British Intelligence Reports Mossad ran 9/11 Arab “hijacker” terrorist operation

 

By Wayne Madsen

British intelligence reported in February 2002 that the Israeli Mossad ran the Arab hijacker cells that were later blamed by the U.S. government’s 9/11 Commission for carrying out the aerial attacks on the World Trade Center and Pentagon. WMR has received details of the British intelligence report which was suppressed by the government of then-Prime Minister Tony Blair.

A Mossad unit consisting of six Egyptian- and Yemeni-born Jews infiltrated “Al Qaeda” cells in Hamburg (the Atta-Mamoun Darkanzali cell), south Florida, and Sharjah in the United Arab Emirates in the months before 9/11. The Mossad not only infiltrated cells but began to run them and give them specific orders that would eventually culminate in their being on board four regularly-scheduled flights originating in Boston, Washington Dulles, and Newark, New Jersey on 9/11.

The Mossad infiltration team comprised six Israelis, comprising two cells of three agents, who all received special training at a Mossad base in the Negev Desert in their future control and handling of the “Al Qaeda” cells. One Mossad cell traveled to Amsterdam where they submitted to the operational control of the Mossad’s Europe Station, which operates from the El Al complex at Schiphol International Airport. The three-man Mossad unit then traveled to Hamburg where it made contact with Mohammed Atta, who believed they were sent by Osama Bin Laden. In fact, they were sent by Ephraim Halevy, the chief of Mossad.

The second three-man Mossad team flew to New York and then to southern Florida where they began to direct the “Al Qaeda” cells operating from Hollywood, Miami, Vero Beach, Delray Beach, and West Palm Beach. Israeli “art students,” already under investigation by the Drug Enforcement Administration for casing the offices and homes of federal law enforcement officers, had been living among and conducting surveillance of the activities, including flight school training, of the future Arab “hijacker” cells, particularly in Hollywood and Vero Beach.

In August 2001, the first Mossad team flew with Atta and other Hamburg “Al Qaeda” members to Boston. Logan International Airport’s security was contracted to Huntleigh USA, a firm owned by an Israeli airport security firm closely connected to Mossad – International Consultants on Targeted Security – ICTS. ICTS’s owners were politically connected to the Likud Party, particularly the Netanyahu faction and then-Jerusalem mayor and future Prime Minister Ehud Olmert. It was Olmert who personally interceded with New York Mayor Rudolph Giuliani to have released from prison five Urban Moving Systems employees, identified by the CIA and FBI agents as Mossad agents. The Israelis were the only suspects arrested anywhere in the United States on 9/11 who were thought to have been involved in the 9/11 attacks.

The two Mossad teams sent regular coded reports on the progress of the 9/11 operation to Tel Aviv via the Israeli embassy in Washington, DC. WMR has learned from a Pentagon source that leading Americans tied to the media effort to pin 9/11 on Arab hijackers, Osama Bin Laden, and the Taliban were present in the Israeli embassy on September 10, 2001, to coordinate their media blitz for the subsequent days and weeks following the attacks. It is more than likely that FBI counter-intelligence agents who conduct surveillance of the Israeli embassy have proof on the presence of the Americans present at the embassy on September 10. Some of the Americans are well-known to U.S. cable news television audiences.

In mid-August, the Mossad team running the Hamburg cell in Boston reported to Tel Aviv that the final plans for 9/11 were set. The Florida-based Mossad cell reported that the documented “presence” of the Arab cell members at Florida flight schools had been established.

The two Mossad cells studiously avoided any mention of the World Trade Center or targets in Washington, DC in their coded messages to Tel Aviv. Halevy covered his tracks by reporting to the CIA of a “general threat” by an attack by Arab terrorists on a nuclear plant somewhere on the East Coast of the United States. CIA director George Tenet dismissed the Halevy warning as “too non-specific.” The FBI, under soon-to-be-departed director Louis Freeh, received the “non-specific” warning about an attack on a nuclear power plant and sent out the information in its routine bulletins to field agents but no high alert was ordered.

The lack of a paper trail pointing to “Al Qaeda” as the masterminds on 9/11, which could then be linked to Al Qaeda’s Mossad handlers, threw off the FBI. On April 19, 2002, FBI director Robert Mueller, in a speech to San Francisco’s Commonwealth Club, stated: “In our investigation, we have not uncovered a single piece of paper – either here in the United States, or in the treasure trove of information that has turned up in Afghanistan and elsewhere – that mentioned any aspect of the September 11 plot.”

The two Mossad “Al Qaeda” infiltration and control teams had also helped set up safe houses for the quick exfiltration of Mossad agents from the United States. Last March, WMR reported: “WMR has learned from two El Al sources who worked for the Israeli airline at New York’s John F. Kennedy airport that on 9/11, hours after the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) grounded all civilian domestic and international incoming and outgoing flights to and from the United States, a full El Al Boeing 747 took off from JFK bound for Tel Aviv’s Ben Gurion International Airport. The two El Al employee sources are not Israeli nationals but legal immigrants from Ecuador who were working in the United States for the airline. The flight departed JFK at 4:11 pm and its departure was, according to the El Al sources, authorized by the direct intervention of the U.S. Department of Defense. U.S. military officials were on the scene at JFK and were personally involved with the airport and air traffic control authorities to clear the flight for take-off. According to the 9/11 Commission report, Transportation Secretary Norman Mineta ordered all civilian flights to be grounded at 9:45 am on September 11.” WMR has learned from British intelligence sources that the six-man Mossad team was listed on the El Al flight manifest as El Al employees.

WMR previously reported that the Mossad cell operating in the Jersey City-Weehawken area of New Jersey through Urban Moving Systems was suspected by some in the FBI and CIA of being involved in moving explosives into the World Trade Center as well as staging “false flag” demonstrations at least two locations in north Jersey: Liberty State Park and an apartment complex in Jersey City as the first plane hit the World Trade Center’s North Tower. One team of Urban Moving Systems Mossad agents was arrested later on September 11 and jailed for five months at the Metropolitan Detention Center in Brooklyn. Some of their names turned up in a joint CIA-FBI database as known Mossad agents, along with the owner of Urban Moving Systems, Dominik Suter, whose name also appeared on a “Law Enforcement Sensitive” FBI 9/11 suspects list, along with the names of key “hijackers,” including Mohammed Atta and Hani Hanjour, as well as the so-called “20th hijacker,” Zacarias Moussaoui.

Suter was allowed to escape the United States after the FBI made initial contact with him at the Urban Moving Systems warehouse in Weehawken, New Jersey, following the 9/11 attacks. Suter was later permitted to return to the United States where he was involved in the aircraft parts supply business in southern Florida, according to an informe3d source who contacted WMR. Suter later filed for bankruptcy in Florida for Urban Moving Systems and other businesses he operated: Suburban Moving & Storage Inc.; Max Movers, Inc.; Invsupport; Woodflooring Warehouse Corp.; One Stop Cleaning LLC; and City Carpet Upholstery, Inc. At the time of the bankruptcy filing in Florida, Suter listed his address as 1867 Fox Court, Wellington, FL 33414, with a phone number of 561 204-2359.

From the list of creditors it can be determined that Suter had been operating in the United States since 1993, the year of the first attack on the World Trade Center. In 1993, Suter began racking up American Express credit card charges totaling $21,913.97. Suter also maintained credit card accounts with HSBC Bank and Orchard Bank c/o HSBC Card Services of Salinas, California, among other banks. Suter also did business with the Jewish Community Center of Greater Palm Beach in Florida and Ryder Trucks in Miami. Miami and southern Florida were major operating areas for cells of Israeli Mossad agents masquerading as “art students,” who were living and working near some of the identified future Arab “hijackers” in the months preceding 9/11.

