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End is near in Babylon
ERIC S. MARGOLIS
…As Iraq turns into a nightmare of carnage and hate, President Bush and mentor Dick Cheney rushed to the Mideast last week to urge their local allies to pull America’s bacon out of the fire. But Iraq’s prime minister, Nuri Al Maliki, governs only over Baghdad’s US-protected Green Zone. The US controls what passes for Iraq’s police and armed forces. Maliki has no army of his own; his Shia supporters are divided and feuding. How can Bush expect a powerless prime minister to do what the mighty US cannot? (…) What western reporters term the Iraqi Army is really a collection of Shia militias, death squads and mercenaries, many former convicts. The US occupation’s extensive use of Shia death squads to fight the Sunni resistance has played a key role in igniting Iraq’s current sectarian bloodbath. This little-known story is a major scandal…
Read the full article / Leggi l’articolo completo: www.uruknet.info/?p=28717
GI Special 4L3: “Starting To Circle The Drain” – December 3, 2006
Thomas F. Barton
Just saw an interview with General Peter Pace’s (JCS) Sgt Major for troop morale who said he had recently returned from Iraq and Afghanistan after speaking with “the troops”.
He maintained that “everyone I spoke with said they knew they needed to be here and wanted to get the job done”(paraphrased).
I am unsure of who or where he spoke with these people but it was not at [Base xxxxx] here in Iraq, (one of, if not the largest single base in Iraq).
(…)
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Iraqi Resistance Report for events of Saturday, 2 December 2006.
Translated and/or compiled by Muhammad Abu Nasr, member, editorial board, the Free Arab Voice
…In a dispatch posted at 8:22pm Makkah time Saturday night, Mafkarat al-Islam reported that Shaykh ‘Abd as-Salam al-Kubaysi, a spokesman for the Association of Muslim Scholars of Iraq, the highest religious authority for Sunni Muslims in the country, said that 37,000 Sunnis are being held prisoner by the puppet regime across the country. He said that they face slow deaths by torture, the trademark of the Shi’i sectarian militias and the regime’s Shi’i sectarian security agencies, if nothing is done to secure their release. The correspondent for Mafkarat al-Islam reported al-Jazeera net as quoting al-Kubasi saying: “37,000 Sunni prisoners in Iraq are facing a slow death and if we keep silent about this, it will mean that they will all die…
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Video
Vigilante Troops Dole Out Ultra-harsh Punishment for Stealing Wood!
Frank J Ranelli
A group of U.S. soldiers stationed in Iraq – true knuckle-heads in this case – decided to be judge, jury and executioner all on their own – to a group of Iraqis who where accused of stealing some wood. What these lowbrow, crude meatheads extemporaneously decided upon, likely without orders or authorization from any superiors, was to teach the cowering, unarmed, and helpless Iraqi civilians a lesson in American might and Red-White & Blue justice. These dullards of dimwittedness, while hovering over a group of crouching, frightened men and even a child, try in hopeless vane to admonish them for their petty theft while speaking in English. When the language barrier proves too much, this group of “defacto sheriffs” take matters into their own hands…
Read the full article / Leggi l’articolo completo: www.uruknet.info/?p=28715
O Come Let Us Adore Them:
Treasuring our American Values of Greed, Self-Interest, and Enlightened Oppression
Ragnar Redbeard III
What kind indeed? Certainly not a prodigious society such as ours. Thanks to Capitalism, the United States is replete with opulence, might, and benevolence. Guided by the brilliant foresight of Hamilton, manacled by men like Keynes, Galbraith, and FDR, and ultimately granted a refreshing degree of freedom by the heroic intellectual efforts of Rand and Friedman, Adam Smith’s “invisible hand” has wrought a citadel for those wishing to pursue healthy greed, self-interest, and enlightened oppression. While Capitalism in the United States is still afflicted with the diseases of a mixed economy, government regulation and socialistic tendencies, America’s socioeconomic system is far superior to any rival, past or present (…) Despite the plethora of gifts bestowed upon the world by American Capitalism, have we established a utopian planet? Of course not. Achieving the difficult is our specialty, but even the mighty United States cannot accomplish the impossible. Overpopulation is rampant due to a fundamental lack of personal responsibility amongst the lower classes. Climate change appears to be accelerating thanks to the actions of a few rogue industries. Evil rogue nations are developing nuclear weapons. Israel remains under siege by Palestinian terrorists. Collateral damage caused by our valiant efforts to maintain peace has unjustly besmirched our reputation as a beneficial superpower…
