CIA running black propaganda operation against Iran, Syria and Lebanon, officials say

bismi-lLahi-rRahmani-rRahiem
In the Name of Allah, the Compassionate, the Merciful

=== News Update ===

 

CIA running black propaganda operation against Iran, Syria and Lebanon, officials say

Larisa Alexandrovna

Published: Monday June 4, 2007

Some intelligence sources more wary of covert Pentagon operations

The Central Intelligence Agency has received approval at least twice in the last several years to conduct an “information war” against several countries in the Middle East, including Iran, Lebanon and Syria, according to current and former intelligence officials.

In addition, the Bush Administration has been running operations out of the Defense Department that are not subject to Congressional oversight, intelligence sources say. These programs appear murkier, and have included support for an alleged terrorist group in Iran.

A recent ABC News report revealed that President George W. Bush had signed a presidential finding giving the CIA the authority to conduct “non-lethal” covert operations against Iran. Former and current intelligence sources tell RAW STORY, however, that there have been “at least two” presidential findings over the past few years which have empowered the agency to run an “open-secret” information war against Iranian interests, mainly leveraging resources and assets “within the United States and France.”

Although the resources – people, groups, organizations – were not identified, sources say that they are not terrorist organizations or groups using violent tactics to achieve their goals. “It’s a propaganda operation,” said a former intelligence case officer who wished to remain anonymous due to the sensitive nature of the information. “It is not new or aggressive,” the source added, explaining that the operation has been going on for some time and has Congressional funding and oversight.

CIA spokesman Paul Gimigliano would not comment about the allegations made in the ABC report or discuss the existence of the presidential findings identified to RAW STORY.

“The CIA does not, as a matter of course, publicly discuss allegations of covert action, whether the assertions are wrong, right, or somewhere in-between,” Gimigliano said. “That’s one reason why the term ‘covert action’ still exists.”

“But it’s important to remember that, through the Congress, there is vigorous oversight of secret intelligence activities,” he added.

According to current and former intelligence officials, the various presidential findings are not limited to Iran. Several countries within the Middle East – including Syria and Lebanon – as well as groups such as Hezbollah, are being targeted through what sources call “black propaganda” efforts.

Iran is being targeted by the CIA’s activities with a “pro-democracy” message, sources say, and the agency is supporting overt “pro-democracy” groups.

The program’s particulars are highly classified. Intelligence sources stress, however, that the groups being used are rather mainstream and the operations are almost entirely restricted to information warfare.

Sources would not identify what mechanism was being employed to distribute the propaganda, if it included news media, individuals or organizations, or whether that information was seeping back into domestic news reports.

One former intelligence case officer did explain that the CIA’s program is operating largely outside of the Middle East and is aimed at identifying potential allies, as well as using already existing well known groups through whom information can be delivered. The type of “information” and the “groups” and “organizations” involved were not identified.

ABC News may have reported the presidential finding as “new” because of the recently passed massive intelligence budget. Under the bill, roughly $50 million was appropriated for the “Democracy Fund” and the “Broadcasting Board of Governors,” both earmarked for Iran operations.

Sources close to the Select Senate Committee on Intelligence would not discuss any aspect of the CIA program or comment on anything relating to the presidential findings.

“This is an area I simply cannot get into,” said one source.

Pentagon operation supporting terrorist group kept from Congress

RAW STORY has also learned that the Pentagon is continuing to conduct more aggressive “black” operations, approved by the National Security Council and the Office of the Vice President.

Current and former intelligence officials would not identify new specific covert programs running out of the Pentagon, though sources stressed these are far riskier and more truly covert operational activities against Iran than the activities of the CIA.

These operations started almost immediately after the Iraq war and have continued for several years. Because they can be considered part of a military operation, they are not subjects to the same requirements for Congressional authorization as the activities of the CIA.

The majority of these efforts to destabilize Iran through a covert war of aggression have been carried out by the Department of Defense, largely steered by the Office of the Vice President and by then-Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld.

A series of RAW STORY reports has identified some of the “off book” or black operations running out of the Pentagon over the last several years. In 2003, the Defense Department began working with terrorist and dissident groups in an effort to destabilize Iran, bypassing traditional intelligence channels. One of the assets the Pentagon used was a terrorist organization known as Mujahedeen-e Khalq (MEK), which was being “run” in two southern regional areas of Iran, including a Shia region where a series of attacks in 2006 left many dead and hundreds injured.

These activities have often been guided by the same individuals whose actions during Iran-Contra were the reason for a 1991 law on covert activities which for the first time clearly defined covert activities and how their oversight should be handled.

During Iran-Contra, the Reagan White House – via the National Security Council – sold weapons to Iran, an avowed enemy of the United States, and used the money to fund various terrorist and dissident groups, collectively called the Contras, to fight a proxy war against the government of Nicaragua.

Sources say that MEK has been used for intelligence collection, an activity which has traditionally fallen under the CIA. The administration also appears to be looking the other way as groups such as MEK commit acts of violence.

Intelligence sources interviewed for this article all expressed concern over the lack of attention to the Pentagon’s covert activities. Some believe illegal activities like those of the Iran-Contra days are now being hidden under the loophole of “traditional military activities” to avoid Congressional oversight.

Steven Aftergood, director for the Federation of American Scientists Project on Government Secrecy, says this loophole exists in Congressional oversight with regards to military covert activities.

“CIA covert actions have to be authorized by a written presidential finding, which must be provided to Congress,” Aftergood said. “By contrast, DOD operations, including clandestine or covert operations, are not subject to this procedure.

