301 Palestinian Children Killed By Israeli Occupation January – June 2007
Comprehensive examination of Israeli crimes against Palestinian children
PalestineFreeVoice Novembre 12 2007 – Semi- Annual Report of Israeli Violations of the Right to Life
Throughout the first half of this year, Israeli military operations in the West Bank and Gaza Strip continued to violate the most basic rights of Palestinian children, including their right to life. Between 1st January and 30th June, DCI/PS documented the killing of 301 Palestinian children as a direct result of Israeli military activity in the Palestinian territory, bringing the total number of children killed since the beginning of the Intifada to 882. The circumstances in which these 30 children were killed include: use of lethal force against children who demonstrate or throw stones, use of lethal force against children who attempt to cross into Israel or escape arrest, indiscriminate shelling, indiscriminate fire during incursions; and extra-judicial targeted assassinations (which oftentimes result in the killing of many non-targeted civilians). None of the 30 children killed were armed, although there is some indication that one child intended to make a Molotov cocktail before he was killed….

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IRAQ: A Tale of One City, Now Two
Ali al-Fadhily*
The separation of religious groups in the face of sectarian violence has brought some semblance of relative calm to Baghdad. But many Iraqis see this as the uncertain consequence of a divide and rule policy. Claims are going the rounds that sectarian violence in Iraq has fallen, and that the U.S. military “surge” has succeeded in reducing attacks against civilians. Baghdad residents speak of the other side of the coin – that they live now in a largely divided city that has brought this uneasy calm. “I would like to agree with the idea that violence in Iraq has decreased and that everything is fine,” retired general Waleed al-Ubaidy told IPS in Baghdad. “But the truth is far more bitter. All that has happened is a dramatic change in the demographic map of Iraq.” And as with Baquba and other violence-hit areas of Iraq, he says a part of the story in Baghdad is that there is nobody left to tell it. “Most of the honest journalists have left.” “Baghdad has been torn into two cities and many towns and neighbourhoods,” Ahmad Ali, chief engineer from one of Baghdad’s municipalities told IPS. “There is now the Shia Baghdad and the Sunni Baghdad to start with. Then, each is divided into little town-like pieces of the hundreds of thousands who had to leave their homes.”…

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EXCREMENT DISGUISED AS HISTORY
Malcom Lagauche
….Iraq’s history is in the hands of the U.S. Every document the Ba’ath government produced is kept under lock and key. This means that Iraqi history is being quickly re-written and turned into a ridiculous account and nobody can do anything about it. The U.S. knocks “revisionist” historians, yet the revisionist history of Iraq now being put forth makes Richard Nixon look honest. Baghdad is a dysfunctional city that is laden with walls that imprison the people. The city resembles a landfill that in which the air is constantly blurred with dust and smoke. U.S. soldiers and military equipment are a common sight. Baghdad is ruined. Only five years ago, Baghdad was still the capital of the Arab world. Despite an overwhelming embargo, the city was beautiful. It had a few rough edges because of the sanctions, but it still was Baghdad. The name of the city invoked magical images to the world. Today’s Baghdad depicts a failed ruined city in chaos. Despite all the facts, the U.S. and its quisling friends in the Green Zone in Baghdad, hail the “new” Baghdad and cite its destruction as a positive occurrence. Few Westerners challenge this preposterous assessment. If you go to the image section Google and punch in the word “Baghdad,” you will be quite shocked and annoyed. Of the first 100 images, only one showed Baghdad prior to 2003 and that photo was taken in 1917….

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Chalabi returns to prominence and power
Christian Berthelsen, Los Angeles Times Staff Writer
Ahmad Chalabi sits in the conference room of his compound in the Green Zone preparing to meet with Lt. Gen. Raymond T. Odierno, the No. 2 U.S. military officer in Iraq. Sunlight streams over expensive Persian carpets and modern Iraqi furniture. Chalabi wears a sober charcoal suit, but there’s a touch of the dandy in his lime-colored polka-dot tie. Chalabi professes not to even know what the meeting is about. The general, he says nonchalantly, requested it. As advertised, an imposing figure sporting fatigues and a shaved head strides through the door a few minutes later. “Thank you for seeing me,” Odierno says. Ahmad Chalabi, it would appear, is back….

