends, a doctor, was saying that one day each slum will march on its palace. No wonder that last Christmas the government instructed newspapers not to publish the prices of parties and weddings."......

And the future? The Arabs, he says, believe that the Americans are their enemies. "The US was once a promise to them. I sit with young people and try to differentiate between American policies and Americans. But the enemies of the Americans are not only the Taliban, Hamas, Hizbollah, but a wide sea of ordinary people who hate them because the Americans created the polarisations in their lives. They are between impotence and despair. This is a catastrophe."

Yet there is still optimism in Heikel. "I think there is something very interesting going on in Egypt, moving under the pressures of society. What is amazing about our students is not the standards of education - it's their eagerness to acquire knowledge. The effect of mobiles, computers, satellites - there is a generation coming that is outside the traditional controls. Normally, generations recreate themselves. But something else is happening. The police are unable to prevent the political demonstrations. These are not very large - but by using phones, mobiles, the internet, SMS, they are starting a political form of guerrilla warfare in a new medium. Do you know that never before in our history in Egypt was the budget of our army less than the budget of our police? Now it is. What does that tell you?"......"

And thus She spoke...

By Layla Anwar

""And on the third day, I rose…

Something inside keeps pushing me to write through.
Even though I have no "ink" left.
Something, someone, like a still little voice deep from within, from without, gently commands me...WRITE.

And I struggle and I wrestle...with words.
Words that keep eluding me, slipping through my fingers like ether, like mercury...
I compress, squeeze, wring...
I shake, as if shaking a bottle for the last drops to trickle and hopefully quench.....

The enemies at my gates were numerous and my Judas had many masks.
Each mask bearing a different origin, a different color, a different lie and each mask hiding another...

Where do you want me to start?

Help me here…

Lend me one of your so called Christian charitable hands and tell me what do you want me to begin with?
Lend me some of your so called Muslim piety and stand by me, at least for a little while.
Lend me some of your so called Jewish tears and speak of the persecuted, the defamed...
Lend me one of your so called Arab pompous, prideful voices and trigger me off.
Lend me one of your so called Solidarity fists and multiply my voice, multiply my absent words...
Lend me one of your so called civilized humanistic orations and halt my blood.

Stop giving me vinegar pretending it is water.
Stop digging more nails into my body pretending they are balms.
Stop crowning me with thorns pretending they are flowers......

Here I am trying to find words as if crawling on four, trying to gather lost, scattered beads from a rosary.
Get down with me and search for them...Reclaim your sacred vows, rediscover your language.
I am giving you this opportunity, I am offering your this gift, over my dead tortured, massacred body...

You have nailed and crucified me and I am resurrecting again and again.
Don't shut me out, dont shut me off...
Don't shut yourself off and repossess the words with me.......

Do not mistake my crying out to you as helplessness...Take it as my hand finally saving you.

Remember me. Remember my history and remember who I am, and don't you ever forget my name. I am Iraq.

I have died a thousand times and have resurrected. And have died once more...and will resurrect again.
But this time around it will be your final end and my eternal beginning."

And thus She spoke, on the third day, on the Cross.

Happy Easter and Happy Resurrection."

In Memorium

Tariq Ayub: Al-Jazeera Reporter
Killed Four Years Ago
When U.S. Jets Deliberately Bombed Al-Jazeera Building in Baghdad
While Ayub was Filming on the Roof

The "Negotiations" Are Proceeding
By Emad Hajjaj

RIP Al-Jazeerah.info January 2002-April 2007: Progressive Website "Knocked Off" - Who's Next?

By Jan Baumgartner

"
Progressive website Al-Jazeerah.info was "knocked-off" this weekend; yet another casualty of the erosion of our First Amendment rights and Freedom of Speech.

This morning, as I set aside time to scan other progressive websites, I pulled up the Al-Jazeerah.info site to find something rather unexpected.

If any of you are familiar with this forum, you will more than likely recognize many of the writer's who contribute to Al-Jazeerah as they are familiar names to Op Ed News - many are frequent writers for this site.

You can imagine my horror when I saw the following statement issued by the founder and editor, Dr. Hassan A. El-Najjir:

From the Al-Jazeerah.info Editor to Readers

Dear Readers,

Al-Jazeerah.info has been a US independent forum promoting peace between the US and the Arab and Muslim worlds and between Israelis and Palestinians, for the last five years.