“As a result,” he added, “there may be a temptation to opt for a purely military action to take advantage of the loophole in congressional notification requirements.”

Covert economic warfare may not be limited to CIA

Another former intelligence official said that the CIA has been cleared to target Iran’s economic interests, but that the approval is limited to non-aggressive activities. The CIA “has been empowered to put economic pressure on Iran,” the former intelligence officer stated, but would not elaborate on what the meaning of “pressure” is.

Yet some suggest that the economic element of the covert program is either far more aggressive or is being attributed to the CIA when in fact another agency may be running it.

Foreign intelligence sources say that economic pressure is aimed at Iran’s oil-rich economy, with US efforts serving to “persuade” financial institutions, oil companies, and international investment interests to pull out of Iran and even drop already existing energy projects.

These sources cite the example of an unnamed company that is being denied financing for energy projects inside Iran by international banks, indicating that many more such examples exist.

Other possible forms of pressure would include less subtle activities, such as intercepting supply convoys and confiscating equipment. Foreign sources are not sure if this covert activity is in fact part of the CIA program.

The Department of Defense did not respond to comment on this story.

Muriel Kane contributed to the research for this article.

Larisa Alexandrovna is the Managing Editor of Investigative News for Raw Story and regularly covers intelligence and national security. She can be reached at larisa@rawstory.com.

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Related Raw Story articles on US planning and operations concerning Iran:

Escalation of US Iran military planning part of six-year Administration push, 1/23/07

Senior intel official: Pentagon moves to second-stage planning for Iran strike option, 9/21/06

Intelligence officials doubt Iran uranium claims, say Cheney receiving suspect briefings, 8/18/06

Congress quietly holds classified briefings on Iran as Democrats seek access to intelligence, 6/22/06

Pentagon confirms Iranian directorate as officials raise new concerns about war, 6/15/06

On Cheney, Rumsfeld order, US outsourcing special ops, intelligence to Iraq terror group, intelligence officials say, 4/13/06

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Raw Story articles on US dealings with Iran-Contra figure Manucher Ghorbanifar:

Intelligence Laundry: To Paris again, 10/16/06

Cheney has tapped Iranian expatriate, arms dealer to surveil discussions with Iran, officials say, 4/20/06

Spurious attempt to tie Iran, Iraq to nuclear arms plot bypassed U.S. intelligence channels, 1/11/06

source:
http://rawstory.com/news/2007/CIA_running_black_propaganda_operation_against_0604.html

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Arkansas GOP head: We need more ‘attacks on American soil’ so people appreciate Bush

bismi-lLahi-rRahmani-rRahiem
In the Name of Allah, the Compassionate, the Merciful

=== News Update ===

 

Arkansas GOP head: We need more ‘attacks on American soil’ so people appreciate Bush

Josh Catone

Published: Sunday June 3, 2007

In his first interview as the chairman of the Arkansas Republican Party, Dennis Milligan told a reporter that America needs to be attacked by terrorists so that people will appreciate the work that President Bush has done to protect the country.

“At the end of the day, I believe fully the president is doing the right thing, and I think all we need is some attacks on American soil like we had on [Sept. 11, 2001],” Milligan said to the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette, “and the naysayers will come around very quickly to appreciate not only the commitment for President Bush, but the sacrifice that has been made by men and women to protect this country.”

Milligan, who was elected as the new chair of the Arkansas Republican Party just two weeks ago, also told the newspaper that he is “150 percent” behind Bush in the war in Iraq.

In his acceptance speech on May 19th, Milligan told his fellow Republicans that it was “time for a rediscovery of our values and our common sense.”

The owner of a water treatment company, Milligan was a relative unknown in Arkansas politics until being elected the party chairman. He had previously served as the party’s treasurer and the Saline County Republican chair.

THE FULL DEMOCRAT-GAZETTE INTERVIEW CAN BE READ HERE

source:
http://rawstory.com/news/2007/Arkansas_GOP_head_We_need_more_0603.html

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Apartheid Israel’s 40th Anniversary

bismi-lLahi-rRahmani-rRahiem
In the Name of Allah, the Compassionate, the Merciful

=== News Update ===

 

Apartheid Israel’s 40th Anniversary

 

Dr Gideon Polya, MWC News

June 3, 2007

JUNE 5th marks the 40th anniversary of the illegal and planned Israeli invasion of Egypt, Jordan and Syria in 1967 and the commencement of the 40 year abusive, illegal and war criminal occupation of what has become a Palestinian Prison, an Apartheid Israel-run Open Concentration Camp for Palestinians.

The Zionist asserted “justification” for the initial criminal invasion and Occupation was “threat”. However a recent article by Stephen Lendman in Rense.com contains the following revealing quotes from top Israeli politicians and generals indicating that there was no threat and that the invasion and occupation had been long planned:

“The New York Times quoted Prime Minister Menachem Begin’s (1977 – 83) August, 1982 speech saying: “In June, 1967, we had a choice. The Egyptian army concentrations in the Sinai approaches do not prove that (President Gamal Abdel) Nasser (1956 – 70) was really about to attack us. We must be honest with ourselves. We decided to attack him.”

Two time Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin (1974 – 77 and 1992 – 95) told French newspaper Le Monde in February, 1968: “I do not believe Nasser wanted war. The two divisions which he sent into Sinai on May 14 would not have been enough to unleash an offense against Israel. He knew it and we knew it.”

