The Iraqi Genocide
Paul Craig Roberts
Why has not the Turkish parliament given tit for tat and passed a resolution condemning the Iraqi Genocide? As a result of Bush’s invasion of Iraq, more than one million Iraqis have died, and several millions are displaced persons. The Iraqi death toll and the millions of uprooted Iraqis match the Armenian deaths and deportations. If one is a genocide, so is the other….

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A prostituted UN acquiesces to Palestinian human rights violations
Khalid Suleiman
John Dugard, the UN human rights envoy to the Israeli-occupied Palestinian territories, has castigated the world body, accusing it of watching passively and doing nothing to stop serious violations of Palestinian human rights. In an interview with the BBC Sunday, Dugard said the UN should withdraw from the Quartet of Middle East mediators unless the group addresses Palestinian human rights. Dugard said the rift between Fatah, which is backed by Israel and the West, and Hamas, the democratically-elected Islamic movement, was threatening the Palestinian people’s right to self-determination. He added that the UN, instead of siding with one faction, which is Fatah, should be playing the role of mediator. “Instead the international community has given its support almost completely to one faction-to Fatah.”….

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A Bag of Second Hand Memoirs…
Layla Anwar, An Arab Woman Blues
….But then, those were the teen-age years and everything was possible. Change, revolutions and eternal love… But a rebel, I was. I think it is genetic in my case. I simply could not accept the given status quo. I had to question which I still do…A problematic attitude if you want to get on in life “smoothly.” But then my life has not exactly been a smooth ride either. War after war after war after war…And my name is Layla Anwar. These wars have shaped me more than I care to admit, intimately shaped me…leaving marks inside, like the foot-prints of some soldier’s boot on wet mud, that eventually dry up in the sun and become like some old totem that one carries around one’s neck… And with each “war” and there has been so many of them, the totem becomes alive again and that rebellious spirit against the madness that injustice engenders, re-emerges…as if it has just woken up from some temporary hibernation. A lost cause? Maybe…But I told you, in my case it’s genetic….

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Abizaid: ‘We’ve Treated The Arab World As A Collection Of Big Gas Stations’
Think Progress
During a round table discussion on “the Fight for Oil, Water and a Healthy Planet” at Stanford University on Saturday, Gen. John Abizaid (Ret.), the former CENTCOM Commander, said that “of course” the Iraq war is “about oil”: “Of course it’s about oil, we can’t really deny that,” Abizaid said of the Iraq campaign early on in the talk. “We’ve treated the Arab world as a collection of big gas stations,” the retired general said. “Our message to them is: Guys, keep your pumps open, prices low, be nice to the Israelis and you can do whatever you want out back. Osama and 9/11 is the distilled essence that represents everything going on out back.” Abizaid has previously argued that the U.S. would need “to keep a long-term military presence in Iraq” in order to protect “the free flow of goods and resources” such as oil, but his Stanford comments go much further in pinning oil as a prime motivator for the war…

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Detainee complain of abuse, violations, and ongoing attacks in Israeli prisons
IMEMC Staff
The Palestinian Prisoners Society (PPS) issued a report documenting an incident of illegal acts and abuse carried against a detainee in an Israeli prison. In a sworn testimony, detainee Hasan Faleh Bazour, from Al Mogheer village, near the northern West Bank city of Jenin, stated that he was repeatedly beaten and tortured by the soldiers when he was arrested and when he was under interrogation. He stated that he was hit with batons, rifles, and other tools on sensitive parts of his body….

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Iraqi Resistance Report for events of Monday, 15 October 2007
Translated and/or compiled by Muhammad Abu Nasr, member, editorial board, the Free
…In a dispatch posted at 11:44am Baghdad time Monday morning, the Association of Muslim Scholars of Iraq (AMSI) reported that the US military had admitted that two more of its occupation soldiers had died in two separate incidents – one in Ninwa Province and the other in Baghdad. The AMSI reported a statement by the US military as saying that one of its soldiers was killed and three more of them wounded when a bomb exploded near their patrol in southern Baghdad on Sunday….

