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Israel: Profile of a Rogue State
by Stephen Lendman
Rogue states spurn international law, treaties, conventions, and in Israel's case its own laws and Supreme Court decisions.
Daily examples offer proof, including from Ahmed el-Helah and Mariam Itani's new book titled, "The Suffering of the Palestinian Child under the Israeli Occupation," saying:
Over a million Palestinian children "live and suffer every moment of their lives under the painful reality of occupation."
Growing numbers are killed, injured, maimed, handicapped, arrested, imprisoned, and tortured. Most are impoverished and many hungry.
Spreading Eurozone Contagion
by Stephen Lendman
The operative word is contagion. It's malignant and spreading because it's unresolved and irresponsibly addressed.
Germany, Europe's strongest economy, just had its worst ever bond auction since 1999. Over a third of 10-year bunds offered were unsold. More on the failure below.
Comparable Italian yields jumped to 7.3%. Italy's two-year bond hit 7.7%. The inverted curve signals tougher times ahead. Italy also sold six-month bills at 6.50%, its highest rate in 14 years.
Troubled Spain had to pay 5.11% for three-month money, the highest short-term rate since formation of Europe's Economic and Monetary Union (EMU) in 1999.
Other Eurozone rates also rose, including Portugal's after Fitch downgraded its debt to junk and retained a negative outlook. Hungary was downgraded to junk as well with a negative outlook. Yields there jumped close to 10%. Belgium's in trouble. So are France and Britain. Credit default swaps on European sovereign debt and banks reached all-time highs.
Rage for Change in Egypt
by Stephen Lendman
Tantawi
Last February, Egyptians celebrated Hosni Mubarak's ouster. He became an obstacle to Washington's Middle East agenda and had to go.
For years, State Department and Pentagon officials wanted him out for opposing key US policies, including Iran's nuclear program and Bush's 2003 Iraq war.
A military junta replaced him, headed by Field Marshall Mohammed Hussein Tantawi. He's a powerful old regime stalwart with close ties to Washington. However, US diplomats call him "aged and change-resistant." Notably, he opposes economic and political reform that conflicts with military rule.
The Troubling Case of Saif Gadhafi
By Franklin Lamb - (Zintan, Libya)
Despite the claims of the National Transitional Council of Libya (NTC) that Saif al Islam Gadhafi, the apprehended subject of an International Criminal Court arrest warrant that ordered his transport to The Hague, is in a secure hidden location near Zintan, Libya, a town approximately 85 miles southwest of Tripoli, this is not the case.
Neither are the assurances by Steven Anderson, spokesman for the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) who on 11/23/11 announced that Saif al-Islam’s injuries had been “taken care of,” nor his profuse assurances that Saif is in good health. In point of fact, following the ICRC assurances, the Ukrainian-born Doctor Andrei Murakhovsky who lives in Zintan reported that “Saif’s wound is covered with gangrenous tissue and necrotic tissue.” He added that “This wound is not in good condition and requires amputation. His index finger has been ripped off at the level of the middle phalange (finger bone), the bones are all shattered. It’s the same thing with the thumb of that hand.” Dr. Murakhovsky told the Reuters news service.
Why the Occupy Movement is doomed to failure?
By Prakash Kona
I never understood what the Occupy Movement aimed to achieve to begin with. Either it was too ambitious in aspiring to challenge corporate despotism or its goals were impossible to begin with. Not to mention it continues to be abstract and surreal as ever. I like to watch the protesters on TV who sometimes look innocent to me. The comparison with the Arab Spring by way of analogy is a completely wrong one. The comparison is not between apples and oranges since both are fruits but more like comparing a blue stocking with oxtail soup. Those who have traveled or at least have watched international movies with interest know for a fact that third world streets have a different character from those of the first world. Third world streets like third world life are filled with all too visible contradictions. The contradictions are disguised in the colonial economies of the west. The Occupy Movement and the Arab Spring are as distinct as Tahrir Square and Wall Street and the people who stand there.
The Arab Spring - hello or goodbye to democracy?
By Alan Hart
Israeli democracy fades to black (the black of the blank screen at the end of a film). That was the headline over a recent article by Lawrence Davidson, an American professor of Middle East history. He argued that the suppression of the democratic rights of non-Jews in Israel is coming full circle with Prime Minister Netanyahu’s Likudniks and settlers now targeting the rights of Jews as well. Events in Cairo provoked this question: Are we witnessing the fading to black of the prospects for freedom and democracy in Egypt, or, is resurgent people power going to make it impossible for the military to maintain its controlling grip? (Presumably there would be limits to how many Egyptian civilians Egyptian soldiers were prepared to kill even if the generals, desperate to protect their wealth and privileges, ordered the suppression by all means of protests and demands for real democracy).
Oregon governor rightly suspends death penalty
Mary Shaw
In a September 7 debate among the GOP presidential hopefuls, Texas Governor Rick Perry seemed quite proud of leading the country in death row executions. He indicated that he loses no sleep over the possibility of executing an innocent person. This is despite the fact that we now know that at least one innocent man - Cameron Todd Willingham - had died by lethal injection on Perry's watch.
In sharp contrast, Oregon Governor John Kitzhaber wants to take no such chance. On November 22, Kitzhaber announced that he would allow no more executions through the end of his time in office.
The War on Terrorism or a Global Crusade against Islam
By Mahboob A. Khawaja, Ph.D.
British author and producer Adam Curtis (The Power of Nightmares: The Rise of the Politics of Fear: BBC documentary challenging the American version of the “War on Terrorism”), spells out the myth with clarity: “international terrorism is a fantasy that has been exaggerated and distorted by politicians. It is a dark illusion that has spread unquestioned through governments around the world, the security services and the international media.”
The Feds Knew: 50 years of fracking-induced earthquakes
By Rady Ananda
Washington's Blog posted some info last August confirming that the US federal government has long known of the link between fracking and earthquakes, as well as the link between deep well fluids contaminating shallow drinking wells. As more info keeps coming out, this collection should serve as a handy resource for those confronting (or occupying) well sites or state regulatory agencies.
Global milk war ramps up as citizens face off with regulators
By Rady Ananda
The battle for food freedom intensifies across the planet as citizens assert their right to raw dairy products unadulterated by drugs and genetically modified ingredients – in the face of authorities seeking to restrict our food choices and to criminalize entrepreneurs who operate outside the monopolized factory food system.
The State of Maine recently sued farmer Dan Brown for selling food and milk without State licenses, despite a local law that permits it. “Blue Hill is one of five Maine towns to have passed the Local Food and Community Self-Governance Ordinance,” explains Family Farm Defenders.
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