General Mordechai Hod, Commander of the Israeli Air Force during the Six-Day War said in 1978: “Sixteen years of planning had gone into those initial eighty minutes. We lived with the plan, we slept on the plan, we ate the plan. Constantly we perfected it.”

General Haim Barlev, Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) Chief told Ma’ariv in April, 1972: “We were not threatened with genocide on the eve of the six-day war, and we had never thought of such a possibility.”

The human cost of this carefully planned, criminal act of Israeli State Terrorism – and its continuance through US-Israeli State Terrorism- has been catastrophic for the conquered, kidnapped Palestinians subject to 40 years of abusive occupation: the post-invasion excess deaths (avoidable deaths, deaths that did not have to happen) in the Occupied Palestinian Territory now total 0.3 million and the post-invasion under-5 infant deaths total 0.2 million; Palestinian refugees now total about 7 million with 4.2 million registered with the UN in the Middle East; US- and UK-backed, anti-Arab anti-Semitic, Islamophobic, Zionist run Apartheid Israel is passively killing about 7 Palestinian infants daily through war criminal non-supply of life-sustaining requisites to the OPT (UN Population Division, UNHCR and UNICEF data: for detailed analysis, Below is a detailed summary of this countinuing horrendous abuse of humanity and International Law by Apartheid Israel:

1. Post-invasion excess deaths and infant deaths. UN Population Division data indicate that the post-invasion excess deaths (avoidable deaths, deaths that did not have to happen) in the Occupied Palestinian Territory (OPT) total 0.3 million and the post-invasion under-5 infant deaths (largely avoidable) total 0.2 million.

Articles 38, 55 and 56 of the Geneva Convention Relative to the Treatment of Civilian Persons in Time of War make it absolutely clear that an Occupier must do everything in its power to preserve the health and lives of its conquered subjects – and especially of Children and Mothers. Three quarters of the Palestinians are Women and Children.

2. Annual avoidable under-5 infant deaths in the OPT. The latest UNICEF data (2005 figures) inform that the “annual under-5 infant death rate” in the Occupied Palestinian Territory (OPT) is 23 deaths/1,000 births as compared to 6 in Israel proper and in Australia. Accordingly the “annual avoidable under-5 infant death rate” is 23 – 6 = 17 deaths/1,000 births.

UN Population Division data indicate that the population of the OPT is 3,762,000 and the annual birth rate is 37.5/1,000 of population. Accordingly the annual number of births is 37.5 x 3,762 = 141,075.

Accordingly we can calculate that the “annual under-5 infant deaths” in the OPT = 23 x 141.075 = 3,245 and that the “AVOIDABLE annual under-5 infant deaths” in the OPT = 17 x 141.075 = 2,398.

3. Israeli victims of Palestinians according to the Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs. The Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs states that “from 1920 through 1999, a total of 2,580 residents of Mandatory Palestine and, since 1948, the State of Israel fell victims to hostile enemy action; in most cases, terrorist attacks” and “1,130 people have been killed by Palestinian violence and terrorism since September 2000.” Deducting the pre-1949 deaths specified on this site yields post-1948 Israeli deaths from “terrorism” as 2,646. Thus each year nearly as many Occupied Palestinian under-5 year old infants die aviodabaly (2,400) as have Israeli victims of “terrorism” over the last sixty years (2,600) (for a detailed analysis see MWC News ).

4. Current homicide rate in the Holy Land. Notwithstanding racist, holocaust-ignoring Mainstream media “terrorism hysteria”, about 80% of homicides in the Holy Land each year are committed by Israelis (for a detailed and documented analysis see MWC News).

5. Refugees. The latest information from the world’s premier refugee care agency, the UNHCR indicates 4.2 million UN-registered Palestinian refugees in the Middle East alone. Israel continues to violate UN Resolution 194 for refugee return. There are some 7 million Palestinian refugees of which 4.2 million are actually registered with the UN.

6. Intifada deaths. The Israeli Human Rights group B’tselem estimates that so far (30 April 2007) since September 2000, about 4,100 Palestinians have been killed by Israelis (about 1/5 children) and about 1,000 Israelis (military and civilians) by Palestinians.

7. Ethnic cleansing of Palestinian Christians. According to a report in leading Australian newspaper The Age: “Melbourne academic Abe Ata says there were 400,000 Palestinian Christians in 1948; today there are 60,000, and falling fast ” i.e. a 85% decrease tantamount to Genocide as defined by the UN Genocide Convention.

8. Annual under-5 infant death rates. The “annual under-5 infant death rate” (2003) was 0.5% (OPT) as compared to 0.1% (occupier Israel) (UN Population Division data).

9. Traumatizing of Palestinian Children. According to UNICEF , in the Occupied Palestinian Territory: “Landmines and other unexploded ordnance are an ongoing threat to children; chronic malnutrition affects nearly 10 per cent of children under age five. The situation is most acute in Gaza, where 50,000 children are malnourished; about half of children under age two are anaemic and 70 per cent have vitamin A deficiency …children in nearly a third of all families experience anxiety, phobia or depression”.

10. Occupied Palestine in the wider context of Zionist promoted Western anti-Arab anti-Semitism, Islamophobia and “democratic imperialism” (democratic tyranny, democratic Nazism). Post-invasion excess deaths (avoidable deaths, deaths that did not have to happen) in the Occupied Palestinian, Iraqi and Afghan Territories now total 0.3 million, 1.0 million and 2.4 million, respectively (mostly Women and Children), these figures being consonant with post-invasion under-5 infant deaths of 0.2 million, 0.5 million and 1.9 million, respectively; there are 7 million Palestinian refugees (4.2 million UN registered), 4 million Iraqi refugees and 3.7 million Afghan refugees (UN Population Division and medical literature data; for details and documentation see MWC News .