Some people apparently neither like peace nor tolerate the First Amendment to the US Constitution. They have not stopped attacks on Al-Jazeerah, its editor, its contributors and authors.

What's new this time is that those who oppose Al-Jazeerah.info have been orchestrating a campaign against Al-Jazeerah.info Editor, personally.

A letter writing campaign has been going on since March 22, 2007 targeting officials of the institution I work with in addition to a continuous smearing internet and media campaign against me, personally.

I have concluded that it's not safe for me any more to continue editing Al-Jazeerah.info in this atmosphere of intimidation, which abridges freedom of speech and freedom of the press.

I promise to resume publication as soon as conditions change to a more peaceful and tolerant discourse.

Hassan El-Najjir, Al-Jazeerah Editor

About Al-Jazeerah: This is an educational publication that promotes peace in the world, between Palestinians and Israelis and between the US and the Arab and Muslim worlds. Ending wars and occupation is the first step.

Al-Jazeerah Peace Information Center is an independent U.S. news and world research publication. It is not related to any other identity or government in the world. In particular, it is not related to the Saudi, UAE, or the Qatari websites with similar names.

This website, Al-Jazeerah.info is not related by any means to Aljazeera t.v. station of Qatar.

It does not aim for profit. All donations and proceeds are used to run the website.

*******

Many of the past contributors to Al-Jazeerah.info are also contributors for like sites such as Op Ed News, Common Dreams, Truthout, Counterpunch, etc., and the content of the articles published on Al-Jazeerah were of similar nature and content as those published on these other progressive sites.

I cannot help but wonder if the very name of the forum, as well as that of its founder/editor, had anything to do with the attacks, intimidations and its ultimate demise.

How tragic that individuals who provide an open forum for peace and peaceful dialogue must fear for their "safety." And yet, in an atmosphere which has driven this country to its knees using nothing more than the fear-factor with its own "terror tactics," I suppose I shouldn't be all that surprised.

Question is, who's next? "

الزبيدي: السياسيون فشلوا بإدارة المعركة مع الاحتلال

"انتقد قائد كتائب شهداء الأقصى -الجناح العسكري لحركة التحرير الوطني الفلسطيني (فتح)- في الضفة الغربية، أداء القيادات السياسية للتنظيمات الفلسطينية، متهما إياهم بالفشل في إدارة المعركة مع الاحتلال، ومحاولة إسقاط الورقة الوحيدة في يد الشعب الفلسطيني وهي المقاومة.

وتبرأ زكريا الزبيدي في حديث خاص بالجزيرة نت قبيل إصابته برصاص الاحتلال بيوم واحد، من الخلافات الداخلية بين الفصائل وما تبعها من فوضى وانفلات، مؤكدا أنه لا يمكن لمقاوم رفع سلاحه في وجه الاحتلال وينتظر الموت في كل لحظة أن يرفع سلاحه في وجه أخيه المقاوم. واتهم "فئات مأجورة" بإثارة حالة الفوضى في الشارع الفلسطيني.

وأكد الزبيدي أن كتائب الأقصى ليست في هدنة، وأنها لا تفرق في عملياتها بين الأراضي المحتلة عام 1948 والأراضي المحتلة عام 1967، واصفا قرارات التقسيم الدولية بأنها "أرقام حسابات بنكية لشخصيات متنفذة".

وبمناسبة الذكرى السنوية الخامسة لاجتياح مخيم جنين، أشار قائد كتائب الأقصى إلى أن حالة من الإحباط تسود الشارع الفلسطيني من المستوى السياسي وعدم حصاد ثمار التضحيات التي قدمها الشعب.

وفيما يلي نص الحوار مع الزبيدي الذي تطرق لجملة من القضايا في الساحة الفلسطينية ومستقبل المقاومة.

........"

Fatah members fear Barghouti’s release

Fatah says release of former Tanzim leader as part of prisoner exchange deal with Israel may increase public support for Hamas, spark upheaval within faction; Barghouti’s associates: Fatah members are wary of his ‘threatening status’

"While Hamas leaders have already promised Marwan Barghouti’s family that the former Tanzim leader in the West Bank would be included in a prisoner exchange deal with Israel, some Fatah members would rather see him remain in jail.

