FREED!

Al Jazeerah Sudanese camera man Sami alHajj was finally released from Guantanamo Bay by US military authorities. He was held captive, without being charged for more than five years. In a bit of double speak, US officials said he wasn't being released but merely transferred to Sudanese authorities, who immediately declared alHajj was a free man.

Old news rehashed

The comment was swirling around the internet immediately after 911, but now Netanyahu has repeated it and it's easily attributed. Evidently he likes the taste of his own foot.

The Israeli newspaper Ma'ariv on Wednesday reported that Likud leader Benjamin Netanyahu told an audience at Bar Ilan university that the September 11, 2001 terror attacks had been beneficial for Israel.

"We are benefiting from one thing, and that is the attack on the Twin Towers and Pentagon, and the American struggle in Iraq," Ma'ariv quoted the former prime minister as saying. He reportedly added that these events "swung American public opinion in our favor."

Netanyahu reportedly made the comments during a conference at Bar-Ilan University on the division of Jerusalem as part of a peace deal with the Palestinians.

Meanwhile, Iran's President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad cast doubt over the veracity of the September 11 attacks Thursday, calling it a pretext to invade Afghanistan and Iraq.

"Four or five years ago, a suspicious event occurred in New York. A building collapsed and they said that 3,000 people had been killed but never published their names," Ahmadinejad told Iranians in the holy city of Qom.

"Under this pretext, they [the U.S.] attacked Afghanistan and Iraq and since then, a million people have been killed only in Iraq."

Speaking Wednesday at a news conference on the Iran threat, Netanyahu compared Ahmadinejad to Adolf Hitler and likened Tehran's nuclear program to the threat the Nazis posed to Europe in the late 1930s.

Netanyahu said Iran differed from the Nazis in one vital respect, explaining that "where that [Nazi] regime embarked on a global conflict before it developed nuclear weapons," he said. "This regime [Iran] is developing nuclear weapons before it embarks on a global conflict."

My question is does that mean Israel ties its fortune inversely to the fortune of America so that what's bad for America is good for Israel and vice versa? If Netanyahu honestly feels this way, what then was the role of the dancing Israelis who were equally happy that terrorism struck American soil?

If an atrocity is not printed in MSM does that mean it didn't happen?

That's what the purveyors of conventional wisdom would have you believe. If they have their way, they will eliminate the only challenge to that notion, the internet, so that the public is left completely in the dark about the crimes of the current occupiers. So, before this gets swept under the rug, I'd like to post a few links that detail rather graphically what a Palestinian sees daily in his front or back yard. I note with a certain smugness one of my sources is Israeli, which makes me wonder whether even some of them have grown sick of the bloodshed and mayhem they've wreaked on a defenseless population.

"Everyone there feels like they are doing something wrong. At least my friends felt they were doing something wrong." This was the opening sentence in a pamphlet over 100 pages long, which tells the stories of dozens of soldiers who have served in Hebron over the last few years.

The pamphlet was published by an organization called Breaking the Silence, and includes horrifying descriptions about the behavior IDF soldiers have adopted towards the Palestinian residents of Hebron, and that of the settlers.

Representatives of Breaking the Silence claim that their goal is "to encourage a public debate about the moral price paid by Israeli society as a whole due to the harsh reality faced by young soldiers forced to take control of a civilian population."

According to the organization, all testimonies were investigated fully before being printed and cross-referenced with witnesses' testimonies and archives of other human rights organizations.

One of the organization's activists said that the situation in Hebron has not changed much during recent years, and that Breaking the Silence has been hearing a lot about the "moral deterioration" of the system as a whole and the soldiers subjected to it. He added that Israeli society has a duty to listen to the soldiers and take responsibility for what is being done in its name.

Four testimonies

Metal wire causes loss of hand:

Soldier: "There was one really crazy soldier in my unit, and he loved torture. One time he caused a man to have his hand cut off."

Interviewer: "What happened?"

Soldier: "Just this Arab… The soldier stole a tobacco box from him. "Suddenly the Arab came and yelled, 'thieves, thieves, I saw you.' He got close to the soldier and we tried to keep him away… We didn't know about the stealing.

"The soldier started to beat him, and everyone started pushing… It became a situation where the Arab was being beaten up badly.

"Then the soldier took a metal wire. He was really screwed up. Grabbed the Arab and started to twist it around…"

Interviewer: "On his hand?"

Soldier: "Yeah, he really twisted it. I tell you, we tried to stop him. 'No, I won't let him go. He lifted a hand on me, he'll be punished.' Around and around… Afterwards we tried to get it off and we couldn't, it actually made a groove in his hand. It was blue. And the guy is yelling, 'I can't feel my hand anymore.'

"I said he would have to have his hand cut off. We even tried to dig with a knife, to get it off, but we couldn't… We told him to go to the hospital. Nothing to do, we couldn't cut the wire off."