ABC’s 20/20 correspondent John Miller ensured that the Israeli connection to “Al Qaeda’s” Arab hijackers was buried in an “investigation” of the movers’ activities on 9/11. Anchor Barbara Walters helped Miller in putting a lid on the story about the movers and Suter aired on June 21, 2002. Miller then went on to become the FBI public affairs spokesman to ensure that Mueller and other FBI officials kept to the “Al Qaeda” script as determined by the Bush administration and the future 9/11 Commission. But former CIA chief of counter-terrorism Vince Cannistraro let slip to ABC an important clue to the operations of the Mossad movers in New Jersey when he stated that the Mossad agents “set up or exploited for the purpose of launching an intelligence operation against radical Islamists in the area, particularly in the New Jersey-New York area.” The “intelligence operation” turned out to have been the actual 9/11 attacks. And it was no coincidence that it was ABC’s John Miller who conducted a May 1998 rare interview of Osama Bin Laden at his camp in Afghanistan. Bin Laden played his part well for future scenes in the fictional “made-for-TV” drama known as 9/11.

WMR has also learned from Italian intelligence sources that Mossad’s running of “Al Qaeda” operatives did not end with running the “hijacking” teams in the United States and Hamburg. Other Arab “Al Qaeda” operatives, run by Mossad, were infiltrated into Syria but arrested by Syrian intelligence. Syria was unsuccessful in turning them to participate in intelligence operations in Lebanon. Detailed information on Bin Laden’s support team was offered to the Bush administration, up to days prior to 9/11, by Gutbi al-Mahdi, the head of the Sudanese Mukhabarat intelligence service. The intelligence was rejected by the Biush White House. It was later reported that Sudanese members of “Al Qaeda’s” support network were double agents for Mossad who had also established close contacts with Yemeni President Ali Abdullah Saleh and operated in Egypt, Saudi Arabia, and Eritrea, as well as Sudan. The Mossad connection to Al Qaeda in Sudan was likely known by the Sudanese Mukhabarat, a reason for the rejection of its intelligence on “Al Qaeda” by the thoroughly-Mossad penetrated Bush White House. Yemen had also identified “Al Qaeda” members who were also Mossad agents. A former chief of Mossad revealed to this editor in 2002 that Yemeni-born Mossad “deep insertion” commandos spotted Bin Laden in the Hadhramaut region of eastern Yemen after his escape from Tora Bora in Afghanistan, following the U.S. invasion.

French intelligence determined that other Egyptian- and Yemeni-born Jewish Mossad agents were infiltrated into Sharjah in the United Arab Emirates as radical members of the Muslim Brotherhood. However, the “Muslim Brotherhood” agents actually were involved in providing covert Israeli funding for “Al Qaeda” activities. On February 21, 2006, WMR reported on the U.S. Treasury Secretary’s firing by President Bush over information discovered on the shady “Al Qaeda” accounts in the United Arab Emirates: “Banking insiders in Dubai report that in March 2002, U.S. Secretary of Treasury Paul O’Neill visited Dubai and asked for documents on a $109,500 money transfer from Dubai to a joint account held by hijackers Mohammed Atta and Marwan al Shehhi at Sun Trust Bank in Florida. O’Neill also asked UAE authorities to close down accounts used by Al Qaeda .  . . . The UAE complained about O’Neill’s demands to the Bush administration. O’Neill’s pressure on the UAE and Saudis contributed to Bush firing him as Treasury Secretary in December 2002 ” O’Neill may have also stumbled on the “Muslim Brotherhood” Mossad operatives operating in the emirates who were directing funds to “Al Qaeda.”

After the collapse of the Soviet Union and the rise to power of the Taliban in Afghanistan, Sharjah’s ruler, Sultan bin Mohammed al-Qasimi, who survived a palace coup attempt in 1987, opened his potentate to Russian businessmen like Viktor Bout, as well as to financiers of radical Muslim groups, including the Taliban and “Al Qaeda.”

Moreover, this Israeli support for “Al Qaeda” was fully known to Saudi intelligence, which approved of it in order to avoid compromising Riyadh. The joint Israeli-Saudi support for “Al Qaeda” was well-known to the Sharjah and Ras al Khaimah-based aviation network of the now-imprisoned Russian, Viktor Bout, jailed in New York on terrorism charges. The presence of Bout in New York, a hotbed of Israeli intelligence control of U.S. federal prosecutors, judges, as well as the news media, is no accident: Bout knows enough about the Mossad activities in Sharjah in support of the Taliban and Al Qaeda in Afghanistan, where Bout also had aviation and logistics contracts, to expose Mossad as the actual mastermind behind 9/11. Bout’s aviation empire also extended to Miami and Dallas, two areas that were nexuses for the Mossad control operations for the “Al Qaeda” flight training operations of the Arab cell members in the months prior to 9/11.

Bout’s path also crossed with “Al Qaeda’s” support network at the same bank in Sharjah, HSBC. Mossad’s phony Muslim Brotherhood members from Egypt and Yemen controlled financing for “Al Qaeda” through the HSBC accounts in Sharjah. Mossad’s Dominik Suter also dealt with HSBC in the United States. The FBI’s chief counter-terrorism agent investigating Al Qaeda, John O’Neill, became aware of the “unique” funding mechanisms for Al Qaeda. It was no mistake that O’Neill was given the job as director of security for the World Trade Center on the eve of the attack. O’Neill perished in the collapse of the complex.Mossad uses a number of Jews born in Arab countries to masquerade as Arabs. They often carry forged or stolen passports from Arab countries or nations in Europe that have large Arab immigrant populations, particularly Germany, France, Britain, Denmark, Sweden, and the Netherlands.

For Mossad, the successful 9/11 terrorist “false flag” operation was a success beyond expectations. The Bush administration, backed by the Blair government, attacked and occupied Iraq, deposing Saddam Hussein, and turned up pressure on Israel’s other adversaries, including Iran, Syria, Pakistan, Hamas, and Lebanese Hezbollah. The Israelis also saw the U.S., Britain, and the UN begin to crack down on the Lebanese Shi’a diamond business in Democratic Republic of Congo and West Africa, and with it, the logistics support provided by Bout’s aviation companies, which resulted in a free hand for Tel Aviv to move in on Lebanese diamond deals in central and west Africa.

Then-Israeli Finance Minister Binyamin Netanyahu commented on the 9/11 attacks  on U.S. television shortly after they occurred. Netanyahu said: “It is very good!” It now appears that Netanyahu, in his zeal, blew Mossad’s cover as the masterminds of 9/11.

Wayne Madsen is a Washington, DC-based investigative journalist, author and syndicated columnist. He has written for several renowned papers and blogs. Madsen is a regular contributor on Russia Today. He has been a frequent political and national security commentator on Fox Newsand has also appeared on ABC, NBC, CBS, PBS, CNN, BBC, Al Jazeera, and MS-NBC. Madsen has taken on Bill O’Reilly and Sean Hannity on their television shows. He has been invited to testifty as a witness before the US House of Representatives, the UN Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda, and an terrorism investigation panel of the French government.

As a U.S. Naval Officer, he managed one of the first computer security programs for the U.S. Navy. He subsequently worked for the National Security Agency, the Naval Data Automation Command, Department of State, RCA Corporation, and Computer Sciences Corporation.

Madsen is a member of the Society of Professional Journalists (SPJ), Association for Intelligence Officers (AFIO), and the National Press Club. He is a regular contributor to Opinion Maker.

http://www.opinion-maker.org/2011/01/british-intelligence-reports/

US warns Lebanon on militants in government

By Associated Press ,

 

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Obama administration on Monday warned Lebanon’s political leaders that continuing U.S. support for their country will be difficult if the militant Hezbollah movement takes a dominant role in government.

The makeup of the Lebanese government is Lebanon’s decision, the State Department said. But the larger the role for Hezbollah, the “more problematic” for relations with Washington, State Department spokesman P.J. Crowley said.

The United States considers Iranian–backed Hezbollah as a foreign terrorist organization and has imposed sanctions against it and its members. U.S. officials do not meet with Hezbollah members and U.S. money is not supposed to further the group’s activities.

Crowley’s comments came as Hezbollah moved into position to control the next Lebanese government as it secured enough support in parliament to nominate the candidate for prime minister.

“Our view of Hezbollah is very well–known,” he told reporters. “We see it as a terrorist organization, and we’ll have great concerns about a government within which a Hezbollah plays a leading role.”

Crowley declined to say what the United States would do if Hezbollah’s candidate becomes prime minister and is able to form a government, but he said it would be hard to carry on business as usual if that happens.

