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Archive for December 9th, 2007

Eight Senior Republican Appointees Challenge Official Account of 9/11 – “Not Possible”, “a Whitewash”, “False”

Posted by musliminsuffer on December 9, 2007

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

=== News Update ===

Eight Senior Republican Appointees Challenge Official Account of 9/11 – “Not Possible”, “a Whitewash”, “False”

By Alan Miller

December 4, 2007 – Eight former senior Republican administration appointees have severely criticized the official account of 9/11 and several have called for a new investigation. “I find the facts against the official story of the [WTC] buildings’ collapse more compelling than the case that has been made in behalf of the official story. I would like to see the issue debated by independent scientists and engineers,” wrote Paul Craig Roberts, PhD, Assistant Secretary of the Treasury under President Ronald Reagan. “A real investigation is needed to find an explanation consistent with the evidence, even if it doesn’t reassure the public,” said Dr. Roberts [1], frequently referred to as the “Father of Reagonomics.”


Paul Craig Roberts, PhD

“Over the past six years, the ranks of distinguished skeptics of the 9-11 storyline have grown enormously. The ranks include distinguished scientists, engineers and architects, intelligence officers, air traffic controllers, military officers and generals, including the former commanding general of U.S. Army Intelligence and Security Command, former presidential appointees and members of the White House staff in Republican administrations, Top Gun fighter pilots and career airline pilots who say that the flying attributed to the 9-11 hijackers is beyond the skills of America’s best pilots, and foreign dignitaries.” [2] Dr. Roberts currently serves as Chairman of the Institute for Political Economy and Research Fellow at the Independent Institute. Previously he was the William E. Simon Chair in Political Economy, at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, Georgetown University. He also served as a Senior Research Fellow at the Hoover Institution, Stanford University, and as Associate Editor of The Wall Street Journal.

In a 2004 interview by Dennis Bernstein on the Flashpoints radio show, Catherine Austin Fitts, former Assistant Secretary of Housing under President George H.W. Bush (41) said “The official story could not possibly have happened. In other words, what the administration has put forward is essentially a conspiracy theory that does not conform to the facts. It’s not possible. It’s not operationally feasible … The Commission was a whitewash.” [3]


Catherine Austin Fitts
Prior to her appointment to the first Bush administration, Ms. Fitts served as Managing Director and Member of the Board of Wall Street investment bank, Dillon, Read & Co. She previously was President of The Hamilton Securities Group.In a 2004 essay, Ms. Fitts wrote, “Much has transpired since September 11, 2001. … We have emerged deeply disturbing unanswered questions of 9-11 through global Internet media. We have worked with [Paul Thompson's Complete] 911 Timeline and realized that the official explanation of events is conspiracy theory, not conforming to documented fact.

We have watched the U.S. government suppress facts and restrict of the 9-11 Commission’s access to information. We have watched the 9-11 Commission fail to answer the unanswered questions and concede to official suppression of information. We have watched the leaders of the national security infrastructure richly rewarded for their failure to protect America on 9-11. We have noted the material omissions of the corporate media. Something does not add up. Someone has something to hide. … The Administration has something to hide. Rather than lose time and resources getting lost in the White House fog, let’s follow the alleged advice of one of the 9-11 Commissioners, Fred Fielding …”Follow the Money.” [4]


Morgan Reynolds, PhD
In a 2006 video interview with Alex Jones, Morgan Reynolds, PhD, former Chief Economist of the U.S. Department of Labor under current President George W. Bush said, “I first began to suspect that 9/11 was in inside job when the Bush-Cheney Administration invaded Iraq. … We can prove that the government’s story is false.” [5] Prior to his appointment to the Bush administration, Dr. Reynolds was Director of the Criminal Justice Center at the National Center for Policy Analysis. He is also Professor Emeritus of Economics, Texas A&M University. And in a 2005 essay, Dr. Reynolds wrote, “It is hard to exaggerate the importance of a scientific debate over the cause(s) of the collapse of the Twin Towers [each 1300+ feet tall, 110 stories] and Building 7. If the official wisdom on the collapses is wrong, as I believe it is, then policy based on such erroneous engineering analysis is not likely [to] prove to be sound.” [6]