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PHR: 9 Palestinian patients died after Israel barred their entry for treatment
Palestinian Information Center
Ron Yaron, the coordinator in the physicians for human rights organization (PHR), confirmed that nine Palestinian patients died lately after the IOA blocked their entry to the Palestinian lands occupied in 1948 in order to receive medical treatment. In a press release, Yaron stated that the IOA does not grant permits to a large number of Palestinian patients even though they meet the standards set by the Israeli authorities themselves. PHR coordinator added that in case some Palestinian patients were granted entry permits, the Israeli intelligence agents at the Erez crossing bar them from entry before they collaborate and provide them with information about Gaza and when they refuse their blackmail, they return despite their serious medical status….

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Palestinians stranded in Egypt call for assistance
Nisreen Qumsieh & Rami al-Mughari – IMEMC News
A group of approximately 6,000 Palestinians stranded on the Egyptian side of the Gaza-Israel border, on Monday morning delivered a petition to both Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas and Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak to intervene and help bring an end to their suffering. In the petition, the stranded Palestinians indicated that several of their number were suffering from serious diseases and called for immediate intervention to bring an end to their ongoing plight. The petition added most of the group had no money or supplies left an, as such, were forced to sleep outdoors in the increasingly cold weather….

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Rock it…
Layla Anwar, An Arab Woman Blues
…Is that what Maliki, the asshole, means by “sectarian violence is now closed” ? Does that mean that you, American shits and your sectarian Shia scum cohorts have finished off the Sunnis? Hence, you can safely declare that “sectarian violence is closed?” (…) Ha! Keep on dreamin’. There are no closed chapters in Iraq, as long as it occupied by American and sectarian shia filth… We will keep on rockin’ you, you motherfuckers. You and your collaborators. You don’t believe me ? Just by coincidence, the 1920 Revolutionary Brigade from the Iraqi Resistance, has started its operation “Rock HARD.” And by God we will rock you and your collaborators very hard. Very hard indeed…

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Neocon Sandwich: U.S. Building Military Base Directly Atop Iraqi Oil Platform
The HuffingtonPost
From the Wall Street Journal: The U.S. Navy is building a military installation atop this petroleum-export platform as the U.S. establishes a more lasting military mission in the oil-rich north Persian Gulf. While presidential candidates debate whether to start bringing ground troops home from Iraq, the new construction suggests that one footprint of U.S. military power in Iraq isn’t shrinking anytime soon: American officials are girding for an open-ended commitment to protect the country’s oil industry….

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The Blame Game in Gaza
In light of the gravity of Gaza’s situation there is much temptation to fall into a logically fallacious line of reasoning
Philip Rizk, PalestineFreeVoice
The blame game surrounding Gaza’s current political and social crisis is too unilateral and simplistic. In the public sphere responsibility for the instability of Gaza and the general Palestinian political malaise is placed either on Fatah’s corruption in leadership or on Hamas’ violent tendencies while seizing control of the Gaza Strip and during its consequent rule. Such a stance is feeding into the dichotomous derision of the rival Palestinian parties’ rhetoric. Both Hamas and Fatah must bare responsibility for their action and inaction. Meanwhile, unless the International Community pressures Israel to put an end to human rights abuses carried out against Palestinians in Gaza and the West Bank the milieu for any compromise between Hamas and Fatah remains unattainable….