Asked whether the U.S. would be able to continue economic support for a Hezbollah–controlled government in Lebanon, he replied, “That would be difficult for the United States to do.”

The U.S. has provided Lebanon with hundreds of millions of dollars in economic and military aid over the past five years, following the withdrawal of Syrian forces that had controlled the country for decades.

The United States called the fragile Lebanese democracy a counterweight to authoritarian and militant influences in the Middle East. Washington underwrote Lebanon’s army as a counterweight to Hezbollah, and argued that without U.S. support Iran or Syria might fill the vacuum.

Congressional critics of that policy cite a worry that the weapons and equipment could slip into the hands of Hezbollah for use against Israel. Hezbollah, which forced the collapse of the Lebanese coalition government last week, fought a monthlong war with Israel in August 2006.

Since 2006, the U.S. has provided four kinds of security assistance to Lebanon, the bulk of which has been about $500 million in sales of weapons and equipment such as mortars, rifles, grenade launchers, ammunition, body armor, radios and Humvee utility vehicles.

The U.S. also has increased its spending on military education and training for Lebanese officers and on programs designed to improve Lebanon’s ability to counter terrorism threats.

Rep. Howard Berman, a Democrat and the former chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, was among lawmakers who last year blocked $100 million in U.S. military aid to Lebanon. They relented and allowed the money to go through after the White House gave assurances in classified briefings that the aid bolsters both Lebanese and U.S. national security and would not be hijacked by Hezbollah.

Berman’s successor as head of the committee, Rep. Ileana Ros–Lehtinen, a Republican, has raised similar concerns.

___

AP National Security Writer Robert Burns contributed to this report.

Chile Launching Inquiry Into Allende’s Death in a CIA-Sponsored Coup

By DJ Pangburn
In 1973, Chilean President Salvador Allende was murdered in a coup led by military leader Augusto Pinochet, a neo-fascist backed by the U.S. government.

In 1973, Salvador Allende lay bloodied on the floor of the presidential palace after committing suicide.  It was a symbolic action, one that Allende carried out so that the fascist reactionaries (supported financially and logicistically by the CIA) could not use his capture for propaganda purposes.

Allende said in his farewell radio address:

“I will pay for loyalty to the people with my life… “

Pinochet had been Allende’s Commander-in-Chief of the Chilean army until he led a CIA-backed coup-d’etat that toppled Allende’s government and allowed Pinochet to assume dictatorial power and American business interests to flow freely once again.

This story is as old as the Monroe Doctrine of 1823, which stated, in essence, that the Western Hemisphere was the American sphere of influence, and any European interference or further attempts at colonization would be viewed as acts of aggression precipitating war.

Translation: You, Europe, do not have the right to colonize South America; only the United States has the right.

And so it was with Chile through the puppet Augusto Pinochet.  People might argue that Pinochet was not a true fascist, but this is just semantics.  Fascism is the reactionary response to popular movements such as Communism, and, to a lesser degree, Anarchism; its only purpose being to preserve oligarchical capitalism.  We might even call Fascism, Militarized Capitalism.

And while it is interesting to argue the nature of Pinochet’s regime, it is important to remember that it was, from its inception to its last breath, supported by the United States government.  From 1973 to 1990 (the duration of the regime), five presidents held office, four of which were Republican: Nixon, Ford, Carter, Reagan and Bush the Elder.  Pinochet was later indicted by the Chilean Supreme Court on human rights violations, but the case was dismissed.  He was later brought to trial again for allegations of torture and murder but died before justice could be served.

Now, according to the BBC, the nature of Allende’s death is being brought before the Supreme Court, along with 725 other human rights complaints committed during Pinochet’s reign.

The complaint was filed yesterday by prosecutor Beatriz Pedrals to determine how exactly Allende died.

Like JFK’s assassination, Allende’s death sparks similar emotions.  He was a popular social democratic leader who turned to Cuba and the Soviet Union when rebuked by the U.S. over American business interests.  And though Chileans and others around the globe might want to know exactly how Allende exited this planet, we all know how and why he died.

Allende was killed by Pinochet’s military and the U.S. government through the paramilitary activities of the CIA.

The Day Reagan Sold American Dictatorship To the World and Called It “Democracy”

20 Years Later: Reagan’s Westminster Speech

Published on June 4, 2002 by President Ronald Reagan

Ronald W. Reagan
Address to Members of the British Parliament
June 8, 1982

My Lord Chancellor, Mr. Speaker:

The journey of which this visit forms a part is a long one. Already it has taken me to two great cities of the West, Rome and Paris, and to the economic summit at Versailles. And there, once again, our sister democracies have proved that even in a time of severe economic strain, free peoples can work together freely and voluntarily to address problems as serious as inflation, unemployment, trade, and economic development in a spirit of cooperation and solidarity.

Other milestones lie ahead. Later this week, in Germany, we and our NATO allies will discuss measures for our joint defense and America’s latest initiatives for a more peaceful, secure world through arms reductions.

Each stop of this trip is important, but among them all, this moment occupies a special place in my heart and in the hearts of my countrymen — a moment of kinship and homecoming in these hallowed halls.

Speaking for all Americans, I want to say how very much at home we feel in your house. Every American would, because this is, as we have been so eloquently told, one of democracy’s shrines. Here the rights of free people and the processes of representation have been debated and refined.

It has been said that an institution is the lengthening shadow of a man. This institution is the lengthening shadow of all the men and women who have sat here and all those who have voted to send representatives here.

This is my second visit to Great Britain as President of the United States. My first opportunity to stand on British soil occurred almost a year and a half ago when your Prime Minister graciously hosted a diplomatic dinner at the British Embassy in Washington. Mrs. Thatcher said then that she hoped I was not distressed to find staring down at me from the grand staircase a portrait of His Royal Majesty King George III. She suggested it was best to let bygones be bygones, and in view of our two countries’ remarkable friendship in succeeding years, she added that most Englishmen today would agree with Thomas Jefferson that “a little rebellion now and then is a very good thing.”

Well, from here I will go to Bonn and then Berlin, where there stands a grim symbol of power untamed. The Berlin Wall, that dreadful gray gash across the city, is in its third decade. It is the fitting signature of the regime that built it.

And a few hundred kilometers behind the Berlin Wall, there is another symbol. In the center of Warsaw, there is a sign that notes the distances to two capitals. In one direction it points toward Moscow. In the other it points toward Brussels, headquarters of Western Europe’s tangible unity. The marker says that the distances from Warsaw to Moscow and Warsaw to Brussels are equal. The sign makes this point: Poland is not East or West. Poland is at the center of European civilization. It has contributed mightily to that civilization. It is doing so today by being magnificently unreconciled to oppression.

Poland’s struggle to be Poland and to secure the basic rights we often take for granted demonstrates why we dare not take those rights for granted. Gladstone, defending the Reform Bill of 1866, declared, “You cannot fight against the future. Time is on our side.” It was easier to believe in the march of democracy in Gladstone’s day — in that high noon of Victorian optimism.

We’re approaching the end of a bloody century plagued by a terrible political invention — totalitarianism. Optimism comes less easily today, not because democracy is less vigorous, but because democracy’s enemies have refined their instruments of repression. Yet optimism is in order, because day by day democracy is proving itself to be a not-at-all-fragile flower. From Stettin on the Baltic to Varna on the Black Sea, the regimes planted by totalitarianism have had more than 30 years to establish their legitimacy. But none — not one regime — has yet been able to risk free elections. Regimes planted by bayonets do not take root.

The strength of the Solidarity movement in Poland demonstrates the truth told in an underground joke in the Soviet Union. It is that the Soviet Union would remain a one-party nation even if an opposition party were permitted, because everyone would join the opposition party.

America’s time as a player on the stage of world history has been brief. I think understanding this fact has always made you patient with your younger cousins — well, not always patient. I do recall that on one occasion, Sir Winston Churchill said in exasperation about one of our most distinguished diplomats: “He is the only case I know of a bull who carries his china shop with him.”

