Jonathan Cook is a former journalist with the Observer and Guardian newspapers, now based in Nazareth, Israel. He has also written for the Times, the International Herald Tribune, Le Monde diplomatique, and Aljazeera.net. His book "Blood and Religion: The Unmasking of the Jewish and Democratic State" was recently published by Pluto Press. His website is www.jkcook.net
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Editorial: Morning Came: A letter from Palestine
Peace Palestine
07/02/06
Please forward widely
Morning came and we found that 90 of the nation's best men were captured by Israel from their homes in the night. Our mayor, who was released from four years in prison just a month ago. Someone for whom I have the utmost respect and admiration, as do his people here, political allies and opponents alike. And our vice mayor, too. The last time I talked with him, earlier this week, he was struggling a lot with chronic back pain. I wonder where they are now. If they have been fed today, or tortured. If they will sleep on beds tonight, or not at all. If they will be home tomorrow. If we will never see some of them again alive.
It's the first time Palestinians have captured an Israeli soldier in a long time; families of prisoners have begged the resistance not to release him until there is a prisoner exchange no matter what the consequences to the community -- being well acquainted with the suffering that implies. Everyone went about their business today, wedding processions in the streets, families eating ice cream and watermelon in the sticky heat. Some with the heavy numb shock of loved ones vanished suddenly, shock without surprise; they expected that the price that has been paid, and paid, and paid, for keeping one's spirit from being broken, must be paid again.
Myself, I couldn't keep from crying from time to time, although for me it is just a very small taste of the shock, seeing two good men that I know a little, powerful in their community with the power the community has entrusted them with, suddenly made helpless, pieces of meat for Israeli intelligence officers somewhere to enjoy, and knowing that if I knew them more, if I knew others, the sense of anger and sorrow and disbelief would be multiplied. I know that for the people around me these tears fell years and years ago. The anger and sorrow and loss and disbelief have happened too many times to count, but it does not diminish, to the world it is one more added to a large number, for each mother and sister and wife it is an unconsolable agony, an irreplaceable loss, an unimaginable theft, a violation of a family, a marriage, that might never be able to recover from the traumas and abuses that are being suffered, will be suffered in the days ahead.
Israel has over 10,000 Palestinian hostages, hundreds of them children, and slaughters Palestinians of any age on a daily basis. When Palestinians take 2 Israeli hostages and kill two soldiers, Israeli bombs Gaza. Bombs out the power stations, the water reticulation; no electricity, no water, bridges blasted severing cities from each other. Gaza Strip, the most densely populated area on earth on account of Israel using it as a specially designed human garbage can where refugees are disposed off and hermetically sealed off from the rest of the world.. Brilliant, but unsuccessful. If you treat humans as garbage and they know that they are humans and not garbage, they will not quietly disappear. You will never sleep safe at night. You will never have the right to sleep safe at night. May you never sleep safe at night.
A young woman in my neighborhood asked, can you believe Israel kidnapped most of our government last night? Imagine waking up to hear that Palestinian forces had kidnapped 90 Israeli government leaders. It's hard to imagine that Israel would leave one house standing, one person uninjured.
Imagine if Palestinians had the military capacity to punish Israel on a comparable scale for every 2 hostages it takes and 2 it kills. Imagine if Americans, and Europeans, valued the blood of Palestinians and Iraqis as much as their own blood. Imagine if the nations of the world used their armies to protect the lives of the innocent and bring to justice thieving, raping, murdering states. A couple days ago I sat with someone I know, who was taken hostage last night. He explained part of Hamas' interpretation of the Qur'an as follows: there are three kinds of people that Muslims have to deal with. 1) Those who treat you with respect. In this case, it is a crime against God to treat them with anything but respect, kindness, and hospitality. In other words, if a Jew wanted to immigrate to Palestine with full respect for the people here, wishing to become a member of Palestinian society, he should be welcomed. 2) Then there are those who do not respect you, and oppose you. You have no obligation to extend hospitality to them. 3) Then there are those who have no respect for your humanity, your property or your religion, they take power over your land and your lives, destroy your land and kill your people. In this case you have an obligation to fight against them to protect your land and your people. If they kill your people, you can kill their people.
Today I visited with another friend who thinks he may be captured tonight; so many of his friends were captured last night. He said, Israel doesn't care too much about the lives of the Israeli hostages, in the past there were cases of them killing the hostages themselves by indiscriminate bombing of communities. But Israel has been waiting since Hamas' election for Hamas' first military operation, and so they knew this massive attack on the community would come, sooner or later. Even though different groups have participated in the Palestinian military operations in the past few days, all of Israel's targets are Hamas leaders. Israel wants to see Hamas destroyed, Europe and America want to see Hamas destroyed, and Abu Mazen seems to be trying his best to join them. Many of those arrested were among the Hamas members that Israel exiled to the no mans land between Israel and Lebanon, a decade ago. He told me some of his friend's stories from those three terrible years, living in tents through snowy winters. He talked about the warm spirit that thrived in the tents during freezing months. He told of how hungry men went to an apricot orchard and couldn't find the owner, so they took some fruit and then tied some money in a handkerchief to the tree. When the owner found it, he tracked them down, and said to them, with tears coming down his face, what kind of men are you, starving and rejected by the world, who have such principles that you will not even take fruit that you find on a tree. I give you my fruit, I give you my orchards! I felt the poverty of being from the West, where the media can say nothing about these men except to endlessly regurgitate simpleminded slander... of those captured I know just a few names, and little of their stories. For anyone here, each of these names represents a rich story, decades of struggles, of suffering, heroism, years of prison, of pain, of courage, of trying again, of hopes betrayed, of disappointment and endurance that continues forward to find new hope.
We had this conversation over lunch in his daughter's home. She and her husband were active with Hamas and he was seized by Israel and killed in prison, leaving her with their 3 small children. Don't forget, it is America that gives Israel everything it needs to do this to us, she said. When we left, she and her three boys kissed him over and over, not knowing if tomorrow they will wake up to hear that her dad, their grandpa, has become a prisoner. This week I spent with a French student, an orphan of war in Bangladesh, who is doing research on women's views of dignity. Dignity is a word thrown around a lot in international law but without definition; people have a "right to dignity" but since no one knows what it is, when it comes right down to it violations of this right cannot be prosecuted. I helped her interview dozens of women this week, from Fatah, Hamas, PFLP, poor and wealthy, educated and illiterate, young and old. We would sit down with strangers and as soon as dignity, al karame, was mentioned, the room burst into life with passionate opinions, terrible stories, and incredibly brave and inspiring statements. Here are some of the things I heard about dignity.
There is no dignity in Palestine; we face humiliation at checkpoints, restriction from visiting our families or going to school, soldiers in our homes during the night, prison... Israel's war is first of all against our dignity which Israel attacks from every angle and with every means possible, because if it can succeed in destroying our dignity, we will not be able to resist anymore. There is tremendous dignity in Palestine; perhaps more than anywhere else in the world, because the occupation with all its mechanisms for humiliation makes us aware of our dignity; the more they try to destroy our dignity the stronger our dignity becomes; they are getting the opposite results that they want. There are two kinds of dignity: one that you get from others, when you are treated with dignity, the other comes from inside of you, from what you know about who you really are before God, and no one has the power to take this away from you unless you let them. Even if as women we are captured by Israel, stripped naked and raped in the prisons, if we resist every attack upon our dignity it will not be lost. A woman was told at a checkpoint to remove her scarf. She refused, and the soldier showed her a metal rod and said he would drive it through her eyes if she did not take it off. You can have your eyes, or you can have your dignity. She refused. He drove it through her eyes. She survived, but she is blind. And she did not lose her dignity. A friend of the Prophet Mohammad, a woman, was tied to the ground by a man who made her choose between her dignity or her life. The only thing she was able to do was to spit in his face, and she did. He killed her. But he did not destroy her dignity.
Arab people have a great source of dignity from the rich and deep history of our culture. But now all Arab lands are captive and only in Iraq and Palestine are we free within ourselves, because we do not accept the enslavement that is forced upon us; our resistance gives us great dignity.
We get our dignity from our land. It is our life. As long as we are in our land, no matter how much we suffer, we will have our dignity. If they succeed in expelling us to Jordan, our dignity will be lost forever. I have my family's olive trees. Every year I used to have precious olive oil from my own trees that I could give generously to my friends and neighbors. Now Israel has killed half of my trees and imprisoned the rest. These trees are like my own children. It is a terrible, terrible sorrow and shame for me each day to know that I am powerless to help them. Now, when we need olive oil for ourselves, we have to go to the store and buy it. But I was one who could generously give olive oil to my friends and relatives.
We get our dignity from Islam, as women, and as human beings. In our culture, before Islam, women were just seen as property, baby girls could be buried alive. We see women in many parts of the world who have no dignity. Islam has given us our full rights as women in every sense, and full equality with every other human being. In the Qur'an God says that he has given the same dignity to every human being - it does not depend on whether you are male or female, or whether you are Muslim or from another religion, each of us has the same worth.
What do you expect and hope for in the future?
Things will get much, much worse. It is written that we will suffer like this until near the end.
Our hope comes from knowing that Jesus will come back and will remove all injustice from the earth, and at last the race of mankind will be free to live in peace and equality.
What do you believe should be the political outcome for Palestine?
If only they would all go back where they came from, we could live in peace in our homes and land again.
We can never live with them; if someone has killed your children, can you accept them as a neighbor?
We already live with them, of course we can in the future.
We cannot live with them, we must have a state, and they must have a state. About all the refugees who have their homes and lands in Israel, I don't know........
We can live with them in one state, the refugees must be given back their homes and their land.
If we have an Islamic state on all of Palestine, it is the only way we will be able to live together, us and them, because Islam is the only system where equality between people of different religions is protected.
Do you think negotiations or armed struggle is the best strategy at this time?
Of course, if we could get our rights back without violence, that would be the best way. If negotiations ever worked, then we should use that instead of armed struggle, but they have never produced anything. We have to keep fighting to protect our land and our community. How could it be right to do nothing when daily they are attacking our lives and our land?
As a woman would you participate in armed struggle?
I admire women who do, but I myself don't think I'm capable of it.
My contribution is to study and be a good mother to my children.
No, I don't think women should carry weapons.
Yes! It would be a great honor to fight for my country! Yes! How I wish we had the chance to be trained as soldiers like all the Israeli women are. I am not married yet, but I hope that one day I will have a son who will give his life for our country to be free.
The Americans, Europeans and Israelis place more value on the blood of their dogs and cats than they do on the blood of Palestinians. None of us can ever forget the sight of little Huda screaming for her father on the beach of Gaza, throwing herself on the sand next to his dead body over and over. No one in the world has expressed their outrage, or even sorrow, to us about these atrocities against us. They care deeply about the Mundial, and Huda's agony is an interruption, a distraction, from the soccer score. Our blood is so, so cheap to the world, and Israeli blood is so valuable. They do not see our humanity at all.
How do you find your sense of your own humanity, when all the world is telling you your life, your death, your blood is worthless?
When it comes down to that, we know that God sees us, even if we are suffering in an Israeli torture chamber and no one in our family knows if where we are or if we are alive or dead, we know that God sees us and knows our value, our humanity. We belong to him, and in that is our worth, and our hope, our fates are in his hands and our lives are very precious to him, no matter how worthless they are to our brothers and sisters in the human race, and in the end, that is what matters. We know who we are. Our lives, our deaths, our suffering, our hopes, our disappointment, are not insignificant.
Yesterday I met a new appointee from the German government in Jerusalem, a young guy with an American accent. He was happy that Hamas and Fatah had agreed on the Prisoners' Document. Great, we've gotten Hamas to recognize Israel, he said. Now we just have to get them to renounce armed struggle, and then get rid of these ideas of an Islamic state. The problem is when we bring democracy to the middle east, we always have to deal with the challenge of making sure there is a secular state when so many people want an Islamic state. (Jewish states, apparently, are just dandy.) What these Palestinians just don't understand, he said, is that armed struggle won't get them anywhere. Haven't they learned anything, after all these years? It's really hurting their image in the international community. Well, I said sarcastically, since you understand this so well, and none of the Palestinians have been able to grasp it, maybe you should explain it to them then. Oh, I am, every Palestinian I meet, he said with sincerity.
And what is that dazzling offer that Europe will extend, if Palestinians promise to sit on their hands and open their mouths? In exchange for your dignity, what? Maybe longlife, lifelong food rations? Maybe the chance to clean toilets in Israel, and the dream that your grandchildren could do the same?
I have not been here too long, but it is long enough to be sure of one thing: It is the Europeans, the Israelis, and the American who fail to grasp the central truth, after all these decades of trying to finetune the catastrophe they have engineered in Palestine: these women and men and children, who carry their heads so high, know who they are. They are prepared to sacrifice their lives, but they are not prepared to sacrifice their dignity. While the world discusses the moral or strategic aspects of armed resistance, there is no confusion about these issues here. Undefended, dignity, and the land, would be lost, and death would be better. With or without your permission, they will continue to fight.
[ Original ]
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Editorial: Signs Economic Commentary
Donald Hunt
Signs of the Times
July 3, 2006
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Editorial: The Failed Administration of George W. Bush
July 3, 2006
Rodrigue Tremblay
The New American Empire
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Editorial: American Patriots
The Nation
Sun July 2, 2006
Patriotism, Tom Paine observed, is not best measured in times of national comfort and quiet. It is in times of crisis, when the summer soldiers and sunshine patriots have retreated to the safety of official talking points and unquestioning loyalty, that those who truly understand the meaning and merit of the American experiment come to its defense. On the 230th anniversary of the launch of that experiment, let us reflect on those who have met the test, noting in particular that some of the boldest expressions of patriotism have come from groups not necessarily associated with dissent.
Consider America's librarians. Since the enactment of the Patriot Act in 2001, the American Library Association (ALA) has been at the forefront of the fight to defend freedom of inquiry and thought from provisions of the act that allow the Justice Department to subpoena the records of libraries and bookstores. The librarians succeeded in getting the House to adopt language protecting library records in 2005--only to have it stripped from the bill to which it was attached by an Administration-friendly House-Senate conference committee.
But the librarians have not just been lobbying to change the Patriot Act, they've been on the front lines of exposing its abuses. When four Connecticut librarians challenged an attempt by the FBI to use a National Security Letter to obtain records of who was reading what in that state, the Justice Department slapped a gag order on them. But the 64,000-member ALA and its Freedom to Read Foundation stood up for the librarians, working with the American Civil Liberties Union, the Association of American Publishers and the American Booksellers Foundation for Free Expression to make a federal case of the issue. In May, after the FBI dropped its defense of the gag order--and shortly before it withdrew its demand for the records--a federal appeals court declared that order moot, and the librarians were at last free to speak out. Peter Chase, director of the Plainville, Connecticut, public library, explained that he and his fellow librarians decided to fight because of their frustration at receiving the National Security Letter even as "the government was telling Congress that it didn't use the Patriot Act against libraries and that no one's rights had been violated. I felt that I just could not be part of this fraud being foisted on our nation."
The ALA isn't the only group challenging the Administration's disregard for basic liberties. The American Bar Association is investigating whether George W. Bush exceeded his constitutional authority when he reserved the right to ignore more than 750 laws enacted since he took office. The American Medical Association has adopted guidelines that make it unethical for physicians to participate in interrogating detainees. And 399 communities and eight states have answered the Bill of Rights Defense Committee's call for passing resolutions upholding civil liberties.
Those defenders of basic rights are the patriotic heroes of this Fourth of July, as are those who exercise those rights, like the Code Pink members, who will fast for peace outside the Bush White House on the Fourth, and the Raging Grannies, who will join parades and picnics around the country. Fittingly, in the city where it all began, a fife-and-drum corps will lead a parade of anti-Iraq War activists through the streets of Philadelphia on the eve of the Fourth to a gathering where they will sign a Declaration of Peace. They are responding to Paine's call, as relevant now as it was more than 200 years ago: "Ye that dare oppose not only the tyranny but the tyrant, stand forth!"
