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Dennis Ross will become Special Assistant to the President and Senior Director for the Central Region with overall responsibility for the region. He will work with Don Camp, Senior Director for South Asia, Lt. Gen. Doug Lute, Special Assistant to the President and Senior Adviser and Coordinator for Afghanistan-Pakistan, Dan Shapiro, Senior Director for Near East and North Africa, and Puneet Talwar, Senior Director for the Gulf States, Iran and Iraq.
"In the White House, I think it would be hard to find a worse choice than the new Special Assistant to the President, Dennis Ross. Three examples of his skill: a) in the early negotiations between the Israelis and the Palestinians, when he was supposedly the honest broker, he took a more disruptive position than even the Israelis, apparently shocking even them; b) in the build-up to the Iranian elections he sponsored and organized a program to "electronically invade" Iran with destabilizing messages trying, more subtly to be sure than the 1953 CIA-MI6 coup, to "regime change" it."
"Mr Shturman, the deputy director of the ministry’s hasbara department, admitted his team would be working undercover.“Our people will not say: ‘Hello, I am from the hasbara department of the Israeli foreign ministry and I want to tell you the following.’ Nor will they necessarily identify themselves as Israelis,” he said. “They will speak as net-surfers and as citizens, and will write responses that will look personal but will be based on a prepared list of messages that the foreign ministry developed.”
"The new team is expected to increase the ministry’s close coordination with a private advocacy group, giyus.org (Give Israel Your United Support). About 50,000 activists are reported to have downloaded a programme called Megaphone that sends an alert to their computers when an article critical of Israel is published. They are then supposed to bombard the site with comments supporting Israel."I bring up again my previous post "Twitters impact inside Iran is zero," where i brought up the analysis done by Chartingstocks.net on the original Twitter posts that sparked the media idea of a "twitter revolution" in Iran. Chartingstocks.net found (through unscientific methods) that the Jerusalem Post was the first media outlet to use twitter posts as legitimate news on the election.
It seems that as the Obama administration's war policy matures, Southwest Asia is being turned inside out in the name of America's Overseas Contingency Operation (the official "new" term for the Global War on Terror).
My favorite frontline reporter, Syed Saleem Shahzad, has a new article out, "Pakistan-U.S. plan falls into place." The article is worth reading multiple times, and perhaps printing out and saving, as it lays out the framework for what will be, in Shahzed's words "a struggle of unprecedented proportions."
On one side of the struggle are the military politicians of the imperial states. Shahzad writes "The seamless friendship between the chairman of the United States Joint Chiefs of Staff, Admiral Mike Mullen, and Pakistan's Chief of Army Staff General Ashfaq Parvez Kiani, has cemented the relationship between the military establishments of the two countries to levels not seen since the 1950s." According to Shahzad, the "cemented relationship" will proceed along two path.
First, "Pakistan will launch a comprehensive battle against all Taliban groups in the country, irrespective of whether they are perceived as good or bad." Second, "an initiative will be made by the Pakistani government, supported by the country's Western allies, for better relations with India, strongly mediated by the Pakistan army."
In order to understand this alliance, it must be understood that the U.S. is thoroughly engaged in a Great Game, meaning that the military is only a facade for underlying economic concerns.
In Pakistan, the American's have been setting up quite a "civilian" task-force in Islamabad. They currently have more than 500 advisors in the capital city, and earlier this year the White House asked Congress for $736 Million to build a new super-embassy in the capital city. (To put that price tag in perspective, when the U.S. built the world's largest embassy in Baghdad's Green Zone, it cost $740 million.) And what have these "civilians" been advising the Pakistani government to do? According to Shahzad, they have told the Pakistani Army to declare war westward, rather than eastward. My asumption right now is that the U.S. is hoping to benefit itself, and not India, from a shift in Pakistani belligerence. It was rumored that when Richard Holbrooke was put it charge of diplomacy for the region, his original title included Kashmir, but it was removed at India's request.
Across the Durand Line, in Afghanistan, all signs are pointing to a continuation of the neoliberal occupation of the state. Zalmay Khalizad as CEO? James Carville as campaign strategist? Chances are that Afghanistan is still a pipeline war, or a surround Iran war, and Zbig has no plans to give up on his policy. The recent American military operation, Operation Daggerthrust, sprawled 5,000 marines out over Helmand Province, where a new 443 acre military base, Camp Leatherneck, is being built (near both the Iran and Pakistan border). The operational is out of style for General Stan McChrystal, who specializes in small Special Forces operations. There has been, however, talk of Special Forces raids from Helmand province into Pakistani Baluchistan, which according to Pepe Escobar, is the greatest prize in Great Game 2.0. Watch for the ultra-remote Nimruz province of Afghanistan to start cropping up in the news, as it will be the staging ground for any cross border operation.
As it stands, Pakistan lives off of an IMF lifeline, a fact that the military leaders of both America and Pakistan are fully aware of. Therefore, if the U.S. military needs an allied army to join the fight for empire, Pakistan has no choice but to agree. Washington has all the cards, and it seems that Richard Armitage's September 11th "with us or against us" ultimatum is still being adhered to. All that is left to be seen is how hard the other side of the struggle, the Southwest Asian militants, will fight. For that, read Shahzad's article.