Read the full article / Leggi l’articolo completo: www.uruknet.info/?p=28714
U.S. Rethinking Iraqi Unification Goal
ANNE GEARAN
President Bush is becoming more personally involved in Iraq’s fragmented politics as his administration reevaluates efforts to unite different Iraqi groups in an attempt to preserve U.S. options. The administration is looking at ways to unite Iraq’s fractious sectarian and political factions, officials familiar with an internal administration review of Iraq policy said Friday. At the same time, the president is stepping up his personal diplomacy – meeting with a top Shiite power broker at the White House next week and with the nation’s Sunni vice president in January…
Read the full article / Leggi l’articolo completo: www.uruknet.info/?p=28700
Abbas’s shameful behavior
Khalid Amayreh, for thepeoplesvoice.org
Standing alongside Condoleezza Rice, the American Secretary of State, during their joint press conference in Jericho, Thursday, 30 November, Palestinian Authority (PA) President Mahmoud Abbas, declared that efforts to form a national unity government with Hamas reached a dead-end. He added in a threatening tone that he would soon take measures toward the formation of a new government, in lieu of the present one headed by Ismael Haniya, whose main task would be the lifting of the American-led, Israeli-enforced financial and economic blockade on the Palestinians. But Abbas’s really scandalous behaviour was his reported reference to a speech by Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert in southern Israel a few days earlier as “positive.”…
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As America Slept
Anwaar Hussain, Fountainhead
It all happened while America slept. As America slept, airline jets appeared in the azure blue New York Skies some five years back and within minutes bumped through tall wonders of human achievements reducing them and their occupants to a tangled mass of steel, concrete and human flesh. While the world stood horror-struck and frozen from the pain of the victims and the sheer scale of the crime, somewhere in some dark unlit corners of America, a small leering cabal of malicious, hateful and warmongering few backslapped each other. But America slept…
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UNHCR update on the Iraq situation
United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees
Iraq is haemorrhaging. The humanitarian crisis which the international community had feared in 2003 is now unfolding. The massive displacement has emerged quietly and without fanfare but the numbers affected are in excess of what many agencies had predicted in 2003. Since the February 2006 Samarra bombings UNHCR, as Cluster Coordinator for displaced groups inside Iraq, estimates some 425,000 Iraqis to have been recently displaced. In addition, some two to three thousand Iraqis are leaving per day via neighbouring countries as the extent of the tragedy becomes obvious. UNHCR estimates that there are at least 1.6 million Iraqis internally displaced with at least another 1.6 – 1.8 million in neighbouring states…
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Corporate Media Uses Fuzzy Math to Minimize Size of Lebanese Demonstrations
Kurt Nimmo
As usual, here in America, the corporate media has a problem counting. “A siege on Lebanon’s American-backed government continued Saturday with tens of thousands of demonstrators sympathetic to the Shiite Muslim Hezbollah militia and its allies packing downtown Beirut and calling for the resignation of Prime Minister Fuad Saniora and his cabinet,” reports the Mercury News. Meanwhile, closer to the “siege,” actually a widespread call for the neolib sponsored government of free trader (or free plundering by international financiers) Siniora to step aside, the counting is a bit more realistic. “Hundreds of thousands of opposition protesters crammed into the heart of Beirut Friday and besieged the headquarters of Prime Minister Fouad Siniora’s government in a peaceful show of force to bring down the ruling Cabinet,” reports the Daily Star, a Lebanese newspaper. Some observers put the number well over 800,000…
Read the full article / Leggi l’articolo completo: www.uruknet.info/?p=28711
Iraqi Resistance Report for events of Friday, 1 December 2006
Translated and/or compiled by Muhammad Abu Nasr, member, editorial board, the Free Arab Voice