[ Original ]
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How to Start WWIII
Israel warns: free soldier or PM dies
Middle East correspondent Martin Chulov
July 01, 2006
SRAEL last night threatened to assassinate Palestinian Prime Minister Ismael Haniyeh if Hamas militants did not release a captured Israeli soldier unharmed.
The unprecedented warning was delivered to Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas in a letter as Israel debated a deal offered by Hamas to free Corporal Gilad Shalit.
It came as Israeli military officials readied a second invasion force for a huge offensive into Gaza.
Hamas's Gaza-based political leaders, including Mr Haniyeh, had already gone into hiding.
But last night's direct threat to kill Mr Haniyeh, a democratically elected head of state, sharply raised the stakes.
The bid to free Corporal Shalit was brokered by Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak, who last night warned Hamas it faced severe consequences if it did not curb its "extreme stance" and described the growing conflict as a lightning rod for Palestinian vengeance.
Jerusalem has made no official comment, but Egyptian state media said Israel had found the offer unacceptable. Israel has not spelt out the terms demanded by Hamas, but earlier this week it refused to buy into talk of a prisoner swap.
Thousands of Hamas supporters protested in Gaza City late on Thursday over the arrest by Israeli forces of up to 32 Hamas MPs on the West Bank that day.
A Hamas spokesman said the group would never recognise Israel, in spite of a deal its leaders signed this week offering implicit recognition of the Jewish state in return for easing an economic blockade.
Israeli fighter jets bombed 20 targets in Gaza, including the Interior Ministry, which it said had been used by militants to stage meetings, while artillery hit the northern strip with 500 shells in the 24 hours until yesterday morning.
Jewish settler Eliyahu Asheri, who was murdered by militants this week, was buried on Thursday as leaders of the Popular Resistance Committees pledged to seize more hostages in the West Bank. No further word has emerged about another suspected Jewish hostage, Noach Moskowitz, who Israeli police said was found dead hours after Mr Asheri's remains were found.
Much of Gaza, including two main hospitals, was without power and running water as a UN aid chief warned that the 1.4 million residents of the strip were three days away from a humanitarian crisis.
"They are heading for the abyss unless they get electricity and fuel restored," said emergency relief co-ordinator Jan Egeland, who urged militants to free Corporal Shalit and stop firing rockets into Israel.
Residents complain that sonic booms caused by Israeli jets traumatise children and that shelling confines families to their homes.
Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert has vowed the military will do all it can to avoid civilian deaths if a full-scale assault is launched.
Mr Olmert said the decision to invade northern Gaza had already been delayed to allow Mr Mubarak's negotiations to continue.
The arrested Hamas legislators have been sent to security prisons and many will stand trial on terrorism offences. The detentions have hurt Hamas's already limited ability to govern and are likely to force a regime change.
Israel claims it has intelligence about the area where Corporal Shalit is held, but has been unable to pinpoint the exact location. Mr Olmert said the military would leave the strip if he was unconditionally and safely returned.
Egypt and the neighbouring Arab states of Jordan and Lebanon fear a war between Israel and the Palestinians could lead to uprisings within their own borders, which house many Palestinian refugees.
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Israel strike hits Palestinian PM's office
By IBRAHIM BARZAK
Associated Press
July 2, 2006
GAZA CITY, Gaza Strip - Israeli aircraft blasted the Palestinian prime minister's office early Sunday during the fifth straight night of airstrikes aimed at winning the freedom of an Israeli soldier held captive by Hamas militants in Gaza.
The attack on Ismail Haniyeh's empty office came amid continued diplomatic efforts involving Egypt and other regional players to end the standoff, which have been under way since Cpl. Gilad Shalit, 19, was seized a week ago in a cross-border raid.
Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and Defense Minister Amir Peretz were to meet with security officials later Sunday to discuss whether to give diplomacy more time or to escalate the military operation.
Late last week, Olmert called off plans to broaden the Israeli incursion from southern Gaza to the coastal strip's north in a nod to the diplomatic activity.
On Sunday, he hinted at possible escalation when he said his government had instructed the military to "do all it can" to return Shalit safely.
Palestinians said two missiles fired by attack helicopters set Haniyeh's office ablaze, but it was empty because of the late hour, witnesses said. One bystander was slightly injured.
Inspecting the wreckage, Haniyeh called the attack senseless. "They have targeted a symbol for the Palestinian people," he said.
The Israeli military said, however, it would "employ all means at its disposal ... to secure the safe return" of Shalit. Roni Bar-On, an Israeli Cabinet minister, said the attack was also meant to "compromise the Hamas government's ability to rule."
"We will strike and will continue to strike at (Hamas') institutions," he said. "They have to understand that we will not continue to let them run amok."
Hamas, whose charter calls for Israel's destruction, took power after winning Palestinian parliamentary elections in January.
Although Israel has said repeatedly in the past that Haniyeh could be a target for assassination, the gunmen holding Shalit are thought to take their orders from Hamas'
Syria-based political chief, Khaled Mashaal, so the attack on Haniyeh's office appeared to be more symbolic than aimed at killing him.
In other airstrikes after midnight, Israeli aircraft hit a school in Gaza City and Hamas facilities in northern Gaza, where a Hamas militant was killed and another wounded, Palestinian officials said. The military said the two were "planning terror attacks against Israel."
The 34-year-old Hamas gunman, Shaaban Manoun, was the second militant killed in the offensive.
Exerting pressure on Hamas from various directions, Israel continued to hold 64 Hamas leaders, including eight Cabinet ministers, rounded up in the West Bank on Thursday. Military officials said the government would bring the detainees to court by midweek to seek permission to extend their detention.
After the Israeli airstrike on his office, Haniyeh met with Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas for an hour to discuss the Israeli attacks and efforts to keep the government functioning despite the arrests, the prime minister's office said.
In a statement, Haniyeh called for foreign intervention to stop the Israeli offensive. "The international community must shoulder its responsibility," he said.
Israel, meanwhile, planned to reopen its main cargo crossing with Gaza later Sunday to allow food and medical supplies to reach the impoverished strip, the Defense Ministry said. The Karni passage, sealed after the militant attack, will be open four days this week, the ministry said.
While food shortages have not been reported, human rights groups have cautioned that Gaza could face a humanitarian crisis because nearly half the territory's electricity supply was knocked out after Israeli missiles struck Gaza's only power station. Israel has since increased its supply of electricity to Gaza, the Israeli army said Saturday.
Fuel supplies were also dwindling after Israel cut off the flow to Gaza through a pipeline. Israel Radio reported that a separate crossing in southern Israel would be opened later Sunday to allow fuel through, but the Defense Ministry did not confirm this.
On Saturday, Hamas demanded the release of more than 1,000 prisoners held by Israel and a halt to the offensive, but Israel rejected the conditions out of hand. On Sunday, Bar-On reiterated that Israel wouldn't negotiate Shalit's release.
Hamas government spokesman Ghazi Hamad urged Israel to be more flexible.
"I think that if the Israeli government will understand that it's possible to release prisoners, things will end OK," Hamad told Army Radio. "If not, I think the situation will be very difficult for us and for you, too. ... Maybe there will be a (military) escalation and people will die."
Peretz met with senior security officials Saturday night and then called U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice to urge the Bush administration to step up pressure on Syria to work for Shalit's release, Israeli officials said on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to make a formal statement.
Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan of Turkey, a predominantly Muslim country that has close ties with Israel, called President Bush on Saturday and talked for 30 minutes about the crisis.
"The president said that the initial goal should be freeing the Israeli soldier - that is the key to ending the crisis," said Frederick Jones, spokesman for the National Security Council at the White House.
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Israeli forces gather along Gaza border
By RAVI NESSMAN
Associated Press
July 3, 2006
GAZA CITY, Gaza Strip - Israel massed tanks and troops along Gaza's northern border early Monday, firing artillery and unleashing more airstrikes in a show of force after the prime minister ordered his army to "do all it can" to free an abducted soldier.
At daybreak Monday, a small force of Israeli tanks entered northern Gaza, but the military said it was a "limited" mission to find explosives and tunnels near the border fence.
Prime Minister Ehud Olmert's warning signaled the government was losing patience with diplomatic efforts to end the week-old crisis over the captive soldier, Cpl. Gilad Shalit, and was preparing for a possible escalation of its military offensive.
However, political and security officials said that Israeli military and political leaders have not ruled out swapping 19-year-old Shalit for Palestinian prisoners who weren't involved in hostile activity against Israel, though they didn't think a deal was near. The officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were discussing private conversations.
Publicly, Israel has refused to discuss the captive with Palestinian militants and rejected their demand to release some of the 9,000 Palestinian prisoners held in Israeli jails.
Israeli aircraft went back into action early Monday, hitting several targets around the Gaza Strip including a building in Gaza City where the Al Aqsa Martyrs' Brigades has an office, Palestinians and the military said. Al Aqsa is a violent offshoot of moderate Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas' Fatah movement.
A missile struck the second floor of the two-story building, setting it on fire. No one was in the office at the time of the attack, after midnight. A family living on the first floor escaped harm. Other areas hit in the airstrikes included a building in northern Gaza and empty fields.
Israel also shelled northern Gaza early Monday, slightly wounding one person in a house on the outskirts of the town of Beit Hanoun, Palestinians said. The military confirmed artillery was fired in the area.
Shelling from the sea, Israeli navy ships aimed at a beachfront Hamas camp but missed, Palestinian security officials said.
Israeli aircraft, gunboats and artillery have pounded Gaza since troops and tanks took up positions in the south of the coastal strip on Wednesday. The operation is aimed at pressuring Palestinians to free Shalit. Five Palestinian fighters had been reported killed, four of them on Sunday.
Israel has been massing forces across from Beit Hanoun in northern Gaza. Olmert called off a planned invasion late last week, but there were signs that the military was ready to roll again.
Hamas-affiliated militants holding Shalit have offered to give Israel information about him in exchange for the release of hundreds of prisoners in Israeli jails, a deal Israel rejects.
"These are difficult days for Israel, but we have no intention of giving in to any form of blackmailing," Olmert said Sunday. "Everyone understands that giving in to terror today means an invitation to the next act of terrorism, and we will not act that way."
Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice called Olmert Sunday to discuss the situation, Olmert's office said in a statement. He told Rice Israel would use all means at its disposal to get Shalit released and said there was no humanitarian crisis in Gaza.
Palestinian officials had warned Saturday that a shortage of fuel threatened to shut down generators used to pump water and power hospitals.
Israel reopened the main cargo crossing with Gaza to allow 50 trucks of food, medical supplies and fuel into Gaza from Israel, Israeli officials said. Trucks carrying diesel fuel, gasoline and natural gas also began entering northeastern Gaza through the Nahal Oz border crossing.
"I take personal responsibility for what is happening in Gaza. I want nobody to sleep at night in Gaza. I want them to know what its like," Olmert told his Cabinet. "People are saying it's uncomfortable. It will be uncomfortable, (but) nobody dies from being uncomfortable."
Olmert told the Cabinet he had instructed the military to "do all it can" to get Shalit back safely, but added that the offensive would end immediately if he was released, according to a meeting participant who spoke on condition of anonymity.
Last week, Israel arrested eight Cabinet ministers in the Hamas-led Palestinian government and dozens of other Hamas lawmakers in the West Bank.
Olmert indicated to the Cabinet that more such arrests may be coming in Gaza, Hamas' power base where many of its leaders including Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh, live.
Egypt has been working to broker a compromise to free the soldier and end the standoff, but negotiations were complicated by confusion over who was in charge of Shalit's fate.
The Palestinian government, led by the Islamic militants of Hamas since January elections, said it had no contact with the kidnappers. Israel assumes Shalit's captors answer to Hamas leader Khaled Mashaal, who lives in Syria, but the group's foreign leadership denied having any authority over the matter.
"We have no contact with those holding the prisoner," said Osama Hamdan, a top Hamas leader based in Lebanon.
Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak was trying to enlist Syrian President Bashar Assad's help to persuade Hamas leaders to free Shalit, while Egypt's intelligence chief was talking with Mashaal directly, an Egyptian official said. But Israeli Vice Premier Shimon Peres said Sunday that Syria has not acted to help free the soldier.
Raising the stakes, Israeli aircraft launched two missiles into the Palestinian prime minister's empty office building before dawn Sunday, damaging offices and leaving parts of the building smoldering.
Abbas, a rival of Haniyeh's from the moderate Fatah Party, surveyed the damage with Haniyeh and called the attack "a dirty, criminal act."
The strike, which came after Israel destroyed the interior minister's office, was a clear signal no one was immune.
"I remain very concerned about the need to preserve Palestinian institutions and infrastructure," U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan said Sunday. "They will be the basis for an eventual two-state solution and are thus in the interests of both Israel and the Palestinians. It would therefore seem inadvisable to carry out actions that will have the opposite effect."
Hamas militants said they would retaliate if Israel continued attacking Palestinian institutions. Hamas is responsible for dozens of deadly suicide bombings in Israel.
An airstrike Sunday hit a school in Gaza City and Hamas facilities in northern Gaza, where a Hamas militant became the second Palestinian fatality since the offensive started, Palestinian officials said. The Israeli military said the militant was "planning terror attacks against Israel."
In other violence Sunday, Israeli artillery pounded open areas near the southern town of Khan Younis. Israeli troops shot dead three armed Palestinians near the long-closed Gaza airport, two of them carrying explosive belts, the military said.
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Gaza Camp swelters with little power or water
Chris McGreal in Nuseirat refugee camp
Monday July 3, 2006
The Guardian
For the 58,000 residents of Nuseirat, a refugee camp south of Gaza City, life has got very much tougher over recent days as Israel squeezes ordinary Palestinians in an effort to win the release of Corporal Gilad Shalit, who was captured a week ago by Palestinian militias and is thought to be held in a Gaza refugee camp.
Nuseirat not only lost electricity, along with most of the rest of the Gaza Strip, when Israel bombed the territory's power station last Wednesday, but its water supply was all but severed when a bridge carrying the main pipe was blown up by an Israeli jet.
Amal al-Najar and her sister, Fatma al-Hor, have 12 children between them. "When you have children, not having water is a real problem," said Mrs Najar. "I can't clean my children properly. I can't clean my house. I can't wash clothes."
The UN estimates that about 130,000 Gazans have been left without a regular supply of fresh water and that many more receive it only sporadically or in sufficient quantities for drinking and cooking but not for bathing and laundry.
The Gaza Strip lost about 60% of its electricity when the Israeli airforce struck six transformers with missiles at the territory's only power plant. Gaza gets its remaining power from Israel and that is now being rationed with each town and refugee camp receiving electricity for a few hours a day. But without regular refrigeration meat has turned rotten and dairy products cannot be kept.
Israel also shut down deliveries of fuel. On Saturday there were long queues for petrol but by yesterday the pumps had dried up and garages were closed. There is also a dire shortage of diesel for generators.
In the summer heat and without power for fans, the Najar family spend the nights outside in the cool air, at least until the early hours, when Israeli jets rouse Gaza's population with sonic booms.
The planes break the sound barrier over Gaza, creating waves of pressure and noise that in the first instance are hardly distinguishable from a real and massive explosion. The sound bomb appears to be very close by no matter where a person is. The booms are powerful enough to blow out windows.
"The sonic booms are terrible for the children," said Mrs Hor. "They wake up and scream and come running out of their room. We adults get used to it because although it is very loud and shocking we know it is not a bomb. But the children are frightened every time."
An Israeli MP said yesterday that the prime minister, Ehud Olmert, had told the military to "make sure no one sleeps in Gaza at night".
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Gaza: 'The children wake up screaming. I am worried it will damage them'
UK Independent
By Donald Macintyre
03 July 2006
Mahmoud Mughari speaks bluntly. "I normally wash and shower twice a day. Now I can only do it every four or five days. The children smell. We all smell. We are worried that this will cause diseases."
Outside the home in central Gaza he and his own family share with his elderly parents, five married brothers and their children - 48 in all - Mr Mughari was describing the impact made by Israel's air strikes in Gaza last week, one of which severed the water pipe serving this refugee camp of 57,000 people.
