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NOVANEWS


 
Releasing terrorists shows America’s moving forward
Posted: 04 Aug 2010

Washington finally comes to its senses:

As part of its routine series of preparedness drills aimed at testing national security, the Department of Homeland Security announced Monday that it had set free the five most deadly foreign terrorists in U.S. custody.
“Protecting the American people is our highest priority, so it is crucial that we periodically put our country’s safeguards to the test,” DHS Secretary Janet Napolitano said during a press conference. “Only by loosing these dangerous extremists on our infrastructure, landmarks, and chemical or nuclear facilities can we properly assess our vulnerability to terrorist attacks.”
“If the Empire State Building or Jefferson Memorial blows up, for example, then we’ll know we have to make some improvements,” she added. “It’s all part of the process.”

 

Israel emerges in the Wikleaks documents
Posted: 04 Aug 2010

I’ve been wondering if Israel appears at all in the recent Wikileaks information dump.
A new search tool provides the answer; only briefly though protests did occur in Afghanistan against Israel’s onslaught in Gaza in January 2009.

 

Who says Wikileaks put lives at risk?
Posted: 04 Aug 2010

Interesting:

The Web site Wikileaks has been drawing criticism for publishing 90,000 classified documents about the war in Afghanistan, some of which reveal the names of Afghan citizens who have provided information to the U.S. The Obama Administration has said this could endanger the lives of those informants. But it turns out that prior to their publication, the documents had already been widely disseminated across a kind of Pentagon classified Internet called “SIPRNet,” which makes information widely available within the defense and intelligence communities. SIPRNet was set up to encourage greater information-sharing among defense and intelligence agencies, according to former CIA director Michael Hayden. The posting of the classified documents on SIPRNet means the real identities of the Afghan sources were already available to thousands of people.

 

Which views are acceptable in Israel these days?
Posted: 04 Aug 2010

Israel’s growing neo-McCarthyism is virulent and largely ignored by the Zionist Diaspora.

 

What the West has left Iraq
Posted: 04 Aug 2010

Anthony Shadid writes a powerful piece in the New York Times on the deadly legacy of America in Iraq, in 2003, today and into the future. The occupation isn’t about to end:

The morning after President Obama spoke of bringing the war in Iraq to “a responsible end,” insurgents planted their black flag on Tuesday at a checkpoint they overran by killing the five policemen who staffed it. It was the second time in a week.
The rest of the day, the police blotter looked like this: Three mortars crashed in Baghdad neighborhoods, where five roadside bombs were detonated and two cars were booby-trapped. Two other mortars fell in the Green Zone, still the citadel of power in a barricaded capital and still a target of insurgents who seem bent on proving they were never defeated.
By dusk, a car bomb tore through Kut, an eastern town long spared strife.
“Nothing unusual,” said Murtadha Mohammed, a 20-year-old baker, as he shoveled rolls into bags a short walk from one of the bombs. “We’ve been raised on this.”
The word “disconnect” never quite captures the gulf in perceptions between two countries whose fate remains reluctantly intertwined, however exhausted each seems of the other. Moments have come and gone: transitional governments, declarations of sovereignty, the signing of agreements. Mr. Obama’s announcement Monday was another.
On Tuesday, Qahtan Sweid greeted it with the cynicism that colors virtually any pronouncement the United States makes here, itself a somewhat intangible but pervasive legacy of seven years of invasion, occupation, war and, now, something harder to define.
“The Americans aren’t leaving,” Mr. Sweid insisted, whatever Mr. Obama had promised. “For one million years, they won’t leave. Even if the world was turned upside down, they still wouldn’t withdraw.”
From the first days after the fall of Baghdad on April 9, 2003, America and Iraq seemed divided by more than language; they never shared the same vocabulary. Perhaps they never could, defined as occupier and occupied, where promises of aid and assistance often had the inflection of condescension. These days, though, they do not even seem to try to listen to each other — too tired to hear the other, too chastised by experience to offer the benefit of doubt.
In a speech that was admittedly modest, Mr. Obama declared Monday that violence continued to be at the lowest it had been in years. Iraq is indeed a safer country than it was 2006 and 2007, when carnage threatened to shred the very fabric of its traumatized society. But security, still elusive here, is an absolute; you either feel safe or you do not.

 

Would the real Tony Abbott please stand up?
Posted: 04 Aug 2010

For Australian voters, a helpful reminder of the stakes on election day 21 August:
 
Better Place’s electric cars will be haunted by Palestine
Posted: 04 Aug 2010

I’ve written extensively about the Israeli electric car company Better Place and its highly questionable connections to working for the occupation in the West Bank.
A letter in today’s Sydney Morning Herald denies political favours for the firm (the NSW Premier’s husband is a senior member of the company):

Your story ”Keneally rivals shut out of car project” (August 2) implies our involvement in the Smart Grid, Smart Cities project with EnergyAustralia was based on political connections. We absolutely reject this.
We believe it is the unique combination of the industry experience of our senior management team, our position as the global industry leader, our capital backing and the quality and completeness of our technology solution that led three of the four bidders for the project to choose us as their preferred partner.
Only our solution includes an integrated network of plug-in points and battery swapping stations, and sophisticated network software that integrates with a ”smart grid” and enables the use of renewable energy to ensure zero emissions driving.
EnergyAustralia was quoted in the story as saying: ”If there was another company that also provided this electric vehicle model, we would have approached them. However, Better Place is the only company we know of that offers this model.”
It should be made clear that Better Place’s Smart Grid, Smart Cities engagement was led by our chief financial officer, Antony Cohen, a leading Australian electricity market expert, and our chief technology officer, Alan Finkel, a successful business leader and chancellor of Monash University, who are recognised as leaders in their fields.
Alison Terry Head of Corporate Affairs, Better Place Australia, Richmond (Vic)

Still no mention in the Australian mainstream media of Better Place’s activities in Palestine.