The Invasion was long pre-planned and in gross violation of International Law; the Occupation has involved gross violation of International law, major Humanitarian Conventions, and numerous UN Resolutions. This continuing illegal, abusive and deadly Occupation is a blot on Humanity and calls for urgent, comprehensive intra-national and inter-national sanctions and boycotts against Zionist-run Israel and its racist, anti-Arab anti-semitic and Islamophobic western backers. British academics have now voted for sanctions and boycotts.

Dr Gideon Polya, MWC News Chief political editor, published some 130 works in a 4 decade scientific career, most recently a huge pharmacological reference text “Biochemical Targets of Plant Bioactive Compounds” (CRC Press/Taylor & Francis, New York & London, 2003), and is currently writing a book on global mortality —

source:
http://mwcnews.net/content/view/14899/42/

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40 year of occupation and 60 years of wars

bismi-lLahi-rRahmani-rRahiem
In the Name of Allah, the Compassionate, the Merciful

=== News Update ===

 

40 year of occupation and 60 years of wars

 

Qumsiyeh: A Human Rights Web

June 4, 2007

Those who planned the 1967 “six day war” (Al-Naksa in Arabic) 40 years ago and we the people who lived there could not foresee its ramifications on lives of Israelis and Palestinians let alone Americans and Iraqis today. I was a 10-year old kid growing up in the Shepherd’s field at the time the occupation began and my memories of the initial onslaught are vivid. After I immigrated to the US in 1979, I still go almost every year and still maintain residency there. I saw it get worse and worse every year from 1967 (and I dread my trip this summer). What can be said after 40 years of illegal occupation, after over 250,000 Israeli Jewish colonial settlers in the West Bank, after over 18,000 of our homes demolished, after causing massive economic dislocation (unemployment is at twice what it was for Americans during the Great depression), after over 11,000 Palestinian political prisoners now in Israeli jails, after over 10,000 fellow Palestinian civilians killed? What can be said after the remaining Palestinians are squeezed into shrinking ghettos after much of their best lands was confiscated? Should we focus on the price the occupiers also paid (especially since the introduction of the phenomenon of suicide bombings 10 years ago). Should we focus on the price the world has paid including the unfolding tragedy in Iraq (and now the Israel lobby is pushing for a war on Iran)? How about the over $1 trillion that Israel cost the US in these 40 years?

It was called a six day “war” because the Israeli aerial blitzkrieg so devastated the armies of Jordan, Syria, and Egypt in the first few hours that the remainder of the time was basically what it took infantry to occupy the West Bank, Gaza, Sinai, and the Golan Heights. Most analysts believe that this war was critical in cementing the Israel-US “strategic” relationship to a point of mutual dependency. But the survivors of the USS Liberty (A US Navy ship attacked by Israel in International waters on June 8, 1967) and all objective historians convincingly showed that: 1) Israel’s attack on the USS Liberty was deliberate, and 2) that the Israeli lobby was already strong before the war and thus managed to stifle an inquiry (for details see http://www.ussliberty.org/ ). President Carter suggested that there are individuals seeking to silence debate on these issues. He was ruthlessly attacked thus proving his point. Similarly, a research paper on the Israel lobby by renounced scholars Mearsheimer (University of Chicago) and Walt (from Harvard) was attacked in a way that proves its salient points. Thanks to the Internet, it is becoming more difficult to silence the truth. So even if this article is not published in a US mainstream newspaper, it will be read by tens of thousands anyway. So let us look openly at the legacy of 1967.

First let us dispense with the mythology about how that war started or its goals. For example Israeli General Matityahu Peled admitted: “The thesis that the danger of genocide was hanging over us in June 1967 and that Israel was fighting for its physical existence is only bluff, which was born and developed after the war…To pretend that the Egyptian forces massed on our frontiers were in a position to threaten the existence of Israel constitutes an insult not only to the intelligence of anyone capable of analyzing this sort of situation, but above all an insult to the Zahal Israeli army” (Ha’aretz, 19 March 1972). The largest evidence for Israel’s intentions is the commencement of immediate Israeli settlement of the occupied areas. Israel also annexed 10% of the West Bank (expanded “greater Jerusalem”) and all the Golan Heights. Israel hoped that through economic pressures, land and natural resource confiscations, and physical violence that they would annex the rest when the native population is reduced especially on the richest land areas. That is why Israeli colonies/settlements (which violate International law) sit atop the Western and Eastern water aquifers in and encircle Jerusalem (all in the West Bank). It is also why Israel still holds the Golan heights (for its water). The charade of colonial need for security (from those irrational and violent natives) has been always the mantra to use for further colonization and expansion whether used by European settlers in the Americas or the Apartheid regime in South Africa or Israel. For making all of this possible, the US lost so much credibility around the world. Votes at the UN General assembly now routinely see 160 countries voting one way while Israel and the US vote anther. Attacks on civilians by US supplied F-16s, Apache gunship helicopters, and cluster bombs are seen in other parts of the world as state terrorism and not as Israeli self-defense. Europeans polled by a large majority identified the US and Israel as the two most dangerous countries in the world. Indeed this is the legacy of the lobby that ensured the “special relationship” that would continue to drag us in America to wars in an endless cycle now packaged as “war on terrorism”.