The first problem, Mr Mughari, says, is that power - which would normally be running, among much else, refrigeration and fans in the current 91F (33C) temperatures - has been cut from 24 hours a day to eight hours a day.
This is itself a function of Palestinian engineers reallocating some of the electricity half of Gaza takes from Israel to the other half previously dependent on the Gaza power station whose transformers were destroyed in Wednesday's missile attack. The second is that water previously available two days out of three is now available for only four to five hours every third day. And the third is that the impossibility so far of ensuring electricity and water coincide makes it impossible to pump the water up to the roof tanks and provide a steady supply through the taps.
They have been storing their rationed supplies in two blue 250- litre barrels, saving most of it for drinking and - when it is possible - for cooking. And to escape the heat, he says, members of the family have started sleeping on mattresses on the pavement outside the house. The latest crisis has compounded the problems of the Mughari family ever since Hamas provoked an international economic blockade of the Palestinian Authority by winning last January's election.
Mr Mughari, one of only two brothers working - the other three are unemployed tailors - has not received the £134-per-month salary for three months from the job creation scheme on which he works. While the family are eligible for UN food aid, he says their meat consumption has fallen from three or four times a week to once a fortnight.
The family is also coming to terms with the resumption of the deliberate sonic booms, or "bombs", generated by Israeli F-16s overflying Gaza, starting in the predawn hours. "The children wake up screaming and run into my room," he says. "Some of them understand that this is just a very loud noise, but Mai, my four-year-old daughter thinks it is a real bombardment. I am worried that it will affect them psychologically in the future."
If the purpose of Israel's military campaign so far is to secure a major shift in Palestinian public opinion, it does not appear to have worked. Flanked by his parents and many of his own and his brothers' children, Mr Mughari says that even if there is an Israeli ground incursion: "We'll take it even if it gets worse."
There are few overt signs of preparations by militants, but Mr Mughari adds: "If [the Israelis] come here they will not get roses. There will be resistance." He adds of Cpl Shalit's abduction: "My personal opinion is that there should be a prison exchange."
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Flashback: Iran And Syria Sign Defense Agreement
by Farhad Pouladi
AFP
June 16, 2006
Tehran - Defense ministers from close allies Iran and Syria on Thursday signed an agreement for military cooperation against what they called the "common threats" presented by Israel and the United States. In a joint press conference, Iranian Defense Minister Mostafa Mohammad Najjar and visiting Syrian counterpart Hassan Turkmani said their talks had been aimed at consolidating their defense efforts and strengthening support for one another.
"Our cooperation is based on a strategic pact and unity against common threats. We can have a common front against Israel's threats," Turkmani told reporters after two intensive rounds of talks with Najjar.
"Our cooperation with the Iranians against Israeli threats is nothing secret and we regularly consult about this with our friends," he said.
Before the press conference, Iran's defense ministry said the two sides "stressed strengthening mutual ties and the necessity to preserve peace and stability in the region."
The defense ministry statement also said they discussed "ridding the region of weapons of mass destruction," in an apparent reference to the widely held belief that Israel possesses nuclear warheads.
The United States has led opposition to Iran's nuclear program, which Tehran insists is aimed at civilian energy purposes but which Washington suspects is a cover for atomic weapons-making.
US President George W. Bush has advocated diplomacy to resolve the international row over Iran's aims but has also said "all options are on the table" if Iran refuses to halt sensitive uranium enrichment work.
Washington has included Syria in its so-called axis of evil that also comprises Iran and North Korea, citing these nations as "supporters of terrorism."
Asked about US threats against Damascus and Tehran, both top brass brushed off the importance of such threats.
"This is nothing new, we will resist these threats," the Syrian defense minister said.
However, Turkmani dismissed the possibility of hosting an Iranian military base on Syrian soil.
"The language of a (foreign) military base in our country is alien to us. I want to say that it is not on the agenda," he added.
The Iranian defense minister said: "US threats are a kind of psychological operation. It is not new. With unity among the region's nations, these threats will not prevail."
Although the two refused to give specifics about the agreement for military cooperation, Najjar said Iran "considers Syria's security its own security, and we consider our defense capabilities to be those of Syria."
Najjar also shrugged off reports that Iran could pose a threat to the region.
"Iran is ready to sign a non aggression pact with regional countries," he said.
"Our military warfare equipment is based on deterrent policies and strategy. Enemies should know about our capabilities and should not even think about an assault against us," he said in response to a question about the optimization process going on for the medium range Shahab-3 missile.
Iran's Shahab-3 missiles have a range of 2,000 kilometers (1,280 miles), capable of hitting arch-enemy Israel and US bases across the Middle East.
Najjar added that the Syrian side has purchased some Iranian military equipment, but did not elaborate on the purchased items and did not say whether the purchases were made as part of Thursday's agreement.
Turkmani started an official visit to Tehran on Sunday.
During his trip, Turkmani has also met with President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, the Islamic republic's military chiefs and visited Iranian military factories in Isfahan and Tehran.
Comment: So, Iran and Syria band together, Bush gives Iran until July 5th to give up its "nuclear weapons programs", and Israel invades Gaza and accuses Syria of harboring terrorists. Yes indeed, things are progressing quite nicely...
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Nuke programme 'will continue'
News24.com
01/07/2006
Tehran - Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has said Tehran will continue its uranium enrichment programme, despite international calls to halt the sensitive project, reported state television on Saturday.
"The Iranian government and the people have decided, and without any doubt with dignity and glory we will pass this phase," said Ahmadinejad, after explaining Iran's fuel cycle programme to Ivory Coast President Laurent Gbagbo in Gambia.
Ahmadinejad is in Gambia to address the African Union summit.
Tehran is under mounting pressure to respond to an international offer that would defuse the nuclear standoff.
World powers gave Iran one more week on Thursday, to provide a "clear and substantive response" to an international proposal on suspending uranium enrichment.
Tehran has rejected the deadline.
Iran will reply to proposal in August
Foreign ministers of the G8 group of leading nations said European Union foreign policy chief Javier Solana and Iran's head nuclear negotiator, Ali Larijani, would meet to discuss the plan on Wednesday.
"We expect to hear a clear and substantive Iranian response to these proposals at the planned meeting," said the ministers in a statement from Moscow, where they were preparing a July 15 to 17 summit in Saint Petersburg.
But speaking at the United Nations in New York, Iranian foreign minister Manouchehr Mottaki said Tehran would not respond before late August.
Solana handed Iran the proposal from the five permanent UN security council members - Britain, China, France, Russia and the United States - as well as Germany, on June 6.
The proposal promises incentives and multilateral talks if Iran agrees to temporarily halt uranium enrichment.
Diplomats said Iran was asked to reply by June 29. Last week, Ahmadinejad said Tehran would take until August 22 to answer.
Iran said its nuclear programme was to generate electricity and that uranium enrichment was needed to provide the fuel.
The EU and the US suspect Iran of concealing a military weapons project.
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FBI and Western Union helped Israel With targeted assassinations
By Shmuel Rosner
Haaretz Correspondent
06/30/06
WASHINGTON - From the spring of 2003 until autumn 2004, the Shin Bet security service tracked down Palestinian terror cells in the West Bank thanks to information from the Western Union money transfer service, which was passed on by the FBI.
This fact was disclosed in a book published this week about America's war on terror after September 11, 2001. In "The One Percent Doctrine," author Ron Suskind connects the transfer of intelligence from the FBI to the Shin Bet with several targeted assassinations carried out by Israel during this period.
Suskind, who is considered a reliable journalist, describes how major private companies cooperated with government agencies such as the FBI, the CIA, the National Security Agency and the Treasury to monitor communications and financial transfers after September 11, in operations of questionable legality.
The FBI's most important connection during this period was with First Data, an Omaha-based electronic fund transfer company with a global reach. The company offered to assist the U.S. government in the war against terror.
FBI Financial Crimes Section chief Dennis Lormel and his colleagues at other intelligence agencies eventually realized that the information supplied by the company could be used not only to locate and freeze the assets of terror groups, but also to track them in real time - in other words, to follow the money trail directly to the sources and destinations of the funds.
First Data subsidiary Western Union, with branches throughout the Arab world and a high volume of money transfers, was in a perfect position to help. American intelligence agents and company officials cooperated in tracking the data trail and in monitoring security cameras installed in Western Union branches in order to see who was picking up the funds.
According to the book, then Shin Bet head Avi Dichter, whom Suskind calls an agent of change in the U.S. war against terror, was briefed by Lormel on the new monitoring capabilities during one of his frequent visits to Washington.
In April 2003, Dichter called Lormel to ask for the FBI's help in this regard. Dichter told officials that the Shin Bet had information about a courier who was expected to be bringing money to Israel from Lebanon shortly. The source of the money was known, but not the identity of the person for whom its was destined.
In early April, 2003, an Islamic Jihad activist went to a Western Union office in Lebanon and ordered a money transfer to Hebron. The Justice Department authorized Western Union to release this information to the FBI and the CIA, and eventually to the Shin Bet. According to Suskind, all this took just minutes, enabling Israeli intelligence to track the person who collected the transfer in Hebron and to uncover the terror cell.
According to the book, this method was used successfully many times over the next year and a half, until autumn 2004, when Palestinian operatives realized that their Western Union transfers were being used to trap them.
Dichter told Haaretz on Wednesday that he has never spoken with Suskind.
Intelligence cooperation between the U.S. and Israel has increased over the past several years, but until now, Israel's use of information from American companies had been kept secret.
The Homeland Security Committee of the U.S. House of Representatives approved a bill last week aimed at further increasing intelligence ties with Israel and other countries by establishing a new office for international cooperation programs within the Department of Homeland Security.
This atmosphere of cooperation, Suskind states in his book, has reinforced the sense that President George Bush wants to assist Israel and was not disturbed by the military operations that Ariel Sharon's government authorized in the territories. Suskind quotes Bush as saying during his first National Security Council meeting that the U.S. must refrain from active mediation in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
To then secretary of state Colin Powell's argument that such behavior could be interpreted by Sharon's government as a green light to apply force, Bush responded that sometimes a show of force can clarify the issue at hand.
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Israeli rally opposes Gaza offensive
Rachel Shabi
Sunday 02 July 2006
Al-Jazeerah
Hundreds of protesters gathered outside the Israeli prime minister's home on Saturday night to denounce the government as war criminals and demand an end to the Gaza invasion.
Demonstrators stood outside Ehud Olmert's official residence in Jerusalem holding banners that read, "Stop, war crimes ahead," and "Swap hostages now!"
The protest follows smaller actions on the same theme in the past few days at the Sufa army base near the southern Gaza border and outside the defence ministry in Tel Aviv.
Last night's demonstration was organised by Yesh Gvul, the peace movement that supports refusal to serve in the Israeli Army.
Police and organisers estimated 600 people attended the protest.
Yishai Menuhin, a spokesman for Yesh Gvul, said: "We call for our government to stop targeting Palestinian civilians - the targeting of civilians is a war crime - and start negotiating with the elected Palestinian leaders, not to arrest them."
Military solution
Aviv Sela, a 19-year-old who has been jailed for refusing to serve in the army, said at the protest: "The military solution is not a solution."
He added that, while not everyone is prepared to go to prison, "everyone has the strength to say no" to the attack on Gaza.
Other demonstrators chanted, "The occupation is terror, the refuser is a hero."
Within Israel, the Gaza invasion is being portrayed as an attempt to release an Israeli hostage, 19-year-old corporal Gilad Shalit.
The soldier was snatched during a raid on Israeli positions outside Gaza last Sunday, in which two Israeli soldiers and two Palestinian attackers were killed.
Prisoner of war
Tamar Gozansky, a former Knesset member, said on Saturday night: "The soldier is not a hostage, he is a prisoner of war. Israel is holding about 7,000 Palestinian prisoners in jail."
Demonstrators believe that the Gaza invasion had little to do with the kidnapped soldier. "It is not self-defence and it is not new - Israel has been dropping artillery shells on Gaza and attacking the population for months," said Zvi Schuldiner, who attended the protest.
"People have been in the army and know the difference between acts of terrorism and this classic and very daring commando act, of fighters against soldiers," said veteran peace activist, Uri Avneri.
Commentators on the left say that the wider Israeli public is critical of the Gaza invasion, not least because there is little trust for the leadership of Olmert and the defence minister, Amir Peretz.
"There is a growing doubt about it, the gap between what the government says and what logic says is getting bigger from day to day," said Avneri.
A recent poll in the newspaper Yediot Aharonot shows 58% in favour of a prisoner swap to release Shalit.
But Saturday night's demonstrators were not hopeful of getting such a message through to the government.
Would the prime minister be paying attention to the demonstration outside his house? "We hear he's really enjoying the world cup," said Menuhin.
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Israel to release prisoners without "terror conviction"
www.chinaview.cn 2006-07-03 17:14:46
JERUSALEM, July 3 (Xinhua) -- Israeli army officials have said that Palestinian prisoners who are not convicted of "terror activities" will be freed if a deal of swap is reached to bring about the release of a kidnapped Israeli soldier, local newspaper Ha'aretz reported on Monday.
However, the officials also said that they did not think Israel and the Palestinians were close to reaching such a deal.
The prisoners to be released are those who have not been involved in planning or carrying out "terror attacks", the officials were quoted as saying, adding that those "with blood on their hands" will not be set free.
They also said that the Israeli army would be willing to release Hamas ministers and legislators, as well as security prisoners jailed for relatively minor offenses, according to the report.
The army has formulated a draft deal to gain the release of the 19-year-old Corporal Gilad Shalit who was abducted by Palestinian militants on June 25 after days of discussion among Defense Minister Amir Peretz, Israel Defense Forces Chief of Staff Dan Halutz and top defense brass, said the report.
The draft deal also agrees to stop an ongoing broad military operation in Gaza in exchange for a halt to Palestinian militant rocket firing, attacks on Israeli troops and citizens and abductions, the report added.
The deal, meanwhile, reserves Israel's right to defense itself and to foil attacks by Palestinian militants, it said.
Earlier, Palestinian militants who held Shalit hostage set an early Tuesday ultimatum for Israel to meet their demands to release Palestinian women and minors and 1,000 prisoners in Israeli jails.
The militants also threatened unspecified consequences if Israel failed to do so.
Israel, however, has so far rejected a prisoner swap, insisting on the unconditional release of Shalit.
Israeli troops entered the Gaza Strip on June 28 in a bid to rescue the kidnapped Shalit.
It is the first major Israeli ground offensive in Gaza since Israel quit the desert coastal strip last summer after 38 years of occupation.
Meanwhile, Israeli troops launched a large-scale arrest campaign in the West Bank last week, detaining eight ministers of the Hamas-led Palestinian government and dozens of Hamas lawmakers.
Hamas' armed wing took part in the June 25 attack on an Israeli army post near the Gaza border during which Shalit was snatched.
But the Palestinian government led by Hamas, or the Islamic Resistance Movement, said it did not order the abduction and had no foreknowledge of the attack.
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Premier tells troops to do all they can to free soldier
Posted on Mon, Jul. 03, 200By RAVI NESSMAN
The Associated Press
"I take personal responsibility for what is happening in Gaza. I want nobody to sleep at night in Gaza. I want them to know what it's like," Olmert told his Cabinet. "People are saying it's uncomfortable. It will be uncomfortable, [but] nobody dies from being uncomfortable."
GAZA CITY, Gaza Strip -- Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert stepped up pressure on the Palestinian government Sunday, telling his military to "do all it can" to free an abducted soldier and hinting that Israel might arrest more Hamas leaders.
Coming just hours after an Israeli airstrike blasted offices of the Palestinian prime minister, Olmert's threat signaled that the government is losing patience with diplomatic efforts to end the crisis.
Israel shelled northern Gaza early today, slightly wounding one person in a house on the outskirts of the town of Beit Hanoun, Palestinians said. The military confirmed that artillery was fired in the area.
Israeli aircraft, gunboats and artillery have pounded Gaza since troops and tanks took up positions in the south of the coastal strip Wednesday. The operation is aimed at pressuring Palestinians to free Cpl. Gilad Shalit, the Israeli soldier abducted a week ago. Five Palestinian fighters have been reported killed, four of them Sunday.
Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice called Olmert on Sunday to discuss the situation, Olmert's office said in a statement. He told Rice that Israel would use all means at its disposal to get Shalit released and said there is no humanitarian crisis in Gaza.
Palestinian officials had warned Saturday that a shortage of fuel threatened to shut down generators used to pump water and power hospitals.
Israel reopened the main cargo crossing with Gaza to allow 50 trucks of food, medical supplies and fuel in from Israel, Israeli officials said. Trucks carrying diesel fuel, gasoline and natural gas also began entering northeastern Gaza through the Nahal Oz border crossing.
"I take personal responsibility for what is happening in Gaza. I want nobody to sleep at night in Gaza. I want them to know what it's like," Olmert told his Cabinet. "People are saying it's uncomfortable. It will be uncomfortable, [but] nobody dies from being uncomfortable."
Comment: Israeli is carrying out what is called "collective punishment" against the Palestinians for the capture of an Israeli soldier. Collective punishment is illegal under international law, but, then, we all know that Israel doesn't care about international law. Collective punishment means punishing the entire community for the act of an individual or individuals.
When Israel destroys the house of a co-called "suicide bomber", even if that bomber was encouraged and manipulated by Israeli agents, it is collective punishment because the rest of the family has had nothing to do with the bombing.
But Israel doesn't care about international law.
Israel care about one thing: killing off or driving out every Palestinian from the land they claim their god gave them over 3000 years ago. Moreover, they are extremely successful in this policy because their propagandists in the Western media tell us that Israel wants peace. We are told the Palestinians are the aggressors when it is Palestinian land that was stolen to form Israel in the first place.
For a look at the way Israel manipulates Western media, in particular that of the US, we recommend the documentary Peace, Propaganda, and the Promised Land.
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Israel rejects Palestinian ultimatum
Last Updated Mon, 03 Jul 2006 08:50:42 EDT
CBC News
Israel has rejected an ultimatum by Palestinian groups believed to be holding an Israeli soldier, which had demanded the country start releasing 1,500 Palestinian prisoners by Tuesday morning.
The three Palestinian militant groups faxed their demand to media outlets on Monday, warning that Israel would "bear all the consequences" unless the prisoner release started soon.
"We give the Zionist enemy until 6:00 tomorrow morning, Tuesday, July 4," said the declaration, which was posted on the website of the military wing of Hamas, whose political wing leads the Palestinian Authority government.
"If the enemy does not respond to our humanitarian demands mentioned in previous leaflets on the conditions for dealing with the issue of the missing soldier ... we will consider the current file of the soldier to be closed ... and then the enemy must bear all the consequences of the future results," the statement said without specifying what the consequences would be.
'There will be no negotiations': Israeli PM
Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert quickly rejected the ultimatum.
"There will be no negotiations to release prisoners," he said in a statement, which held the ruling Hamas party partly responsible for the return of Cpl. Gilad Shalit.
Shalit, 19, was taken on June 25 when Palestinian militants tunnelled into southern Israel and attacked an Israeli army outpost.
The three militant groups believed to be holding the soldier have demanded the release of about 1,500 Palestinians currently held by Israel.
Israel launched a military campaign in the Gaza Strip in the past week to pressure the militants into releasing the soldier. Air strikes have hit bridges and a power station in the region, which is home to about 1.5 million people.
Israel continues to fire on Gaza
The campaign continued on Monday, as Israeli tanks fired rounds of artillery into northern Gaza.
At least three Palestinian militants were killed. Israeli military officials said two of them were wearing bomb belts.
Early Sunday, Israeli troops gathered across from the border with northern Gaza in what appeared to be preparations for an invasion. On the weekend, Omert vowed his government would do everything it could to secure Shalit's release.
The London-based newspaper Al Hayat reported on Monday that Egyptian negotiators saw Shalit alive and that he was being treated by doctors. The report didn't say when the visit happened.
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Israel's act of war is inexcusable
By Will Hutton
The Observer
07/02/06
In a conflict as long-standing and bloody as the one in the Middle East, both sides know the rules and the impact of their actions on their enemies. The Palestinian factions, including Hamas militants, which captured Corporal Shalit last Sunday, will have known that Israel would respond fiercely, but also how the reaction would undermine Palestine's emerging common front. And Israel, in turn, knew precisely the impact of its incredibly disproportionate response, both on its enemies and on the political balance within its own society.
Which is why, whatever the outcome, last week was so depressing. The calculations have been made by those opposed to any long-term deal. Israel's destruction of Gaza and illegal political detention of members of the Palestinian government and parliament were to teach Hamas a lesson. But it was not the lesson Hamas needs right now as it gropes its way towards political reality and acceptance of Israel's right to exist. Israel is now less safe than it was. It has betrayed its own deep hunger for a settlement and peace.
Israel has frequently resorted to the doctrine of disproportionate response: not an eye for an eye, but 10 or 20 Palestinian deaths for every Israeli loss. Twelve years ago, Yitzhak Rabin sealed off the West Bank to allow Israeli special operation units to rescue kidnapped Corporal Waxman. That operation ended in his death, but even by those standards, what happened last week was extraordinary.
Gaza, unlike the 1994 West Bank, is supposed to be a semi-autonomous sovereign territory. By bombing its main power station, Israel has deprived most of Gaza of electricity, including water-pumping stations. Sealing off access to water and food can only inflict acute discomfort on the people there; already, frailer Palestinians are dying.
Even more extraordinary were the overnight raids that led to the detention and arrest of eight cabinet members of a sovereign government, including its finance minister, 30 members of parliament and up to another 30 officials. Israel threatens to put some or all on trial for terrorism.
In any other context, this would be a declaration of war.
It is breathtaking, but this is the Middle East. The Hamas government has not yet renounced its commitment to the elimination of Israel or to the use of terrorism. Missiles from Gaza are regularly fired at Israel.
Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert has committed to withdraw Israel from parts of the West Bank, regarded by the Israeli right and Zionist fundamentalists as the ultimate sell-out (even if Israel simultaneously confiscates compensating land). Olmert needed to show that he was no pushover.
But disproportionality on such a scale is self-defeating. It casts Israel as the rogue state and Palestinians as victims. These are not the actions of a government that wants to be a 'partner for peace'.
Worse, it suggests that Israel will find it impossible to accommodate a just settlement.
Every parent, manager and successful politician knows the importance of achieving ends by consent and that entails respect. Subjugation, repression and humiliation do not work as strategies. Yet Israel, overwhelmingly the more powerful player, is governed by an attitude that would not survive days in a family, factory or political party.
Worse, it trashes encouraging developments. Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas challenged Hamas to recognise that the only way out of the conflict was a two-state solution, in effect, recognising Israel and its gains in the 1967 war, or he would call a national referendum. Hamas backed down, knowing he would win, and reached a national unity pact with Mr Abbas's Fatah. The basis for resuming negotiations was being put in place.
The dark interpretation of Israel's reaction in Gaza is that it does not want a politically viable negotiating partner in Palestine. It suits Israel to characterise Hamas as terrorist fundamentalists who are beyond the pale. Thus it can proceed with its unilaterally imposed settlement, wall and land grab, in turn fanning the flames of Palestinian extremism.
We all have a stake in breaking this vicious circle. The best response to the rise of Islamic terrorism would be a just settlement in the Middle East. Israel's actions are linked by a bloody thread to the next terrorist attack on us, now more likely. Britain, with the EU and US, was right to insist that the incoming Hamas government had to recognise Israel and to back that demand with sanctions.
Now that Hamas signals changes, we must be no less uncompromising about condemning Israeli action. The mealy-mouthed reaction of the G8 that we have 'particular concerns' is pathetic. What happened last week was an international disgrace. We need to say so. We hold Hamas to account for its words and actions. The same applies to Israel.
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US Troops In Iraq
Muslim group condemns reports of U.S. rape
AP
July 2, 2006
BAGHDAD, Iraq - An influential Sunni Muslim organization Sunday strongly condemned reports that U.S. troops raped an Iraqi women then killed her and her family, saying it shows "the truth of the ugly American face."
The Association of Muslim Scholars said that what U.S. troops have done by "raping this girl then mutilating her is shameful and will remain as a sign of shame to American invaders."
U.S. investigators believe that American soldiers spent nearly a week plotting an attack in which they raped the Sunni Muslim woman, then killed her and her family in a religiously mixed area about 20 miles south of Baghdad.
The Americans entered the home, separated three family members from the woman, then raped her and set fire to her body, a U.S. military official said Saturday on condition of anonymity because the investigation is ongoing.
The three others, apparently including a child, were also slain, another official said.
The association said in its statement that it "condemns this ugly crime and declares to the whole world that this mean behavior and terrible violations committed by the invaders show the truth of the ugly American face and also shows that their claims of calling for humanity and liberation are not true."
"We put the world and all humanitarian organizations as witnesses to this ugly crime and call them to face the American recklessness that went way too far," said the association, a strong critic of American presence in
Iraq.
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Did Suspected GIs Plan Rape-Slaying?
July 1, 2006
CBS News
Investigators Believe U.S. Soldiers Under Investigation Plotted Attack For Nearly A Week
U.S. officials said they knew of the deaths but thought the victims died due to sectarian violence. But Mahmoudiya police Capt. Ihsan Abdul-Rahman said Iraqi officials received a report March 13 alleging that American soldiers had killed the family.
(CBS/AP) Investigators believe the U.S. soldiers suspected of raping an Iraqi woman, then killing her and members of her family plotted the attack for nearly a week, a U.S. military official said Saturday.
The official, who is close to the investigation, told The Associated Press that flammable liquid was used to burn the woman's body in a cover-up attempt, although it was not clear if it was gasoline or lighter fluid.
The official, speaking on condition of anonymity because the investigation is ongoing, said it appeared the attack was "totally premeditated" and that the soldiers "studied them for about a week."
According to the official, the Sunni Arab family had just moved into a new home in the insurgent-riddled area around Mahmoudiya, south of Baghdad. The Americans entered the home, separated three males from the woman, then raped her and set fire to her body, the official said. The three males were also slain.
U.S. officials said they knew of the deaths but thought the victims died due to sectarian violence. But Mahmoudiya police Capt. Ihsan Abdul-Rahman said Iraqi officials received a report March 13 alleging that American soldiers had killed the family. The incident occurred in the Khasir Abyad area, about 6 miles north of Mahmoudiya, he said.
There were some discrepancies over how many soldiers were being investigated. The U.S. official said it was at least four. Two other U.S. officials said Friday that five were under investigation but one already had been discharged for unspecified charges unrelated to the killings and was believed to be in the United States.
In Baghdad, the U.S. military issued a terse statement Friday, saying only that Maj. Gen. James D. Thurman, commander of the 4th Infantry Division, ordered a criminal investigation into the alleged slaying of a family of four in Mahmoudiya, 20 miles south of Baghdad.
The four still in the Army have had their weapons taken away and are confined to a U.S. base near Mahmoudiya, officials said. If convicted of premeditated murder, the soldiers could receive a death sentence under U.S. military law.
The suspects in the killing were from the same platoon as two soldiers kidnapped and killed south of Baghdad this month, another official close to the investigation said Friday. Their mutilated bodies were found June 19, three days after they were abducted by insurgents near Youssifiyah southwest of Baghdad.
The military has said one and possibly both of the slain soldiers were tortured and beheaded. The official said the mutilation of the slain soldiers stirred feelings of guilt and led at least one member of the platoon to reveal the rape-slaying on June 22.
One soldier was arrested after admitting his role in the alleged attack on the family, he said on condition of anonymity because the case is under way. The official said the rape and killings appear to have been a "crime of opportunity," noting that the soldiers had not been attacked by insurgents but had noticed the woman on previous patrols.
One of the family members they allegedly killed was a child, said a senior Army official who also requested anonymity because the investigation is ongoing. The senior official said the alleged incident was first revealed by a soldier during a routine counseling-type session. The official said that soldier did not witness the incident but heard about it.
A second soldier, who also was not involved, said he overhead soldiers conspiring to commit the crimes and then later saw bloodstains on their clothes, the official said.
The allegations of rape could generate a particularly strong backlash in Iraq, a conservative, strongly religious society in which many women will not even shake hands with men who are not close relatives.
The case is among the most serious against U.S. soldiers allegedly involved in the deaths of Iraqi civilians. At least 14 U.S. troops have been convicted.
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Flashback: US soldiers accused of sex assaults
Suzanne Goldenberg in Washington
Tuesday March 8, 2005
The Guardian
Soldiers from the 3rd Infantry Brigade - the same military unit whose troops fired on the car carrying the freed Italian hostage Giuliana Sgrena - were under investigation last year for raping Iraqi women, US army documents reveal.
Four soldiers were alleged to have raped the two women while on guard duty in a Baghdad shopping precinct. A US army investigator interviewed several soldiers from the military unit, the 1-15th battalion of the 3rd Infantry Brigade - but did not locate or interview the Iraqi women involved - before shutting down the inquiry for lack of evidence.
Transcripts of the investigation, obtained by the Guardian from the American Civil Liberties Union, show only the most cursory attempts by the investigator to establish whether the women were raped.
The soldiers claimed the women were prostitutes, or denied any knowledge of any one in their unit having sex while deployed in Iraq. The statements went largely unchallenged. "I know the women were Iraqi. I however don't know if they were raped, or were prostitutes, or just wanted sex," one soldier told investigators.
Jameel Jaffar, an attorney for the ACLU, which has led a long legal struggle for the Pentagon to release documents of its investigations, argues that the failure to conduct a thorough investigation on such serious charges as rape was part of a disturbing pattern. "There are always questions in these files about whether the investigator was sufficiently aggressive in pursuing leads and tracking down evidence," he said.
The allegations of rape were contained in 1,200 pages of documents released yesterday by the ACLU. Together, the documents cover investigations into 13 cases of suspected abuse. However, no action was taken against any soldier as a result.
The documents also provide further evidence that US troops have destroyed evidence of abuse, in order to avoid a repetition of last year's Abu Ghraib prison abuse scandal.
In the latest such episode, an officer is believed to have destroyed a home-made DVD showing members of the Florida National Guard abusing Iraqi detainees, and manipulating the hand of a dead Iraqi to wave at the camera. Another scene shows a soldier hitting a bound prisoner on the head with a rifle butt.
At least one of the soldiers - a sergeant - was identified from the DVD. However, no criminal charges were brought in that investigation after military lawyers concluded that the DVD showed "inappropriate rather than criminal behaviour".
The DVD, which the soldiers called Ramadi Madness, was discovered by a civilian public affairs employee at the unit's headquarters in West Palm Beach, Florida. The DVD was later destroyed by an officer who had learned the case was under investigation.
Mr Jaffer said: "We have to start to ask the question of whether there is a whole layer of abuse out there that we are not seeing because the evidence of abuse has been covered up."
The investigation into the allegations of rape was launched last April after a report appeared in Playboy magazine alleging that the unit had engaged in various war crimes from rape to hogtieing and beating up an Iraqi detainee. By July 26, 2004, the inquiry was over. "Investigation established there was insufficient evidence to prove or disprove the allegations," the report concluded.
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Flashback: U.S. Soldiers Accused Of Raping Iraqi Women Escape Prosecution
Democracy Now Interview
March 29 2005
On International Women's Day, Guardian reporter Suzanne Goldenberg broke the story about how soldiers from the 3rd Infantry Brigade accused of rape were able to escape the charges. The soldiers were from the same military unit whose troops fired on the car carrying freed Italian hostage Giuliana Sgrena. [includes rush transcript] Suzanne Goldenberg's article appeared in the Guardian newspaper.
It began: "Soldiers from the 3rd Infantry Brigade -- the same military unit whose troops fired on the car carrying freed Italian hostage Giuliana Sgrena -- were under investigation last year for raping Iraqi women, U.S. Army documents reveal. Four soldiers were alleged to have raped two women while on guard duty in a Baghdad shopping precinct. A U.S. Army investigator interviewed several soldiers from the military unit, the 1-15th battalion of the 3rd Infantry Brigade, but did not locate or interview the Iraqi women involved before shutting down the inquiry for lack of evidence.