But witty as Sir Winston was, he also had that special attribute of great statesmen — the gift of vision, the willingness to see the future based on the experience of the past. It is this sense of history, this understanding of the past that I want to talk with you about today, for it is in remembering what we share of the past that our two nations can make common cause for the future.

We have not inherited an easy world. If developments like the Industrial Revolution, which began here in England, and the gifts of science and technology have made life much easier for us, they have also made it more dangerous. There are threats now to our freedom, indeed to our very existence, that other generations could never even have imagined.

There is first the threat of global war. No President, no Congress, no Prime Minister, no Parliament can spend a day entirely free of this threat. And I don’t have to tell you that in today’s world the existence of nuclear weapons could mean, if not the extinction of mankind, then surely the end of civilization as we know it. That’s why negotiations on intermediate-range nuclear forces now underway in Europe and the START talks — Strategic Arms Reduction Talks — which will begin later this month, are not just critical to American or Western policy; they are critical to mankind. Our commitment to early success in these negotiations is firm and unshakable, and our purpose is clear: reducing the risk of war by reducing the means of waging war on both sides.

At the same time there is a threat posed to human freedom by the enormous power of the modern state. History teaches the dangers of government that overreaches — political control taking precedence over free economic growth, secret police, mindless bureaucracy, all combining to stifle individual excellence and personal freedom.

Now, I’m aware that among us here and throughout Europe there is legitimate disagreement over the extent to which the public sector should play a role in a nation’s economy and life. But on one point all of us are united — our abhorrence of dictatorship in all its forms, but most particularly totalitarianism and the terrible inhumanities it has caused in our time — the great purge, Auschwitz and Dachau, the Gulag, and Cambodia.
Historians looking back at our time will note the consistent restraint and peaceful intentions of the West. They will note that it was the democracies who refused to use the threat of their nuclear monopoly in the forties and early fifties for territorial or imperial gain. Had that nuclear monopoly been in the hands of the Communist world, the map of Europe — indeed, the world — would look very different today. And certainly they will note it was not the democracies that invaded Afghanistan or supressed Polish Solidarity or used chemical and toxin warfare in Afghanistan and Southeast Asia.

If history teaches anything it teaches self-delusion in the face of unpleasant facts is folly. We see around us today the marks of our terrible dilemma — predictions of doomsday, antinuclear demonstrations, an arms race in which the West must, for its own protection, be an unwilling participant. At the same time we see totalitarian forces in the world who seek subversion and conflict around the globe to further their barbarous assault on the human spirit. What, then, is our course? Must civilization perish in a hail of fiery atoms?

Must freedom wither in a quiet, deadening accommodation with totalitarian evil?

Sir Winston Churchill refused to accept the inevitability of war or even that it was imminent. He said, “I do not believe that Soviet Russia desires war. What they desire is the fruits of war and the indefinite expansion of their power and doctrines. But what we have to consider here today while time remains is the permanent prevention of war and the establishment of conditions of freedom and democracy as rapidly as possible in all countries.”

Well, this is precisely our mission today: to preserve freedom as well as peace. It may not be easy to see; but I believe we live now at a turning point.

In an ironic sense Karl Marx was right. We are witnessing today a great revolutionary crisis, a crisis where the demands of the economic order are conflicting directly with those of the political order. But the crisis is happening not in the free, non-Marxist West, but in the home of Marxist-Leninism, the Soviet Union. It is the Soviet Union that runs against the tide of history by denying human freedom and human dignity to its citizens. It also is in deep economic difficulty. The rate of growth in the national product has been steadily declining since the fifties and is less than half of what it was then.

The dimensions of this failure are astounding: A country which employs one-fifth of its population in agriculture is unable to feed its own people. Were it not for the private sector, the tiny private sector tolerated in Soviet agriculture, the country might be on the brink of famine. These private plots occupy a bare 3 percent of the arable land but account for nearly one-quarter of Soviet farm output and nearly one-third of meat products and vegetables. Overcentralized, with little or no incentives, year after year the Soviet system pours its best resource into the making of instruments of destruction. The constant shrinkage of economic growth combined with the growth of military production is putting a heavy strain on the Soviet people. What we see here is a political structure that no longer corresponds to its economic base, a society where productive forces are hampered by political ones.

The decay of the Soviet experiment should come as no surprise to us. Wherever the comparisons have been made between free and closed societies — West Germany and East Germany, Austria and Czechoslovakia, Malaysia and Vietnam — it is the democratic countries what are prosperous and responsive to the needs of their people. And one of the simple but overwhelming facts of our time is this: Of all the millions of refugees we’ve seen in the modern world, their flight is always away from, not toward the Communist world. Today on the NATO line, our military forces face east to prevent a possible invasion. On the other side of the line, the Soviet forces also face east to prevent their people from leaving.

The hard evidence of totalitarian rule has caused in mankind an uprising of the intellect and will. Whether it is the growth of the new schools of economics in America or England or the appearance of the so-called new philosophers in France, there is one unifying thread running through the intellectual work of these groups — rejection of the arbitrary power of the state, the refusal to subordinate the rights of the individual to the superstate, the realization that collectivism stifles all the best human impulses.

Since the exodus from Egypt, historians have written of those who sacrificed and struggled for freedom — the stand at Thermopylae, the revolt of Spartacus, the storming of the Bastille, the Warsaw uprising in World War II. More recently we’ve seen evidence of this same human impulse in one of the developing nations in Central America. For months and months the world news media covered the fighting in El Salvador. Day after day we were treated to stories and film slanted toward the brave freedom-fighters battling oppressive government forces in behalf of the silent, suffering people of that tortured country.

And then one day those silent, suffering people were offered a chance to vote, to choose the kind of government they wanted. Suddenly the freedom-fighters in the hills were exposed for what they really are — Cuban-backed guerrillas who want power for themselves, and their backers, not democracy for the people. They threatened death to any who voted, and destroyed hundreds of buses and trucks to keep the people from getting to the polling places. But on election day, the people of El Salvador, an unprecedented 1.4 million of them, braved ambush and gunfire, and trudged for miles to vote for freedom.

They stood for hours in the hot sun waiting for their turn to vote. Members of our Congress who went there as observers told me of a women who was wounded by rifle fire on the way to the polls, who refused to leave the line to have her wound treated until after she had voted. A grandmother, who had been told by the guerrillas she would be killed when she returned from the polls, and she told the guerrillas, “You can kill me, you can kill my family, kill my neighbors, but you can’t kill us all.” The real freedom-fighters of El Salvador turned out to be the people of that country — the young, the old, the in-between.

Strange, but in my own country there’s been little if any news coverage of that war since the election. Now, perhaps they’ll say it’s — well, because there are newer struggles now.

On distant islands in the South Atlantic young men are fighting for Britain. And, yes, voices have been raised protesting their sacrifice for lumps of rock and earth so far away. But those young men aren’t fighting for mere real estate. They fight for a cause — for the belief that armed aggression must not be allowed to succeed, and the people must participate in the decisions of government — [applause] — the decisions of government under the rule of law. If there had been firmer support for that principle some 45 years ago, perhaps our generation wouldn’t have suffered the bloodletting of World War II.

In the Middle East now the guns sound once more, this time in Lebanon, a country that for too long has had to endure the tragedy of civil war, terrorism, and foreign intervention and occupation. The fighting in Lebanon on the part of all parties must stop, and Israel should bring its forces home. But this is not enough. We must all work to stamp out the scourge of terrorism that in the Middle East makes war an ever-present threat.

But beyond the troublespots lies a deeper, more positive pattern. Around the world today, the democratic revolution is gathering new strength. In India a critical test has been passed with the peaceful change of governing political parties. In Africa, Nigeria is moving into remarkable and unmistakable ways to build and strengthen its democratic institutions. In the Caribbean and Central America, 16 of 24 countries have freely elected governments. And in the United Nations, 8 of the 10 developing nations which have joined that body in the past 5 years are democracies.

In the Communist world as well, man’s instinctive desire for freedom and self-determination surfaces again and again. To be sure, there are grim reminders of how brutally the police state attempts to snuff out this quest for self-rule — 1953 in East Germany, 1956 in Hungary, 1968 in Czechoslovakia, 1981 in Poland. But the struggle continues in Poland. And we know that there are even those who strive and suffer for freedom within the confines of the Soviet Union itself. How we conduct ourselves here in the Western democracies will determine whether this trend continues.