WTC Building 7 was 610 feet tall, 47 stories. It would have been the tallest building in 33 states. Although it was not hit by an airplane, it completely collapsed into a pile of rubble in less than 7 seconds at 5:20 p.m. on 9/11. However, no mention of its collapse appears in the 9/11 Commission’s “full and complete account of the circumstances surrounding the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks.” Watch the collapse video here. And six years after 9/11, the Federal government has yet to publish its promised final report that explains the cause of its collapse.

Another senior Republican appointee who has questioned the official account of 9/11 is Col. Ronald D. Ray, U.S. Marine Corps (ret), who served as Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense under President Ronald Reagan. He’s a highly decorated Vietnam veteran (two Silver Stars, a Bronze Star and a Purple Heart). He was also appointed by President George H. W. Bush to serve on the American Battle Monuments Commission (1990 – 1994), and on the 1992 Presidential Commission on the Assignment of Women in the Armed Forces. He was Military Historian and Deputy Director of Field Operations for the U.S. Marine Corps Historical Center, Washington, D.C. (1990 – 1994).


Col. Ronald D. Ray
In an interview on Alex Jones’ radio show on June 30, 2006 [7], Col. Ray described the official account of 9/11 as “the dog that doesn’t hunt”, meaning it doesn’t stand up to scrutiny. In response to Alex Jones’ question, “Is it safe to say or is the statement accurate that you smell something rotten in the state of Denmark when it comes to 9/11?” Col. Ray replied, “I’m astounded that the conspiracy theory advanced by the administration could in fact be true and the evidence does not seem to suggest that that’s accurate. That’s true.”

Another senior Republican appointee who has questioned the official account of 9/11 is Mary Schiavo. Appointed under the administration of President George H. W. Bush, Ms. Schiavo served as the Inspector General for the U.S. Department of Transportation from 1990 – 1996. Ms. Schiavo and her staff secured more than 1,000 criminal convictions and uncovered billions in waste and abuse at the U.S. DOT. Since leaving the Transportation Department, Ms. Schiavo has represented passenger and crew families in every major U.S. air crash, as well as pilots and passengers on private planes.


Mary Schiavo

In a press conference on June 10, 2002 regarding the events of 9/11, Ms. Schiavo stated, “First of all, the question is not ‘What they [the U.S. government] should have known?’ And I believe I can show you in just a few seconds the question is, ‘What did they know?’ And believe me, they knew a lot. The second thing to emphasize is that in every single aviation disaster, whether there was intervening criminal activity or not, in every single one in the course of modern aviation history it has been followed by, not only were it necessary, a criminal investigation, but also a National Transportation Safety investigation into what went wrong in the aviation system. And the reason for that is so that it never happens again.”

Ms. Schiavo continued, “This is the first time, and this is the worst disaster, but this is the first time that families have been attempted to be silenced through a special fund, which I believe is about silence more so than about money. Why? … And from my rounds on the Hill to find these facts and others, I found that the airlines approached members of Congress and the Senate to get their bailout and their immunity and their protection starting on 9/11. They sent their first lobbyist up to the Hill on 9/11. And this has been confirmed to me personally by Senators and members of Congress. Now to me that’s very shocking but to me it raises another question, Why? Why did they have to rush to the Hill to change the law? … So in the wake of September 11, 2001, when we heard the carriers and governments alike saying, ‘Oh, no one could have foreseen this. No one knew that this was coming. No one knew that there was any risk like this in the world,’ is absolutely false. … In the last thirty years we have had 682 hijackings. 682. Here’s an interesting statistic. When we had the United States saying, ‘Oh, we couldn’t have known this.’ ” [9]


Barbara Honegger

Ms. Honegger also served as Project Director of the Attorney General’s Anti-Discrimination Federal Law Review at the U.S. Department of Justice in Reagan’s administration. She is a graduate of the Naval War College master’s program in National Security Decision Making and for over 12 years has served as Senior Military Affairs Journalist at the Naval Postgraduate School, the U.S. Navy’s and the Defense Department’s premier science, technology and national security affairs university.