…In a dispatch posted at 8:26pm Makkah time Friday night, Mafkarat al-Islam reported that a short while earlier US forces surrounded a funeral service that was taking plance near Samarra’, about 120km north of Baghdad, for a member of the Iraqi Resistance killed in battle with US troops in the area on Friday morning. The Samarra’ correspondent for Mafkarat al-Islam reported that US troops arrested 30 of the participants in the funeral as it took place in the al-Hawish area, about 17km northwest of Samarra’. The correspondent reported that the Americans accused the participants in the funeral of having been among the Resistance detachment that were involved in the battle along with the man whom they were burying…
Read the full article / Leggi l’articolo completo: www.uruknet.info/?p=28708
Saudi security adviser’s Iraq article: Govt denies it would back Iraq insurgents
Daily Times
Saudi Arabia said there was no truth in an article by a Saudi security adviser suggesting the world’s top oil exporter would back Iraq’s Muslim Sunnis in the event of a wider sectarian conflict. Nawaf Obaid, a security adviser to the Saudi government, said on Wednesday the kingdom would intervene with funding and weaponry to prevent Shiite militias attacking Iraq’s Sunnis once the United States begins pulling out of Iraq. He also suggested Saudi Arabia, the world’s biggest oil exporter, could bring down world oil prices to squeeze Shiite power Iran, which Saudi Arabia and other Sunni Arab countries accuse of meddling in Iraq. Saudi state news agency SPA issued a statement on Friday attributed to an “official source” who rejected Obaid’s ideas. “There is no basis in truth to the article by the writer Nawaf Obaid in the Washington Post of Nov. 29, 2006,” it said…
Read the full article / Leggi l’articolo completo: www.uruknet.info/?p=28707
O Come Let Us Adore Them:
Treasuring our American Values of Greed, Self-Interest, and Enlightened Oppression
Ragnar Redbeard III
What kind indeed? Certainly not a prodigious society such as ours. Thanks to Capitalism, the United States is replete with opulence, might, and benevolence. Guided by the brilliant foresight of Hamilton, manacled by men like Keynes, Galbraith, and FDR, and ultimately granted a refreshing degree of freedom by the heroic intellectual efforts of Rand and Friedman, Adam Smith’s “invisible hand” has wrought a citadel for those wishing to pursue healthy greed, self-interest, and enlightened oppression. While Capitalism in the United States is still afflicted with the diseases of a mixed economy, government regulation and socialistic tendencies, America’s socioeconomic system is far superior to any rival, past or present (…) Despite the plethora of gifts bestowed upon the world by American Capitalism, have we established a utopian planet? Of course not. Achieving the difficult is our specialty, but even the mighty United States cannot accomplish the impossible. Overpopulation is rampant due to a fundamental lack of personal responsibility amongst the lower classes. Climate change appears to be accelerating thanks to the actions of a few rogue industries. Evil rogue nations are developing nuclear weapons. Israel remains under siege by Palestinian terrorists. Collateral damage caused by our valiant efforts to maintain peace has unjustly besmirched our reputation as a beneficial superpower…
Read the full article / Leggi l’articolo completo: www.uruknet.info/?p=28714
Bush to Meet With Head of Iraq Shiite Party
DAVID E. SANGER and EDWARD WONG
The White House said Friday that President Bush would meet next week with Abdul Aziz al-Hakim, the head of one of the most powerful Shiite parties in Iraq, the latest step in a burst of new administration attempts to try different approaches to bolstering the fragile Iraqi government. The effort is part of a White House strategy that calls for reaching out to a wider circle of Iraqi politicians to give greater support to the weak government of Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki, and lessen his dependence on Moktada al-Sadr, the anti-American Shiite cleric. But it immerses Washington even deeper into Baghdad’s byzantine coalition politics, and it risks being interpreted in Baghdad as a sign that Mr. Bush is hedging his bets…
Read the full article / Leggi l’articolo completo: www.uruknet.info/?p=28706
Battlestar Galactica takes on Hamas, Iraqi resistance
Firas Al-Atraqchi