No, democracy is not a fragile flower. Still it needs cultivating. If the rest of this century is to witness the gradual growth of freedom and democratic ideals, we must take actions to assist the campaign for democracy.

Some argue that we should encourage democratic change in right-wing dictatorships, but not in Communist regimes. Well, to accept this preposterous notion — as some well-meaning people have — is to invite the argument that once countries achieve a nuclear capability, they should be allowed an undisturbed reign of terror over their own citizens.

We reject this course.

As for the Soviet view, Chairman Brezhnev repeatedly has stressed that the competition of ideas and systems must continue and that this is entirely consistent with relaxation of tensions and peace.

Well, we ask only that these systems begin by living up to their own constitutions, abiding by their own laws, and complying with the international obligations they have undertaken. We ask only for a process, a direction, a basic code of decency, not for an instant transformation.

We cannot ignore the fact that even without our encouragement there has been and will continue to be repeated explosions against repression and dictatorships. The Soviet Union itself is not immune to this reality. Any system is inherently unstable that has no peaceful means to legitimize its leaders. In such cases, the very repressiveness of the state ultimately drives people to resist it, if necessary, by force.

While we must be cautious about forcing the pace of change, we must not hesitate to declare our ultimate objectives and to take concrete actions to move toward them. We must be staunch in our conviction that freedom is not the sole prerogative of a lucky few, but the inalienable and universal right of all human beings. So states the United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which, among other things, guarantees free elections.

The objective I propose is quite simple to state: to foster the infrastructure of democracy, the system of a free press, unions, political parties, universities, which allows a people to choose their own way to develop their own culture, to reconcile their own differences through peaceful means.

This is not cultural imperialism, it is providing the means for genuine self-determination and protection for diversity. Democracy already flourishes in countries with very different cultures and historical experiences. It would be cultural condescension, or worse, to say that any people prefer dictatorship to democracy. Who would voluntarily choose not to have the right to vote, decide to purchase government propaganda handouts instead of independent newspapers, prefer government to worker-controlled unions, opt for land to be owned by the state instead of those who till it, want government repression of religious liberty, a single political party instead of a free choice, a rigid cultural orthodoxy instead of democratic tolerance and diversity?

Since 1917 the Soviet Union has given covert political training and assistance to Marxist-Leninists in many countries. Of course, it also has promoted the use of violence and subversion by these same forces. Over the past several decades, West European and other Social Democrats, Christian Democrats, and leaders have offered open assistance to fraternal, political, and social institutions to bring about peaceful and democratic progress. Appropriately, for a vigorous new democracy, the Federal Republic of Germany’s political foundations have become a major force in this effort.

We in America now intend to take additional steps, as many of our allies have already done, toward realizing this same goal. The chairmen and other leaders of the national Republican and Democratic Party organizations are initiating a study with the bipartisan American political foundation to determine how the United States can best contribute as a nation to the global campaign for democracy now gathering force. They will have the cooperation of congressional leaders of both parties, along with representatives of business, labor, and other major institutions in our society. I look forward to receiving their recommendations and to working with these institutions and the Congress in the common task of strengthening democracy throughout the world.

It is time that we committed ourselves as a nation — in both the pubic and private sectors — to assisting democratic development.

We plan to consult with leaders of other nations as well. There is a proposal before the Council of Europe to invite parliamentarians from democratic countries to a meeting next year in Strasbourg. That prestigious gathering could consider ways to help democratic political movements.

This November in Washington there will take place an international meeting on free elections. And next spring there will be a conference of world authorities on constitutionalism and self-goverment hosted by the Chief Justice of the United States. Authorities from a number of developing and developed countries — judges, philosophers, and politicians with practical experience — have agreed to explore how to turn principle into practice and further the rule of law.

At the same time, we invite the Soviet Union to consider with us how the competition of ideas and values — which it is committed to support — can be conducted on a peaceful and reciprocal basis. For example, I am prepared to offer President Brezhnev an opportunity to speak to the American people on our television if he will allow me the same opportunity with the Soviet people. We also suggest that panels of our newsmen periodically appear on each other’s television to discuss major events.

Now, I don’t wish to sound overly optimistic, yet the Soviet Union is not immune from the reality of what is going on in the world. It has happened in the past — a small ruling elite either mistakenly attempts to ease domestic unrest through greater repression and foreign adventure, or it chooses a wiser course. It begins to allow its people a voice in their own destiny. Even if this latter process is not realized soon, I believe the renewed strength of the democratic movement, complemented by a global campaign for freedom, will strengthen the prospects for arms control and a world at peace.

I have discussed on other occasions, including my address on May 9th, the elements of Western policies toward the Soviet Union to safeguard our interests and protect the peace. What I am describing now is a plan and a hope for the long term — the march of freedom and democracy which will leave Marxism-Leninism on the ash-heap of history as it has left other tyrannies which stifle the freedom and muzzle the self-expression of the people. And that’s why we must continue our efforts to strengthen NATO even as we move forward with our Zero-Option initiative in the negotiations on intermediate-range forces and our proposal for a one-third reduction in strategic ballistic missile warheads.

Our military strength is a prerequisite to peace, but let it be clear we maintain this strength in the hope it will never be used, for the ultimate determinant in the struggle that’s now going on in the world will not be bombs and rockets, but a test of wills and ideas, a trial of spiritual resolve, the values we hold, the beliefs we cherish, the ideals to which we are dedicated.

The British people know that, given strong leadership, time and a little bit of hope, the forces of good ultimately rally and triumph over evil. Here among you is the cradle of self-government, the Mother of Parliaments. Here is the enduring greatness of the British contribution to mankind, the great civilized ideas: individual liberty, representative government, and the rule of law under God.

I’ve often wondered about the shyness of some of us in the West about standing for these ideals that have done so much to ease the plight of man and the hardships of our imperfect world. This reluctance to use those vast resources at our command reminds me of the elderly lady whose home was bombed in the Blitz. As the rescuers moved about, they found a bottle of brandy she’d stored behind the staircase, which was all that was left standing. And since she was barely conscious, one of the workers pulled the cork to give her a taste of it. She came around immediately and said, “Here now — there now, put it back. That’s for emergencies.”

Well, the emergency is upon us. Let us be shy no longer. Let us go to our strength. Let us offer hope. Let us tell the world that a new age is not only possible but probable.

During the dark days of the Second World War, when this island was incandescent with courage, Winston Churchill exclaimed about Britain’s adversaries, “What kind of a people do they think we are?” Well, Britain’s adversaries found out what extraordinary people the British are. But all the democracies paid a terrible price for allowing the dictators to underestimate us. We dare not make that mistake again. So, let us ask ourselves, “What kind of people do we think we are?” And let us answer, “Free people, worthy of freedom and determined not only to remain so but to help others gain their freedom as well.”

Sir Winston led his people to great victory in war and then lost an election just as the fruits of victory were about to be enjoyed. But he left office honorably, and, as it turned out, temporarily, knowing that the liberty of his people was more important than the fate of any single leader. History recalls his greatness in ways no dictator will ever know. And he left us a message of hope for the future, as timely now as when he first uttered it, as opposition leader in the Commons nearly 27 years ago, when he said, “When we look back on all the perils through which we have passed and at the mighty foes that we have laid low and all the dark and deadly designs that we have frustrated, why should we fear for our future? We have,” he said, “come safely through the worst.”

Well, the task I’ve set forth will long outlive our own generation. But together, we too have come through the worst. Let us now begin a major effort to secure the best — a crusade for freedom that will engage the faith and fortitude of the next generation. For the sake of peace and justice, let us move toward a world in which all people are at last free to determine their own destiny.

Thank you.

Technicolor Sczenophrenic Color-Coding Terror War

DHS to Scrap Color Code Terror Alerts by April

Homeland Security Advisory System criticized for “scaring, not preparing”

Russia considers color-coded terror threat alerts

(AP) – 6 hours ago

MOCOW (AP) — Russia’s parliament on Friday gave preliminary approval to a law creating color-coded terrorist threat alerts, a measure rushed forward in the wake of the Moscow airport bombing that left 35 dead and raised questions about the country’s ability to handle attacks.