Ms. Honegger has become a prominent critic of the official account of 9/11 as a private researcher, author and speaker at conferences. This is not Ms. Honegger’s first experience with allegations of serious executive branch misconduct. In 1983, she resigned from the Reagan administration in protest to planned domestic policy decisions. In 1989, she authored the pioneering Irangate expose October Surprise, which led to a full-subpoena-power U.S. House of Representatives investigation. Her book alleged that prior to the 1980 Presidential election, members of the Reagan campaign cut a secret deal with Iran to delay the release of the 52 American hostages, in order to prevent President Jimmy Carter from arranging their release and prevent him from winning the November election. The hostages were released on the day of Ronald Reagan’s inauguration, after 444 days in captivity.


Edward Peck
Shortly after the release of the 9/11 Commission Report, a group of over 100 prominent Americans signed a petition [11] urging Congress to immediately reinvestigate 9/11. In addition to four prominent former CIA officials [12], the signers included Catherine Austin Fitts (mentioned above), Edward Peck, and Morton Goulder. Edward Peck served as Deputy Director of the White House Task Force on Terrorism under President Ronald Reagan. Mr. Peck, a 32-year veteran of the U.S. Foreign Service also served as Deputy Coordinator, Covert Intelligence Programs at the State Department and as U.S. Ambassador and Chief of Mission in Iraq (1977 – 1980).

Morton Goulder
Morton Goulder was appointed Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Intelligence and Warning under President Richard Nixon and continued in that capacity under Presidents Gerald Ford and Jimmy Carter. In World War II, he served as a Lt. Commander in the U.S. Navy. He is a co-founder of Sanders Associates, a billion dollar defense contractor, now a division of BEA Systems.

The petition stated, in part, “We want truthful answers to questions such as:

1. Why were standard operating procedures for dealing with hijacked airliners not followed that day?

2. Why were the extensive missile batteries and air defenses reportedly deployed around the Pentagon not activated during the attack?

3. Why did the Secret Service allow Bush to complete his elementary school visit, apparently unconcerned about his safety or that of the schoolchildren?

4. Why hasn’t a single person been fired, penalized, or reprimanded for the gross incompetence we witnessed that day?

5. Why haven’t authorities in the U.S. and abroad published the results of multiple investigations into trading that strongly suggested foreknowledge of specific details of the 9/11 attacks, resulting in tens of millions of dollars of traceable gains?”

These questions and many others still remain unanswered three years after the petition was submitted and six years after the terrible events of 9/11. As the statements of these eight senior Republican Administration appointees show, the need for a new thorough, and independent investigation of 9/11 is not a matter of partisan politics, nor the demand of irresponsible, mentally ill, or disloyal Americans. It is instead a matter of the utmost importance for America’s security and the future of the entire world.

Statements questioning the official account of 9/11 and calls for a new investigation by more than 800 credible individuals can be found at
http://PatriotsQuestion911.com

Additional information on skeptics of the official account of 9/11 can be found in the author’s other articles on this subject.

Sept. 23, 2007 – Seven CIA Veterans Challenge 9/11 Commission Report – Official Account of 9/11 a “Joke” and a “Cover-up” featured statements by CIA veterans Raymond McGovern, William Christison, Melvin Goodman, Robert Baer, Robert David Steele, Lynne Larkin, and David MacMichael.

Sept. 5, 2007 – U.S. Navy ‘Top Gun’ Pilot Questions 9/11, featured the statement of Commander Ralph Kolstad, U.S. Navy ‘Top Gun’ pilot.

Sept. 4, 2007 – Former Congressional Office of Technology Assessment Senior Staff Member Calls for New Investigation of 9/11 featured the statement of Joel S. Hirschhorn, Ph.D., who served for 12 years as a Senior Staff Member of the Congressional Office of Technology Assessment and later as Director of Environment, Energy and Natural Resources for the National Governors Association.

