Global Research

Three militiamen have been injured over the past 24 hours in shelling of Donetsk People’s Republic.

Ukrainian military action has violated ceasefire arrangements in the war-torn region some 46 times in 24 hours, spokesman Eduard Basurinclaimed.Shelling has been recorded near the settlements of Gorlovka, Shirokino, Spartak, Zhabichevo, Sakhanka, Lozovoye, Novaya Maryevka, Altnoye, Oktyabr, Donetsk airport and Volvo-Centre district.

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A decision has been made in principle to demilitarize the village of Shirokino and to pull back medium weapons having calibresunder 100 mm has been agreed at the Contract Group level, Russia’s OSCE envoy Andrey Kelin told the media on Thursday.”The fundamental agreement does exist. Now the details are to be looked into,” Kelin said.The military sub-group hopes Kiev’s paramilitary entities of Nazis such as Azov, Donbass battalionswill follow accepted decisions. We aren’t so sure.

Meanwhile, Ukrainian media reported that big bad DPR militia shelled peaceful fortification facilities of Kiev’s army around town Gorlovka with MLRS Grad. Following UNIAN report 2 Porosheko’s super soldiers are dead, 9 are injured. However, honest Ukrainian journalists have forgotten to explain why pro-Kiev military have built fortifications around DPR’s town. The only released proof of MLRS shelling by DPR militia is this photo, therefore the most probable case is that it was Kiev’s attempt to attack in Gorlovka sector of frontline.

Two Chinese missile frigates will enter the Russian Black Sea naval base of Novorossiysk for the first time in history. They will then conduct joint exercises with Russia in the Mediterranean.The Linyi and the Weifang will enter the port on May 8 to take part in Victory Day celebrations, according to the Russian Defense Ministry. Each is a 4,000-ton vessel of the relatively new Type 054A, which first entered service in 2007. They are accompanied by a support ship. The ships will then head to the Mediterranean for joint drills Russian-Chinese exercise Sea Cooperation-2015.The exercise will take place from May 11 to May 21.

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Over the course of Greece’s painful and protracted negotiations with European creditors, Athens has sought, at various times when a deal seems to be slipping away, to play the Russian pivot card. What began as a series of diplomatic overtures between the Tsipras government and Moscow quickly turned more serious once rumors began to swirl around Greece’s potential participation in Russia’s Turkish Stream pipeline which, as a reminder, will allow Russia to bypass Bulgaria by piping gas through Turkey, then through Greece, Serbia, and Hungary straight to the Austrian central hub.

In short order, it leaked that Moscow was set to advance Greece $5 billion against the future potential profits from the pipeline, a payment which we characterized as a get-out-of-Troika-jail free card and although conflicting reports emerged thereafter regarding just how soon money would actually be flowing from Moscow to Athens, discussions around the pipeline continued to move forward when Gazprom chief  Alexei Millervisited Greece late last month to discuss “current energy issues of interest.”

That visit proved more than Europe could bear, and so the European Commission promptly filed antitrust charges against the Russian gas giant in an absurdly transparent attempt to punish the Kremlin for interfering in negotiations between the EU and its Aegean debt serf.

Now with negotiations between Athens and creditors still fraught with uncertainty, and with the IMF now reportedly at odds with the rest of the Troika over appropriate bailout terms, another interested party is stepping into the melee because, as NY Times reports, fresh off a humiliating political defeat at the hands of China’s Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank, Washington is in no mood to see the birthplace of Western civilization co-opted by a Russian natural gas firm. Here’s more:

The United States, wading into the international efforts to shape Greece’s economic and geopolitical orientation, is pushing the leftist government in Athens to resist Russia’s energy overtures.

A State Department envoy in Athens urged Greece on Friday to embrace a Western-backed project that would link Europe to natural gas supplies in Azerbaijan, rather than agree to a gas pipeline project pushed by Moscow.

The dueling sales pitches, reminiscent of a Cold War struggle, come as debt-burdened Greece is desperate for new sources of revenue of the sort that a gas pipeline could bring.

In an interview in Athens on Friday, before meeting with Greek officials, the State Department envoy, Amos J. Hochstein, said Greece would increase its appeal to Western investors — and would help reduce the European Union’s dependence on Russian gas supplies — if it declined to play host to a pipeline proposed by the Russian state-controlled energy giant Gazprom.

That pipeline would carry Russian gas to Europe through Turkey and Greece, bypassing pipelines that run through Ukraine…

The geopolitical tug of war over Europe’s energy supply is growing increasingly intense.

The Russian president, Vladimir V. Putin, spoke by telephone with Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras of Greece about the Gazprom pipeline project on Thursday. And Mr. Tsipras’s office has confirmed his country’s readiness to take part in the construction of a Greek pipeline to transfer Russian natural gas from the Greek-Turkish border to Europe.

The Greek foreign minister, Nikos Kotzias, has said that the Greek portion of the Russian-backed project could be worth billions of dollars to his country…

While revenue from a new gas pipeline could be years away, such a project — whether with Russian or Western backing — would have obvious allure for Greece.

The Russian proposal is for a pipeline called Turkish Stream. It is intended to replace an earlier Russian initiative for a pipeline to Europe called South Stream, which Mr. Putin was forced to abandon late last year because of European Union rules that would have made the project unpalatable to Moscow by requiring Gazprom to share the pipeline with other suppliers. The South Stream pipeline, running under the Black Sea, would have brought gas into the European Union through Bulgaria.

Mr. Hochstein, the American official, said on Friday that the pipeline he was promoting — called the Southern Gas Corridor project — was farther along in construction. It would involve multiple companies, including the British energy giant BP, and countries including Georgia and Turkey, and it would bring together a series of pipeline projects stretching from Azerbaijan to Italy, through Greece.

The Southern Gas Corridor is a project aimed at “improving the diversity of the EU’s energy supply” — in other words, it’s an attempt to help break Gazprom’s stranglehold and this is of course why Washington is giving Greece the hard sell.

Essentially, the corridor will allow the EU to tap into Caspian gas via a series of connecting pipelines running from Azerbaijan to Italy.

Here is what the European Council On Foreign Relations has to say about the prospects for working closely with Azerbaijan:

Azerbaijan is the supplier best placed to respond to the EU’s strategy of diversifying gas supply away from Russia. Azerbaijan has long been cooperating with Western energy companies on projects such as the Azeri-Chirag-Deepwater Guneshli oil project and the Shah Deniz gas condensate project (both led by BP), as well as the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan (BTC) and the Baku-Tbilisi-Erzurum (BTE) pipelines. Thus, the scope for increasing gas supply from Azerbaijan seems to be simply a matter of the economics of the potential supply projects.

The supply is expected to come from the second phase of the Shah Deniz project, with an estimated cost of over $45 billion, or $380-430/billion cubic metres at the Turkey-Greece border, and from the Umid gas field (SOCAR and Nobel Oil). The two projects could potentially supply up to 18-19 bcm per year of gas by 2020, with at least 6 bcm committed to the Turkish market and 10 bcm to Greece, Albania, and Italy. In 2014, the Shah Deniz consortium finally agreed to commit gas resources to the Trans Adriatic Pipeline (TAP), which will bring Azeri gas to Europe through Turkey; although it has a small transport capacity, this project will certainly contribute to the EU’s diversification efforts.

And here is an amusing graphic which outlines the pros and ‘cons’ of various alternatives to Russian energy:

As the Times suggests, this is further evidence that Washington is becoming increasingly concerned that the world is rapidly shifting away from the US-dominated, unipolar model that has existed, in one form or another, since the collapse of the Soviet Union. This consternation is beginning to manifest itself in the revitalization of Cold War politics.

Of course the official line is that the US is simply concerned about Greece’s economic future and thereby feels it necessary to adopt a bit of well-meaning paternalism to assist the country — which clearly cannot make decisions for itself — in determining what is in its own best interests. Indeed, Washington is even brazen enough to assume that no one will see the hilarious irony in this assessment of Russia’s Turkish Stream Pipeline: “It’s not an economic project… it’s only about politics.”

We wonder how long it will be before Washinton “urges” Pakistan to tread carefully when cooperating with China on infrastructure development.

We’ll leave you with Vladimir Putin’s take on the issue:

“Just because Greece is debt-ridden, this does not mean it is bound hand and foot, and has no independent foreign policy.”

*  *  *

Here’s the official statement from the US Embassy in Athens:

Mr. Amos Hochstein, Special Envoy and Coordinator for International Energy Affairs at the U.S. Department of State, visited Athens May 7-8 for discussions with Minister of State Nikos Pappas, Minister of Foreign Affairs Nikos Kotzias, Minister of Productive Reconstruction, Environment and Energy Panagiotis Lafazanis, and energy company officials.

Special Envoy Hochstein came to Athens to reaffirm Secretary of State Kerry’s and the U.S government’s support for Greek energy diversification, including support for key natural gas infrastructure projects such as the Trans Adriatic Pipeline, Greece-Bulgaria Interconnector (IGB), and expanded use of Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG).

These projects will increase Greek and European Union energy security, reduce Greece’s dependence on a single supplier of gas, increase competition, and reduce prices for consumers.  TAP will result in 1.5 billion euros in foreign investment in Greece, generate 10,000 jobs during construction, and provide many millions of euros in revenue annually over 25 years.

The United States is concerned that Greek consideration of an extension of a “Turkstream” pipeline across Greece will not increase energy diversification, may be of concern to EU competition authorities, and is not a long-term solution to Greece’s energy needs.

Mr. Hochstein discussed with Greek leaders Greece’s great potential to play a leadership role in being part of the solution to Europe’s energy security concerns. (emphasis added)

Dear veterans,

Distinguished guests,

Comrade soldiers and seamen, sergeants and sergeant majors, midshipmen and warrant officers,

Comrade officers, generals and admirals,

I congratulate you all on the 70^th Anniversary of Victory in the Great Patriotic War!

Hitler’s reckless adventure became a tough lesson for the entire world community. At that time, in the 1930s, the enlightened Europe failed to see the deadly threat in the Nazi ideology.

Today, seventy years later, the history calls again to our wisdom and vigilance. We must not forget that the ideas of racial supremacy and exclusiveness had provoked the bloodiest war ever. The war affected almost 80 percent of the world population. Many European nations were enslaved and occupied.

The Soviet Union bore the brunt of the enemy’s attacks. The elite Nazi forces were brought to bear on it. All their military power was concentrated against it. And all major decisive battles of World War II, in terms of military power and equipment involved, had been waged there.

And it is no surprise that it was the Red Army that, by taking Berlin in a crushing attack, hit the final blow to Hitler’s Germany finishing the war.

Our entire multi-ethnic nation rose to fight for our Motherland’s freedom. Everyone bore the severe burden of the war. Together, our people made an immortal exploit to save the country. They predetermined the outcome of World War II. They liberated European nations from the Nazis.

Veterans of the Great Patriotic War, wherever they live today, should know that here, in Russia, we highly value their fortitude, courage and dedication to frontline brotherhood.

Dear friends,

The Great Victory will always remain a heroic pinnacle in the history of our country. But we also pay tribute to our allies in the anti-Hitler coalition.

We are grateful to the peoples of Great Britain, France and the United States of America for their contribution to the Victory. We are thankful to the anti-fascists of various countries who selflessly fought the enemy as guerrillas and members of the underground resistance, including in Germany itself.

We remember the historical meeting on the Elbe, and the trust and unity that became our common legacy and an example of unification of peoples – for the sake of peace and stability.

It is precisely these values that became the foundation of the post-war world order. The United Nations came into existence. And the system of the modern international law has emerged.

These institutions have proved in practice their effectiveness in resolving disputes and conflicts.

However, in the last decades, the basic principles of international cooperation have come to be increasingly ignored. These are the principles that have been hard won by mankind as a result of the ordeal of the war.

We saw attempts to establish a unipolar world. We see the strong-arm block thinking gaining momentum. All that undermines sustainable global development.

The creation of a system of equal security for all states should become our common task. Such system should be an adequate match to modern threats, and it should rest on a regional and global non-block basis. Only then will we be able to ensure peace and tranquillity on the planet.

Dear friends,

We welcome today all our foreign guests while expressing a particular gratitude to the representatives of the countries that fought against Nazism and Japanese militarism.

Besides the Russian servicemen, parade units of ten other states will march through the Red Square as well. These include soldiers from Armenia, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan. Their forefathers fought shoulder to shoulder both at the front and in the rear.

These also include servicemen from China, which, just like the Soviet Union, lost many millions of people in this war. China was also the main front in the fight against militarism in Asia.

Indian soldiers fought courageously against the Nazis as well.

Serbian troops also offered strong and relentless resistance to the fascists.

Throughout the war our country received strong support from Mongolia.

These parade ranks include grandsons and great-grandsons of the war generation. The Victory Day is our common holiday. The Great Patriotic War was in fact the battle for the future of the entire humanity.

Our fathers and grandfathers lived through unbearable sufferings, hardships and losses. They worked till exhaustion, at the limit of human capacity. They fought even unto death. They proved the example of honour and true patriotism.

We pay tribute to all those who fought to the bitter for every street, every house and every frontier of our Motherland. We bow to those who perished in severe battles near Moscow and Stalingrad, at the Kursk Bulge and on the Dnieper.

We bow to those who died from famine and cold in the unconquered Leningrad, to those who were tortured to death in concentration camps, in captivity and under occupation.

We bow in loving memory of sons, daughters, fathers, mothers, grandfathers, husbands, wives, brothers, sisters, comrades-in-arms, relatives and friends – all those who never came back from war, all those who are no longer with us.

A minute of silence is announced.

Minute of silence.

Dear veterans,

You are the main heroes of the Great Victory Day. Your feat predestined peace and decent life for many generations. It made it possible for them to create and move forward fearlessly.

And today your children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren live up to the highest standards that you set. They work for the sake of their country’s present and future. They serve their Fatherland with devotion. They respond to complex challenges of the time with honour. They guarantee the successful development, might and prosperity of our Motherland, our Russia!

Long live the victorious people!

Happy holiday!

Congratulations on the Victory Day!

Hooray!

Ho Chi Minh City.

Ho Chi Minh City.

US-installed Ukrainian fascists commemorated Poroshenko’s established victory in Europe Day of Remembrance by vowing to “destroy Moscow,” free its people, and let them “shape their own future.”

Ukrainian ultranationalists attending a May 8 commemoration included 14th SS Waffen Grenadier division veterans, Ukrainian Insurgent Army (UPA) members, and Nazi-infested volunteer battalions involved in what they call “the Russian-Ukrainian war.”

Svoboda party overt Nazis participated. Their slogan is “Ukraine for the Ukrainians” – meaning ethnically pure, free of Jews, Russians and others not wanted, by extermination or other means.

Party member Yuri Sirotyuk called war on Russia Ukraine’s historic mission. “I believe that if we truly want it, we will do it,” he blustered.

Obama’s Ukrainian allies are over-the-top lunatics like Sirotyuk and likeminded fascists wanting war, not peace.

Prime minister Arseny Yatsenyuk  referring to World War II accused Soviet Russia of invading Germany.

Nazi collaborator Stepan Bandera is honored as a national hero. His Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists (OUN-B) was involved in mass executions and ethnic cleansing in Ukraine in liaison with the Nazis.

Poroshenko ranted on V-Day saying “May 9 will always be a red date in the Ukrainian calendar, just as these red poppies (replacing Russia’s St. George’s Ribbons) symbolize the remembrance of the fallen.”

“We will never celebrate this day under the Russian scenario, because it provides for the cold-blooded use of Victory Day for an apology to the expansionist policy regarding neighbors aimed at keeping them in the sphere of one’s influence and restoration of empire.”

Ukrainian fascists are US proxies waging dirty war without mercy on their own people – besides targeting all anti-regime Ukrainians wanting to live free from the scourge of fascism.

Donbass remains in the eye of the storm. Minsk ceasefire terms were dead on arrival. Ukrainian shelling continues daily.

Residential areas are prime targets. On V-Day, Gorlovka was attacked. “The shelling of northern suburbs resumed in the second half of day” after earlier a kindergarten and civilian homes were struck, a local resident explained.

Explosions were heard in nearby villages. Heavy smoke was seen rising. A gas pipeline was destroyed.

Other targeted areas include Donetsk airport, surrounding areas, and Shirokino village. According to Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) military spokesman Eduard Basurin:

“The intensity of attacks by Ukrainian law enforcement agencies increased, with 57 violations of the ceasefire” on one day alone – dozens of violations daily.

Ukrainian forces largely conceal weapons during daylight hours – then use them against Donbass targets mostly at night.

Days earlier, OSCE chairman Ivica Dacic condemned ceasefire violations. He and other Western officials do nothing to stop them.

Poroshenko vows to continue war until Donbass freedom fighters are eliminated and Crimea is forcefully seized from Russia.

He wants NATO membership to facilitate his war plans – including against Russia.

On a day peace advocates celebrate defeating the scourge of Nazism, the Kiev regime integrated by Ukraine’s Nazi parties calls for war with Russia.

At first, a few progressive heads-of-state in Europe were appalled at U.S. President Barack Obama’s pressure for them to reject Russia’s invitation to an upcoming 9 May 2015 celebration of victory against Hitler, and Czech President Milos Zeman even came out publicly saying, in a conspicuous face-slap to Obama, on 3 January 2015, that the U.S. overthrow of Ukraine’s democratically elected President Viktor Yanukovych in February 2014 had been a coup and that “only poorly informed people” were comparing that to Czechoslovakia’s own “Velvet Revolution” against communism on 29 December 1989. Zeman even said that Ukraine’s 22 February 2014 U.S. overthrow of Yanukovych, or the event (under the cover of public demonstrations at the) “Maidan, was not a democratic revolution” but instead a coup.

Or, as the head of Stratfor, the private CIA firm, has acknowledged, it was even “the most blatant coup in history,” because it was so well documented in videos taken by bystanders at the time, as well as by internal intelligence leaks (such as this and this). So: indeed, “only poorly informed people” didn’t know about it. (And some still don’t.)

On 2 January 2015, the progressive Zeman — a passionate opponent of Hitler and of his Nazis and their nazism — courageously stated his intention to go to Moscow for its upcoming May 9th victory-over-Nazism celebration; but, on 8 April 2015, the Czech deputy prime minister, who leads a conservative party, caved to pressure from the U.S. Ambassador, and said that Zeman would have to do it at his own personal expense if at all; and, so, two days later, on April 10th, Zeman said that he wouldn’t attend — the pressure from the U.S. was just too great.

Then, on 3 May 2015, France’s Boulevard Voltaire, as translated at Fort Russ, reported that no Western leader would be attending, and Fort Russ headlined on May 9th, “Putin ‘all by himself in Red Square’ — with the leaders of half the planet.” (The only Western official to attend is Greece’s Speaker of Parliament.) Obama had, indeed, succeeded at blocking virtually all Western representation at Russia’s 70th-Anniversary victory celebration against nazism.

Mr. Obama had earlier paid homage to Hitler, the historical founder of nazism or racist fascism, by making the U.S., on 21 November 2014, one of only three countries in the entire world to vote against a resolution at the United Nations condemning the recent upsurge in racist fascism in many countries. Although Hitler wasn’t even mentioned in it, Obama had his U.N. representative vote against it — vote against condemning Hitler’s ideology.

Even before that, in February 2014, Obama was the first-ever U.S. President to perpetrate a coup overthrowing a democratically elected head-of-state and installing a racist-fascist, or ideologically nazi, regime to replace it. This is what he did in Ukraine.

That regime subsequently engaged in an ethnic-cleansing campaign, which Obama supports.

All of this is due to Obama’s obsession to defeat Russia, which, of course, is adjoining Ukraine, which proximity makes Obama’s takeover of Ukraine especially useful for his main foreign-policy goal of defeating Russia.

According to Western accounts, the whole problem started on 21 November 2013, right after Ukraine’s freely elected President Viktor Yanukovych announced his rejection of the EU’s offer, but America’s planning for the coup actually started back in Spring of 2013, not after 21 November 2013; and Yanukovych had good reason to reject the EU’s offer, because it would have cost Ukraine an estimated $160 billion. So, that account in Western media is demonstrably false, insofar as it pertains to what had actually caused those public demonstrations. It was Obama’s determination to defeat Russia.

Obama’s TPP and TTIP international-trade deals are part of that — to lock out both Russia and China. But Obama even opposes the policy, which is already in place in all industrialized countries except America, and even in some underdeveloped countries, that basic healthcare is not a privilege that should be available only to persons who have the financial ability to pay for it, but is instead a basic human right, which must be made available to all citizens regardless of how rich they are.

Obama even places higher priority on defeating Russia than on defeating ISIS and Al Qaeda.

Some people say that none of this can be true, because it doesn’t fit with Obama’s rhetoric. But no intelligent person trusts his rhetoric anymore. Too much is established by his record, for anyone today still to be trusting his mere rhetoric. But anyway, as President he has argued to the U.S. Supreme Court (and the Court unanimously agreed) that the right to lie in politics is guaranteed by the U.S. Constitution and cannot be limited by any state.

Investigative historian Eric Zuesse is the author, most recently, of  They’re Not Even Close: The Democratic vs. Republican Economic Records, 1910-2010, and of CHRIST’S VENTRILOQUISTS: The Event that Created Christianity, and of Feudalism, Fascism, Libertarianism and Economics.

Las contradicciones entre acumulación de capital y supervivencia de la humanidad y del planeta alcanzan niveles ostensiblemente críticos, el complejo militaro-industrial implementa cada vez más guerras para seguir su crecimiento perverso. En este contexto aparece como un imperativo ético y político el análisis medular de las guerras: no podemos ya contentarnos con las explicaciones postizas y seudo antropológicas de “guerras tribales” o de “no hay cultura de paz en esos pueblos”: pronunciamientos cuya naturaleza distila colonialismo y constituye la argucia para evitar ir al centro del problema. Evidentemente hay plétora de seudo estudios e instituciones que difunden, algunos más sutilmente que otros, esas premisas cosméticas. Aquellos que tienen un altísimo interés en impedir la comprensión de la realidad, y por consiguiente la posibilidad concreta de transformación de la misma, financian estos tanques de pensamiento.

1. ‘Cultura de Aceptación del Saqueo’ disfrazada de ‘Cultura de Paz’

Sería digna de aguaceros de risas en una representación de teatro grotesco, la existencia de “Estudios de Preservación del Medio Ambiente”, financiados por la industria farmacéutica o petrolera, o bien la existencia de “Cátedras de Cultura de Paz” cuya línea se dedica a esquivar el análisis de la raíz de la guerra. Cátedras impartidas en Europa o EEUU, en países en los que radican las principales empresas fabricantes de armas, y las depredadoras energéticas: unas cátedras que se centran en “enseñarles” a becados provenientes de países como el Congo, Afganistán, Colombia, etc, la manera de ser más “pacíficos”, de “resolver los conflictos desde la civilidad” y de “desarrollar una cultura de paz”, obviando olímpicamente que la guerra y la paz tienen raíces económicas y se desarrollan en contextos de desigualdad social, y no son meros asuntos de Cultura. Así los países que dedican millonarios presupuestos en guerras imperialistas y cuya supremacía mundial radica en una historia de prácticas colonialistas y genocidas, muy lejanas de la Cultura de Paz que pregonan de fachada, imparten cátedras de asimilación mental a la cultura de la aceptación del saqueomás desmedido, a la vez que ‘bombardean humanitariamente’ en su relance colonial. Así los becarios de países que sufren la voracidad capitalista de las guerras por el saqueo de los recursos, son adiestrados en la retórica que sirve para perder de vista el núcleo del problema; es el zorro enseñándoles a las gallinas con qué salsa deben ser comidas.

Los apelativos “guerras tribales” y demás expresiones consagradas en el campo semántico destinado a prolongar el estatus quo, encubren guerras por la acumulación de recursos, guerras fomentadas con fines geopolíticos y económicos claramente definidos por los verdaderos ‘Señores de la guerra’ que son los fabricantes de armas, los mercaderes de la energía, de la alimentación industrial, y las multinacionales de químicos, todos motores de la maquinaria depredadora del planeta.

bodegas de recursos’, cada día sufrirán de manera más cruenta la violencia del saqueo y su correlativo empobrecimiento, que a la vez causa éxodos masivos. Hay una carrera del gran capital por hacerse cada día con más recursos planetarios.

El estudio del caso colombiano arroja luces indeclinables sobre la realidad mundial: es una muestra en quintaesencia del capitalismo. Por esta razón hay un constante esfuerzo mediático en tergiversar la realidad colombiana, en invisibilizarla e impedir la comprensión de una realidad que es una radiografía de las mestástasis más atroces del sistema capitalista. La resistencia del pueblo colombiano es asimismo tergiversada e invisibilizada en ese esfuerzo constante de los monopolios de difusión de implementar la guerra mediática contra la comprensión de la realidad, haciéndo ver a las resistencias populares como “terrorismo”. El estudio a las fuentes de los sujetos históricos y sociales deviene una verdadera hazaña en medio del amedrentamiento contra la investigación social y el pensamiento crítico: no obstante su peligrosidad, ese estudio es indispensable.

2. Acumulación capitalista y Terrorismo de Estado en Colombia

En la realidad colombiana se plasma el despojo y reacomodo territorial destinado a escala planetaria a todas las zonas que presenten un interés económico; una lógica capitalista que no admite escrúpulos y constituye un ecocidio doblado de un genocidio. En Colombia son acicateadas las estrategias del Terror correlativas al saqueo capitalista. Estas son también exportadas como método de control social, sabotaje, exterminio de la reivindicación y contrainsurgencia a países de la región (México, Honduras, Venezuela, etc).

Las cifras del Terrorismo de Estado en Colombia son elocuentes: según un reciente informe, un total de 19 defensores de derechos humanos fueron asesinados en Colombia durante el primer trimestre de 2015, y otros 276 fueron agredidos [1].  Otro informe documenta que Colombia es el segundo país líder en el asesinato de ambientalistas en el mundo, con 25 asesinados en el 2014 [2] . El 80% de las violaciones a los derechos humanos y el 87% de los desplazamientos poblacionales han ocurrido en regiones donde las multinacionales operan la explotación minera. El 78% de los atentados contra sindicalistas fueron contra aquellos que trabajan en el área minero-energética [3].

La planificación de la acumulación de tierras mediante el despojo violento se expresa en la existencia de 6,3 millones de personas despojadas y desplazadas de sus tierras para beneficio del gran capital, millones de personas malviviendo en cinturones de miseria [4]. El despojo se acelera: el 40% del territorio colombiano está pedido en concesión por multinacionales [5].

El Terrorismo de Estado se expresa también en: 9.500 presos políticos [6];  la eliminación física de un partido político: La Unión Patriótica (5.000 personas asesinadas por las herramientas paramilitares y oficiales del Estado)[7]. El exterminio contra la oposición política es tal que:“En Colombia se cometen el 60% de los asesinatos de sindicalistas que se presentan en todo el mundo, por una violencia histórica, estructural, sistemática y selectiva que se convirtió en pauta de comportamiento del Estado colombiano”, según denuncia la CUT [8]. El Tribunal Sindical Mundial condenó al Estado colombiano: “por ser responsable de los hechos sistemáticos de violación del principio de libertad sindical, en calidad de autor directo, coautor, cómplice o encubridor de homicidios, lesiones, torturas, privaciones ilegítimas de la libertad, atentados(…)”[9].

El genocidio se plasma en los niveles de desaparición forzada: la ONU estima que más de 57.200 personas han sido desaparecidas en Colombia [10].  Un informe de la Fiscalía documenta: 173.183 asesinatos y 34.467 desapariciones forzadas, cometidos por la herramienta paramilitar, en un lapso de solo 5 años [11] . Una estimación de Piedad Córdoba, basada en el cotejo de informes y el conocimiento de la sistemática subvaloración de los registros oficiales, cifró en unos 250.000 los desaparecidos en 20 años [12]. La Coordinación Colombia-Europa-EEUU expresó que hay un:  “continuo aumento de los casos(…) Las desapariciones forzadas han sido usadas históricamente como un instrumento de persecución política y de control social basado en el terror, perpetrado por agentes del Estado y por grupos paramilitares que actúan con su tolerancia, omisión y aquiescencia y que se benefician de la impunidad(…) Las desapariciones forzadas forman parte de una práctica sistemática de ataques contra la población civil, que han sido funcionales al sostenimiento de las élites sociales, políticas y económicas del país”[13]. Hay mecanismos para la impunidad: “El subregistro de casos de desaparición forzada, la impunidad que se consolida con diversos mecanismos legales y sociales y la presencia de los perpetradores en las comunidades (…) Muchos casos no se denuncian por la mala administración de justicia, la ineficacia de los mecanismos de denuncia, el ambiente generalizado de temor e intimidación que viven los familiares de las víctimas, sus abogados, los testigos(…)[Ibíd.]. Se suman las leyes que excluyen a gran parte de las víctimas de desaparición forzada de los registros, las leyes que amplían el accionar represivo de la policía, y las leyes que intentan cobijar de impunidad a los responsables: “el Gobierno del presidente Santos está promoviendo un nuevo marco normativo con preocupantes limitaciones a los derechos de las víctimas de desapariciones forzadas.” [14]La mayor fosa común de Latinoamérica fue hallada detrás del batallón militar en la Macarena, con 2000 cadáveres de desaparecidos por la Fuerza Omega del Plan Colombia, fuerza que tiene estrecha ‘asesoría’ estadounidense [15].

3.Planificación de los Crímenes de Estado en el marco de la lógica de “disuadir la reivindicación mediante el terror”

Hay una lógica en el Terrorismo de Estado: y es que a mayor tortura y degradación de las víctimas, mayor alcance del “mensaje disuasivo” en las comunidades. La estrategia de la disuasión mediante el terror está teorizada en los manuales del ejército: se concibe a la población como “el enemigo interno”, y se preconiza claramente el empleo de una herramienta paramilitar para realizar las masacres y torturas. El paramilitarismo fue preconizado para Colombia desde la misión estadounidense Yarborough [16], y reiteradamente apuntalado hasta nuestros días. La herramienta paramilitar es adiestrada para torturar, y entrenada por (de)formadores de EEUU e Israel, como el mercenario Yair Klein [17]. Se trata de perpetrar Crímenes de Estado como el crimen contra la niña Alida Teresa Arzuaga, de 9 años, violada y asesinada para torturar a su padre (preso político), a la par que inyectar miedo en la oposición política[18]; o como la masacre de la familia del militante comunista y de la UP Julián Vélez, cuyo hijo fue torturado y castrado [19].Se trata, en el marco de esta planificación del Terror Estatal, de perpetrar masacres como la masacre de Mapiripán. Los paramilitares fueron trasladados en aviones del ejército del norte al sur de Colombia, y llevados por el ejército al sitio de la masacre [20]. Estuvieron amputando y violando durante 10 días, mientras el ejército impedía que entrara o saliera nadie: debido al cerco del ejército nadie pudo darle auxilio a la población. Unas 60 personas fueron asesinadas: sometidas a toda clase de torturas. Hasta hoy hay dificultad para identificar a las víctimas dada la barbarie con que la herramienta paramilitar procedió a descuartizarlas y lanzarlas al río. Según lo confesó el General Uzcátegui en una grabación: “¿sabe qué hizo la Brigada militar Móvil 2? Colocó un colchón de seguridad para que salieran los paramilitares. El ejército no sólo tiene vínculos con los paramilitares, no sólo no los combatió, sino que combatió a las FARC para que las FARC no golpearan a los paramilitares” [Ibíd.]. Mientras los paramilitares torturaban, el ejército garantizaba las atrocidades combatiendo a las FARC que intentaron romper el cerco militar para auxiliar a la población. El ejército garantizó que la masacre comprendiera las torturas más aberrantes: no era “una bala perdida”, era una operación de Terrorismo de Estado dentro de la estrategia de tierra arrasada en los Llanos Orientales, en la que estuvo envuelta la asesoría estadounidense. El Obispo del Guaviare testimonió: “Pasaron camiones con alrededor de 120 hombres de civil sin armas, después de pasar por el batallón salieron con uniformes y armados (…) otro grupo de paramilitares también se desplazó pero por el río Guaviare, pasando por el punto de control militar sobre el río” [Ibíd.].

Otro crimen de Estado que evidencia de manera flagrante esta planificación del terror, es aquel cometido por militares y paramilitares contra la comunidad del Cacarica, cuando “jugaron fútbol con la cabeza” del líder campesino afrodescendiente Marino López. La Operación Militar ‘Génesis’ consistió en aterrorizar a la comunidad para forzarla a un masivo desplazamiento poblacional: “Los paramiltares y también militares rodearon todo el caserío. Nos juntaron a todos (…) Dos de los doce militares tomaron a Marino(…) Lo insultan, lo golpean. Uno de los criminales coge un machete y lo corta en el cuerpo, Marino intenta huir, se arroja al río, pero los paramilitares lo amenazan, ‘si huye, le va peor’. Marino regresa, extiende su brazo izquierdo para salir del agua. Uno de los paramilitares le mocha la cabeza con la macheta. Luego le cortan los brazos en dos, las dos piernas… Y empiezan a jugar fútbol con su cabeza. Todas y todos lo vimos. Todo fue terror.”[21]. Los habitantes denunciaron el accionar de la Brigada XVII. Varios paramilitares del bloque Elmer Cárdenas, al mando de Freddy Rendón, alias “El Alemán”, señalan al General Rito Alejo del Río como uno de los máximos responsables: “Se trató de una operación conjunta” relataron ante el Fiscal de Justicia y Paz [22].

La lista de crímenes de Lesa Humanidad perpetrados de manera sistemática por el Estado colombiano contra la población, en el marco de una planificada estrategia del terror y desposesión, sería interminable. El Estado colombiano y su mentor estadounidense pretenden continuar viabilizando el saqueo de los recursos aterrorizando a la población cuya reivindicación entra en conflicto con la depredación capitalista. Se pretende eliminar toda oposición, sea esta armada o no.

El testimonio de Marinelly Hernández, presa política, es ilustrativo de las aberrantes torturas que el Estado colombiano comete contra los familiares de los opositores políticos, máxime si estos son insurgentes, una realidad silenciada: “A nuestro padre el Ejército colombiano, en unión con los paramilitares lo colgó vivo de sus manos introduciendo ganchos en sus extremidades como si fuera carne de carnicería, luego le chuzaron el estómago y todo su cuerpo con una navaja, después arrollaron sus labios como se les taja a los pescados, por último, le dieron un tiro de gracia; según medicina legal a nuestro padre lo torturaron vivo. Tenía 70 años, ¿Cómo es posible que hagan eso con un anciano, tildándolo de guerrillero? Acaso por yo ser revolucionaria ¿Tenían que cobrarlo con la vida de mi padre?”[23]. Aquí la tortura aberrante claramente tiene por objetivo enviar un mensaje de terror a los que piensen ingresar en la insurgencia. Estas prácticas genocidas son recurrentes.

Marinelly expresa la correlación entre el saqueo de los recursos y las masacres perpetradas por el ejército y la herramienta paramilitar contra la población de las zonas codiciadas por el gran capital. Aquí se refiere a la masacre del Río Nare: “El Capitán Martínez con sus tropas ingresaron a unas minas de oro donde se encontraban los campesinos sacando el mineral: un día antes, lanzaron panfletos diciéndoles que desalojaran, y al otro día entraron con motosierras y hachas: amarraron a los trabajadores en cadena… los iban soltando de uno en uno, sin asesinarlos, les quitaban los brazos, las piernas y luego de cada persona recogían un solo brazo, una sola pierna, hacían un montón y lo tiraban al río y otros a los huecos de las minas y otros los dejaban para que las aves se los comieran” [ Ibíd. ]. Marinelly, de una familia campesina, vivió en carne propia las agresiones del ejército colombiano contra el campesinado; fue testigo de múltiples asesinatos de amigos y familiares, cuyos cuerpos fueron abandonados torturados y desmembrados: “parte de la guerra sucia y psicológica que implementan para asustar a los luchadores populares”.  La presa política explica que las violaciones del Estado colombiano la empujaron a la insurgencia, como su: “única forma de preservar la vida, luchar por ella y reclamar nuestros derechos”, y evitar “terminar masacrada, torturada o discapacitada por ser ejemplarizada como quedan muchos campesinos, o terminar siendo desplazada y viviendo de las limosnas en las ciudades”[Ibíd. ].