Barghouti is at the top of the list of senior prisoners the Palestinian Authority is demanding Israel free in exchange for IDF soldier Gilad Shalit, but some Fatah members fear his release would boost support for rival faction Hamas.

Senior Fatah officials are trying to convince Barghouti’s family to back efforts to release him as part of a more comprehensive deal with Israel for which Hamas does not get all the credit.

The Islamic group claimed responsibility for the kidnapping of Shalit in a cross-border operation near Gaza in June of last year.

Fatah prefers to see Barghouti released as part of a goodwill gesture by Israel to President Mahmoud Abbas.

'Release would spark changes within the party'

Barghouti’s associates have accused Fatah members opposed to his release of being concerned with Barghouti’s ‘threatening status within Fatah.’

Barghouti, whose relations with Hamas’ leaders are excellent, was instrumental in the drafting of a document drafted by Palestinian prisoners, which urged the formation of a Palestinian unity government and to end internal strife.

Along with Hamas, he also helped devise a ceasefire between rival Palestinian factions, which was declared in March 2005 in Cairo.

Several Fatah leaders fear that Barghouti’s release would spark the beginning of changes within the party, some of which they may not approve of......."

7 NATO soldiers killed in Afghan blasts

"KABUL, Afghanistan - Roadside bombs in southern Afghanistan on Sunday left seven NATO soldiers dead, the alliance said, as its forces continued an anti-Taliban offensive in the world's most fertile opium-producing region.

One roadside bombing killed six NATO soldiers dead and wounded another, the alliance said. A separate roadside bomb killed one NATO soldier and wounded two, while a clash in the east left two Afghan guards and two militants dead, officials said......"

هيرش ينتقد تغطية الإعلام الأميركي لشؤون الشرق الأوسط

في حوار خاص مع الجزيرة نت

"يعتبر الصحفي الأميركي سيمور هيرش أحد كبار رموز صحافة الاستقصاء في العالم على مدى العقود الثلاثة الماضية. وقد اشتهر هيرش في المشهد الإعلامي العالمي عندما كشف عام 1969 ما أصبح يعرف بمذبحة "ماي لي" التي قتل فيها أكثر من خمسمائة مدني فيتنامي على أيدي جنود أميركيين، وكشف أيضا أسرار الترسانة النووية الإسرائيلية في كتاب له صدر في أوائل التسعينيات من القرن الماضي.

وفي السنوات الأخيرة أصبحت تحقيقات هيرش في مجلة "نيويوركر" تشكل مصدر إحراج حقيقي لسياسات الإدارة الأميركية بقيادة الرئيس جورج وبورش وخاصة خططها في منطقة الشرق الأوسط. في عام 2004 عاد هيرش للواجهة بكشف فضيحة التعذيب الذي تمارسه القوات الأميركية في سجن أبو غريب بالعراق وألف كتابا يعري خلفيات السياسة الأميركية منذ عام 2001 بعنوان "سلسلة القيادة: الطريق من 11 سبتمبر إلى أبو غريب".

بفضل مصادره الكثيرة في مختلف دواليب الإدارة الأميركية يمتلك هيرش دراية واسعة بالإستراتيجيات ومخططات الإدارة الأميركية. وخلال مساره المهني الطويل ألف هيرش عددا من الكتب وحصل على عدة جوائز تقديرية بينها جائزة بوليتزر مكافأة لتميزه المهني في تناول عدة قضايا تهم الرأي العام الأميركي والعالمي.

في لقاء مع الجزيرة نت على هامش منتدى الجزيرة الإعلامي الثالث ينتقد هيرش أداء كبرى وسائل الإعلام الأميركية في تغطية الأوضاع في الشرق الأوسط خلال السنوات القليلة الماضية ويدافع عن دور الصحافة وخاصة صحافة الاستقصاء في التأثير على مجريات الأمور في جميع أنحاء العالم وبصفة خاصة في منطقة الشرق الأوسط.

في كلمتكم بمنتدى الجزيرة الإعلامي الثالث قلتم إن الصحافة كفاح من أجل تحسين الأمور، هل تعتقدون أن للصحافة تأثيرا على مجريات الأمور في الولايات المتحدة حاليا؟

بطبيعة الحال أقول إن للصحافة تأثيرا على مجريات الأمور في الولايات المتحدة. لكن الأمور ليست كذلك في الوقت الحاضر في ظل حكومة غريبة لأن إدارة الرئيس جورج بوش ونائبه ديك تشيني لا تبالي كثيرا بما تقوله الصحافة.