The solutions are not too difficult to see. Segregation in America in the South and in Apartheid South Africa was the etiology of the disease so why do some still consider it a solution. The history of this issue and its resolution based on International law is well recognized around the world bud buried in America thanks to hijacking our institutions by those with racist ideologies. This hijacking is to the detriment of all involved (Americans, Israelis, Palestinians, Lebanese, Iraqis). At the core of this is that Palestinian refugees and displaced people must be allowed to return to their homes and lands according to their rights supported by International law (530 villages and towns were completely depopulated, see palestineremembered.com). For a real road map to peace, all we need is the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and to implement all relevant UN resolutions starting with UNGA 194 of 1949. Many churches, unions, and student groups heeded the Palestinian civil society call that focuses on non-violent actions including boycotts, divestments, and sanctions similar to what was applied on South Africa. Most recently this included the large Congress of South African Trade Unions (COSATU) and University and College Union in England (representing 120,000 academics in higher education). The racist attacks on this growing movement proved its effectiveness.

America in the past and Israel more recently both shared visions of “manifest destiny” to conquer untamed “wilderness” of which the natives were the main obstacles. Vilifying the natives was thus a common feature in America then and in Israel today. (Of course, the percentage of Native Americans who remained alive is very small compared to the percentage of Native Palestinians and the latter issue is dragging us to a World War.) It is time to seek real reconciliation both in America and Israel. On June 10, thousands will be in DC for a rally and march demanding an end to the occupation (see endtheoccupation.org). We collectively work for peace so that the 60-year anniversary of the beginning of the Palestinian dispossession (November 1947) will be a new turning point for real peace based on justice and equality.

source:
http://www.qumsiyeh.org/40yearsofoccupation/

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The KUBARK Manual of Counter-Intelligence Interrogation by Central Intelligence Agency

bismi-lLahi-rRahmani-rRahiem
In the Name of Allah, the Compassionate, the Merciful

=== News Update ===

 

The KUBARK Manual of Counter-Intelligence Interrogation by Central Intelligence Agency

 

June 4th, 2007 396 Views

 

In 1963 a CIA program known as KUBARK created the Manual of Counter-Intelligence Interrogation for dissemination to its operatives. The manual contains detailed instructions on interrogating people who may have vital information, such as captured operatives. Using modern behavioral psychology the manual takes the operative step-by-step through the entire process of establishing and conducting counter-intelligence interrogation operations, from legal and policy considerations to selecting the right interrogator, to defining the personality types of those to be interrogated (and thus choosing the right approach for each individual) to “coercive” methods for extracting information from un-cooperative subjects. A fascinating document that is as valid today as it was forty years ago – perhaps one of the most important pieces of applied behavioral psychology ever created, and only begins to reveal the dark side of intelligence gathering interrogation operations such as today’s Rendition program.

source:
http://www.khanfactor.com/blog/?p=300

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9/11 Lies : U.S. case against Khadr collapses

bismi-lLahi-rRahmani-rRahiem
In the Name of Allah, the Compassionate, the Merciful

=== News Update ===

 

PAUL KORING

 

Globe and Mail Update

June 4, 2007 at 4:47 PM EDT

GUANTANAMO BAY, Cuba ­ All charges against Omar Khadr were dismissed Monday by a U.S. military judge, who ruled that his tribunal had no jurisdiction to try the alleged terrorist because the government had failed to designate him an “unlawful enemy combatant.”

“Charges are dismissed without prejudice,” Colonel Peter Brownback said. Congress created the military tribunals to try only so-called “unlawful” enemy combatants. The military panel that ruled on Mr. Khadr’s status designated him only as an “enemy combatant” in 2004.

Mr. Khadr showed no emotion when the ruling was announced. It was not clear that he understood the ruling. He was quickly hustled out of court.

The judge ruled that his court had no jurisdiction because Congress created the tribunals to deal only with “unlawful enemy combatants.”

Enlarge Image

Charges were dismissed Monday against Omar Khadr, a Canadian citizen held by the Americans at Guantanamo Bay, since he was 15. (Janet Hamlin)

Whether Monday’s legal bombshell really means that Mr. Khadr faces no charges and might perhaps even be released, or whether the government will find a way to recharge him remains unclear.

At very least it is a huge embarrassment and perhaps a fatal legal setback for the Bush administration, which created the military tribunals system to try alleged foreign terrorists.

Deputy Liberal Leader Michael Ignatieff said the government should actively take up his case, which he said appears to be in “legal limbo”.

“Whatever we may think about Mr. Khadr and his past, he is a Canadian citizen with the rights of a Canadian citizen and the Government should take up his case actively with U.S. authorities,” Mr. Ignatieff said on Monday afternoon.

Mr. Ignatieff said the Government should also “be aware” of the case of David Hicks, a 31-year-old Australian man who spent five years in Guantanamo Bay before pleading guilty to providing material support for terrorism and striking a plea-bargain to serve the rest of his sentence in Australia.

New Democrat Justice Critic Joe Comartin backed the call, saying this was “an opportune time” for Canada to step in and have Mr. Khadr serve any sentence within Canada.

“This individual was 15 years of age when the alleged crime took place. He was by all intents and purposes from what we understand a child soldier,” Mr. Comartin said.

“If he was convicted of [killing American soldiers], we obviously have to make an assessment. But he is our citizen. We are responsible for him and we should take that responsibility on. To slough it off onto some other country is not fair.”

