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Hamas’ Political Impasse: Between Principal and Necessity
Ramzy Baroud
Much can be said to explain, or even justify Hamas’ recent political concessions, where its top leaders in Gaza and Damascus agreed in principle with a political settlement on the basis of the two-state solution.
On June 25, Damascus-based leader of the Islamic group’s political bureau, Khaled Meshaal reiterated Hamas’ rejection of recognizing Israel as a Jewish State, rightfully dubbing such a designation as “racist, no different from Nazis and other calls denounced by the international community.” However, he did endorse the idea of a two-state solution, which envisages the creation of an independent Palestinian state on roughly 22 percent of the land of historic Palestine.
Reviewing Marjorie Cohn and Kathleen Gilberd's "Rules of Disengagement: The Politics and Honor of Military Dissent"
by Stephen Lendman
Marjorie Cohn is a Distinguished Law Professor at Thomas Jefferson School of Law in San Diego where she's taught since 1991 and is the current President of the National Lawyers Guild. She's also been a criminal defense attorney at the trial and appellate levels, is an author, and writes many articles for professional journals, other publications, and numerous popular web sites.
Her record of achievements, distinctions, and awards are many and varied - for her teaching, writing, and her work as a lawyer and activist for peace, social and economic justice, and respect for the rule of law. Cohn's previous books include "Cameras in the Courtroom: Television and the Pursuit of Justice" and "Cowboy Republic: Six Ways the Bush Gang Has Defied the Law."
Her newest book just out, co-authored with Kathleen Gilberd (a recognized expert on military administrative law), is titled "Rules of Disengagement: The Politics and Honor of Military Dissent." It explores why US military personnel disobey orders and refuse to participate in two illegal wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. It also explains that US and international law obligate them to do so.
Dear President Obama
Cindy Sheehan
My friend, Cynthia McKinney and Nobel laureate, Mairead Maguire and 20 other people were trying to deliver humanitarian aid to Gaza, which, as I understand, is something that you have encouraged Israel to allow.
The Honorable Cynthia McKinney served six terms in the US Congress and she was the Green Party candidate for the office that you eventually won. It is an outrage that the Israeli Navy would block the boat that she and 21 others were on in international waters and board the boat and kidnap the crew and humanitarian aid workers.
Questioning The Ethical Legitimacy of Drone Attacks in Pakistan And Afghanistan
by Brian McAfee
Ongoing Civilian casualties have become an important consideration when looking at and considering the use and legitimacy of drones in South Asia. In a belated admission last month the U.S. had admitted to 26 civilian deaths in a series of drone attacks that took place in May but was not released to the media until over a month later. In the May attacks Afghan officials put the death toll at 140, significantly higher than U.S. claims. In the same strikes the Afghan Independent Human Rights Commission put the Civilian deaths at 86.
SWITZERLAND IS STILL THE ULTIMATE SAFE-HAVEN FOR WEALTH
By Ron Holland
Many governments, politicians and financial centers competing with Switzerland regularly attack the independent, freedom loving Swiss because this alpine financial center is home to almost $4 trillion dollars in secure, private wealth. Back during World War Two, Adolf Hitler stated, "The Swiss are the most despicable and wretched people, mortal enemies of the new Germany".
Goldman Sachs -the Root of All Evil?
Matt Taibbi
The Greatest Non-Apology of All Time
“While we regret that we participated in the market euphoria and failed to raise a responsible voice, we are proud of the way our firm managed the risk it assumed on behalf of our client before and during the financial crisis,” he said. (via Goldman Regrets ‘Market Euphoria’ That Led to Crisis - DealBook Blog - NYTimes.com.)
Anyone else out there find himself doubled over laughing after reading Goldman, Sachs chief Lloyd Blankfein’s “apology” for his bank’s behavior leading up to the financial crisis? Has an act of contrition ever in history been more worthless and insincere? Even Gary Ridgway did a better job of sounding genuinely sorry at his sentencing hearing — and he was a guy who had sex with dead prostitutes because it was cheaper than paying live ones.
Iran and Washington's Hidden Hand - Has the CIA Been Caught in Iran's Cookie Jar, Again?
Esam Al-Amin
Only weeks after the September 11, 2001, attacks, Charles Krauthammer, the Washington Post columnist and mouthpiece of the neoconservatives, revealed the target list of the Bush administration as it set out on its post-9/11 war footing. The list included six nations: Afghanistan, Iraq, Iran, Syria, Libya, and the Palestinian Authority. While the priority allotted to Afghanistan and subsequently Iraq was not in dispute, the remaining order was in flux.
Israel was given a free hand in dealing with the Palestinian Authority (PA). President George W. Bush completely shunned and isolated PA President Yasser Arafat, until he died under siege in November 2004. Former Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon was allowed to use brutal military tactics to crush the Al-Aqsa intifada, reoccupying much of the West Bank, and setting up hundreds of military checkpoints devastating Palestinian life and what remained of the PA.
Pakistanis Reject U.S. "Aid" Flights, As Lawsuit is Filed Against U.S. Drone Attacks
Jeremy Scahill
Damn those ungrateful Pakistanis. After U.S. drone attacks killed more than 600 of their people since 2006—most of them civilians—it seems they think they have some right to say they don’t want the U.S. flying its “aid” planes to Swat and other “tribal areas.” The New York Times reports that “the Pakistani authorities have refused to allow American workers or planes to distribute the aid in the camps for displaced people.”
The paper reports:
Islamist charities and the United States are competing for the allegiance of the two million people displaced by the fight against the Taliban in Swat and other parts of Pakistan — and so far, the Islamists are in the lead.
Ethnic Cleansing as a State Policy
Nicola Nasser
In his speech at Bar Ilan University on June 14, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu proposed a new Israeli “peace plan,” with preconditions that a Palestinian negotiator must first meet before he would “promptly” engage in “unconditional” bilateral talks to meet an international consensus demanding the creation of a Palestinian state alongside Israel. His preconditions added to the fourteen conditions the former Israeli government of comatose Ariel Sharon attached to Israel’s adoption in grudge of the 2003 Road Map blueprint for peace with the Palestinian side, on the basis of which the U.S. administration of President Barak Obama and his presidential envoy George Mitchell are now urging an early resumption of “immediate” Israeli – Palestinian peace talks, which Mitchell on June 26 hoped “very much to conclude this phase of the discussions and to be able to move into meaningful and productive negotiations in the near future."
John Yoo, Donald Rumsfeld and the Systematic Torture of Prisoners
Jason Leopold
[Former Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld. Rumsfeld instructed officials at the Department of Defense to organize a working group to access the fallout from harsh interrogation methods. (Photo: Kevin Lamarque / Reuters)]
On January 17, 2003, Mary Walker, the Air Force general counsel, received an urgent memo from the Pentagon's top attorney. Attached to the classified document was a set of directives drafted two days earlier by Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld. "Establish a working group within the Department of Defense to assess the legal, policy and operational issues relating to the interrogations of detainees held by the US Armed Forces in the war on terrorism," the directives said.
Among the issues to be addressed were "policy considerations with respect to the choice of interrogation techniques, including contribution to intelligence collection, effect on treatment of captured US military personnel, effect on detainee prosecutions, historical role of US armed forces in conducting interrogations, recommendations for employment of particular interrogation techniques by [Defense Department] interrogators." John Yoo, then a deputy in the Justice Department's Office of Legal Counsel, drafted the document, dated March 14, 2003. It essentially provided military interrogators with legal cover if they resorted to brutal and violent methods to extract information from prisoners.
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