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Reasons for decreasing US death toll in Iraq
Seele, Iraq-war.ru
…The new “search and avoid” missions on which more and more of the US patrols tend to go, as we learned from the military boys themselves, when they admitting that despite the troop numbers being up in Iraq, the true numbers of patrols being carried out is significantly down (!) as more and more US soldiers and small commanders (US low rank officers like e.g. captians etc.) silently tend to refuse to carry out the patrols their high command is demanding them to do. And instead of performing the demanded “patrols” they simply leave the base “as if going on patrol” but then after having carried out at best 1/3 of it, they simply “park” their vehicles somewhere and then wait till the time which the patrol is supposed to take is over. And then they return to their base and tell their higher commanders that they carried out the patrol and did see nothing, or tell them whatever story…

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US-led forces kill two children in Afghanstian
Fisnik Abrashi, Associated Press Writer
US-led coalition troops battling suspected militants in southern Afghanistan lobbed a grenade that destroyed a house and killed 15 militants as well as a civilian woman and two children, the coalition said yesterday. A roadside bomb in the east killed two NATO troops and wounded a third, the alliance said in a statement. The US-led troops in southern Afghanistan were raiding compounds suspected of housing bomb makers in the Garmser district of Helmand province on Sunday when militants attacked them with heavy fire, the statement said…

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Intel Official: Say Goodbye to Privacy
PAMELA HESS, AP
A top intelligence official says it is time people in the United States changed their definition of privacy. Privacy no longer can mean anonymity, says Donald Kerr, the principal deputy director of national intelligence. Instead, it should mean that government and businesses properly safeguards people’s private communications and financial information. Kerr’s comments come as Congress is taking a second look at the Foreign Surveillance Intelligence Act. Lawmakers hastily changed the 1978 law last summer to allow the government to eavesdrop inside the United States without court permission, so long as one end of the conversation was reasonably believed to be located outside the U.S….

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What was going inside thier tiny heads ? I wander
Dr. Mona El-Farra, From Gaza, with Love
I don’t know exactly, what was going, inside the little heads, of the kids who were preparatory school children, of Al Buriege boys preparatory school
But the two tiny bodies were shot ,with many bullets, as I was told by my colleagues of the ER at the AlAqsa hospital. Life of kids in Gaza is very intolerable, poverty, violence. Lack of security no entertainments, in simple one sentence, LACK OF NORMAL LIFE UNDER OCCUPATION AND INSIDE THE REFUGEE CAMP, populatiion of Gaza is 1.4 million 60%are children under 17 years old , two thirds are refugees . On that day, when the dreams of two tiny kids has stoped forever…

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Amnesty Warns ISAF Over Afghan Torture Reports
The Epoch Times Ireland
NATO forces in Afghanistan may be breaching their own operating rules by handing detainees to Afghan security services despite reports that they torture their prisoners, rights group Amnesty International said on Tuesday. It said the fact that the torture and mistreatment reports were now so widely circulated made the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) members in effect complicit when they handed over detainees. The allegations of torture particularly involved the National Directorate of Security (NDS), Amnesty said in a report “Afghanistan: Detainees transferred to torture: ISAF complicity?”…

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The Dismantling of Yugoslavia: A Study in Inhumanitarian Intervention (and a Western Liberal-Left Intellectual and Moral Collapse) – Parts I,II
Edward S. Herman and David Peterson, Monthly Review
The breakup of Yugoslavia provided the fodder for what may have been the most misrepresented series of major events over the past twenty years. The journalistic and historical narratives that were imposed upon these wars have systematically distorted their nature, and were deeply prejudicial, downplaying the external factors that drove Yugoslavia’s breakup while selectively exaggerating and misrepresenting the internal factors. Perhaps no civil wars—and Yugoslavia suffered multiple civil wars across several theaters, at least two of which remain unresolved—have ever been harvested as cynically by foreign powers to establish legal precedents and new categories of international duties and norms. Nor have any other civil wars been turned into such a proving ground for the related notions of “humanitarian intervention” and the “right [or responsibility] to protect.” Yugoslavia’s conflicts were not so much mediated by foreign powers as they were inflamed and exploited by them to advance policy goals. The result was a tsunami of lies and misrepresentations in whose wake the world is still reeling…

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The Intention of Demolishing Great Mosque
Association of Muslim Scholars in Iraq (AMSI)
AMSI made a press statement warning the current Iraqi Government about intention of demolishing the great Mosque of Samarra and Religious Schools in the city. At the press statement (number 483) the Association of Muslim Scholars in Iraq (AMSI) said that “AMSI warns the current government about its schemes through the demolition of Great Mosque and Religious Institutions in Samarra City. This work will provoke the feelings of Muslims especially the people of Samarra City.”….