Aug. 27, 2007 – National Academy of Sciences Member Calls for New 9/11 Investigation featured the statment of Lynn Margulis, Ph.D., world renowned scientist.

Aug. 21, 2007 – Former Chief of NIST’s Fire Science Division Calls for Independent Review of World Trade Center Investigation featured the statement of James Quintiere, Ph.D., one of the world’s leading fire science researchers.

July 16, 2007 – Former California Seismic Safety Commissioner Endorses 9/11 Truth Movement featured the statement of J. Marx Ayres, former member of the National Institute of Sciences Building Safety Council and former member of the California Seismic Safety Commission.

Original Content at http://www.opednews.com/articles/genera_alan_mil_071202_seven_senior_republi.htm
Endnotes [1] Is American Democracy Too Feeble to Deal with 9/11? By Paul Craig Roberts, PhD on VDare.com Sept. 10, 2006
http://www.vdare.com/roberts/060910_911.htm
[2] 9/11, Six Years Later by Paul Craig Roberts, PhD on VDare.com Sept. 10, 2007
http://www.vdare.com/roberts/070910_911.htm
[3] Interview of Catherine Austin Fitts by Dennis Bernstein on the Flashpoints radio show Sept. 9, 2004
http://www.kpfa.org/archives/index.php?arch=4024
[4] 9/11 Profiteering by Catherine Austin Fitts on March 22, 2004 on GlobalResearch.ca
http://globalresearch.ca/articles/FIT403A.html
[5] Video interview of Morgan Reynolds, PhD, by Alex Jones June 2, 2006

[6] Why Did the Trade Center Skyscrapers Collapse? by Morgan Reynolds, PhD on LewRockwell.com June 9, 2005
http://www.lewrockwell.com/reynolds/reynolds12.html
[7] Radio interview of Col. Ronald D. Ray by Alex Jones, June 30, 2006 (Subscription required.) Summarized in July 1, 2006 article on propagandamatrix.com
http://www.propagandamatrix.com/articles/july2006/010706doesnthunt.htm

[8] Stewardess ID’d Hijackers Early, Transcripts Show by Gail Sheehy, New York Observer, Feb. 15, 2004
http://www.observer.com/node/48805

[9] Press conference with Mary Schiavo June 10, 2002 Video:
http://www.propagandamatrix.com/multimedia/mary_schiavo.html
Transcript:
http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/HL0206/S00159.htm#mary

[10] “The Pentagon Attack Papers” by Barbara Honegger, published in The Terror Conspiracy by Jim Marrs 2006
http://physics911.net/pdf/honegger.pd
f

[11] Petition to Reinvestigate 9/11 Signed by Over 100 Prominent Americans Oct. 26, 2004
http://www.911truth.org/article.php?story=20041026093059633

[12] Seven CIA Veterans Challenge 9/11 Commission Report by Alan Miller, Sept. 23, 2007
http://www.opednews.com/articles/genera_alan_mil_070922_seven_cia_veterans_c.htm

Authors Website: http://www.PatriotsQuestion911.com
Authors Bio: Alan Miller is author of the website http://www.PatriotsQuestion911.com

===

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

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More Evidence of Obstruction of Justice in 9/11 Investigation

Posted by musliminsuffer on December 9, 2007

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

=== News Update ===

More Evidence of Obstruction of Justice in 9/11 Investigation

Thursday, December 06, 2007

By now you’ve heard that the CIA destroyed videotapes of interrogations of alleged Al Qaeda members. The interesting part of this story is that the 9/11 Commission claimed that it obtained most of its information about the attacks from these interrogations (and then only indirectly as reported by the military to the Commission; the Commission never met the alleged detainees, was not allowed to submit questions to them directly, nor was it allowed to question the alleged interrogators to assess their credibility).