La combinación del saqueo de los recursos y el Terror de Estado ejercido contra quiénes se oponen al saqueo, explica la existencia de las insurgencias colombianas, como única salida que encuentra una población sometida al despojo y a la represión más descarnada frente a sus reivindicaciones. Esta es una comprensión indispensable para quiénes deseamos la paz en Colombia. La paz significa justicia social, cese de la entrega del país en concesiones a multinacionales, reforma agraria, soberanía alimentaria, y cese del Terror de Estado que hoy facilita la acumulación capitalista en desmedro de las mayorías empobrecidas. Los problemas deben ser resueltos desde sus causas, no desde sus consecuencias.

4. ¿ Denunciaremos los crímenes resultado de una planificación Estatal,  o vamos a seguir promoviendo la confusión?

Estos crímenes de Estado envían un mensaje del terror contra la población: ‘Esto les puede pasar, a ustedes o a sus familiares, si persisten en su reivindicación’. Hay un claro intento de paralizar la acción reivindicativa de las comunidades, y ese terror se ejerce desde el mismo Estado, en un accionar que obedece a unos intereses económicos claros: es inaceptable por lo tanto que se intente endilgar los crímenes a “la violencia” en abstracto, como reiteradamente lo hacen los mass-media con los crímenes del Terrorismo de Estado. El mensaje es enviado por los verdugos a través de sus ejecutantes paramilitares, y no es aceptable que los maquilladores mediáticos vengan a garantizar la impunidad total a quienes son los verdaderos comanditarios de estos crímenes: los que se sirven del terror para sojuzgar a un pueblo y para garantizar la acumulación de capital en pocas manos, en desmedro del medio ambiente y de las mayorías. El intentar, mediante el aparato mediático, transformar los reiterados asesinatos políticos en “víctimas de los violentos” (así, “los violentos”, en abstracto), busca diluir responsabilidades, busca ocultar la planificación de un Terror que de manera sistemática es ejercido desde el propio Estado contra la oposición política. Esa impostura mediática no cala en los sectores más conscientes del campo popular, sin embargo en parte de la opinión pública sí hace mella.

5.Ofensiva contra la comprensión de la realidad: Estrategia de la ConfusiónLa Estrategia de la Confusión es implementada hasta la saciedad por el aparato mediático: por ejemplo el redactar notas sobre crímenes en los que se conoce perfectamente que la autoría es paramilitar, pero poner “asesinado por grupos armados”: esto con la clara intención de exculpar a la herramienta paramilitar que le sirve al poder económico, y de buscar endilgarle a la resistencia popular parte de los crímenes perpetrados por la estrategia paramilitar.

El léxico “grupos armados”  o “actores armados” es un léxico de la confusión, dado que grupos armados son tanto los paramilitares, como el ejército, como las insurgencias; por lo tanto no hay nada más aberrante que conocer que los victimarios son parte de una Estrategia represiva Estatal y paraestatal, articulada al poder multinacional, y optar por tejer el discurso de la confusión. Esta mediatización es indignante, y constituye una doble victimización de las comunidades que denuncian a los responsables, y que sin embargo ven ignoradas sus voces en las notas mediáticas, de manera a que la herramienta paramilitar-militar del terror no solamente haya cometido las atrocidades, sino que los medios no señalen su responsabilidad, amparándola así de la impunidad que la perpetúa.

Parte de la Estrategia de la Confusión es el empleo de la falsa dicotomía “grupos armados legales” versus “grupos armados ilegales”: siendo legales las fuerzas represivas del Estado, mientras que en la ilegalidad se hallan tanto las fuerzas represivas paramilitares –que sin embargo se articulan al mismo Estado, recibiendo logística, armamento e impunidad–, y las guerrillas –éstas últimas de naturaleza opuesta al paramilitarismo–. Esta perfidia mediática busca instaurar un campo conceptual que ignora la realidad del paramilitarismo como estrategia preconizada en manuales militares. También busca instalar un campo conceptual que excluye el carácter político y social del conflicto colombiano, al intentar presentar a las insurgencias en un mismo paquete con el paramilitarismo; intentando quitarle a la guerrilla su carácter político, inherente a su misma génesis y composición, de ser una expresión del campo popular colombiano que se alza en protesta política contra el saqueo, protesta política que deviene armada debido a la imposibilidad democrática instaurada desde el Estado mediante la sistemática represión al opositor político.

El paramilitarismo es una herramienta al servicio del Gran capital que actúa con la plena coordinación del ejército colombiano; pero los medios trabajan para ocultar la vinculación de esta herramienta con los que la crean y emplean. Lamentablemente este trabajo sistemático de los medios logra colonizar a parte importante de la población, dejando incluso huellas residuales que sorprende encontrar en las mentes de las mismas víctimas. El bombardeo mediático es una ofensiva sin tregua contra la capacidad de comprensión de la realidad, y por lo tanto, contra la posibilidad de acción efectiva sobre la misma.

Por ello es importante desenmascarar esa planificada manipulación semántica diseñada por los tanques de pensamiento. Esta manipulación es también inyectada en el discurso de las ONG a través del condicionamiento que imponen los financistas, logrando paulatinamente que en el campo popular se introduzca un entramado semántico que obstaculiza la capacidad de comprensión de la realidad. Hay una planificación del terror para facilitar la acumulación capitalista en manos de multinacionales y latifundio; frente al genocidio no cabe más caer en el borroneo de las causas del drama colombiano, ni jugar a la confusión, ni adoptar el léxico impuesto por los tanques de pensamiento de la USAID.

2015 Colombia: Continúa el exterminio de dirigentes populares. “En Colombia hay 20 millones de personas pobres, el 70% de los trabajadores activos están en la tercerización a través de contratos a término fijo, y un 60% de la población ocupada en la economía informal o del rebusque. Estas cifras contradicen las informaciones oficiales. Desde 1986, año de fundación de la Central Unitaria de Trabajadores (CUT), hasta el 2014, fueron asesinados más de 3.500 sindicalistas.”

¡La violencia antisindical de Colombia persiste! Radiografía de la crisis humanitaria del sindicalismo. http://cut.org.co/la-violencia-antisindical-de-colombia-persiste-radiografia-de-la-crisis-humanitaria-del-sindicalismo/

“La Escuela Nacional Sindical (ENS) denunció en Washington el asesinato de 105 sindicalistas durante cuatro años, que coinciden con la aplicación del plan de acción laboral que Colombia suscribió en 2011 como complemento al Tratado de Libre Comercio (TLC) con Estados Unidos”.

Enero 2015 CUT y de Fensuagro intervinieron en Bruselas

In 2002, Canadian Omar Khadr was captured by US forces in Afghanistan and transferred to Guantánamo Bay. He is alleged to have killed a US soldier during the battle that preceded his capture.  He was fifteen years old when apprehended, and has now spent six years (a quarter of his life) in detention.  The conditions of detention and the legal framework governing the treatment of detainees at Guantánamo Bay have been widely criticized inside and outside the United States as violations of international human rights, international humanitarian law, US military law, the US Constitution, and the rule of law.  Omar Khadr is the only remaining citizen of a western state and NATO ally detained in Guantánamo Bay.  The United Kingdom, France, Germany and Australia each successfully requested the return of their citizens and, in some cases, non-citizen permanent residents.

In March 2007, Professor Audrey Macklin hosted Omar Khadr’s US defense team at the Law Faculty. Lt. Col. William Kuebler, Prof. Muneer Ahmad and Kristine Huskey addressed faculty and students about Omar Khadr’s situation, then met with a group of local lawyers, graduate students, and NGO advocates to launch a Canadian campaign to raise awareness regarding the case of Omar Khadr and to advocate for his return to Canada. Since that strategy session, more individuals have become involved and we have undertaken several activities. In addition to publishing op-eds in Canadian newspapers, granting media interviews and holding press conferences, we have:

• Delivered an open letter to Prime Minister Harper and then-Foreign Minister Peter Mackay, calling for Omar Khadr’s repatriation, signed by  over twenty present and former parliamentarians, and over a hundred Canadian academics, individuals and organizations
• Organized an address by Lt. Col. William Kuebler to the Canadian Bar Association at the 2007 annual conference
• Submitted an amicus brief on behalf of 32 present or former Canadian parliamentarians and over 60 legal academics to the United States Supreme Court in an appeal by several Guantánamo detainees (including Omar Khadr) challenging the legality of the denial of habeas corpus (Prof. Craig Forcese and Scott Christenson, counsel of record)
• Submitted to the Military Commission an amicus brief on behalf of Canadian parliamentarians, Canadian and international legal academics, national and international legal associations, arguing that the procedures under the Military Commissions Act fail to respect minimum international guarantees applicable to children (18 January 2008).
• Represented interveners in Khadr v. Canada on the issue of Canada’s duty to disclose information obtained through the interrogation by Canadian officials of Omar Khadr at Guantanamo Bay; appeal to be heard by Supreme Court of Canada, 26, March 2008.

This website contains the open letter, the amicus brief, as well as background documents that provide context and legal analysis of relevant issues.

Background Information

Compiled by Canadian and US lawyers and advocates.

• Omar Khadr: Summary + Timeline (PDF)
• Omar Khadr as Child Soldier (PDF)
• List of detainees transferred out of GTMO (PDF)
• Legal Inadequacy of U.S. Military Commissions for Trying Omar Khadr (PDF)
• Military Commissions Act of 2006
  
• University of Ottawa Foreign Policy Practicum, “Repatriation of Omar Khadr to Be Tried Under Canadian Law” (Brief Submitted to Canadian Senate Standing Committee on Human Rights), January 2008 (PDF)
• Omar Khadr Interrogation at Guantanamo Bay by Canadian Officials (10 minute excerpt)
• Wikipedia entry for Omar Khadr
• CBC: The Khadr Case – Legal Options
• UN Commission on Human Rights Report on Guantanamo Bay (2006)
• “The US vs. Omar Khadr” (CBC TV documentary, first aired October 2008)

Legal documents

Plea Agreement, 24 October 2010

• Pre-trial Agreement
• Diplomatic Notes between United States and Canada
• “Ottawa Agrees to Repatriate Omar Khadr”, Globe and Mail 1 November 2010

Canada

Khadr v. Canada (Prime Minister): Repatriation of Omar Khadr to Canada

• Supreme Court of Canada judgment in Canada (Prime Minister) v. Khadr, 2010 SCC 3, 29 January 2010
• Factum of Crown, Supreme Court of Canada, 21 September 2009 (PDF)
• Factum of Omar Khadr, Supreme Court of Canada 9 October 2009 (PDF)
• Human Rights Watch/University of Toronto International Human Rights Program and Asper Centre for Constitutional Rights Intervener Factum (PDF)
• BC Civil Liberties Association Intervener Factum (PDF)
• National Council for Protection of Canadians Abroad Intervener Factum (PDF)
• Avocats Sans Frontières Canada, Le Barreau du Québec et Le Groupe d’étude en droits et libertés de la Faculté de Droit de L’Université Laval (PDF)
• Amnesty International Intervener Factum (PDF)
• Canadian Coalition on the Rights of Children/Justice for Children and Youth Intervener Factum (PDF)
• Criminal Lawyers Association Intervener Factum (PDF)
• Canadian Civil Liberties Association Intervener Factum (PDF)
• Leave to Appeal to Supreme Court of Canada granted 4 September 2009, hearing scheduled 13 November 2009
• Crown Application for Leave to Appeal, Supreme Court of Canada, 24 August 2009
• Omar Khadr Memorandum of Reply to Crown Application for Leave to Appeal, Supreme Court of Canada, 27 August 2009
• Crown Reply to Omar Khadr Memorandum of Reply, Supreme Court of Canada, 28 August 2009
• Khadr v. Canada (Prime Minister), Federal Court of Appeal, 2009 FCA 246, 14 August 2009
• Factum of Omar Khadr, Federal Court of Appeal
• Factum of Crown, Federal Court of Appeal
• Khadr v. Canada (Prime Minister), Federal Court, 2009 FC 405, 23 April 2009.
• Factum of Omar Khadr, Federal Court
• Factum of Crown, Federal Court
• Notice of Application to Federal Court, 8 August 2008 (PDF)
• Affidavit of Omar Khadr (PDF)
• Affidavit of CDR William Kuebler (PDF)
• Affidavit of April Bedard (PDF)

Motions, Applications and Decisions

• Khadr v. Canada (Attorney General), Federal Court of Canada, 18 August 2004 (motion to strike statement of claim) (Word)
• Khadr v. Canada (Attorney General), Federal Court of Canada, 13 October 2004 (motion to strike Charter claim arising from interrogation by Canadian officials) (Word)
• Khadr v. Canada (Attorney General), Federal Court of Canada, 28 January 2005 (application for production of documents) (Word)
• Khadr v. Canada (Attorney General), Federal Court of Canada, 8 August 2005 (injunction to bar further interrogations by Canadian officials) (Word)
• Khadr v. Canada (Minister of Justice), 2006 FC 509, 25 April 2006 (mandamus ordering disclosure of documents)
• Khadr v. Canada, Factum of Omar Khadr before Federal Court of Appeal (PDF)
• Khadr v. Canada Federal Court of Appeal, 10 May 2007 (non-disclosure of documents as Charter violation)
• Khadr v. Canada, Application for Leave to Appeal to Supreme Court of Canada, 3 August 2007 (PDF)
• Khadr v. Canada, Reply by Omar Khadr to A-G Application for Leave to Appeal to SCC (Word)
• Khadr v. Canada, Supreme Court of Canada, 25 October 2007, (leave to appeal granted) (PDF)
• Khadr v. Canada, Factum of the Appellant, Attorney General of Canada, 20 December 2007 (PDF)
• Factum of the Respondent, Omar Khadr, filed 14 February 2008 (PDF)
• Factum of the Intervenor, University of Toronto International Human Rights Clinic / Human Rights Watch, 22 February 2008 (PDF)
• Factum of the Intervenor, British Columbia Civil Liberties Association, 22 February 2008 (PDF)
• Factum of the Intervenor, Criminal Lawyers Association (22 February 2008) (PDF)
• Motion by Government to Strike Parts of Respondent’s Factum (PDF)
• Government Motion to Strike U of T IHRC-HRW Intervention (PDF)
• Respondent Reply to Motion to Strike (PDF)
• Additional Page in Respondent Reply (PDF)
• UofT IHLC – HRW Reply to Government Motion to Strike (PDF)
• BCCLA Reply to Motion to Strike (PDF)
• Supreme Court of Canada Decision on Motions by Appellant and Respondent, 20 March 2008 (PDF)
• Canada (Minister of Justice) v. Khadr, 2008 SCC 28, 23 May 2008 (judgment)
• Khadr v. Canada (Attorney-General), 25 June 2008 (disclosure pursuant to Supreme Court of Canada judgment)
• Khadr v. Canada (Prime Minister, Minister of Foreign Affairs, CSIS Director, RCMP Commissioner), 23 April 2009, 2009 FC 405 (failure by government to request Omar Khadr’s repatriation violates Khadr’s Charter s. 7 rights).

Evidentiary Record in Canada (Attorney General) v Khadr, Supreme Court of Canada, 13 November 2009

Note: These PDF files are very large.

• Joint Record, Volume I (PDF)
• Joint Record, Volume II (PDF)
• Joint Record, Volume III (PDF)
• Joint Record, Volume IV (PDF)
• Joint Record, Volume V (PDF)
• Joint Record, Volume VI (PDF)
• Joint Record, Volume VII (PDF)

Evidentiary Record in Canada (Minister of Justice) v. Khadr, 2008 SCC 28, 23 May 2008

Consolidated Evidentiary Record

• Appellant’s Record (PDF) (30 MB)

Fresh Evidence filed by Respondent, Omar Khadr 

• Affidavit of William Kuebler(PDF)
  • Exhibit A | Exhibit B
• Affidavit of Muneer Ahmad(PDF)
  • Exhibit A | Exhibit B | Exhibit C | Exhibit D | Exhibit E | Exhibit F | Exhibit G | Exhibit H | Exhibit I | Exhibit J | Exhibit K |Exhibit L | Exhibit M | Exhibit N | Exhibit O | Exhibit P | Exhibit Q | Exhibit R | Exhibit S | Exhibit T | Exhibit U | Exhibit V | Exhibit W | Exhibit X
• Affidavit of William Hooper(PDF)
  • Cross Examination of William Hooper (PDF)
  • Exhibits for Cross Examination of Hooper (PDF)
• Affidavit of Serge Paquette(PDF)
  • Cross Examination of Serge Paquette (PDF)
  • Exhibits for Cross Examination of Paquette (PDF)

United States

• Boumediene v. Bush; Al Odah v. United States(PDF) (US Supreme Court, 12 June 2008):
  • Brief submitted to the United States Supreme Court on behalf of Omar Khadr in upcoming appeal regarding the right of Guantanamo detainees to habeas corpus (PDF)
  • Canadian Parliamentarians and Professors of Law Amicus Brief (PDF)
  • Child Soldier Amicus Brief (PDF)
  • Note on English law issues raised by government brief and supporting amici (Word)
  • Reply Brief by Petitioners Lakhdar Boumediene, et al. (PDF)
  • Reply Brief by Petitioners Khaled A. F. Al Odah, et al. (PDF)
  • Reply Brief by Petitioners Khaled A. F. Al Odah, et al. (PDF)
• Omar Khadr v. Bush, US Dist. Ct. (DC), 12 July 2005 (application for preliminary injunction barring further interrogation or torture, requiring 30 days notice to counsel of any transfer to foreign country)
• Military Commission Documents in Relation to Omar Khadr
• US Court of Military Commissions Review (USCMCR) Documents With Respect to Omar Khadr
• Instructions to counsel on the conduct of the military commission in US v. Khadr (25 September 2007)  (PDF)
• Defense Motion For Dismissal Due to Lack of Jurisdiction Under the MCA in Regard to Juvenile Crimes of a Child Soldier, 18 January 2008 (PDF)
• Amicus Brief on Behalf of Canadian Parliamentarians and Law Professors in Support of Defense Motion Before MCA on Omar Khadr as Child Soldier, 18 January 2008 (PDF)
• Amicus Brief by Sen. Robert Badinter and Other International Law Professors and Jurists (PDF)
• Amicus Brief by Juvenile Law Center (PDF)
• “Omar Khadr Motion for Habeas Corpus” District Court, District of Columbia, 20 August 2008 (Doc)
• Ruling on Defense Motion to Suppress Evidence, Military Commissions Judge Parrish, 17 August 2010

UK and Australia

• Hicks v Ruddock, [2007] FCA 299 (action to compel Australian government to seek his release from Guantanamo Bay) (Word)
• Briefs by Eminent Jurists on Legality of US Detention of David Hicks and of Charges Against Him [A and B) (Word and PDF)
• Oxford Pro Bono Publico, The Hicks Project, Opinion on the Indispensable Judicial Guarantees Required by Common Article 3 of the Geneva Conventions (Word)
• Secretary of State for Home Department v. Hicks, [2006] EWCA Civ 400 (power of Secretary of State to grant and revoke Hick’s British citizenship) (Word)
• Abbasi v. Secretary of State for Commonwealth and Foreign Affairs. [2002] EWCA Civ 1598 (Application to compel UK government to make representations on UK citizen’s behalf) (Word)
• Al Rawi v. Secretary of State for Commonwealth and Foreign Affairs, [2006] EWCA Civ 1279 (Application to compel UK government to repquest release of UK permanent residents).  (Word)

Advocacy

• Amnesty International Online Action, Bring Omar Khadr to Justice. Bring Him to Canada (Amnesty International Canada)
• Open Letter to Prime Minister Stephen Harper, 14 June 2007 (PDF)
• Prime Minister’s reply to Open Letter, 3 August 2007
• Minister of Foreign Affairs Reply to Open Letter, 17 October 2007
• Press Statement (PDF)
• Letter from Canadian Bar Association to Prime Minister Stephen Harper, 12 August 2007 (PDF)
• Letter from former Chair of UN Committee on the Rights of the Child to PM Harper Re: Omar Khadr (PDF)
• Human Rights Watch, Omar Khadr: A Teenager Imprisoned at Guantánamo (PDF)
• Amnesty International, UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: Justice delayed and justice denied? Trials under the Military Commissions Act (PDF)
• Amnesty International, Media Releases and Reports of AI Observer for Military Commissions (Selected)
• Guantánamo Testimonials Project (University of California, Davis)
• “Public Letter by Canadian Legal Academics for a Government of Canada Intervention before the US Military Commission in the Omar Khadr Case on the Issue of Child Soldiers“, 17 January 2008 (PDF)
• Letter to Prime Minister Harper from British Parliamentarians calling on the government to follow the lead of the UK and other US allies and repatriate Omar Khadr to Canada (PDF)
• Canadian Lawyers Abroad Petition: “Bring Omar Khadr to Justice in Canada”
• Amnesty International, USA: “In whose best interests? Omar Khadr, child ‘enemy combatant’ facing military commission,” 16 April 2008. Summary of Report (PDF); Full Report (PDF).
• Letter from Law Society of Upper Canada to Prime Minister Stephen Harper, 6 November 2008.

Media Coverage, Op-Eds and Other Documents

• Angus Reid Poll: Canadians Doubt DFAIT Would Help Abroad
• Toronto Star: Act on Khadr, Harper urged
• BBC: Guantanamo detainee loses appeal – A Canadian Guantanamo Bay detainee must face a military commission after a previous ruling is overturned.
• Op-Ed, “Reclaim the high ground in case of Omar Khadr,” 24 August 2007, Toronto Star (Muneer Ahmad)
• Op-Ed, “Stop putting relations with the U.S. ahead of human rights,” 6 June 2007, Montreal Gazette (Maude Barlow, Alex Neve, Roche Tassé)
• Op-Ed, “Bring Omar Khadr home,” 30 March 2007, Ottawa Citizen (Audrey Macklin)
• Jamais deux sans trois: After two failed attempts, the U.S. military is hoping they can finally put Omar Khadr on trial for war crimes, 6 December 2007, Maclean’s
• Campaign to free Khadr escalates, 7 January 2008, Toronto Star
• Cracks Appear in Murder Case Against Khadr, 5 February 2008, Globe and Mail
• “Railroading a Canadian child-soldier,” William C. Kuebler And Rebecca S. Snyder, National Post, January 15, 2008
• “Children as Terrorists: Wrong to Train, Wrong to Charge,” David Crane, JURIST, February 12, 2008
• “A case built on lies,” Lt. Cmdr. William C. Kuebler and Rebecca S. Snyder, National Post, March 26, 2008
• “Bring Omar Khadr home,” Romeo Dallaire, National Post, March 31, 2008
• Department of Foreign Affairs Report on Visit with Omar Khadr, March 2008 (PDF)
• Department of Foreign Affairs Report on Visit with Omar Khadr, April 2008 (PDF)
• Department of Foreign Affairs Report on Visit with Omar Khadr, May 2008 (PDF)
• Report of the Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs and International Development, Subcommittee on International Human Rights, “Omar Khadr”, June 2008 (PDF)
• “Harper should seek release of Khadr,” Audrey Macklin, The Calgary Herald, July 12, 2008
• “The Omar Khadr Case: Redefining War Crimes,” Audrey Macklin, Jurist, October 31, 2008.
• “A chance to do the right thing,” Diana Juricevic, Cheryl Milne and Prof. Audrey Macklin, Globe and Mail, February 1, 2010

Amnesty International has issued four reports on the Israeli massacre in Gaza in 2014.¹Given the scale of the destruction and the number of fatalities, any attempt to document the crimes committed should be welcomed. However, these reports are problematic, and raise questions about the organisation itself, including why the reports were ever written at all.²They also raise questions about the broader human rights industry that are worth considering.

Basic background

July 2014 marked the onset of the Israeli massacre in Gaza (I will dispense with the Israeli sugar-coated “operation” name). The Israeli army trained for this attack for several months before finding a pretext to attack the Gaza Strip, shattering an existing ceasefire; this was the third such post-“disengagement” (2004) attack, and possibly the worst so far. At least 2,215 people were killed and 10,000+ wounded, most of them civilians. The scale of destruction was staggering: tens of thousands of houses were rendered uninhabitable; several high-rise buildings were struck by huge American-supplied bombs; schools and hospitals were targeted; 61 mosques were totally destroyed; water purification and sewage treatment plants were damaged; Gaza’s main flour mill was bombed; and all chicken farms in the territory were ravaged. There was incalculable devastation.³

Israeli control over Gaza has been in place for decades, with violence escalating over time, and the Palestinians there have been under siege for the past eight years. The Israelis have placed Gaza “on a diet”,⁴ permitting only a trickle of strictly controlled goods to cross the border, enough to keep the population above starvation levels. The whole Gaza Strip is surrounded on all sides, blocked off from the outside world: military bulldozers raze border areas, snipers injure farmers, and warships menace or destroy fishing boats with gunfire. Periodically, the Israelis engage in what they term “mowing the lawn” massacres and large scale destruction. It is this history that must serve as the foundation of any report that attempts to describe both the intent of the participating parties and the relative consequences.

Context-challenged – by design

The ongoing crimes perpetrated against Gaza are chronic and, indeed, systematic. Arnon Soffer, one of Israel’s Dr Strangelove types and “intellectual father of the wall”, had this to say about the enclave:

Q (Ruthie Blum): Will Israel be prepared to fight this war?

Arnon Soffer: […] Instead of entering Gaza, the way we did last week, we will tell the Palestinians that if a single missile is fired over the fence, we will fire 10 in response. And women and children will be killed, and houses will be destroyed. After the fifth such incident, Palestinian mothers won’t allow their husbands to shoot Kassams, because they will know what’s waiting for them. Second of all, when 2.5 million people live in a closed-off Gaza, it’s going to be a human catastrophe. Those people will become even bigger animals than they are today, with the aid of an insane fundamentalist Islam. The pressure at the border will be awful. It’s going to be a terrible war. So, if we want to remain alive, we will have to kill and kill and kill. All day, every day.⁵

To determine the reasons behind Israeli actions, one only has to read what such Dr Strangeloves say; it is no secret.

The aim is to create miserable conditions to drive the Palestinians off their land, warehouse the population in an open air prison called Gaza, and to repress any Palestinian resistance disproportionately. Israelis have to “kill and kill and kill, all day”. Such pathological reasoning puts Israeli actions into perspective; they are major crimes, possibly genocidal. Recognition of such crimes has some consequences.

First, the nature of the crimes requires their recognition as crimes against humanity, arguably one of the most serious crimes under international law. Second, Israeli crimes put the violence of the Palestinian resistance into perspective; Palestinians have a legitimate right to defend themselves against the occupying power. Third, the long history of violence perpetrated against the Palestinians, and the resulting power imbalance, suggests that one should be in solidarity with the victim, not the aggressor.

Amnesty, though, refuses to acknowledge the serious nature of Israeli crimes, by using an intellectually bankrupt subterfuge. It insists that as a rights-based organisation it cannot refer to historical context; doing so would be considered “political”, in its warped jargon. An examination of what Amnesty considers as “background” in its reports confirms that there is virtually no reference to relevant history or context, such as the prior Israeli attacks on Gaza, who initiated those attacks, the Goldstone Report, and so on. Hey presto! Now there is no need to mention serious crimes. It also doesn’t recognise the nature of the Palestinian resistance, and their right to self-defence. Nowhere does Amnesty International acknowledge that Palestinians are entitled to defend themselves against Israel’s military occupation. Finally, the rights group cannot express solidarity with the victim because, hey, “both sides” are victims!

At this point, once Amnesty has chosen to ignore the serious Israeli crimes, it takes on the Mother Teresa role of sitting on the fence castigating “both sides” for non-compliance with international humanitarian law that determines the rules of war. Thus, Amnesty criticises Israel not for the transgression of attacking Gaza, but for utilising excessive force or targeting civilians. The group’s favourite term to describe such events is “disproportionate”. This is problematic because it suggests that there is no problem with the nature of the action, just with the means or scale of it. While Amnesty bleats that a one-ton bomb in a refugee camp is disproportionate, it would seem that using a 100kg bomb would be acceptable. Another favoured term is “conflict”, a state of affairs where both sides are at fault, both are at once victims and transgressors.

Notice that while Amnesty avoids recognising major crimes by using its rights-based framework, it suddenly changes its hat, and takes on a very legalistic approach to criticise the violence perpetrated by the Palestinians. It manages then to list the full panoply of international humanitarian law which it deems to be applicable.

The key thing to watch in the upcoming International Criminal Court (ICC) investigation of the 2014 massacre will be whether the court will copy the Amnesty approach. Any investigation that doesn’t focus on the cause of the violence and who initiated it will result in another fraud, and no pixel of justice.

Criminalising Palestinian resistance

Amnesty dispenses with the Palestinians’ right to defend themselves by stating that the rockets fired from Gaza are “indiscriminate”, and proceeds to call their use a war crime. Palestinian resistance groups are also told not to hide in heavily populated areas, not to execute collaborators, and so on. While Palestinians are told that their resistance amounts to war crimes, the Israelis aren’t told that their attacks are criminal per se; for them, it is only a matter of scale.

The “Unlawful and deadly rocket and Mortar Attacks…” report condemns repeatedly Palestinian rocket firing with inaccurate weapons, deems these “indiscriminate”, and ipso facto war crimes. Amnesty confuses the term “inaccurate” with “indiscriminate”. Examining the table below suggests that Israel killed proportionately far more civilians, albeit with more accurate weapons. It is quite possible to target indiscriminately with precision munitions. There is also a possibility, which Amnesty International appears to disregard, that the Israeli military targeted civilians intentionally. Indeed, it is likely that Israeli drones targeted children intentionally. A report by Defence for Children International states: “As a matter of policy, Israel deliberately and indiscriminately targeted the very spaces where children are supposed to feel most secure.”⁶

Regardless of the accuracy of the weapons, the key issue is one of intent. Amnesty dwells on an explosion at the Shati refugee camp on 28 July. On the basis of one field worker’s testimony, Israeli-supplied evidence and an unnamed “independent munitions expert”,⁷ the organisation concludes that:

Amnesty International has received no substantive response to its inquiries about this incident from the Palestinian authorities. An independent and impartial investigation is needed, and both the Palestinian and Israeli authorities must co-operate fully. The attack appears to have violated international humanitarian law in several ways, as the evidence indicates that it was an indiscriminate attack using a prohibited weapon which may well have been fired from a residential area within the Gaza Strip and may have been intended to strike civilians in Israel. If the projectile is confirmed to be a Palestinian rocket, those who fired it and those who commanded them must be investigated for responsibility for war crimes.

Mother Teresa certainly provides enough comic material; an occasional joke makes it easier to read a dull report. The evidence for the provenance of this missile is taken at face value although it is supplied by Israel, but, of course, it requires an “investigation”; Amnesty is suggesting that both Israel and the Palestinians should investigate this incident. If the Palestinian resistance was responsible for this explosion, then it was caused by a misfire; thus, there was no intention to cause the consequent deaths. Suggesting that this amounts to a war crime is rather absurd, but the title of the section advertising the report on the Amnesty International website suggests a motive for harping on about this incident: “Palestinian armed groups killed civilians on both sides in attacks amounting to war crimes”. This conveys a rather warped and negative view of the Palestinian resistance – they kill civilians on both sides – and it suggests that it is not possible to be in solidarity with them.

Tyranny of reasons

After any Israeli attack, the pro-Israel propagandists offer a rationale about why a given target was struck. They claim that there were Palestinian militants firing rockets from hospitals, schools, mosques, the power plant and other civilian buildings. At a stroke, such locations are legitimised as Israeli targets whether or not the propaganda statements are true. What is disconcerting in the two reports on Israeli crimes is that Amnesty International imputes reasons for the targeting of buildings or families.

One finds, for example, statements such as:

• Amnesty International believes this attack was targeting one individual.
• The apparent target was a member of a military group, targeted at a time when he was at home with his family.
• The fighters who were the apparent targets could have been targeted at a different time or in a different manner that was less likely to cause excessive harm to civilians and destruction of civilian objects.
• The apparent target of Israel’s attack was Ahmad Sahmoud, a member of the al-Qassam Brigades, Hamas’ armed wing. […] Surviving family members and neighbours denied this.

Amnesty parrots the rationales provided by the Israeli military; one only needs to look at the footnotes of its reports to check the veracity of this claim. And Amnesty discounts the intentional bombing of buildings to create misery among the Palestinian middle class and demoralise a key sector of society; and that destroying the power plant amounts to collective punishment. But don’t worry, Mother T will always check with the Israeli military to determine why something was targeted.

AI is not an anti-war organisation

One would expect a human rights organisation to be intrinsically opposed to war, but Amnesty International is a cheerleader of so-called humanitarian intervention, and even “humanitarian bombing”.⁸ Despite such a predisposition, it was honoured with the Nobel Peace Prize, yet another questionable recipient of a prize meant to be given only to those actively opposed to wars. Today, one wonders if AI is going to jump on the R2P (Right to Protect) neocon bandwagon. A consequence of its “not-anti-war” stance is that it doesn’t criticise wars conducted by the United States, Britain or Israel; it is only the excesses that merit Amnesty’s occasional lame rebuke, often prefaced with the term “disproportionate” or “alleged”. This stance is evident in its latest reports; here the premise is that the Israeli attack on the Gaza Strip was legitimate, but it is the conduct of “both sides” that is the object of the reports’ criticism.

Can’t see the wood for the trees

Amnesty International is a small organisation with insufficient resources to conduct a proper report on the massacre in Gaza last year. Given the fact that it didn’t have direct access to Gaza approved by Israel, it chose to focus on two aspects of the Israeli attack: the targeting of entire families and the destruction of landmark buildings. Within these two categories it chose to focus on a handful of examples of each. The main problem is that Amnesty harps on about a few cases to the exclusion of the totality; it can’t see the wood for the trees. There is no mention of some of the most significant total figures, say, of the number of hospitals and schools destroyed, the tonnage of bombs dropped on Gaza,⁹ the tens of thousands of artillery shells used, and so on. The seriousness of the crime is lost by dwelling on a subset of a subset of the crimes committed. Amnesty isolates a few examples, describes them in some detail, and then suggests that unless there were military reasons for the attacks, then there should be an “investigation”. Oh yes, and it has sent some polite letters to the Israeli authorities requesting some comment, but the Israelis have been rather unresponsive. Quite possibly the likes of Netanyahu, Ya’alon, Ganz and their colleagues are too busy rolling on the floor laughing.

Given such a warped framework one would expect symmetry in the way that the attacks are described, but no. While Amnesty provides the total number of rockets fired by the Palestinian resistance, it gives no similar numbers of the tens of thousands of Israeli artillery shells fired, nor the total tonnage of bombs dropped on Gaza. The Israeli military propagandists were all too happy to provide detailed statistics about the Palestinian rockets, and Amnesty does not seem to express any misgivings about using this data. It is also clear that Mother T didn’t ask the propagandists to supply statistics on the lethal Israeli tonnage dropped on Gaza.

Methodology and evidence

Every report contains a methodology section admitting to the fact that AI didn’t have direct access to Gaza. All of its research was done on the Israeli side, and by two Palestinian fieldworkers in the besieged and occupied territory. The inability to enter Gaza possibly explains the reliance on many Israeli military statements, blogs and the foreign ministry about the Palestinian rocket attacks. One can verify all the footnotes to find a significant number of official Israeli statements to provide so-called evidence. It is rather jarring to find Amnesty relying on information provided by the offensive military forces to implicate Palestinian resistance in war crimes. How appropriate is it to use “Hamas’ Violations of the Law” issued by the Israel Ministry of Foreign Affairs, or “Declassified Report Exposes Hamas Human Shield Policy” issued by the Israeli military?

It is also jarring to find Amnesty referring to Israeli claims that rockets were fired from schools, hospitals and the electricity power plant. This information was provided as a justification for Israel’s destruction of such sites, but in the report Amnesty uses it to wag its finger at the Palestinian resistance.¹⁰

Amnesty International’s access to Israeli victims of Palestinian rockets produced emotional statements by the victims, and complied with Israeli propaganda needs. Israeli PR was keen to take journalists or visiting politicians to the border towns to show the rocket damage, and Amnesty seems to have been pleased to tag along. At the same time, Israel prevented any Amnesty access to Gaza; clearly, any information coming out of the territory would not be compliant with Israeli PR requirements. Thus, why send any researchers to the Israeli border area?

Execution of collaborators – who will be criticised?

Amnesty has announced the publication of a forthcoming report on the execution of collaborators, and one can only speculate on its contents. It is odd that while AI is not opposed to wars it is opposed to the death sentence; it is opposed to some deaths, but silent about others. Couple this stance with an unwillingness to recognise the Palestinian right to self-defence and, consequently, AI will inevitably deem the execution of Palestinians who collaborate with Israel as abhorrent.