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Islamic Army in Iraq’s statement
Denying media lies about killing 18 of al-Qaeda elements
Islamic Army in Iraq’
Media agencies reported a news that the Islamic Army in Iraq with the joint forces had killed 18 and arrested 16 of the Al-Qaeda organization in Samarra, assigned this stating to a member in the Islamic Army in Iraq named Abu Ibrahim, here we want to point out the following:
1. Any statement not coming from our official sources is a lie and the side broadcasts it bears the responsibility of it.
2. Our official sources are the letters from the leader of the Islamic Army, official spokesman, the media spokesman, statements and official statements on our official website on the internet.
3. The Islamic Army in Iraq didn’t involve in its military operations with any military force except the Jihadist factions.
4. All military forces that target the jihadist factions are our enemy.
5. Fighting al-Qaeda organization happens only under the concept of self defense and what the news reported was a purely lie….

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Iraq: Kurds Push Ahead With Oil Contracts
Kathleen Ridolfo
Iraq’s Kurdistan regional government (KRG) continues to award contracts for oil exploration and development to foreign oil companies despite allegations by the central Oil Ministry that the contracts are not valid due to the absence of an oil law. The KRG has ignored the criticism and contends that the contracts are legal. The KRG has awarded 12 new contracts to international firms over the past two weeks. On November 12, it said it approved five production-sharing contracts with European, U.S., and Korean companies. The contracts are for the exploration and development of fields in the region’s Irbil, Al-Sulaymaniyah, and Dahuk governorates….

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Iraqi Resistance Report for events of Monday, 12 November 2007.
Translated and/or compiled by Muhammad Abu Nasr, member, editorial board, the Free Arab Voice. www.freearabvoice.org
…In a dispatch posted at 2:20pm Baghdad time Monday afternoon, the Yaqen News Agency reported that US troops together with puppet police and tribal levies known as the “al-Anbar Awakening Council” puppet police carried out a series of mass raids and arrests in the town of al-’Ubaydi located to the east of al-Qa’im near the Syrian border in western Iraq. Yaqen reported sources in the puppet police as saying that the arrests were accompanied by a curfew that was imposed on the city until further notice. The puppet police claimed that the sweep followed information that large numbers of booby trapped cars had been moved into al-’Ubaydi for attacks on Americans and their allies…

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A massacre in Afghanistan
( late Tuesday night, May 8, 2007 – May 11, 2007)
Prof. Marc W. Herold, The Afghan Victim Memorial Project
In what must surely be labeled a massacre, some 50-80 civilians were killed in a string of small villages including Sarwan Qala and Sra Ghar. An occupation force convoy was attacked in the afternoon of May 8th. Later U.S. Special Forces called-in close in support. US/NATO war planes then bombed houses where they believed Taliban were hiding. Even the puppet governor of Helmand Province, Assadullh Wafa, admitted that 21 civilians had died in the bombing (a figure widely cited by the Associated Press which routinely and uncritically publishes accounts by the U.S. military and the Kabul client regime). Others put the deaths much higher. A resident of the bombed area, Mohammad Asif, said five homes in the village of Soro were bombed, killing 38 and injuring more than 20. “Foreign troops are killing Afghans every day, but our government has closed its eyes and does not see our casualties,” local resident Haji Ibrahim said. Residents disputed that Taliban fighters were involved. “There were no Taliban in our area,” Mohammad Rahim, a resident of Sangin, told Reuters by phone, adding he had seen 24 bodies in three houses. The village of Sarwan Qala was demolished. The photo shows one of the many civilians injured. Carlotta Gall, one of the few independent news reporters, wrote,