Theft:

Soldier: "There was a lot of theft… Once we were at these rich people's house in Hebron. We found a ton of dollar bills in one of the drawers. Insane. The commander said to the two senior guys in the unit, 'Okay, we'll split the money.' They split it. Left a little there and told me, 'If you talk we'll come back and slaughter you.'"

Interviewer: "Was looting normal?"

Soldier: "A little looting was normal. Backgammon and cigarettes, everything… Everything that looked nice we took. Other guys took presents for their girlfriends from stores."

Beating:

Soldier: "We were on a patrol and we saw a guy in a cab that looked like he was hiding something. We stopped the car… There was just an incident of a soldier getting stabbed there or something.

"We found a knife… We asked the guy, 'Why the knife?' and he said, 'It's for my mother, to chop vegetables.' We said, 'what are you, an idiot? Are you kidding? Are you lying?' He really pissed us off. We grabbed him, hit him a little, in the ribs, not the face.

"Then the rest of the guys on patrol saw the beating. Everyone jumped on him… They beat him up, really beat him up… Hit him with sticks, in the head… And then one started choking him, with two hands. He was 17 or 18 and he started yelling, 'Mama, Baba.' He kept choking him, he was starting to get blue and lose consciousness.

"Suddenly the other guys saw what was happening and started pulling off the soldier. But he wouldn't let go. He wouldn't let go and he yelled, 'You're trying to kill us, you want to kill us, you want to stab me, eh? Son of a bitch, you want to stab me.'

"He was crazy… We pulled him, his legs and stomach. And his whole body was in the air, and we were pulling and pulling… He went at him like a pit-bull. Finally we got him off."

Choking:

Soldier: "We did all kinds of experiments to see who could do the best split in Abu Sneina. We would put them against the wall, make like we were checking them, and ask them to spread their legs. Spread, spread, spread, it was a game to see who could do it best.

"Or we would check who can hold his breath for longest."

Interviewer: "How do you check that?"

"Choke them. One guy would come, make like he was checking them, and suddenly start yelling like they said something and choke them… Block their airways, you have to press the adams apple. It's not pleasant. Look at the watch as you're doing it, until he passes out. The one who takes longest to faint wins."

I like the part about a "little looting". They probably categorized the theft of an entire state in the same way.

A young Palestinian journalist was recently killed. His video camera was rolling as a tank shell was fired in his direction and exploded in front of his camera sending thousands of one inch darts in his direction. Many are claiming he was targeted by the IDF, and while a picture, his last, is worth a thousand words, there are others who will get us to not see what is unavoidably apparent. Meanwhile the deflecting and diversion of whether the flechettes were legal or illegal under international law continues.

The Horror......

I really can't get angry at the mainstream media for not printing the news that comes out of occupied Palestine, but I do get angry at the denial of people who say death and destruction is not happening to Palestinians while decrying the misery of Israelis. The two are simply not the same. More on that in another post, perhaps. Here is an account out of Gaza that is both chilling and depressing.

Through the streets of Jabaliya refugee camp, the nauseous smell of burning tyres mixes with the sickening smell of singed flesh. Houses gutted by bombs teeter on their foundations. Ambulances race through the camp, sirens screaming as they collect the critically injured and random body parts strewn around the streets.

Electricity no longer functions. Clean water is scarce. Families crouch in cubbyholes and makeshift shelters, huddled around small handheld radios, listening, praying, hoping for an end. This is Israel's "Hot Winter", its latest intensified assault on the people of Gaza and its most recent attempt to rout Hamas.

At Jabaliya's Kamal Adwan Hospital, a steady stream of wounded pour in, the lucky still in possession of life and limbs. Frantic family members vie for attention from exhausted emergency staff. An ambulance arrives. Inside a man clings to life, though much of his skin has been plastered on the streets by an F-16. Mercifully he is unconscious.

With just two operating rooms, Kamal Adwan's surgeons struggle to attend to the admitted while performing triage on the arrivals. Blood coats their uniforms. The scene is of organised destruction and a determination to save lives despite the odds. As the surgeons work, an orderly wheels in another victim. This young man arrives in a coma, bleeding profusely from multiple shrapnel wounds delivered by an air-to-ground missile. The doctors desperately attempt to stem the bleeding.

Suddenly all eyes are raised to the ceiling. Outside, the thwop-thwop-thwop of a helicopter gunship envelops the medical sanctuary, its vibration deafening. Moments later, a thud followed by Boom! Boom! Ka-boom! The Israelis are shelling again close by. Stressed and exasperated, those waiting scream. Some cry, while others sit blank-faced in shock.

Leaving the hospital I pass a young man named Mustapha al-Banna being carried in. His legs and one arm are gone; his eyes have welled with tears. Awake yet not awake, his lip quivers, wanting to speak but he can't. His father frets, holding his son's hand. "He was feeding the sheep at our home when an Israeli F-16 bombed our house," he explains. "His legs were blown out from under him!"