The proposed law is modeled on the U.S. system instituted after 9/11, which Washington announced Thursday it would be abandoned by the end of April and replaced with a new plan to notify specific people about specific threats. Critics had complained the general color alerts were unhelpful.

Russia’s State Duma, or lower house, unanimously approved the bill Friday in the first of three required readings.

Russia has not specified how its three-level codes would work. But the push to pass the legislation underlines Russia’s growing anxiety about its international security image as it tries to cope with terrorist attacks blamed on Islamist insurgents from the restive Caucasus region.

The measure was on the State Duma’s agenda for February, but the vote was rushed forward after the bombing at Domodedovo Airport, Russia’s busiest. No claim of responsibility for the bombing has been made, and officials have not publicly identified any suspects.

But, media reports say investigators are focusing on insurgents from the Caucasus region. Chechen rebels have claimed responsibility for a number of deadly attacks over the years, including ones against the Moscow subway system and suicide bombings of two planes that took off from Domodedovo in 2004.

The Monday afternoon explosion tore through the meeting area for international arrivals at Domodedovo. Some 180 people were injured, 129 of whom remained hospitalized Friday, according to the Health Ministry.

Authorities have not released an account of how the bombing took place, and media accounts have cited various sources as saying it was a male suicide bomber or a female, or that the bomb was remotely detonated.

The Interfax news agency on Friday cited an unidentified law enforcement source as saying that surveillance video showed an unaccompanied male suspected suicide bomber, clad in a black jacket and baseball cap, standing in the area for about 15 minutes before the blast.

Some media have shown photos of a severed head believed to be that of the bomber and say the head has been sent to a forensic laboratory for DNA analysis.

After the blast, suspicion initially fell on Chechen insurgents who have fought Russian forces since 1994 and who have claimed responsibility for an array of previous attacks, including last year’s double suicide bombing of Moscow subways that killed 40 people. However, Prime Minister Vladimir Putin said preliminary evidence showed no connection with Chechnya.

In recent years, the Islamic insurgency that started in Chechnya has spread to adjacent parts of the Russian Caucasus, notably to Dagestan, where shootings, bombings and police operations against rebels occur almost daily. Late Thursday, security forces armed with rocket-propelled grenades killed two militants in an assault on a house in the village of Severny. One of the insurgents killed was identified by police as a militant commander, Adam Guseinov.

The respected newspaper Kommersant on Thursday reported that suspects in the airport bombing included a man identified as Vitaly Razdobudko, allegedly a member of an insurgent group in the Stavropol region of the Caucasus called the Nogai Brigade.

The state news agency RIA Novosti quoted an unidentified source as saying surveillance video showed Razdobudko was not the bomber. However, reports suggest he is being seen as possibly the organizer of the attack.

A half-dozen transport and police officials have been fired in connection with the bombing. President Dmitry Medvedev said after the blast that Domodedovo’s security was in a “state of anarchy.”

The attack stained Russia’s image at a vulnerable time, coming just before Medvedev’s appearance at the Davos World Economic Forum to try to woo international investment. The explosion also called into question Russia’s ability to safely host major international events such as the 2014 Winter Olympics and the 2018 World Cup.

Copyright © 2011 The Associated Press. All rights reserved.

The website at www.jang-group.com appears to host malware–Jan. 28

The website at http://www.jang-group.com appears to host malware – software that can hurt your computer or otherwise operate without your consent. Just visiting a site that hosts malware can infect your computer.

US Consulate employee was produced in court Friday on double murder charges

Court grants 6-day remand of American

Updated at: 1452 PST,  Friday, January 28, 2011 LAHORE: US Consulate employee was produced in court Friday on double murder charges, Geo News reported, a day after he shot dead two men on a motorcycle in what he said was self-defence. The US citizen was appeared before the Senior Judge Zafar Iqbal who handed over the accused to the police on six-day remand. The man, Raymond Davis was described by the State Department in Washington as an American civilian working for the US Consulate in Lahore. A third Pakistani was crushed to death by a consulate car that went to the scene to aid the man following the shooting in a busy street in the eastern city. Provincial law minister Rana Sanaullah said officials had asked the US Consulate to release the second vehicle and its driver to police. The US embassy in Islamabad has confirmed the man involved was a consular worker but said it was still trying to work out with the police what had happened. Punjab minister Sanaullah said no American pressure would be allowed to influence the criminal case.

American Shooter of Two Pakistanis Charged With Murder

American kills two men in ‘self defence’, booked for murder

* Another killed shortly after shooting when a car from US consulate crushed a motorcyclist at the crime scene

Staff Report

LAHORE: An employee of the US Consulate in Lahore shot dead two youths, while a third was crushed by the driver of a Parado, who was called by him for help, at Chowk Qartaba on Thursday afternoon.

The American, identified as David Raymond, told police that two armed motorcyclists tried to rob him. He chased them and opened fire at them near Chowk Qartaba.

Police said one of the bikers died on the spot while the other succumbed to his injuries in a hospital.

After the shooting, David made a rescue call and a team rushed to the scene in a jeep. Violating one-way traffic law, the jeep driver hit an innocent motorcyclist, who died on the spot. He sped away from the scene while police arrested David near Old Anarkali Food Street after a chase.

One of the two victims of David was identified as Faizan of Ravi Road while the other has not yet been identified. The jeep drivers’ victim was identified as Ibadur Rehman, a resident of A Block of Gulshan Ravi.

Eyewitnesses belied David’s claim and said the motorcyclists would have retaliated if they had guns.

A source in the police department said Faizan’s brother was murdered some time ago after which he started carrying weapon for self-defence.

The relatives and friends of Faizan said he had never been involved in any crime and the American’s story was a pack of lies.

Police registered a case against David on two counts late Thursday, while a case was registered against unidentified people on the application of Ibad’s brother Ijaz.

Key events in Lebanon since Hariri assassination

Key events from the 2005 assassination of Lebanese premier Rafiq Hariri until Wednesday’s collapse of the unity government over a UN probe into the killing:

2005

• Feb 14: Billionaire former prime minister Rafiq Hariri is killed in a massive Beirut bombing along with 22 others. A string of high-profile assassinations targeting anti-Syrian figures follow over the next three years. Pro-Western leaders blame Syria.
• April 26: Syria, which denies any role in Hariri’s killing, pulls its troops from Lebanon after a 29-year deployment amid massive popular protests.
• Oct 20: An initial UN probe implicates Syrian agents in Hariri’s murder.

2006

• July 12-Aug 14: A 34-day war between Hezbollah and Israel kills nearly 1,200 Lebanese, mostly civilians, and 160 Israelis, mostly soldiers.
• Nov 11: All Shiite ministers, including two from Hezbollah, resign from government after failed talks on granting Hezbollah and its allies greater representation.

2007

• May 20: Clashes break out between the army and Al-Qaeda inspired Fatah al-Islam in a Palestinian refugee camp. More than 400 people are killed and 30,000 displaced in 15 weeks.
• June 10: The UN-backed Special Tribunal for Lebanon (STL) is created.
• Nov 23: Pro-Syrian President Emile Lahoud’s term ends. Lebanese are unable to agree on a successor.

2008

• May 7: A government bid to curb Hezbollah’s power leads to a week of sectarian clashes, killing more than 100 as militants of the Hezbollah-led opposition seize large swathes of Sunni areas in Beirut.
• May 21: Rival leaders agree to a power-sharing formula in Qatar. Army chief Michel Sleiman is slotted as next president.
• July 11: Fuad Siniora forms government in which Hezbollah and its allies have veto power.
• Oct 15: Syria and Lebanon formally establish diplomatic ties.

2009

• April 29: The STL orders the liberation of four Lebanese generals detained without formal charges over Hariri’s murder since August 2005.
• May 25: Hezbollah chief Hassan Nasrallah accuses Israel of being behind a Der Spiegel report implicating his group in Hariri’s murder.
• June 7: The anti-Syrian parliamentary majority wins legislative elections.
• June 27: Saad Hariri, son of Rafiq, is named prime minister.
• Nov 9: Hariri forms a national unity government in which Hezbollah has two ministers.