"Transcripts of the investigation, obtained by the Guardian from the American Civil Liberties Union, show only the most cursory attempts by the investigator to establish whether the women were raped. The soldiers claimed the women were prostitutes, or denied any knowledge of anyone in their unit having sex while deployed in Iraq. The statements went largely unchallenged. "I know the women were Iraqi. I however don't know if they were raped, or were prostitutes, or just wanted sex," one soldier told investigators.
"Jameel Jaffar, an attorney for the ACLU, which has led a long legal struggle to get the Pentagon to release documents of its investigations, argues that the failure to conduct a thorough investigation on such serious charges as rape was part of a disturbing pattern. 'There are always questions in these files about whether the investigator was sufficiently aggressive in pursuing leads and tracking down evidence,' he said."
We are joined by Suzanne Goldenberg in our D.C. studio.
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Flashback: Rape of Iraqi girls by US mercenaries and soldiers was rampant in Baghdad
May 6, 2004
La Voz de Aztlan
One victim was a 9 year old girl who suffered permanent vaginal injuries
Los Angeles, Alta California - (ACN) The recent apology by President George Bush to the Iraqi people is not sufficient to undo the horrible pillage and rape of Iraqi women and girls that took place during the early days of the US occupation of Baghdad. There is some evidence that the invading US forces were provided with amphetamines and pornographic materials to incite their thorough ravaging of Baghdad.
Reports of sexual violence and abduction of women and girls abounded in Baghdad during the early days of the occupation reports that the US government chose to ignore. Human rights groups, medical practitioners, victims, and witnesses had documented many of the crimes. Human rights organizations were concerned that many other cases went unreported and uninvestigated because some of the Iraqi women and girls feared that reporting sexual violence and rapes would provoke "honor" killings and social stigmatization.
A large number of the abductions and rapes were committed and filmed by hired mercenaries of the Pentagon and many of these photographs and videos wound up in for-pay pornographic websites based in the United States. One of these websites has shut down ever since La Voz de Aztlan made this information public. The website called "Iraq Babes", believed owned by Jewish pornographers, advertised it with the following banner: "Horny soldiers having extreme sex in war"! The website at http://www.iraqbabes.com/ has been shut down and presently only shows one web page with a stick drawing of a horse. The website showed photographs and videos of Iraqi women and girls being brutally raped. We hope the website has shut down permanently for it only reinforces the allegation that the USA is really "The Great Satan" Islam talks about.
There are numerous cases of the brutal rape of Iraqi women and babies as young as nine years old. We are reporting the following two just as examples:
Case 1:
On May 22, 2003, in Baghdad, a nine-year-old girl was abducted from the stairs of the building where she lived, taken to an abandoned building nearby, and raped. A family friend who saw the young girl immediately following the rape informed international human rights groups.
The report quotes the family friend, "She was sitting on the stairs, here, at 4:00 p.m. It seems to me that probably they hit her on the back of the head with a gun and then took her to [a neighboring] building. She came back fifteen minutes later, bleeding [from the vaginal area]. [She was still bleeding two days later, so] we took her to the hospital."
A human rights group saw a copy of the medical report by the U.S. military doctor who treated the baby girl six days later. The report documented bruising in the vaginal area, a posterior vaginal tear, and a broken hymen. Lieutenant Monica Casmaer, a physician's assistant attached to a U.S. military unit, examined the nine year old girl. with the pediatrician. She described the injuries as fairly severe, especially given the time that had elapsed before she was examined.
Case 2:
A young Iraqi woman told an international human rights group that armed men abducted her from her home on a Thursday night in early May, 2003. She said her captors gang-raped her at an unknown location before dropping her in an unfamiliar district of Baghdad the following morning.
The report of the woman says, "I was here, on the stairs by the door when a car pulled up with four men. My daughter was on the upper floor, I was on the ground floor. The four men got out of the car and approached me. They were armed, they put guns to my head and said come with us. I screamed and said take the pistol away. My daughter started to scream. They pulled my hair and pushed me in the car and they started shooting at the house, more than fifty shots. My daughter was screaming the whole time. Many neighbors started to shoot too, but they couldn't catch them".
The victim added "In the car they made me put my head down between my legs, and put a pistol to my head. They said that if I moved my head I'd be killed, so I don't know where they took me.... [Then they took me into a building where] they were hitting me on the head and arms, and I still can't stretch out because my whole body hurts. They used hot water on my head, my eyes still burn from that and my arms. They raped me, in many, many ways. They kept me until the next day, I begged them, I said I have a young child, I said she might die if I leave her alone. And so then they left me alone. When I came home my appearance was so bad, my hair was a mess, my mouth was bloody and my legs too. They burned my legs with cigarettes. They bit me, on my shoulders and arms. All of them raped me, there were five or six more than the four who kidnapped me, there were ten of them total and I was raped by all ten of them.
The most unconscionable aspect of these heinous rapes in Iraq is that many were filmed for the depraved enjoyment of perverts in the USA. Only a thorough Congressional investigation will begin the process of bringing the Pentagon rapists and sodomists to justice. Congress must investigate the connection between the rape of Iraqi women and girls and the Jewish pornographic industry in the USA. A thorough investigation might even save the lives of many American girls who are also being abducted and utilized for the same purpose. There are hundreds of underage girls that disappear in the USA yearly never to be seen again. Many of these young American girls lose their lives in the production of "kiddie porn snuff films".
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Flashback: Army Condones Rape by US Soldiers in Iraq
Afsc.org
May 2004
According to investigative reports in The Denver Post, the US Army is routinely refusing to prosecute US soldiers in Iraq who are accused of rape.
According to a report on January 25, 2004, "At least 37 female service members have sought sexual-trauma counseling and other assistance from civilian rape crisis organizations after returning from war duty in Iraq, Kuwait, and other overseas stations, The Denver Post has learned. The women, ranging from enlisted soldiers to officers, have reported poor medical treatment, lack of counseling and incomplete criminal investigations by military officials. Some say they were threatened with punishment after reporting assaults."
A follow-up report in The Denver Post on April 12, 2004, based on records from 41 closed rape investigations obtained through the Freedom of Information Act, found that the system of giving the power to decide whether to prosecute or not to the commanders of the accused, not to prosecutors, frequently resulted in terminated investigations, dropped charges, and light administrative punishments, even in cases with substantial evidence.
The Post reported, "In the case of [a] sergeant accused of assaulting three battalion soldiers - two incidents occurring in shower stalls - he even admitted to the crimes, documents show. And despite a prosecutor's note that 'sufficient admissible evidence is available to prosecute the subject for the offenses,' the commander chose only to reprimand the sergeant. No explanation was given, a trend in all the cases." These cases indicate that mild administrative punishments are more the rule than the exception.
Preceding the revelations in May 2004 about systematic abuse in the US administered prisons in Iraq, the Post reported that, "In one investigation, three Fort Bragg, NC, soldiers with the 519th Military Intelligence Battalion were accused of assaulting an Iraqi woman held in the Abu Ghraib prison. Although no details were provided, the report notes that the enlisted men were each fined at least $500 and demoted in rank."
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Flashback: Iraqi Woman Recalls Abu Ghraib Rape Ordeal
Ira Chernus
July 21 2004
IslamOnline.net
- The rape ordeal she suffered at the hands of US soldiers, both males and females, in the notorious Abu Gharib prison will continue to haunt Nadia for the rest of her life.
Though freed now, she is "imprisoned" in painful memories that left her psychologically and physically scarred, paying the price of the brutality and sadism of her American jailers.
Nadia, the name given by a freed Iraqi female prisoner to Al-Wasat, a weekly supplement of the respectable London-based Al-Hayat newspaper, felt it incumbent upon herself to speak out and expose the less-talked-about abuse of female prisoners in US-run detention camps across Iraq.
Her visit to a relative ended up in her detention by American troops, who stormed the home under the preferable excuse of "searching for weapons".
"I tried in vain to convince the impeded interpreter I was a guest, but I lost consciousness to find myself later in a dingy dark cell all by myself," Nadia recalled...
With tears rolling down her cheeks, she told the paper how she was stripped by her "liberators" of the most precious thing an Arab and Muslim women can have: Her virginity.
"A thrill of fear ran through me when I saw US soldiers laughing hysterically with a female solider telling me mockingly in an Arabic accent 'I never heard about female arms dealer in Iraq'," Nadia said.
"As I tried hard to explain to her that I was wrongly rounded up, the female soldier started accosting and kicking me with my cries and pleas falling on dead ears."
She went on: "She gave me a cup of water and no sooner had I started sipping it than I went into a deep trance to find myself later naked and raped."
'Like Animals'
Only then Nadia realized that hard times and an uncertain fate were lying ahead.
And days proved her right. The other day, five soldiers fondled and raped her one after another in a distasteful sex orgy on the tunes of culturally offensive heavy metal music.
"One month later, a soldier showed up and told me in broken Arabic to take a shower. And before finishing my bath, he kicked the door open. I slapped him but he raped me like animals and called two of his colleagues, who forced me to have sex with them," added Nadia.
"Four months later, the female soldier came along with four male soldiers with a digital camera. She stripped me naked and started fondling me as if she was a man while her male colleagues broke into laughter and started taking photos.
"Reluctant as I was, she fired four shots close to my head and threatened to kill me if I resist. Then, four soldiers raped me sadistically and I lost conscience. Later, she forced me to watch a clip of my raping, saying bluntly: 'Your were born to give us pleasure'."
Naida was set free from the US hell in Abu Gharib after spending up to six months there.
The American soldiers dumped her along the highway of Abu Gharib and gave her a meager of 10,000 dinars to "start a new life".
Too ashamed to return home, she now works as a housemaid for an Iraqi family.
Britain's mass-circulation The Guardian revealed on May 12 that US soldiers in Iraq have sexually humiliated and abused several Iraqi female detainees in Abu Gharib.
In its May 10-17 issue, the Newsweek said that yet-unreleased Abu Gharib abuse photos "include an American soldier having sex with a female Iraqi detainee and American soldiers watching Iraqis have sex with juveniles."
The Iraqi abuse scandal exploded onto the world stage on April 29 after the CBS news network published several shocking photos of Iraqi detainees tortured and sexually abused by US soldiers.
In a damning report presented to the administration in February, before the outbreak of the scandal, US Major General Antonio Taguba found numerous "sadistic, blatant and wanton criminal abuses" at the prison complex.
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Flashback: Hersh: children raped at Abu Ghraib, Pentagon has videos
Seymour Hersh
New Yorker
July 2004
BoingBoing.net
Seymour Hersh speaking at an ACLU event said the US government has videotapes of children being raped at Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq.
Excerpt from statement provided by Abu Ghraib Kasim Mehaddi Hilas, Detainee #151108, on January 18 2004:
"I saw [name deleted] fucking a kid, his age would be about 15 - 18 years. The kid was hurting very bad and they covered all the doors with sheets. Then when I heard the screaming I climbed the door because on top it wasn't covered and I saw [name deleted] who was wearing the military uniform putting his dick in the little kid's ass. I couldn't see the face of the kid because his face wasn't in front of the door. And the female soldier was taking pictures. [name deleted], I think he is [deleted] because of his accent, and he was not skinny or short, and he acted like a homosexual (gay). And that was in cell #23 as best as I remember."
Link to pdf of testimony
Another testimony alleging abuse of minors from a statement provided by Thaar Salman Dawod, Detainee #150427, on January 17, 2004:
"I saw lots of people getting naked for a few days getting punished in the first days of Ramadan. They came with two boys naked and they were cuffed together face to face and Grainer was beating them and a group of guards were watching and taking pictures from top and bottom and there was three female soldiers laughing at the prisoners. The prisoners, two of them, were young. I don't know their names."
Here's a update (sub required) on Capitol Hill plans for hearings on new (and as-yet unreleased) material documenting torture at Abu Ghraib. And there's this snip from a CBS interview with "leash girl" Pfc. Lynndie England, the guard seen grinning and pointing at Iraqi prisoners in the infamous photos:
When England was asked if there were other things that happened at Abu Ghraib, things that were not photographed, she said, "Yes." When asked if there were worse things that happened, she said "Yes," but would not elaborate.
Link to first PDF, Link to second PDF.
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U.S. probes possible 'friendly fire' death
By TINI TRAN
Associated Press
Sat Jul 1, 2006
KABUL, Afghanistan - The U.S. military on Saturday said it was investigating the death of a soldier in eastern Afghanistan as a possible "friendly fire incident."
The Defense Department said Pfc. Justin R. Davis, 19, of Gaithersburg, Md., died on June 25 in eastern Kunar province when he came in contact with indirect fire - a term used for mortar shelling - while on patrol during combat operations.
"The circumstances of the soldier's death are under investigation as a possible friendly fire incident," the statement said.
In Afghanistan, the U.S.-led coalition released a statement saying an investigation into the incident is under way.
"We are looking into Pfc. Davis' death to determine what happened. No final determination has been made and we will not release any information relating to the investigation till it is complete," the statement said.
Davis had been assigned to the 1st Battalion, 32nd Infantry Regiment, 3rd Brigade Combat Team, 10th Mountain Division based in Fort Drum, N.Y.
His mother, Paula Davis, told The Frederick News Post that Davis "was passionate about joining the service.
"He would always say, 'This is my dream. I am going to follow it,'" Paula Davis told the newspaper. "He died doing what he loved."
Justin Davis had been in Afghanistan since March and had plans to come home for several weeks in August.
"It was a calling," she said. "It was a life that fit him."
Davis' body arrived at Dover Air Force Base in Delaware on Tuesday, Paula Davis said. He will be buried in Arlington National Cemetery with full military honors July 10.
Coalition troops have been operating in eastern Afghanistan to battle insurgents active along the Pakistan border.
According to U.S. Army data earlier this year, 17 soldiers have died from friendly fire in the past four years - 10 in
Iraq and seven in Afghanistan. They occurred in 11 separate incidents.
The most famous case was the 2004 death of former NFL player Pat Tillman, an Army Ranger and corporal, who died during a gunbattle near the Pakistan-Afghanistan border. That case triggered a criminal investigation that is still pending.
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Baghdad car bombing kills 66 in Shiite market
by Ammar Karim
AFP
Sat Jul 1, 2006
BAGHDAD - At least 66 people have been killed by a car bomb in a busy Baghdad market in a Shiite district despite a massive security crackdown in the Iraqi capital.
The second deadliest attack this year came a day after Al-Qaeda supremo Osama bin Laden vowed the war would go on in
Iraq regardless of a peace plan launched by Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki.
A Sunni woman MP was also kidnapped in north Baghdad Saturday along with eight of her bodyguards.
The sprawling Shiite district of Sadr City, a stronghold of Mehdi Army militiamen loyal to radical leader Moqtada Sadr, has been a repeated target for Sunni Arab insurgents amid mounting sectarian violence.
The massive bomb exploded as a police patrol passed through Al-Ula market which was packed with morning shoppers, an interior ministry official said Saturday.
Deputy Health Minister Sabah al-Hussein said at least 66 people were killed and 98 wounded in the bombing.
It was the deadliest attack since a suicide bomber killed 67 people and wounded 105 at a police recruitment centre in the insurgent bastion of Ramadi, west of Baghdad, on January 5.
"The explosion happened in a very crowded market frequented by many people even from outside the area," Hussein told state television.
"At the beginning of this market, the criminal blew up his dynamite-packed truck after trying to go over the pavement."
The market contains shops selling everything from bridal gowns to kitchenware. Many vendors also have stalls along the main market street and in packed alleyways selling fruits, vegetables and other goods.
The force of the blast torched nearby stalls and around 20 vehicles.
Fearful residents were seen desperately searching through the mangled wreckage for missing loved ones.
A US military vehicle which attempted to approach the blast scene withdrew in a hail of stones thrown by angry residents.
Major General Jihad Taher al-Luaibi, head of the interior ministry's anti-explosives unit, said: "The martyrs were of all sexes and ages -- innocent people. Their bones and flesh were crushed together.
"The impact of the explosion scattered pieces everywhere, as far as 500 metres (yards) from the scene," he told state television.