There are many collaborators in the West Bank and they are evident at all levels of society, even in the so-called Palestinian Authority. The PA has even committed itself to their protection. Collaboration with Israel in the West Bank is thus a relatively low-risk activity. In Gaza there are also collaborators, who are used to infiltrate and inform on the armed resistance groups, and also to sow black propaganda. During the 2014 massacre, collaborators were instrumental in pinpointing the location of the resistance and its leadership. In most countries, treason and espionage in time of war merits execution, but it is doubtful that Amnesty International will accept this, and will instead urge a judicial process with no death sentence.

The key aspect of the forthcoming report will be whether the organisation deems the Israeli use of collaborators as an abhorrent practice. Israel not only uses collaborators to gather information, but they are also meant to fragment Palestinian society, and to sow discord. With a society already under massive stress due to economic hardship and military repression, collaborators are a pernicious means to break morale and undermine Palestinian resilience. Will Amnesty criticise Israel’s use of collaborators, or will its report merely castigate Hamas for the way it deals with collaborators?

Why were these reports written at all?

All Amnesty International reports follow the same formula: a brief overview, a methodology section about data sources, some emotional quotations by the victims, a section on accountability, and then some recommendations. They are trite, barely readable and certainly not very useful either for legal purposes or to educate its volunteers. So why are these reports published and who actually reads them? Amnesty would like to be known as one of the leading human rights organisations and it must be seen as reporting on major human rights violations and crimes. Its volunteers must be given the impression that the organisation cares for some of the wholesale atrocities, and not merely the retail crime or violation.

The timing of the publication of one report (“Unlawful and deadly: Rocket and mortar attacks…”) is rather curious. The report dealing with the Palestinian rockets was published a few days before the Palestinian accession to the International Criminal Court. A coincidence? While some Palestinians are gearing up to prosecute Israel for war crimes and crimes against humanity, a leading human rights organisation publishes a report which goes on about Palestinians being guilty of war crimes. Amnesty has published reports in the past that were exploited for propaganda purposes; the Iraqis throwing-the-babies-out-of-the-incubators propaganda hoax, for example.¹¹ Those reports were published just in time to provide a justification for war.

Impotence by design

All the reports contain a list of recommendations for Israelis, Palestinians and other states. One is struck by the impotence of the recommendations. The group urges Israel to cooperate with the UN commission of inquiry; allow human rights organisations access to Gaza; pay reparations to some victims; and ensure that the Israeli military operates within some legal limits. Given that Israel can more or less do as it pleases in any case – ignoring commissions of inquiry, proclaiming loudly that it will engage in disproportionate attacks (that is, the Dahiya doctrine), and that it refuses to compensate any Palestinian victim of its previous massacres – all these recommendations ring hollow.

Amnesty urges Palestinians to address their grievances via the ICC. It is curious that while international law apparently provides the Palestinians with no protection whatsoever, they are urged to jump through international legal hoops. It is also questionable to suggest a legal framework meant for interstate conflict when dealing with a non-state dispossessed native population. Of course, Amnesty fails to mention that Israel has avoided and ignored international law with the complicity and assistance of the United States.

Finally, Amnesty International requests other governments to assist the commission of inquiry and to assist in the prosecution of war criminals. It remains to be seen whether the commission of inquiry will actually publish a report that has some teeth. The group also urges other countries to stop supplying weapons to “both sides”. There is no mention of the fact that the US resupplied Israel with weapons during last year’s massacre in Gaza. It is very unlikely that the US or Britain will stop arming Israel; as such, Amnesty’s recommendations are ineffective rhetoric.

Amnesty trumpets that it has 7 million supporters world-wide;¹² a few months ago this number was 3 million; two years ago it was 400,000, and a few more years ago it was 200,000. One should marvel at this explosive growth. If the organisation really can tap into the support of even a fraction of these volunteers, then it can urge them to do something that has tangible results; it could, for example, ask its members and supporters to boycott Israeli products or products made by western companies complicit in Israeli crimes. Such action would be far more effective than the meaningless recommendations that are ignored regularly by Israel and its western backers. Alas, it is difficult to conceive that Amnesty will issue a call for a boycott to its ever expanding army of supporters. It is difficult for Mother T to change her stripes.

The human rights industry

There are thousands of so-called human rights organisations. Anyone can set up such a group, and thereby specify a narrow focus for the NGO, determine the parameters within which it will operate – even define who is human – and then the new organisation can chime in with press releases, host wine and cheese receptions, bestow prizes, lobby politicians, launch investigations and castigate the enemy du jour. Bono, Geldof and Angelina might even hop along and sit on the NGO’s board. The human rights framework is elastic and can be moulded to fit legitimate purposes, but it can also be manipulated for propaganda purposes. The history of some of the largest human rights organisations shows that they were created originally with the propaganda element foremost in mind.¹³ This suggests that NGO output, such as Amnesty’s reports, for example, merit scrutiny not so much for what they say, but for what they omit. In the Palestinian context, a simple test on the merits of a so-called human rights organisation is whether it challenges state power, calls for accountability and the prosecution of war criminals, and urges its supporters to do something more than write out cheques or very formal and polite letters to governments engaged in criminal acts.

Another test for the merits of a human rights NGO is whether it is in solidarity with the victims of violence, and whether victims are treated differently depending on their support or demonisation by “the west”. In Amnesty’s case, consider that on the one hand it provides long lists of “prisoners of conscience” pertaining to prisoners held in Cuba, Syria, etc., but on the other hand it explicitly does not make such a list of Palestinian prisoners available.[14] We have no means of knowing how many Palestinian political prisoners Amnesty actually cares about, and whether its volunteers engage in letter writing campaigns on their behalf. One thing is certain, though, that while the majority of Cuban political prisoners are considered prisoners of conscience, only a tiny fraction of the Palestinian political prisoners have been given such status. In reality, of course, Mother Teresa doesn’t give a hoot about political prisoners who might have been involved in violence, so Palestinians are just a stone’s throw away from being ignored by Amnesty International. Some victims are more meritorious than others.

In trying to justify the organisation’s double standard, Malcolm Smart, Amnesty’s Director of the Middle East and North Africa Programme, stated:

“By its nature, the Israeli administrative detention system is a secretive process, in that the grounds for detention are not specified in detail to the detainee or his/her legal representative; inevitably, this makes it especially difficult for the detainee to challenge the order for, by example, contesting the grounds on which the detention was made. In the same way, it makes it difficult or impossible for Amnesty International to make a conclusive determination in many cases whether a particular administrative detainee can be considered a prisoner of conscience or not.”¹⁵

It thus provides yet more comic material. AI admits that Israeli military courts can determine who can be considered a Palestinian prisoner of conscience. The only thing that those courts need to do is to keep their proceedings secret or not reveal “evidence”. Alternatively, they can simply imprison the victims without trial or declare that they are members of a “banned” organisation¹⁶ and then the Israelis won’t have to reply to those pesky polite letters written by AI volunteers. Once again, double standards in the treatment of victims raise questions about the nature of any human rights NGO.

Human rights is denatured justice

Pushing for the observance of human rights doesn’t necessarily imply that one will obtain justice. The human rights agenda merely softens the edges of the status quo. As Amnesty’s position on the Israeli attacks on Gaza illustrates, pushing human rights can actually be incompatible with obtaining justice. Human rights are a bastardised, neutered and debased form of justice. The application and effectiveness of international law is bad enough, but a pick and choose legal framework with no enforcement is even worse. If one seeks justice, then it is best to avoid the human rights discourse; above all, it is best to avoid human rights organisations.

Palestinians should be wary of Mother Teresas peddling human rights snake oil. In exchange for giving up their resistance and complying with Amnesty’s neutered norms, they are unlikely to obtain any justice. One should be wary of human rights groups that don’t push for justice, play the role of Israel’s lawyer, and are bereft of solidarity with the victims. When the likes of Amnesty International come wagging their finger, it is best to keep the old blunderbuss near to hand.

Further Reading

• Nabeel Abraham, et al.; International Human Rights Organizations and the Palestine Question, Middle East Report (MERIP), Vol. 18, No. 1, January-February 1988, pp. 12 – 20.
• Dennis Bernstein and Francis Boyle, Amnesty on Jenin: an interview, CAQ, Summer 2002, pp. 9 – 12, 27.
• Paul de Rooij, AI: Say It Isn’t So, CounterPunch, 31 Oct. 2002
• Paul de Rooij, Amnesty International: The Case of a Rape Foretold, CounterPunch, 26 November 2003
• Paul de Rooij, Double Standards and Curious Silences / Amnesty International: A False Beacon, CounterPunch, 13 October 2004.
• PIWP database: list of articles on the politics of human rights

Notes

1. Families Under the Rubble: Israeli Attacks on Inhabited Homes (MDE 15/032/2014), 5 November 2014.
   “Nothing is immune”: Israel’s destruction of landmark buildings in Gaza (MDE 15/029/2014), 9 December 2014.
   Unlawful and deadly: Rocket and mortar attacks by Palestinian armed groups during the 2014 Gaza/Israel conflict (MDE 21/1178/2015), 26 March 2015.
   The fourth report about the execution of collaborators has not been published yet.
2. I distinguish between Amnesty International, the international organization, and its well intentioned letter-writing volunteers.
3. Possibly the best overview of the Gaza Massacre 2014 is Al Haq’s Divide and Conquer; http://alhaq.org/publications/publications-index/item/divide-and-conquer
4. Statement made in 2006 by Dov Weisglas, one of Israel’s Dr. Strangeloves and close confidant of Ariel Sharon. Source: http://www.corkpsc.org/db.php?qid=1013
5. Ruthie Blum interviews Arnon Soffer, ONE on ONE: It’s the demography, stupid, Jerusalem Post, 10 May 2004
6. Ali Abunimah , Israel “directly targeted” children in drone strikes on Gaza, says rights group, Electronic Intifada, 17 April 2015.
7. Amnesty loves to trot out military experts and dwell on the type of weapons used. First, there is an issue about the military expert, and who they are. What is the ethics about showing up in Gaza with a military person who might still be in the armed forces of, say, the UK? One can hardly expect them to be “independent”. And why dwell on the type of munitions if their use is already criminal to begin with? Focusing on the type of weapon deflects attention from the damage and the victims – that should be the emphasis.
8. Alexander Cockburn, “How the US State Dept. Recruited Human Rights Groups to Cheer On the Bombing Raids: Those Incubator Babies, Once More?”, CounterPunch newsletter, April 1-15, 1999.
9. While AI reports the total number of Palestinian rockets fired, there is no equivalent number to the totals used by the Israeli military. That number would be of interest because it would indicate the scale of the crimes committed. Tens of thousands of artillery shells were used, requiring them to be restocked by the United States in the middle of the offensive.
10. The UN report on the Israeli attacks against schools lists several incidents where the Israelis falsely accused the Palestinians of firing on these schools. Such evidence should reduce the credibility of Israeli statements. See, e.g., Ali Abunimah, UN finds Israel killed dozens at Gaza schools but ducks call for accountability, Electronic Intifada, 28 April 2015.
11. In the lead up to the 1991 invasion of Kuwait/Iraq, Amnesty issued a report on the so-called babies out of incubators story. President Bush Senior showcased the report on the eve of the attack, and used it for its full propaganda potential. When it was pointed out to Amnesty that they were pushing a propaganda hoax, it doubled its estimate of the number of children dumped from the incubators. To this day, the organisation has never apologised for playing a role in selling an American war.
12. See: https://www.amnesty.org/en/who-we-are/ And notice that in the page after title page of Amnesty International’s reports the number of supporters increases from one report to the next.
13. Kirsten Sellars, The Rise and Rise of Human Rights, Sutton Publishing, 29 April 2002. Herein she discusses the origin of Human Rights Watch.
14. Malcolm Smart, Letter: Amnesty International’s Prisoner of Conscience lists and the reason for double standards, 9 August 2010 http://www.corkpsc.org/db.php?aid=133223.
15. Ibid.
16. Another technique to rule out sympathetic treatment of Palestinians is to suggest that they are members of a banned organisation. NB: it is Israel which does the banning. Any organisation seeking liberation or to confront the Israeli dispossession or violence is deemed by the Israelis to be a “terrorist organisation”. Currently, Amnesty plays along with this charade, and also ignores Palestinians belonging to “political” organisations.

May 8. Today’s payroll jobs report is more of the same. The Bureau of Labor Statistics claims that 223,000 new jobs were created in April. Let’s accept the claim and see where the jobs are.

Specialty trade contractors are credited with 41,000 jobs equally split between residential and nonresidential. I believe these are home and building repairs and remodeling.

The rest of the jobs, 182,000, are in domestic services.

Despite store closings and weak retail sales, 12,000 people were hired in retail trade.

Despite negative first quarter GDP growth, 62,000 people were hired in professional and business services, 67% of which are in administrative and waste services.

Health care and social assistance accounted for 55,600 jobs of which ambulatory health care services, hospitals, and social assistance accounted for 85% of the jobs.

Waitresses and bartenders account for 26,000 jobs, and government employed 10,000 new workers.

There are no jobs in manufacturing.

Mining, timber, oil and gas extraction lost jobs.

Temporary help services (16,100 jobs) offered 3.7 times more jobs than law, accounting architecture, and engineering combined (4,500 jobs).

As I have pointed out for a number of years, according to the payroll jobs reports, the complexion of the US labor force is that of a Third World country. Most of the jobs created are lowly paid domestic services.

The well paying high productivity, high value-added jobs have been offshored and given to foreigners who work for less. This fact, more than the reduction in marginal income tax rates, is the reason for the rising inequality in the distribution of income and wealth.

Offshoring middle class jobs raises corporate profits and, thereby, the incomes of corporate owners (shareholders) and executives. But it reduces the incomes of the majority of the population who are forced into either lowly paid and part time jobs or unemployment.

The extraordinary decline in the labor force participation rate indicates shrinking opportunities for the American labor force. No economist should ever have accepted the claim that the economy was in recovery while participation in the labor force was declining.

The officially documented decline in the labor force participation rate casts additional doubt on the claimed increases in payroll jobs. If jobs are growing, the labor force participation rate should not be declining.

Having looked at the actual details of the payroll jobs report, which are seldom if ever reported in the financial media, let’s look at what else goes unreported in the media.

The government’s economic statistical agencies are under pressure not to roil the financial markets. Consequently, initial reports, which are always the headline reports, are as close as possible to the “consensus forecast” prepared by economists in the financial sector, whose jobs are to maintain a good atmosphere for financial instruments.

This practice results in optimistic advanced estimates and first estimates. The real reporting comes later in revisions. For example, today the headline was 223,000 new jobs, recovery on track, stock market up. What was not reported by the media is that the prior month’s (March) payroll jobs growth was cut to 85,000 jobs, substantially below population growth.

The same thing happens with the reporting of GDP growth. The first quarter GDP advanced estimate was kept in positive territory with a 0.2%–two-tenths of one percent–growth. When the revisions arrive, which we already know will be negative GDP growth due to the trade figure, they will not receive the same attention.

There are many additional problems with the economic reporting. I have written about a number of them in past reports. Here I will provide one more example. According to the payroll jobs report oil and gas extraction lost 3,300 jobs in April. This low number is inconsistent with what we know about layoffs from fracking operations. According to Challenger Gray, a private firm that tracks job cuts announced by corporations, in April 20,675 jobs were lost as a result of falling oil prices. That is more than six times the loss reported by the payroll jobs report.

Challenger Gray reports that during the first four months of this year, corporations have announced 201,796 job cuts. Obviously, corporations are not creating new jobs. That is why the BLS looks to waitresses, bartenders, remodeling contractors, government, and social services for employment growth.

Jobs offshoring has shriveled the employment opportunities for Americans. These shriveled opportunities are largely responsible for stagnation and decline in real median family incomes, for the falling labor force participation rate, for the rising inequality in the income and wealth distribution, and for student loans that cannot be repaid from the lowly paid jobs available. Corporations and Wall Street in pursuit of short-term profits have given the economy away. Much of the former US economy now belongs to China and India. Corporate executives and shareholders got rich off of this give-away.

By Political Concern

At least, one writes, there will not be the heartache of watching such a team fail – as did the widely hailed Blair and Obama – beset by vested interest and failing to fulfil expectations. Instead on past record there will be:

• more austerity for the ‘have-nots’, continuing as senior bankers flourish – despite causing the economic crash;
• declining public services;
• sub-standard education and training for the young from poorer families;
• ‘aspirational’ housing built on green spaces as council housing lists grow;
• the revolving door between big business and government continuing to spin, ensuring that decisions are made in favour of the rich;
• courting of foreign investment
• more poorly monitored, polluting incinerators;
• permission given for fracking in the politically opposed north;
• exploitation of smaller food producers, favouring food for export;
• lavish expenditure on HS2 and Trident;
• private companies entering the NHS and putting profit first;
• increasing export of armaments, causing mayhem in other countries;
• assistance for America’s military aggression.

And perhaps more:

Copyright Political Concern 2015

A future Little Britain: separated from Scotland, subservient to America, outside the European Union and beholden to the conflicting agendas of the Conservative Friends of Israel (CFI) lobby and the SNP is a frightening prospect.

A government expenditure of £100 billion to replace the Trident nuclear deterrent would be about as protective to Britain as writing a powerful computer virus which if used would permanently damage our own entire communications infrastructure leaving all state security systems disabled. The Trident weapon of mass destruction has no legitimate purpose: its use would be impossible as huge numbers of civilians, including millions of British citizens, would be unavoidable victims.

The plain facts are that: ‘international terrorism, cyber-attacks and natural hazards as greater threats than nuclear war. The cost of replacing Trident would be enough to fully fund A&E services in UK for 40 years, employ 150,000 new nurses, build 1.5 million affordable homes, build 30,000 new primary schools, or cover tuition fees for 4 million students.’

The Trident so-called deterrent is for status reasons only. It should be scrapped and Britain’s defence infrastructure should be rebuilt without nuclear or chemical weapons of mass destruction and without any collaboration from Israeli-owned arms suppliers. Britain’s defence should not be compromised by the use of equipment sourced from outside the EU or NATO. To do so, potentially places us, in Britain, all in danger in the event of any future conflict.

The Conservative government’s current defence policy is dangerously flawed and with an isolated Britain divorced from Scotland and outside the EU – would be an easy target for international terrorism.

Oxfam’s recent report, “WEALTH: HAVING IT ALL AND WANTING MORE” contains shocking figures that the press haven’t sufficiently publicized; so, the findings and the reliability of their sources will be discussed here. The results will then be related to the central political debate now going on in the U.S. Presidential contests for 2016, which is about equality and inequality.

First, the findings:

1. The richest 80 individuals own as much as do all of the poorest half of humanity.

2. During 2009-2014, the wealth of the 80 richest people doubled, yet the wealth of the bottom 50% declined slightly.

Now, the sources:

These data are calculated from Forbes magazine, regarding the world’s richest individuals, and from the Credit Suisse Global Wealth Databook 2014, regarding the global wealth-distribution.

The source on the richest 80:

The Forbes list is one of two such lists, the other being Bloomberg. The two are generally in rather close agreement, but sometimes disagree enormously. For example, as of 8 May 2015, Forbes shows Sweden’s Ingvar Kamprad, the owner of Ikea, as #8 owning $43.1B, but Bloomberg shows him as #497 owning $3.5B.

Furthermore, Newsweek on March 2nd headlined “Why Putin Isn’t on ‘Forbes’ Billionaires List,” and reported that,“Forbes excludes members of royal families and ‘dictators who derive their fortunes entirely as a result of their position of power.’ Although it details this caveat, the magazine offered limited insight into the exact reason Putin was left off. When asked about Putin, a spokeswoman for Forbes told Newsweek: ‘Vladimir Putin is not on the list because we have not been able to verify his ownership of assets worth $1 billion or more’ and cited the methodology. The spokeswoman and [Assistant Managing Editor Kerry] Dolan did not comment directly as to whether the magazine considered Putin a dictator, and thus exempted him from the list by this classification. A reporter who worked on the list did not reply to a request for comment.” So: royals, and “dictators,” are both left off the list. Also: Dolan said that the magazine attempts to obtain the cooperation of listees but that “some cooperate; others don’t.”

Forbes itself says that,

“We do not include royal family members or dictators who derive their fortunes entirely as a result of their position of power, nor do we include royalty who, often with large families, control the riches in trust for their nation.”

This means the wealthy royal families of the United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia and other Gulf countries are not eligible for our global wealth ranking. (These monarchs, like Khalifa bin Zayed Al-Nahyan and Saudi King Abdullah bin Abdul Aziz Al Saud, land on our list of The World’s Most Powerful People.)”

Consequently, the Forbes ranking is quite unreliable; and, on top of that, it is methodologically opaque. Leaving royalty off of their list is automatically excluding the royalty in England, Saudi Arabia, and other countries, where those people might well be the richest ones in their nation, if not the richest people in the entire world.

The Forbes ranking is thus untrustworthy, because it automatically excludes entire groups of people which might include many who are wealthier than any who are on their list. However, all that this means is that many people might exist who are even wealthier than the ones that show up as being among the top 80 on the Forbes list. Consequently, the Forbes list systematically under-states the wealth of the people who are actually the world’s 80 richest. The richest 80 could conceivably even be an entirely different list. Therefore, perhaps the richest 80 own far more than do the poor half of Mankind. But they almost certainly don’t own less than do the poor half of Mankind. In any case, they own at least as much as do the lower half.

The source on the global wealth-distribution:

The source that’s used to calculate the amount of personal wealth in the entire world and its nation-by-nation distribution, Credit Suisse, is overwhelmingly regarded as the most thorough that exists on this subject. Its research-team was selected by Anthony Shorrocks, who had long headed the UN’s World Institute for Development Economic Research, which is the leading research institute on global wealth-distribution.

However, yet again, the available data exclude a lot at the very top. For example, since the Saudi and other royals and dictators are disappeared from even the pretense of being calculated for possible inclusion into world’s-richest lists, the wealth-distributions for many Arabic and other totalitarian countries — and for constitutional monarchies such as in Norway, Netherlands, UK, Morocco, and Jordan — are necessarily based on much guesswork. Consequently, global wealth-inequality is being systematically underestimated, even in the best available source. Yet, even so, what can be publicly determined about global wealth-inequality is staggering:

The Credit Suisse Global Wealth Databook 2014 presents on its page 98, a global wealth pyramid, which indicates that the world’s richest 0.7% (35 million people) own $115.9 trillion, while the poorest 99.3% (4,665 million people) own $147.3 trillion. It also shows that the richest 8.6% own $224.5T (trillion), while the poorest 91.4% own only $38.7T. (Or, in other words: the richest 8.6% own 5.8 times as much as do the poorest 91.4%.)

Consequently, if the transfer of wealth from the many to the few is to continue, then the main way for that to happen will need to be by the super-rich receiving their added wealth from the lesser-rich, because the percentage of wealth that exists amongst the non-rich — the lower 91.4% — is only 17% of the globe’s total wealth, which isn’t much; and, even if all of that were to go to the richest 8.6%, it still would increase their current $224.5T to $263.2T, a 17% rise. However, from 2009 to now, the wealth of the richest 80 humans has actually more than doubled; so, even a 17% rise would be far less than the 80 richest are accustomed to — especially over such a multi-year time-period as was 2009-2014. Those 80 people would then be feeling shortchanged.

This is why the richest 80 people will need to be getting their increases, in the future, mainly from the richest 8.6%. Wall Street and other major financial centers are perhaps in the best position to achieve that.

The Credit Suisse Global Wealth Databook 2014 presents, on page 124, its categorization of countries according to equality-inequality, and they apply for this purpose a methodology that minimizes the distortive influences such as have been mentioned here. Here is their resultant listing:

As is clear there, the United States is listed in the highest-inequality category; and, so, no reasonable question exists that inequality is even more extreme here than it is in most of the world’s countries.

The way that U.S. President Barack Obama and his economic advisors have dealt with this is to say that what needs fixing in the U.S. isn’t economic inequality itself but instead inequality of economic opportunity — as if the latter doesn’t depend upon the former. It’s impossible to increase equality of economic opportunity unless economic equality is increased. America’s politicians lie through their teeth, because they’re financed — in both Parties — by the super-rich. The only difference between the two Parties is that the Republicans lie by saying that America’s extreme economic inequality is okay and that government action to reduce it merely increases inequality of economic opportunity — something that presupposes what it pretends to be concluding, which is that government has no constructive role to play in this matter. They’re all hoaxters. But the American public senses this, even if only vaguely. They sense that the problem is real, but they don’t know that the Democratic Party’s approach to the problem since the time when Bill Clinton became President in 1993 is itself fraudulent and a sell-out to the super-rich.

The resultant political debate in the U.S.:

On May 4th, Gallup headlined “Americans Continue to Say U.S. Wealth Distribution Is Unfair,” and reported that, in response to the question, “Do you feel that the distribution of money and wealth in this country today is fair?”

63% say no, and in 1985 it was 60% saying no to that question. The highest percentage saying no was 68% right before the 2008 crash, and the lowest was 58% immediately after that crash. By 56% to 34%, Republicans right now are saying that the wealth-distribution is fair. By 86% to 12%, Democrats say that it’s not. (Among the overall population, 63% say it’s unfair, and 31% say it’s fair. That’s a two-to-one margin.) The poorer a person was in Gallup’s study, the likelier he or she was to say it’s “unfair.” The richer he was, the likelier to say “fair.” In other words: only at the very financial top is the belief commonly held that the existing wealth-distribution is “fair.” However, Republicans, of any amount of wealth, think that it’s “fair”: virtually all Republicans agree with the very rich about the fairness of the wealth-distribution, and virtually all non-Republicans don’t agree with that. (The only problem for non-Republicans is how to solve it.)

The only U.S. Presidential candidate who focuses, and stands clearly, on the side of this issue that says it’s “unfair” (which, as was just pointed out, Gallup finds to be by two-to-one, the norm) is Bernie Sanders, who is running in the Democratic Party. Unlike Obama and the Clintons, he acknowledges that it’s the basic problem, and that shunting it off onto “equality of economic opportunity” is essentially fraudulent. All of the other candidates are raising their campaign-funds from the top 1% of America’s wealth-pyramid, who are the very people the likeliest to believe that the present wealth-distribution is fair. Those candidates are raising their campaign-funds from the few people who own almost everything that there is to own, and these are also the people who have the most to lose. Senator Sanders is raising his campaign-funds from the many people who own almost nothing. While other candidates need to serve the rich, Sanders needs to run an authentically grass-roots campaign, which can defeat far-better-financed opponents, or he otherwise stands no real chance of winning.

This situation is called ‘democracy’ in the United States, but other terms are used for it in other countries. The only scientific study that has been done of the question of whether the U.S. is a democracy has found that it definitely is not. In order to make it one, profound change would be required. However, America’s richest need to convince America’s public that the nation already is a democracy, because, otherwise, America’s public won’t continue to accept rule by the super-rich — the people who finance almost all major politicians and who benefit from the current dictatorship. And that would cause the public to vote against any candidate who is receiving most of his financial support from the super-rich, which is almost all candidates. So: the only possible way to overcome any such tendency of the public to vote against the interests of the rich is to distract the public from that entire issue, onto personalities and other such distractions.

Consequently, it is to be expected that, in the 2016 contests, the best-financed candidates will be promoted by advertisements and issues that distract and deceive, instead of inform or educate, the public. That will be a contest between well-financed lies, and poorly financed truths. Perhaps by Election Day, the poorly financed truths will have been totally drowned-out. That way would lead to hellish future for the United States.

The 2016 contests will be of major historical importance: if the movement into democracy doesn’t win in 2016, then its likelihood of succeeding in the future will be virtually nil (since the current direction is toward increased dictatorship by the super-rich). The 2016 elections will be do-or-die for future democracy in the U.S. If for no other reason than this, the 2016 Presidential contests will be hugely important. If the poor come out in record numbers in the Democratic primaries and then, if Sanders wins the nomination, in the final election, then economic inequality in the U.S. will be reduced and equality of economic opportunity in the U.S. will increase, and so the future for the United States will be improvement. Otherwise, America’s future will be grim, no matter how well America’s top 0.1% will be living.

America has a huge problem; and, if it’s ignored in 2016, as it has been ignored ever since Ronald Reagan won the White House in 1980, then America will, virtually certainly, spiral down into hell.

The problem is real; it has to be grappled-with, now, or else. It’s now, or it’s never. That’s the 2016 choice, for Americans — and, then, perhaps, for the rest of the world, and for all of the human future. That’s what is at stake, in the 2016 U.S. elections. The data make this clear.

This article was first published by Global Research in March 2004.

Almost without exception, those arbitrarily arrested and sent to Guantanamo were civilians rather than “enemy combatants”.

Did the Bush administration “recruit detainees” among the civilian population and pass them off as “terrorists”?

Fourteen years later, the evidence amply confirms that those detained in Guantanamo were not “enemy combatants”. They were arrested and sent to Guantanamo as part of a diabolical propaganda campaign, the purpose of which is twofold:

1. To perpetuate the legend that the Western is threatened by Islamic Terrorists;

2. To provide legitimacy to the Global War on Terrorism as well obfuscate the fact that the Islamic terrorists are trained and recruited by the Western military alliance and its Persian Gulf allies.

But there is another diabolical dimension.  What happened to the bona fide Al Qaeda “enemy combatants”  who were arrested by US-NATO forces in November 2001? 

In November 2001, at least 4000 Al Qaeda fighters had been airlifted to Northern Pakistan on the orders of Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld. And these Al Qaeda units were also being supplied by Pakistan’s ISI.  According to Seymour Hersh, “The Administration ordered the US Central Command to set up a special air corridor to help insure the safety of the Pakistani rescue flights from Kunduz to the northwest corner of Pakistan” 

What was the purpose of the airlift? 

We are dealing with a intelligence operation: By airlifting “enemy combatant” to safety in Northern Pakistan, the Bush administration had created the pretext for intervening militarily within Pakistan as part of the “Global War on Terrorism”. 

The preconditions for the subsequent launching of the CIA drone attacks had been established in November 2001 by relocating Al Qaeda enemy combatant to the northern Tribal areas of  Pakistan.  

Without the airlift of al Qaeda fighters in Pakistani military planes, the drone war would not have a leg to stand on.  

Compare Seymour Hersh’s account in the “Getaway” pertaining to the US sponsored evacuation of  hard core Al Qaeda and Taliban fighters with the various accounts and testimonies pertaining to the deportation of innocent civilians to Guantanamo.

What these comparisons convey is that Al Qaeda fighters and their senior Pakistani advisers were “saved” on the orders of Donald Rumsfeld. Meanwhile, also on the orders of the Secretary of Defense,  innocent civilians who had no relationship whatsoever to the war theater were categorized as “enemy combatants”, kidnapped, interrogated and sent to Guantanamo.

Why?

Did the Bush administration need to “recruit detainees” among the civilian population and pass them off as “terrorists”?

Why did they not arrest the al Qaeda fighters in November 2001?

…

Is it incompetence or poor military planning? Or is it a diabolical covert op to safeguard and sustain “enemy number one”? Because without this “outside enemy” personified by Osama bin Laden and Ayman al Zawahri, there would be no “war on terrorism”.

(quoted from March 2004 article)

Michel Chossudovsky, Global Research, May 9, 2014

*    *    *

Kidnapping and deporting Civilians to Guantanamo, Providing a Safe-haven to Al Qaeda Fighters

by Michel Chossudovsky

Global Research, March 20, 2015

In late November 2001, the Northern Alliance supported by US bombing raids took the hill town of Kunduz in Northern Afghanistan. Eight thousand or more men “had been trapped inside the city in the last days of the siege, roughly half of whom were Pakistanis.  Afghans, Uzbeks, Chechens, and various Arab mercenaries accounted for the rest.” (Seymour M. Hersh, The Getaway, The New Yorker, 21 January 2002,  )

Also among these fighters were several senior Pakistani military and intelligence officers, who had been sent to the war theater by the Pakistani military.

The presence of high-ranking Pakistani military and intelligence advisers in the ranks of Taliban/ Al Qaeda forces was known and approved by the Washington.

Moreover, Pakistan’s military intelligence, the ISI, which was overseeing the operation, had a close and longstanding working relationship with the CIA; since the 1980s it has channeled support to a number of terrorist organizations, including Al Qaeda and the Taliban, acting on behalf of its US counterpart. (See Michel Chossudovsky, War and Globalization, the Truth behind September 11 ,  2002. Ch. 2, 3 and 4.

According to Seymour M. Hersh:

“President Bush said, ‘We’re smoking them out. They’re running, and now we’re going to bring them to justice.’” (Seymour Hersh, op cit)

In fact, most of them were never brought to justice, nor were they detained or interrogated. On the orders of Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, they were flown to safety:

“The Administration ordered the US Central Command to set up a special air corridor to help insure the safety of the Pakistani rescue flights from Kunduz to the northwest corner of Pakistan” (Ibid)

“Musharraf won American support for the airlift by warning that the humiliation of losing hundreds-and perhaps thousands-of Pakistani Army men and intelligence operatives would jeopardize his political survival. ‘Clearly, there is a great willingness to help Musharraf,’ an American intelligen

ce official told me. A C.I.A. analyst said that it was his understanding that the decision to permit the airlift was made by the White House and was indeed driven by a desire to protect the Pakistani leader. The airlift ‘made sense at the time,’ the C.I.A. analyst said. ‘Many of the people they spirited away were the Taliban leadership’-who Pakistan hoped could play a role in a postwar Afghan government. According to this person, ‘Musharraf wanted to have these people to put another card on the table’ in future political negotiations. ‘We were supposed to have access to them,’ he said, but ‘it didn’t happen,’ and the rescued Taliban remain unavailable to American intelligence.

According to a former high-level American defense official, the airlift was approved because of representations by the Pakistanis that “there were guys- intelligence agents and underground guys-who needed to get out.” (Seymour Hersh, op cit)

In other words, the official story was:  “we were tricked into it” by the Pakistani ISI.

Out of some 8000 or more men, 3300 surrendered to the Northern Alliance, leaving between 4000 and 5000 men “unaccounted for”. According to Hersh’s investigation, based on Indian intelligence sources, at least 4000 men including two Pakistani Army generals were evacuated. (Ibid)

US officials admitted, however, that

“what was supposed to be a limited evacuation apparently slipped out of control, and, as an unintended consequence, an unknown number of Taliban and Al Qaeda fighters managed to join in the exodus.”  (quoted in Hersh op cit)

An Indian Press report confirms that those evacuated courtesy of Uncle Sam were not the moderate elements of the Taliban, but rather the “hard-core Taliban” and Al Qaeda fighters. (Times of India, 24 January 2002).

 “Terrorists”  or “Intelligence Assets” ?

As part of an operation led by Pakistan’s ISI,  the foreign and Pakistani Al Qaeda fighters were flown to North Pakistan. Many of these fighters were subsequently incorporated into the two main Kashmiri terrorist rebel groups, Lashkar-e-Taiba (“Army of the Pure”) and Jaish-e-Muhammad (“Army of Mohammed”).

The Council on Foreign Relations (CFR) confirms  that  both Jaish and Lashkar are supported by Pakistan’s ISI:

“through its Interservices Intelligence agency (ISI), Pakistan has provided funding, arms, training facilities, and aid in crossing borders to Lashkar and Jaish…Many were given ideological training in the same madrasas, or Muslim seminaries, that taught the Taliban and foreign fighters in Afghanistan. They received military training at camps in Afghanistan or in villages in Pakistan-controlled Kashmir. Extremist groups [supported by the ISI] have recently opened several new madrasas in Azad Kashmir.”

(Council on Foreign Relations at http://www.terrorismanswers.com/groups/harakat2.html , Washington 2002)

What the CFR fails to mention is the crucial relationship between the ISI and the CIA and the fact that the ISI continues to support Lashkar, Jaish and the militant Jammu and Kashmir Hizbul Mujahideen (JKHM), while also collaborating with the CIA. Coinciding with the 1989 Geneva Peace Agreement and the Soviet withdrawal from Afghanistan, the ISI was instrumental in the creation of the militant Jammu and Kashmir Hizbul Mujahideen (JKHM).(See K. Subrahmanyam, Pakistan is Pursuing Asian Goals, India Abroad, 3 November 1995.).