In Mr. Khadr’s case, the “unlawful” element of the enemy combatant designation is crucial. For instance, throwing a grenade ­ as Mr. Khadr is alleged to have done at the end of a firefight in Afghanistan in 2002 ­ would be a legal act by a lawful enemy combatant. Only if Mr. Khadr were an “unlawful” combatant could such an act be a war crime or murder.

Mr. Khadr will not be released because of Monday’s ruling ­ the Bush administration has already said that he might be held as a prisoner until the end of hostilities in the so-called war on international terrorism.

The jurisdictional issue may, however, affect hundreds of detainees.

None of those who have been through the combatant status panel process have been deemed “unlawful” enemy combatants.

Wearing drab prison garb and flip-black flops during the two brief sessions, Mr. Khadr refused to stand as his hearing began ­ signalling disdain for the U.S. military tribunal that was intended to try him on murder and terrorist charges.

Mr. Khadr, now 20 and with a full beard and unruly hair, said nothing during the two sessions.

The ramifications for him and hundreds of other detainees at prisons at this U.S. naval station in Cuba remain unclear.

He has spent more than five years in prison ­ most of it in solitary confinement at the U.S. naval base at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba ­ and has gone through one previous false start that scrubbed when the U.S. Supreme Court rejected the military tribunals process as unjust.

source:
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20070604.wkhadr0604_1/BNStory/International/home

 

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9/11 Lies : An Illusion Of Justice

Jameel Jaffer

 

June 04, 2007

Jameel Jaffer, is the director of the ACLU’s National Security Project. He will be in Guantanamo June 4 to observe the proceedings for the ACLU, one of four human rights groups allowed to monitor proceedings at Guantanamo.

Today, the military tribunals at Guantánamo Bay reconvene for the arraignments of Omar Khadr, a 20-year-old Canadian citizen who has been in U.S. custody since he was 15, and Salim Ahmed Hamdan, a Yemeni national who is accused of having served as Osama Bin Laden’s chauffeur and bodyguard. To some, the re-initiation of the tribunals will look like a victory in the long-running effort to bring Guantánamo under the rule of law. Having monitored the fits and starts of the tribunal process for several years now, I am not nearly so optimistic.

More than five years have passed since President Bush authorized the military tribunals at Guantánamo Bay, but it’s possible that Khadr will turn out to be the first prisoner actually tried in this system. This is in part because the Defense Department did not charge any of the detainees held at Guantánamo Bay until June of 2004. Then some of the detainees who had been charged contested the lawfulness of the proceedings, and the tribunals were put on hold while the Supreme Court considered the detainees’ case. In 2006, the Supreme Court struck down the tribunal rules, finding that they violated the Geneva Conventions­and therefore the Uniform Code of Military Justice­because they failed to afford “all the judicial guarantees which are recognized as indispensable by civilized peoples.” Not until October 2006 did President Bush sign into law the Military Commissions Act under which Khadr is now about to be tried. (The Australian David Hicks would have been the first to be tried under the new rules but his trial was averted by a last-minute plea bargain.)

Unlike the old rules, the tribunals’ new rules have been endorsed by Congress. But the rules remain deeply flawed. They permit the use of secret evidence, allow the introduction of evidence that has been extracted through cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment, limit the right of defendants to be represented by counsel of their choosing and fail to provide any guarantee that proceedings will be completed within a reasonable time. The rules are profoundly unfair, and those who have been criticizing them have been entirely justified in doing so. The tribunals offer not justice but the illusion of justice.

But the deeper injustice of Guantánamo does not stem from the unfairness of the tribunals’ rules. Most of the prisoners at Guantánamo have not been charged and will never be brought before the tribunals at all. Some of them have been held for five years already­and there is no end in sight, because the Bush administration has claimed the authority to hold them until the “war on terror” is over. The handful of prisoners who have been charged under the Military Commissions Act will be tried, but there’s no assurance that they will be freed if acquitted. The administration contends that they can be imprisoned indefinitely whether found guilty or not.

It is this situation that is Guantánamo’s deeper injustice, and it is this situation that appears to be driving the detainees to despair. Last week, a Saudi man was found dead in his cell­the fourth detainee to have committed suicide at Guantánamo. Perhaps it is a variety of this same despair that led Omar Khadr last week to dismiss his American attorneys. Today he will appear with Canadian attorneys­if the tribunal permits these attorneys to represent him­or he will appear on his own, without counsel.

The military tribunals are important­they are the closest thing that Guantánamo has to actual courts, and it is critical, not only for the detainees but for the U.S. as well, that they be both fair and perceived as fair. But fixing Guantánamo requires more than fixing the tribunals’ rules. Hundreds of men have been held now for three, four and in some cases more than five years, and the administration insists that it has the power to hold them forever­whether or not they are charged with crimes, and whether or not they are found guilty. This is Guantánamo’s deeper injustice; in debating the fairness of the tribunals, we should not lose sight of it.

source:
http://www.tompaine.com/articles/2007/06/04/an_illusion_of_justice.php

 

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-muslim voice-
______________________________________
BECAUSE YOU HAVE THE RIGHT TO KNOW

US Terrorize The Whole World by “War on Terror” – 19 Jumadil Awal 1428 H (5.6.07)

bismi-lLahi-rRahmani-rRahiem
In the Name of Allah, the Compassionate, the Merciful

=== News Update ===

 

Number Of Iraqi Civilians Slaughtered In America’s War On Iraq – At Least 655,000 + +

http://tinyurl.com/usq4x

 

Number of U.S. Military Personnel Sacrificed (Officially acknowledged) In America’sWar On Iraq 3,495

http://icasualties.org/oif/

 

