In memory of another wedding party massacre
47 Afghan civilians killed, including: The bride, 8 persons aged 14 to 18, 38 women and children
Prof. Marc Herold
6:30 AM, July 6, 2008: a procession was making its way by foot (or in vehicles?) to a wedding in the Ghaz area of Nangarhar Province. The group of mostly women and children escorting the bride to the wedding had stopped to rest when U.S. fighter planes came and bombed, according to eyewitnesses. The procession was as is custom on its way to the groom’s home. A witness, Lal Wazir, who was covered in blood after carrying some of those wounded, said outside the hospital, “The wedding participants were on their way to the groom’s house. They stopped in a narrow location for rest. The plane came and bombed the area. There were between 80 to 90 people altogether.” The procession was hit by a “precision” U.S. air assault when it was in Ka Chona village, Deh Bala (or Haska Mena) district close to the border with Pakistan. The U.S war planes obliterated the wedding party guests: the result was 47 dead civilians including the bride, 8 teenagers and 38 women and children…

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British soldiers accused of sickening sex assault on Iraqi boy, 14
Andrew Johnson, Independent
British soldiers forced a boy of 14 to carry out an act of oral sex on a fellow male prisoner in Iraq, according to shocking new allegations made about the behaviour of British troops. The Ministry of Defence confirmed yesterday that the Royal Military Police (RMP) have launched an investigation. If the allegations are proved, it would mark a sordid low in the behaviour of British troops in Iraq, and damage further the reputation of Britain in the Middle East…

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IRAQ: In one ‘Black Night,’ another Baghdad neighborhood is walled in
By Usama Redha in Baghdad
…The wall wasn’t erected completely, so my driver hoped to find an opening he could squeeze his microbus through. Eventually he gave up and went to the exit manned by two checkpoints and took his place at the end of a long line. When we finally cleared the checkpoints, the other passengers and I saw fresh graffiti that said, “Rafah Crossing welcomes you.” But we were not in Rafah Camp, we were not in Israel at all; we were in Baghdad and the area was Hurriya…

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How Britain wages war
John Pilger
… The second photograph is of a 12-year-old boy, one of three children. They are Kuchis, nomads of Afghanistan. They have been hit by Nato bombs, American or British, and nurses are trying to peel away their roasted skin with tweezers. On the night of 10 June, Nato planes struck again, killing at least 30 civilians in a single village: children, women, schoolteachers, students. On 4 July, another 22 civilians died like this. All, including the roasted children, are described as “militants” or “suspected Taliban”. The Defence Secretary, Des Browne, says the invasion of Afghan istan is “the noble cause of the 21st century”…

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Gaza Strip and West Bank Report 1002: Carter Center to Monitor Truce – Israeli Atrocities Continues on WB
Hiyam Noir, PalestineFreeVoice
Ismail Haniyeh, the Palestinian PM in Gaza City, approved on Friday a proposal from the Carter Center [former US President Jimmy Carter],which has volunteered to monitor the truce agreement on Gaza Strip,of the 19th of June,between the Israeli occupant and the Palestinian resistance.The statement came in an announcement at a press conference held by the Gaza governments spokesman Taher An-Nono.In a summary of the meeting between Ismail Haniyeh and two representatives of the Carter Center…

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Despite all the sabre-rattling, it looks as if Tehran wants to talk
Tony Karon
…The Bush administration’s game amounts to hoping the bluff of a military threat will force the Iranians to back down on uranium enrichment. But the consensus in Iran – and the belief that the US lacks the appetite for a confrontation – makes it extremely unlikely the Iranians will buckle to a threat. There are growing signs, however, that Iran is interested in pursuing a deal that resolves the issue, and the broader tensions with the West, in a manner that accommodates the legitimate concerns of all sides. Pragmatists around Ayatollah Khamenei, like the key foreign policy adviser Ali Akbar Velayati, have urged that Iran engage with the latest Western proposals. They have even managed to rein in the Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad to the point that he is now making clear that Iran has no intention of attacking Israel, or anyone else…

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Torture and the Rule of Law
Glenn Greenwald, Salon
… In fact, none of the scandals of radicalism and criminality which we’ve learned about over the last seven years — including the creation of this illegal torture regime — can be viewed in isolation. They’re all by-products of the country that we’ve become in the post-9/11 era, primarily as a result of our collective decision to exempt our Government leaders from the rule of law; to acquiesce to the manipulative claim that we can only be Safe if we allow our Leaders to be free from consequences when they commit crimes; and to demonize advocates of the rule of law as — to use Larry Lessig’s mindless, reactionary clichés — shrill, Leftist “hysterics” who need to “get off [their] high horse(s)”…