الرئيس بوش منفصل عن الصحافة وفي ظل حكمه لا أعتقد أن الصحافة ستؤثر بشكل كبير على تطورات الأمور. لكن بصفة عامة الصحافة لها تأثير كبير في جميع أنحاء العالم. ويعتبر الشرق الأوسط من المناطق التي يمكن للصحافة أن تلعب دورا فعليا خاصة في ظل التقاليد السائدة في المنطقة والمتمثلة في احتكار الحكومات لوسائل الإعلام.

وهنا أسوق نموذج العربية السعودية التي تمول صحفا كبرى تصدر في أوروبا. هذا لا يعني أن كل ما ينشر هو دعاية لكن هناك أخبارا ووقائع.

وهكذا فظهور صحافة مستقلة سيساعد على تغيير مجريات الأمور في المنطقة. وعموما أقول أن الصحافة القوية شيء مهم. وفي الولايات المتحدة أعتقد أن النبرة النقدية في الصحف بشأن الحرب على العراق أثرت على الانتخابات الأخيرة في الولايات ا "
عموما أقول إن الصحافة القوية شيء مهم. وفي الولايات المتحدة أعتقد أن النبرة النقدية في الصحف بشأن الحرب على العراق أثرت على الانتخابات الأخيرة في الولايات المتحدة وساعدت في حصول الديمقراطيين على الأغلبية في الكونغرس.

........."

MK Bishara set to declare he quits from Knesset

"MK Azmi Bishara, chairman of the Arab Balad party, intends to announce his resignation from the Knesset while he is out of the country, Haaretz learned on Sunday.

Bishara is expected to make the announcement on a television interview from his present location in Amman, Jordan. Bishara will also send his letter of resignation to Knesset Speaker Dalia Itzik following the Passover recess, later in the week.

Bishara's intentions were first reported on the Website of the Nazareth-based Arab language newspaper A-Sinara. The circumstances surrounding Bishara's expected resignation are still unclear.

The Balad chairman left Israel two weeks ago. He initially left for Qatar to serve as commentator for the Aljazeera TV network during the Arab Summit in Riyadh. He then flew to Amman, in order to promote the release of his latest novel. He plans to announce his resignation from Amman, and it is unclear when he intends to return to Israel.

Senior Balad officials stressed to Haaretz on Sunday that the resignation will be confirmed only if Bishara does in fact make the announcement......."

National Democratic Assembly denies that Azmi Bishara intends to resign from Knesset

"Bethlehem-Ma'an- National Democratic Assembly NDA, a Palestinian political party inside Israel, denied on Sunday the news that the party's chairman, and Israeli Knesset member Dr Azmi Bisharah intends to resign from the Israeli Knesset.

In a statement distributed today, the NDA said, " the news published in the media are false, because if there was such an intention, the party would have reported it."......"

Israel doesn't want peace

By Gideon Levy

"The moment of truth has arrived, and it has to be said: Israel does not want peace. The arsenal of excuses has run out, and the chorus of Israeli rejection already rings hollow. Until recently, it was still possible to accept the Israeli refrain that "there is no partner" for peace and that "the time isn't right" to deal with our enemies. Today, the new reality before our eyes leaves no room for doubt and the tired refrain that "Israel supports peace" has been left shattered.

It's hard to determine when the breaking point occurred. Was it the absolute dismissal of the Saudi initiative? The refusal to acknowledge the Syrian initiative? Prime Minister Ehud Olmert's annual Passover interviews? The revulsion at the statements made by Nancy Pelosi, the speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives, in Damascus, alleging that Israel was ready to renew peace talks with Syria?

Who would have believed it? A high-ranking U.S. official says Israel wants peace talks to resume and instantly her president "severely" denies the veracity of her words. Is Israel even hearing these voices? Are we digesting the significance of these voices for peace? Seven million apathetic Israeli citizens prove that we are not......

Israel makes a point of setting prerequisites and believes it has an exclusive right to do so. But, time and time again, Israel avoids the most basic prerequisite for any just peace - an end to the occupation. Of all the questions asked during his Passover interviews, no one bothered to ask Olmert why he didn't react with excitement to the recent Arab initiatives, without preconditions? The answer: real estate. The real estate of the settlements......."