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What’s it all about, Indy?
Mary Rizzo & Gilad Atzmon
Yup, I suppose some thought I would be able to finally post about events in Palestine. I even thought I would finish my study on racism issues in Italy and how it all relates to maintaining an established order of things so that power remains in the hands of the few and everyone feels insecure. I even had some other things on the back burner, Palestinian poetry and an analytical piece. Nope, it seems that those who would censor and determine the agenda for all “solidarity campaigning” have been working fulltime. As they say, the Devil never sleeps. That means that those who are committed to Palestinians, but are being vilified by this motley crew either have to allow their names to be slurred and their ideas to be buried, or they are in some way compelled to react. So, react we must. Indymedia’s discussion list has been the latest setting of a long series of ritual hangings of Gilad Atzmon, of Peacepalestine, of DYR, of the SWP, of any person, venue or container that does not cave into the pressure of a small and noisy lobby…

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Don’t forget Palestine Arafat never did, and he never let others forget.
Sonja Karkar
For fifty years, Yasser Arafat – or Abu Ammar as he is more familiarly known – made the Palestinian cause his life’s journey, and along the way, be became the undisputed leader of the Palestinian people. His passion spilled over into three words “Don’t forget Palestine” – words he wrote to Egypt’s first President in 1953 when he was still a student, and words which remained his mantra to the end. He lived and breathed Palestine, but sadly, he did not survive to see an independent Palestinian state…

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Update: Another Surge Success Story
Chris Floyd , Empire Burlesque
Following on from our previous report on the America’s new allies in Iraq, Juan Cole has more on another “success” of the surge: the loudly-trumpeted “return” of some Baghdad residents to the city. Al-Hayat reports in Arabic that Syrian officials say 1,500 Iraqis are being forced to leave Syria every day as a result of strict new visa requirements…Note, however, that this influx of 7,000 Iraqis a week from Syria is not spurred by better security in Iraq (otherwise, why are 500 a day or 3500 a week still leaving Iraq for Damascus?) The exodus is being dictated by new Syrian strictness about visas and residency permits.

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On the 3rd anniversary of Arafat death
Dr. Mona El-Farra, From Gaza, with Love
What happened in Gaza today was very sad and shameful. The police opened fire against the crowd,thousands of women , men and children , who were gathering to commomerate ,the 3rd annivesary of Mr. Arfat death. At least 100 were injured 7 were killed , tens were arrested . On my way home i saw many armed masked men. The firing is sporadic ,the roads next to my home were covered with scattered stones, it was not easy for me to reach home , I was not allowed to use many roads , in the end I managed to reach home . I will stop here as words cannot flow , I feel so sad…

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At least six Palestinians killed during Arafat commemorative rally
IMEMC
At least six Palestinians were on Monday killed during a mass rally commemorating the death of Yasser Arafat in Gaza city, media sources have indicated. Initial eyewitness reports suggest that the Gaza police force attacked the rally after an armed man, reported by Hamas sources to be a Fatah gunman, opened fire from nearby rooftops, but the precise circumstances of the outbreak of violence remain unclear. IMEMC’s correspondent in Gaza city, who attended the demonstration, reported that Hamas forces attacked and assaulted demonstrators, leaving at least 30 Palestinians injured….

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Iraqi taxi driver killed by private security guard protecting US convoy in Baghdad
The Associated Press
An Iraqi taxi driver was shot dead by a private security guard hired to protect U.S. convoys driving through Baghdad, Iraqi officials said Monday. The incident took place Saturday afternoon, when a taxi driver got close to the convoy in western Baghdad’s Atafiyah neighborhood, according to Iraq’s Interior Ministry and a police officer at the nearest station. The U.S. Embassy in Baghdad corroborated that account, but said it could not confirm whether anyone was killed or wounded. It was the latest incident involving what Iraqis believe are unprovoked killings by contractors hired to protect Americans here. In September, another shooting left 17 Iraqis dead and prompted the Iraqi government to call for the expulsion of the firm involved, Blackwater Worldwide….