…Machine vs man, man vs machine as told countless times in “I, Robot” and “The Matrix,” “Demon Seed” and so on. But “Galactica” may have broken ground in its opening salvo as it took on the specter of suicide bombings, occupation vs. resistance and the never tiring dilemma of ‘us’ vs ‘them.’ In its first episode of the third season, the humans are occupied by the machines-cum-humans, the Cylons. There is a resistance group called “insurgents” in the episode. The insurgents use makeshift bombs planted in the roadside to take out as many Cylons in their vehicles as they possibly can. No, it is no coincidence that these scenes are a near identical retelling of the improvised explosive devices used in Iraq by the armed groups there. The most poignant comparison, however, is the scene where a young blond man volunteers for a suicide mission to kill Cylons and a group of humans who have joined a police force trained, funded and supported by the machines…
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Media Cranks Up Hard Sell of Biometric and RFID Microchipped Future
Kurt Nimmo
I don’t watch a lot of television. But no sooner did I flip on MSNBC last night a coiffured talking head appeared gabbling about the insecurity of ATM machines. If we are to believe Algorithmic Research, an Israeli company, there is a flaw in the average ATM regarding PINs, account numbers, encryption, and decryption, that is to say there is a window of opportunity to snatch this information—over the internet, of course—by an unscrupulous hacker…
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Stand in line and place your Bets
Layla Anwar
I was told today that the figure for the number of dead in Iraq is a 40% increase on last month. Who wants to bid more? Imagine you are in an auction, and don’t get all politically correct with me now (it did not help much in the past). Imagine you are at Sothebys or Christies and the bald guy on a commission is shouting:
“ Last bid , 1 ,2, 3, who says more? “. You don’t like this one, it’s too morbid for you? Let me give you another one…
Read the full article / Leggi l’articolo completo: www.uruknet.info/?p=28709
Wingnut Trolls Can Stow Indignation on AP Story
Bob Geiger
I’ve been getting a ton of e-mail from conservative trolls on my post about right-wing bloggers who jumped all over the Associated Press (AP) for allegedly inventing a news story about Sunni worshippers being burned alive by Shiite militiamen in Iraq. Lo and behold, a preponderance of all evidence suggested the story is true, and I wrote about the irony in their questioning the AP’s journalistic standards…
Read the full article / Leggi l’articolo completo: www.uruknet.info/?p=28716
GI Special 4L2: Down- Rating Our Service – December 2, 2006
Thomas F. Barton
After spending a year in Iraq, I have found that the Iraqis are not a threat or the enemy. I did find that we are the threat and the enemy to them.
They acted as we would if someone came into America and said we are going to change your ways.
I feel this war is no longer about taking out a threat. But I believe it is about securing oil commerce for the future.
Read the full article / Leggi l’articolo completo: www.uruknet.info/?p=28692
DAILY WAR NEWS FOR SATURDAY, December 2, 2006
Today in Iraq
Three parked car bombs exploded in central Baghdad near an area packed with vendors, killing at least 91 people and wounding dozens, officials said. The bombs were about 100 yards apart in the busy al-Sadriyah shopping district and exploded nearly simultaneously, according to police Lt. Ali Muhsin. At least 10 other parked vehicles were destroyed in the area, where vendors sell fruit, vegetables and other items such as soap. Muhsin and hospital officials said 91 people were killed and 43 were wounded. A defence official told AFP the first blast appeared to target an Iraqi army Humvee jeep patrolling the central Rusafa district at sunset. There were soldiers among the casualties, but he could not say how many. The second blast followed immediately with the third just a few moments later, rocking windows 500 metres (yards) away on the opposite bank of the Tigris River. Shortly afterwards gunfire erupted around the city…
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PRESS RELEASE
The Judge Dismissed Lawyer Badie Arif Izzat
The Defense Committee for President Saddam Hussein
In another violation to the right to the sacred right of the defense and in furtherance to the series of breaching all the well-established standards of a fair trial; the Court dismissed our colleague lawyer Badie Arif Izzat, removed him out and apprehended him for no reason except that he seeks to reveal the truth, the aim for which five lawyers have been martyred, a mater which does not delight the Court. This proves that the Defense Committee was right when it decided to suspend its attendance before the court unless sufficient guarantees are provided for the defense attorneys in order to accomplish their noble duty adequately…
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