American Hypocrisy; So What is New?

North Koreans Arm Ethiopians as U.S. Assents

Ethiopian tanks in Somalia. Ethiopia bought much of its military equipment from the former Soviet Union and relies on North Korean parts.


"WASHINGTON, April 7 — Three months after the United States successfully pressed the United Nations to impose strict sanctions on North Korea because of the country’s nuclear test, Bush administration officials allowed Ethiopia to complete a secret arms purchase from the North, in what appears to be a violation of the restrictions, according to senior American officials.

The United States allowed the arms delivery to go through in January in part because Ethiopia was in the midst of a military offensive against Islamic militias inside Somalia, a campaign that aided the American policy of combating religious extremists in the Horn of Africa......."

Do You Trust This Scoundrel?

Cleric calls for Iraqis to end cooperation with the U.S., start attacking

"BAGHDAD — The renegade cleric Muqtada al-Sadr urged Iraqi forces to stop cooperating with the United States and told his guerrilla fighters to concentrate their attacks on American troops rather than Iraqis, according to a statement issued Sunday.

The statement, stamped with al-Sadr's official seal, was distributed in the Shiite holy city of Najaf on Sunday — a day before a large demonstration there, called for by al-Sadr, to mark the fourth anniversary of the fall of Baghdad.

"You, the Iraqi army and police forces, don't walk alongside the occupiers, because they are your archenemy," the statement said. Its authenticity could not be verified......."

Iraq cleric says fight in Diwaniyah is 'trap' by US

"Iraq's radical Shiite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr on Sunday urged his militiamen and security forces to end their three-day-long fight in Diwaniyah, saying it was a "trap" by US-led forces.

"He (Sadr) appeals to the Iraqi army and the Mahdi militia not to fall into America's trap by fighting in Diwaniyah," said a statement stamped and issued by the cleric's office in the holy city of Najaf.

US and Iraqi soldiers have clashed with Shiite militiamen, including from Sadr's Mahdi Army, in the central city of Diwaniyah since Friday......."

Military faction in Gaza says Abbas' comments are an insult to the Palestinian resistance

"Gaza - Ma'an - The An-Nasser Salah Ad-Din brigades, the military wing of the Popular Resistance Committees (PRC), have criticized the statements made by Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas in which he criticized the launching of projectiles at Israeli communities inside Israel from the Gaza Strip.

The brigades said they consider such statements as an insult to the Palestinian resistance. In a statement issued on Sunday, the brigades said that the projectiles are a "normal and natural retaliation for the Israeli crimes."

The statement added that the projectiles are "part of the strategic arsenal to protect the fighters and to defend themselves."

According to a Reuters report, on Saturday Abbas called on members of his presidential guards and national security forces to step up efforts to prevent the firing of projectiles so "that our people can lead a safe life"."

***

It is very significant that HAMAS has not said a word about this declaration by the puppet Abbas. I take it that HAMAS is more concerned about its new, "moderate" image in the eyes of the West and in preserving "national unity" with "Brother Abu Mazen" than in preserving the right to resist. As it is, HAMAS has been meticulously observing a one-sided "cease fire" and for HAMAS resistance is a thing of the past. Now is the age of Ahmad Yousef with HAMAS "leaders" jetting around from capital to capital in three-piece suits with Palestinian flag pins on their lapels.

Celebrate the end of resistance, NOW!

MK Bishara pessimistic about the possibilities of peace in the region

"Bethlehem - Ma'an - Arab member of the Israeli Knesset, Azmi Bishara, has said that the Palestinian unity government must confront the lawlessness and disorder and avoid slipping into any unjust settlement to the Palestinian-Israeli conflict.

Bishara played down the recent political activity in the region, in spite of its importance, because of what he called "the Israeli position".

Speaking to the Jordanian daily 'Al-Ghad', he said that the Palestinian issue has turned into a public relations issue with no goals. He did not exclude the possibility of a new war in the region. He added that emphasising the sectarian issue will lead to failure.

Bishara, who is a Palestinian citizen of Israel, said that the economy in the Palestinian territories should be improved and should be able to produce and build. He stressed that the Palestinian Authority should act differently and must stop acting like a beggar.

He added that he did not expect a settlement to be reached between the current Palestinian and Israeli governments.