2010

• March 31: Nasrallah reveals Hezbollah members were questioned by UN interrogators as “witnesses,” and warns his group would not “remain silent” if it is accused by the tribunal.
• July 22: Nasrallah says Hariri informed him the tribunal will indict Hezbollah members in connection with the ex-premier’s assassination.
• Oct 28: Nasrallah calls on Lebanese to boycott the STL and warns further cooperation is tantamount to attacking his party.
• Nov 11: Nasrallah threatens to “cut off the hand” of any who attempt to arrest Hezbollah members over Hariri’s murder, amid frenzied speculation an indictment is near.

2011

• Jan 11: The Hezbollah-led alliance announces failure of Syrian-Saudi efforts to defuse the STL crisis.
• Jan 12: Hezbollah forces the collapse of Lebanon’s unity government when 11 ministers resign, representing the Shiite party, its allies and one loyal to the president.

US and Co-Conspirators Prepare Counter-Offensive Against New Lebanese Govt.

International meeting in Paris postponed, Feltman prepares counter offensive

PARIS, By Jessy Abou Habib | iloubnan.info

US Assistant secretary and former US ambassador to Lebanon Jeffrey Feltman. Photo: AFP

Paris based expert on Lebanese affairs, who requested to remain anonymous, confirmed to iloubnan.info that a meeting between representatives of countries concerned about the situation in Lebanon was to take place tomorrow in Paris; however, excluding Syria. Late on Thursday, the meeting was postponed, after a Qatari decision that followed a meeting with President Sarkozy.

Representatives of the U.S., France, Qatar, Turkey, Russia and Saudi Arabia were to meet on Friday to discuss developments in Lebanon. However, late on Thursday, the meeting was postponed, most likely after a Qatari decision following a meeting between Cheikh Hamad bin Jassem bin Jaber al Thani (Prime minister and Foreign minister of Qatar) and French President.

U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for Near Eastern Affairs Jeffrey Feltman had arrived earlier this week to Paris, coming from Tunisia. Feltman’s visit to France, was described by the expert as “multi-layered and holding a macro Middle-Eastern dimension, followed by a Tunisian one.”

Information disclosed about this visit is not homogeneous in political circles. However, rumors say Feltman is launching a counter offensive to the appointment of a new Hezbollah-backed PM in Lebanon to form a cabinet, after they toppled U.S.-backed Saad Hariri’s cabinet on Januray 12.

“There are serious rumors, that remain to be proved, that the Elysee is to give green light to the Mikati/Syrian scenario in Lebanon; however, the French Foreign Ministry and French lobby are not satisfied by the set back of Hariri’s clan,” the source told iloubnan.info.

“Feltman’s visit is a way of launching a counter-offensive on that scenario; yet, the success of this offensive remains pending,” it added.

There were two scenarios for Friday’s meeting; “if the representatives of countries see the Status Quo in Lebanon as acceptable for a while, they will issue a mild statement regarding the new to be-cabinet.” If the situation in Lebanon and dialogue go down on the road, the counter offensive is to be taken further. “They will not attack Mikati in their statement, but they will remain at the skeptical side,” the source told iloubnan.info. “As far as Thursday night, Syria remains uninvolved in Friday’s meeting, a position Syria might consider insignificant or condemn it as an aggression to its choices. “ The source evoked the possibility that the meeting postponment might be due to Syria. The specialist said that the French Foreign Ministry was “furious”, as well as Jeffrey Feltman.

When asked if Feltman’s presence is the reason for Syria’s exclusion, the source did not disregard the option.

The source said that Marwan Hamadeh and Elias Murr, who left to Paris on Wednesday ‘on private visits’ might be meeting Feltman to look into the situation in Lebanon and tell him “things cannot be left this way.”

Moreover, the source confirmed that the Elysee did not call off the visit of the President of the National Assembly to Damascus, explaining that “its President makes his own decisions.&rdquo

The Planned De-Industrialization of America, January 1, 2001

`Post-Industrial’ Southern Strategy

(from: The Planned Gutting of Industrial America: Who Did It and Why)

http://educate-yourself.org/cn/southernstrategyassaultonamerica01jan01.shtml

By John Hoefle

The heart of the Southern Strategy was the oligarchy’s plan to shift the United States from the world’s most powerful industrial economy, into a post-industrial rentier-financier empire. The industrialized cities of the North would be allowed to decay, while the relatively small cities of the South would be built up as cheap-labor service centers. As the Industrial Belt turned into the Rust Belt, the New South ascended. Houston, spurred by the oil boom, became the fourth-largest city in the country, old Atlanta became the “New Atlanta,” and sleepy Charlotte became a major international financial center. Existing cities were transformed–Dallas, San Antonio, Jacksonville, Orlando, Tampa-St. Petersburg, Miami, to name a few–while Northern cities such as Baltimore, Cleveland, and Philadelphia went into decline.

Coincident with this Southern shift, was the ascension of finance over industry. U.S. industry had largely been in the hands of the financiers since the days of J.P. Morgan’s creation of the industrial trusts, and that control was rapidly consolidated during the 1980s. Orchestrated by Bush’s masters, the speculators took over. The corporate raiders, financed by the dirty-money junk bond networks, bought up significant chunks of corporate America, and terrified the rest. The raiders’ targets, and those who feared they might become targets, turned to Wall Street’s investment banks and law firms for “protection.” As such, the leveraged buy-out/junk bond operation functioned as a giant protection racket, destroying some as a way of collecting tribute from the rest. At the same time, dirty money poured into the real estate market, notably through the giant Canadian developers Olympia & York and Cadillac Fairview. These firms built the skyscrapers which were then filled up with service workers–bankers, lawyers, accountants, clerks, and other white-collar types. Having the tallest office building became something of a fetish for the business leaders, spurring ever larger towers, which in turn were filled with ever larger numbers of white-collar workers.

The pouring of hot money into the real estate markets caused real estate prices to rise. The “wealth” created by these rising values provided more money to pump into the bubble. The rising stock market served a similar function. The cities were transformed into service centers ringed by suburbia, leaving the inner cities full of the poor and minorities, ripe for Strategic Bombing Survey decimation through drug distribution and “Negro removal.”

In the office buildings and the suburbs, the ordinary citizen was also being hooked on speculation. One of the effects of Fed Chairman Paul Volcker’s deadly interest-rate hikes in 1979-80, was that ordinary savings accounts suddenly started paying high rates of interest, giving the ordinary citizen a taste of the action. As more and more of the “little people” discovered the joys of usury, the modern “my money” era was born. That process escalated with the rise in residential real estate prices–homes were transformed from residences to “investments,” with rising equity values adding significantly to the pools of “my money.” The ordinary citizen also began making money from the rising stock market. Over time, a significant portion of the population became addicted to usury and speculation, considering it their right to make money from the manipulation of money. The speculator went from being the enemy to being the role model; the suckers now identified with the casino. The old-style productive industry became the realm of “losers,” replaced by the hot new “industries” of finance and information. Make derivatives, not steel!  (read HERE)

The Real Ronald Reagan

as Portrayed by Phil Hartman. Maybe Reagan really was the evil genius behind everything

The Real Ronald Reagan, as Portrayed by Phil Ha…, posted with vodpod

The Entire Arab World Is Going Over the Cliff

[We are about to see just how masterful the masters of the strategy of tension are in their meddling and attempting to turn societies against themselves in order to shape the fiery end-product.  I am certain that their egos exceed their mastery of human nature, at least any of the higher aspects of that nature.  They will continue playing around, manipulating hot-headed emotions until the whole thing takes  on a life of its own.]

Egyptian protests intensify, as clashes spread across the Middle East

Egyptian police have been fighting protesters in intensifying clashes, and demonstrations have reported from Yemen and Gabon – a sign that defiance against authoritarian rulers in the Middle East is spreading.