The New York Times confirms that the government swore that it had turned over all of the relevant material regarding the statements of the people being interrogated:

“The commission did formally request material of this kind from all relevant agencies, and the commission was assured that we had received all the material responsive to our request,” said Philip D. Zelikow, who served as executive director of the Sept. 11 commission ….

“No tapes were acknowledged or turned over, nor was the commission provided with any transcript prepared from recordings,” he said.

But is the destruction of the tapes — and hiding from the 9/11 Commission the fact that the tapes existed — a big deal? Yes, actually. As the Times goes on to state:

Daniel Marcus, a law professor at American University who served as general counsel for the Sept. 11 commission and was involved in the discussions about interviews with Al Qaeda leaders, said he had heard nothing about any tapes being destroyed.If tapes were destroyed, he said, “it’s a big deal, it’s a very big deal,” because it could amount to obstruction of justice to withhold evidence being sought in criminal or fact-finding investigations.

This isn’t the first evidence of obstruction of justice by the government regarding the 9/11 investigations. For example:

Indeed, there are even indications that false evidence may have been planted to deflect attention from the real perpetrators.

Of course, even had the government told the truth to the 9/11 Commission, the Commission was set up as a whitewash anyway.

The full story in

http://georgewashington.blogspot.com/2007/12/more-evidence-of-obstruction-of-justice.html

===

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

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CIA destroyed video of ‘waterboarding’ al-Qaida detainees

Posted by musliminsuffer on December 9, 2007

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

=== News Update ===

CIA destroyed video of ‘waterboarding’ al-Qaida detainees

By Suzanne Goldenberg in Washington

12/07/07 “The Guardian” — – The CIA destroyed video evidence of the coercive interrogation of al-Qaida operatives held under its secret rendition programme in order to shield agents from prosecution, it was revealed yesterday.

The decision to destroy two videotapes documenting the use of waterboarding against Abu Zubaydah and another high-value al-Qaida detainee was made in November 2005 – as American media were just beginning to focus on the existence of the secret CIA prison network.

“The tapes posed a serious security risk,” the CIA’s director, Michael Hayden, told agency employees in a statement yesterday. “Were they ever to leak, they would permit identification of your CIA colleagues who had served in the programme, exposing them and their families to retaliation from al-Qaida and its sympathisers.”

Hayden’s message to CIA employees went out a day after he learned that the New York Times planned to publish an article today about destruction of the videotapes.

The revelation is bound to reignite debate in Congress about the use of torture in the war on terror. But far more seriously for the Bush administration, it raises the prospect that the CIA withheld information from and obstructed the work of the commission investigating the September 11 attacks as well as lawyers for Zacarias Moussaoui, the so-called 11th hijacker. Officials from the September 11 commission told the New York Times yesterday they had formally requested from the CIA evidence of interrogations, and had been informed that all materials had been handed over.

The Washington Post, which also carried a story on its website yesterday about the destroyed videotapes, reported that the order to destroy the tapes came from Jose Rodriguez Jr, then the director of the CIA’s clandestine operations.

The leaders of the house and Senate intelligence committees – which were then under Republican control – were aware of the existence of the footage and the CIA’s decision to destroy the material, Hayden said in his memo. However, Democratic committee members who had long demanded that such interrogations be videotaped, were not made aware of the existence of the tapes, the Times reported.

Hayden said the interrogations were filmed in 2002 after George Bush authorised the use of harsh interrogation, including the controversial practice of controlled drowning, known as waterboarding, against al-Qaida suspects.

“The agency was determined that it proceed in accord with established legal and policy guidelines,” Hayden wrote. “So, on its own, CIA began to videotape interrogations.”

However, the CIA soon discontinued the practice, and it is believed that only two detainees were filmed while undergoing interrogation. It has long been believed that Abu Zubaydah, a Saudi believed to be a close associated of Osama bin Laden, was subjected to harsh treatment following his capture in Pakistan in March 2002.

The footage would have clarified what practices such as waterboarding and sleep deprivation – both of which a gravely wounded Abu Zubaydah was subjected to – involve.