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East Jerusalem towns being cordoned off, nearby village under complete isolation
Palestinian News Network (PNN)
Israeli forces have imposed a travel ban on the street leading to the East Jerusalem town of Beit Hanina and the Bir Nabala neighborhood. Nabi Samwiil is utterly isolated due the road closure and impossibility of passing the checkpoint. Residents from neighboring villages are unable to use the street as well, causing a wide gap in the international right to freedom of movement. Israeli forces will also not allow any cars with Palestinian license plates to pass through the checkpoint that is near the illegal Israeli settlement of Ramot. Access within East Jerusalem and the West Bank, and that between the two, is being further restricted…

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Something in Talabani’s satchel ?
Arablinks
…In other words, according to these rumors, Bush implied, at least, that he is prepared to help perpetuate the Kurdish/Daawa/SupremeCouncil regime insofar as he can do so in the waning months of his administration, but the main element of this will have to be an agreement respecting continued American military involvement—in this context, obviously, as a support for the Kurd/Shiite regime for whose support Bush has suffered so much and such harsh criticism, and on behalf of which he has done so much “on presidential authority..that his advisers… do not agree with”…

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Internal chaos in Gaza continues: local Fateh leader dies to alleged abuse in Hamas prison
Palestinian News Network (PNN)
Fateh officials reported the death of their Secretary from the central Gaza Strip’s Nusseirat Refugee Camp this afternoon. He died on Saturday after spending a month and a half in a Hamas run prison. Bassam Al Anani was the father of five children. Hamas arrested the 40 year old nearly five months ago on 22 February, however due to alleged beatings and torture inside the prison he was taken to Al Shifa Hospital 15 days ago where medical personnel rushed him into intensive care and pronounced his condition “critical.” Doctors reported today that Al Anani died at noon today in the hospital… Aseer Moharar, the Gaza organization to free prisoners, reports that Israeli forces arrested Al Anani on 28 January 1993, sentencing him to 13 years. He was released after five in 1998. Israeli forces also killed his brother, Mahmoud Al Anani, a member of Fateh’s armed resistance wing Al Aqsa Brigades…

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“Siege with a new flavor”: Gazans disappointed with truce
Ma’an news
Three weeks after Israel and Palestinian groups in the Gaza Strip agreed to hold their fire, Palestinians in Gaza are disappointed with the results. Life in Gaza has improved marginally – the constant shelling has stopped and a few more goods have been allowed into the besieged territory – but Israel’s continuing total closure of the borders to civilian travel has rendered the ceasefire a letdown. Only the purported reason for the closure has changed. Whereas before Israel blockaded Gaza in response to homemade rockets fired by Palestinian fighters, it now justifies the closure in terms of “violations of the truce.”..

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REWRITING HISTORY
Malcom Lagauche
A few years ago, Michael MacDonald, a teacher at Pine Middle School in Reno, Nevada was called on the carpet for teaching history. The subject was Nazi Germany and the Hitler Jugend (Hitler Youth). He discussed how the youth of Germany were mobilized into groups and were given lessons in military procedures. MacDonald displayed a picture of the Hitler Jugend flag that was emblazoned with a Nazi swastika. Although he had used the same flag depiction in this portion of his history class for the past 10 years, this time a group complained. The Jewish Defense League (JDL) protested the act and asked that the flag be removed and the teacher disciplined. The flag came down, but the school refused to discipline the teacher… I am saddened by the attitude of the JDL, an organization that is not known for its benevolence toward Arabs, atheists, socialists, communists, or many other factions of the U.S. populace. In 2004, a high-ranking JDL official was arrested for plotting to blow up a Muslim mosque in Los Angeles. If any group can throw its weight around enough to blackmail an educational institution into taking down a symbol that depicts history, we are in sad shape in the U.S. The Nazi swastika was real and it was a part of history. It is one thing for a skinhead to wave a Nazi flag and suggest harm to minorities, but it is something totally different to take a symbol out of the history books…

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Iran’s Conflicting Signals to the West
Some Observers Suggest That Missile Tests Show a Readiness to Bargain
Glenn Kessler, Washington Post Staff Writer
… “The Iranian calculation is they need a show of strength,” said Mehrzad Boroujerdi, director of Middle East studies at Syracuse University’s Maxwell School. “They are ready for diplomacy and willing to talk, but they are also saying you can’t treat us like a weak, third-tier state.” Former Middle East envoy Dennis Ross said the varying messages may reflect “both sides of the Iranian leadership,” but they also send a single message: “It makes no sense to attack us — we can talk and we can also make things really horrible.”…