"But when you see two little Afgahn girls crouched on the front steps of their new school, clutching tightly with both arms the notebooks handed to them by a U.S. Admiral--as is they were their first dolls--it's hard to say: "Let's just walk away." Not Yet."
Mortenson's efforts remind us what the essence of the War on Terrorism is about. It's about the war of ideas within Islam--a war between religous zealots who glorify martyrdom and want to keep Islam untouched by modernity and isolated by other faiths, with its women disempowered, and those who want to embrace modernity, open Islam to new ideas and empower Muslim women as much as men.
"Contrary to the military's claims of hundreds of militants killed, the militants say they have lost only 50 of their men, with the remainder being civilians killed in crossfire or in aerial bombings. Of the 50, two commanders - one named only as Daud and the other as Shah Doran - have died.""A few months ago, when the Malakand operation was in full swing, the Americans became so desperate that action should be taken against Pakistani militants who were due to go into Helmand that the Pakistani establishment believed they would take matters into their own hands and move into Pakistan.
To pre-empt this, all possible tribal rivals of Baitullah Mehsud in South Waziristan were organized (all were Taliban) under the banner of the Pakistan army."Jabbar had always opposed attacks on the Pakistani security forces as well as jihadi operations in Pakistan. Under US pressure (more than 500 Americans have arrived in Islamabad to observe developments) an operation was organized against militants in the southern Punjab and several high-profile commanders, including one named Farooq and other members of the Jaish-e-Mohammad, were arrested.
A top jihadi leader commented to Asia Times Online, "We never imagined such a reaction. We have not fought against the Pakistan army and we do not consider it right. But if the present arrests continue, what option will we have ... without going to Waziristan and doing what other people are doing there?
My hope is that these "Western Diplomats" are only trying to help News Corp spin the Atlantic political climate into a warlike state, but i would not be surprised for one moment if Rahm Emanuel and company in Washington struck this type of deal. Israel has never been one to sit down and behave, and if another deceitful "peace process" is indeed underway, no doubt Israel will do everything it can to milk the diplomatic procedures to its benefit.The exercises come at a time when Western diplomats are offering support for an Israeli strike on Iran in return for Israeli concessions on the formation of a Palestinian state.
If agreed it would make an Israeli strike on Iran realistic “within the year” said one British official.
Diplomats said that Israel had offered concessions on settlement policy, Palestinian land claims and issues with neighboring Arab states, to facilitate a possible strike on Iran.
“Israel has chosen to place the Iranian threat over its settlements,” said a senior European diplomat.
The first eye-witness accounts of the war by serving Israeli reservists and conscripts describes the Israeli use of Palestinian civilians as "human shields". They detail the killing of at least two civilians, the vandalism, looting and wholesale destruction of Palestinian houses, the use of deadly white phosphorus, bellicose religious advice from army rabbis and what another battalion commander described to his troops as "insane firepower with artillery and air force".
Despite official accounts that homes were only destroyed for strictly "operational" reasons, one reservist, a veteran of the conflict in Gaza since before 2005, said "I never knew such fire power" used by tanks and helicopters for the "constant destruction" of houses.
Palestinian human shields – or "johnnies" as they were termed by soldiers on the ground – were suborned to enter surrounded houses ahead of troops, including houses known to contain armed militants.
One soldier said an army rabbi had "aimed at inspiring the men with courage, cruelty aggressiveness, expressions as 'no pity. God protects you. Everything you do is sanctified'... there were specific scenarios discussed... but from the context it was pretty obvious he came to tell us how aggressive and determined we need to be, that we must win because this is a holy war"
In the process of running from pillar to post, though, the militants sought each other's help and established new lines of cooperation and coordination - and Mullah Omar once again became active. A grand shura (council) was convened in the southwest, bringing together big and small commanders, including Abdullah Saeed, al-Qaeda's commander-in-chief for Afghanistan. Mullah Omar, a source from the al-Qaeda camp told Asia Times Online, emphasized that each group should set up a coherent fighting strategy, and their preference should be Afghanistan.
Significantly, a major role was envisaged for al-Qaeda and the Afghan war will now be its prime goal. Al-Qaeda will continue to shift its manpower from the Middle East to the South Asian war theater, especially from Iraq. These men bring with them vast experience, especially in the field of improvised explosive devices and ambush techniques.
A former Vice President (really President) - we will call him Mr. Smith - gets wind that a reporter will soon be coming out with a book in which it is alleged that Smith ran a death squad, which operated in several countries, including our own. Smith knows that he will have to admit to some of this, because the reporter has managed to get some incriminating information. Smith decides that he will get ahead of this story by controlling it. Smith's version will be that he had initiated a program to assassinate ONLY the really bad guys plotting to kill us. But, he decided against activating the program because it was illegal and he was having second thoughts. In Smith's version of the story, it will be admitted that Smith did in fact mislead Congress and ordered others to do so, but ONLY because the program was never activated.