The body of one young girl was found on the roof of a nearby gymnasium.
Stressing that the security forces had asked for new equipment to detect car bombs, Luaibi pleaded: "If the prime minister is listening, please approve our request because this will save human lives."
An unknown Sunni insurgent group claimed responsbility for the attack.
"Your mujahedeen brethren in 'the Supporters of the Sunni Community' decided to teach the Rawafidh (a derogatory term for Shiites) a lesson they will not forget as long as they are alive," said a statement on an Internet website usually used by insurgent groups.
"A booby-trapped car loaded with a huge amount of highly explosive material was introduced today into the stronghold of the Mehdi Army in the so-called Sadr City, the fortified trench of the Rawafidh from which they launch the ugliest operations of treachery and killing against Sunnis," it said.
The car was "detonated near a den where the Rawafidh meet and against patrols of the Mehdi Army disguised as police ... killing at least 100 Rafidhi, mostly from the Mehdi Army, and wounding more than 100 others."
Following the attack Mehdi militiamen threatened to take over patrolling the district.
"The Iraqi forces are not doing their job properly... they are not checking cars that are entering the area. If this is the case, we will take the security of the area into our own hands," Fuad, a Shiite militiaman who gave only one name told AFP.
Hardline Shiite MP Sheikh Jalaleddin al-Saghir said after meeting revered Shiite cleric Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani in the southern shrine city of Najaf that the bombing was "a conspiracy being hatched by outside enemies".
Saghir has always accused neighbouring Sunni-dominated Arab countries such as Saudi Arabia and Jordan of turning a blind eye to their extremists flocking to Iraq to attack Shiites.
Riyadh al-Nuri, a senior aide to Sadr, blamed the attack on those who were part of the government but continued to "pander to terrorists" in a veiled reference to Sunni Arabs.
Sunni Vice President Tareq al-Hashemi's Iraqi Islamic Party said: "We condemn the bombing in Sadr City and we hold the interior and defense ministers and Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki responsible for an impotent security plan that is unable to prevent such attacks."
Taiseer Najeh Awad al-Mashhadani, an MP from the National Concord Front, the largest Sunni Arab bloc in parliament, was seized in Baghdad, security sources said.
Her abduction came after Maliki, a Shiite, launched a national reconcilation plan aimed at wooing members of the disenchanted Sunni community away from the protracted insurgency and back into the political process.
The violence was a reminder of the precarious security situation in the capital despite a massive security clampdown that has seen over 60,000 US and government troops patrolling Baghdad streets in recent weeks.
Elsewhere in Iraq eight people were killed and eight bodies were found.
As part of Maliki's plan, 495 detainees were released Saturday, the seventh such batch to be freed since he first floated the idea of a partial amnesty on June 6.
Maliki on Saturday reached Jeddah as part of his tour of Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Kuwait to gain support for his peace plan.
Meanwhile, US officials announced Friday that the military was probing allegations that at least two US soldiers raped an Iraqi woman and then murdered her and three family members.
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Back in Bushland
US Attorney General defends special military tribunals
by Joelle Bassoul
AFP
Sat Jul 1, 2006
CAIRO - US Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales has defended special military tribunals for terrorist suspects, saying they serve "a viable role in the war on terror."
"We are carefully reviewing the decision by the US Supreme Court," Gonzales told reporters during a trip to Cairo after meeting with Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak Saturday morning.
"We intend to work with Congress to develop procedures and practices that will meet the requirements set forth by the Supreme Court, but we continue to believe that military commissions would serve a viable role in the war on terror," he said.
The US Supreme Court on Thursday ruled that US President George W. Bush had overstepped his powers by creating military war crimes tribunals for Guantanamo Bay inmates.
In a 5-3 vote, the high court ruled that a military commission established to try Salim Ahmed Hamdan, a 36 year old Yemeni -- Osama bin Laden's former driver -- charged with conspiracy to commit war crimes and terrorism, violated US military law and the Geneva Conventions.
Following the ruling, the White House and other administration officials signalled they would try to consult with Congress to refine rules for such commissions, in line with the landmark Supreme Court judgement.
Gonzales said he hoped to try the suspects "in military commissions once we establish the procedures that will meet the requirements set forth by the Supreme Court."
Refering to the detention center in Guantanamo Bay, Gonzales said the US continued to believe it was "necessary".
"When the US captures someone on the battlefield, we have to have some way of holding them so that they do not come back and fight against us or fight against our friends and allies," he said.
Asked about the practice of renditions, the secret transfer of detainees by the CIA to their home countries, where in some cases they risk being tortured, Gonzales insisted that the US seeks assurances before returning the suspects.
"When we have in our custody an individual and their home country wants them returned, we are not going to return them without adequate assurances that they are not being mistreated," said Gonzales who refused to comment on renditions cases to Egypt specifically.
"We look at past records of the country in the treatment of people in their custody," he said.
"In respect to Egypt, let me say that we welcome the progress that is occuring here in Egypt," he said refering to constitutional ammendments recently passed.
Italy has accused CIA operatives of involvement in what it says was a clandestine operation to kidnap Egyptian national Abu Omar in 2003, handing him over to Egyptian authorities for interrogation.
The cleric -- who was under investigation in Italy as part of an inquiry into international terrorism -- was the imam of a Milan mosque which had been under close surveillance since the September 11, 2001 attacks in the United States.
He was snatched from the street in February 2003 and flown from a US military base in northern Italy to Egypt, where his supporters say he was tortured.
"We do have a legal obligatin not to render someone back to a country where we know they might be mistreated or tortured,' Gonzales reiterated.
Gonzales, who is the first US attorney general to visit Egypt, said that his department will send a permanent envoy to Cairo to "further cement the relationship" between the two countries.
Earlier in the day, Gonzales discussed with Mubarak the situation in the Gaza strip, calling Mubarak's mediation efforts between the Israelis and the Palestinians "important in resolving this matter in a peaceful manner," in reference to the abduction Sunday of an Israeli soldier by Palestinian militants.
The Israeli army on Wednesday launched a large-scale offensive in the Gaza strip to rescue the soldier.
During his three-day visit, Gonzales met with justice minister Mahmud Abou Leil and interior minister Habib al-Adli.
Comment: Huh? Gonzalez and the author of this article need to get their facts straight. Rendition is not "sending prisoners back" to their home countries; it is when the US government sends prisoners to another country to be imprisoned and tortured.
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Roberts Is at Court's Helm, but He Isn't Yet in Control
By LINDA GREENHOUSE
The New York Times
July 2, 2006
WASHINGTON - As the dust settled on a consequential Supreme Court term, the first in 11 years with a change in membership and the first in two decades with a new chief justice, one question that lingered was whether it was now the Roberts court, in fact as well as in name.
The answer: not yet.
Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. was clearly in charge, presiding over the court with grace, wit and meticulous preparation. But he was not in control.
In the court's most significant nonunanimous cases, Chief Justice Roberts was in dissent almost as often as he was in the majority. His goal of inspiring the court to speak softly and unanimously seemed a distant aspiration as important cases failed to produce majority opinions and members of the court, including occasionally the chief justice himself, gave voice to their frustration and pique with colleagues who did not see things their way.
The term's closing weeks were particularly ragged. The court issued no decision in a major patent case that had drawn intense interest from the business community, announcing two months after the argument, over the dissents of three justices, that the case had been "improvidently granted" - they should not have agreed to decide it - in the first place.
So if it wasn't yet the Roberts court, what exactly was it?
Perhaps it was the Kennedy court, based on the frequency with which Justice Anthony M. Kennedy cast the deciding vote in important cases.
Or perhaps it was more accurately seen as the Stevens court, reflecting the ability of John Paul Stevens, the senior associate justice in tenure as well as in age, to deliver a majority in the case for which the term will go down in history, the decision on military commissions that rejected the Bush administration's view of open-ended presidential authority.
Chief Justice Roberts did not participate in that case because he had ruled on it a year earlier as an appeals court judge. Based on his vote to uphold the administration's position then, he almost certainly would have joined Justices Antonin Scalia, Clarence Thomas and Samuel A. Alito Jr., the newest member of the court, in dissent.
If none of these labels - Roberts court, Kennedy court, Stevens court - seem to fit precisely, it is probably because what the Supreme Court really was in its 2005-6 term was a court in transition.
For the justices, it was a time of testing, of battles joined and battles, for the moment, postponed.
The term's early period of unanimity, during which cases on such contentious subjects as abortion and federalism were dispatched quickly, with narrowly phrased opinions, reflected agreement not on the underlying legal principles but rather on the desirability of moving on without getting bogged down in a fruitless search for common ground. This was especially so in the term's early months, when Justice Sandra Day O'Connor was still sitting but was counting the days until a new justice could take her place.
Once Justice O'Connor retired in late January, after Justice Alito's confirmation, and as the court moved into the heart of the term, some of the court's early inhibitions seemed to fall away. Yet when its most conservative members reached out aggressively to test the boundaries of consensus in the term's major environmental case, Justice Kennedy unexpectedly pushed back and left them well short of their goal.
In that case, Chief Justice Roberts along with Justices Alito, Scalia and Thomas tried to cut back on federal regulators' expansive view of their authority under the Clean Water Act to define wetlands.
Justice Kennedy also deserted the conservatives in a redistricting case from Texas when he found a violation of the Voting Rights Act in the dismantling of a Congressional district that had previously had a Mexican-American majority. The action of the Republican-led Texas Legislature had deprived the Latinos of the ability to elect the candidate of their choice, Justice Kennedy said, leaving Chief Justice Roberts to complain in dissent, "It is a sordid business, this divvying us up by race."
Nonetheless, there was little doubt that in its transition, the court was becoming more conservative. A statistical analysis by Jason Harrow on the Scotusblog Web site showed that Justice Alito voted with the conservative justices 15 percent more often than Justice O'Connor had.
A separate analysis, by the Supreme Court Institute at Georgetown University Law Center, showed that Justice Alito and Chief Justice Roberts had the highest agreement rate of any two justices in the court's nonunanimous cases, 88 percent, slightly higher than the agreement rate between Justice O'Connor and Justice David H. Souter in the first half of the term, 87.5 percent.
Chief Justice Roberts agreed with Justice Scalia in 77.5 percent of the nonunanimous cases and with Justice Stevens, arguably the court's most liberal member, only 35 percent of the time. The least agreement between any pair of justices was between Justices Alito and Stevens, 23.1 percent.
The court decided 69 cases with signed opinions in the term that began on Oct. 3 and ended on June 29. Nearly half were decided without dissent, a greater number than usual, although not dramatically so. Sixteen cases were decided by five-justice majorities, either 5 to 4 or 5 to 3, a proportion very close to the 10-year average.
One measure of the court's shift to the right is in dissenting votes. In the previous term, the justice who dissented least often was Stephen G. Breyer, who dissented in 10 of the term's 74 decisions. But this term, he had the second-highest number of dissents, 16; Justice Stevens had the most, 19. Justice Thomas and Justices Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Souter were also frequent dissenters. Of those who served the full term, Chief Justice Roberts had the fewest dissents, seven. Justice Kennedy had the second fewest, with nine.
Chief Justice Roberts's dissents, while few, came in some important cases. In addition to dissenting from the Voting Rights Act portion of the Texas redistricting decision, he also dissented from a decision reopening a 20-year-old death penalty case on the basis of new evidence; a federalism case, in which the majority found the states not immune from private bankruptcy suits; and a ruling that invalidated the personal assertion of authority by John Ashcroft, the former attorney general, to penalize doctors in Oregon who follow that state's Death With Dignity Act and prescribe lethal doses of medication for terminally ill patients who request it.
The court's next term, which begins Oct. 2, looms as a major test of the justices' fortitude and ability to work together, with cases challenging precedents on abortion and affirmative action already on the docket.
With the court having indicated in Hamdan v. Rumsfeld, the military commission case, that lawsuits now pending in the lower courts on behalf of dozens of detainees at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, are still alive, the justices are likely to have further opportunities to address the profound issues of presidential power and judicial authority that these cases raise. This time, the chief justice will not need to stay silent, and the country that is just getting to know him will hear his voice.
Following are summaries of the term's major rulings.
Presidential Power
The court repudiated the Bush administration's plan to use military commissions to try Guantánamo detainees, ruling 5 to 3 that the commissions were unauthorized by statute and violated a provision of the Geneva Conventions.
The majority opinion in Hamdan v. Rumsfeld, No. 05-184, by Justice Stevens, set minimum procedural protections that any future commissions, even those authorized by Congress, would have to provide. Justices Kennedy, Souter, Ginsburg and Breyer joined the opinion. Justices Scalia, Thomas and Alito dissented. Chief Justice Roberts, who had voted as an appeals court judge to uphold the commissions, did not participate.
Elections
A splintered decision rejected a challenge to the Republican-driven mid-decade redistricting of Texas's Congressional map, finding that it was not an impermissible partisan gerrymander. Justice Kennedy wrote the opinion in League of United Latin American Citizens v. Perry, No. 05-204. Agreeing with the judgment on the gerrymander challenge were Chief Justice Roberts and Justices Alito, Scalia and Thomas. Justices Stevens and Breyer dissented. Justices Souter and Ginsburg expressed no view on the issue, making the vote 5 to 2 to 2.
In the same case, the court ruled that the dismantling of a district in southwestern Texas with a Latino majority, an action the State Legislature had taken to shore up the faltering prospects of the Republican incumbent, violated the Voting Rights Act. On this question, Justice Kennedy spoke for a 5-to-4 majority that included Justices Stevens, Souter, Ginsburg and Breyer.
The court voted 6 to 3 to strike down Vermont's campaign finance law, which both limited the amount that candidates could spend on their own campaigns and placed the country's lowest ceilings on contributions to candidates from individuals and political parties.
The fragmented majority did not offer a unified approach to contribution limits, leaving the court's path in this area uncertain. Justice Breyer wrote the controlling opinion in the case, Randall v. Sorrell, No. 04-1528, joined by Chief Justice Roberts and Justice Alito. Justices Kennedy, Thomas and Scalia joined the judgment.
Criminal Law
In Georgia v. Randolph, No. 04-1067, the court held that when the police lack a search warrant, they cannot enter a home if one occupant objects, even if another occupant gives permission. The vote was 5 to 3, with Justice Alito not participating. In his majority opinion, Justice Souter said the decision comported with "widely shared social expectations" about privacy in the home. Chief Justice Roberts filed his first dissenting opinion in this case. Justices Scalia and Thomas also voted in dissent.
The court ruled that evidence the police find when they search a home to execute a search warrant can be admitted in court despite an officer's failure to observe the constitutional requirement to "knock and announce" before entering. Justice Scalia, writing for the 5-to-4 majority, said the ordinary rule against admitting unconstitutionally obtained evidence should not apply in this circumstance - nor, he implied, in many other circumstances currently governed by the "exclusionary rule."
This case, Hudson v. Michigan, No. 04-1360, was argued for a second time after Justice Alito joined the court; his vote with the majority determined the outcome. The others in the majority were Chief Justice Roberts and Justices Thomas and Kennedy.
The court was unanimous in ruling that inmates facing execution by lethal injection can invoke a federal civil rights law to challenge the state's choice of drugs and the manner in which they are administered. The decision, Hill v. McDonough, No. 05-8794, opened the door to lawsuits that would be prohibited by tight restrictions on petitions for habeas corpus. Justice Kennedy wrote the opinion.
The court ruled 5 to 3 that new evidence in a Tennessee murder case, including DNA evidence, sufficiently undermined the prosecution's theory of the case to require a new federal court hearing for the man who was convicted and sentenced to death for the crime 21 years ago.
The case, House v. Bell, No. 04-8990, was the first in which the court factored the results of modern DNA testing into consideration of whether a prisoner might qualify for a chance at habeas corpus that would otherwise be prohibited by procedural obstacles. Justice Kennedy wrote for the majority. Chief Justice Roberts dissented, along with Justices Scalia and Thomas. Justice Alito did not participate.