In the wake of the US bombing of Afghanistan, US press reports confirmed that one of the main consequences of (the US sponsored) evacuation of Al Qaeda fighters out of Kunduz in November 2001 was to reinforce the Kashmiri terrorists organisations:

Even today [March 2002], over 70 per cent of those involved in terrorism in Jammu and Kashmir are not Kashmiri youths but ISI trained Pakistani nationals. There are also a few thousand such Jehadis in Pakistan Occupied Kashmir prepared to cross the LOC. It is also a matter of time before hundreds from amongst those the Bush Administration so generously allowed to be airlifted and escape from Kunduz in Afghanistan join these terrorists in J&K. (Business Line, 4 March 2002)

A few months following the November 2001 “Getaway”, the Indian Parliament in Delhi is attacked by Lashkar-e-Taiba and Jaish-e-Muhammad. (January 2002)

Moreover, since the onslaught of the US bombing of Afghanistan (October 2001), the Al Qaeda-ISI sponsored Ansar al-Islam in Northern Iraq has grown in size, most probably incorporating Al Qaeda fighters who fled Afghanistan in the wake of the US bombings. (Christian Science Monitor, 15 March 2002). While there was no firm evidence, one suspects that some of the Mujahideen fighters airlifted out of Kunduz in the US sponsored evacuation were subsequently relocated to other countries including Northern Iraq. (See Michel Chossudovsky, Who is behind the “Terrorist Network” in Northern Iraq, Baghdad or Washington? February 2003 )

Kidnapping Civilians

The plight of the Guantanamo detainees is now coming to light with the release of prisoners from the Camp Delta Concentration camp in Guantanamo, after more than two years of captivity.

The evidence suggests that most of the detainees are in fact civilians.

Compare Seymour Hersh’s account in the “Getaway” pertaining to the US sponsored evacuation of  hard core Al Qaeda and Taliban fighters with the various accounts and testimonies pertaining to the deportation of innocent civilians to Guantanamo.

What these comparisons convey is that Al Qaeda fighters and their senior Pakistani advisers were “saved” on the orders of Donald Rumsfeld. Meanwhile, also on the orders of the Secretary of Defense,  innocent civilians who had no relationship whatsoever to the war theater were categorized as “enemy combatants”, kidnapped, interrogated and sent to Guantanamo.

Why?

Did the Bush administration need to “recruit detainees” among the civilian population and pass them off as “terrorists”?

Did they need to boost up the numbers “to fill the gap” resulting from the several thousand Al Qaeda fighters, who had been evacuated on the orders of Donald Rumsfeld and flown to safety? Were these “terrorists” needed in Kashmir in the context of a CIA covert op?

Whatever the motivation, we are dealing with a diabolical intelligence operation.

Some 660 people from 42 countries, are currently being held in the Camp Delta concentration camp in Guantanamo. While US officials claim that they are “enemy combatants” arrested in Afghanistan, a large number of the civilian detainees have never set foot in Afghanistan. They were kidnapped in several foreign countries including Pakistan, Bosnia and Gambia on the West Coast of Africa, and taken to the US military base in Bagram, Afghanistan, before being transported to Guantanamo.

Kellogg, Brown & Root (KBR), the British subsidiary of Vice President Dick Cheney’s company Halliburton has a multimillion dollar contract to expand the facilities of the Guantanamo concentration camp including the construction of prisoner cells, guard barracks and interrogation rooms. The objective is to bring “detainee capacity to 1,000” (Vanity Fair, January 2004)

At least three children are being held at Guantanamo, aged between 13 and 15 years old. According to Pentagon officials: “the boys were brought to Guantanamo Bay because they were considered a threat and they had “high value” intelligence that U.S. authorities wanted.” (Washington Post, 23 August 2003). According to Britain’s Muslim News: “out of the window has gone any regard for the norms of international law and order … with Muslims liable to be kidnapped in any part of the world to be transported to Guantanamo Bay and face summary justice.” ( http://www.muslimnews.co.uk/index/press.php?pr=177 )

Recent Developments in Northern Pakistan

As the US elections approach,  the search for bin Laden and his deputy Ayman al-Zawahri has picked up pace in the border regions of Northern Pakistan.  This search has been carefully timed to coincide with the election campaign.

In October 2003, in coordination with the Pentagon, the Pakistani military launched an operation in the tribal areas of northern Pakistan,  following the visit in October to Islamabad of Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage and Assistant Secretary of State Christina Rocca.

The Pentagon describes the strategy to go after bin Laden as a “hammer and anvil” approach, “with Pakistani troops moving into semiautonomous tribal areas on their side of the border, and Afghans and American forces sweeping the forbidding terrain on the other”. (The Record, Kitchener, 13 March 2004).

In March 2004, Britain’s Sunday Express, quoting “a US intelligence source”  reported that

“bin Laden and about 50 supporters had been boxed in among the Toba Kakar mountainous north of the Pakistani city of Quetta and were being watched by satellite… Pakistan then sent several thousand extra troops to the tribal area of South Waziristan, just to the north.”  (quoted in South China morning Post, 7 March 2004)

In a bitter irony, it was to this Northern region of Pakistan that at least 4000 Al Qaeda fighters were airlifted in the first place, back in November 2001, on the orders of Secretary Donald Rumsfeld. And these Al Qaeda units were also being supplied by Pakistan’s ISI. (UPI, 1 November 2001)

In other words, units of Pakistan’s military intelligence, the ISI, –which had coordinated the November 2001 evacuation on behalf of Uncle Sam–  are now involved in the “hammer and anvil” search for Al Qaeda in northern Pakistan, with the support of Pakistani regular forces and US Special Forces.

From a military standpoint, it does not make sense. Evacuate the enemy to safe-haven, and then two years later in the months leading up to the presidential elections, “go after them” in the tribal hills of North Pakistan.

Why did they not arrest the al Qaeda fighters in November 2001?

Is it incompetence or poor military planning? Or is it a diabolical covert op to safeguard and sustain “enemy number one”? Because without this “outside enemy” personified by Osama bin Laden and Ayman al Zawahri, there would be no “war on terrorism”.

And Bush needs more than the rhetoric of the “war on terrorism”, he desperately needs a “real” war on terrorism, within the chosen theater of the tribal areas of Northern Pakistan, which can be broadcast on network TV in the US and around the World.  “The war on terrorism”  is the cornerstone of Bush’s presidential election campaign. A media propaganda and PR operation has been launched.

Yet if the truth trickles down to the broader public regarding the administration’s covert support to Al Qaeda,  this campaign strategy may in fact backlash.

A major war in Central Asia and the Middle East, supposedly against international terrorism, has been launched by a government which is harboring international terrorism as part of its foreign policy agenda.

In this context, the hidden agenda behind “Operation Enduring Freedom” launched in October 2001, was precisely to ensure that Al Qaeda leaders (i.e. US sponsored intelligence assets) be able to escape.  This operation was an integral part of the propaganda ploy. Al Qaeda fighters were flown to safety to keep the war on terrorism alive.

Al Zawahri is now being identified by the media as the brain behind 9/11, which usefully serves to distract public attention from the fact, amply documented,  that the Bush administration had foreknowledge of the September 11 attacks.

On May 7, Netanyahu announced the most lunatic fringe coalition regime in Israel’s history. It includes racist hate-mongers, over-the-top fascists and religious fundamentalist zealots – an incendiary combination threatening regional peace and stability.

Palestinian Authority (PA) chief negotiator Saeb Erekat said “(t)he face of a new form of racist, discriminatory Israel has been revealed.”

Netanyahu is “leading the charge to bury the two-state solution and impose a perpetual apartheid regime.”

He formed a new government “of war which will be against peace and stability in our region.”

Abbas spokesman Nabil Abu Rudaineh said Netanyahu must choose between peace and a two-state solution or a “policy of aggression and arbitrary violations against our people.”

The PLO negotiations department issued a statement saying:

Netanyahu’s new “right-wing extremist government is not a partner for peace when the leaders call for the annexation of Palestinian land and the forcible transfer of the Palestinian population and the genocide against our people.”

It’s long overdue for Israel to be held accountable for “crimes and violations against our people.”

Fatah spokesman Osama Qawassmeh said the new government will increase “settlement activities and the Judaization of the West Bank, while at the same time isolating the Gaza Strip.”

He said Palestinians should respond through greater resistance – “exposing Netanyahu’s racist policies before the international community.”

Straightaway, his regime approved 900 new illegal East Jerusalem housing units on stolen Palestinian land – even before his new government is officially sworn in on May 11. It’s the most anti-Palestinian, pro-war, apartheid on steroids regime in Israel’s history.

Washington, other major Western nations and UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon pay lip service only against its horrific high crimes and abuses.

They yawn and do nothing to stop them. America supports all Israeli wars of aggression – longstanding rogue state partners in crime.

At the same time PA officials were denouncing Israel’s new regime, it continues enforcing its ruthlessness – collaborating against their own people for special benefits they enjoy.

On May 8, Human Rights Watch (HRW) accused PA-controlled security forces of harassing, persecuting, arresting, interrogating and mistreating West Bank Palestinian students for political views they hold and express.

HRW’s Sarah Leah Whitson called it “deeply worrying that students are being held by Palestinian forces for no apparent reason other than their (alleged) connection to Hamas or their opinions.”

“Palestinians should be able to express critical political opinions without being arrested or beaten.”

Following Birzeit and other university student council elections, Addameer prisoner rights group director Sahar Francis told HRW 25 students were detained or summoned for interrogations.

In custody, they’re beaten and otherwise abused. It’s standard PA  security force practice serving Israeli interests – operating ruthlessly against their own people.

Current abuses followed numerous previous ones. Views critical of Israeli and/or PA policies aren’t tolerated.

PA security services West Bank spokesman Adnan Al-Dimiri lied saying “(w)e never arrest people for their speech or for their political affiliations.”

It happens all the time – including trumped up criminal charges justifying the unjustifiable.

HRW said PA authorities presented no credible evidence indicating arrested individuals committed any criminal activity – or advocated any.

Jihad Salim is a Birzeit University Hamas-affiliated student representative. He said around 6:00PM on April 25, PA security forces accosted him, shoved him into a civilian car, took him to a Ramallah office, and brutalized him during interrogation about earlier Palestinian elections.

Two interrogators were involved, he said. “They started cursing my mother,  cursing my sisters, slapping me around.”

“Then they punched me while asking questions about how Hamas won the elections.”

He was forced to stand uncomfortably, arms and legs spread apart, from11:00PM until 10:30AM the next day. Interrogation continued until 5:00PM. No food or water was supplied.

Numerous other cases follow the same pattern – lawless PA security force arrests, followed by detentions, brutalizing interrogations, beatings and other abuses, denial of all fundamental rights, and at times concocted charges of nonexistent criminality.

HRW said it “previously documented abuses by Palestinian security forces, including credible allegations of torture and arrests of people identified as political opponents.”

US funding and training makes Washington complicit with false arrests and detentions, torture, ill treatment, and other abuses against Palestinians solely for political reasons.

PA officials critical of Israel’s new regime share guilt in its crimes – serving as lawless apartheid enforcers.

“At the beginning of 1959, United States companies owned about 40 percent of the Cuban sugar lands—almost all the cattle ranches—90 percent of the mines and mineral concessions—80 percent of the utilities—practically all the oil industry—and supplied two-thirds of Cuba’s imports.” Senator John F. Kennedy (1917-1963), (speech at a Democratic Dinner, Cincinnati, Ohio, October 6, 1960, during the 1960 Presidential campaign)

 “I believe that there is no country in the world including any and all the countries under colonial domination, where economic colonization, humiliation and exploitation were worse than in Cuba, in part owing to my country’s policies during the Batista regime.

—I approved the proclamation which Fidel Castro made in the Sierra Maestra, when he justifiably called for justice and especially yearned to rid Cuba of corruption. I will even go further: to some extent it is as though [Dictator] Batista was the incarnation of a number of sins on the part of the United States. Now we shall have to pay for those sins.

—In the matter of the Batista regime, I am in agreement with the first Cuban revolutionaries. That is perfectly clear.” President John F. Kennedy, October 24, 1963, (interview with journalist Jean Daniel, The New Republic, published on December 14 1963, pp. 15-20)

“It is clear that counter-terror became the strategy of the Batista government. It has been estimated by some that as many as 20,000 civilians were killed.” A Report to the National Commission on the Causes and Prevention of Violence Volume 2, U.S. Government Printing Office, 1969, p. 582.

In December 2014, U.S. President Barack Obama and Cuban President Raul Castro announced that they would begin normalizing diplomatic relations between the two nations, an agreement brokered by Catholic Pope Francis. Last Saturday, April 11, U.S. President Obama and Cuban President Castro met in Panama to finalize the new reality and to “turn the page and develop a new relationship between our two countries,” in Mr. Obama’s words.

This development is about to put an end to more than a half-century scandalous boycotting of the small island of Cuba by American politicians, as this small Caribbean island became a pawn in the Cold War between the U.S. and the USSR. In the U.S., this was done also mainly for purely domestic electoral motives, i.e. to obtain the Miami exiled Cubans’ votes and money, and against basic human morality.

This is a sad chapter in 20^th Century American foreign policy history, especially considering that the U.S. government has established full diplomatic relations with countries such as China and Vietnam, and also considering that Canada has recognized and has traded with Cuba since 1960.

Indeed, a few years after the 1959 Cuban revolution that overthrew the corrupt government of dictator Fulgencio Batista (1952-1959), a government under the direct influence of elements of the American mafia who controlled the drug, gambling, prostitution, racetrack and casino businesses in Cuba, successive U.S. governments imposed on the inhabitants of Cuba a blanket of severe economic and political sanctions that crushed the small Cuban economy and lowered its people’s standard of living.

Two generations of Cubans were the victims of this cruel policy. That President Obama agreed to restore diplomatic ties with the Cuban government, ties that were unilaterally broken off by Washington in 1961, is all to his credit. Kudos also to Pope Francis, an Argentine, who pressed for ending such an insane policy that saw a powerful country crush a small neighbor, irresponsive to the human suffering that resulted.

As the two quotes above from President John F. Kennedy show, there were American politicians who felt that Cubans were in their right to overthrow the mafia and their corrupt local collaborators who controlled most of everything in Cuba under Dictator Batista. How could a nation that threw off the yoke of British king George III not understand that?

An obvious question begs to be asked: To what extent President Kennedy’s statements and intentions played a role in his assassination one month later, on October 23?

Three groups had special reasons to be adamantly opposed to President Kennedy’s support of the Cuban revolution and to his avowed intention to establish political and economic relations with Cuba.

First, the elements of the American mafia who had been kicked out of Cuba and had to abandon their lucrative trades in that Caribbean island country.

Second, the Cuban supporters of dictator Batista who left Cuba for an exile in Florida, leaving behind properties and other possessions, with no hope of returning to their country if the U.S. government was to have normal relations with the Cuban-Castro government.

A third group is composed of some elements of the United States government’s Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), under then CIA Director Allen Dulles (1953-1961), who had sponsored the failed Bay of Pigs invasion of Cuba in April 1961, and whose objective was the overthrow of the Cuban government of Fidel Castro. Such a plan had been drafted under the previous Eisenhower administration (1953-1961). (Keep in mind that CIA Director Allen Dulles was the brother of John Foster Dulles, Dwight D. Eisenhower’s Secretary of State.)

After his election, President John F. Kennedy had been informed of the CIA’s invasion plan and had initially approved it, but when it unfolded, he refused to commit U.S. armed forces to the operation. The CIA thus had ample reasons to blame President Kennedy for the glaring failure of the Bay of Pigs para-military invasion of Cuba, considering that a similar invasion of Guatemala in 1954 had required the assistance of U.S. troops to succeed. Later, President Kennedy discharged CIA Director Allen Dulles and replaced him with John McCone (1961-1965).

Cui Bono? (Who profits?) All three of these groups had special motives for blaming President John F. Kennedy for their misfortunes in Cuba. And all three of them had reasons to be violently opposed to President Kennedy’s intentions to normalize political and economic relations with Cuba.

The 1964 controversial Warren Commission Report on John F. Kennedy’s assassination did not establish any link between these groups who had reasons to hate the President, and his assassination, concluding instead that Lee Harvey Oswald had acted alone in the November 1963 shooting of the President. And this, even after it had been established that the murderer had been monitored by the FBI under Director J. Edgar Hoover and by the CIA under Director Allen Dulles in the months before the assassination.

It is true that not all the evidence surrounding the Kennedy Assassination has been released to the public, some of which has been classified and kept secret. However, these documents are scheduled for release two years from now, in 2017. It is anybody’s guest if they might reveal new information about the circumstances that led to President Kennedy’s assassination in 1963.

Dr. Rodrigue Tremblay is an international economist and author, whose last two books are:

The Code for Global Ethics, Prometheus Books, 2010; andThe New American Empire, Infinity Publishing, 2004.

To read Dr. Tremblay’s blog, please visit:http://www.thenewamericanempire.com/blog.htm

“Iraq’s fate was sealed from the moment we invaded: it has no future as a unitary state … Iraq is fated to split apart into at least three separate states…This was the War Party’s real if unexpressed goal from the very beginning: the atomization of Iraq, and indeed the entire Middle East. Their goal, in short, was chaos – and that is precisely what we are seeing today.” — Justin Raimondo, editor Antiwar.com

A bill that could divide Iraq into three separate entities has passed the US House Armed Services Committee by a vote of  60 to 2.  The controversial draft bill will now be debated in the US House of Representatives where it will be voted on sometime in late May. If approved, President Barack Obama will be free to sidestep Iraq’s central government in Baghdad and provide arms and assistance directly to Sunnis and the Kurds that are fighting ISIS. This, in turn, will lead to the de facto partitioning of the battered country into three parts; Kurdistan, Shiastan, and Sunnistan.

The plan to break up Iraq has a long history dating back to Oded Yinon’s darkly prophetic 1982 article titled  “A Strategy for Israel in the Nineteen Eighties”. Yinon believed that Israel’s survival required that the Jewish state become a imperial regional power that “must effect the division of the whole area into small states by the dissolution of all existing Arab states … The Zionist hope is that sectarian-based states become Israel’s satellites and, ironically, its source of moral legitimation.” (The Zionist Plan for the Middle East, Israel Shahak)

The  GOP-led House Armed Services Committee’s bill embraces Yinon’s vision of a fragmented Iraq. (Note: Under the current bill, which is part of the 2016 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA),  as much as 60% of the proposed funds, or $429m, would flow directly to the “Kurdish Peshmerga, the Sunni tribal security forces with a national security mission, and the Iraqi Sunni National Guard”.) Providing weapons to Sunni militias and the Kurdish Peshmerga will inevitably lead to the disintegration of the country,  the ramping up of sectarian hostilities,  and the strengthening of extremist groups operating in the region.  It’s a prescription for disaster.  Here’s a brief excerpt from Yinon’s piece on Iraq:

“Iraq, rich in oil on the one hand and internally torn on the other, is guaranteed as a candidate for Israel’s targets. Its dissolution is even more important for us than that of Syria. Iraq is stronger than Syria. In the short run it is Iraqi power which constitutes the greatest threat to Israel … Every kind of inter-Arab confrontation will assist us in the short run and will shorten the way to the more important aim of breaking up Iraq into denominations as in Syria and in Lebanon. In Iraq, a division into provinces along ethnic/religious lines as in Syria during Ottoman times is possible. So, three (or more) states will exist around the three major cities: Basra, Baghdad and Mosul, and Shi’ite areas in the south will separate from the Sunni and Kurdish north.”  ( “A Strategy for Israel in the Nineteen Eighties”, Oded Yinon)

The fact that US and Israeli strategic objectives match up so closely calls into question the ISIS invasion of Iraq in 2014 when a two mile-long column of white land rovers loaded with 15,000 jihadis barreled across the open desert from Syria spewing clouds of dust into the atmosphere without being detected by US AWACs or state-of-the-art spy satellites. The logical explanation for this so called “intelligence failure” is that it was not a failure at all, but that Washington wanted the operation to go forward as it coincided with US-Israeli strategic aims. As it happens, the areas now controlled by the Kurds, the Sunnis and the Shia are very close to those projected by Yinon suggesting that the ISIS invasion was part of a broader plan from the very beginning.  That’s not to say that ISIS leaders take orders directly from Langley or the Pentagon. No. It merely implies that Washington uses the marauding horde for their own purposes.  In this case, ISIS provides the pretext for arming the Sunnis and Kurds, imposing new borders within the existing state,  creating easier access to vital resources, and eliminating a potential rival to US-Israel regional hegemony. The US needs an enemy to justify its constant meddling. ISIS provides that justification. Check this out from the Daily Star:

“The present ISIS lightning war in Iraq is the creation of an illusion to initiate the fulfillment of a pre-planned agenda of the West in close alliance with Israel to redraw the map of the entire region as the “New Middle East…..The chaos, destruction and devastation caused by the ISIS in its process of establishing the Sunni Islamic Caliphate in Iraqi and Syrian territories is the realisation of the intended policy of the US and the West to change public perception that the “War on Terror” was never a war waged by the West against Islam but a “war within Islam” along religious, ethnic and sectarian lines in the Islamic world…

The division of Iraq into three separate entities had also been strongly advocated by US Vice-President Joe Biden. Biden’s heritage and an analysis of his electoral constituents will help understand better his support for the fragmentation of Iraq under the Yinon Plan.” (The Yinon Plan and the role of ISIS, The Daily Star)

The Biden-Gelb plan, which was proposed in an op-ed in the New York Times in May 2006, called for the establishment of  “three largely autonomous regions” with Baghdad becoming a “federal zone.”  In other words, the powers of the Iraqi central government would be greatly reduced. The authors tried to soft-peddle their radical scheme as “decentralization” which is a milder term than the more accurate “partition”.  The authors, both of who are members of the powerful Council on Foreign Relations, obscure the real aims of the plan which is to weaken the country through dismemberment and to leave it in “a permanent state of colonial dependency.” (Chomsky)

Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi has denounced the proposed bill as an attempt to undermine his authority and rip the country apart.   In a recent phone conversation with Vice President Biden, Abadi expressed his opposition to the bill insisting that “only the Iraqi people can decide  the future of their country.”

Also, according to Press TV, Iraqi cleric, Muqtada al-Sadr,  warned that if congress passed the bill, he would order his Mahdi Army to resume hostilities against the US targets in Iraq.

“We are obliged to lift the freeze on our military wing … and begin hitting US interests in Iraq and outside it,” said Sadr, who once led the powerful Mahdi Army and still enjoys huge influence among the Shia population.

Although Obama doesn’t approve of the new bill’s wording,  his opposition is far from convincing.  Here’s what State Department spokesperson Marie Harf said on the matter at a recent briefing: “The policy of this Administration is clear and consistent in support of a unified Iraq. We’ve always said a unified Iraq is stronger, and it’s important to the stability of the region as well.”

“Clear and consistent”?  When has US policy in the Middle East ever been clear and consistent?  Is it clear and consistent in Libya, Syria, or Yemen where jihadi militias are armed and supported either directly or indirectly by Washington or its allies?  Is US policy clear and consistent in Ukraine where far-right neo-Nazi extremists are trained and given logistical support by the US to fight a proxy war against Russia?

Sure, Obama wants to make it look like he opposes the bill, but how much of that is just public relations?  In truth, the administration is on the same page as the Congress, they just want to be more discreet about it.  Here’s  Harf again: “We look forward to working with Congress on language that we could support on this important issue.”

Indeed, the administration wants to tweak the wording for the sake of diplomacy, but that’s the extent of their opposition.  In fact,  the House Armed Services Committee has already complied with this request and removed the offending clause from the bill (asking for recognition of the Peshmerga and Sunni tribal militias as “countries”)  while, at the same time,  “maintaining that some of the military aid should go directly to the two forces fighting ISIS….”

So they deleted a couple words from the text but meaning remains the same. Also, according to Huffington Post:

“Rep. Michael McCaul (R-Texas) said Sunday he wants to identify “a way to streamline the process of getting the weapons to both the Sunni tribes and the [Kurds] … while at the same time not undermining the government of Iraq in Baghdad.”

There’s no way to “streamline the process” because the two things are mutually exclusive, Abadi has already said so. If Obama gives weapons to the Sunnis and the Kurds, the country is going to split up. It’s that simple.

So how has Obama responded to these latest developments?

Last week he met with Kurdish president Masoud Barzani in Washington. Here’s what happened:

“Asked by Kurdish outlet Rudaw whether he had secured any commitments on a change to the policy from President Barack Obama and Vice President Joe Biden when he met with them Tuesday, Barzani responded, “Both the vice president and the president want the peshmerga to get the right weapons and ammunition. … The important point here is that the peshmerga get weapons. How they will come, in which way, that’s not as important as the fact that peshmerga need weapons to be in their hands.”  (Kurdish Leader Aligns With White House Over Congress On ISIS Strategy, Huffington Post)

So Obama basically told Barzani he’d get the weapons he wanted. (wink, wink)

Can you see what a sham this is?   Iraq’s fate is sealed. As soon as Congress approves the new defense bill, Obama’s going to start rushing weapons off to his new buddies in the Kurdish north and the so called Sunni triangle.  That’s going to trigger another vicious wave of sectarian bloodletting that will rip the country to shreds.

And that’s the goal, isn’t it: To split the country into three parts, to improve access to vital resources,  and to eliminate a potential rival to US-Israel regional hegemony?

You know it is.

Mike Whitney lives in Washington state. He is a contributor to Hopeless: Barack Obama and the Politics of Illusion (AK Press). Hopeless is also available in a Kindle edition. He can be reached at [email protected].

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Several years ago at the annual May Day rally in Newcastle, UK, a local trade unionist spoke about fascism’s insidious nature and the duty that workers have in identifying and curbing the reemergence of this evil before it has an opportunity to take root in society, poison minds and elevate the objectively ridiculous to the level of indisputable dogma. She described the Nazi Party’s rise to power and rhetorically asked how a nation that produced philosophers such as Immanuel Kant, Martin Luther and Karl Marx, alongside the music of Beethoven, Bach and Handel, could so easily lose its humanity by committing acts of the greatest barbarity. Two quotes attributed to Adolf Hitler shed light on how millions may be duped into expressing genocidal hatred towards an entire race or ethnic group.

“Make the lie big, make it simple, keep saying it, and eventually they will believe it”

“How fortunate for leaders that men do not think.”

The apparent ease with which fear propagates ideas which might otherwise be easily rejected as absurd is both frightening and baffling.

Recall the speed with which an orgy of violence erupted between Hutu and Tutsi tribes in Rwanda’s genocide following the 1994 assassination of Rwanda’s Hutu President, Juvenal Habyarimana.

In the 1990s, propaganda incited Serbs, Croats and Bosnian to turn against their neighbours alongside whom they had lived for decades. Witness how easily far right Israeli politicians stir up anger and angst within the hearts and minds of Israeli settlers.

Pronouncements such as those made by Israel’s Foreign Minister, Avigdor Lieberman, advocating the elimination of Israeli Arabs deemed disloyal to the State of Israel adds fuel to the flames of conflict: “Those who are against us, there’s nothing to be done – we need to pick up an axe and cut off his head,”.

The lie that former Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein had at his disposal the WMD to wreak destruction upon the ‘freedom loving’ Western world within 45 minutes, oiled the wheels of a US driven juggernaut which desolated a nation posing no threat to either Europe or North America.

The fable that hordes of Jihadist extremists seek to destroy our day of life because they “hate our freedoms” conveniently obfuscates the reality that Western support for corrupt Kings and dictators within the Arab world (the Shah of Iran, Gaddafi, Mubarak, the Saudi Royal family, Saddam and Assad in the former days) plays a role in radicalising the poor and oppressed.

More recently, revamped Cold War rhetoric resurfaced to portray the USA’s ideological nemesis led by ‘KGB villain’ Vladimir Putin as the newest imagined threat to Western civilisation.

It appears that pundits and politicians have learnt little over the past decade. Just as a decade earlier no evidence proving Iraq possessed WMD or had any connection to the 9/11 attacks did not stop a war of aggression, the lack of photos or video footage of Russia tanks invading Ukrainian territory is no obstacle to perpetuating the story that Russia invaded Ukraine. In a classical example of Orwellian doublespeak, few would dare postulate that NATO troops invaded Eastern Europe after the collapse of the USSR despite the large numbers of soldiers and military bases in former Soviet territories. Despite former US Secretary of State, James Baker, and various European leaders pledging that NATO would not expand beyond the borders of Germany, this has happened.

NATO has incorporated several Baltic States and seeks to advance into Ukraine, Georgia, Moldova and perhaps beyond.The former Warsaw pact countries won their ‘freedom’ in the early 1990s and promptly switched one master for another. FREEDOM IS SLAVERY.

Russian troops stationed on Crimean territory, by a long-standing agreement with Ukraine, any military manoeuvres taking place squarely within Russia borders, or even the provision of humanitarian aid to residents of the war torn Donbass region are considered acts of aggression by the Kiev regime. Contrast this attitude with the presence of regular NATO military exercises across the Baltic states. Recently military vehicles belonging to the US Army’s Second Cavalry Regiment paraded through the Estonian town of Narva, across a river and only three hundred metres away from the Russia border, as reported by the Washington Post. NATO do not consider this to be a bellicose, or at least a very unwise, act which could easily racket up tensions between The West and Eurasia. WAR IS PEACE.

The openly racist attitudes of some Ukrainian politicians towards their country’s Russian speaking population came to the fore following a US funded and orchestrated coup that ousted President Victor Yanukovich. Far right extremists played a significant role in the coup acting as shock troops. Their actions were praised by many Western politicians who promoted the violence as acts that would usher in an age of democracy and free Ukraine from the shadow of its apparently threatening Eastern neighbour, a country with which it has long been fused culturally and historically. Elements of far right paramilitary formations, such as the Azov battalion and the Right Sector hold Nazi collaborator Stepan Bandera in high esteem.

Some of their members have been seen unashamedly wearing Nazi symbols in public. The far right paramilitaries in today’s Ukraine were not only used to spearhead the overthrow of an elected, though corrupt, President, but have since been unleashed against their (former) fellow countrymen and women who wanted no part in the new nationalistic and xenophobic Ukraine which exploded onto the world stage in Feb 2014.

During the Second World War, under Bandera’s leadership, the Ukrainian Insurgent Army (or UPA) murdered thousands of Jews and non Jewish Poles and Russians. In the single region of Volyn, the UPA slaughtered an estimated 40,000 Poles in order to ethnically cleanse the region of non-Ukrainians in preparation for a future Ukrainian state as per the 1943 decisions of the UPA’s politician wing, the OUN (Organisation of Ukrainian Nationalists). In July 1941 OUN militants participated in the Lviv pogrom, alongside the invading German troops, in which thousands of Jews were killed. Last year, modern day Bandera sympathisers went about the task of trying to purify Ukraine of ethnic Russians and ‘traitors’.

The paramilitary organisations that played a role in the invasion of the seceding Donetsk and Lugansk regions make no secret of their ideological inspiration. It is sad fact that for the first time since 1945, militants who admire Nazi collaborators and take inspiration from the ideology of the Third Reich are goose-stepping through a European capital. IGNORANCE IS STRENGTH.

Some of those who suffered in the 1940s, such as Ukrainians whom the UPA deemed traitors and persecuted alongside Poles, Jews and Russians, are still alive to see the same evil arise twice within their lifetimes. A small vestige of comfort may be that just as these dark forces failed in their drive against USSR in WW2, they are again failing to occupy control former Soviet territories nowadays.

The Western media talks ad nauseam about Russia’s alleged ‘invasion’ of Ukraine. It is quite plausible that the some Russian agents are on the ground in Eastern Ukraine. This would not be surprising and in many ways logical as the hostile Kiev administration has been working hard to create instability in the border regions between the two countries. Likewise there is scant condemnation of allegations that the US and Canada are planning on sending lethal and non-lethal weaponry and advisors to Ukraine. Not to be outdone, UK Prime Minister David Cameron proposed to send military trainers to assist the Kiev regime.

Just imagine the lengths to which the US would go if a rival nation poured billions of dollars into supporting anti-US groups in a neighbouring country and helped instigate a coup to elevate such groups to power. The British and American media have gone into overdrive spouting myths of Putin’s desire for a new cold war and reminding us that Russia invaded Ukraine (honest!). Despite globalised surveillance and satellites scrutinising every corner of the globe, we are still waiting for evidence that Putin’s tanks are joyriding around Ukraine.

Despite this lack of evidence and the propagation of a myth at least as big as the story that Saddam had WMD, Western politicians, pundits, and unfortunately many people in the West (though perhaps increasingly less so as time goes on) are swallowing the story. The best President Poroshenko’s regime can manufacture in terms of proof was handed to US Republic Senator James Inhofe by Lt. Col. Semen Semenchenko, the commander of the Donbas Volunteer Assault Battalion and a newly elected member of the Ukrainian parliament.

Semenchenko’s photos purportedly showed “Russian troops in T-72 tanks, B.T.R. armoured personnel carriers, and B.M.P. infantry fighting vehicles entering eastern Ukraine”. After months of claims, the ‘evidence’ finally coughed up did not actually depict Russian soldiers or vehicles conducting the much proclaimed invasion about which Porshenko and friends fantasise daily. The pictures reportedly showed separatists from the secessionist regions of the former East of Ukraine as well Russian troops conducting operations in South Ossetia, near Georgia’s border, six years ago.

Epic fail. The US senator was embarrassed at having swallowed Semenchenko’s propaganda. One has to ask, how many US and European politicians actually believe Russian has invaded Ukraine and how many pretend they do just to use Ukraine for their own interests. It seems to me that the US is happy to fight Russia to the last Ukrainian. Meanwhile ‘patriots’ such as Poroshenko are happy to fulfil their side of the bargain and send their citizens to kill  and be killed. The USA, of course, always support democracy except when exercised by those whose plans do not fit with the US’ hegemonic agenda.

Dr Tomasz Pierscionek is editor of the London Progressive Journal

There’s much that could be said about the Conservative party’s victory today in Britain’s election. Not least David Cameron has emerged stronger: he now has a small but absolute majority in parliament, compared to his last government, in which he had to share power, a little of it anyway, with his minor coalition partners, the Lib Dems.

According to the rules of the British system, he has won a supposed mandate to carry out all his party’s policies, even though the Tories gained the support of slightly less than 25% of the total electorate, and little more than a third of those who actually voted. That in itself should be enough to discredit the idea that Britain is a democracy in any meaningful sense.

But I want to focus on two issues that this particular election highlighted. Although this refers to the British election, the lessons apply equally to US elections.

The first is a debate that gripped some on the far left after Russell Brand interviewed Labour leader Ed Miliband and subsequently gave Miliband his backing. This was quite a surprise – and disappointment – given that Brand had shaken up British politics over the previous 18 months by arguing that the whole political system was inherently flawed and undemocratic. He had called on people not to vote as a way to show that the system had no popular legitimacy, and invest their energies instead in a different kind of grassroots politics. Britain’s two main parties, Brand and others argued, represented the interests of the big corporations that now dominate Britain and much of the globe.

The labels of Conservative and Labour are the misleading vestiges of a time when there was some sort of class politics in Britain: the Tories representing the unalloyed interests of the capitalist class, and Labour the interests of organised labour. But the  Tories under Margaret Thatcher long ago destroyed the power of the trade unions. Labour became a shell of its former self, its finances and ability to organise workers crumbled as the corporations entrenched their power, assisted by the Tories.

Under a power-hungry Tony Blair, Labour allowed itself to be captured by those same corporations, famously illustrated by his Faustian pact with media tycoon Rupert Murdoch. Labour sold what was left of its soul, becoming a Tory-lite party, and winning the support of Murdoch and his media empire as a result.

Brand seemed to understand this, arguing that what we needed was to turn our back on sham elections every five years between two parties representing the interests of the 1%. Instead the people needed to foment a non-violent political revolution, and take back power. How did voting for Miliband, a man who had largely adopted the Blair credo, make sense in the light of Brand’s earlier claims?

Brand justified his change of mind using a familiar argument. He admitted Miliband was far from perfect but was still the preferable choice because he was prepared to listen to the people, unlike Cameron’s Conservatives. He was the “lesser evil” choice.

The problem with his logic – aside from its faith-based component – was that the same argument could have been used about any recent British election. It was an excuse to avoid engaging in real politics.

Supporters of Tony Blair, even after he committed the supreme war crime by invading Iraq, could have argued quite convincingly that the Tories too would have invaded Iraq – plus they would have done worse things at home, inflicting greater damage on the health and education systems. Thus, on the lesser-evil argument, it was legitimate to vote for the war criminal Blair. A man like Blair could destroy another nation, cause suffering on a scale unimaginable to most of us, and yet still claim the moral high ground because the alternative would be even worse.