The War in Iraq Costs $431,624,868,560 – See the cost in your community

http://nationalpriorities.org/index.php?option=com_wrapper&Itemid=182

 

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CIA running black propaganda operation against Iran, Syria and Lebanon, officials say

The Central Intelligence Agency has received approval at least twice in the last several years to conduct an “information war” against several countries in the Middle East, including Iran, Lebanon and Syria, according to current and former intelligence officials.
http://tinyurl.com/ywtvhk

 

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9/11 Lies : An Illusion Of Justice

Today, the military tribunals at Guantánamo Bay reconvene for the arraignments of Omar Khadr, a 20-year-old Canadian citizen who has been in U.S. custody since he was 15, and Salim Ahmed Hamdan, a Yemeni national who is accused of having served as Osama Bin Laden’s chauffeur and bodyguard.
http://tinyurl.com/225wru

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9/11 Lies : U.S. case against Khadr collapses

All charges against Canadian Omar Khadr were dismissed Monday by a U.S. military judge, who ruled that his tribunal had no jurisdiction to try the alleged terrorist because the government had failed to designate him an “unlawful enemy combatant.”
http://tinyurl.com/2gpebu

 

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The KUBARK Manual of Counter-Intelligence Interrogation by Central Intelligence Agency

In 1963 a CIA program known as KUBARK created the Manual of Counter-Intelligence Interrogation for dissemination to its operatives. The manual contains detailed instructions on interrogating people who may have vital information, such as captured operatives. Using modern behavioral psychology the manual takes the operative step-by-step through the entire process of establishing and conducting counter-intelligence interrogation operations, from legal and policy considerations to selecting the right interrogator, to defining the personality types of those to be interrogated (and thus choosing the right approach for each individual) to “coercive” methods for extracting information from un-cooperative subjects. A fascinating document that is as valid today as it was forty years ago – perhaps one of the most important pieces of applied behavioral psychology ever created, and only begins to reveal the dark side of intelligence gathering interrogation operations such as today’s Rendition program.
http://www.khanfactor.com/blog/?p=300

 

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An Interrogation Role Model

U.S. picked up tactics — including torture — from Israeli intelligence. Yossi Melman, International Consortium of Investigative Reporters
http://www.publicintegrity.org/militaryaid/report.aspx?aid=861

 

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Barbaric Warmonger Arkansas GOP head: We need more ‘attacks on American soil’ so people appreciate Bush

In his first interview as the chairman of the Arkansas Republican Party, Dennis Milligan told a reporter that America needs to be attacked by terrorists so that people will appreciate the work that President Bush has done to protect the country
http://tinyurl.com/25gjh7

 

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Apartheid Israel’s 40th Anniversary

ImageJUNE 5th marks the 40th anniversary of the illegal and planned Israeli invasion of Egypt, Jordan and Syria in 1967 and the commencement of the 40 year abusive, illegal and war criminal occupation of what has become a Palestinian Prison, an Apartheid Israel-run Open Concentration Camp for Palestinians.
http://mwcnews.net/content/view/14899/42/

 

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U.S. forces face bloody start to June in Iraq

BAGHDAD, June 3 (Reuters) – Sixteen American troops died in Iraq in the first three days of June, marking a bloody start to the month as the U.S. military presses on with its crackdown on sectarian violence in Baghdad.
http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/COL351094.htm

 

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Iraq’s mercenaries – with a licence to kill

‘These private contractors can get away with murder… They aren’t subject to any laws at all’
http://tinyurl.com/27zzsp

 

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US, Iraqi troops control a third of Baghdad

BAGHDAD, June 4 (Reuters) – U.S.-led soldiers control only about a third of Baghdad, the military said on Monday, almost four months into a security crackdown during which troops are dying at rates not seen for more than two years.
http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/L04571501.htm

 

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Iraqi Resistance Report for events of Sunday, 3 June 2007

• US admits seven more American troops killed in Iraqi Resistance attacks across Iraq Saturday, Sunday.
• Islamic Army Resistance organization issues statement that the US occupation and its stooges were trying to use the internal strife between the Islamic Army and the al-Qa‘idah organization
• US barrage kills two Iraqi civilians in ad-Dulu‘iyah.
• Turkish artillery blasts Kurdish villages in northern Iraq Saturday.
• Resistance fighters attacked the US tank with hand grenades. Ad-Dulu‘iyah
• US barrage kills two Iraqi civilians in ad-Dulu‘iyah.
• Resistance fighters assault headquarters of US, puppet forces in Samarra’ Sunday.

http://www.albasrah.net/pages/mod.php?mod=art&lapage=../en_articles_2007/0607/iraqiresistancereport_030607.htm

 

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Gunmen kill 2 soldiers at south Lebanon camp

Islamist gunmen killed two Lebanese soldiers at a Palestinian refugee camp in south Lebanon on Monday, the first fatal spillover from fighting between the army and al Qaeda-inspired fighters in the north.
http://tinyurl.com/yp5u8t

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Militants pledge to spread fighting

A senior Fatah Islam commander has pledged to spread the militant group’s battle with the Lebanese army to the already embattled southern Palestinian refugee camp of Ein el-Hilweh
http://tinyurl.com/yqdy7z

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TWO MORE CHILDREN ‘RITUALLY SLAUGHTERED’ BY ISRAELI TROOPS IN GAZA

Palestinians at work, Palestinians at play, Palestinians at the beach are nothing more than beasts to be slaughtered in accordance with zionist ritual with the blessings of the former chief rabbi.

