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Some Good News from Palestine
by Stephen Lendman
There's precious little any time. Vicious Israeli persecution horrifically affects life in Occupied Palestine creating intolerable conditions for millions.
In the Negev alone, Israel destroys 1,000 Arabs homes annually on the phony pretext of building without permit permission.
Israeli security forces kidnap Palestinians for wanting to be treated like human beings. Hundreds of Palestinians are imprisoned uncharged and untried. Others are tortured to extract confessions for crimes they didn't commit.
Soldiers target farmers in their fields, fishermen at sea and children at play or going to or from school. They commit cold-blooded murder with impunity.
Israel wages wars of aggression at its discretion. Thousands of Palestinians harmed don't matter. An endless cycle of violence and oppression continues without letup. The world community does nothing to stop it.
Over the past year, investors reacted with their pocket books. The UN Conference on Trade and Development's (UNCTAD) World Investment Report indicated foreign investment in Israel plunged nearly 50% in 2014 - hitting the lowest level in more than a decade, from $11.8 billion in 2013 to $6.4 billion in 2014.
Naked aggression on Gaza along with BDS effectiveness are key reasons why. Report co-author Roni Manos said "(w)e believe that what led to the drop in investment in Israel are Operation Protective Edge and the boycotts Israel is facing."
Slicing and Dicing Greece to Pay Bankers
by Stephen Lendman
Western societies are banker occupied territory. Financialization let monied interests scam ordinary people of incomes, savings, jobs, homes, overall welfare and futures.
Profits alone matter. Paying bankers first is standard practice. Eurozone straightjacket membership mandates rules no just societies would tolerate, including foregoing the right to:
• control their own money to monetize debt freely;
• legislate fiscal policies to stimulate growth; and
• devalue their currency to make exports more competitive.
Tiny Greece is forced to accept the same system as economic powerhouse Germany - no matter the obvious inequities.
It's debt entrapped way beyond its ability to repay. The more bailout help it accepts, the deeper the financial hole it digs.
WHEN JOHNNY CAME HOME
Allen L Roland. Ph.D
A heart centered approach to assist combat veterans with PTSD has not only proved effective but has led to inner transformation for many combat veterans in the past five years. I present a composite of two graduates of the Healing the Wounded Hearts (Band of Brothers) program in Northern California where Johnny finally came home to a life of meaning , value and framed in gratefulness: Allen L Roland. Ph.D
“Cultivate the habit of being grateful for every good thing that comes to you, and to give thanks continuously. And because all things have contributed to your advancement, you should include all things in your gratitude.” ~ Ralph Waldo Emerson
It is estimated that at least 40% of combat troops suffer from Post traumatic Stress disorder (PTSD) ~ a disorder that an individual is diagnosed with after being directly exposed to an extreme traumatic event such as witnessing an actual or threatening death experience, serious injury, or someone who has been fatally injured. PTSD can also be triggered by a threat to one’s physical integrity or learning, or witnessing an unexpected or violent death, serious harm, or being threatened of death or injury by a family member or other close associate.
Pentagon Declares Truth-Telling Journalists Unprivileged Belligerents
by Stephen Lendman
According to the Department of Defense Law of War Manual, journalists aren't just civilians. They "may be members of the armed forces, persons authorized to accompany the armed forces, or unprivileged belligerents."
Section 1031 of the FY 2010 Defense Authorization Act replaced the designation "unlawful enemy combatant" with "unprivileged enemy belligerent." Language changed but not intent or lawlessness. Obama embraces the rogue Bush agenda on steroids.
Designating truth-telling journalists "unprivileged belligerents is one step away from criminalizing their work ordering their arrest, disappearing them or eliminating them altogether for explaining what everyone needs to know on issues mattering most and not tolerating high crimes of state.
Senate Caves on Fast Track
by Stephen Lendman
It's all over but the impending disaster awaiting US consumers and the environment.
After cloture ended debate on Tuesday, Senate members overwhelmingly caved to corporate predators, giving them the right to plunder freely - their top priority to profit hugely by ripping off consumers, compromising digital freedom, polluting the environment and overriding national laws for their own benefit.