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No fingerprints, and an improbable artery
Xymphora
The Daily Mail is reporting that there were no fingerprints on the knife that David Kelly supposedly used to kill himself, and that his death was the only one reported that year in Britain caused by the cutting of that particular artery. This information comes from the private investigation of Liberal Democrat MP Norman Baker. The new information is not a surprise for those who know he didn’t commit suicide. It was Kelly’s own knife, meaning his own fingerprints should have been on it, meaning that the agents who staged the suicide scene didn’t use gloves to handle the knife, and therefore had to wipe it clean of all fingerprints. This seems to be an indication of lack of professionalism in staging the scene…

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Railways…did they become a relic of the past?
Voices of Iraq
…Kadhem Abdul-Wahid, the director of the Basra railways authority, said after the 2003 war on Iraq many stations, carriages and railway lines in Basra and other provinces were pillaged and sabotaged, totally crippling train traffic.
The history of the railway network in Basra dates back to the early 20th century when the British forces, one year after occupying Iraq, built the first train station in the area of al-Maaqal, which overlooks the Shatt al-Arab river channel, the confluence of the Tigris and Euphrates rivers flowing southeast to the Gulf. “The railways have played an important role in transport of passengers or goods between Basra and Baghdad at low costs,” Abdul-Wahid told VOI. After upgrading the old consumed locomotives with modern French ones in the early 1980s, the service improved to a great extent only to retreat during the years Iraq came under a crippling economic embargo, he said. However, the railway traffic continued with four trains a day carrying more than 16,000 passengers from the station in Basra on a daily basis, in addition to thousands of tons of goods, he added….

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Private US military contractors move into Helmand
Kim Sengupta, Independent
Large numbers of US private military personnel are expected to arrive in Helmand, the focal point of British involvement in Afghanistan, as part of a new effort to promote reconstruction and development in the war-torn province. The US has contributed the largest sum to the new aid effort, over $200m. But British officials striving to win “hearts and minds” in the conflict against the Taliban have expressed concern over the potential influx of military contractors, amid a continuing furore over the shooting of civilians in Iraq by Blackwater…

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Dahr Jamail: “Beyond the Green Zone: Dispatches from an Unembedded Journalist in Occupied Iraq”
Democracy Now!
The United Nations is calling for a “vigorous” investigation into a deadly US air raid north of Baghdad on Thursday that killed at least fifteen women and children. The call comes as the first pictures have emerged in the aftermath of the attack which took place north of Baghdad. The US military has expressed regret over the loss of civilian life but said they sent in helicopters after ground troops came under fire from insurgents. Iraqi villagers say some of the victims were shot dead. Pictures captured at the scene of the attack show bullet holes that appear to be from a ground assault. The US has admitted six women and nine children were killed, along with nineteen insurgents. But local villagers say they have buried twenty-four people and that several others were detained by US forces….

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US Builds Bunker of an Embassy in Iraq
Der Spiegel
The new American embassy currently rising from the dust of the Green Zone in Baghdad will break all records. It covers an area of 400,000 square meters, six times that of the United Nations complex in New York and 10 times that of the new US embassy in Beijing. It’s said to be the largest embassy the US has ever built; at a cost of $592 million (€416 million), it’s certainly the most expensive. But now the State Department in Washington is having to face accusations of mismanagement and shoddy building practices. Due to last-minute repairs that will add an estimated $150 million to the building’s price tag, the embassy, which was scheduled to open in September 2007, won’t open its doors until the beginning of next year. So far, criticism has been restrained. But behind closed doors, Democrats and senior Iraqi politicians are quietly wondering whether the giant project might turn into a giant disaster…

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GI Special 5J8: “Thanks Man. The Army Stinks” [ October 11, 2007 ]
Thomas F. Barton
“Thanks Man – The Army Stinks”
“This War Sucks – George Bush Is Nuts”
“It’s Often Said Soldiers Aren’t ‘Political’ But I Damn Well Saw That They Are”
“The Police Coming Into The Smoking Room Set Off Two Of The Soldiers. ‘They Should Let You Hand Them Out – This Is Supposed To Be A Free Country Isn’t It’”

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Two journalists killed in Iraq in 24 hours
AFP
A freelance journalist was shot dead near Iraq’s northern city of Kirkuk on Monday, less than 24 hours after a reporter for the Washington Post was killed in Baghdad, a media watchdog said. Paris-based Reporters Without Borders named the freelance journalist as 32-year-old Dhi Abdul-Razak al-Dibo and said he was killed in an ambush by unidentified gunmen near the oil city, 180 kilometres (110 miles) north of Baghdad. His two bodyguards were injured in the attack. The Washington Post wrote on its website that reporter Salih Saif Aldin, 32, who had been reporting on clashes between militiamen and insurgents in Baghdad’s Sadiyah community, was fatally shot on Sunday….

