Link: http://www.nytimes.com/2009/06/10/world/asia/10peshawar.html?ref=asia

"Militants" opened fire on security guards and rushed a small truck packed with explosives through the gates of a five-star hotel in this northwestern city on Friday, detonating a large bomb in the parking lot and killing at least 11 people and wounding 55, Pakistani officials.

Link: http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1244371046569&pagename=JPost/JPArticle/Printer

In a sign of growing concern in Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu's government over US President Barack Obama's Middle East policies, Minister-without-Portfolio Yossi Peled proposed Israeli sanctions on the US in a letter to cabinet ministers on Sunday. In the 11-page letter, obtained by The Jerusalem Post from a minister on Monday, Peled recommends steps Israel can take to compensate for the shift in American policy, which he believes has become hostile to Israel.

Link: http://www.presstv.ir/detail.aspx?id=97525&sectionid=351020202

Israeli tanks have crossed the border into the southeast Gaza Strip after the regime's gunboats opened fire at Palestinian fishing boats off the coast across the strip. According to witnesses and local sources, four tanks provided cover for six bulldozers to roll hundreds meters deep into the strip on Tuesday and flattened the cultivated fields in al-Shouka neighborhood in eastern Rafah city. PressTV: Israel hints broader war in region.

Link: http://www.thepeoplesvoice.org/TPV3/Voices.php/2009/06/09/jewish-town-in-galilee-demands-a-8220-lo-8221

Jonathan Cook reports on the depths of racism to which Israel has sunk, where local and regional councils are excluding Arab citizens of Israel from living in the community by demanding that they pledge support for “the values of the Zionist movement, Jewish heritage, settlement of the Land of Israel ... and observance of Jewish holidays”.

Link: http://www.nypost.com/seven/06082009/news/regionalnews/hikind__jews_only_173112.htm

HOLOCAUST-MEMORIAL FLAP. Assemblyman Dov Hikind, whose mother survived the death camp at Auschwitz, said yesterday that only Jews persecuted during the Nazi reign should be honored at a Holocaust memorial in Brooklyn. Hikind said even though 5 million people from other groups -- including gays, the disabled and Jehovah's Witnesses -- were killed along with 6 million Jewish people during the Holocaust, the memorial in Sheepshead Bay should be for Jews only. "To include these other groups diminishes their memory," said Hikind, as he stood next to his 89-year-old mother, Frieda. He said he is not against a memorial to honor the other groups -- as long as it is somewhere else. "These people are not in the same category as Jewish people with regards to the Holocaust."

Link: http://emptywheel.firedoglake.com/2009/06/08/leon-panetta-kisses-his-credibility-goodbye/

Well, that didn't take long, for a Director of Central Intelligence to totally lose his credibility in the servitude of the institution. What has it been? Three, four months? I'll have more to say about Panetta's declaration in the ACLU FOIA case tomorrow. But for now, a little unsolicited advice for the spook-in-chief.

Link: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/7259427.stm

A company owned by Osama Bin Laden's half-brother has proposed building a bridge across Mandab Strait on the Red Sea, to link Djibouti to Yemen. Tarek Bin Laden Construction is negotiating with the two governments about plans for the 28.5km bridge - one of the longest in the world. The proposed bridge would carry a six-lane motorway and a railway. Apart from the $70bn cost, critics have pointed out that the project would be sited in an earthquake zone. New cities would be built at either end of the bridge. Tarek Bin Laden has spent time lobbying politicians in Djibouti and Yemen to accept his proposal to build the bridge across the Mandab Strait, from Djibouti to Yemen's Perim Island, which is the narrowest stretch of sea between the two countries. ENR.com: Notice-to-Proceed Launches Ambitious Red Sea Crossing.

Link: http://www.presstv.ir/detail.aspx?id=97517&sectionid=3510203

A deadly Israeli attack on a US ship -- an incident largely kept in the dark by Washington -- receives new attention with survivors reliving the painful memory. USS Liberty survivors gathered in Washington on Monday to commemorate the 42nd anniversary of the incident and expound on how they were sprayed with bullets by America's "closest ally and beneficiary".

Link: http://gawker.com/5283939/sean-hannity-interviews-sarah-palin-in-the-woods?autoplay=true

Sean Hannity creepily interviewed Sarah Palin in some wooded area of Long Island, where Sarah proceeded to do what Sarah does—-Spewed out a maddening but hilariously folksy word soup that translates to "I told you so!"

Link: http://rebelreports.com/post/120143061/breaking-15-million-settlement-in-wiwa-vs-shell-oil

Today, the parties in Wiwa v. Shell agreed to settle human rights claims charging the Royal Dutch/Shell company, its Nigerian subsidiary, Shell Petroleum Development Company (SPDC or Shell Nigeria), and the former head of its Nigerian operation, Brian Anderson, with complicity in the torture, killing, and other abuses of Ogoni leader Ken Saro-Wiwa and other non-violent Nigerian activists in the mid-1990s in the Ogoni region of the Niger Delta.

Link: http://www.trifter.com/Africa/15-Awesome-Sites-to-See-in-Namibia.774295

[Click on photo to enlarge.] [Located in Southern Namibia along the Fish River is the second largest canyon in the world the Fish River Canyon which is roughly 100 miles long and up to 16.5 miles wide.] Namibia is one of the poorest countries in the world with an unemployment rate approaching 40% and is the second most sparsely populated country in the world. Namibia relies heavily on tourism for its economy and the country is really an eco-tourists dream. It has tremendous sites to see set in such a sparsely populated country that Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt decided to have their daughter Shiloh Nouvel born in Swakopmund, Namibia in 2006. Here are 15 great things to see and visit in Namibia.