The faulty logic of the lesser-evil argument is apparent the moment we consider the Blair case. If there is no political cost for committing the ultimate war crime, because the other guys are worse, what real leverage can the electorate ever have on the political system. The “left” vote will always gravitate to the slightly less nasty party of capital. No change is really possible. In fact, over time the political centre of gravity is likely to shift – as has in fact happened – ever more to the right, as the corporations accrete ever greater power.

Further, where does Brand’s logic take us now that Miliband has lost. If we were supposed to have faith that Miliband would have listened had he achieved power, then why not extend that faith to his successor? If we are satisfied by the lesser-evil argument, why not wait till the next election to see if we can get another slightly less nasty candidate into Downing Street? We can defer the choice to demand real change indefinitely.

The second point is that the programme of extreme austerity at the heart of Cameron’s manifesto has been fully discredited by most economists over the past few years. Not only does it penalise the overwhelming majority of the population by redistributing wealth away from the working and middles classes to the financial elite, but it also inflicts great damage on the long term health of the economy. In other words, British voters look like supreme masochists. They voted to seriously harm their own, and their country’s, interests. Are Britons collectively insane?

Of course, not. So how can we explain their insane choice this week? The answer is staring us in the face. In fact, Blair showed us what was required to win a British election. A party hoping to win power needed first to seduce the corporations, and their media divisions. Without most of the media on your side, no party stands a chance of winning because the media subtly controls the narrative of the election: what count as “the issues”, how the leaders and their platforms are presented, what and who is considered credible.

Miliband’s failure was that, unlike Blair, he looked a little half-hearted about his desire to be the 1%’s mouthpiece in parliament and Downing Street. Maybe what seduced Brand about Miliband was the sliver of humanity that was still just visible below the surface of the corporate employee the Labour party had groomed their leader to become.

The revolution that we need in Britain and the US has to start with a disengagement from the mainstream media’s representation of events. We have to discard their narratives. Even more important than an overhauled electoral system, one that fairly reflects the electorate’s preferences, we need a grassroots media that is free of the control of fabulously wealthy proprietors and major corporations, that does not depend on the massive subsidies of corporations (in the form of advertising), and that does not rely, like the BBC, on funding from government. We need independent journalists, and we need to demand a new funding model for the media. And we need to do all this while the mainstream media entirely control the narrative about what a free media is.

It is a huge challenge – and one that reflects the extent of our own ideological confinement. Just like the political parties, we have been captured by the 1%. We cannot imagine a different world, a different economic system, a different media landscape, because our intellectual horizons have been so totally restricted by the media conglomerates that control our newspapers, our TV and radio stations, the films we watch, the video games we play, the music we listen to. We are so imaginatively confined we cannot even see the narrow walls within which our minds are allowed to wander.

As long as the media represent the span of interests of the 1% – from the psychopathic Murdoch empire to the capitalism with a little heart of the Guardian Media Group – our politicians will range from the Blue Tories of the Conservative party to the Red Tories of the Labour party. And we will remain enslaved.

This article was first published in March 2015.

There is a consistent pattern. NATO member states including Turkey, France, Britain as well as NATO partner countries (Israel, Saudi Arabia, Qatar) have been involved in the recruitment and training of ISIS terrorists. 

Canada is no exception. The latest bombshell revelation pertains to the alleged uncover role of Canada and its intelligence services in the recruitment of ISIS mercenaries.

According to a detailed report in the Ottawa Citizen entitled “Reports link Islamic State recruiter to Canadian Embassy in Jordan” (March 13, 2015)   Canada’s embassy in Amman, was allegedly involved in the recruitment of ISIS “jihadists”. The report pertains specifically to the recruitment and smuggling of three adolescent (underaged) British girls into ISIS controlled territory in Syria:

“We have been engaged with someone [recruiter working for Canada’s intelligence agency CSIS] who is not blocking people from travelling to Syria to join up with ISIL, they’re actually facilitating it,” he said. [Dewar, spokesperson for the NDP]

“So the government has to understand that they’re accountable for the actions of our spy agency and whomever they work with.”

My heart bleeds, my soul is sick and my land is broken and dying.  How else can I describe how I felt when I learnt that the dis-United Kingdom was back in the greedy and unfeeling grasp of the ‘nasty’ party, the Conservatives.  I was not alone.

“I was quite happy this morning – until I saw a newspaper on my way to work…  I hope to God my children end up living abroad,” was one acquaintance’s reaction, her face still shocked hours later.

But my heart sings for Scotland, a nation that has shown corrupt Westminster the door, the Scottish National Party taking all but two of the seats.  Bring on land reform; bring on social justice; and bring on independence!  For independence there will be.  Scotland has taken too many insults from Westminster politicians.  If no others demand reform of our broken political system, they will.

But so should the rest of us, the English, the Welsh and those in Northern Ireland.

How did this happen?  How did every single poll get it wrong?  How could a country where so many of its citizens have suffered because of the ‘austerity’ policies of the last 5 years vote for another 5 years of misery?  What kind of a future are we looking at with Cameron and his rich cronies back in power?

These are people who will make the most outrageous promises to buy your vote, and forget them the moment the vote is cast.

These are people for whom the land which feeds our souls with its beauty and our bodies with its food has little intrinsic value.  They will kill more and more of our badgers in the name of ‘science’.  They will repeal the Hunting Act which gave not enough protection to foxes, stags and hares.  They will do this despite what the public says.

They enjoy the land by striding over their countless acres, shotgun ready to fire at deer, at pheasant, at grouse – and at buzzard and eagle, hawk and falcon to preserve their ‘game’.  Should one even wonder why the word ‘game’ is used to describe their prey?

These are the people who farm their land on an industrial scale regardless of the cost to the animals and environment, pocketing millions of pounds in EU subsidies, while shouting that the EU must be reformed or they will leave.  Do they care about the little farmer trying to make a small living by growing food?  Like hell, they do.

These are the people who will bulldoze through any regulations that protect our land in the name of ‘development’.  They will waste our money on pet projects like nuclear weapons and high-speed trains, when both people and expert opinion say these things are not needed – or wanted.

These are the people who will stand in the way of wind and solar power, but do their best to bring fracking to the UK, regardless of the cost to the land and the people who live on it.

These are the people who can buy the best medical treatment in the world, but who plan to deny access to any totally free treatment for the rest of us, – who have all helped pay for our National Health Service.

These are the people who will make the already-poor homeless and sell their homes to developers to create houses and flats for the more well-off; who will cut an already savaged welfare budget to the bone, while wasting millions on useless government projects.

These are the people who will climb into any bed that offers money and more influence, prostitutes of the highest order.  And the one thing they prostitute more than anything else is this beloved country, which truly is not theirs to sell.

And they are deaf to the people they represent, being far richer than almost all of them.

They have a long history, men like David Cameron and his colleagues.  Much of Britain’s history is littered with them.

It was those men who enclosed land belonging to the people and made it their own, an act of never-acknowledged theft.

It was those men who got rich through slavery.

It was those men who sat in their big houses while hundreds died in their mines, mills and factories, and in the ‘back-to-back’ unhealthy and hideous little hovels they were made to live in.

It was those men who stayed at home watching their riches increase while they sent countless thousands to die on foreign battlefields.

It was those men who got rich selling arms to dictators the ordinary person would have deemed an enemy of humanity.

And it was those men, who lied to citizens and allies alike, who were responsible for this island becoming known as ‘Perfidious Albion’.

For Albion was the earliest recorded name for Britain, and our history, full of greed, arrogance and wrongful claims of entitlement, has dirtied that ancient name.

And it is now these men who would sell off this country’s assets to the highest bidder – or one of their friends – until there is  nothing left, the land and its people stripped bare of all.

It is these men who would like to remove our human rights while defending their own.

It is these men who do not give a fig for the threat of climate change, and who will not pause in their rush for more fossil fuels; who will delay and delay any action while they make just a little more money.

It is these men who would privatise the very air we breathe if they thought they could get away with it.

It is these men who believe they are entitled and have a right to do what they do.

It is these men who believe that money and power are everything, and the people are naught.

There is a legend that says the land is a sleeping giant waiting to wake up.  There is a legend that says King Arthur lies sleeping under a hill not many miles from my home and that, when the country has need of him, he will rise again to defend it.

We the people are not those who deal in perfidy.  So where are the people who make up the body of the giant, where are those who will wake up and say “Enough!”  On this dark and depressing day, our land needs us.

Initially published on GR on September 30, 2014

“The story of Omar and Guantanamo Bay reflects the failure of civil society, its institutions, and its people to speak out in ensuring our shared values of a just society are carried out.”  — DENNIS EDNEY

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Omar Khadr is a Canadian born of Egyptian and Palestinian parents. As a child, he had moved to Jalalabad Afghanistan with his family.

At 15, ten months after 9/11, Khadr was captured following a battle with US forces in the village of Ayub Kheyl, Afghanistan. Injured during the melee, he was accused of throwing a hand grenade and planting bombs targeting US Troops.

In October, Khadr was transferred to Guantanamo Bay, suspected of being an enemy combatant. He would reside at that facility for a decade before being released based on a plea bargain.

Khadr’s lawyer is Dennis Edney. Edney has taken on the Khadr case pro-bono and has been involved since 2003 representing his client at the Supreme Court of Canada and at the United States Supreme Court. Dennis Edney is recipient of the 2008 National Pro Bono Award and of the 2009 Human Rights Medal awarded by the Lieutenant Governor of British Columbia for work that “has helped to promote and further human rights”.

The Global Research News Hour contacted Edney during his visit to Winnipeg, Canada on the occasion of the Grand opening of that city’s brand new Human Rights Museum. It also follows a dinner held in his honour.

video footage courtesy of Paul S. Graham

Edney discusses meeting Omar Khadr for the first time, the facts around the case, the rationale behind the Canadian government’s neglect of this young man, and what the young man’s decade-long incarceration says about the state of human rights in Canada.

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The Global Research News Hour airs every Friday at 1pm CT on CKUW 95.9FM in Winnipeg. The programme is also podcast at globalresearch.ca .

The show can be heard on the Progressive Radio Network at prn.fm. Listen in every Monday at 3pm ET.

Community Radio Stations carrying the Global Research News Hour:

CHLY 101.7fm in Nanaimo, B.C – Thursdays at 1pm PT

Boston College Radio WZBC 90.3FM NEWTONS  during the Truth and Justice Radio Programming slot –Sundays at 7am ET.

Port Perry Radio in Port Perry, Ontario – Thursdays at 1pm ET

Burnaby Radio Station CJSF out of Simon Fraser University. 90.1FM to most of Greater Vancouver, from Langley to Point Grey and from the North Shore to the US Border. It is also available on 93.9 FM cable in the communities of SFU, Burnaby, New Westminister, Coquitlam, Port Coquitlam, Port Moody, Surrey and Delta, in British Columbia Canada. – Tune in every Saturday at 6am.

CFRU 93.3FM in Guelph, Ontario. Tune in Wednesdays from 12am to 1am.

by Nulwee Follow

I’ve known about Omar Khadr since he was a boy. He’s 26, like me.  At age 15, U.S. military found Khadr face-down, unconscious, under a pile of rubble in Afghanistan. When Khadr regained consciousness a week later, he was at Bagram air force base, “one of the worst places on Earth“:

Damien Corsetti, who was known as “Monster” at Bagram, based on a tattoo on his chest, and also as “The King of Torture,” described himself as “a disabled veteran suffering post traumatic stress disorder as a result of his interrogation work in both Afghanistan and Iraq,” and explained how, on seeing Khadr on July 29, 2002, just two days after his capture, he was struck by how he was an injured “child” detained in “one of the worst places on Earth.” He added, “More than anything, he looked beat up. He was a 15 year-old kid with three holes in his body, a bunch of shrapnel in his face. That was what I remember. How horrible this 15 year-old child looked.”

The well-circulated photo of Khadr at age 14, only a little younger than he was at his capture, still haunts me, not unlike the photo of the bombing victim Ali Ismael Abbas which I used to wave at Iraq Occupation protests.  It has been alleged that Omar Khadr, a Canadian citizen, was a child soldier, used as a pawn first by terrorists and then punished by the U.S as if he were an adult with agency.Khadr is being released to Canada after a decade long battle by civil rights groups.  He will serve out his sentence in Canadian prison, with eligibility for parole in 2013.

The U.S. defence department issued a statement Saturday referring to the five war crimes to which Khadr pleaded guilty before a military commission:murder in violation of the law of war attempted murder in violation of the law of war conspiracy providing material support for terrorism spying

There are too many ironies and outrages to catalogue in this diary entry.Khadr was still injured when the torture began. The interrogators pried open his mind and used fear to transform him:

There is much more in the affidavit – casual cruelty, whereby guards made Khadr do hard manual labor when his wounds were not healed, and, significantly, threats “to have me raped, or sent to other countries like Egypt, Syria, Jordan or Israel to be raped.” He also noted, “I would always hear people screaming, both day and night,” and explained that other prisoners were scared of his interrogator. “Most people would not talk about what had been done to them,” he declared. “This made me afraid.”Khadr also described what happened to him in Guantánamo, where, as I explained last week, he “arrived around the time that a regime of humiliation, isolation and abuse, including extreme temperature manipulation, forced nudity and sexual humiliation, had just been introduced, by reverse-engineering torture techniques, used in a military program designed to train US personnel to resist interrogation if captured, in an attempt to increase the meager flow of ‘actionable intelligence’ from the prison.”

At various points in 2003, while the use of these techniques was still widespread, Khadr stated that he was short-shackled in painful positions and left for up to ten hours in a freezing cold cell, threatened with rape and with being transferred to another country where he could be raped, and, on one particular occasion, when he had been left short-shackled in a painful position until he urinated on himself:

Military police poured pine oil on the floor and on me, and then, with me lying on my stomach and my hands and feet cuffed together behind me, the military police dragged me back and forth through the mixture of urine and pine oil on the floor. Later, I was put back in my cell, without being allowed a shower or a change of clothes. I was not given a change of clothes for two days. They did this to me again a few weeks later.

Khadr was subjected to a ‘Palestinian hanging’:

The first to reveal a glimpse of the regime at Bagram was, ironically, a medic called as a witness by the prosecution. “Mr. M,” as he was identified, who testified by video link from Boston, countered Khadr’s claims that, while he was at Bagram, “five people in civilian clothes would come and change my bandages,” and that they “treated me very roughly and videotaped me while they did it,” stating that he alone changed his bandages twice a day, and that no rough treatment was involved.He did, however, note that, on one occasion, he found Khadr hooded and chained to a cage by his wrists with his arms “just above eye level,” and that when he lifted the hood, Khadr was visibly upset. The medic added, as Carol Rosenberg described it in the Miami Herald, that “he didn’t object to Khadr’s treatment, because chaining was an approved form of punishment” at Bagram, “adding that he didn’t know the reason for the punishment nor how long Khadr had been chained.”

This rather nonchalant description of “chaining” may not have shocked the medic, especially as the chains were apparently “slack enough to allow Khadr’s feet to touch the floor,” but the only reason for this was because of the severity of his wounds, as Khadr explained in his affidavit, in which he also stated that he was chained up “several times.” Otherwise, like numerous other prisoners, including Dilawar (the subject of “Taxi to the Dark Side”) and Mullah Habibullah, the two prisoners who were killed at Bagram in December 2002, he would have been fully suspended by his wrists, in a torture technique more commonly known as the “strappado” technique or “Palestinian hanging.”

Nevertheless, as Barry Coburn, Khadr’s lead lawyer, explained, the medic’s testimony provided “critically important validation” of statements in his client’s affidavit, and another of his lawyers, Kobie Flowers, added, “Had this been an American soldier in North Korea, people would be outraged. Here we have a 15-year-old individual who was nearly killed with bullets in his back who was left up there to hang as punishment.”

There’s more in the long, sad, tale of Omar Khadr. But that gives you some idea.This is a critical story and its embers have to remain hot.  These are the stakes. The U.S. can choose to forget that it captured and tortured a boy for years, physically and psychologically. That it tortured many people, some Middle Eastern, some Western. I guarantee you that the price of forgetting will revisit us in the future. Or we can remember the stain on our nation, like many other countries have to each day.

Literature fans who respect Palestinian rights will have been disturbed to find Israel listed among sponsors of this week’s PEN World Voices festival in New York.

The “embassy of Israel” was named on the festival’s sponsors page as a “patron” and also appears on an individual events page as a fully-fledged “sponsor.”

Some of these events, and the festival more broadly, feature a number of prominent supporters of Palestine, including writer and academic Teju Cole, novelist and Armenian heritage campaigner Nancy Kricorian and Palestinian poet and academic Nathalie Handal. This suggests that the festival had not been entirely transparent with participants about its financial relationships.

Cole and Kricorian’s events, the web pages of which had no direct links to the Israeli embassy, had already taken place before The Electronic Intifada was alerted to the sponsorship issue. Handal, who had originally been scheduled to appear at the sponsored event, disappeared from the listing yesterday.

The festival’s organizers did not response to a request for comment.

Charlie Hebdo award

American PEN, a division of the international literature and freedom of expression organization, has recently attracted controversy over a gala dinner it held on Tuesday.

Six “table hosts” for the dinner — renowned authors Peter Carey, Michael Ondaatje, Francine Prose, Teju Cole, Rachel Kushner and Taiye Selasi — all withdrew from their roles in protest at plans to award French satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo with a special award.

A further 200 of PEN American Center’s 4,000 members were also said to have signed an open letter stating that the award overstepped the line between “staunchly supporting expression that violates the acceptable, and enthusiastically rewarding such expression.” Those who signed include internationally famous authors such as Joyce Carol Oates and Junot Diaz.

Peter Carey, in an email interview with The New York Times, condemned both the deadly attack on Charlie Hebdo in Paris earlier this year but also the agenda which the magazine itself espoused, saying; ”A hideous crime was committed, but was it a freedom-of-speech issue for PEN America to be self-righteous about? All this is complicated by PEN’s seeming blindness to the cultural arrogance of the French nation, which does not recognize its moral obligation to a large and disempowered segment of their population.”

Director’s pro-Israel influence

The Israeli sponsorship of the World Voices festival suggests views at PEN’s America Center which extend beyond a Western liberal reification of “freedom of speech” over basic values of responsibility and anti-racism.

The association with Israel seems to stem from the appointment of Suzanne Nossel as the executive director of PEN American Center last year. Nossel had previously attracted controversy during her brief stint as head of Amnesty International’s US office. Before that, as her whitewashed biography on the PEN America website puts it, she worked for the US State Department and the US mission to the United Nations and served as a board member of Human Rights Watch.

As a classic example of the “revolving door,” Nossel has brought the influence of the US government to the nongovernmental organizations in which she works — the same groups which have often provided the selective arguments about human rights with which Washington justifies its wars.

She has also been a staunch supporter of Israel. In 2005, for example, she wrote in Dissent magazine that “Longstanding US perceptions of the UN membership as anti-Western, unprincipled, motivated by petty biases, and dominated by a herd mentality stem largely from— and are given continuing basis by —the body’s history of anti-Israel conduct … Israel became something like the proverbial friendless kid in a schoolyard, always attacked and in need of constant help.”

While working for the State Department in 2011 she reasserted her views, saying: ”At the top of our list is our defense of Israel, and Israel’s right to fair treatment at the [UN] Human Rights Council. This is the most challenging issue we face.”

And in 2012, she rejected the Goldstone report, the findings of a UN investigation into Israel’s slaughter in Gaza in late 2008 and early 2009, saying that the paper put “the most negative possible spin that you could put on Israeli behavior … It draws a series of inferences about Israel’s motives and behavior that are simply not supported by the facts … We do take exception to that.”

Controversy

Nossel’s stint with Amnesty International’s US office was the subject of considerable criticism from human rights and justice campaigners, including at The Electronic Intifada, where David Cronin commented that “she had been a deputy assistant secretary of state under Hillary Clinton. Under Nossel’s leadership, Amnesty whitewashed the invasion of Afghanistan by hosting a conference praising NATO’s ‘progress’ in that country. The guest of ‘honor’ at that event was Madeleine Albright, the secretary of state who declared that killing as many as 500,000 children in Iraq by depriving them of essential medicines was a price worth paying.”

She is said to have “resigned unceremoniously” after protests from Amnesty staff and donors about the organization’s support for the US invasion of Afghanistan during her leadership.

It is therefore unsurprising that her switch to PEN American Center has also attracted severe condemnation. One PEN member, Chris Hedges, a veteran journalist, canceled his appearance at a PEN event and resigned from the organization with a letter which accused Nossel of failing to oppose Israeli abuses as well as torture and extra-judicial killing by the US and its allies. Going on to call Nossel “utterly unfit to lead any human rights organization,” Hedges said:

This appointment makes a mockery of PEN as a human rights organization and belittles the values PEN purports to defend. I spent seven years in the Middle East, most of them as the Middle East bureau chief of The New York Times. The suffering of the Palestinians under Israeli occupation and the plight of those caught up in our imperial wars in countries such as Iraq are not abstractions to me… I hereby resign from PEN. I will wait until the organization returns to its original mandate to defend those who are persecuted, including those within the United States, before returning to the organization.

Other critics have pointed out that, just as Amnesty’s failure to support US whistleblower Chelsea Manning while under Nossell’s control, so has PEN America on her watch.

The PEN Charter affirms the necessity for freedom of expression and thought. But members also “pledge themselves to do their utmost to dispel race, class and national hatreds.”

Under Nossel, it appears, PEN America sees Israel as a state to be defended despite its repression of Palestinian expression and rights, while those who confront the US government’s warmongering are met with silence and a cold shoulder.

The Scottish National Party (SNP) has secured 56 out of 59 Scottish seats in the General Election, elevating former leader Alex Salmond to Westminster and destroying the Labour Party’s share of the vote.

Senior party figures, including Scottish Labour leader Jim Murphy and Shadow Foreign Secretary Douglas Alexander, were among those ejected from office, as well as prominent Liberal Democrats, including Treasury Secretary Danny Alexander and former party leader Charles Kennedy.

The result represents the SNP’s biggest ever win, with the party taking all seven of Glasgow seats – including Glasgow North East by a record swing of 39.3 percent.

The nationalists’ previous record was 11 seats in 1974.

The SNP’s referendum-era leader Alex Salmond got the better of the Lib Dems in Gordon. He returns to Westminster for the first time since 2010.

His victory address pulled no punches.

“There’s going to be a lion roaring tonight, a Scottish lion, and it’s going to roar with a voice that no government of whatever political complexion is going to be able to ignore,” Salmond told Gordon constituents.

“I think it’s going to be a resounding voice, a clear voice, a united voice from Scotland, and I think that is a very good thing.”

SNP leader Nicola Sturgeon was lauded by many for building a dynamic campaign in the wake of a jolting defeat in the independence referendum last year.

Arriving at the Glasgow count in the early hours of Friday, she said, “I am feeling absolutely fantastic.

“This is a watershed in the politics of this country and all the SNP candidates must now work to stand up for Scotland. Whatever happens, the government must take heed of what has happened here.”

Among the most notable results was the election of 20-year-old SNP candidate Mhairi Black at the expense Douglas Alexander, who might otherwise have returned to the Commons as Labour’s foreign secretary.

She will be the youngest MP elected to parliament in over 300 years. Her historic victory even won her a nod from Time magazine.

Thank you to everyone who turned out and voted for me and helping me win the Paisley and Renfrewshire South #voteSnP pic.twitter.com/nZqyO7C85G

— Mhairi Black (@mhairi1921) May 8, 2015

Before taking her place in Westminster, the politics student must face the daunting task of completing her final exams. It didn’t all go the SNP’s way, however, despite early suggestions of a landslide victory.

I’d treat the exit poll with HUGE caution. I’m hoping for a good night but I think 58 seats is unlikely! #GE15

— Nicola Sturgeon (@NicolaSturgeon) May 7, 2015

Much of the commentary by other parties had focused on the supposed threat of ‘nationalism’ rather than the SNP’s anti-austerity and anti-nuclear agenda. A careworn Labour leader Ed Miliband warned the next government would face the possible breakup of the United Kingdom. While Sturgeon did not address the question of a second independence referendum at length, suggesting she would only do so if the Scottish people called for one, social media is alive with precisely those calls.

SNP say that a second referendum will only happen when the people of Scotland ask for it. I’m asking for it now.

— Lizabeth (@Tracey94249526) May 8, 2015

Congratulations to the SNP on a well deserved and majority vote. Can we just get a second referendum like now plz?

— Michael Ritchie (@Michaelritchie7) May 8, 2015

On June 11, 2013, the ACLU challenged “the constitutionality of the National Security Agency’s mass collection of Americans’ phone records (ACLU v. Clapper).”

It argued that doing so violates Fourth and First Amendment rights, saying:

“Because the NSA’s aggregation of metadata constitutes an invasion of privacy and an unreasonable search, it is unconstitutional under the Fourth Amendment.”

“The call-tracking program also violates the First Amendment, because it vacuums up sensitive information about associational and expressive activity.”

NSA claims authorization under the Patriot Act’s Section 215 – the so-called “business records” provision. It permits warrantless searches without probable cause. It violates fundamental First Amendment rights. It does so by mandating secrecy. It prohibits targeted subjects from telling others what’s happening to them. It compromises free expression, assembly and association. It authorizes the FBI to investigate anyone based on what they say, write, or do with regard to groups they belong to or associate with.

It violates Fourth and Fifth Amendment protections by not telling targeted subjects their privacy was compromised. It subverts fundamental freedoms for contrived, exaggerated, or nonexistent security reasons.

At the time of its suit, the ACLU said “(w)hatever Section 215’s ‘relevance’ requirement might allow, it does not permit the government to cast a seven-year dragnet sweeping up every phone call made or received by Americans.”

The 1978 Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) authorized surveillance relating to “foreign intelligence information” between “foreign powers” and “agents of foreign powers.”

It restricts spying on US citizens and residents to those engaged in espionage in America and territory under US control.

No longer. Today anything goes. America is a total surveillance society. Obama officials claim no authority can challenge them. Governing this way is called tyranny.

The US Second Circuit Court of Appeals agreed. It held Section 215 of the USA Patriot Act doesn’t permit bulk collection of Americans’ phone records. A three-judge panel ruled unanimously – overturning a lower court decision.

The Obama administration argued that the ACLU lacked “standing” to challenge NSA surveillance practices, and Congress “precluded” judicial review except by the secret Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court most often only hearing government arguments.

The appeals court rejected this reasoning, saying:

“If the government is correct, it could use Section 215 to collect and store in bulk any other existing metadata available anywhere in the private sector, including metadata associated with financial records, medical records, and electronic communications (including e‐mail and social media information) relating to all Americans.”

“Such expansive development of government repositories of formerly private records would be an unprecedented contraction of the privacy expectations of all Americans.”

ACLU staff attorney Alex Abdo called the ruling “a resounding victory for the rule of law.”

“For years, the government secretly spied on millions of innocent Americans based on a shockingly broad interpretation of its authority.”

“The court rightly rejected the government’s theory that it may stockpile information on all of us in case that information proves useful in the future.”

“Mass surveillance does not make us any safer, and it is fundamentally incompatible with the privacy necessary in a free society.”

ACLU deputy legal director/lead counsel in the case Jameel Jaffer explained:

“This ruling focuses on the phone-records program, but it has far broader significance, because the same defective legal theory that underlies this program underlies many of the government’s other mass-surveillance programs.”

“The ruling warrants a reconsideration of all of those programs, and it underscores once again the need for truly systemic reform.”

Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) executive director Cindy Cohn called the ruling “a great and welcome decision and ought to make Congress pause to consider whether the small changes contained in the USA Freedom Act are enough.”

”The 2nd Circuit rejected on multiple grounds the government’s radical reinterpretation of Section 215 that underpinned its secret shift to mass seizure and search of Americans’ telephone records.”

“While the court did not reach the constitutional issues, it certainly noted the serious problems with blindly embracing the third-party doctrine – the claim that you lose all constitutional privacy protections whenever a third-party, like your phone company, has sensitive information about your actions.”

EFF’s legislative analyst Mark Jaycox added:

“Now that a court of appeal has rejected the government’s arguments supporting its secret shift to mass surveillance, we look forward to other courts – including the Ninth Circuit in EFF’s Smith v. Obama case – rejecting mass surveillance as well.”

“With the deadline to reauthorize section 215 looming, we also call on Congress to both expressly adopt the interpretation of the law given by the court and to take further steps to rein in the NSA and reform the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court.”

One court victory doesn’t mean overall triumph. The right-wing Supreme Court may have final say – or Congress able to legislatively circumvent High Court or other judicial rulings with no administration opposition by either party.

US governance serves powerful entrenched interests at the expense of popular ones. It’s fundamentally anti-democratic, anti-freedom.

In the twenty-first-century world of drone warfare, one question with two aspects reigns supreme: Who counts?

Introduction by New Cold War.org, May 6, 2015

On April 29, Canada’s House of Commons held a four-hour, ‘take note’ foreign policy discussion concerning the situation in Ukraine. The discussion was hardly a debate, as ‘take note’ sessions in Parliament sometimes become. No, this was a pat-on-the-back, we’re-all-in-this-together session. Enclosed is a summary of the non-debate in Parliament, written by a contributor to the Rabble.ca website discussion board called ‘Babble’. The summary has been slightly shortened.

Canada’s House of Commons: A yawning chasm where a debate didn’t happen

Canada has decided to send 200 Canadian Forces troops styled as ‘trainers’ to Ukraine, allegedly to prepare the Ukrainian Armed Forces to defend the U.S.-backed regime of fascists and oligarchs against ‘Russian aggression’. Or so says our national media.

On April 29, a four-hour ‘take note debate’ was held in Parliament to review this decision. Representatives of all parties and the cabinet participated. The record of the proceedings inHansard is not an encouraging read. Canadians deserve better.

But how appropriate that this discussion of the ongoing situation in Ukraine should be called a ‘take note debate’, when it is highly doubtful many of us did ‘take note’. I’ll share some of my notes in hopes of persuading you to take note.

Since speaker after speaker credited the ultra-nationalist lobby organization, the Ukrainian Canadian Congress, with teaching them  everything they know on Ukraine, perhaps it is only appropriate that we begin with the UCC’s view of this debate. After all, the UCC, perhaps more than anyone else in Canada on the subject of Ukraine, ‘makes it happen’. Here is its article reporting on the debate: Canadian House of Commons holds Debate on Situation in Ukraine, April 30.

Since there is an international agenda to UCC’s domestic one, let’s take a look at their ‘partners’ as well: Atlantic Council and Ukrainian World Congress Partner to Advance a European, Democratic and United Ukraine, Oct. 9, 2014. The Atlantic Council is an organization closely associated with NATO, the US State Department and American power.

One of those pictured is Natalie Jaresko, a US national, former US State Department official and later CEO of Horizon Capital, an investor vulture-fund. Jaresko is now Ukraine’s Minister of Finance, and is mentioned in the debate.

Her long-time business partner Lenna Koszarny, a Canadian,  is also pictured. She replaced Jaresko as CEO of Horizon Capital. She is Advisory Chair of the Ukrainian Canadian Congress in Kiev, but is referred to in our debate as ‘an accountant’. (Veteran financial writer John Helmer has written extensively on Horizon Capital and the legal and financial difficulties it is facing.)

Atlantic Council lists among its advisers, directors and ‘honorary’ directors, Madeleine Albright, Frank Carlucci, Condoleeza Rice, Robert Gates, George Schulz, James Woolsey, Leon Panetta, Henry Kissinger, Brent Scowcroft, Rupert Murdoch and Zbigniew Brzezinski. Perhaps you begin to get the picture now. Perhaps this is an additional reason the Ukrainian ultra-nationalist lobby has been so spectacularly successful and influential with Canadian politicians.

Perhaps you vaguely recall domestic media reports of Liberal support for the Canadian Forces Ukraine deployment, but the NDP has ‘issues’ outstanding, including demanding a formal debate in Parliament. Perhaps you even expected opposition from the ‘official opposition’. Especially given the serious geopolitical implications involved. Especially after Libya. Here is yet another provocative deployment of Western forces on behalf of one side of a civil war, over the repeated protests and warnings by the Russian Federation.

Perhaps you even wondered if this deployment did not violate the intent if not the spirit of the comprehensive ceasefire signed in Minsk, Belarus on February 12, also called the Minsk-2 Agreement, and UN Security Council Resolution 2202 (2015). Article 10 of Minsk-2 clearly calls for “the withdrawal of all foreign armed formations, military equipment as well as mercenaries from the territory of Ukraine”. Why is Canada sending “foreign armed formations and military equipment” to Ukraine? UNSC Resoution 2202, Minsk Agreements:

http://www.securitycouncilreport.org/atf/cf/%7B65BFCF9B-6D27-4E9C-8CD3-CF6E4FF96FF9%7D/s_res_2202.pdf

If, as President Poroshenko has clearly stated, the intention of the Ukraine government is to retake both Crimea and Donbas, then we really are moving into a dangerous geopolitical scenario described by Noam Chomsky as ‘three minutes to midnight’.

Ongoing Situation in Ukraine, discussion in Canada’s House of Commons, April 29, 2015(scroll down the page to 1945 hours)

Excerpts: (The parties are Conservative (CPC), Liberal (Lib), New Democratic Party (NDP) and Green Party (GP)

“Mr Chair… We indicated very quickly after the announcement was made by the government that we would be supportive. I take it from what the defence critic for the NDP has said tonight that his party as well is supporting the training mission that Canada has sent to Ukraine.’ Ralph Goodale (Wascana, Lib)

“This is a friendly debate because we agree with the substance of the issue. The government has already engaged in the areas I mentioned. We encourage it to continue its efforts…” Ms Helene Laverdiere (Laurier-Saint Marie, NDP)

“Mr Chair, I would make reference to the fabulous work that the Ukrainian Canadian Congress has done in terms of supporting members of Parliament on all sides of the House. Information that it provides to us is quite substantial and of great benefit.” Mr Ken Lamoureux (Winnipeg North, Lib)

“Mr Chair, the aid that Canada has been providing is that which will enable the Ukrainian people and the Ukrainian military to elevate their ability to deal with a very aggressive and brutal regime that is endeavouring to take over not only Crimea but that whole area of the world…” Hon Julian Fantino

“I have to thank the Prime Minister. His leadership on this file is head and shoulders above that of most other world leaders. He had a strong role in making sure that we were there to support Ukraine and its people as they got rid of a very corrupt president..” Mr James Bezan, CPC

“The NDP has not asked a single question in question period since the training announcement was made. It has not written me a letter asking for information. Tonight when I spoke, the NDP members did not ask me for details of the training operation. They asked me about logistics in the Ukrainian military and the provision of supplies. What is going on here?

Let us call a spade a spade. The NDP does not want to take a position, because most Canadians support this training operation. The NDP’s ideological base cannot tolerate the notion of Canadian troops operating in any capacity overseas. I think that is what is really happening…” Hon Jason Kenney, CPC

“In terms of what our support for what the government has laid out in support for the troops and training, it was very clear what we wanted to see. It was just very clear goals, ensuring that, it is the professionalism. We are providing what I think we should be doing and being consistenet on it, as official opposition, to say , that we understand what the government’s intentions are and we will monitor it closely. We want to ensure the goals are established clearly.” Mr Paul Dewar NDP

“I want to tip my hat to the Ukrainian Canadian Congress for its continued relentless efforts to seek the support of Canadians and the Canadian government to build the nation. I also want to thank the Ukrainian Canadian Congress for the establishment of the Canada-Ukraine Foundation, through which all of us an contribute to the building of Ukraine. I want to commmend the Canadian government not simply for stepping forward and providing military training aid…” Ms Linda Duncan (Edmonton-Strathcona, NDP)

“Mr Chair, considering the parties in this House have been remarkably supportive of a mission for which we do not have a lot of information, it is unfortunate that this has turned into some partisan sparring…I support sanctions, but I am also concerned that we have placed Canadian troops into this situation without a discussion in Parliament. I know I may be a very small minority on this point but I am concerned. I would rather see us pursue whatever we can to build the bridges, as I see German leader Angela Merkel attempting to do.” Ms Elizabeth May (Saanich – Gulf Islands, GP)

“Mr Chair, I thought I was going to have 10 minutes so having 5 minutes I will speak a little quicker. We join together. This  is a debate in the spirit of collegiality to say that we stand in unison with the people of Ukraine. I want to especially give a shout-out to Paul Grod and the Ukrainian Canadian Congress, because it has been the Ukrainian diaspora that has been really vigilant and forceful in demanding acccountability and support for Ukraine. I really want to thank them.