House members caved days earlier. Overwhelming popular sentiment didn't matter. Congress handed corporate predators blank check authority to do any damn thing they wish - no matter the harm to consumers, the environment or rule of law.
Irresponsible Iran Bashing
by Stephen Lendman
The world's number one human rights abuser on a global scale annually publishes individual country reports excluding itself. One-sided bias describes how Washington views independent governments it wants replaced by ones it controls - vilifying them irresponsibly.
Its latest 2014 Iran human rights report contains a litany of exaggerations, misinformation and Big Lies.
Included are false claims of speech, press, religion and assembly restrictions, disappearances, arbitrary arrests and detentions, torture, murder, denial of free elections, due process and judicial fairness, anti-Semitism among other misreported allegations listed.
Why are some Lebanese Sunni Muslims becoming sympathetic toward Da’ish (ISIS)?
Franklin Lamb
Damascus
As recent developments in the Levant make plain, the Sunni-Shiite conflict is increasingly dominating political and strategic initiatives and calculations in Lebanon. In the twelve months since declaring its "caliphate” on June 29, 2014, the “Islamic State” (IS/ISIS/Da’ish), basically a political power movement as opposed to being a religious project, continues birthing international and local franchises. The numbers of foreign fighters from diverse countries traveling to join Da’ish or Nusra increases after every victory. The US State Departments just released 2014 Country Reports (6/18/2015) spends considerably more time discussing the growth in popularity of the group's ideology than previous reports.
Congress Approves Greater Corporate Predation
by Stephen Lendman
On June 18, House members narrowly approved fast track Trade Promotion Authority (TPA) - using procedural gimmicks, bribes and heavy pressure, the usual way corrupt politicians operate.
On June 23, Senate members followed suit. A cloture motion to end debate passed - clearing the way for a Wednesday vote expected to support TPA.
Public Citizen President Robert Weissman commented saying: The usual "legislative contortions an gimmicks…hand(ed) (corporate predators) their top priority" - the right to ram through Congress with minimal debate and no amendments anti-consumer rapacious trade deals no responsible societies would tolerate.
Plans for Destroying Greece Stall
by Stephen Lendman
Monied interests want vVV destroyed - trapped in endless debt peonage. Industry groups said nearly 60 Greek companies shut down daily since January 1 - costing over 600 jobs and 22 million euros in GDP every 24 hours.
EU officials complicit with the IMF and ECB (the so-called Troika) want Greek enterprises and assets handed to Western corporate predators at fire sale prices and its citizenry reduced to impoverished serfdom with no rights whatever.
It wants democracy entirely eliminated in its birthplace. It wants Western plunder turning Greece into a dystopian wasteland - a nightmarish ruler/serf society enforced by police state harshness. It wants it serving as a model for what's intended for other European countries and America. So-called Western civilization was never civilized. It's on a devastating race to the bottom for ordinary people - beyond the worst of what Orwell envisioned.
IMF Violates IMF Rules, to Continue Ukraine Bailouts
Eric Zuesse
The IMF whose bailout operations are absorbed by the taxpayers in the member countries whenever a particular bailed-out nation defaults, announced on Friday, June 19th, that it will "continue to support Ukraine through its Lending-into-Arrears Policy even in the event that a negotiated agreement with creditors in line with the program cannot be reached in a timely manner.” Though this new “Lending-into-Arrears” policy violates two IMF rules, it was justified by the IMF’s Managing Director Christine Lagarde on the basis of the Ukrainian government’s “continued efforts to reach a collaborative agreement with all creditors.”
In other words: a statement by Ukraine’s government that it wants to reach an agreement with its private creditors is being used by the IMF as if it were an excuse to extend into the indefinite future the IMF’s continued taxpayer-guaranteed financing of (‘lending’ to) the Ukrainian government, despite the fact that the IMF is violating two of the IMF’s own most-basic rules restricting its lending-authority — these rules are lending-restrictions whose purpose was to reduce the riskiness of the IMF’s lending, and so to minimize the amount that the IMF will be taking from taxpayers to fund its losses:
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