Smith will then have a few loyal pals still active in government launder this version of events by planting the story in the press. Smith won't comment for the story, but Smith's daughter will do the TV rounds and point to the article(s) and say see, it never operated and if it had it would have only gone after the really evil guys who tried to blow up America.
"In a little-noticed piece of bipartisan legislation introduced this spring — the LRA Disarmament and Northern Uganda Recovery Act — a group of U.S. lawmakers is urging the Obama administration to form a strategy for taking out one of the most dangerous rebel leaders roaming the jungles of Africa: Joseph Kony, the leader of the Lord’s Resistance Army."
"Was an attempt to carry out a 2001 presidential authorization to capture or kill al Qaeda operatives... One former senior intelligence official said the program was an attempt "to achieve a capacity to carry out something that was directed in the finding," meaning it was looking for ways to capture or kill al Qaeda chieftains...Some officials who advocated the approach were seeking to build teams of CIA and military Special Forces commandos to emulate what the Israelis did after the Munich Olympics terrorist attacks, said another former intelligence official.....Eventually Mr. Bush issued the finding that authorized the capturing of several top al Qaeda leaders, and allowed officers to kill the targets if capturing proved too dangerous or risky.Panetta also told the two Intelligence Committees that Dick Cheney had "directly ordered" the CIA to conceal the program from Congress over the past eight years.
The story of the Twin Cities men does not lend itself to facile categorizations. They make up a minuscule percentage of their Somali-American community, and it is unclear whether their transformation reflects any broader trend. Nor are they especially representative of the wider Muslim immigrant population, which has enjoyed a stable and largely middle-class existence.I just wonder why a report detailing a "miniscule percentage" that is "not especially representative" warrants a front page, above the fold placement in the Sunday Edition, complete with two page spread inside, including around 5 color photographs. I'm just saying.
"Traditional colonialism was characterized by three features: ultimate decision-making rested with the occupying power instead of the indigenous client government; the personnel of the colonial administration were governed by different laws and institutions than the colonial population; and the local political economy was shaped to serve the interests of the occupying power. All the features of classic colonialism took shape in the Bush years in Iraq and are now, as far as we can tell, being continued, in some cases even strengthened, in the early months of the Obama era."Following this is a detailed point by point breakdown of how Americans still control Iraq in matters military and economic. I think that the scariest point the author makes is how the occupation of Iraq is beginning to resemble the occupation of Palestine. (However, i would argue that the authors phrase "may have been borrowed" does not come close to indicating the level of collusion between Israel and America in Iraq):
"Recently, the occupation has also been appropriating various streets and roads for its exclusive use (an idea that may have been borrowed from Israel's 40-year-old occupation of the West Bank). This innovation has made unconvoyed transportation safer for embassy officials, contractors, and military personnel, while degrading further the Iraqi road system, already in a state of disrepair, by closing useable thoroughfares."Once Again, thank you Tomdispatch.com for not fearing the truth.
"Between 2003 and 2007 there had been an 80% increase in overall desertion rates in the Army."
"Between 2000 and 2006, more than 40,000 troops from all branches of the military deserted, more than half from the Army. Army desertion rates jumped by 42% from 2006 to 2007 alone."
"While no broad poll of troops has been conducted recently, a Zogby poll in February 2006 found that 72% of soldiers in Iraq felt the occupation should be ended within a year."The last statistic is sickly funny, because it was right after the poll when General Patreus "surged" in even more troops, continuing a military occupation which under the current SOFA must be completely dismantled by the end of 2011, save for a caveat at the end that allows either side to renegotiate it at any time. So when 72% of soldiers wanted one more year of war, the Washington Politicians settled on 5 to endless years of war.
In a phone interview with the Pashto Radio on Monday, General Beig said that there is undisputed intelligence proving the US interference in Iran.
“The documents prove that the CIA spent 400 million dollars inside Iran to prop up a colorful-hollow revolution following the election,” he added.
"In court papers Tuesday, Ghailani's lawyers asked the government to preserve secret locations known as "black sites" so they can inspect them as they gather evidence for his trial...Kaplan said he was pleased that the government will not dismantle the locations, as the CIA had indicated earlier this year it intended to do."
"This is an outrageous violation of international law against us. Our boat was not in Israeli waters, and we were on a human rights mission to the Gaza Strip," said Cynthia McKinney, a former U.S. Congresswoman and presidential candidate. "President Obama just told Israel to let in humanitarian and reconstruction supplies, and that's exactly what we tried to do. We're asking the international community to demand our release so we can resume our journey."...Thousands of Gazans whose homes were destroyed earlier during Israel's December/January massacre are still without shelter despite pledges of almost $4.5 billion in aid, because Israel refuses to allow cement and other building material into the Gaza Strip...Just before being kidnapped by Israel, Huwaida Arraf, Free Gaza Movement chairperson and delegation co-coordinator on this voyage, stated that: "No one could possibly believe that our small boat constitutes any sort of threat to Israel. We carry medical and reconstruction supplies, and children's toys.