The court ruled 6 to 3 that foreign criminal defendants who have not been notified of their right under an international treaty to contact one of their country's diplomats are not entitled to special accommodation from courts in the United States. The decision, Sanchez-Llamas v. Oregon, No. 04-10566, rejected claims brought under the Vienna Convention on Consular Relations by foreign citizens convicted in Oregon and Virginia. Chief Justice Roberts wrote for the majority. Justices Breyer, Stevens and Souter dissented.
In a unanimous opinion, the court ordered a new trial for an inmate on South Carolina's death row on the ground that an evidentiary rule used in that state's courts had prevented the inmate from putting on a complete defense. Justice Alito, writing his first opinion for the court, said the rule was irrational and arbitrary. The case was Holmes v. South Carolina, No. 04-1327.
The court was deeply split on a basic question of death penalty law: the validity of the death penalty statute in Kansas under which a death sentence is automatic if the jury finds that the mitigating evidence and aggravating evidence are of equal weight. Voting 5 to 4 in an opinion by Justice Thomas, the court upheld the law, which the State Supreme Court had declared unconstitutional. Justice Alito's vote, following a reargument after he joined the court, made the difference. Justices Souter, Stevens, Ginsburg and Breyer dissented in the case, Kansas v. Marsh, No. 04-1170.
The court considered defendants' rights to cross-examine the state's witnesses, a right protected by the Confrontation Clause of the Sixth Amendment, in a pair of cases that were decided in a single opinion by Justice Scalia.
In the first part of the opinion in Davis v. Washington, No. 05-5224, the court was unanimous in ruling that a crime victim's emergency telephone call to 911 can be introduced as evidence at trial, even if the victim is not present for cross-examination, because a call to 911 does not produce the kind of "testimonial statement" to which the Confrontation Clause is addressed.
The court then went on to hold, by a vote of 8 to 1, with Justice Thomas dissenting, that a crime victim's statement to police officers who arrive at a scene should be considered "testimonial" if the police are investigating the crime rather than providing emergency assistance. Such a statement should therefore be banned from the trial if the person who gave it is not available for cross-examination, Justice Scalia said.
In another Sixth Amendment case, on the right to the assistance of counsel, the court ruled 5 to 4 that defendants who are wrongly deprived of the right to hire a lawyer of their choice are entitled to have a conviction overturned without the need to show that the first-choice lawyer would have achieved a better result. Justice Scalia wrote the opinion in the case, United States v. Gonzalez-Lopez, No. 05-352, joined by Justices Stevens, Souter, Ginsburg and Breyer.
Government Authority
The court ruled 6 to 3 that John Ashcroft, the former attorney general, acted without legal authority when he declared that doctors in Oregon who followed the procedures of that state's Death With Dignity Act to help patients commit suicide would lose their federal prescription rights and thus forfeit, as a practical matter, their ability to practice medicine.
No statute authorized the attorney general to take such action unilaterally contrary to "the background principles of our federal system," Justice Kennedy said in the majority opinion. The decision, Gonzales v. Oregon, No. 04-623, was a rebuff of the Bush administration, which had embraced Mr. Ashcroft's personal fight against assisted suicide and carried on the case after he left the government.
Chief Justice Roberts joined a dissenting opinion written by Justice Scalia. Justice Thomas also dissented. Justice Alito was not yet on the court when the case was decided, with Justice O'Connor in the majority, on January 17.
A pair of decisions on the question of state immunity from suit, also issued in January, before Justice Alito joined the court, gave strong indications that the Rehnquist court's federalism battles were far from over.
The court was unanimous in permitting a disabled Georgia prison inmate's lawsuit against the state to go forward under the Americans With Disabilities Act. But the unanimity was achieved only because the court limited the decision, Goodman v. Georgia, No. 04-1203, to little more than the statement of a truism: that Congress has the power to make the states liable to lawsuit when they violate the Constitution.
In this case, the inmate claimed that his mistreatment had been so egregious as to violate not only the disabilities law, but also the Constitution. Justice Scalia's opinion said that to this extent, the lawsuit could proceed.
In the second decision, the court split 5 to 4 in ruling that states are not immune from private lawsuits brought under federal bankruptcy law. Justice O'Connor joined the majority opinion by Justice Stevens in this case, Central Virginia Community College v. Katz, No. 04-885. The dissenters were Chief Justice Roberts and Justices Scalia, Kennedy and Thomas, who wrote the dissenting opinion supporting state immunity.
The court ruled that as a matter of constitutional due process, the government must take reasonable steps to make sure that homeowners have been notified before it sells a house for nonpayment of taxes. Chief Justice Roberts wrote for the 5-to-3 majority in this case, Jones v. Flowers, No. 04-1477. Justices Thomas, Scalia and Kennedy dissented, and Justice Alito did not participate.
The justices ruled 7 to 1 that the Postal Service may be sued by people who trip over packages that letter carriers have carelessly left in their path. The majority opinion by Justice Kennedy in this case, Dolan v. United States Postal Service, No. 04-848, was based on an interpretation of the Federal Tort Claims Act, not on the Constitution. Justice Thomas dissented, and Justice Alito did not participate.
Environment
A fractured decision in the term's major environmental case, defining federal jurisdiction over wetlands in the Clean Water Act, did not produce a majority opinion but did retain the ability of the government to continue enforcing the 1972 statute vigorously.
The court split 4 to 1 to 4 in the case, Rapanos v. United States, No. 04-1034, with Justice Kennedy in the middle. One group of four - Justices Scalia, Thomas and Alito, and Chief Justice Roberts - denounced federal regulators' open-ended approach to wetlands as "beyond parody" and would have redefined the term to land adjacent to open water and actually wet most of the time.
The other foursome, Justices Stevens, Souter, Ginsburg and Breyer, would have deferred to the longstanding judgment of the Army Corps of Engineers that a "wetland" can often appear dry and can be miles from a body of water, as long as it sometimes performs a filtering or runoff-control function. Justice Kennedy voted with the first group to send the case back to a lower court, but he proposed a standard much closer to that of the Stevens group.
In a second case under the Clean Water Act, the court ruled unanimously that operators of hydroelectric dams must meet a state's water quality requirements to qualify for a federal license. Justice Souter wrote the opinion in this case, S. D. Warren Company v. Maine Board of Environmental Protection, No. 04-1527.
Religion
In a significant application of the Religious Freedom Restoration Act, the court ruled 8 to 0 that a small religious sect based in Brazil has the right to import a hallucinogenic tea that the federal government had wanted to seize as a banned narcotic.
The tea, known as hoasca, is central to the sect's rituals, Chief Justice Roberts noted in his opinion for the court. He said the government had not met the religious freedom act's demanding standard for applying a generally applicable law - federal narcotics law, in this instance - in a way that impinges on religious observance. Justice Alito did not participate in the case, Gonzales v. O Centro Espírita Beneficente União do Vegetal, No. 04-1084.
Education
Voting 8 to 0, the court upheld a federal law that requires universities to forfeit all federal financing if any part of the university does not provide military recruiters with the same access to students as it provides other potential employers.
The law, known as the Solomon Amendment, was challenged by a coalition of law schools that objected to the military's exclusion of openly gay men and women. The law schools argued that their First Amendment rights to free speech and association had been violated by the requirement that they open their doors to military recruiters.
Writing for the court in this case, Rumsfeld v. Forum for Academic and Institutional Rights, No. 04-1152, Chief Justice Roberts said the speech in question was that of the government, not of the law schools, which he noted remained free to criticize the military and to express their views on its policies. Justice Alito did not participate.
The court ruled 6 to 2 that parents who disagree with a public school system's special-education plan for their children have the legal burden of proving that the plan will fail to provide the "appropriate" education that a federal law guarantees to children with disabilities. Justice O'Connor wrote the decision in the case, Schaffer v. Weast, No. 04-698. Chief Justice Roberts did not participate, and Justice Alito was not yet on the court.
Separately, the court ruled 6 to 3 that parents who prevail at a special-education hearing are not entitled to reimbursement for the cost of hiring expert witnesses. Justice Alito wrote this opinion, Arlington Central School District v. Murphy, No. 05-18. Justices Souter, Breyer and Stevens dissented.
Employees' Rights
The court gave employees substantially enhanced protection against retaliation for complaining about discrimination on the job. Justice Breyer wrote the opinion in the case, Burlington Northern & Santa Fe Railway Company v. White, No. 05-259, which interpreted the anti-retaliation provision of the Civil Rights Act of 1964.
The court defined retaliation broadly as any "materially adverse" employment action that "might have dissuaded a reasonable worker" from making the complaint. Eight justices joined the majority opinion, and Justice Alito filed a separate concurring opinion.
Addressing the free-speech rights of government workers, the court ruled 5 to 4 that the Constitution does not protect public employees against retaliation for what they say in the course of performing their assigned duties.
Justice Kennedy's majority opinion in this case, Garcetti v. Ceballos, No. 04-473, drew a distinction between public employees' official speech, which he said supervisors were entitled to control, and their speech as citizens contributing to "civic discourse," for which they retained constitutional protection. The dissenters were Justices Stevens, Souter, Breyer and Ginsburg.
Abortion
The justices papered over, at least for this term, their fundamental differences on abortion, ruling narrowly and unanimously in a case from New Hampshire on access to abortion for teenagers facing medical emergencies. In an opinion by Justice O'Connor, her last before leaving the bench, the court reaffirmed that a medical-emergency exception was constitutionally required in a law that placed obstacles, like a parental-notice requirement and a waiting period, in the path of teenagers seeking abortions.
The more difficult question in the case, Ayotte v. Planned Parenthood of Northern New England, No. 04-1144, was that of what to do about New Hampshire's failure to include such an exception in its parental notice law. The justices sent the case back to the federal appeals court in Boston, which had banned enforcement of the law in its entirety, even for teenagers not facing a medical emergency.
That "most blunt remedy" would be justified, Justice O'Connor said, only if it was clear that New Hampshire's legislature, which enacted the law in 2003, would have preferred no law at all to one with the necessary health exception. Otherwise, she said, the appeals court should come up with a more limited remedy for the constitutional problem.
Patents
Indicating new interest in intellectual property law, the justices considered several patent cases but failed to offer much guidance in this burgeoning legal area.
The court handed a limited victory to eBay in its patent dispute with MercExchange, which successfully sued eBay for patent infringement on the method behind the online auction company's "Buy It Now" feature. The United States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit, which has sole jurisdiction over patent appeals, then granted an injunction against eBay's use of the technology, under the view that an injunction should automatically follow a finding of infringement.
In a unanimous opinion by Justice Thomas, the justices instructed the appeals court to make a case-by-case determination rather than apply an automatic injunction rule. But the opinion, eBay v. MercExchange, No. 05-130, left it unclear what presumptions and factors should go into that determination, and it was evident that the justices themselves had not agreed on a standard.
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Supreme Court Ruling Troubles GOP Senators
By PETE YOST Associated Press Writer
© 2006 The Associated Press
July 3, 2006, 7:51AM
WASHINGTON - Of all the steps the Supreme Court could have taken to undercut President Bush's legal position in the war on terror, applying international law to al-Qaida probably would have been the worst.
That development came to pass Thursday and now Republicans are rushing to protect the cornerstone of Bush's thinking: Suspected terrorists are not entitled to protection under the Geneva Accords.
Sens. Mitch McConnell and Lindsey Graham said Sunday that Congress must address the Supreme Court ruling embracing Article 3 of the conventions in the military commission case of Osama bin Laden's former driver.
Article 3 prohibits outrages upon personal dignity, "in particular humiliating and degrading treatment," and bars violence, including murder, mutilation and torture.
In an election year, declaring that international law governs the war on terror reminds voters of some of the Republican administration's lowest moments: controversies over Justice Department "torture" memos and allegations of abuse against detainees at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.
McConnell, R-Ky., the second-ranking GOP leader in the Senate, said the 5-3 court decision "means that American servicemen potentially could be accused of war crimes."
"I think Congress is going to want to deal with that," McConnell said on NBC's "Meet the Press." He called the ruling "very disturbing."
The Geneva Conventions' Article 3 is "far beyond our domestic law when it comes to terrorism, and Congress can rein it in, and I think we should," said Graham, R-S.C., assigned as a Reserve Judge to the Air Force Court of Criminal Appeals. Graham spoke on "Fox News Sunday."
Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., also expressed concern about the decision, saying it "is somewhat of a departure, in my view, of people who are stateless terrorists." McCain appeared on ABC's "This Week."
McConnell wants Congress to deal with the Geneva Accords issue at the same time it addresses the court's overturning of the military commissions created to try a limited number of detainees at Guantanamo Bay.
Addressing the commission issue, McCain and Senate Judiciary Committee chairman Arlen Specter, R-Pa., said Congress might devise broader changes than the White House wants in trials of detainees at Guantanamo Bay.
As a starting point for debate, McCain said Congress should embrace the Uniform Code of Military Justice, the bedrock of military law protecting the rights of accused soldiers. The Bush administration has skirted the code for nearly five years in dealing with Guantanamo Bay prisoners it has classified as enemy combatants.
Specter said "we have to reconcile" what the Bush administration thinks it can do and what the Supreme Court decision says. Specter spoke on CBS' "Face the Nation."
Many Republicans in Congress say detainees in the war on terror should not have the same legal protections as those in the military. Congress, they say, should give its imprimatur with little or no change to the Pentagon's military commissions.
McCain agreed that justice afforded to enemy combatants "shouldn't be exactly the same as applied to a member of the military." He added, however, that the Uniform Code of Military Justice is "a good framework."
The Supreme Court said Bush's military commissions violate the Uniform Code of Military Justice and the four Geneva Conventions signed in 1949.
Under military commission rules, the court noted, such panels may block an accused and his civilian lawyer from ever learning of evidence the prosecution presents that is classified. In addition, commissions can permit the admission of any evidence it deems to have probative value to a reasonable person.
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Supreme Court's decision in Hamdan vs. Rumsfeld could expose officials to prosecution
By Rosa Brooks
Los Angeles Times
06/30/06
THE SUPREME Court on Thursday dealt the Bush administration a stinging rebuke, declaring in Hamdan vs. Rumsfeld that military commissions for trying terrorist suspects violate both U.S. military law and the Geneva Convention.
But the real blockbuster in the Hamdan decision is the court's holding that Common Article 3 of the Geneva Convention applies to the conflict with Al Qaeda - a holding that makes high-ranking Bush administration officials potentially subject to prosecution under the federal War Crimes Act.
The provisions of the Geneva Convention were intended to protect noncombatants - including prisoners - in times of armed conflict. But as the administration has repeatedly noted, most of these protections apply only to conflicts between states. Because Al Qaeda is not a state, the administration argued that the Geneva Convention didn't apply to the war on terror. These assertions gave the administration's arguments about the legal framework for fighting terrorism a through-the-looking-glass quality. On the one hand, the administration argued that the struggle against terrorism was a war, subject only to the law of war, not U.S. criminal or constitutional law. On the other hand, the administration said the Geneva Convention didn't apply to the war with Al Qaeda, which put the war on terror in an anything-goes legal limbo.
This novel theory served as the administration's legal cover for a wide range of questionable tactics, ranging from the Guantanamo military tribunals to administration efforts to hold even U.S. citizens indefinitely without counsel, charge or trial.
Perhaps most troubling, it allowed the administration to claim that detained terrorism suspects could be subjected to interrogation techniques that constitute torture or cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment under international law, such as "waterboarding," placing prisoners in painful physical positions, sexual humiliation and extreme sleep deprivation.
Under Bush administration logic, these tactics were not illegal under U.S. law because U.S. law was trumped by the law of war, and they weren't illegal under the law of war either, because Geneva Convention prohibitions on torture and cruel treatment were not applicable to the conflict with Al Qaeda.
In 2005, Congress angered the administration by passing Sen. John McCain's amendment explicitly prohibiting the use of cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment of detainees. But Congress did not attach criminal penalties to violations of the amendment, and the administration has repeatedly indicated its intent to ignore it.
The Hamdan decision may change a few minds within the administration. Although the decision's practical effect on the military tribunals is unclear - the administration may be able to gain explicit congressional authorization for the tribunals, or it may be able to modify them to comply with the laws of war - the court's declaration that Common Article 3 applies to the war on terror is of enormous significance. Ultimately, it could pave the way for war crimes prosecutions of those responsible for abusing detainees.