“Let me be clear, as my colleagues have been, my colleagues from Ottawa Centre and from St John’s East, that we support the actions of our government in terms of training and professionalization of the military in Ukraine…” Ms Peggy Nash (Parkdale-High Park, NDP)

“I have seen this movie before. My parents in fact have seen this movie before. My father could tell us about this movie from the inside of a gulag. This is something that is recurring in history. Vladimir Putin is also a historian. He studies Stalin, he understands Stalin and he is refining his methods..” Mr Ted Opitz, CPC

That last one sounds like he could be a poster in this Ukraine thread. Recently, the Hill Times reported less than 50% of Canadians supported sending troops to Ukraine. Why isn’t this reflected in Parliament? I hope it is obvious that people need to put their thinking caps on, do their own research, outside of the UCC,  and come up with a principled position. It clearly isn’t to be found in Ottawa. I suggest that a good place to stop this drive to war is with the Minsk-2 Peace Agreement. Or even better, take to the streets. And don’t vote for any of them. Chomsky is right. It’s three minutes to midnight.

Troops Out Now!

Copyright The New Cold War 2015

Britain’s Prime Minister David Cameron and his wife Samantha return to 10 Downing Street in London, May 8, 2015. (Photo: Kirsty Wigglesworth/AP)

Thursday’s United Kingdom elections brought a surprise lurch to the right, with the Conservative Party seizing the majority of Parliamentary seats and Prime Minister David Cameron sweeping back to power with more muscle behind him this time.

The overwhelming win was unexpected, as polls ahead of the election had shown a close race with the opposition Labour Party, and many analysts had expected a hung parliament in the immediate aftermath.

But both the centrist liberal democrats and Labour Party were clobbered in the election, prompting Labour Party leader Ed Miliband to resign from his role.

Cameron immediately signaled that he plans to oppose independence for Scotland and Wales. “I want my party, and I hope a government that I would like to lead, to reclaim a mantle that we should never have lost—the mantle of one nation, one United Kingdom,” hesaid on Friday.

However, the Scottish Nationalist Party—anti-nuclear, anti-austerity, and pro-independence—made considerable gains, jumping from just six seats to 56.

The Guardian reports:

At the time of writing, with almost all 650 seats declared, the Conservatives had 325, Labour 229, the SNP 56 and the Liberal Democrats eight. In practice 323 Members of Parliament is the number needed to form a majority government.

“It is an extraordinary statement of intent from the people of Scotland,” said SNP leader Alex Salmond. “The Scottish lion has roared this morning across the country.”

The instability of the global financial system and the potential for another crash have been underscored by a major sell-off of government bonds this week. Yesterday saw European markets display levels of volatility not seen since the euro zone debt crisis turmoil of three years ago.

In the course of the day, the yield on the German 10-year government bond, which moves inversely to its price, jumped by 21 basis points (a 0.21 percentage point rise) to 0.80 percent, before falling back to its opening level of 0.59 percent.

In the middle of last month, the yield was just 0.05 percent, with predictions that it was on its way to zero.

Other markets in Asia and the United States have also showed considerable volatility. The US bond market this week suffered its longest losing streak since 2011, with the yield on the 10-year bond treasury note rising at one point to its highest level for the year.

It has been estimated that in the last two weeks alone some $2 trillion has been wiped off global share and bond markets.

The rapid rise in European yields indicates that there has been a massive exit from the bond market after investors and speculators had shovelled billions of dollars into purchases following the initiation of the European Central Bank’s asset purchasing program which pumps €60 billion per month into financial markets.

Money poured in because of the belief that, as a result of the ECB’s actions, bond prices would continue to rise and, despite falling yields, there were big profits to be made via capital gains. Markets operated according to the theory that while it may be foolish to buy at an elevated price there was a bigger fool who would pay even more in the near future.

The scale of the swing can be gauged from the fact that in normal times the yield on bonds only moves by a few hundredths of a percentage point in the course of a day.

But normal calculations have been thrown awry by the near-zero interest rate regime of the world’s major central banks and the associated asset-purchasing programs, so-called quantitative easing.

Consequently, market analysts were at something of a loss to find an explanation for this week’s events, as evidenced by a range of comments cited in today’s Financial Times.

“The movements of recent days have been extremely unusual and the magnitude doesn’t reflect the economic data we’re seeing,” said James Athey, investment manager at Aberdeen Asset Management.

Michael Riddell, bond fund manager at M&G investments, told the newspaper: “It is difficult to understand exactly what is driving this. But that’s in part because central bank action has blunted the relationship between the feedback from the economy and prices in markets.”

Ralf Presser, the rates strategist as Bank of America Merrill Lynch, said there was a “lot of soul searching at the moment” because it was thought that the yield on German 10-year bonds was heading for minus 20 basis points. In other words, the price of bonds was going to continue to rise.

In addition to the gyrations on the bond market, another indication of mounting financial instability is contained in a report issued today which claims that emerging markets—a target for speculators in search of higher profits—have suffered a bigger exit of capital over the last three quarters than that experienced in the financial crisis of 2008–2009. The total outflow from the 15 largest such markets in the nine months the end of March was just over $600 billion, compared to an outflow of $545 billion in the same period to March 2009.

A spokesman for the firm publishing the results said the selloff could continue into the second quarter of the year. An even bigger contraction has been recorded in the foreign currency reserves of emerging markets; these have plummeted by more than $374 billion from December last March, amid falling growth rates—down to 3.9 percent in February from 4.1 percent the previous month.

While it is not clear yet where the losses in European financial markets have been sustained—and they could run into many billions of dollars—the potential for another financial catastrophe was made clear in a report issued by the Joint Committee of European Supervisory Authorities earlier this week.

It covered conditions in financial markets from September 2014 to March this year in the lead-up to this week’s sell-off. The report began by noting that since the last report in August “financial system risks” had “intensified further.”

Persistent low interest rates had sustained the demand for riskier investments and provided investors with incentives for enhancing their returns. “This is frequently achieved by renewed build-up of leverage [that is, increased debt]” with such increases “mainly limited to financial institutions outside the banking system.”

But it also indicated that “fundamental questions” remain about the “sustainability of some banks’ business models in search for sustained and solid profitability” in an environment of low interest rates.

In a warning of the possible consequences, it concluded: “A fragile market equilibrium, could be disrupted by some large or several unexpected negative events.” This could lead to a reassessment of risk which “would have a substantial impact on the financial system via decreasing asset values.”

This week’s events certainly fit the description of an “unexpected negative event.”

The report also gave the lie to the claim, advanced by financial authorities in support of the program of quantitative easing, that in the long run it will provide a boost to the real economy.

Describing investment levels as “anaemic” and remaining below the pre-2008 trend, it said that with low growth rates, savers turn to bubbles to reach their targets and “over time, productive investments are crowded out, as real resources are misdirected.”

That is to say, far from leading to an improvement in the real economy via increased investment, the policies of the central banks, which have fuelled bubbles and enabled the accumulation of vast profits via financial speculation, make an already dire situation even worse.

The worsening state of the global economy has also been highlighted by figures on the American economy, which show that it all but stagnated in the first quarter this year, recording an expansion of just 0.2 percent. It would have been negative but for a build-up of inventories, often an indicator of recession.

But these figures could be revised down in the coming weeks amid further evidence of economic weakening.

The US trade deficit for March rose by 43 percent to $51.4 billion, the worst figure since October 2008 and the largest percentage increase since 1996. These figures indicate that US export performance in the first quarter may have been worse than initially estimated, prompting a report by BNP Paribas that the American economy could have contracted at an annual rate of 0.4 percent in the first quarter.

The turbulence in financial markets and the worsening outlook in the real economy are an indictment of capitalist governments and financial authorities around the world.

Not only have their policies provided no economic “recovery,” their handing out of virtually free money to the finance houses and speculators has created the conditions for another financial catastrophe which will result in further far-reaching attacks on the social conditions of the working class.

Even though early polling of presidential races is basically meaningless, I was interested to see that the New York Times had a new poll on “Americans’ Views on the 2016 Presidential Campaign and the Issues” (5/5/15), because there haven’t been any major national polls released on the Democratic race since Sen. Bernie Sanders officially entered the race; I was curious whether his announcement (undercovered as it was) had affected public opinion.

When I looked at the Times‘ interactive feature on the poll, however, I was disappointed to see that it had a section on “Republican Candidates” and a section on “Hillary Rodham Clinton”–as though Clinton were running unopposed for the Democratic nomination.

In the New York Times‘ presentation, only Republicans have choices.

As an unrelated Times graphic acknowledges, there are two major declared candidates in the race–and three more (Martin O’Malley, Jim Webb and Lincoln Chafee) that the Times categorizes as “probably” running on the Democratic line. (The Times lists Vice President Joe Biden as “probably not” running for president, and Sen. Elizabeth Warren as “not running.”)

So why treat the presidential contest as though there’s a race for the Republican spot, while Democrats only get to express their feelings about their one predetermined choice?

Actually, if you’re a real polling nerd, and you click on the link to the “Full New York Times/CBS News Poll,” you find that the Times (and CBS) actually did ask voters about other Democratic candidates–but the Times chose not to share those results with readers in any kind of reader-friendly form.

In case you’re curious, the percentage of Democrats who say they “would consider voting for” Sanders has risen from 14 percent in February to 23 percent now–but 61 percent say they haven’t heard enough to be able to say…which is, of course, in part a function of journalists treating next year’s Democratic contest as a foregone conclusion.

If the New York Times were to say that they’re treating the 2016 Democratic race as a foregone conclusion because it is a foregone conclusion, I would point them to Gallup’s October 2007 roundup of what that election cycle’s year-before-the-election polling showed:

See, there is more than one candidate running for the Democratic nomination. (New York Times graphic)

Gallup’s 2007 national presidential polling strongly points to Clinton winning the 2008 Democratic nomination. Barring something unusual or otherwise unexpected, she is well positioned for the 2008 Democratic primaries.

When 2008 is history and one looks retrospectively at where the race stands today, the key factors forecasting Clinton’s success will likely be the following: …Clinton has led the Democratic pack in every Gallup Poll conducted between November 2006 and October 2007…. Clinton holds a commanding lead among nearly every major subgroup of potential Democratic primary voters…. Clinton enjoys high favorable ratings in the Democratic Party that extend well beyond the 40 percent to 50 percent of Democrats typically naming her as their top choice for the nomination…. Democrats and Democratic-leaning independents choose Clinton as the candidate best able to handle a wide variety of national issues.

“Clinton’s nomination seems almost inevitable,” Gallup concluded–though it added that “under extreme circumstances, a strong Democratic candidate can blow a big lead.” Apparently 2008’s circumstances turned out to be extreme.

You can send a message to the New York Times at [email protected], or to public editor Margaret Sullivan at [email protected]. Please remember that respectful communication is the most effective.

US Secretary of State John Kerry appeared side by side with his Saudi counterpart, Foreign Minister Adel al-Jubeir, in Saudi Arabia’s capital of Riyadh Thursday and praised the monarchical oil regime for its role in the bloody nearly two-month-old war against Yemen, the most impoverished nation in the Arab world.

The Saudi royals were to be commended, he said, for their “initiative to bring about a peaceful resolution through the announcement of their intent to establish a full, five-day, renewable ceasefire and humanitarian pause.”

Kerry used the word “intent” advisedly. Even as he spoke, Saudi warplanes continued to pound Yemeni homes, schools and hospitals into rubble, carrying out at least seven airstrikes Thursday against the port city of Hudaydah and five against the northwestern provincial capital of Sa’ada, a stronghold of Yemen’s Houthi rebel movement that the Saudi regime is determined to crush.

Earlier, Saudi warships fired rockets into the town of Hajjah, striking the Maydi Hospital, and more than 100 airstrikes in other areas of the country left scores dead, many of them women and children.

Neither Kerry nor Jubeir said when the five-day “humanitarian pause” would begin, nor did they provide any specific definition of its terms. Jubeir indicated, however, that it would be dependent on the Houthi rebels laying down their arms.

This is not the first time the Saudi regime indicated that it would call a halt to the bloodbath it has unleashed on Yemen. On April 21, after nearly a month of bombing, it proclaimed that Operation Decisive Storm, the title given to its air war against Yemen, had ended and a new phase centered on achieving a political resolution of the Yemeni conflict would begin. Instead, the air strikes only intensified.

The United Nations has put the death toll from the Saudi-led war at more than 1,400, with thousands more wounded, the overwhelming majority of the casualties civilians. Some 300,000 people have been forced to flee their homes. Bombs have demolished at least 30 schools and the violence has left nearly 2 million school children unable to attend classes.

An estimated 20 million people, or 80 percent of the population, are going hungry as a Saudi-led blockade of Yemen’s harbors together with repeated air strikes that have destroyed runways at the country’s airports have cut off its food supplies.

Speaking in Djibouti, a stop on his way to Saudi Arabia, Kerry postured as if the imperialist power he represents were just one more humanitarian enterprise. He declared that Washington was

“deeply concerned about the humanitarian situation that is unfolding in Yemen” and urged “all sides, anybody involved, to comply with humanitarian law and to take every precaution to keep civilians out of the line of fire.”

Who does the US secretary of state think he’s kidding? Washington is not some benevolent bystander in this bloodbath.

The White House and the Pentagon have backed Saudi Arabia to the hilt since the war began, rushing it fresh arms, including deadly cluster bombs, banned by the vast majority of the world’s nations because of their murderous effect upon civilians. It has set up a US command center in Riyadh to supply the Saudi Air Force with targeting intelligence, and it has dispatched US Air Force KC-135 Stratotankers to the region to carry out daily aerial refueling of Saudi warplanes, so that the airstrikes can continue around the clock.

Last year, Saudi Arabia spent $80 billion on arms, making it the fourth largest weapons purchaser in the world. The Obama administration is preparing to sell it and the other Persian Gulf oil monarchies even more powerful weapons systems.

The US president is scheduled to hold a summit at Camp David next week with the crowned royals of the Gulf Cooperation Council. He is prepared to offer them an advanced ballistic missile defense system as well as bunker buster bombs.

CNN quoted a senior US official as saying that “the president’s goal is building a defense infrastructure and architecture for the Gulf region that also includes maritime security, border security, and counter-terrorism.”

In other words, the Obama administration is further solidifying US reliance on the Saudi monarchy as a key pillar of its drive for domination of the strategically vital and oil-rich Middle East. Even as the US and the other major powers negotiate an agreement over Iran’s nuclear program, Washington is building up Saudi Arabia and the other reactionary Gulf states for a possible war against Iran.

The nature of the Saudi regime was made abundantly clear on the eve of Kerry’s visit with the mass beheading of five immigrants—two from Yemen and one each from Sudan, Eritrea and Chad. A Saudi national was decapitated on the day the US secretary of state landed in the desert kingdom. After these grisly public executions, the headless corpses of the victims were hung from helicopters to ensure the maximum display of the state atrocity.

The US-Saudi axis gives the lie to all the pretexts used by US imperialism to justify the decades of wars that have taken the lives of over a million in the Middle East, from the claim that it intervened to fight for “democracy” to the lie that it was waging a “war on terrorism.”

Even as it continued bombing Yemeni cities, the Saudi air force, with Washington’s blessings, dropped arms and supplies this week to Al Qaeda of the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) forces in Yemen, a movement that the Obama administration had previously portrayed as the paramount terrorist threat. As the most rabidly sectarian enemies of the Houthis—inspired by the Saudi monarchy’s state religion of Wahhabi Islamism that animates similar movements, from ISIS to Boko Haram—AQAP has now been recast as Yemeni patriots.

As in Iraq, Libya and Syria before it, Washington’s role in the Yemeni war is based not on humanitarian concern, support for democracy or hostility to terrorism. It is pursuing the predatory interests of US imperialism, attempting to offset American capitalism’s economic decline by military means. It is prepared in this process to spill unlimited amounts of blood and to drag the peoples of Middle East, the United States and the entire planet into a third world war.

A Facebook event page created by animal rights activists last September was monitored by a Texas counterterrorism unit, recently uncovered emails show.

According to news site MuckRock.com, which obtained the documents through a public records request, a counterterrorism specialist with the Texas Department of Public Safety alerted fellow employees to the “National Weekend of Action” shortly after discovering the page.

Hosted by the Institute for Critical Animal Studies, the event’s description called for activists to set up film viewings, workshops, protests and vegan potlucks to “educate the public about federal laws that specifically target animal advocates.”

Information regarding the event was shared widely throughout Texas agencies, even making its way to the Austin Regional Intelligence Center (ARIC).

“We will be monitoring as well,” an ARIC officer wrote in a response email.

Despite ARIC policy forbidding the collection of information on individuals and groups unrelated to terrorism, an Austin police spokesperson seemingly defended the action after being pressed by MuckRock.

“The ARIC is tasked, from an all-crimes perspective, with keeping the citizens of Austin and the surrounding communities safe,” the spokesperson wrote. “As part of this mission, the ARIC will examine unrestricted, publicly available social media solely with the intent of looking for bad actors that would cause harm.”

The incident remains somewhat unsurprising given the findings from a 2012 bi-partisan Senate report on fusion centers such as the ARIC, which found the centers to be a “useless and costly effort that tramples on civil liberties.”

Last January a similarly benign group known as “The Rainbow Family” was also targeted by law enforcement for their radical advocacy of “peace and love.” Police requested a quarter of a million dollar grant from the Department of Homeland Security to create a mobile command unit to spy on the “extremist” group.

A New Hampshire police chief also requested cash from DHS in 2013 in order to obtain an armored military vehicle, citing the threat posed by “Occupy activists and libertarians” as justification.

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A disgruntled faction of establishment scientists who claim to have a corner on scientific truth recently attempted (and failed) to unseat Dr. Mehmet Oz from his position as head of Columbia University’s Department of Surgery, maintaining that Dr. Oz shows “disdain for science” and promotes “quackery.” What these prideful fools aren’t divulging is the fact that they themselves are the true purveyors of quackery and anti-science, blatantly endorsing industry interests for pay under the guise of “science.”

As it turns out, four of ten co-signers of an embarrassingly pompous letter calling for Dr. Oz’s removal from Columbia are current or past employees of the American Council on Science and Health (ACSH), a corrupt industry front group that is financed by corporations like Coca-Cola, Procter & Gamble, Bristol-Myers Squibb and Monsanto. Gilbert Ross, the acting president and executive director of ACSH, is actually a former felon who now has the gall to accuse Dr. Oz of nudging the medical profession towards disrepute.

Ironically, it’s ACSH that is shaming the integrity of science with its constant peddling of pseudoscience in flagrant promotion of things like electronic cigarettes, genetically-modified organisms (GMOs), alcohol and vaccines. ACSH claims to be an independent, non-profit group that upholds unbiased science as a beacon of truth in the world, all while quietly accepting huge donations from chemical, pharmaceutical and biotechnology corporations.

This document^[PDF] contains leaked ACSH financial records for the 2013 fiscal year. It was never intended to be publicly released, as ACSH guards its financials and the identities of its donors and sponsors under lock and key. They are right to hide such information because it clearly exposes who this sham organization truly works for.

As you’ll notice, ACSH had a goal of achieving a $2 million working budget in 2013, and this required petitioning its top donors for large cash infusions. These donors include popular industry names like Chevron, Bayer CropScience, Syngenta, McDonald’s, Monsanto, and many others who collectively contributed hundreds of thousands of dollars to ACSH.

How can an organization that is almost completely funded by drug, vaccine, and chemical interests possibly be unbiased and scientific?

Let’s think about this for a moment: if nearly every penny that flows into ACSH comes from corporations that promote junk foods, pharmaceuticals, “fracking,” vaccines, cigarettes and alcohol, what kind of “science” do you think ACSH is going to promote? It surely won’t be independent science that dares to question the safety or effectiveness of any of these products.

“[The ACSH] platform, invariably, sides with big business, opposing science that claims products or practices are harmful to the public or the environment,” reveals the TruthWiki entry for ACSH.

“In a letter to the editor of the Washington Times, Michael Jacobson, the Director of the Center for Science in the Public Interest, stated that ACSH is ‘a receptacle for payments from pharmaceutical, chemical, biotechnology, food and other companies who appreciate the convenience of having their grantees and former employees serve on government science panels.'”

Also serving on the ACSH Board of Trustees is pro-vaccine quack “Dr.” Paul Offit, the infamous jab fanatic from Philadelphia Children’s Hospital who says that aluminum is healthy for a developing fetus and that injecting babies with up to 10,000 vaccines at once is completely safe. These are the same folks who, out of the other sides of their mouths, claim to promote only “science-based medicine.”

Sources for this article include:

http://www.naturalnews.com/files/acsh-financial-summary.pdf

http://truthwiki.org/The_American_Council_on_Science_and_Health

http://www.washingtontimes.com

http://acsh.org/about-acsh/meet-the-team/

http://www.naturalnews.com

http://www.ageofautism.com

http://www.medscape.com

The permanent representative of the United States to the UN, Samantha Power, speaking at a meeting of the General Assembly on May 5, 2015, cited the diary of Tanya Savicheva, recalling the suffering of the girl during the siege of Leningrad in 1941-1944.  Below is the comment by Maria Zakharova, Director of the Department of Information and Press of the Russian Foreign Ministry, published in Russian by RT. But first we have to remind you of the tragic story of that Leningrad family. 

The Diary of Tanya Savicheva

During the 900-day German blockade of Leningrad 642,000 civilians died in the city and another 400,000 during evacuation.

In 1941 the Savichev family lived in Leningrad, and was making plans to spend the summer in a country side. But only Tanya’s brother Mikhail managed to leave the city before the blockade.

With the onset of the war all members of the family began helping with the war effort. The mother was sewing uniforms, others worked in weapons manufacturing and served defending the city.

As food supplies were cut off during the siege, most of the city’s residents were sentenced to hungry death. Tanya’s family did not escape the common fate and her diary became a testament to Leningrad’s human tragedy in WWII.

The first entry:

“Zhenya died on December 28, 1041 at 12:30 am”

Sister Zhenya worked at an arms plant, where she had to walk battling the harsh winter elements. She became the first victim of the family, due to high physical demands and a lack of nutrition.

Less then a month later, a new entry appeared in the diary:

“Grandma died on January 25, 1942 at 3pm”

Tanya’s grandma, Evdokia Arsenieva

“Leka died on March 17, 1942, at 5 am”

Leonid Savichev (1917 – 1942)

 “Uncle Vasya died on April 13, 1942 at 2 am”

Vasily Savichev (1885-1942), photo taken in 1915

Finally Tanya writes about the death of uncle Lesha, and her mother Maria. Lesha died on May 10, and her mom 3 days later. In the entry Tanya skips the word “died”:

“Mama on May 13, 1942, at 7:30 am”

Maria Savicheva (1889-1942), Tanya’s mother

Last entries:

“Savichev family died”

“Everyone died”

“Only Tanya is left”

Soon Tanya was evacuated with other kids. In august 1942 the train with kids arrived in village Shatki. The girl ended up in an orphanage #48. But she was the only one among the new kids with tuberculosis. Tanya died on July 1, 1944 at 14 years old.

Maria Zakharova:

Cynicism has many definitions and examples. Here’s another one. Cynicism – is when on May 5, 2015, U.S. permanent representative to the UN, Samantha Power from the podium of the General Assembly quotes the diary of Tanya Savicheva, talking about the girl’s suffering during the siege of Leningrad.

First, Samantha Power temporarily forgot that the siege of Leningrad lasted 872 days – from September 8, 1941 to  January 27, 1944. And the long-awaited Second front was opened in Europe six months after the complete liberation of Leningrad from the blockade!

What prevented the US and the UK to start helping our country to save Tanya and hundreds of thousands of the same children for 2.5 years? After all, something was preventing it, right? Or did Washington and London not possess the pages from the diary of Tanya Savicheva at the time? But if they did, then certainly would have started a military operation against Hitler’s troops in Europe three years earlier, right?

It’s just that Tanya is gone. And now American diplomacy can speculate on her name all they want. It is fair to say that to demand a knowledge of history from Americans, especially of a foreign country, although common, is, you know, on the brink of cynicism.

Children in Donbass were hiding in shelters for months while Ukrainian troops are shelling the cities.

Secondly, by playing the “good aunt”, who deplores the fate of a child who died in the distant 1944, the U.S. Ambassador to the UN has again forgotten that at no time during the past year, not once at the thematic meetings of the Security Council she bothered to mention about the fate of the still living children of Donbass, too, by the way, suffering [including from hunger – KR] as a result of military operations and humanitarian disaster caused by the current blockade. However, she was not alone to forget about this, but following the other colleagues from the State Department.

It’s just that the children of Donbass don’t exist, it’s all a myth of “Russian propaganda”! They, from the point of view of the “exclusive” Samantha Power, are not even worth the status of Pussy Riot, to talk about them at the UN. Now, if these children died on the right side of history and, preferably, many years ago, to be unable to stand up for themselves; or, stuffing a frozen chicken in all kinds of places [reference to Pussy Riot – KR] proudly declared that they suffer from [Putin’s] regime and lack of creative fulfillment, then Samatha Power would guarantee a free tour of the building of the United Nations and an honorable mention from the UN podium.

Pentagon sources reveal that they are putting in place arrangements for their program to train and equip Syrian rebels, and will begin as early as this week.

US troops and support staff have arrived at locations in the Middle East to mark the beginning of the Pentagon’s controversial plan to train and equip Syrian rebels who they deem ‘moderate’, and who they hope will take the fight to the Islamic State.

In February the Pentagon announced deals had been signed with Turkey and Jordan to set up facilities to train and equip Syrian opposition fighters, while Saudi Arabia and Qatar had also offered to host the training.

Defense Department officials said around 1,200 Syrian opposition fighters were identified as potential candidates for the training; according to recent reports, 400 have passed the initial security screening, and will soon begin the training, subject to final approval.

The first of the 400-strong cohort of military trainers have recently arrived in Turkey and Jordan in preparation for carrying out the training, which aims to train more than 5,000 rebels annually for three years, covering small arms, radio communication, battlefield tactics and medical equipment. The rebels will also be provided with weapons, trucks and tactical radios.

Rebel fighters from ‘the First Regiment’, part of the Free Syrian Army, climb on a bar as they participate in a military training in the western countryside of Aleppo May 4, 2015 – © REUTERS/ Hosam Katan

The US hopes that the trained rebels will return home from the training to defend their towns and villages from the Islamic State; however, concerns remain that the rebel fighters will use their new-found knowledge to fight against Syrian government forces, or for extremist groups such as the al-Qaeda affiliate Nusra Front.

Rebel fighters from ‘the First Regiment’, part of the Free Syrian Army, swing from bars as they participate in a military training in the western countryside of Aleppo May 4, 2015 – © REUTERS/ Hosam Katan

The number of trained rebels is also far outnumbered by the Islamic State’s fighting force, which is estimated by the CIA to have more than 30,000 fighters.

The current mission is an escalation of a covert CIA-led program to train Syrian fighters which began in Jordan in 2013, and is also an expansion of the US policy in Iraq, where more than 3,000 troops have been sent to train Iraqi and Kurdish forces.

On December 4, the US House of Representatives extended the president’s authority to train and equip moderate Syrian rebels by two years as part of the $585 billion annual defense authorization bill, which also authorized $6.6 billion for operations against the Islamic State.

As the Bureau revealed recently, the accidental killing of American Warren Weinstein and Italian Giorgio Lo Porto by the CIA in January now means at least 38 Westerners have been killed by covert US drones in Pakistan, Somalia and Yemen.

Yet, as a major analysis of the nationalities killed by such strikes shows, this figure is just 1.6% of the total dead who the Bureau has established their country or region of origin.

There have now been 515 US drone strikes in Pakistan, Yemen and Somalia since 2002, killing at least 2,887 people. Of those, the Bureau has been able to determine where 2,353 came from. They include Moroccans, Kenyans and Syrians – drawn from 34 countries in all.

The majority however came from the country they died in. More than 60% of those killed in Pakistan were reportedly from Pakistan. More than 80% of those killed in Yemen were reportedly Yemenis. For Somalia, information about the dead is more limited, but where the Bureau has been able to find details, 45% of those killed were Somali.

This data is not in itself surprising – experts have told the Bureau the majority of armed groups in these countries are made up of local people.

But the how much the local populations have been in the drones’ firing line had hitherto not been quantified. The Bureau compiled this data in conjunction with Chris Woods for his new book Sudden Justice: America’s Secret Drone War.

This demonstrates the extent to which Pakistan the US has been hitting the insurgents who have used the country’s tribal areas as a safe-haven from which to launch attacks on US and allied troops in Afghanistan. In Yemen, the US has been fighting with the government on one side of a complicated civil war.

Pakistan

Pakistan

Yemen

Yemen 

The civilian toll from all CIA strikes in Pakistan also falls on the local population. Of the minimum 423 civilians reported killed, three have been clearly identified as coming from outside the Central Asian region. Lo Porto and Weinstein were Westerners, and Umm al Shaymah was the Egyptian wife of al Qaeda terrorist Mustafa Abu Yazid. Al Shaymah’s three daughters were also killed in the attack though it is not clear if they were born in Egypt or Pakistan.

Details on many of the dead is difficult to come by. For example, the Bureau’s Naming the Dead project has over two years painstakingly pieced together information on the dead in Pakistan – but it has only named 721 of at least 2,449 people killed.

The gaps in the CIA’s data could stem from its use of tactics like signature strikes.

Signature strikes kill people not based on their identity but on a pattern of life analysis – an intelligence assessment built up over prolonged surveillance. There is considerable scope for error in these kinds of attacks. The January 15 attack that killed Lo Porto and Weinstein was a signature strike. After days of surveillance of the house they were held in, the CIA determined four unidentified al Qaeda members were inside. The CIA knew it had made a mistake when six bodies were removed from the structure.

Controversial Tactics

The high proportion of Pakistanis among the drone dead could be a consequence of other controversial CIA tactics.

The CIA’s targeting policies have taken their toll on the Pakistani population of the Federally Administered Tribal Areas (Fata), even when the drones were not aiming at a local target. On October 30 2006 drones destroyed a madrassa in Bajaur agency. The target was reportedly Ayman al Zawahiri, Osama Bin Laden’s Egyptian deputy. The strike missed him but killed at least 79 Pakistani civilians, most of them children.

The high number of Pakistanis and people from Afghanistan and Uzbekistan reportedly killed by drones could also demonstrate how the US has expanded its range of drone targets in the country. The early strikes were intended for two groups: al Qaeda terrorists the CIA was gunning for, and Pakistani terrorists who Islamabad wanted dead.

According to the New York Times, Pakistan and the CIA came to an agreement before the drone campaign began. The US could take out its al Qaeda targets if it also killed Pakistan’s enemies.

Since 2004, the strikes appear to have taken their toll on the traditionally Arab membership of al Qaeda in Pakistan and Afghanistan. The Bureau has recorded at least 107 people killed by drones in Pakistan who reportedly came from Middle Eastern, or north and east African countries such as Egypt, Libya and Sudan. A further 116 people were simply described as “Arabs”.

The first drone strike in June 2004 killed Nek Mohammed, a Pakistani militant who defied the Pakistani military and forced the army into a humiliating ceasefire two months before his death. The second strike, in May 2005, took out Haitham al Yemeni – an al Qaeda explosives expert from Yemen.

Documents reviewed by McClatchy news agency confirmed a secret deal between US and Pakistani officialsensured the CIA and its Pakistani counterpart the ISI worked together to kill both countries’ enemies.

The rate of strikes increased during the Obama administration as did the number of casualties and the number of Arabs among them. With the number of veteran al Qaeda fighters dwindling, a “deep bench” of terrorists from Pakistani and Central Asian terrorist groups stepped up to replace them, an unnamed US intelligence official told the Long War Journal in 2012.

The number of Arab fighters fell “dramatically” after around 2009 when US drone strikes and Pakistani military offensives took their toll on al Qaeda’s ranks, Rahimullah Yusufzai, a Pakistani journalist and expert on armed groups in the Fata, told the Bureau

There was a significant population of Arabs in the Fata, Yusufzai continued. “But numbers have gone down drastically… I don’t think that there would be more than 200.”

Fewer young Arab men are following the traditional path to Pakistan to fight in Afghanistan, he said. “It is not easy [to] come here and stay here. There is better security, better controls at the airport [and] on the borders.”

This leaves the veterans “who are living here for years, who can’t go back, who are most wanted. So they are here moving back and forth across the border between [Afghanistan and Pakistan].”

According to US administration officials from President Obama down, Washington uses its drones to hunt “al Qaeda and associated forces”.

This vague phrasing is believed to include the various factions. These include those Pakistan as a haven while fighting with the insurgency in Afghanistan, such as the Haqqani Network and the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan, and groups set against the Pakistani state, including the Pakistan Taliban and Lashkar e Jangvi.

The CIA’s own data demonstrates it has targeted a wider array of armed groups than just al Qaeda.

These organisations comprise Pakistanis, Afghans and Uzbeks. They are the largest groupings of fighters by nationality, according to Yousufzai, and it is unsurprising there are so many of them listed in the Bureau’s data.

Pakistanis make up nearly two-thirds of those people killed by drones in Pakistan, according to Bureau research. This figure rises to 72% when people from the wider region – those described as Uzbeks, Central Asian or Pashtun – are included.

The lower frequency of strikes in the early years of the drone war demonstrates some constraint on the campaign. However in 2008 President Bush gave the CIA greater freedom in its strikes in Pakistan – including giving them permission to specifically target westerners, as revealed by Woods.

A Surge in CIA Strikes

This leeway from the White House precipitated a surge in CIA strikes in the second half of 2008. This continued in 2009 before the CIA stepped up the intensity again in 2010.

In December 2009 the Pakistan Taliban and al Qaeda sent a suicide bomber to Camp Chapman, a CIA base in Khost province, Afghanistan. The attack left seven CIA personnel dead. After the bombing, the CIA’s “shackles were unleashed” according to an unnamed intelligence official. “The CIA went to war,” another official said, adding: “The White House stood back.”

The US carried out 128 drone strikes in Pakistan that year, 23 in September alone, the peak of the drone war. At least 755 people were killed, 89 of them reportedly civilians. At least 510 of the dead were said to be from Pakistan or elsewhere in Central Asia – at least 72 of them civilians.

In Yemen the US has hit proportionally more local people than in Pakistan. The Bureau however has only managed to determine place of origin for 179 of the minimum 436 people killed by drones there. This partial picture shows more than four fifths of them were Yemeni which fits with the established understanding of the make-up of al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP).

It was formed in 2007 from an amalgamation of veterans from al Qaeda groups based in Yemen and Saudi Arabia. It has largely retained this composition, Yemen expert and Buzzfeed’s writer-at-large Gregory Johnsen told the Bureau. “They have an international aspect but certainly the vast majority of the organisation continues to be Yemeni and then Saudi.”

Who exactly is a member of AQAP has always been hard to determine in Yemen, not least because AQAP has formed alliances of convenience with various Yemeni tribes. In the past, the tribes would side with al Qaeda in their fight against the central government in Sanaa. Now, the tribes have united with fellow Sunnis in AQAP against the Shia Houthi rebels who have swept through Yemen in the past six months, ousting the president into exile.

“Membership in this group, and particularly now given the fluid situation on the ground in Yemen, is really really hard to determine,” says Johnsen.

“It is hard to determine who are fighters who are local fighters in Yemen who are joining and affiliating with al Qaeda only as a way to, say, combat the Houthis, and who are members who are joining with the organisation in a way that accepts wholeheartedly their ideology both the national and what al Qaeda would call the transnational Jihad.”

Throughout all, the US has supported the government in Sanaa which has strongly supported Washington’s counter-terrorism efforts in Yemen. As one US official said in April 2012, this has led the US into a complicated conflict: “I think there is the potential that we would be perceived as taking sides in a civil war.”

This was echoed by a former senior US Department of Defence official who told Woods: “I am not convinced that what we are doing in Yemen makes sense either politically or even that we’re striking the right people… You get more of a sense that we may be involved in a local conflict more than a global conflict.”

The US took sides in a civil war in Somalia when it backed an Ethiopian invasion of Somalia, ostensibly aimed at crushing al Shabaab. The group had become the dominant force in the country. Since 2007 the US has provided air strikes and intelligence support to various African countries that have sent troops to the Horn of Africa to support the government in Mogadishu.