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Attacking Iran? It will not happen
Uri Avnery
… IRAN IS now a regional power. It makes no sense to deny that. The irony of the matter is that for this they must thank their foremost benefactor in recent times: George W. Bush. If they had even a modicum of gratitude, they would erect a statue to him in Tehran’s central square. For many generations, Iraq was the gatekeeper of the Arab region. It was the wall of the Arab world against the Persian Shiites. It should be remembered that during the Iraqi-Iranian war, Arab Shiite Iraqis fought with great enthusiasm against Persian Shiite Iranians. When President Bush invaded Iraq and destroyed it, he opened the whole region to the growing might of Iran. In future generations, historians will wonder about this action, which deserves a chapter to itself in “The March of Folly”…

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Worse than McCain
Mike Whitney
As Bill Van Auken points out in an article on the World Socialist web site, Obama may turn out to be the point-man for reinstating the draft: Obama has “lamented the failure of the Bush administration to issue “a call to service” and “a call for shared sacrifice…There is no challenge greater than the defense of our nation and our values,” said Obama. We “need to ease the burden on our troops, while meeting the challenges of the 21st century,” which, according to Obama, will require an “increase US ground forces by 65,000 soldiers and 27,000 Marines.’” (”Obama continues lurch to the right on Iraq war and militarism” Bill Van Auken)
Is that why the political establishment is so enthusiastic about Obama, because they need a better recruiting sergeant than the uninspiring McCain?..

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CORPORATE MEDIA COLLUDES WITH DEMOCRACY’S DEMISE
Desertpeace
…Our media institutions, deeply embedded in the power structures of society, are not providing the information that we need to make our democracy work. To put it another way, corporate media consolidation is a corrosive social force. It robs people of their voice in public affairs and pollutes the political culture. And it turns the debates about profound issues into a shouting match of polarized views promulgated by partisan apologists who trivialize democracy while refusing to speak the truth about how our country is being plundered. Democracy without honest information creates the illusion of popular consent at the same time that it enhances the power of the state and the privileged interests that the state protects…

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Afghan Warlords, Formerly Backed By the CIA, Now Turn Their Guns On U.S. Troops
Anna Mulrine
The war in Afghanistan reached a wrenching milestone this summer: For the second month in a row, U.S. and coalition troop deaths in the country surpassed casualties in Iraq. This is driven in large part, U.S. officials point out, by simple cause and effect. Marines flowed into southern Afghanistan earlier this year to rout firmly entrenched Taliban fighters, prompting a spike in combat in territory where NATO forces previously didn’t have the manpower to send troops. “We’re doing something we haven’t done in seven years, which is go after the Taliban where they’re living,” says a U.S. official. But amid a well-coordinated assassination attempt on Afghan President Hamid Karzai and large-scale bombings last week in the capitals of both Afghanistan and Pakistan, U.S. forces are keenly aware that they are facing an increasingly complex enemy here—what U.S. military officials now call a syndicate—composed not only of Taliban fighters but also powerful warlords who were once on the payroll of the Central Intelligence Agency…

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Iraq handing out cash to people on the streets
SALLY BUZBEE and QASSIM ABDUL-ZAHRA
It is a politician’s dream: Handing out cold, hard cash to people on the street as they plead for help. Iraq’s prime minister has been doing just that in recent weeks, doling out Iraqi dinars as an aide trails behind, keeping a tally. The handouts by Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki and a handful of other top officials are authorized — as long as each goes no higher than about $8,000, and the same people don’t get them twice…

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Anti-Zionist Orthodox Jews Condemn Zionist Pogroms in West Bank and Strangulation of Gaza
NETUREI KARTA of THE ORTHODOX JEWRY – JERUSALEM, PALESTINE
Anti-Zionist Orthodox Jews worldwide condemn the savage pogroms unleashed against the Palestinian people in the West Bank by the Zionist terrorist gang known as the “IDF. “The Zionist terrorists are currently on a rampage throughout the West Bank to terrorize Palestinian civil society as they strengthen their hold on the prison known as Gaza. We implore the world community not to stand idly by and allow the Palestinian people to be terrorized and sacrificed solely in order to make life comfortable for the Zionist regime…

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