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Afghanistan struggles with heroin addiction scourge
Reuters
Afghanistan, the world’s biggest heroin producer, is struggling to cope with a drug problem as thousands of Afghans — trying to cope with the traumas of war, displacement and poverty — are becoming addicted to narcotics. On the outskirts of Kabul, a sprawling bombed-out building that was once a centre for culture and science is home to over 100 squatters whose main concern is feeding their heroin habit. Ghulam Ahmad, a 17 year-old addict, has been injecting heroin for almost two years now. Like many living in the squalid, filthy building, he started using drugs in neighboring Iran….

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A Few Good Ones Left…
Layla Anwar, An Arab Woman Blues
I want to share with you two other true Solidarity mails I have received. They are important for me. They tell me that I am not talking to the walls, or “pissing in the wind.” (to use one of your expressions.) They tell me, that there is an echo out there, and that means a lot to me and am sure to other Iraqis as well… One such mail comes from a German lady M.R. (…) “Germany did not send troops to Iraq in 2003 but we are guilty like the rest of all European countries. Our governments supported the criminal sanctions against your country. Our people watched all this crimes live on TV. We should stop talking about Auschwitz without mentioning the Iraqi Holocaust. The indifference of the world towards the genocide committed in Iraq, our silence is a crime against humanity. Nobody of us can say: “we didn’t know”…. I am almost 50 years old, I remember the solidarity campaigns against the war in Vietnam we have organised in Germany. Regarding our solidarity(?) with Iraq, the so called anti-war movement continues parrotting the fabricated lies of the mainstream media. “We are against this war, but Saddam Hussein is / was a brutal dictator…” Can you imagine that the so called German left, is still discussing the legitimacy of the Iraqi Resistance?!!!” (…) “The “civilised world” has committed the biggest crime against humanity in modern history: The criminal sanctions, the fabricated lies demonising President Saddam Hussein, the daily atrocities of the occupation… The world commu! nity mus t pay compensation to the Iraqi people! Here in Germany we are still paying to the “State of Israel” for the crimes committed during World War II and the generations following me will continue paying… I have run out of words to express my sentiments.
The indifference of the world, the silence of the anti-war movement has caused more destruction in Iraq than an atomic bomb….

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Video: Iraqi Teens Work to Help Their Families
Alive in Baghdad
Baghdad, Iraq: The population of Iraq is estimated to be at least 50% under the age of 18. These children and adolescents are in dire straits due to the war. This Eid was no exception, as 15 women and children were killed in an American air raid and a suicide attack near a playground killed at least 1 child and wounded 20 others (…) Unemployment and desperation are leading many Iraqi children and teenagers to work to help feed their families….

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OPT: Self-help Gazans still need outside world
The continuing power cuts in Gaza have made candles a basic necessity, but many residents can no longer afford them.
IRIN News
The continuing power cuts in Gaza have made candles a basic necessity, but many residents can no longer afford them. Ahmed Asidawi, aged 42, has been mostly unemployed since the start of the Palestinian uprising in September 2000 and he is barred from entering Israel to seek work. He is a refugee registered with UNRWA, the UN agency for Palestinian refugees. “I don’t have money to buy candles. I get aid from the agency. I am registered as a special hardship case. I have no other source of income,” he told IRIN from Nussairat refugee camp in central Gaza. Najwa Sheikh Ahmed and her husband Taher, also residents of Nussairat, recently began a campaign to help their poorest neighbours. Najwa’s job with UNRWA brought her into contact with international aid workers who are able to exit and enter the Gaza Strip, a luxury few Palestinians have enjoyed since June, when, following bloody battles which left the Islamic group Hamas in control of Gaza, the borders were sealed….