The Bureau’s data on drone strikes in Somalia is limited because of the difficulties in obtaining information in a country racked by decades of conflict. The Bureau has the nationality of 12 of at least 23 people killed with drones in Somalia.

Eight are from Somalia or Kenya which is generally consistent with the structure of the group, according to Dr Stig Jarle Hansen, associate professor of international relations at the Norwegian University of Life Science.

It is now 13 years since the US started its covert drone wars and it is clear its targets have expanded beyond al Qaeda. It is also clear that the local men who make up these other targeted entities have been hit more than anyone. The US still fighting the Taliban in Afghanistan and AQAP looks set to exploit the calamitous situation in Yemen. With CIA director John Brennan warning an audience in Washington the war on terror could continue indefinitely it is inevitable the death toll among local communities will rise.

Data for this investigation came in part from the Bureau’s Naming the Dead project which is supported by Joseph Rowntree Charitable Trust.

Visualisation by Krystina Shveda

Follow Jack Serle on Twitter. Sign up for monthly updates from the Bureau’s Covert War project, subscribe to our podcast Drone News, and follow Drone Reads on Twitter to see what our team is reading.

Pro-Kiev forces have destroyed a gas pipeline and a cafe building in Donetsk with artillery shelling. “After an explosive object hit, roof and floor were destroyed on an area of 2,500 meters in the Dilyara cafe on Marshal Zhukov Street.

A shell also damaged a gas pipeline on Signalnaya Street,” the press service Donetsk city administration said on Wednesday.

The DPR emergencies ministry has confirmed information about shellings. According to its reports around 300 explosive objects were found near Lisichanskaya, including 105 artillery shells of 152mm, 14 of 125mm and 20 mines for a 120mm mortar. Explosive objects were also found near Khartsyzsk, Debaltsevo and Gorlovka.

“The economic blockade has not been lifted, the banking system has not been restored, pensions and social payments are not paid,” he said. Furthermore, there is no constitutional reform, even though Ukraine says that something is being done.Zakharchenko noted that the Package of Measures adopted on February 12 envisages that all issues relating to local elections must be coordinated with representatives of DPR and LPR. “But no one coordinates anything with us. The Minsk agreements are thus violated. They remain on paper 100%,” the head of the republic claimed.

Representatives of the DPR in the sub-group on refugees, internally displaced persons and humanitarian assistance should urge Kiev to lift its blockade on delivering medicaments to Donbas at recent Contact Group meeting, chief physician at Donetsk central hospital Valentina Podolyaka said on Wednesday.We receive humanitarian aid from Russia which helps us to keep afloat, but this is not enough, she said. Donetsk doctors now need antibiotics, heart medications and medicine for newborn children.

Twenty seven presidents and prime ministers have confirmed their participation in the Moscow celebrations of the 70th Victory Day anniversary on May 8-10, Russian presidential aide Yury Ushakov stated.

“This means 27 heads of state and governments. Moreover, heads of a number of international organizations, in particular UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon and UNESCO Director General Irina Bokova, will participate,” he said.In addition to aforementioned leaders, honorary guests who will be sent by relevant heads of states will attend the celebrations. For instance, Winston Churchill’s grandson who is a British MP will come from the United Kingdom. Foreign ministers of France, Italy and Monaco, as well as some other countries, and defense ministers of several countries are expected to come.

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Rwandan and Ugandan troops have been reported in the Democratic Republic of Congo during the past two weeks, but reporting is scant and neither the U.S., the U.N. Security Council nor any other members of the international community have spoken to this, the latest Rwandan and Ugandan violation of Congo’s sovereignty. The international community has instead been focused on the constitutional crisis in Congo’s neighbor, Burundi.

Transcript

KPFA Evening News Anchor: Unrest and political oppression in the African Great Lakes Region continue to cause fears of a regional war. The Democratic Republic of the Congo’s government accuses both Uganda and Rwanda of sending troops across the borders they share in Congo’s resource rich east.

M23 commander Sultani Makenga, during M23’s occupation of the eastern Congolese city of Goma in 2013

At the same time, Burundi’s constitutional crisis threatens to engage its neighbors, Rwanda and Congo. KPFA’s Ann Garrison spoke to international criminal defense attorney and former law professor Peter Erlinder about the U.N. Security Council’s response.

KPFA/Ann Garrison: Peter Erlinder, the U.N. Security Council has not responded to credible reports of Ugandan and Rwandan troops in DR Congo, even though this is a clear violation of the U.N.’s founding principle, the equal sovereignty of member states.

Peter Erlinder: Yes, of course it is, but there’s been a long history of that. We know that as early as 1997, Uganda and Rwanda invaded the Congo and set up their own puppet government and have repeatedly invaded and occupied large portions of the Congo because of the desire to control the wealth in the eastern part of the Congo. That is the goal of Rwandan and Ugandan elites, if not the governments themselves.

KPFA: OK, the U.N. Force Intervention Brigade drove Rwanda and Uganda’s M23 proxy militia back into Rwanda and Uganda in 2013. Isn’t the UNSC legally or theoretically obliged to respond to these cross border incursions again?

Peter Erlinder: Well, it would seem logically that the U.N. Security Council would be obligated to follow through on the obligation that they took up to remove M23. But M23 was, as you know, essentially under the control of the Rwandan government, and the United States and the United Kingdom support Rwanda and Uganda, so it remains to be seen whether the U.S. and U.K. will have the Security Council follow out on that mandate.

Unrest and political oppression in the African Great Lakes Region continue to cause fears of a regional war.

KPFA: On Friday, Russia and China blocked a U.N. Security Council resolution to censure Burundian President Pierre Nkurunziza for seeking a third term, which his supporters claim he’s constitutionally entitled to do. Russian U.N. Ambassador Vitaly Churkin told reporters, “It’s not the business of the Security Council and the U.N. Charter to get involved in constitutional matters of sovereign states.” Could you comment on that?

Peter Erlinder

Peter Erlinder: Yeah, this is one of the things that the Security Council has had to contend with, now that Russia and China have begun to actively use the veto again, which they weren’t able to do for about 20 years. The U.N. Security Council should not involve itself in the internal affairs of a sovereign country. At least at this point, the question of whether the Burundian president can properly run for a third term or not is an internal question for the Burundians.

That’s different than the situation of the M23 proxy militia in the Congo, because that of course is an invading force that was in Congo, and the U.N. was there to help drive them out. So Russia and China are quite correct.

KPFA: Today Burundi’s defense minister suggested that he might intervene in Burundi’s constitutional crisis. That would no doubt violate Burundi’s Constitution, but it would still be Burundi’s issue, wouldn’t it?

Peter Erlinder: Well, it might lead to some sort of a conflict within Burundi, but whether it violates Burundi’s Constitution more or less than the decision to run for a third term again gets us back to this being a Burundian question and a struggle for the Burundian people to resolve. This isn’t an international question unless, of course, someone decides to make it so.

Russian U.N. Ambassador Vitaly Churkin told reporters, “It’s not the business of the Security Council and the U.N. Charter to get involved in constitutional matters of sovereign states.”

KPFA: OK, the US hasn’t remarked on the Rwandan and Ugandan troops in Congo, but it has called on Burundi’s Nkurunziza to step down and not seek a third term – and sent a special envoy rushing off to Bujumbura. Legalities aside, what do you think the USA’s primary interests are?

Peter Erlinder: Well, what we can see since 1990, when the Ugandan military, made up of Rwandan troops, invaded Rwanda, is that the U.S. has played a major role, through proxies, in influencing the politics and the reality of life in Central Africa. Whether that role has been one that’s been approved by the Security Council or not has varied from time to time, whether it’s been legal or not has varied from time to time, but the U.S. has been constant in attempting to influence affairs in Rwanda, Burundi, Uganda and certainly in the Congo.

So I think U.S. primary interests are to remain a player in influencing the outcome of who controls power in all of the Great Lakes states. I think this is consistent with that.

KPFA: OK, Peter Erlinder, thank you for speaking to KPFA.

Peter Erlinder: OK, thanks Ann.

KPFA: For Pacifica, KPFA and AfrobeatRadio, I’m Ann Garrison.

Oakland writer Ann Garrison writes for the San Francisco Bay View, Black Agenda Report, Black Star News, Counterpunch, Colored Opinions and her own website, Ann Garrison, and produces for AfrobeatRadio on WBAI-NYC, KPFA Evening News, KPFA Flashpoints and for her own YouTube Channel, AnnieGetYourGang. She can be reached at [email protected]. In March 2014 she was awarded the Victoire Ingabire Umuhoza Democracy and Peace Prize for promoting peace in the Great Lakes Region of Africa through her reporting.

So fell spin doctor par excellence Alastair Campbell on the BBC’s commentary regarding the exit poll from the broadcaster.  The temperature in various party rooms wasn’t quite right either. According to the Beeb’s prediction, the Tories would be increasing their numbers to 316 seats, with Labour getting a reduced 239 when all the results would be in.  Another prediction then followed: the conservatives would be able to govern in their own right, heaving past the majority line.  Others suggested that the exit poll was “incredible” and “unbelievable”, a sort of forecast from distant Narnia.  Treat it with “caution”, claimed the First Minister of Scotland, Nicola Sturgeon.

The attempt to “splinter” the conservative bloc from the UK Independence Party side did not materialise.  Having ridden a wave of anti-European and anti-immigration protest, the conservative attempt to chew some of that fat from the reactionary side of politics may have neutralised what seemed to be an ominous threat. Poundland Powellism may not have yielded Nigel Farage the numbers he wants, but UKIP has left a large, and very persistent stain of suspicion on the landscape.[1]

The splintering did take place, though it assumed the form of a withering devastation for Labour in Scotland at the hands of the lady deemed the “Tartan Terror”.  Shadow foreign secretary Douglas Alexander was butchered in the vote, as was Jim Murphy, the Scottish Labour leader.  Sturgeon will be thrilled, with the Scottish nationalists posed to become the third largest power bloc at Westminster.

The Liberal Democrats, the ill-fated coalition partners of the Tory party, were given a predictable mauling by an unforgiving electorate, with an outcome that will probably yield it eight seats.  It had held 57.  Its former leader, Charles Kennedy, lost his seat to the SNP in Ross, Skye and Lochaber.  Business secretary Vince Cable lost Twickenham, a seat he has held since 1997.  Lynne Featherstone was defeated in Honsey and Wood Green.  Party veteran Paddy Ashdown, having promised to eat his hat at the exit poll result, will have to do just that.

Cleaning out was taking place in other quarters.  The headline grabbing George Galloway, the leader of Respect, who had been reported to the police for sending out information on an exit poll before the vote was concluded, lost his Bradford West seat to Labour.[2]

The election did have its fair share of observations before counting.  There was the usual British wonder at queues.  A note on the Guardian blog observed: “Democracy in action. Twitter users have posted pictures of long queues outside polling stations up and down the country – a sign of decent turnout or just bad organisation?  Here’s hoping it’s the former.”[3]

Well, it was a form of democracy, even if was hollowed out and qualified.  “Face it my beloved Britons,” claimed Pablo Guimón, UK correspondent for El País, “you’ve got a weird electoral system.  You might think it’s normal that the Greens could get 10% of the vote and just one seat, while the SNP might end up with 4% of the vote and 50 seats.  But it’s not.  Even if it does stop Ukip.”[4]

What, then, did this election signify?  In the optimistic analysis from Josh Allen in Jacobin Magazine, it proved that there was, in fact, a generative response to austerity and conservatism in Britain.  “The coalition government’s austerity agenda has fertilized an entire ecosystem of activism that is focused on providing a sustained challenge to neoliberalism, market fundamentalism, and ultimately, capital itself.”  That challenge will evidently have to continue.

There were the usual eccentric entries posing with variously serious agendas, though these only registered as mild tremors on what was a gradual return to British traditionalism.  The “Give Me Back Elmo” Party ambushed Prime Minister David Cameron at a polling station in Oxfordshire with little effect.  The party’s platform speaks of every child’s “right to a Father” and halting “the discrimination against Fathers in the secretive, gender bias family courts and end the emotional child abuse.”[5]

A notable fact through this entire campaign was the political inking out of Labour’s Miliband, a sort of erasure from history, be it by slander or good old satire.  He was bullied into rubbery confusion by presenter Jeremy Paxman, who treated him as part git and part geek.  He was excoriated at every turn.  Each public relations exercise looked like an attempt to attain tenure in clumsiness and moronic hilarity.  The press proved unforgiving.

The response from British media outlets to Miliband’s Chatham House speech on foreign policy was a near zero.  This suggested much, if only because Miliband expressed no room, let alone interest, in holding a referendum on Europe and Britain’s links.  “The threat of an in/out referendum on an arbitrary year timetable, no clear goals for [the Tories’] proposed European renegotiation, no strategy for achieving it… poses a serious risk to Britain’s position in the world.”  Such sensibility will get you punished.

One premise, followed with stubborn sleep-walking conviction, has been an insistence that a succeeding coalition government would be impossible.  Coalitions are the venereal disease of the establishment – a result of ill-thought through comingling that produces strange offspring.  Neither Labour nor the Tories were countenancing that – a distressing unnatural form of government for the traditionalists, because it seems to the political sages that voters do get it wrong.  For the Tories, this has paid off.  For Labour, it has been fatal.  After this election, the fans of coalitions and opponents of rampant majority politics will have to wait for another time.

Dr. Binoy Kampmark was a Commonwealth Scholar at Selwyn College, Cambridge.  He lectures at RMIT University, Melbourne.  Email: [email protected]

 Notes

Even if one almost always goes wrong with such prognoses, the fact is that the Spanish state is facing the biggest rupture since the end of the Franco dictatorship. In several large cities, the left radical-democratic lists of the Guanyem / Ganemos Initiatives have real chances of winning the mayoral elections in May. In recent months in Catalonia, millions were on the street calling for the democratic right to self-determination, to which Madrid could only answer with new prohibitions. But it is above all the left party Podemos(We Can) that is dominating Spain’s political landscape. According to some current polls, Podemos, though founded only in January 2014, is the strongest party today with an almost 28 per cent voter approval, one year before the parliamentary elections.

What is more remarkable about Podemos than the poll results, which can merely be volatile snapshots of the moment, is the social mobilization that the organization set in motion. 900 Podemos base groups, so called circles, have formed throughout the whole country. Almost 10,000 people took part in the party’s founding congress in October. And in municipal district assemblies hundreds of neighbours discuss the crisis, capitalism, and ‘real democracy’ – and in this case ‘neighbours’ means literally neighbours. Podemos has left the subcultural milieus behind.

The level of debate is astounding, determined as it is, on the one hand, by a pragmatism directed at the 2015 elections and, on the other, by sharp criticism of neoliberalism and bourgeois political routine.

Crisis of Representation

Podemos is the expression of a crisis of representation that has gripped many countries with a neoliberal regime since the 1990s. That is, Podemos is not the product of a gradual process of growth but appears to have emerged out of a political vacuum and is expanding in an explosive manner. No existing political structures (such as trade unions, the larger NGOs or the media) have supported the project; the party activists – most of them under 35 – belong to the generation characterized as apolitical, and its immense popularity among the population is not easily explained. In the Spanish mainstream, left positions were decidedly marginal until 2011.

Despite this, Podemos naturally did not come out of nowhere. Its bases are the new anti-institutional protest movements that have repeatedly filled public squares and streets in the Iberian peninsula. That Podemos is more than a fleeting protest party like the Pirates in Germany has mainly to do with the 15M Movement and the Mareas.

The 15M Movement (public square occupations with the demand for ‘real democracy now’), which many on the left at first regarded with suspicion and at the very least was seen to be naïve and tending to apoliticism, has brought forth a new generation of activists and new forms of politics and made possible a tremendous repoliticization – both internally and externally.

The crucial factor in the 15M Movement is its intuitive linking of criticism of capitalism with democratic demands. Starting with the concrete European experience, in which there is no longer a distinction between the economic and social policy of socialists and conservatives, the movement has problematized the systemic limits to democracy in the bourgeois state: i) The democratic process ends where the interests of big capital, that is especially the banks, begins. Before the outbreak of the crisis, Spain’s debt ratio was 40 per cent under the German level. Only when Madrid was forced by the EU to bail out private Spanish banks (and thus also German investors), did the state deficit explode. The cuts in healthcare and social services already made by the PSOE governments showed that in an emergency government executives have the function of carrying out underlying power interests. ii) However, political parties also seem to be increasingly standing in the way of democracy. With the ‘political class’, distinguished by professional politics and closed decision-making circuits, a specific social group has emerged with its own strategies of power and self-enrichment. In Spain, the political apparatuses are strongly shaped by the real estate boom of recent decades. The awarding of building permits and construction contracts, as well as state oversight of public savings banks (which have flourished in conjunction with the construction industry) guaranteed the ‘political class’ lucrative (mostly illegal) sources of income.

In contrast to what media reports suggest, the 15M Movement has in no way dissolved itself after the ebbing of the 2011 street protests but has spread throughout society. Thus we have seen the emergence, among other things, of the so-called mareas, protest movement for the defence of the public education and healthcare systems, in which public service employees come together through patients’ initiatives and patient and refugee groups, or the movement against forced evictions – the Plataforma de Afectados por la Hipoteca (PAH), a coalition of base groups, which connect direct action, solidarity and case-oriented self-help in a remarkable way. There is also a revival of labour organizations: In Andalusia, for example, activists of the base trade union SAT organized the non-violent redistribution of food purloined from supermarkets. The mareas in the healthcare and education sectors are supported by local groups of various smaller and larger trade unions. And, finally, the Marchas de la Dignidad, nationwide protest marches on Madrid, mobilized a million people in 2014 once again.

These movements made it clear that there is a social majority beyond the political apparatuses. But it also became clear – and this in turn led to thinking processes among the anti-institutional left – that the neoliberal regime has no difficulty in sitting out social protests (as Germany’s red-green government did with the Hartz IV protest at the beginning of the 2000s). Since the use of force is no longer an option, as it was for the labour movement of the twentieth century, a central means of pressure in adversarial politics is missing. ‘Citizens’ protests’, which duly request permits from the authorities and do not disturb capitalist business as usual, do not affect the neoliberal regime. It is not prohibited to have a different opinion because in the end it has no practical consequences.

Transforming Political Power

Against this background, the social movements in Spain faced the question of how these constant mobilizations could be transformed into real power from below, into poder popular. The Podemos and Guanyem inititiatives – and this distinguishes these phenomena from other organizations of the European left – aim not simply at the founding of a new party but at the redefinition of political space. What is at issue is thus not simply new parliamentary political majorities but a transformation of the institutional framework.

The danger of accommodation to the institutions (as in the case of the German Greens, who in the end transformed themselves more than they did politics) has up to now been held at bay through the sheer speed of the movement’s growth. The anti-institutional resistance is permeating the institutions with such vehemence that the institutions cannot hedge and absorb the dissidence – at least this is the project’s manifest hope.

In this Podemos can certainly be accused of being itself a result of ‘alienated‘ politics. The comparison with the Guanyem initiative in Barcelona makes it clear what this means: The latter is committed – completely within the logic of grassroots movements – to local processes of change from below. Guanyem Barcelona, which will very likely present ex-squatter Ada Colau as a candidate for the mayoral elections there, arose from the Plataforma de Afectados por la Hipoteca (PAH). The declared goal of Guanyem is to set into motion a municipal grassroots movement via municipal district assemblies, which will work out a platform for an alternative city government. It is thus expressly not aiming at welding together left groups through negotiations to form a coalition but to circumvent the existing (fragmented) left and at the same time incorporate them through the emergence of a grassroots movement. In terms of method, a path is being consciously taken here which is an alternative to the extant forms of representation.

Podemos is proceeding completely differently in this respect and has had great success – although in so doing it is in conflict with the radical-democratic postulates of 15M: Podemos’ founding group – Pablo Iglesias, Juan Carlos Monedero, Carolina Bescansa, Luís Alegre, and Íñigo Errejón – are Madrid political scientists, most of whom have worked for extended periods in Venezuela or in Bolivia. Its central figure is the 36-year-old Pablo Iglesias, who has made a name for himself on radio and television talk shows as a critic of the neoliberal regime.

The rise of Podemos thus does not completely conform to the grassroots criteria of the 15M Movement. The initiative is carried by a small group, which to be sure intends to subject itself to democratic contestation processes but at the same time has formulated a clear claim to leadership. And it is doubtless also a product of the mass media; without television Podemos would probably be a marginal phenomenon. The grassroots participatory process unfolding with Podemos was thus originally set in motion in a more vertical way.

Podemos’ founding group is pursuing a strategy overtly based on Latin American experiences. The central objective is to transform the general social discontent into an alternative political hegemony and thus launch a mobilization that in turn will open up perspectives going beyond a classic reform policy. In this context we should remember that the political change in Venezuela, Ecuador, and Bolivia was neither the simple result of electoral victories nor the result of revolutions but emerged from the combination of radical rupture, continuity, and transformation. The anti-neoliberal revolts and mass uprising have blocked the neoliberal regime in these countries for almost a decade, but the regime change took place within the existing political system. The opening up of larger transformational perspectives after this was in the last analysis due to the constitutional processes that gave form to the underlying constituent processes (the emergence of alternative popular power). These constitutional processes resulted from the fact that in these countries there was broad popular participation in the discussion of a new social contract. Podemos appears to be pursuing a similar project; it is formulating, at least implicitly, the problem of a democratic revolution that bursts the existing institutions.

Two Elements of Discourse

To open up this possibility Podemos’ discourse is based principally on two elements. 1. Relative Indeterminacy: Even if its critique of neoliberalism is unequivocal the consequences drawn from it are indefinite. Podemos’ whole presence appears shaped by this ambivalence. Although its founding circle comes out of the Communist Youth, was active in the milieu of the Izquierda Unida (IU – United Left) or the more left Izquierda Anticapitalista, or positively refers to Chavism in Venezuela, Podemos tries to position itself outside of left-right schemes. Time and again, Podemos stresses that it represents ‘the new’, which cannot be described by concepts linked to ‘the old’. Accordingly, social conflicts are not dealt with as class questions but as a conflict between los de abajo, those ‘at the bottom’ (to which then the ominous ‘middle strata’ explicitly belong, which are becoming increasingly scarce in Spain), and the ‘political caste’. All problems which could damage the ‘Podemos brand’ – in the marketing newspeak that the founders themselves use in describing the party – are dealt with in a similarly ambiguous way. For example, Iglesias positively approaches the concept of patriotism, a concept heavily tainted in Spain, and re-signifies it: “Being a patriot means extending the democratic right to self-determination to all spheres and defending the public services.” At the same time, however, he defends the right of Catalans and the Basque to decide whether they want to belong to Spain, even though he regards independence as not a sensible solution.

2. Momentum: Podemos assumes that the weakness of left politics is not due to faulty analysis but to the lack of a promising counter-project, and as a consequence is committed to targeted political mobilization. The entire political energy is to be concentrated on overthrowing the two-party system, that is, ‘the caste’, in the 2015 elections. This purpose is expressed with a conviction that at times sounds bizarre – now the party is even striving for an absolute majority ‘because there is no alternative to it’.

Against this background it becomes clear why it does not make sense to acuse Podemos of the ambiguity we have described. Podemos has kept its discourse open in a completely conscious way. They are openly building here on the experiences of the constituent processes in Latin America. In the 1990s and 2000s, Latin America’s neo-left, especially Venezuelan Chavism, developed discourse figures capable of achieving hegemony (without working through them on the level of theory), which Ernesto Laclau later called “empty signifiers.” Laclau claims that hegemonic politics necessarily implies vagueness because social relations are heterogeneous and projects capable of majority support must accordingly reflect this heterogeneity through ambiguity. Moreover, the relative indeterminacy of a project opens up, to ‘the many’, participatory and democratic space for shaping reality. In the end, a social transformation is only truly open if the result is not predetermined at the outset. Podemos seems to have internalized these considerations. The project’s main objective is to open a political space to the social majorities excluded from the real decision-making processes. Just as Chavism, which first attacked the corrupt ‘Fourth Republic’ as enemies and then the ‘escuálidos’, that is, the U.S.-oriented elites, Podemos has similarly chosen a clearly defined, rhetorically easy to handle opponent that unites the heterogeneous popular camp through exclusion: ‘the caste’.

The dangers of this radical political experiment are obvious. That the indeterminacy of the project has up to now not found expression in turf wars is also due to the fact that all efforts are being concentrated on overthrowing the two-party system. As soon as this goal is achieved or setbacks are suffered along the way, this openness can lead to a crisis at any moment. At least Podemos’ base is more heterogeneous than that of Germany’s Pirates: The European Parliament deputy Pablo Echenique, who proposed an alternative, more collective organizational structure at Podemos’ founding congress, recently admitted, with admirable self-criticism, that just a few years ago he had been a supporter of the neoliberal party Ciutadans and had been in favour of the Iraq War. Other Podemos components had been apolitical, internet activists or were active in the Communist Youth.

The danger is also very real that the founding group will become an elitist leadership circle. The new organizational statute, which was discussed in October in the Asamblea di Ciudadanos and then approved in a rank-and-file decision, strongly reduces the party’s structure to the leader, Pablo Iglesias. The alternative draft, “Sumando Podemos,” submitted by the European Parliament deputies Pablo Echenique and Teresa Rodríguez, proposed a three-person collective leadership. It makes sense that the overwhelming majority were for Iglesias’ concept; precisely because Podemos is so heterogeneous the organization needs a strong symbolic identity. Furthermore, in recent years Iglesias has acted coherently and with ethical integrity – and he is therefore capable of integrating diverse currents.

On the other hand, in the process a personalistic leadership structure is being established, which – as can be observed in the last decade in Venezuela, Bolivia, and Ecuador – can, it is true, facilitate social mobilization but which then at its core contradicts longer-term democratization processes. Very strong leadership figures foster a culture of opportunism and claqueurs.

Long-term Transformation Project?

But the central question is a different one: Does Podemos actually have a transformation project that goes beyond the removal of the Partido Popular (PP) government? I think it does. For what would have to be done has been obvious after the mobilizations since 2011 and the ongoing conflicts with the other nations in the Spanish state:

1. The notorious corruption has to be fought, for example by establishing mechanisms of the social control of public projects and administration, introducing salary limits for functionaries, and legally anchoring radical democratic forms of participation.
2. The privatization of basic social services and the policy of forced evictions have to be stopped. No economic logic can justify the socialization of speculative losses and their being shifted onto the shoulders of the population.
3. The repressive policy against social and independence movements has to be ended and the anti-democratic exceptional laws annulled.
4. But most of all Spain needs a constitutional process similar to the process in Latin America. The 1978 constitution is (as is the monarchy established at the time) the result of an elite pact of Francoist, regionalist, social democratic and Eurocommunist party leaderships and thus the expression of a fundamental democratic deficit. It is true that this constitutional pact made possible an opening in Spain after forty years of dictatorship, but it impeded a real break with the power of Francoist elites in the state and economy. A constituent process – that is, not just a meeting of constitutional jurists and politicians but a fundamental social debate as the form of development of a new popular hegemony – could finally bring to a close the unfinished democratization process. In this the derecho a decidir (the right to decide), defended by both social as well as independence movements, could be given a key role as an instrument for the re-democratization of all social spheres.

Finally, there is the question of why IU (Izquierda Unida – the United Left) was not able to articulate these wishes for change, although it shares many of Podemos’ demands and in some cases formulates them more clearly. The answer seems obvious to me: IU could not articulate the revolt against the political system because it itself was an integral part of this system in many respects. The Communist Party (CP) – as the most important party of IU – actively backed the 1978 constitutional pact and also participated, via the trade union Comisiones Obreras, in the social partnership, established by the PSOE, with all its corporatist practices. IU, as a broad electoral alliance, has repeatedly formed coalition governments with the PSOE and in so doing also reproduced the usual corrupt practices. It participated – as, for example, in the case of the Caja Madrid savings bank – in the plundering of public financial institutions.

But even apart from the question of individual cases of corruption IU’s organizational structures stand in contradiction to the radical democratic ambitions emerging from society. The political practice of the CP and IU was always marked by the classical logic of representation in which priority is given to the strengthening of one’s own organization and its electoral successes over social (self-empowerment) processes. The means to this change – the political organization – has become an end in itself, so that IU, like almost all parties belonging to the Party of the European Left, has become a self-referential electoral alliance. Even if thousands of party members are active in movements, the institutional logic dominates. Radical attempts at reorganization come too late.

Podemos has – up to now – been different: The organization is presently the instrument of a social process that is progressing too rapidly for the party to turn around the relation between the democratic revolt and the institutional form.

This of course does not mean that everything that happened in IU or was done by it in the last thirty years was wrong. Podemos will probably soon be confronted by many of the problems that characterize IU today. For example, how can a balance be found between the emerging political tendencies without internal organizational considerations determining the politics of the organization. But this is probably the central insight of the political process in Spain today: The intervention of the organized left was not at all irrelevant; without the experience of left activists, the 15M Movement would have fallen apart sooner, the PAH never have emerged, and Podemos would probably have been a diffuse liberal internet party like Germany’s Pirates. However, a social process is sweeping aside even the organizational forms of the left. The revolutionary-democratic awakening, longed for by a part of Spanish society, cannot be articulated through the bureaucratic corset of the IU. How long Podemos remains the appropriate space for this is to be seen. However, today Podemos is one of the spaces of the democratic revolution in Spain and probably the most important one. •

Raul Zelik is a freelance writer and currently a Fellow at the Rosa Luxemburg Foundation. (Translation by Eric Canepa)

On May 3, Saudi-led coalition entered Yemen. According to reports about from 20 to 50 soldiers have landed in Yemen’s strategic port of Aden for a ‘reconnaissance’ mission and more troops are coming.

The deployment of Saudi-led forces seeks the goal to help forces loyal to US, Saudi proxy-President AbdRabbu Mansour Hadi. Lately a spokesman from the Saudi-led coalition, Brigadier General Ahmed Asseri, has denied claims about a ground operation in the port.“There are no foreign forces in Aden but the coalition continues to help fight against the Houthi militia,” Asseri said in a statement.

Notwithstanding the denials regarding the ground operation in Yemen, Saudi Arabia has started training hundreds of Yemeni tribesmen to fight the Houthis on the ground. The training received by the Yemeni tribesmen in Saudi Arabia allegedly includes light weapons and tactical training.

According to Reuters, the Kingdom plans to boost deployment of these units to fight the Houthis resistance.

Another source reports that some 300 fighters have already managed to return to Yemen after getting Saudi training. They were allegedly sent the Sirwah district in the central Marib province to battle Houthis in the area.The fighting is ongoing on a number of major fronts. In Aden, the Houthis are fighting tribesmen who are supported by the Saudi-led air campaign.

In Yemen’s third largest city, Taiz, Houthis are fighting the Sunni Islamist fighters. The Houthis and their allies have been also fighting both Islamists and local tribesman in Marib and in Shabwa provinces,  which Saudi Arabia is training and arming with US intelligence and logistic support, Radical Islamists. Probably, the only forces that are gaining as a consequence of this conflict indeed are the Islamic State and Al-Qaeda.

Senegal’s Foreign Minister Mankeur Ndiaye confirmed on Monday that the West African nation would be sending a detachment of 2,100 troops to Saudi Arabia as part of an international coalition cobbled together by the kingdom in its war effort in Yemen.

The amazing fact is that Senegal declared its involvement in a war thousands of miles away from its borders, while dangerous West African terrorist group Boko Haram has declared allegiance to the Islamic State and has changed the name to Islamic State’s West Africa Province or ISWAP. Furthermore, Senegal isn’t engaged in the interstate coalition which opposes ISWAP in the region.

Human Rights Watch says it has credible evidence that the Saudi coalition has used cluster munitions supplied by the United States in its airstrikes against targets including those close to cities and villages. In recent weeks, the US-backed coalition has used cluster bombs in Yemen’s northern Saada governorate, a region bordering Saudi Ararbia, which historically was controlled by the Houthis.

Cluster munitions pose long-term dangers and are prohibited by a 2008 treaty adopted by 116 countries. The World Health Organization said recently that at least 944 Yemenis have been killed and nearly 3,500 injured since the start of airstrikes campaign in Yemen. Now, we perceive the reason of these numbers.

The Islamic State has claimed responsibility for the foiled attack on a controversial Prophet Muhammad cartoon contest near Dallas, Texas that ended with both assailants being shot dead by a traffic cop. The announcement was made on the group’s radio station.

Mainstream US media doubts that ISIS was directly involved in planning and choosing the target of the attack. It’s the first time that the Islamic State has claimed it was behind an attack in US soil. However, it definitely isn’t the first mark of ISIS developing in the USA, therefore the group doesn’t focused entirely on Iraq and Syria how US officials want to believe. In order to get additional political revenue in the ongoing conflicts in Middle East,US has lost the moment, when so-called ‘moderate rebels groups’, often supported by US government, have arisen in America.

I could have titled this piece “The Inevitable” or “It’s not a matter of if, but when” but I have another thought in mind and want to look at Greece from another angle.  Yes, either of those two titles would have sufficed because a Greek default is inevitable and only a matter of when.

My thoughts this morning are “how long will it take” to drag everything down with their default?  As mentioned yesterday, the ratings services, creditors and even “official” sectors are furiously trying to figure out how to not call a default a “default”.  This is of utmost importance because what is left of our global “rule of law” will destroy the derivatives markets from the inside out.  This needs little explanation because it is black and white, “grey” however is what the power structure is desperately hoping for.

If Greece is considered to have defaulted, rather than having some “splaining to do”, there will be billions worth of “paying to do”.  Greece has 350 billion euros of debt owed, this amount is surely “covered” by CDS (credit default swaps).  The reality is probably 10 times this amount but let’s assume it is only this 350 billion.  Liquidity has and is drying up ALL OVER THE WORLD, a 350 billion euro hit will bankrupt many entities, not to mention those who actually hedged and …don’t get paid.  You see, there are two sides here, the debt itself and at least an equal amount of CDS …so now we are talking an absolute minimum of 700 billion euros.

And remember, banks all throughout Europe (including the ECB itself) hold Greek bonds at par (100 cents on the dollar) because Greek debt, even though everyone knows its not worth the paper it is printed on is mandated as tier one capital.  “Tier One” meaning the “safest stuff” and worthy of bank portfolios “carefully safeguarding” depositor funds.  I hope you see the humor in this, sub-sub prime student loans are probably now safer than Greek debt.

Now to the title itself, how long will it take?  For what?  For a total meltdown, THAT’S WHAT!  Will we see some sort of slow burn where convulsions show up now and then, or the other extreme, a complete meltdown?  In my opinion we may see both for a couple of weeks or maybe even two months.  It is possible that those rendered insolvent get overnight injections and don’t admit to anything.  This may work for a short time but as always, insiders will know and start slipping out the back door.

Honestly, once a default is “recognized”, and trust me it will be sooner or later, I don’t believe the markets will stay open more than 48 hours before being closed by necessity.  I cannot imagine any scenario where Greece defaults (doesn’t pay) and the markets do not convulse into a death spiral in more than two week’s time.  There is a reason for me going through this exercise, some may believe they will be able to move and sidestep it.  Others have been trying to time the “perfect” entry or re-entry into precious metals and believe they will be delivered upon, I don’t believe this will practically be possible.

Forget about the “timing”, I do believe there will be some who time it perfectly …but just one problem.  So you are so smart and deft to sell out of the stock market at one minute before midnight, where does your capital go?  It takes three days to even “settle” a trade, then, does your broker send a check?  A wire?  Or do they put the settled funds into their “insured” money market?  Do you see the problem?  Your capital may be out of stocks (maybe not a great idea if we enter hyperinflation) …BUT it is STILL WITHIN THE SYSTEM!  Looking at the precious metal timer, let’s assume they are also “perfect” in their timing.  They get their order in and their broker confirms it, will there be time to transfer good funds?  Will the metal actually arrive in their hands?  Maybe?

Here is the problem as I see it, “emotions”.  When a Greek default is announced, stocks will probably fall and physical metals rise.  How many have the fortitude to sell into a weak stock market …and not sit tight “hoping” it comes back just one more time.  How many will be willing to “pay up” for gold in what is believed to be an ongoing bear market?  And if the markets are open again the next day, these emotions are even more fierce to fight!