Down the street, I hear the cries of a young girl. "Wake up Samah, please!" she screams. But the teenage victim cannot hear; her torso is burned black. Panicking, the young girl looks to her eldest sister on the other side of the room. But this sister, Salwa, is also dead, both siblings killed as they slept by an Israeli F-16.

When the paramedics arrive at the girls' home, they stare in disbelief. "Where is the rest of the body?" an ambulance driver chokes, realising the walls are where she now lies.

Minutes later, down the street, 17-year-old Jaclyn Abu Shbak screams. Her 14-year-old brother Eyad lies motionless in the street. As she approaches his body, an Israeli sniper shoots her dead.

The Atallah family lived in a three-storey building that was bombed by an Israeli F-16. The air strike killed father, mother and four of their children. Their other two children are in a critical condition and have been transferred to an Egyptian hospital.

And thus the carnage continues. Israeli warplanes, citing "self-defence", relentlessly bomb as women and children flee into the night with whatever they can carry.

Nowhere is safe. The planes target homes. Snipers target children and bombs hold no prejudice or preference.

On 29 February, on Israeli army radio, Israel's deputy defence minister Matan Vilnai threatened "Shoah" on Gaza in response to Qassam rocket fire directed at the Israeli colony of Ashkelon, which resulted in the death of one Israeli. Shoah is the Jewish name for the Holocaust. But this justification for Israel's invasion of Gaza ignores the historical context.

When President George W Bush arrived in the Middle East in January, Israel began a sustained bombing of Gaza, while professing to "seek peace". Its siege and collective punishment of Gaza through border closures and the withholding of food, water and medical supplies has now entered its 25th month.

For the first eight months after Israel removed its illegal colonies from Gaza in September 2005, Hamas and the Palestinian resistance observed a ceasefire, despite Israel's continued random shelling, kidnapping of officials and targeted assassinations. This ended in June 2006 when an Israeli ship bombed a beach in Gaza, killing 13 people, 11 from the same family.

Hamas and the Palestinian Authority in Ramallah repeatedly approach Israel to negotiate a ceasefire. Israel continues to reject each overture, intensifying its assaults and causing an endless tit-for-tat with each side escalating and civilians on both sides paying the price.

Operation Hot Winter claimed 60 lives on its first day. As I write, the total number killed has been more than 126 (among them 39 children and babies and 12 women). There have been more than 380 citizens injured and hundreds of houses demolished.

The United Nations defines as a "massacre" the killing of 50 or more civilians. This has been a massacre, the massacre of Jabaliya. And, as Deputy Defence Minister Vilnai threatened, the potential seed of a holocaust.

I always find these articles amusing....

No terror tie seen in Picatinny incident

The two men who prompted a security alert at Picatinny Arsenal had no connection with terrorism, and only one was charged with unlawfully photographing the military base, authorities said on Monday.

The security scare had prompted the closure of Route 15 for several hours on Sunday while authorities detained the men and investigated the scene.

Denis S. Ayzenberg, 26, of Lawrenceville, Ga., was charged with violating a federal statute that deems it illegal for anyone to possess a "photograph, sketch, picture, drawing, map, or graphical representation of such vital military and naval installations or equipment without first obtaining permission of the commanding officer of the military post."

Ayzenberg and another man, who was not charged and was not identified by authorities, were seen taking photographs of Picatinny from the inside of their tan Nissan Pathfinder on Sunday afternoon, after base police had asked them to leave about 30 minutes earlier, said Picatinny Garrison Commander Lt. Col. John Stack.

The SUV was stopped on Route 15 South, alongside a grassy divide that separates southbound Route 15 from a small side street, West Union Turnpike.

Picatinny police saw that Ayzenberg was concealing a digital camera under a jacket on his lap. Other items that could be used for surveillance, including a laptop, were on the floor of the vehicle. Officers also found a notebook written in a foreign language, along with a sentence in English that read, "Picatinny Arsenal: Take a picture of the red building." There also were several bags authorities on the scene could not open, Stack said.

The men told authorities that a girlfriend who grew up in the area had asked them to take pictures to see how it had changed.

"Their story didn't seem to pan out," Stack said. "These devices could have been used for potential surveillance, and it was unclear whether this was related to terrorism, so we called in experts."

The foreign language turned out to be Hebrew, and the two men, described by authorities as Russian and Belarusian Orthodox Jews, were deemed by the FBI's Joint Terrorism Task Force to have no terrorist connections, authorities said. They were held overnight while a more in-depth investigation was conducted by the Morris County Prosecutor's Office and Rockaway Township Police, Stack said.

The Prosecutor's Office had no information to release on the case, a spokeswoman said Monday evening.