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A Dialogue Between Dr. Harith Al-Dhari and Iraq News Network
Association of Muslim Scholars in Iraq (AMSI)
….Some information indicates that there are negotiations and contacts with Americans, some resistance groups and Baath Party representatives. What is it your attitude of such contacts? We are hearing as you hear that there are contacts and dialogues between some of resistance groups and the occupation authorities. There are also allegations between some political posts such as members of Baath party. But we don’t know about them more. We only hope from our resistance brothers or other politicians whom are standing opposite to the occupation that these talks could be in the level of responsibility, in the sake of liberation of Iraq, ending the occupation in our country and not be as private benefits….

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US group: Iraqis face wide-raging problems in Mideast, detentions in Lebanon
The Associated Press
Iraqi refugees face a wide array of problems in the Middle East, from lack of basic assistance to political obstacles, and are being increasingly detained in Lebanon, a U.S. group advocating refugee protection said in a report Monday. The report by the Washington-based Refugees International was issued after its team visited Lebanon, Syria and Egypt for a month to gauge what homeless Iraqis deal with. An advance copy of the report, dated Nov. 14, was made available to The Associated Press. The report claimed Lebanese authorities have detained hundreds of Iraqis who entered the country illegally….

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Trading citizenship for security
Aljazeera.net
Maher al-Jasem, an Iraqi journalist from Anbar province, recently visited Erbil in northern Iraq, and found that while no political secession has yet occurred, the Kurdish city has effectively partitioned itself from the rest of the country. Erbil is located 80km from Mosul and 90km south of Kirkuk along a crucial trade route to Turkey. It is here that Kurdish authorities have chosen as the seat of the provincial parliament – the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG). And it is here that thousands of families sought refuge, escaping the sectarian carnage in the south of the country. Fearing an influx of mostly Arab refugees, and infiltration by fighters, the KRG has clamped down on the entry of non-Kurds into the city. Those wishing to enter the city are required to have a guarantor who is an “original Kurdish citizen” from Erbil….

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Torture and pre-emptive strikes are similar
John Laughland
Arguments in favour of the legalisation of torture have not lost their capacity to shock. The fact that US attorneys-general and the senior legal adviser at the State Department have said they are in favour of it seems proof to many of America’s slide into barbarism. In reality, however, their pro-torture arguments are no different from the claims made in favour of “humanitarian war” and of other forms of military intervention — arguments that, unfortunately, have become increasingly popular since the end of the Cold War. It is therefore no coincidence that the US administration that justifies its wars in the name of claims about humanity and its right to liberty also advocates the use of torture to protect these. Torture and war have been the subject of absolute or near-absolute interdiction in international law. In the aftermath of the Second World War, the Nuremberg and Tokyo trials established the principle that crimes against peace are the supreme crime. Today, however, many people who say they shudder at the abuses committed by the Spanish Inquisition, or by the Americans at Guantanamo, campaign actively in favour of war….

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RISE OF THE NEO-TALIBAN, Part 1
Death by the light of a silvery moon
Syed Saleem Shahzad, Asia Times
Sitting with four key Taliban commanders deep in a labyrinth of lush green mountains, I could see the Sarkano district of the Kunar Valley in Afghanistan, which is the provincial hub of the American military and a base for the Afghan National Army and Afghan intelligence. Scores of guerrilla groups, each comprising a few dozen men, hide on the fringes of the Kunar Valley and launch daily operations into Kunar and Nooristan provinces, and with each passing day they receive new recruits and their attacks grow in intensity. A year ago, I spent two weeks with the Taliban in Helmand province, but since then there has been a sea-change within the Taliban. Without legends such as the slain Mullah Dadullah and Mullah Akhtar Osmani, and with an extremely ill Jalaluddin Haqqani, a neo-Taliban movement has emerged with a new leadership, new zeal and new dynamics. The revitalized and resupplied Taliban are geared to enter a new phase of war without borders to fight coalition forces in Afghanistan and the Pakistan army….