He also warned Hamas against making any concessions in order to win international acceptance or satisfaction. He also warned Hamas to act like the Palestinian national movement did in the 1970s, or as what happened during the time of the Madrid and Oslo agreements.

Bishara did concede, however, that recent events such as the Mecca agreement, the Palestinian unity government, and the revival of the Arab initiative, could enable the situation to move forward. However, he said that this will result in nothing.

Bishara said he believed that movement at a political level has become a goal in itself, and the peace process is being used as a kind of anaesthetic.

He added that every time a crisis happens in the region, especially one that may harm the USA, activity begins in the region. He said that this happens in order to hide the failure of the Americans. Currently, he said, the political activity is to overshadow the events in Iraq, by making the people busy and creating the impression that the Americans and their allies in the region are working towards a settlement to the Palestinian issue.

Bishara believes that the Arabs are making concessions every time, but there is nothing in the horizon. He said that the Arab allies of the USA are interested in solving the Palestinian issue, but they are not pressurizing Israel and the USA to have the issue solved in a just and fair way. They believe that the USA has all the keys to solving the issue without any pressures needed in return, he said.

He also warned against making concessions regarding the 'right of return' as he believes that Israel will demand more and more concessions. Bishara added that he believes that the initiative came after September 11th, in order to improve the image of the Arabs in the eyes of the world and the Americans. "

Shalom, Shin Bet

By Uri Avnery

"RECENTLY, THE CHIEF of the Shin Bet declared that the "Israeli Arabs", a fifth of Israel's population, constitute a danger to the state.

He requested permission for the General Security Service to act against anyone who aims at changing the official designation of Israel as a "Jewish and democratic state" - even if they use nothing but completely legal means.

It follows that In the view of the chief of the Security Service, a central figure in the Israeli leadership, the task of the Shin Bet (now commonly known in Israel as Shabak) is not only to protect the state from spies and terrorists, but also from any challenge to its ideological designation, like the KGB in the former Soviet Union and the Stasi in communist East Germany......

That brings us to the subject now raised again by the Shin Bet chief.

I attacked Ben-Gurion on many subjects: the total domination of all affairs in the country by the Labor Party (then called Mapai), the corruption that was then starting to infect the ruling class, the discrimination suffered by Jewish immigrants from Oriental countries, the religious coercion, etc.

But the pivot of this struggle was the definition of Israel as a "Jewish state".

What is a "Jewish state"? That was never made clear. A state whose citizens are all Jewish? A state that belongs to Jews only? The "state of the Jewish people", which also belongs to millions of Jews who do not live here and are citizens of the US, Argentina and France? A state ruled by the Jewish religion? A state that expresses Jewish values (and if so, which ones?)......

The term "Jewish state" is nebulous. It can be interpreted in several ways. When one adds the word "democratic", it becomes an oxymoron - if a state belongs only to a part of its population it is not democratic, and if it is democratic then it cannot belong to a part of its population, even if they compose the majority......

Activating the secret police to abort this process would mean turning Israel into a police state. Not a "democracy protecting itself", but, rather, a state protecting itself from democracy.......

When the State of Israel really belongs, practically and officially, to all its citizens, it will be much easier for the Arabs here to decide on their status. If they choose to belong to the Israeli nation, much as Hispanics in the US belong to the American nation, that will be fine. If they prefer the status of a national minority, they should enjoy the rights of such a minority in a modern state. Either way, the Arabic language and Arab culture must be fully recognized by the state. The affinity of the Arab citizens with the Palestinian people and the Arab world must be considered just as legitimate as the affinity of the Hebrew citizens with the Jewish people throughout the world......"

***

Avnery does not address the Palestinians' right of return nor justice for the Palestinian majority that was expelled when Israel was formed by force of arms. However, what does he mean by this paragraph:

"If Israel is an attractive country, natural increase will rise and many will knock on its doors, people who desire to join our nation. The Israeli nation - unlike the Jewish religion - can in principle absorb everyone who wants to belong to it."

So if and when the Palestinian refugee comes knocking on the door with the deed to his property in his hand, what is Avnery's position? And when several million Palestinians want to return to their home, will this contradict Avnery's hope when he says, "I HOPE that the State of Israel remains a state with a Hebrew majority, that the Hebrew language will remain its main language, that it will express the modern Hebrew society and its culture and also keep alive the Jewish tradition of generations past?"