"The end result was that there was no evidence of wrongdoing other than that they were on the installation, taking pictures," Stack said. "The important thing is that we did our due diligence to ensure no criminality before the suspects were released."

Ayzenberg is scheduled to appear before U.S. Magistrate Judge Anthony Mautone on April 29. If found guilty, he could face maximum statutory penalties of up to one year in prison and/or unspecified fines.

Stack said authorities at Picatinny base employ "adaptive security measures" and have taken "precautions and are making adjustments so there are no patterns in the way we react to incidents."

Rep. Rodney Frelinghuysen, R-Harding, who periodically visits the base, applauded the way the investigation was handled by Picatinny and law enforcement officials.

"Senior leaders at the arsenal report that they have established a top-flight security system," Frelinghuysen said in an e-mailed statement. "The people of Picatinny and residents of the surrounding communities deserve no less."

During the incident on Sunday, Route 15 South was closed between Route 80 and Berkshire Valley Road for several hours, and was reopened around 7:30 p.m., after the SUV was towed from the scene.

Picatinny Arsenal spokeswoman Tonya Townsell said the base regretted closing down Route 15, which delayed traffic and caused backups on Berkshire Valley Road.

Did you get the part about foreign handwriting found in the van along with a laptop computer, instructions to photograph a particular building and several bags the authorities couldn't open? This observer wonders why the two different languages, English and Hebrew....unless the Hebrew writing was a religious scripture. Foreign religious texts are a sure sign of suicide bombers, or so we've been led to believe, as it applies to members of the Islamic faith. Both of the men in the above article were identified as orthodox Jews so that means we have nothing to fear. Hiding a digital camera....and secured bags the authorities couldn't open, beg the question what pictures were taken and what was in the bags? We'll never find out, but it is interesting to see the presumption of innocence so quickly given to some while laboriously denied to others.

Context? What the hell is that?

I was floored when I read this news coming out of a Europe that claims freedom of speech is not only a right but a western tradition that must be maintained at all costs. Carrying the banner of freedom of speech aloft, the Dutch have once again incited,or attempted to incite, the passions of Muslims with the latest project to come from that country, the internet video, "Fitnah".

I have always found it funny that they claim freedom of speech to sling epithets at Muslims and de-contextualize Islamic doctrine, but don't see that same freedom extends to the........Holocaust for example, or to Jews in general. So now comes this

The Central Council of Jews in Germany on Thursday requested that a Hamburg court issue a cease-and-desist order against Google for disseminating what it claims are anti-Semitic videos that incite "racial hatred and discrimination" on its YouTube Web site.

"The radical right-wing scene is using YouTube, massively, as a platform," said Stephan Kramer, the general secretary of the Central Council of Jews, the umbrella organization of Germany's Jewish communities. "We are accusing Google, with its YouTube video platform subsidiary of being an accomplice to inciting racial hatred and discrimination."

I don't recall them making that argument when the time bomb cartoons were all the talk about freedom verses giving in to the Islamists. If anybody does know of such a call by the Jewish community when their semitic brothers the Muslims were protesting the turban time bombs as spiteful and hate-filled, please post a comment and a source.

Who said Muslims don't speak out against terrorists in their midst

Winning friends and influencing people is hard to do for the Taliban these days. This comes as no surprise to this observer, since I've already recounted dozens of cases where such a declaration has been made before. This is only the latest, and I'm sure won't be the last.

Another domino has fallen in the excuse for the war on terror. We know now that the US administration knew before it was elected getting rid of Saddam was its first priority, that according to the good folks at PNAC, but even all their excuses have been debunked and proven as lies, from WMDs to the link to al-Qaida to this last tidbit.

But curiously little has been heard about the allegedly foiled assassination plot in the five years since the U.S. military invaded Iraq. A just-released Pentagon study on the Iraqi regime's ties to terrorism only adds to the mystery. The review, conducted for the Pentagon's Joint Forces Command, combed through 600,000 pages of Iraqi intelligence documents seized after the fall of Baghdad, as well as thousands of hours of audio- and videotapes of Saddam's conversations with his ministers and top aides. The study found that the IIS kept remarkably detailed records of virtually every operation it planned, including plots to assassinate Iraqi exiles and to supply explosives and booby-trapped suitcases to Iraqi embassies. But the Pentagon researchers found no documents that referred to a plan to kill Bush. The absence was conspicuous because researchers, aware of its potential significance, were looking for such evidence. "It was surprising," said one source familiar with the preparation of the report (who under Pentagon ground rules was not permitted to speak on the record). Given how much the Iraqis did document, "you would have thought there would have been some veiled reference to something about [the plot].

Looking for evidence that can't be found. It's happened again and again since we invaded Iraq. There's nothing curious about the absence of this excuse on the national conscience as a reason for war. The planners knew it was as spurious as all the other dominoes that have fallen since 2003.