Two young boys flying kites were just murdered in cold blood by Israeli soldiers. A third boy was injured severely, being shot in the back. Their crime??? Need you ask??? THEY WERE PALESTINIAN!

Surely this is without the blessings of God Himself…. but try telling that to the ‘Chosen People.’
http://desertpeace.blogspot.com/2007/06/two-more-children-ritually-slaughtered.html

 

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Little-noticed details in declassified U.S. documents indicate that Israel’s Six-Day War may not have been a war of necessity.

Jun. 04, 2007 | At a little after 7 on the morning of June 5, 1967, as Egyptian President Gamal Abdel Nasser’s commanders were finishing their breakfasts and driving to work, French-built Israeli fighter jets roared out of their bases and flew low, below radar, into Egyptian airspace. Within three hours, 500 Israeli sorties had destroyed Nasser’s entire air force. Just after midday, the air forces of Jordan and Syria also lay in smoking ruins, and Israel had essentially won the Six-Day War — in six hours.
http://mparent7777-2.blogspot.com/2007/06/declassified-us-documents-indicate-that.html

 

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How the 1967 War Doomed Israel

For the Palestinian population, and their Arab neighbors, the crisis of 1948 has never been resolved. And the Israelis, for the last 40 years, by colonizing the West Bank and East Jerusalem, have squandered whatever opportunities their victory of 1967 presented for changing the dynamic — instead, they have sought to cling to elements of the “Greater Israel” they created in that year, and in the vain hope that the Palestinians will some day surrender in exchange for whatever Israel chooses to offer them.

But precisely because they have continued to expand Israel since 1967, they have dimmed the prospects for a new partition creating a viable Palestinian state separate from Israel. Today, more than ever, the fate of the Israelis is inextricably, and intimately linked to the fate of the Palestinians — and vice versa. The lasting legacy of the 1967 war is the bi-national state it created in the old territory of British-Mandate Palestine.
http://www.wakeupfromyourslumber.com/node/1928

 

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40 year of occupation and 60 years of wars

Those who planned the 1967 “six day war” (Al-Naksa in Arabic) 40 years ago and we the people who lived there could not foresee its ramifications on lives of Israelis and Palestinians let alone Americans and Iraqis today. I was a 10-year old kid growing up in the Shepherd’s field at the time the occupation began and my memories of the initial onslaught are vivid. After I immigrated to the US in 1979, I still go almost every year and still maintain residency there. I saw it get worse and worse every year from 1967 (and I dread my trip this summer). What can be said after 40 years of illegal occupation, after over 250,000 Israeli Jewish colonial settlers in the West Bank, after over 18,000 of our homes demolished, after causing massive economic dislocation (unemployment is at twice what it was for Americans during the Great depression), after over 11,000 Palestinian political prisoners now in Israeli jails, after over 10,000 fellow Palestinian civilians killed? What can be said after the remaining Palestinians are squeezed into shrinking ghettos after much of their best lands was confiscated? Should we focus on the price the occupiers also paid (especially since the introduction of the phenomenon of suicide bombings 10 years ago). Should we focus on the price the world has paid including the unfolding tragedy in Iraq (and now the Israel lobby is pushing for a war on Iran)? How about the over $1 trillion that Israel cost the US in these 40 years?
http://www.qumsiyeh.org/40yearsofoccupation/

 

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Israel military occupation court interns Hamas ministers for six months

An Israeli military court ordered Monday that two Palestinian ministers and a member of parliament from Islamist movement Hamas be held without charge for six months, their lawyers said.
http://tinyurl.com/2zjk9u

 

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Rethinking Israel’s David-and-Goliath past

Little-noticed details in declassified U.S. documents indicate that Israel’s Six-Day War may not have been a war of necessity
http://www.salon.com/opinion/feature/2007/06/04/six_day_war/

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Operation ‘Targeted Killings’

U.S. shows signs of emulating controversial Israeli anti-terrorism policy
http://www.publicintegrity.org/militaryaid/report.aspx?aid=862

 

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“Verschärfte Vernehmung”

The phrase “Verschärfte Vernehmung” is German for “enhanced interrogation”. Other translations include “intensified interrogation” or “sharpened interrogation”. It’s a phrase that appears to have been concocted in 1937, to describe a form of torture that would leave no marks, and hence save the embarrassment pre-war Nazi officials were experiencing as their wounded torture victims ended up in court.
http://tinyurl.com/3cjw3t

 

===

 

Understanding America’s Terrorist Crisis: What Should Be Done?

Filmed before a live audience, renowned author Gore Vidal rejects the blind “patriotism” expected by government officials and the mainstream media, and investigates U.S. foreign policy throughout recent history, showing how it has contributed to the terrorist crisis. With his famous wit and insight, Vidal also demonstrates the ways in which the “War on Terrorism” is being used to curtail civil liberties and shred the Bill of Rights.
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article17828.htm

 

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Gorbachev criticises US ‘empire’

In a BBC interview, Mr Gorbachev said that the Russians were ready to be constructive, but America was trying to squeeze them out of global diplomacy.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/6717037.stm

 

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Hillary shifts right with talk of military strike on Iran

A tough-talking Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton yesterday suggested she would back a military strike on Iran if that country’s radical Islamic government attempts to build nuclear weapons.
http://tinyurl.com/2xwzew

 

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-muslim voice-
______________________________________
BECAUSE YOU HAVE THE RIGHT TO KNOW