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The 41st kilometer
Amira Hass, Haaretz
A zoo. This is one of the ways that Palestinians describe the conditions under which nearly 1.5 million of them have been living: in an area of some 360 square kilometers, closed in on three sides by sophisticated barbed-wire fences, concrete walls and military lookout towers, and to the west by Israeli navy ships that seal them off from the sea. Overhead, in the sky, unmanned aircraft and hot air balloons continually photograph whatever happens inside this closed cage, which has seven gates connecting it to the world, all of which are sealed off almost hermetically….

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Racial Profiling at its Worst
The Iraq Solidarity Campaign
In what can only be described as an act of racial profiling in the UK, the Liberal Democrats have sent around “Eid” cards to residents of South Manchester, with their party logo printed below the “Eid Mubarak” greeting. It has been claimed, that the Liberal Democrats had one of their members go through a list of “Islamic sounding names”, by one of their members and as a result, many people who have Middle Eastern names have since received Eid cards. It has also been claimed that the Liberal and Democrat Party did not contact any of the residents in Manchester, to see if they were celebrating Eid or to find out if they were actually Muslims but took it upon themselves, to racially profile constituents in a cheap effort to try and win votes….

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Where are the images of Syria nuclear site?
Roads to Iraq
Is this propaganda report published by the nytimes two days ago “Israel Struck Syrian Nuclear Project, Analysts Say” is the same propaganda published by washingtonpost “Israel, U.S. Shared Data On Suspected Nuclear Site” three weeks ago? Syrian newspapers doesn’t even bothered to answer, surprisingly the answer came from the Syrian opposition. They said: The question which no media asked until now, if these claims are true and that the target was a nuclear reactor, why the American administration or Israel didn’t publish photographs of the site before and after the bombing. There is one answer, they can’t show these images because there are no images to prove these claims, all what they did was the bombing of empty buildings or missiles stores…

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Dear Iraqis, Heed the Danger of the Iranian Occupation! …
Daya Al-Shakraji, Kitabat, Iraq – Translated By James Jacobson
This appeal is not at all exaggerated, and I didn’t start off with an unjustified mental complex toward Iran. Iraq today – or at least a large part of it – truly lies under Iranian occupation, and the tools of this occupation are religious parties, the Turbans (religious leaders), militias and informers. Some people wonder why I’m neglecting the dangers of the clear and obvious American occupation and colonization, and instead warn of Iran’s shadow occupation. I say: Herein lies the danger, since the U.S. occupation is clearly doomed. The consequences of the open occupation, if they aren’t over, soon will be. But Iran’s hidden occupation, by virtue of its being a neighbor and its influence in neighborhoods and through social and religious relationships, is the most dangerous and most capable of surviving America’s more obvious occupation…

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Slaughter of the Innocents
Something is Rotten in Iraq and the Pentagon
DAVE LINDORFF
Isn’t it odd that in the air attack that the US military claims killed 19 high-ranking leaders of Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia and 15 civilians, all the slain Al Qaeda members were men and all the men were Al Qaeda, while all the civilians were women (6) and children (9)? Think about this a minute. This means that no women were Al Qaeda—and yet we know that women also fight, and also blow themselves up as suicide bombers. Yet these women were all civilians. The children, of course, were children. And we’re to believe that there were no men who were innocent bystanders? All those adult males who were killed were “bad guys.” Yet there were innocent bystanders: the women and the children. Somehow, any innocent bystanding men managed to duck out of the way, or the bullets and bomb fragments (and I’m sure they were fragmentation bombs that were used, as well as a withering spray of machine-gun fire) that hit all those poor women and kids, just somehow (magically?) missed the men. Pretty amazing huh? Except that it’s an absurd claim that should insult our intelligence….

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Kurds sign oil deals beyond regional borders – former minister
Azzaman
Iraqi Kurds’ oil contracts with foreign firms are not only illegal but even cover portion of territory officially outside the borders of their semi-independent enclave, a former oil minister said. Isam al-Jalabi, who held the oil portfolio under the former regime of Saddam Hussein, said the latest deal the Kurds struck with Texas-based Hunt Oil Company gives it the right to explore and dig wells in areas which are under the jurisdiction of the Province of Nineveh. The Kurdish enclave now includes the provinces of Dahouk, Sulaimaniya and Arbil. The Kurds are trying to add the Province of Taameem of which the oil-rich city of Kirkuk is the capital….