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Olmert: Abbas willing to recognize Israel as ‘Jewish’ state
John Smith – IMEMC
Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert on Monday told a Knesset Committee that Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas was ready to recognize Israel as a ‘Jewish’ state. Speaking to the Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee, Olmert claimed that both Abbas and Palestinian Prime Minister Salam Fayyad were ready to negotiate and establish peace with Israel as a Jewish state. While Olmert conceded that the current Palestinian Authority (PA) may find itself unable to implement such a position, he reiterated his apparent belief that Israel must negotiate with the PA now….

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Treason of the Mainstream Democrats
The Political Crimes of Complicity
RICHARD W. BEHAN
The mainstream Democrats-represented, say, by Harry Reid, Nancy Pelosi, Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama, John Edwards, Joe Biden, and Christopher Dodd-have not levied war against the United States. Their treason lies instead in committing the second offense: they adhere to enemies of the country, giving them aid and comfort. The enemies are President George W. Bush and Vice President Richard Cheney. Like no other president and vice president in history, these men attacked their country. It was not our geography George Bush and Richard Cheney invaded. Instead they abandoned and subverted the bedrock institution of our Constitutional democracy: the rule of law. By word and deed, Mr. Bush repeatedly and arrogantly sets himself above the law, claiming obedience to be a matter of Presidential choice. Mr. Cheney orchestrates, coaches, applauds and iterates….

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Ramla prison threatens to kill Palestinian prisoners trying to protest
Palestinian Information Center
The lawyer of Nafha society for the defense of prisoners and human rights confirmed that the Israeli Ramla prison administration had threatened to kill any Palestinian prisoner in the event of any protest inside the jail’s sections. The Nafha lawyer reported that Hani Al-Halabi, the deputy director of Ramla prison, threatened to close the canteen and to shoot live bullets at any prisoner trying to protest against the policy of the prison administration. The lawyer added that the deputy director of Ramla prison uses bad language when talking to the prisoners’ representatives, pointing out that the Palestinian prisoners returned their meals in protest at the prison administration’s policy…

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Iraqi Kurds and the Hell Choice
Dr. Basim Al- Tuwaisi – Association of Muslim Scholars in Iraq (AMSI)
The Turkish preparation for a big military operation in Northern of Iraq has discovered the joyfulness of the Kurdish region and also the collapsing of political choice. The operation that had never actually started aims the armed fighters of the banned Kurdish Labor Party (PKK) that had kidnapped eight of Turkish soldiers two weeks ago. It has put the political reality of the Kurdish region in the northern of Iraq under the scope of light and is far away the American make-up which had invested the chaos of occupation of Iraq and spread out an extraordinary campaign of imaginations. It wishes about the settlement and the region which is moving towards a new and a strong state in the north of Iraq and let this legend to be the principle strategy of the partition Iraq and ending the National Iraqi State….

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Military bulldozers uproot lands west of Bethlehem
Najeeb Farraj – IMEM
Israeli military bulldozers uprooted on Sunday afternoon large areas of Palestinian orchards which belong to residents of Al Ma’sar village, south of Bethlehem; dozens of trees were uprooted. Dozens of residents rushed to the area and tried to stop the uprooting of their lands, and the soldiers attacked them with batons and weapons; one resident was injured and was moved to a medical center after suffering concussions and bruises. Mahmoud Zawahra, head of a local committee against the Wall and Settlements in southern Bethlehem villages, stated that these villages are under ongoing attacks as the army is bulldozing more lands in order to pave a settler-only road leading to Efrat settlement…

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THE TEN PLAGUES OF ZIONISM
Desert Peace
The Ten Plagues of the Israeli Occupation 1. THE PLAGUE OF HOUSE DEMOLITIONS AND COLLECTIVE PUNISHMENT. The families of Palestinians who are merely suspected of acting against Israel, or who reside where gunfire is suspected can be subjected to the punishment of house demolition. Palestinians denied building permits on land they already own, can have their homes demolished. As a result, thousands of Palestinians have been left homeless. Collective punishment is a violation of the 4th Geneva Convention. 2. THE PLAGUE OF ILLEGAL SETTLEMENTS AND BY-PASS ROADS Since the beginning of the Occupation of the West Bank, Gaza Strip and East Jerusalem in 1967, 150 Jewish-only settlements and 11 exclusively Jewish neighborhoods in East Jerusalem have been built in the Occupied Territories….