 

Let the post Wikileaks leaking begin
Posted: 03 Aug 2010

This piece didn’t get the attention it deserves. Pentagon Papers leaker Daniel Ellsberg (a clear inspiration to Wikileaks and Julian Assange) told the Washington Post last weekend what documents or information should be leaked and freely available. A truly free society would depend on it:

1. The official U.S. “order of battle” estimates of the Taliban in Afghanistan, detailing its size, organization and geographic breakdown — in short, the total of our opponents in this war. If possible, a comparison of the estimate in December 2009 (when President Obama decided on a troop increase and new strategy) and the estimate in June or July 2010 (after six or seven months of the new strategy). We would probably see that our increased presence and activities have strengthened the Taliban, as has happened over the past three years.
2. Memos from the administration’s decision-making process between July and December 2009 on the new strategy for Afghanistan, presenting internal critiques of the McChrystal-Petraeus strategy and troop requests — similar to the November 2009 cables from Ambassador Karl W. Eikenberry that were leaked in January. In particular, memos by Vice President Biden, national security adviser Jim Jones and others; responses to the critiques; and responses to the responses. This paperwork would probably show that, like Eikenberry, other high-level internal critics of escalation made a stronger and more realistic case than its advocates, warranting congressional reexamination of the president’s policy.
3. The draft revision, known as a “memo to holders,” of the National Intelligence Estimate on Iran from November 2007. This has been held up for the past several months, apparently because it is consistent with the judgment of that NIE that Iran has not made a decision to produce nuclear weapons. In particular, the contribution to that memo by the State Department’s Bureau of Intelligence and Research (INR), since the INR has had the best track record on such matters. Plus, estimates by the INR and others of the likelihood of an Israeli attack on Iran later this summer. Such disclosures could arrest momentum toward a foreseeably disastrous U.S.-supported attack, as the same finding did in 2007.
4. The 28 or more pages on the foreknowledge or involvement of foreign governments (particularly Saudi Arabia) that were redacted from the congressional investigation of 9/11, over the protest of then-Sen. Bob Graham (D-Fla.).
On each of these matters, congressional investigation is called for. The chance of this would be greatly strengthened by leaks from insiders. Subsequent hearings could elicit testimony from the insiders who provided the information (whose identities could be made known to congressional investigators) and others who, while not willing to take on the personal risks of leaking, would be ready to testify honestly under oath if requested or subpoenaed by Congress. Leaks are essential to this process.

 

Maintain the rage over Sri Lanka’s dictatorship
Posted: 03 Aug 2010

The Elders release a statement outlining the still profound issues inside Sri Lanka:

The Sri Lankan government’s clampdown on domestic critics and its disdain for human rights deserves a far tougher response according to The Elders. While welcoming the end of the decades-long civil war, the Elders say that meaningful progress on reconciliation in Sri Lanka is still desperately needed. They describe the international response to Sri Lanka’s worrying approach to human rights, good governance and accountability as a ‘deafening global silence’ that may encourage other states to act in a similar way.
The Elders have been following events in Sri Lanka closely since the last months of the civil war between government forces and the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) in 2009. They have contacted the government of Sri Lanka and officials around the world to express their concerns about alleged violations of international humanitarian law and the need for actions that promote sustainable peace and reconciliation in the country. The Elders have noted some positive change since the end of the war, including greater economic activity in the north, and the return of some 260,000 displaced people to their home districts.
However, these signs of progress are tainted by intolerance of debate or dissent and a culture of impunity that protects those close to the government. The Elders now believe that the Sri Lankan government’s domestic conduct, as well as its recent unacceptable treatment of the United Nations in Sri Lanka warrants a firm, public response from its most influential friends – particularly China, India, Japan and the United States as well as the non-aligned group of countries.
Only the European Union has taken any direct action by suspending Sri Lanka’s preferential trading access (GSP Plus scheme) for its failure to respect its international human rights obligations.
Among recent events that most concern the Elders are:

  • The persecution, intimidation, assassination and disappearance of government critics, political opponents, journalists and human rights defenders.
  • Ongoing detention of an estimated 8,000 suspected ex-combatants without charge or access to legal representation, their families or independent monitors.
  • The government’s failure to withdraw wartime emergency laws more than a year after the end of the conflict with the LTTE.
  • Lack of action by the government to address the political marginalisation of ethnic minorities that was at the root of Sri Lanka’s thirty years of war.

Unacceptable behaviour towards the United Nations — including a siege by demonstrators of UN offices in Colombo, led by a Cabinet Minister — following the UN Secretary-General’s appointment of a panel of experts to advise him on accountability issues relating to alleged violations of international human rights and humanitarian law committed by both sides during the final stages of the conflict in Sri Lanka.

 

Radio New Zealand Media Watch interview on Middle East reporting
Posted: 03 Aug 2010

The issue of media bias in Middle East reporting is something that obsesses the Zionist lobby. Hearing any Palestinians is a problem.
This edition of Radio New Zealand’s Media Watch, featuring my interview on the subject, examines the ways in which this area is hotly debated and why more reporters should be based in the West Bank and Gaza:

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