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The one who makes people talk
Dalia Karpel, Ha’aretz
“We – Israeli soldiers – were put there to punish the Palestinians,” says Ilan Vilenda, an Israeli soldier who served in Rafah during the first Intifada. Ilan is the only soldier of 21 who agreed to have his name published, after he was interviewed by psychologist Nofer Ishai-Karen. The soldiers spoke freely to Nofer, who served with them in the same ASHBAL platoon 20 years ago; they are disclosing their innermost emotions about the horrendous crimes in which they took part: murder, breaking bones of Palestinian children, actions of humiliation, destruction of property, robbery and theft….

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Israel refuses entry to 6 Gazans in urgent need of medical care
Haaretz Staff
The defense establishment is preventing the entry into Israel of six Palestinians from the Gaza Strip in urgent need of medical attention, Army Radio reported on Sunday. The six, all sick with cancer or heart conditions, twice requested permission to enter, and were denied both times due to security considerations, according to the report. Physicians for Human Rights (PHR) has taken up the cause of the six to gain access to medical car in Israel. The defense establishment refuses to explain the security concerns on which its bases its refusal, and PHR Chairman Danny Filk fears that it represents a wider intention to punish Gaza Strip residents for Hamas’ violent takeover of the coastal territory in June….

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An anti-democratic tirade
Former US commander blames “partisan” politics and “agenda-driven” media for Iraq debacle
Barry Grey, WSWS
In an extraordinary speech delivered October 12, retired Lt. Gen. Ricardo Sanchez, the top US commander in Iraq from June 2003 to June 2004, gave vent to deeply anti-democratic sentiments emerging within growing sections of the US officer corps. Addressing the Military Reporters and Editors annual conference in Arlington, Virginia, Sanchez attributed American military failures in Iraq to the “unscrupulous reporting” and “agenda-driven biases” of the media, and “the corrosive partisan politics that is destroying our country and killing our service members who are at war.” (…) At one point, Sanchez all but called for systematic press censorship, saying, “As I assess various media entities, some are unquestionably engaged in political propaganda that is uncontrolled.” He seemed to suggest that the only basis for waging a successful war in Iraq and beyond was some form of military rule at home…

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IRAQ: Iraqi Arabs seek refuge in Kurdish north
IRIN News
According to figures compiled by local officials in the three provinces that make up Iraqi Kurdistan, at least 12,500 Iraqi Arab families (about 75,000 individuals) have fled to the region. There they find themselves in what feels like a foreign country: Kurdistan has been autonomous since 1991 with Kurds running their own affairs. While Arabic is still an official language, it is all but eclipsed by Kurdish. But Iraq’s Kurdistan has largely been spared the relentless car bombings, suicide attacks and Shia-Sunni infighting that has left thousands dead in Baghdad, central Iraq and the south. According to the UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR), an estimated 60,000 people are being forced to leave their homes every month due to the continuing violence in Iraq….

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Police could not find any fingerprints on Dr Kelly’s ‘suicide’ knife
ANDY DOLAN, Daily Mail
Fresh doubts were raised over the suicide of Dr David Kelly after it emerged that no fingerprints were found on the knife he supposedly used to kill himself. The Hutton Inquiry into the death of the Ministry of Defence weapons expert ruled that he slashed one of his wrists with a blunt garden knife and took an overdose of pills. But the campaigning Liberal Democrat MP Norman Baker has carried out his own investigation after forensic experts questioned the official version of events. He has called for the case to be re-opened after Thames Valley Police revealed that no fingerprints were found on the knife. The Lewes MP made the discovery after submitting a Freedom of Information request to the force. The lack of fingerprints is especially strange as police records also revealed the germ warfare expert was not wearing any gloves when he died – nor were any found at the scene of his death….