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Nazis were right, said Alan Dershowitz!
Sabbah’s blog
Welcome to the world of the reality in which a Jewish American Zionist man can cite Nazis in defence of torture tactics. The infamous prof. of Harvard Law School, Alan Dershowitz writes in the Wall Street Journal: There are some who claim that torture is a nonissue because it never works — it only produces false information. This is simply not true, as evidenced by the many decent members of the French Resistance who, under Nazi torture, disclosed the locations of their closest friends and relatives. So it worked for Nazi, why can’t anyone else endorse these tactics…

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American media assaults Arab and Islamic media out of guilt
Ray Hanania (Palestine/USA)
There has been a rise in the number of attacks against the Arab and Islamic media over the past few years. The focus of much of the attacks is al-Jazeera, for no other reason except that al-Jazeera is the best known of the Arab media in the United States, and the most often slandered, libeled and demonized. Most recently, Kristen Gillespie wrote a column in The Nation, the magazine that normally leans “liberal” except when the issues have to do with the Middle East, Palestine-Israel and Islam. Her column in this week’s issue online, The New Face of Al Jazeera, slams the satellite network in what I consider a very unprofessional and unfair manner….

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NATO Expands South, Hindered by US-created Chaos
Nicola Nasser
…Under the headline, “Turkey Rediscovers the Middle East,” the July/August edition of the magazine Foreign Affairs wrote, “a significant shift in the country’s foreign policy has gone largely unnoticed: after of decades of passivity, Turkey is now emerging as an important diplomatic actor in the Middle East.” Within this context Turkey’s pragmatic evolving ties with Iran and Syria, both condemned by Bush as two pillars of a world’s “axis of evil,” is an indication. Similar pragmatic evolution of ties and coordination with the two major obstacles to NATO’s expansion south and southeast, namely Russia and China, could not be ruled out should the United States, the backbone of the alliance, persist with its political and military insensitivity to the strategic interests of her allies….

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Palestinian detainees in Huwwara facing abuse
IMEMC Staff
One of the lawyers of the Palestinian Prisoners Society (PPS) reported on Sunday that Palestinian detainees in Huwwara Israeli prison are facing abuse and ongoing insults by the Israeli soldiers manning the prison. The lawyer stated that the detainees are forced to undergo naked body searches, confined to solitary, and barred from meals. He added that he met with two detainees who informed him of abuse they were subjected to on Monday November 5, after they asked one of the soldiers to give them a lighter as they were in the visiting room….

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Settlements Expand before Annapolis Summit
MIFTAH
Despite optimistic statements made by Palestinians, Israelis and US officials about the “possibility” for peace, facts on the ground remain much stronger testimony than any promises or words of encouragement. While the United States prepares to host the Middle East summit, slated to be held on November 26, Palestinians oscillate between encouraging hopes for the summit’s success and the daunting Israeli measures on the ground. On November 7, the Israeli peace movement Peace Now announced that there is ongoing construction in 88 settlements in the West Bank, including the expansion of already existing settlements and the creation of new settlement outposts. According to Peace Now, 8.1 percent of Israelis live in these illegal Jewish settlements in the West Bank. Most of the construction, the organization said, is in the major settlement blocs Israel insists on annexing to Israel in any final agreement with the Palestinians, including Maaleh Adumim, Gush Etzion and Givat Zeev. Peace Now also said work on the E1 settlement project was continuing in east Jerusalem….

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