Guardian Unlimited © Guardian News and Media Limited 2007

The full story in

http://www.guardian.co.uk/usa/story/0,,2223738,00.html

===

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

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Israel accused of racism against Ethiopian Jews

Posted by musliminsuffer on December 9, 2007

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

=== News Update ===

Israel accused of racism against Ethiopian Jews

Saed Bannoura – IMEMC

ethiopian_jews.jpg
Saed Bannoura – IMEMC Saturday December 08, 2007In addition to the ongoing and well-documented racism agianst the Palestinian people, the Israeli society is now being accused of severe racism by some of its own members.

Ethiopian Jews, imported in large numbers by the Israeli government beginning in the mid-1980s, have revealed multiple examples of a society that discriminates heavily against them, even segregating them in schools and workplaces.

The study, reported Friday in the Israeli press, shows that the incidents of racism against Ethiopians in Israel are not just limited to a single city or region, but occur in every part of Israel where Ethiopians live.

At one elementary school in Petah Tikva, four Ethiopian students were put in a separate classroom and kept segregated from other students. The father of one of these students says, “We are being discriminated against for being black and powerless.”

In another elementary school in southern Israel, parents of white Israeli children demanded that Ethiopian students be moved to another class because “there were too many of them”. The Ethiopian students were removed from the class following the parents’ demand.

An Ethiopian support group known as the “Association for Education and Social Integration of Ethiopian Jews in Israel” had trouble leasing an office in central Israel. The owner of the building told the organization, “There is an office with a lot of medicine nearby, I don’t want any problems with theft and drugs”.

Another group that responds to instances of racism against Ethiopian Jews says it has received over 100 complaints this year alone.

The full story in

http://uruknet.info/?p=m39016&hd=&size=1&l=e

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

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THE GREENING OF PALESTINE … A SPECIAL APPEAL … What Happened to Abir?

Posted by musliminsuffer on December 9, 2007

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

=== News Update ===

THE GREENING OF PALESTINE~~ A SPECIAL POST… A SPECIAL APPEAL

Desert Peace

abir_aramin_web.jpg

December 8, 2007

It’s been almost a year since israeli soldiers brutally murdered this gorgeous child Abir Aramin. She was one of over 100 Palestinian children murdered in cold blood by Israeli soldiers in 2007.

A wonderful group in the States is attempting to immortalise the name of this little Martyr by building a garden in her memory…. a project that all of you can participate in and support.

Abir Aramin’s Garden: a Safe Place to Grow


Summary: Bring former combatants together to create a playground for the children of Anata, advocate for the safety of all children — especially Palestinian children — in school zones, and pursue justice for Abir Aramin. How You Can Help:
$50 – Buys a curbstone to frame the sand area$150 – Buys the sign, “Abir’s Garden” $450 – Pays for a Spring Rooster$1,500 – Buys a Merry-go-round$25,844 – Will fully fund this playground

Project Needs and Beneficiaries:

Help create a long lasting memorial to Abir Aramin, where children can be children and safely step out of the occupation and into their imagination. Former fighters from Combatants for Peace (C4P) will work side by side to build the playground, helping Abir’s friends and the world see that there are people who care for children and work together for justice and peace. Work on Abir’s Garden will begin with the playground area shown in 5a in the plans below, designed by C4P members working with the Parents Committee at the Anata School for Girls in East Jerusalem. Work will continue as funds are raised. When completed, the school grounds will include two play areas, a ball field, fruit and olive trees, a memorial fountain, and many beatiful places for the children to sit, play, and talk.

What Happened to Abir?

Abir Aramin was walking home from school with her sister and two friends in the West Bank town of Anata on January 16th 2007 but never made it back to her family. On this day the Israeli Border Police jeep,parked outside the gates of the Anata girls’ school, opened fire at the 4 girls walking home. Abir was hit with a rubber bullet to the head and critically wounded. Abir Aramin was taken off life support after 3 days of struggling for her life. She was only 10 years old.