The point to this missive is just as simple as the answer to the title “How long will it take?”.  I cannot stress how important it is to be positioned where you want to be NOW!  Not next week or when your gut tells you to because no one knows the timing for sure and Greece is only one of potentially 100 or more flash points that can push the system into the same heap of disaster.  How long will it take?  Not much or not enough?  Either of these answers can and will affect your entire future.

Bill Holter writes for Miles Franklin

Image: Moshe Yaalon speaking at the 2015 Shurat HaDin conference.

Israeli defense minister Moshe Yaalon on Tuesday said Israel would attack entire civilian neighborhoods during any future assault on Gaza or Lebanon.

Speaking at a conference in Jerusalem, Yaalon threatened that

“we are going to hurt Lebanese civilians to include kids of the family. We went through a very long deep discussion … we did it then, we did it in [the] Gaza Strip, we are going to do it in any round of hostilities in the future.”

The Israeli official also appeared to threaten to drop a nuclear bomb on Iran, although he said “we are not there yet.”

In response to a question about Iran, Yaalon said that “in certain cases” when “we feel like we don’t have the answer by surgical operations” Israel might take “certain steps” such as the Americans did in “Nagasaki and Hiroshima, causing at the end the fatalities of 200,000.”

Relating a July 2013 meeting with UN secretary-general Ban Ki-moon, Yaalon recalled promising Israel would bomb the entire Gaza City neighborhood of Shujaiya.

He showed Ban photos of villages in Lebanon and of “certain neighborhoods in Gaza, to include well-known Shujaiya, with many red spots” which he claimed were “terror assets in the densely populated urban area. And I said – July 2013 – we are going to hit it.”

Yaalon was true to his word. The Shujaiya massacre was among the most brutal examples of Israeli war crimes during last summer’s attack on the Gaza Strip.

Israel killed 2,257 Palestinians during the 51-day assault, according to the United Nations monitoring group OCHA. Of that number, OCHA says 70 percent were civilians, including 563 children (Defence for Children International–Palestine has documented 547 child deaths).

The 20 July 2014 attack on Shujaiya was the most bloody day of the war, when Israel bombed the entire neighborhood indiscriminately. Initial reports on the day said 60 bodies had been brought out of the rubble. Later reports suggested death tolls of 90 or 120.

Threat of BDS

The conference was titled “Towards a new law of war” and was intended to help Israel use “lawfare” to defend its crimes in courts around the world.

The other main theme of Yaalon’s speech, which closed the conference, was the “challenge” of BDS, boycott, divestment and sanctions. The Palestinian-led global movement aims to hold Israel accountable for its crimes.

Yaalon sought to cast the grassroots activist movement as a kind of military front. He said that “delegitimization, BDS and lawfare” were just “another tool” in the war of Israel’s enemies.

He complained that he had been unable to visit European countries because of the possibility he could have been arrested for suspected war crimes under universal jurisdiction law: “I prefer not to go to [the] UK, to London for about 10 years, or to Spain for a while.”

“Collateral damage”

In 2011, under Israeli pressure, the UK government changed its laws to make it easier for Israeli war crimes suspects to visit the country. Although the changes have meant that several high-level Israeli politicians and military officers have been able to visit since, in 2013 retired Major-General Doron Almog canceled a visit to London because of an outstanding warrant for his arrest related to war crimes committed in the Gaza Strip.

Yaalon lamented that Israeli soldiers now have to be taught that “we should be ready to give up a visit to London … but it’s not fair, it is not just.”

But, apparently referring to the law changes, he said they “found the common language to discuss these issues with our friends, with our allies.”

He also described criticism of Israel in international bodies such as the UN Human Rights Council as a “war after the war” and advocated that “we should fight them back.”

He said there should be no investigations of Israeli soldiers just because of “collateral damage” – a euphemism for the killing of civilians.

“Lawfare” conference

The conference was organized by Shurat HaDin, a group of Israeli lawyers which is at the forefront of using courts around the world to defend Israeli war crimes, and attack Palestine solidarity groups.

In 2013, as I reported for The Electronic Intifada at the time, it was revealed that the group has extremely close ties to the Israeli security establishment, to the extent of acting as a proxy group for the Mossad, Israel’s deadly overseas spy agency.

Shurat HaDin’s leader Nitsana Darshan-Leitner introduced Yaalon to the conference.

During his speech Yaalon heaped effusive praise on Shurat HaDin and its leader Nitsana Darshan-Leitner. He thanked the group

“for the activities of Shurat HaDin fighting one of Israel’s challenges of today, the lawfare, BDS, delegitimzation of the state of Israel … Nitsana thank you very much for what you are doing for the state of Israel.”

He said Israel and its supporters should use courts around the world “to fight them back,” meaning critics of Israel, and that this is exactly what Shurat HaDin does.

“Hasbara is not the right term,” he continued in the question and answer session, “it’s a war … Each of us can become to be a warrior in this war. By talkbacking, by blogging, by disseminating articles, by raising our case.”

Hasbara (literally “explanation” in Hebrew) is the Israeli term for propaganda.

Justifying Israeli attacks on civilians was the main theme of the conference. Speaker after speaker lined up to reinterpret international law so that it would, supposedly, allow the killing of Palestinian and other Arab civilians.

This was justified with familiar canards about the supposed use by Palestinian resistance factions of “human shields,” which then inevitably results in Palestinian civilian dead. In other words, Israel was being forced to kill civilians.

Yaalon did similar by saying that the civilian neighborhoods Israel had bombed had contained “rocket rooms.”

The New York Times reported Wednesday that Yaalon is likely to continue as defense minister in the newly-agreed government headed by his Likud party leader Benjamin Netanyahu, in coalition with the Jewish Home and other ultra-right-wing parties.

The Electronic Intifada watched the entire conference by livestream and will be reporting more detail soon.

Weeks after Israeli’s March 17 elections, Netanyahu and four other extremist political parties formed a new coalition government – barely with 61 of 120 Knesset seats.

Bar-Ilan University Professor Eytan Gilboa calls it “a big political mess…Nobody in his right mind believes that this will hold for even a short time.”

Coalition partners include:

• Netanyahu’s hard-right Likud (30 MKs)

• Naftali Bennett’s pro-settler Habayit Hayehudi (8MKs);

• two far-right religious parties – Shas (7 MKs) and United Torah Judaism (6 MKs); and

• Moshe Kahlon’s right-wing Kulanu party (10 MKs).

Yisrael Beiteinu party head Avigdor Lieberman refused to join Netanyahu’s coalition. It’s not extremist enough for him. It didn’t annihilate Hamas.

It didn’t enact a racist nationality law officially making non-Jewish Israelis second-class citizens.

Days earlier, Lieberman resigned as foreign minister saying:

“This is certainly a coalition that, to my regret, does not reflect the positions of the nationalist camp and is not to our liking, to put it mildly.”

He and Netanyahu are world class thugs. They spurn rule of law principles. The abhor democratic values.

They prioritize stealing all valued Palestinian land. They deplore peace. Netanyahu calls pursuing it a waste of time.

He opposes Palestinian statehood – publicly announced while campaigning.

Bennett will become education  minister. He’s militantly hardline. He’s anti-democratic. He opposes press freedom. He deplores progressive activism. He wants non-Jews excluded from Israel.

He opposes hiring “foreigners.” He calls them “infiltrators,” a “time bomb.” He reflects the worst of racist hate-mongering.

He’s against what he calls “excessive legalism.” He calls it “judicial activism.” He “killed lots of Arabs in (his) life,” he said – “and there is no problem with that.”

Ultra-orthodox Shas and United Torah represent the worst of religious fundamentalism in Israel. They want Halakha, Jewish religious law principles, enforced.

Netanyahu announced formation of a new government shortly before a Tuesday midnight deadline. He informed President Reuven Rivlin saying:

“I am honored to inform you that I have been successful in forming a government, which I will request is brought before the Knesset for its approval as soon as possible.”

Both men spoke by phone. Rivlin “congratulated (Netanyahu) on completing the formation of the government.”

“I have received your letter of confirmation, and look forward to the convening of the Knesset as soon as possible, to approve the government,” he said.

Bennett said he and Netanyahu “work(ed) all night” to finalize coalition governance terms.

Netanyahu will serve both as prime minister and foreign minister. Reports indicate he wants the latter portfolio as bait to entice Zionist Union leader Isaac Herzog to become a coalition partner.

Don’t bet on it based on his harsh words – calling Netanyahu’s new government a “national failure, lack(ing) responsibility, stability and governance.”

It’s “susceptible to blackmail. (It’ll) advance nothing and will quickly be replaced by a responsible and hopeful alternative.”

According to Likud’s public relations head Nir Hefetz, Netanyahu wants the foreign ministry position “to leave room for the government to expand in the future.”

When asked if he wants Herzog to join, he responded “yes.” Netanyahu appointments so far include Habayit Hayehudi MP Ayelet Shaket as justice minister.

She’s one of many extremist lunatics influencing policy – officials waging war on Palestine, threatening the entire region.

During last summer’s aggression on Gaza, she called for genocidal slaughter – declaring “the entire Palestinian people…the enemy, including its elderly and its women, its cities and its villages, its property and its infrastructure.”

She said Palestinian mothers give birth to “little snakes.”

“The Palestinian people have declared war on us, and we must respond with war. Not an operation, not a slow-moving one, not low-intensity, not controlled escalation, no destruction of terror infrastructure, no targeted killings.”

“Enough with the oblique references. This is a war. Words have meanings. This is a war.”

“It is not a war against terror, and not a war against extremists, and not even a war against the Palestinian Authority.”

“These too are forms of avoiding reality. This is a war between two people. Who is the enemy? The Palestinian people. Why? Ask them, they started.”

She called genocidal Israeli wars morally right. She wants Palestinians entirely exterminated. As justice minister, Palestinians will get none.

Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan compared her to Hitler. “If (her) words had been said by a Palestinian, the whole would have denounced it,” he said.

Zionist Union MK Nachman Shai said her appointment “is like giving the fire and rescue services to a pyromaniac.”

Netanyahu’s new government appears worse than his previous one. Shas party deputy finance minister Aryeh Deri served prison time for corruption.

Likudnik deputy Knesset speaker Moshe Feiglin urges “exterminat(ing) Palestinians in Gaza.”

Notorious racist/outgoing construction minister Uri Ariel becomes new agriculture minister.

He wants Palestine entirely colonized. Earlier he said “(t)here will be just one state between the Jordan River and the sea, and that is the State of Israel.”

Besides education, justice and agriculture, Bennett will control the Settlement Division and Knesset Constitution, Law and Justice Committee.

One of his Habayit Hayehudi party MKs will be appointed deputy defense minister. Kulanu’s Moshe Kahlon will become new finance minister. Likud’s Moshe Ya’alon will likely remain defense minister.

Institute for Palestine Studies senior fellow Mouin Rabbani calls Israel’s new government “the most extremist in its history.”

It includes a rogue’s gallery of hate-mongering racists.

Stephen Lendman lives in Chicago. He can be reached at [email protected]. His new book as editor and contributor is titled “Flashpoint in Ukraine: US Drive for Hegemony Risks WW III.” http://www.claritypress.com/LendmanIII.html Visit his blog site at sjlendman.blogspot.com. Listen to cutting-edge discussions with distinguished guests on the Progressive Radio News Hour on the Progressive Radio Network. It airs three times weekly: live on Sundays at 1PM Central time plus two prerecorded archived programs.

San Francisco attorney Inder Comar didn’t initially strike me as a human rights crusader working to bring accountability to arguably the most powerful political office in the world. Maybe it was the setting.

Comar works out of a small, glass-walled office in the Impact Hub, the spot that the tech industry has carved out of the San Francisco Chronicle Building, replacing the newspaper’s hollowed out core of journalists with start-up entrepreneurs seeking “synergy” and other business buzzwords, or just the next great app.

In fact, that’s most of what Comar does in his business law practice, collaborating with management consultants just down the bustling hallway to feed the current tech boom that is having such a huge impact on San Francisco, for good or ill. But the case that has propelled him onto the international stage, his pro-bono passion project, is Saleh vs. Bush, et al.

The lawsuit — which is based on Alien Tort Claims Act of 1789, but also leans on the Nuremberg Principles that the U.S. established to try and punish Nazi leaders after World War II — argues that Bush and company’s act of military aggression makes them civilly liable for the damages that Saleh and her family suffered when they were forced to flee to Jordan as the social order broke down following the invasion.

“She had a super middle class life and it all got destroyed,” Comar told me recently in his office,

The lawsuit was filed in March 2013 and it was dismissed by the federal district court in San Francisco in December 2014, based on the government’s claim that the President and other federal employees are immune from civil liability for the official acts, as spelled out in the Westfall Act and other assertions of sovereign immunity.

In its motion to dismiss, the government cited procedural reasons for tossing the case, sought to substitute the government for the former officials the case targeted, and wrote, “Saleh’s claims raise non-justiciable political questions that would require the Court to make determinations that are properly committed to the political branches of government.”

Yet Comar says that just because Congress and the Obama Administration haven’t had the stomach to delve back into this ill-advised march to war, a decision that is still dangerously rippling outward today, that doesn’t excuse actions that clearly violated international law and the Saleh family’s rights.

“In a functioning democratic system, the opposition party would help create that accountability, but that hasn’t happened,” Comar told me, noting the challenge that presents to the judicial branch. “That’s the biggest wall a judge will hit: ‘Who am I to do this?’”

Comar is now finishing up an appeal to the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals (just two blocks down from his office) that he intends to file later this month, arguing that claims of immunity don’t apply to leaders who commit acts of aggression that are illegal under international law, particularly when those decisions were made under false pretenses (ie the stockpiles of weapons of mass destruction that didn’t actually exist).

“We allege in the case that it was fraud,” Comar said of Bush’s pretexts for the invasion. “This was not an error, this was a plan they had to go in regardless of the cost.”

It was a plan put into motion after the 9/11 attacks, but that saber-rattling against Iraq by the neocon think tank Project for the New American Century began back in 1997, when those who would later lead the Bush Administration’s war effort pledged to topple Saddam Hussein by any means necessary.

Eventually, Comar would probably have to prove the case for war was fraud to win the case, which doesn’t worry him: “Legally speaking, no one has ever told me this isn’t a strong case.” But he’s going to need to overcome the immunity issue before he ever gets to that point — a high but important bar to overcome.

That’s one reason why he’s been seeking to work with international experts, asking them to join him in establishing the body of legal work that will reinforce the ban on military aggression that was so central to the Nuremberg court’s work. “But no court has dealt with Nuremberg’s ban on aggression,” he told me.

Comar’s case does seem to have generated more interest in international circles that it has on U.S. soil, and last month he was invited to address the Kuala Lumpur Foundation to Criminalise War’s International Forum on Peace and Justice, along with former United Nations Humanitarian Coordinator for Iraq Hans von Sponeck and other luminaries.

Comar told the crowd that his appeal will rely heavily on the Numerberg Principles:

“With that as precedent, it’s quite amazing, actually, what might be possible, and a lot of where I’m coming from is as a student of Nuremberg, having learned about the Nuremberg case in law school, having studied it and read it now countless times, learning about the crime of aggression that was the chief crime prosecuted at Nuremberg.”

He also plans to cite the case that Spanish Judge Baltasar Garzón bought against former Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet in the late 1990s, ordering Pinochet’s arrest and prosecution after rejecting Chile’s claim that its former leader enjoyed sovereign immunity for ordering the torture and killing of Spanish citizens.

“Pinochet is a very critical case because this issue is, I think, the final wall when we talk about accountability of leaders: the ability for a leader to claim some type of immunity. Right? This is what has to be, I think, destroyed in our minds and destroyed in the minds of judges once and for all. Why should immunity apply merely because someone was acting as a leader, if the act in question was illegal? That’s a key question,”

Comar told the gathering.

Meanwhile, Comar toils away in the Impact Hub, doing work that really could change the world, not through techno-gizmos, but through reinforcing the important but forgotten stand that a previous American generation made to prevent future wars and hold the leaders who launch them accountable.

“This is first time since Nuremberg that the issue of aggression is being raised in a U.S. court,” Comar said, noting how important it is to protect the principle that military aggression violates international law. “The whole reason we wanted those rules was to prevent another World War II.”

That’s a discussion that he said we should be having as a nation. As he told me, “From a realistic point of view, our chance of success goes up dramatically if there’s a political discussion around it.” So he’s been disappointed that President Obama is defending Bush and the acts of aggression that Candidate Obama called out and criticized at the time. “When you have Obama providing cover for this stuff, it hurts.”

But if the Ninth Circuit rules that domestic immunity doesn’t apply to Bush and his fellow warmongers, then the case will likely be considered on its merits in federal court.

“If we get that ruling, it’s the crack in the dam that you need,” Comar told me, “and once you get it, the water comes rushing through.”

It’s admittedly a long shot, but chipping away at the walls of power to create floods of justice, that’s San Francisco values at their best.

Inder Comar is a San Francisco attorney and a Global Research Correspondent. To learn more about Comar’s case and Saleh’s story, visit witnessiraq.com.

What does the Boston Tea Party and Gandhi’s Salt March have to do with voting in the United States today? These were symbolic political acts that were effectively used to demonstrate against and defeat the same kind of powerful forces now corrupting American politics.

When patriots sneaked aboard East India Company ships in Boston Harbor during the night of December 16, 1773—and dumped tea overboard—they were creatively confronting corporate political power. Much like today, the Company had obtained tax advantages from the English government that hurt small colonial businesses. Even though the colonists had to pay more for their cup of tea, they demonstrated their unity against corporate corruption and political oppression.

One hundred and fifty seven years later, Mahatma Gandhi used another symbolic act to prove the weak can nonviolently resist a powerful force. The East India Company operated India as a corporate fiefdom for a hundred years before England assumed direct imperial rule in 1858. The government nationalized the Company’s monopoly on salt and prohibited people from making salt—even for their own personal use.

When Gandhi announced he was going to walk 200 miles to the ocean and pick up salt in defiance of the law, the British officials laughed at him, and his own associates questioned his judgment. Starting with just a few believers, the symbolism of his march was not lost on the poor and downtrodden, as multitudes assembled along the way to cheer him on. Thousands joined him and watched as he knelt and scraped up bits of salt from the seashore. Gandhi was later arrested, and—as others peacefully joined him in breaking the law—more than 80,000 were jailed. The simple act of gathering salt generated the mass movement that defeated the Empire and led to the independence of India.

Today, in the United States, the government is dominated by powerful corporations, which have no loyalty to the nation or its people. They control the presidency and congress—irrespective of who is elected. If the American people continue to follow party lines and vote on computers, they will go on electing empty suits who serve their corporate benefactors—rather than the voters.

Half of all eligible voters do not vote, and those who do are forced to chose from among candidates whose campaigns are largely financed by corporations. Withheld or cast, the vote is increasingly worthless. If representative democracy is to survive, voting must become expressive, effective, and valued.

A symbolic feat is needed, one that can be performed by everyone—irrespective of political leaning—to take direct action against corporate control of the government. Rather than wasting their votes, people can take a moment to simply write in the name of whomever they most trust to represent them in government—whether or not that person is on the ballot! Even if voters support named candidates, they should still write in their choices. Nothing can stop voters from writing in anyone, including themselves. The power is in the act itself, and as a physical manifestation of liberty, it is magnified by the unity of action.

Voters can cast symbolic votes—even with computerized voting—by creating their own paper ballots to deposit at the polls. What matters is not whether the ballots are counted, but the breadth and depth of the protest. If enough people cast votes of conscience, corporate candidates will fail to achieve the stamp of legitimacy required to validate their election.

Use of symbolic acts to demonstrate against corrupt power requires imagination and courage. Voters have to look beyond the immediate effect to see the long-term benefit of engaging in a nonviolent, peaceful protest against politics as usual. Seventeen years passed before Gandhi’s symbolic act of gathering salt resulted in the independence of India.

As an emblem of their consent to be governed, the American people must firmly grasp their vote in their hands and feel the radiance of its power. The manner in which they vote, or fail to vote, and the consistency of their effort, will determine whether they will achieve control over their government. The choice is theirs, but they can take heart from Gandhi, who said, after many failures, there was no such word as defeat in his vocabulary.

William John Cox is a retired prosecutor and public interest lawyer who writes on political, policy, and social matters. His email address is [email protected], and the United States Voters’ Rights Amendment is at www.usvra.us.

If the Washington Post’s clueless editorial page editor Fred Hiatt had been around during the genocidal wars against Native Americans in the 1870s, he probably would have accused Sitting Bull and other Indian leaders of “paranoia” and historical “revisionism” for not recognizing the beneficent intentions of the Europeans when they landed in the New World.

The Europeans, after all, were bringing the “savages” Christianity’s promise of eternal life and introducing them to the wonders of the Old World, like guns and cannons, not to mention the value that “civilized” people place on owning land and possessing gold. Why did these Indian leaders insist on seeing the Europeans as their enemies?

But Hiatt wasn’t around in the 1870s so at least the Native Americans were spared his condescension about the kindness and exceptionalism of the United States as it sent armies to herd the “redskins” onto reservations and slaughter those who wouldn’t go along with this solution to the “Indian problem.”

However, those of us living in the Twenty-first Century can’t say we’re as lucky. In 2002-03, we got to read Hiatt’s self-assured Washington Post editorials informing us about Iraq’s dangerous stockpiles of WMD that were threatening our very existence and giving us no choice but to liberate the Iraqi people and bring peace and stability to the Middle East.

Though Hiatt reported these WMD caches as “flat-fact” when that turned out to be fact-free, there was, of course, no accountability for him and his fellow pundits. After all, who would suggest that such well-meaning people should be punished for America’s generous endeavor to deliver joy and happiness to the Iraqi people who instead chose to die by the hundreds of thousands?

Because Hiatt and his fellow deep-thinkers didn’t get canned, we still have them around opening our eyes to Vladimir Putin’s historical “revisionism” and his rampaging “paranoia” as he fails to see the philanthropic motives of the U.S. free-market economists who descended on Russia after the end of the Soviet Union in the 1990s to share their wisdom about the unbounded bounty that comes from unrestrained capitalism.

That many of these “Harvard boys” succumbed to the temptation of Russian girls desperate for some hard currency shouldn’t be held against these selfless business “experts.” Nor should the reality that they sometimes shared in the plundering of Russia’s assets by helping a few friendly “oligarchs” become billionaires. Nor should the “experts” be blamed for the many Russians who starved, froze or suffered early death after their pensions were slashed, medical care was defunded, and their factories were shuttered. Just the necessary “growing pains” toward a “modern economy.”

And, while these U.S. economic advisers helped put Russia onto its back, there was also the expansion of NATO despite some verbal promises from George H.W. Bush’s administration that the anti-Russian alliance would not be pushed east of Germany. Instead, Bill Clinton and George W. Bush shoved NATO right up to Russia’s border and touched a raw Russian nerve by taking aim at Ukraine, too.

But Russian President Putin simply doesn’t appreciate the generosity of the United States in making these sacrifices. The “paranoid” Putin with his historical “revisionism” insists on seeing these acts of charity as uncharitable acts.

‘Mr. Putin’s Revisionism’

In Tuesday’s Post, Hiatt and his team laid out this new line of attack on the black-hatted Putin in an editorial that was headlined, in print editions, “Mr. Putin’s revisionism: His paranoia shouldn’t blot out the good the West tried to offer,” and online as “After the fall of the Soviet Union, the U.S. tried to help Russians.” The editorial began:

“President Vladimir Putin recently was interviewed for a fawning Russian television documentary on his decade and a half in power. Putin expressed the view that the West would like Russia to be down at the heels. He said, ‘I sometimes I get the impression that they love us when they need to send us humanitarian aid. . . . [T]he so-called ruling circles, elites — political and economic — of those countries, they love us when we are impoverished, poor and when we come hat in hand. As soon as we start declaring some interests of our own, they feel that there is some element of geopolitical rivalry.’

“Earlier, in March, speaking to leaders of the Federal Security Service, which he once led, Mr. Putin warned that ‘Western special services continue their attempts at using public, nongovernmental and politicized organizations to pursue their own objectives, primarily to discredit the authorities and destabilize the internal situation in Russia.’”

That was an apparent reference to the aggressive use of U.S.-funded NGOs to achieve “regime change” in Ukraine in 2014 and similar plans for “regime change” in Moscow, a goal openly discussed by prominent neocons, including National Endowment for Democracy president Carl Gershman who gets $100 million a year from Congress to finance these NGOs.

But none of that reality is cited in the Post’s editorial, which simply continues:

“Mr. Putin’s remarks reflect a deep-seated paranoia. … Mr. Putin’s assertion that the West has been acting out of a desire to sunder Russia’s power and influence is a willful untruth. The fact is that thousands of Americans went to Russia hoping to help its people attain a better life. … It was not about conquering Russia but rather about saving it, offering the proven tools of market capitalism and democracy, which were not imposed but welcomed. … The Americans came for the best of reasons.”

Hiatt and his cohorts do acknowledge that not everything worked out as peachy as predicted. There were, for instance, a few bumps in the road like the unprecedented collapse in life expectancy for a developed country not at war. Plus, there were the glaring disparities between the shiny and lascivious nightlife of Moscow’s upscale enclaves, frequented by American businessmen and journalists, and the savage and depressing poverty that gripped and crushed much of the country.

Or, as the Post’s editorial antiseptically describes these shortcomings:

“Certainly, the Western effort was flawed. Markets were distorted by crony and oligarchic capitalism; democratic practice often faltered; many Russians genuinely felt a sense of defeat, humiliation and exhaustion. There’s much to regret but not the central fact that a generous hand was extended to post-Soviet Russia, offering the best of Western values and know-how.

“The Russian people benefit from this benevolence even now, and, above Mr. Putin’s self-serving hysterics, they ought to hear the truth: The United States did not come to bury you.”

Or, as a Fred Hiatt of the 1870s might have commented about Native Americans who resisted the well-intentioned Bureau of Indian Affairs and didn’t appreciate the gentleness of the U.S. Army or the benevolence of life on the reservations: “Above Sitting Bull’s self-serving hysterics, Indians ought to hear the truth: The white man did not come to exterminate you.”

Investigative reporter Robert Parry broke many of the Iran-Contra stories for The Associated Press and Newsweek in the 1980s. You can buy his latest book, America’s Stolen Narrative, either in print here or as an e-book (from Amazon andbarnesandnoble.com). You also can order Robert Parry’s trilogy on the Bush Family and its connections to various right-wing operatives for only $34. The trilogy includesAmerica’s Stolen Narrative. For details on this offer, click here.

According to a report issued by the Internal Displacement Monitoring Centre (IDMC) on Wednesday, a record 38 million people in 60 countries were displaced by ongoing conflicts from their homes within the borders of their own country through the end of 2014. They comprise the vast majority of the more than 50 million classified as refugees.

The report, “Global Overview 2015,” notes that the number of people internally displaced is equivalent to the combined populations of New York City, London and Beijing. The report marks the third straight year in which the IDMC has tallied a record number of internally displaced people.

The report blames rising wealth inequality for increasing conflict around the globe as marginalized religious, ethnic and tribal minorities seek independence and control over territory. They single out Islamic jihadist groups such as the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS), Boko Haram and Al Shabaab whose actions and the response by Western imperialism have caused millions to flee their homes.

11 million people were newly displaced as the result of violent conflict in the course of 2014, with an average of 30,000 people fleeing their homes every day. Iraq, South Sudan, Syria, Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) and Nigeria account for 60 percent of new displacements.

Iraq showed the greatest new dislocation with 2.2 million people escaping from areas seized by ISIS. The Islamic fundamentalist organization launched an offensive in June last year in which it seized control of large swathes of northwestern Iraq including the major cities of Mosul and Tikrit. The United States responded by launching a new air campaign in Iraq and dispatching thousands of special forces which are assisting the Iraqi military in a counterassault.

A total of at least 3.2 million people are currently internally displaced in Iraq, a legacy of the American invasion and occupation of the country between 2003 and 2011.

In neighboring Syria, where the US and its allies have stoked a civil war against President Bashar al-Assad, at least 1.1 million people were forced out of their homes last year. In total, 35 percent of Syria’s population, approximately 7.6 million people, have been displaced by ongoing fighting in the country’s four-year-old civil war. It is estimated that at least 30 percent of the housing stock registered in the 2014 census has been damaged or destroyed, making return for many impossible.

US imperialism and its allies bear the responsibility for the unprecedented humanitarian catastrophe in Syria as they have flooded the country with weaponry and provided military training to so-called moderate rebel forces, which include Islamist fighters now aligned with ISIS and the Al-Qaeda affiliated Al-Nusra Front.

Meanwhile, fighting in South Sudan’s ongoing civil war displaced at least 1.3 million people last year, 11 percent of the country’s total population. Competing factions of the Sudanese People’s Liberation Army have been fighting for control over the northeastern provinces which contain key oil fields since the end of 2013.

In the DRC at least a million people were displaced by fighting in the country’s eastern provinces. People fled in the aftermath of a series of massacres carried out by the rebel Allied Democratic Forces in the city of Beni that killed several hundred.

Nearly one million people were displaced in Nigeria last year where the Islamic fundamentalist organization Boko Haram has been involved in an insurgency since 2009. Suicide attacks and other assaults by Boko Haram killed more than 10,000 people throughout northern Nigeria in 2014.

Ukraine was the only European country in which a significant number of people were newly displaced by fighting last year. More than 646,000 people were forced from their homes as a result of fighting in eastern Ukraine between government forces backed by the United States and Germany and pro-Russia separatists.

The conflict began after the US and Germany backed a fascist-led coup which ousted pro-Russian President Victor Yanukovych. The new pro-Western regime launched a bloody offensive which sought to suppress pro-Russian separatists in the eastern Donbas region opposed to the new government.

What the report makes clear is that every continent is affected by the growing numbers of people displaced due to ongoing armed conflicts.

There were at least 436,500 newly displaced people in North and South America in 2014, making a cumulative total of 7 million people. In Mexico more than 281,000 people have been displaced by fighting between the drug cartels and gang violence. More than 500,000 people in El Salvador, Guatemala and Honduras are currently displaced as the result of organized crime and gang violence.

Colombia accounted for 90 percent of the Americas’ total displaced population. The 6,044,200 people counted as displaced in Colombia account for 12 percent of the country’s total population. In addition to gang violence, many in Mexico, Colombia and Guatemala have been displaced by illegal and legal logging operations and cultivation of crops such as cocoa, poppies for opium, marijuana and palm oil.

Sub-Saharan Africa accounts for more than 10 million of the world’s internally displaced peoples, and at least 4.5 million people newly displaced in 2014. The insurgency in Somalia headed by the Islamic jihadist group Al Shabaab has contributed to the more than 1 million displaced people in that country. Displaced people in Somalia suffer from the highest rate of severe malnutrition in the impoverished country.

At least 3.8 million people were newly displaced in the Middle East and North Africa in 2014, bringing the total to 11.9 million. In just the last four years alone, 7.8 million people have been forced out of their homes. The number of people forced to flee their homes in Libya, destabilized by a US-NATO air assault in 2011, increased more than six-fold from 2013 to 400,000. The Middle East and North Africa now account for 31 percent of the world’s internally displaced people, up from just 14 percent in 2011.

South Asia accounted for 1.4 million new displacements with a total of 4.1 million displaced by violence. In Pakistan the number of displaced people grew from 746,700 to 1.9 million. The US has carried out years of drone attacks and backs military operations against an Islamic insurgency in the country’s northwestern FATA region. In neighboring Afghanistan, which has been subjected to continuous US military operations since 2001, the number of displaced people grew by more than 170,000 to 805,400.

In Southeast Asia, 95 percent of the 855,000 displaced people are in Burma, Indonesia and the Philippines. While the region saw 134,086 new displacements in 2014, it was the only region that experienced a decline in the overall total, mainly in Burma and the Philippines.

The French National Assembly overwhelmingly passed the Intelligence Law on Tuesday, retroactively sanctioning mass spying carried out by the intelligence services. The reactionary and antidemocratic law formally sets up the surveillance infrastructure for a police state in France, allowing the government to collect data on the entire population.

All the parties of the political establishment supported the law, which was approved 438-86, with 42 abstentions. It was overwhelmingly backed by both the ruling Socialist Party (PS) and the conservative Union for a Popular Majority (UMP). Some Green and Left Party delegates voted against, secure in the knowledge that the law would pass overwhelmingly.

The Senate is due to begin examining the law on May 20 and is expected to approve it before the Constitutional Council examines it.

Prime Minister Manuel Valls (PS) personally appeared at the National Assembly to defend the bill. Admitting that “it is exceptionally rare for a prime minister to present a bill to the representatives of the nation,” he said that he was doing so “to insist on the law’s importance.”

During parliamentary debate last week, Valls sought to intimidate deputies critical of the bill by saying that they were refusing to “defend the Republic.” All but accusing opponents of the bill of treason, Valls declared that the decision to vote for or against the law would separate “those who have a sense for the state from those who sometimes do not.”

The French ruling class is seizing on the attacks on the anti-Islam Charlie Hebdo magazine in January to rapidly push through far-reaching measures. By voting for the law, the state is sanctioning powers that even supporters of the law admit were illegal, though broadly used. Last month, Le Monde wrote that “this text, which legalizes forty years of illegal practices by the secret services and tries to somewhat control them, was in the works for years.”

Thus, for years, the intelligence services have employed criminal practices to spy on everyone, without criticism from the parliament, which obeys the orders of the police and intelligence services. The law will now function to protect and offer legal cover to these same intelligence officials.

The law obliges Internet Service Providers to provide their clients’ data in real time. Electronic surveillance will be stepped up, with the mass collection of metadata. Cameras and microphones can also be exploited for spying purposes. Communications between two people in France, as well as communications between people in France and abroad, can be recorded.

An automated national judicial file for perpetrators of terrorist violations will conserve these data for 20 years, and 10 years for minors. Prison officials will also have the right to use these techniques legalized by the bill, turning them into an extension of the intelligence services.

The law also legalizes the use of IMSI-Catchers—false cell phone towers that allow authorities to identify and track physical movements of any cell phone user near the device. Previously, the use of such devices was illegal under French law.

The current law breaks with legality by hiding and justifying illegal conduct taking place without the knowledge of the population. This will only encourage the intelligence services, which know that they are protected by the state, to break through the weak limits that the law unconvincingly claims to impose upon them.

In fact, the law gives the secret services virtually unlimited powers. The National Commission of Control for Intelligence Techniques (CNCTR) will be composed of six magistrates of the Council of State and of the Court of Cassation, of three deputies and three senators from the government and the opposition, and one “technical expert.” This body replaces the current National Commission for Control of Security Intercepts (CNCIS).

The CNCTR can give advisory opinions to approve more intrusive spying, but in urgent cases operational chiefs or even agents of the intelligence services can skip the formality of obtaining the CNCTR’s advice, with the authorization of the prime minister.

The CNCTR thus serves as a pseudo-democratic cover for mass surveillance by the secret services.

The vote for the intelligence law took place behind the back of the French people. Besides a few criticisms that substantial powers were being granted to the intelligence services, the vast political implications of the law were neither mentioned nor debated.

One of the few more substantial statements on the law came from UMP deputy Alain Marsaud who, though he supported it, admitted: “This law does not have enough built-in controls. The capacity for intrusion it grants is enormous. Our life will not be the same before and after it passes, because everything we say will be monitored. This law can allow the creation of a political police, the likes of which we have never seen.”

The passage of the intelligence law, which has been openly compared in the press to the USA Patriot Act, is a warning to the working class. The ruling class is breaking with democratic forms of rule. Following the model employed in all the major capitalist countries, France is responding to the growth of social antagonisms through mass spying and a wholesale assault on democratic rights.

The French ruling class is seeking to implement the illegal and unconstitutional methods perfected by the US National Security Agency, as exposed by Edward Snowden. The NSA collects and monitors the communications data of the American people and of billions of other people around the planet, outside of any democratic control.

The immense expansion of the powers of the spying apparatus is part of a general militarization of French society. After the January terrorist attacks onCharlie Hebdo, the state has deployed 10,000 troops inside France itself.

The “war on terror” proclaimed by the Bush administration nearly 15 years ago was used by the American ruling class as the ideological framework for never ending war abroad and the destruction of democratic rights at home. It is now the modus operandi for country after country.

On Wednesday, a day after the vote in France, the Canadian House of Commons voted to approve the Anti-Terror Act, which gives the Canadian Security Intelligence Service and police vast new powers, including the ability to disrupt activity declared to endanger “national security” and engage in preventive arrests and detention without charges.