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An anti-democratic tirade
Former US commander blames “partisan” politics and “agenda-driven” media for Iraq debacle
Barry Grey, WSWS
In an extraordinary speech delivered October 12, retired Lt. Gen. Ricardo Sanchez, the top US commander in Iraq from June 2003 to June 2004, gave vent to deeply anti-democratic sentiments emerging within growing sections of the US officer corps. Addressing the Military Reporters and Editors annual conference in Arlington, Virginia, Sanchez attributed American military failures in Iraq to the “unscrupulous reporting” and “agenda-driven biases” of the media, and “the corrosive partisan politics that is destroying our country and killing our service members who are at war.” (…) At one point, Sanchez all but called for systematic press censorship, saying, “As I assess various media entities, some are unquestionably engaged in political propaganda that is uncontrolled.” He seemed to suggest that the only basis for waging a successful war in Iraq and beyond was some form of military rule at home…

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Turkish government seeks parliamentary approval for Iraq incursion
Associated Press
The Turkish government has decided to send a motion to Parliament seeking approval for a military operation against Kurdish rebels in northern Iraq, a government spokesman said Monday. The spokesman, Cemil Cicek, said he hoped Parliament would vote on the motion this week — passage is considered likely — but indicated that the government would still prefer a solution to the conflict that does not involve a cross-border offensive. “Our hope is that there will be no need to use this motion,” Cicek said. The spokesman said any military operation would target the rebel Kurdistan Workers’ Party, known by its Kurdish acronym PKK. The statement appeared to be aimed at reassuring Iraq’s central government as well as Iraqi Kurds, who run their own administration in northern Iraq….

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Sunni tribes are being urged to declare their own federal Region: Hakim thinks this would present Sadr with a fait accompli
Arablinks
Ammar al-Hakim, son SIIC leader Abdulaziz al-Hakim and his apparent successor as SIIC leader, visited Ramadi on the weekend with the head of the Badr Corps, and SIIC sources said he met with the leaders of the “Anbar Awakening” (including the brother of the late Sattar abu Risha) and other Sunni tribal leaders. The purpose was the following (according to Al-Hayat): Informed sources said the meetings focused on the importance of declaring a federal [entity] in Sunni west Iraq, at the same time as announcements of a Shiite region in the south and a Kurdish one in the north. Informed sources told al-Hayat this was an initiative of Ammar al-Hakim with the idea of aligning views on the occasion of Eid al-Fitr, with the aim of settling problems and normalizing relations between Sunnis and Shiites…

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Iraqi Resistance Report for events of Sunday, 14 October 2007.
Translated and/or compiled by Muhammad Abu Nasr, member, editorial board, the Free Arab Voice. www.freearabvoice.org
…In a dispatch posted at 7:13pm Baghdad time Sunday night, the Aswat al-’Iraq news agency, which was set up by Reuters and the U.N. Development Agency, reported that armed men blew up a vehicle bridge linking 25 villages in the as-Salam area near Ba’qubah and al-Khalis, about 60km northeast of Baghdad, at midday Sunday. After the bridge was blown, isolating the area, detachments of armed fighters deployed in the area…

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FOR PALESTINIANS IT’S A DREAM OF UNITY IN A SEA OF DISUNITY
Desert Peace
Hundreds of thousands of Palestinian families have been divided, separated by Israeli legislation aimed at the total dehumanisation of the entire nation. The family unit means absolutely nothing to the occupier… if anything, it’s just one more thing to destroy. The specific problem basically lies with Palestinians living in ‘Israel proper’ who are married to Palestinians living in the Occupied Territories. Since 2001, all attempts to reunify such families were halted by the Israeli government….

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War News for Monday, October 15, 2007
Iraq today
MNF-Iraq is reporting the death of a Multi-National Division – Baghdad soldier in an improvised esplosive device attack in a southern neighborhood of Baghdad on Sunday, October 14th. Three other soldiers were wounded in the incident MNF-Iraq is also reporting the death of a Task Force Lightning soldier from a non-hostile, unspecified cause in Ninawa Province in the north of Iraq on Sunday, October 14th….

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Promised Social Change In Ecuador
Stephen Lendman
Raphael Correa was elected Ecuador’s president last November and took office January 15 promising social change. He’s the country’s eighth president in the last decade including three previous ones driven from office by mass street protest opposition against their misrule and public neglect. Correa must now deliver and just got a boost from his governing Movimiento Alianza Pais’ landslide Constituent Assembly election victory to rewrite the nation’s constitution for the 177th time in Ecuador’s history hoping to get it right this time. Awaiting a final tabulation of results, it appears Correa supporters got around 70% of the vote winning 80 of the 130 Assembly seats. That’s a comfortable majority to push through change, but doing it won’t be easy, and Correa’s commitment has yet to be tested….

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