“Over the past 2 years, the Israeli Border Police and IDF forces have been creating provocations near the school district of Anata has become in part of the daily routine for the children. Ever since construction started on the separation barrier surrounding Anata, the jeeps have been roaming the streets especially near the schools and shooting grenades and tear gas along with rubber bullets,” said Avichay Sharon of Combatants for Peace. “Many children have been injured in the past by these brutal actions of the soldiers and on January 16th it became deadly. As in many other cases the police replied that the soldiers were shooting in response to stones thrown at them by children. Even though all the evidence and witnesses stated that no stones were thrown that day, the prosecution decided to close the case because of lack of evidence.”.News of Abir’s death created a wellspring of emotion worldwide, in part because Abir’s father, Bassam Aramin, is an activist and founding member of Combatants for Peace.Responses to a condolence letter online written by Women of a Certain Age came from 58 countries and was addressed to her family.. The Rebuilding Alliance contacted Mr. Aramin, who asked that efforts to organize on behalf of Abir be directed to the children of Anata, in the hope that the world would help Combatants for Peace provide them with a safe place to play.


Abir’s friends are traumatized, as are the children of Anata who live under occupation and witness brutality daily. They have no safe place to play and grow.


Bring Those Responsible to JusticeAn integral part of this project is in pursuing justice for Abir. Despite numerous eye witnesses of the jeep firing rubber bullets at the girls and an autopsy report, the Israeli government recently dismissed Abir Aramin’s case, supposedly for lack of evidence.


urge you to ask your elected representatives to invoke the requirements of the Leahy Law and the Arms Export Control Act to press for justice in the case of Abir Aramin. Ask them to call on the U.S. Secretary of State Condi Rice to demand that the Israeli government investigate and report back to her the circumstances of the death of the ten year old Palestinian girl, and bring the soldier responsible to justice.


The U. S. Arms Control Act prohibits countries from using U.S. weapons against civilians. Furthermore any authorized use must be in “legitimate self-defense” or for “internal security”. Killing a defenseless child fails on both these counts. The Leahy Law adds the requirement that “the government of each country is taking effective measures to bring the responsible members of the security forces unit to justice.”


Please call and email your congressperson and senators and ask for their senior staffers for foreign policy.
Here is a phone script you can use to make that call, and a letter to send by email to follow-up.


Activities:Designs completed, approved. Accounting plan is in place. Ready to purchase playground equipment and schedule the first phase of the project. Combatants for Peace to help with construction in 2 weekends: clearing then assembly.


Potential Long Term Impact: This project arises from the Aramin family’s decision to turn their tragedy and despair into care, creativity, and teamwork. Abir’s Garden will nurture the children of Anata East Jerusalem and provide a model way to overcome violence.


Project Message:I’m not going to lose my common sense, my direction, only because I’ve lost my heart, my child. I will do all I can to protect her friends, both Palestinian and Israeli. They are all our children. — Bassam Aramin, Abir’s father and co-founder of Combatants for Peace


Key People: The following three people sign-off on each stage of the project


Zohar Shapira, among the founding members of Combatants for Peace, heads the Israeli side of the movement. Zohar, now a teacher in a Waldorf school in Israel, served for 15 years in the elite unit “Sayert Matkal”, as a combatant and commander. After the bloody spring of 2002, when hundreds of Israelis and Palestinans were killed in mutual violence he refused to serve in the occupied territories. Zohar is married with one child.


Bassam Aramin, Abir’s father, is co-founder of Combatants for Peace. He now works as a clerk at the Palestinian National Archives. At the age of 17 he was sentenced to 7 years in Israeli prison for belonging to the then-outlawed Fatah movement and for weapons possession. Beaten by soldiers in prison, he decided that he would not become a prisoner of hatred. He and his wife had six children, five remain.


Rabbi Jeremy Milgrom is a member of the board of directors of the Rebuilding Alliance. An American-born rabbi, he has lived in Israel since 1968, and been involved in Israeli peace camp initiatives for over 29 years. Rabbi Milgrom co-founded Clergy for Peace and lectures in Israel and Europe on Judaism, nonviolence, and peace. Now working with the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) to save Jahalin Bedouin villages slated to be removed by the Israeli Separation Wall, he sees building as way to ameliorate the suffering of innocent people and push for policy change.