Riot police clash with protesters in Cairo yesterday  Photo: AP

Security forces shot dead a Bedouin protester in Egypt’s Sinai region on Thursday, bringing the death in the three days of protests to five. Police in Suez fired rubber bullets, water cannon and tear gas at hundreds of demonstrators calling for an end to the 30-year-old rule of Hosni Mubarak, the Egyptian president. Protesters chucked rocks and petrol bombs at police lines. In Ismailia, hundreds of protesters clashed with police, who dispersed the crowds with tear gas.

Like in many other countries in the region, protesters in Egypt complain about surging prices, unemployment and the authorities’ reliance on heavy-handed security to keep dissenting voices quiet. The protests are inspired by Tunisia, where a democratic movement recently overthrew the government.

Egyptian Nobel laureate Mohamed ElBaradei announced on Thursday he was returning to Egypt to join the protests. “Tomorrow is going to be, I think, a major demonstration all over Egypt and I will be there with them,” he said. Mr Baradei, who won the Nobel peace prize for his work as head of the UN’s nuclear agency, called on Mr Mubarak to leave office, saying “he has served the country for 30 years and it is about time for him to retire.”

His arrival could spur protesters who have no figurehead, although many activists resent his absences in recent months.

“Our government is a dictatorship. A total dictatorship,” said Mohamed Fahim, a 29-year-old glass factory worker, as he stood near the charred skeleton of a car.

“It’s our right to choose our government ourselves. We have been living 29 years, my whole life, without being able to choose a president.”

On Wednesday evening, people in Suez had tried to burn down a government building, another police post and a local office of Egypt’s ruling party before police stopped them. The government has said it intervened there against what it called ‘vandalism’.

One policeman has been killed in Cairo in the anti-government protests, unprecedented during Mubarak’s rule of a state that is a key US ally.

Al-Arabiya television reported that Egypt’s general prosecutor had charged 40 protesters with trying to “overthrow the regime”.

Prime Minister Ahmed Nazif urged citizens to exercise self control on Friday, the cabinet spokesman told reporters.

A page on Facebook announcing Friday’s protest gained 55,000 supporters in less than 24 hours and the call was then repeated by some opposition groups.

“Egypt’s Muslims and Christians will go out to fight against corruption, unemployment and oppression and absence of freedom,” wrote an activist on Facebook, which alongside sites like Twitter has been a key tools to rally people on to the streets.

US embassy official kills two men during ‘robbery’ in Pakistan

Foreigner shot 3 dead in Lahore

A foreigner gunned down two people and hit another motorcyclist by his car in Qartaba Chowk Lahore. All the three injured have succumbed to their injuries in the hospital. As per police, the foreigner named Steve David, said to be a US consulate employee, has been apprehended from Purani Anarkali. The accused told the police that he opened fire on the deceased at Qartaba Chowk, Lahore in his defence as they tried to loot him.

US embassy official kills two men during ‘robbery’ in Pakistan

Third man killed by embassy vehicle rushing to the aid of American official, who was named by local media as Raymond Davis

• Declan Walsh in Islamabad
• guardian.co.uk
The car a US consulate employee was travelling in when he was engaged in a shoot-out in Lahore. Illustration: Mohsin Raza/ReutersA US government official shot dead two Pakistanis during an apparent attempted robbery on a Lahore street this afternoon. A third man died after being run over by an embassy vehicle rushing to the scene.

Local police took the American, named by local media as Raymond Davis, into custody.

The US embassy confirmed he was an employee but did not specify his job or say why he was carrying a weapon. Pakistani television stations speculated he was a CIA agent.

Crowds of protesters burned tyres on the site of the shooting as the Punjab chief minister, Shahbaz Sharif, ordered an immediate inquiry into the incident.

“The American told us that he opened fire in self-defence after one of the men pulled out a pistol,” the Lahore police chief, Aslam Tarin, told Reuters.

The shooting incident could inflame tensions in a country where anti-Americanism is rife and speculation abounds about the malign intentions of US covert officials.

Witnesses said that two men riding a motorbike, one carrying a gun, approached the American’s car on a busy street. The American drew his firearm and shot both of them.

The American called for help from a sports utility vehicle that either rushed from the nearby consulate or was following close behind, according to different versions. On the way the jeep knocked over a pedestrian who later died in hospital.

The brother of the dead pedestrian told reporters that the driver of the car should be tried for murder. “We will not take the body of my brother until the foreigner is punished. We will file a case against him so he is hanged,” he said.

Television stations showed footage of Davis – a white American in his 40s with grey hair and a plaid shirt – emerging from his white car, which had several bullet holes in the windscreen.

The identities or motives of the dead gunmen were not clear. Police officials said the American was the victim of an attempted robbery but presented no evidence to back up the statement.

Street robberies are not uncommon in Lahore, although the city is less risky than Karachi and attacks on foreigners are rare.

Pakistan is considered one of the riskiest posts for American officials, who are posted at the Islamabad embassy and consulates in Karachi, Lahore and Peshawar.

A suicide bomber killed an official working for the National Security Agency outside the Karachi consulate in 2006. Gunmen in Peshawar killed an American aid official in 2008, and later that year opened fire on a vehicle carrying the consul general, who escaped unscathed.

Three US special forces officers were killed in a Taliban bomb attack in Khyber Paktunkhwa province last year.

Diplomats do not generally have permission to carry weapons although some are escorted by armed bodyguards. Security rules vary from city to city, with Lahore considered perhaps the least risky despite the threat from Punjabi militant groups.

US spies posted to Pakistan also contend with a hostile public that holds them responsible for many of the country’s ills. Last month, the CIA station chief in Islamabad, named as Jonathan Banks, had to flee Pakistan after a tribesman named him in a criminal prosecution related to CIA drone strikes in Waziristan.

Robert Gates Loves His War

[Gates wants the American people to submissively accept the idea that it is more to expand foreign wars than it is to invest in saving the homeland.  Ending the war will not end the American economy or our way of life, but continuing the war will finish-off we have of saving either one.  They want us to believe that spending our last dollar on killing another bin Laden clone will achieve something other than wasting any chance we might still have to save ourselves.  You see, America can survive the resolution of all of our mistakes if we will only change directions and begin correcting the things that we have done with our military machine.  It is the military that has brought us to the point in the great poker game where we have nothing more to bet on the next deal of the cards.  If we siphon-off the last dollar into the last B-1 bomber or Abrams tank, we will get no closer to our goal of world domination than we are now.  Gates and all the other false prophets of the military/intelligence complex have been riding high on a river of bullshit since his mentors, Reagan and Bush S. began their war on democracy.  It is past time that the American people intervened and dried that river up.

Gates is whining in the press like the high-priced big baby/bully that he is, saying don't lay this mess on his doorstep.  Why not?  When we can trace the entire river of bullshit back to his office door three decades ago, then it is only fitting that, in the end, all the dung be delivered back to his desk.  No one believes that the sky will fall without new tanks, bombs, guns, more gas, more war, more bringing hell into the homes of millions of innocent people.

Yeah, Bob.  The fuckin' sky is falling.]

In this photo released by the U.S. Dept. of Defense, U.S. Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates, left, shakes hands with Canadian Capt. Nancy Silver, while U.S. Ambassador to Canada David Jacobson looks on, upon his arrival in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada, Wednesday, Jan. 26, 2010. Gates is in Canada to attend trilateral meetings with his counterparts from Canada and Mexico. (AP Photo/Dept. of Defense, Cherie Cullen)

Gates faults Congress for ‘crisis on my doorstep’

(AP) – 1 hour ago

OTTAWA, Canada (AP) — Defense Secretary Robert Gates is accusing Congress of dumping what he calls a “crisis on my doorstep” by holding the Pentagon to last year’s spending levels.

He said this has the potential to create a $23 billion budget gap this year that could weaken a wartime military.

Gates says it is increasingly likely that Congress will not act on the Pentagon’s 2011 budget request — which would have the effect of forcing the Pentagon to make do with last year’s amount.

Gates is warning of emergency cuts to make ends meet.

Gates also says in an interview that he isn’t ready to reveal the timing of his planned retirement this year. He’s been on the job since former President George W. Bush chose him to replace Donald Rumsfeld in 2006.

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