Partnering with the Rebuilding AllianceCombatants for Peace is a group of Israeli and Palestinian individuals who were actively involved in the cycle of violence in their area. The Israelis served as combat soldiers in the Israel Defense Forces and the Palestinians were involved in armed resistance in the name of Palestinian liberation. They believe that the blood shed will not end unless they act together to terminate the occupation and stop all forms of violence. They work to educate, raise consciousness and create partners in dialogue, and to maintain political pressure on all governments to stop the cycle of violence.


Women of a Certain Age traveled to the Occupied West Bank in 2004 to meet with Palestinians whose voices have not been heard outside the walls of occupation. They work to keep visible the reality of life on the ground in the Occupied Territories.

The full story in

http://uruknet.info/?p=m39028&hd=&size=1&l=e

===

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

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Child Prisoners in Iraq Suffering Same Abuse as Adults

Posted by musliminsuffer on December 9, 2007

 

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

=== News Update ===

Child Prisoners in Iraq Suffering Same Abuse as Adults

Ahora

bambini8dic.jpeg

December 8, 2007

The existence of minors imprisoned in some Iraqi jails was recently confirmed through IRIN, a project of the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs.

It was known a priori that brutal executions and a thousand forms of horrifying violence would accompany the «democratic» crusade of George W. Bush in Iraq. I’m not only referring to the startling images that appeared a couple years ago, showing prisoners tortured and humiliated in Abu Ghraib by members of the US armed forces; nor am I alluding to the no less atrocious bombings and cutting down of civilian populations by the occupation armies.

I’m speaking of a form of abuse worse than those on the long list of violations committed during America’s intervention: the imprisoment of children. The UN’s Integrated Regional Information Networks, commonly known as the IRIN news agency, recently confirmed the existence of minors imprisoned in some Iraqi jails. They are treated as adults» and subjected to abuse and torture» during interrogations, reported the news agency.

The investigations began after several families went to a humanitarian organization, Association for Justice for Prisoners (AJP), seeking psychological assistance for their children who had just been released from jail.

This case involved five minors, between the ages of 13 and 17, who were detained during operations of the Iraqi army in the Baghdad neighborhoods of Adhamiya, Latifiya, Alawi, Dura and Hay al Adel. They were held under the charges of supporting the insurgency.

«The five children showed signs of torture on their bodies. Three of them had cigarette burns on their legs and one could not speak because the shock sessions had affected his capacity for conversation,» parents bemoaned.

Torture and Abuse

As specified by international law, children that have been arrested should remain in that situation for the shortest possible time, held in a special place separate from adults, and receive special treatment. However, these pacts —we know— only serve to file files in the White House – not to be put into practice or complied with.

Despite the fact that the Interior Ministry of the Mesopotamian country and the occupation army deny these accusations —saying that minors who are held for interrogation are released within 48 hours, without suffering abuse or torture— IRIN affirms that children have remained in prison more than two years, and are mixed in with the adult population.

High-ranking officials of the Iraqi Interior Ministry communicated anonymously to IRIN saying that in each Iraqi jail there are at least 220 children and that they all have been abused. AJP reported that it has informants in the prisons, but since the organization refuses to release their names, it is impossible to prove the alleged abuses. IRIN has requested permission to visit the prisons where minors are said to be held, but its request has —of course— been rejected.

AJP spokesperson Jalid Rabiaa said that weekly, at least two children and their parents come to his office in search of help. «This is not a political game; they’re young and it’s necessary to respect their rights.» «They are trying to hide the truth, but the reality is that they are there and they need special help before and after their release,» he added.

Source: Yailé Balloqui Bonzón

The full story in

http://uruknet.info/?p=m39030&hd=&size=1&l=e>/a>

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-muslim voice-
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BECAUSE YOU HAVE THE RIGHT TO KNOW

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