Common Article 3 forbids "cruel treatment and torture [and] outrages upon personal dignity, in particular humiliating and degrading treatment." The provision's language is sweeping enough to prohibit many of the interrogation techniques approved by the Bush administration. That's why the administration had argued that Common Article 3 did not apply to the war on terror, even though legal experts have long concluded that it was intended to provide minimum rights guarantees for all conflicts not otherwise covered by the Geneva Convention.
But here's where the rubber really hits the road. Under federal criminal law, anyone who "commits a war crime ... shall be fined ... or imprisoned for life or any term of years, or both, and if death results to the victim, shall also be subject to the penalty of death." And a war crime is defined as "any conduct ... which constitutes a violation of Common Article 3 of the international conventions signed at Geneva." In other words, with the Hamdan decision, U.S. officials found to be responsible for subjecting war on terror detainees to torture, cruel treatment or other "outrages upon personal dignity" could face prison or even the death penalty.
Don't expect that to happen anytime soon, of course. For prosecutions to occur, some federal prosecutor would have to issue an indictment. And in the Justice Department of Atty. Gen. Alberto Gonzales - who famously called the Geneva Convention "quaint" - a genuine investigation into administration violations of the War Crimes Act just ain't gonna happen.
But as Yale law professor Jack Balkin concludes, it's starting to look as if the Geneva Convention "is not so quaint after all."
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Journalists and 'leakers' feel heat
By CHARLES J. HANLEY
AP Special Correspondent
Sat Jul 1, 2006
NEW YORK - Headline by headline, a trickle of news leaks on
Iraq and the antiterror campaign has grown into a steady stream of revelations, and from Pennsylvania Avenue to Downing Street, Copenhagen to Canberra, governments are responding with pressure and prosecutions.
The latest target is The New York Times. But the unfolding story begins as far back as 2003, when British weapons expert David Kelly was "outed" as the source of a story casting doubt on his government's arguments for invading Iraq, and he committed suicide.
And it will roll on this fall, when Danish journalists face trial for reporting their government knew there was no evidence of banned weapons in Iraq.
In London's Central Criminal Court, too, accused leakers will be in the dock this fall, for allegedly disclosing
President Bush talked of bombing al-Jazeera, the Arab television station. The British government threatens to prosecute newspapers that write any more about that leaked document.
Media advocates are alarmed at what they see as a mounting assault on press freedom in country after country, arguing it is potentially chilling the pursuit of truth as U.S. and European leaders pursue wars on terror and in Iraq.
"It's grotesque that at a time when political rhetoric is full of notions of democracy and liberty that we should have this fundamental right of journalists to investigate and report on public interest matters called into question," Aidan White, general-secretary of the Belgium-based International Federation of Journalists, told The Associated Press.
But others counter that national interest requires stopping leaks of classified information, and that some media reports endanger lives by tipping terrorists to government tactics.
"We cannot continue to operate in a system where the government takes steps to counter terrorism while the media actively works to disclose those operations without any regard for protection of lives, sources and legal methods," Sen. Pat Roberts (news, bio, voting record) said in Washington.
The Kansas Republican was reacting to a June 23 report by the Times - and other papers - detailing a U.S. government program that taps into a huge international database of financial records to try to track terror financing.
Some Republican lawmakers called for criminal investigations of the journalists responsible and of the government insiders who leaked the information.
Investigations are already under way in other U.S. cases, reaching back to 2003, when whistleblower Joseph Wilson questioned a Bush administration claim about Iraq's supposed nuclear program. Times reporter Judith Miller spent three months in jail in that complex case last year, as investigators sought whoever leaked the name of Wilson's
CIA-agent wife.
The Washington Times says the Justice Department is also investigating New York Times and Washington Post reporters - the Times for disclosing in 2005 that the government was monitoring Americans' phone calls without court warrants and the Post for reporting that the CIA was operating secret prisons for suspected terrorists in eastern Europe. The CIA in April fired a top analyst as an alleged source for the reports on covert prisons.
Just as the stories cross borders, so do the crackdowns.
Swiss investigators are looking for the leaker of an intelligence document attesting to the CIA prison network and are weighing criminal charges, under secrecy laws, against three journalists at the weekly SonntagsBlick who reported the story.
In Britain, revelations and retributions have filled news columns and airwaves since the U.S.-British invasion of Iraq in 2003, when the British Broadcasting Corp., citing an unidentified government source, said allegations of Iraqi weapons of mass destruction - now known to have been false - had been "sexed up."
In July that year, bioweapons expert David Kelly informed superiors he was the BBC's source. He expected confidentiality, but his identity was disclosed and he was compelled to testify, under harsh questioning, before two parliamentary committees. Within days, Kelly killed himself.
In 2004-05, at London's Daily Telegraph and then at The Times, correspondent Michael Smith reported on leaked memos from Prime Minister
Tony Blair's government indicating the Bush administration was long committed to invading Iraq, and weapons intelligence was "fixed" around that aim. Smith says he has been investigated under Britain's Official Secrets Act, but neither he nor any leaker has been charged.
For David Keogh, a former British Cabinet Office spokesman, and Leo O'Connor, an ex-Parliament aide, the outcome was different.
Both are charged under the secrecy act in the alleged leaking of a classified memo about a Bush-Blair meeting in 2004 at which Blair was said to have argued against a Bush suggestion of bombing al-Jazeera's headquarters in Qatar. Keogh and O'Connor face up to two years in prison if convicted this fall.
After London's Daily Mirror reported on that memo last November, Britain's attorney general warned other editors they could face prosecution if they divulged any more of the leaked document.
Across the North Sea, Michael Bjerre and Jesper Larsen of Berlingske Tidene, a major Danish daily, face two years in prison at their trial this fall - the first such prosecution of journalists in Denmark's modern history.
They reported in 2004 that before joining the Iraq invasion, the Danish government was told by military intelligence there was no firm evidence of banned weapons in Iraq, a finding the Danes presumably based on U.S. and British information.
Because it involved going to war, "the articles published were obviously in the public interest," the newspaper's chief editor, Niels Lunde, told AP.
The Danish leaker, a former intelligence officer, was convicted and jailed for four months last year. Now "the court must decide whether the penal code provision banning publishing secret information applies to these journalists," said prosecutor Karsten Hjorth. The government contends the leak damaged its intelligence relations with other nations.
Elsewhere:
-Two journalists in Romania face up to seven years in prison for possessing classified documents about the Romanian military's operations in Iraq and Afghanistan, even though their newspapers never published the information.
-A German parliamentary report May 26 disclosed Berlin's foreign intelligence agency had been illegally spying on German journalists since the 1990s to find the sources of leaks.
-De Telegraaf, the Netherlands' biggest paper, had to go to court to win a ruling last month ordering the Dutch secret service to stop wiretapping calls of two reporters who obtained leaked information about official corruption.
"Systematic surveillance is becoming one of the most worrying features in relations between authorities and media worldwide," said the journalist federation's White.
Even whistleblowers who don't divulge state secrets can feel the heat - like Australia's Rod Barton.
After the Canberra government dismissed what he privately reported about phony weapons "intelligence" and prisoner abuse in Iraq, the former Iraq weapons inspector went public last year with the information. Soon Barton's government contract work evaporated, he was "disinvited" from official functions, and former colleagues were ordered to shun him.
"Although there is still freedom of speech, it is not entirely free. There is a price," he told AP.
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NORAD air base on heightened alert - No reason given for 'Bravo-Plus' security level
WorldNetDaily.com
July 3, 2006
As the U.S. continues to express concern about the possibility of a North Korean missile test directed toward American territory and the rest of the world holds its breath over a close encounter with an asteroid, several U.S. air bases are on heightened alert.
But no one is talking about why.
The Cheyenne Mountain Air Station, which houses NORAD - charged with monitoring the North Korea situation - is now at "Bravo-Plus."
Other air bases in Colorado, California and Florida are also on heightened alert status.
There are five levels of alert: normal, Alpha (low), Bravo (medium), Charlie (high) and Delta (critical). "Bravo-Plus" is slightly higher than a medium threat level.
The Bush administration has urged North Korea to abandon its plans to test a long range missile. The Pentagon believes the missile is capable of reaching the United States.
NORAD and the U.S. Northern Command in Colorado would play a big role in both detecting and responding to a missile launch if it ever occurred.
The U.S. missile defense system is only a few years old, but could be tested if North Korea chooses to act.
Meanwhile, in a development that may or may not be related to the heightened security alert, an asteroid up to half a mile wide is due to brush past the Earth early today.
Scientists who have been tracking asteroid 2004 XP14 say it will approach almost as close as the Moon, traveling at 10.5 miles per second.
It has been classified as a Potentially Hazardous Asteroid (PHA), along with 782 known others.
Initially there were concerns that the asteroid might collide with the Earth later this century. However, further analysis of its orbit has ruled this out - at least for the foreseeable future.
If XP14 did hit the Earth the effects would be devastating.
"It would probably be big enough to wipe out a small country," said Dr David Asher, from the Armagh Observatory in Northern Ireland.
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Pentagon sees Iran bombing as unsuccessful: report
Reuters
Sun Jul 2, 2006
WASHINGTON - Top Pentagon officers have told the Bush administration that bombing Iranian nuclear facilities would probably fail to destroy that country's nuclear program, the New Yorker magazine reported on Sunday.
The senior commanders also warned that any attack launched if diplomacy fails to end the standoff over
Iran's nuclear ambitions could have "serious economic, political, and military consequences for the United States," the article said, citing unidentified U.S. military officials.
"A crucial issue in the military's dissent, the officers said, is the fact that American and European intelligence agencies have not found specific evidence of clandestine activities or hidden facilities; the war planners are not sure what to hit," according to the report.
The U.S. military's experience in Iraq, where no weapons of mass destruction were found and the war continues, has affected its approach to Iran, the magazine quoted a high-ranking general as saying.
"The target array in Iran is huge, but it's amorphous," the unidentified general was quoted as saying. "We built this big monster with Iraq, and there was nothing there.
"This is son of Iraq."
The United States on Friday spurned Iranian calls for more time to study an offer of incentives to curb its nuclear fuel program, insisting Tehran must reply by the Group of Eight industrialized nations' deadline on July 5.
The article, by journalist Seymour Hersh, also questioned the effectiveness of U.S. targeting potential nuclear sites.
"Intelligence has also shown that for the past two years the Iranians have been shifting their most sensitive nuclear-related materials and production facilities, moving some into urban areas, in anticipation of a bombing raid," it said.
Another parallel U.S. military leaders drew with Iraq is the administration's desire for a swift and cheap intervention in Iran without sufficient regard for economic and political consequences, including oil supplies and a backlash in the broader Muslim world and in Europe.
"If you're a military planner, you try to weigh options," one senior military official was quoted as saying. "What is the capability of the Iranian response, and the likelihood of a punitive response like cutting off oil shipments? What would that cost us?"
Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld and his aides "really think they can do this on the cheap, and they underestimate the capability of the adversary," the official told the magazine.
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Weekends With the President's Men
Maureen Dowd
The New York Times
June 30, 2006
ST. MICHAELS, Md. - JUST an hour and a half from Washington, across the 4.3-mile Chesapeake Bay Bridge, or less than 30 minutes in a government-issue Chinook helicopter, is the Eastern Shore of Maryland and the primly groomed waterside village of St. Michaels.
St. Michaels has begun to lure V.I.P.'s who, some boosters would have it, could propel it into the gilded realm of the Hamptons and Nantucket. But that will take a while. There's little for the young - just a few bars and no beaches or nightclubs - and these new householders are too circumspect and perhaps too old to be showcasing their excesses, baubles and abs.
One is Vice President Dick Cheney, 65, who paid $2.67 million last September for a house that resembles a wide, squat Mount Vernon. Another is his old friend Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld, 73, who in 2003 paid $1.5 million for a brick Georgian that was last a bed-and-breakfast. Among other recognizable owners in the area are Tony Snow, President Bush's new press secretary; Joe Trippi, Howard Dean's presidential campaign manager in 2004; Nicholas Brady, President George H. W. Bush's treasury secretary; and John S. D. Eisenhower, a writer and historian and the son of President Dwight D. Eisenhower.
St. Michaels, population 1,200 within the city limits and perhaps a thousand more in the same ZIP code, sits on the wrist of a peninsula that bends deep into Chesapeake Bay. With two broad clawlike fingers, spotted and wrinkled by coves and creeks that reach beyond the town and down to Tilghman Island and Nelson Point, it is a place of waterfront sunsets and white sails, of oysters and crabs, of birding, fishing and hunting, and of affluent retirees, tourists and weekenders. Most, like the Cheneys and Rumsfelds, are past 50.
With many less luminous who have made their marks in business, medicine, law, government and the military, St. Michaels is too proud and indifferent for celebrity gawking. "They're just people living in town," said the Hawaiian shirted bartender at the Carpenter Street Saloon, who thought giving his name would be indiscreet. "They're not the first important people living in town, and they're not the last. They're just here."
The town is beginning to contend, however, with 21st-century perils to its composure. After eight years of resistance, construction will soon start on a development that will bring around 250 new homes and swell the year-round population by about 50 percent. In summer, traffic is choking and decivilizing Talbot Street, the only road through town. Housing developments are crowding Tilghman Island, once almost exclusively home to fishermen - or watermen, as they're called.
One morning in May, Francis Zeglen put on a khaki windbreaker and his wife, Georgia, a turquoise sweater for a shopping stroll along Talbot. They were in a crosswalk when a light-brown pickup knocked them down.
Urged not to move, they were lying there blinking, Mr. Zeglen, 76, on his back, Mrs. Zeglen, 78, on her side. The Rev. Mark Nestlehutt, a tall young sailor and the rector of Christ Episcopal Church, hurried over, not solely on a spiritual mission. He is also chairman of the town's Advisory Committee for Traffic Planning and Pedestrian Friendly Streets - which, in a place with a speed limit of 25 miles an hour and few hot-blooded young drivers, they usually are.
The Zeglens were treated at a hospital in nearby Easton, he for a broken left arm, she for immobilizing bruises, and drove home to Philadelphia the next day. "I turned and looked," Mr. Zeglen said when he gave his own account of the accident, "and he just kept coming." The driver of the pickup was charged with failure to stop for a pedestrian in a crosswalk. It had been a more eventful morning than most, the first pedestrian accident in 23 years - at least the first that the town manager, Cheril S. Thomas, could recall.
In St. Michaels, you also don't see much of the one-upping of Joneses or architectural bullying found in showier coastal resorts. The old farm families and the wealthy weekenders like the Rumsfelds and Cheneys look out over acres of lawn rolling down to the sea grass and their own private docks. But the homes are hidden down two-lane roads with cunning yellow signs on utility poles that say, menacingly and untruthfully, "No Outlet," and then down driveways shrouded by trees and lined with thick and impenetrable hedgerows.
The houses have names. Mr. Rumsfeld's is Mount Misery and is just across Rolles Creek from a house called Mount Pleasant. On four acres, with four bathrooms, five bedrooms and five fireplaces, built in 1804, the Rumsfeld house is just barely visible at the end of a gravel drive.
Thomas M. Crouch, a broker at the Coldwell Banker office in town, says one legend attributes the name to the original owner, said to have been a sad and doleful Englishman. His merrier brother then built a house, and to put him on, Mr. Crouch supposes, named it Mount Pleasant.
But there is some historical gravity to the name, too. By 1833, Mount Misery's owner was Edward Covey, a farmer notorious for breaking unruly slaves for other farmers. One who wouldn't be broken was Frederick Douglass, then 16 and later the abolitionist orator. Covey assaulted him, so Douglass beat him up and escaped. Today, where the drive begins, Mount Misery seems a congenial place, with a white mailbox with newspaper delivery sleeves attached, a big American flag fluttering from a post by a split-rail fence and a tall, one-hole birdhouse of the sort made for bluebirds - although the lens in the hole suggests another function.
Less than two miles from the Rumsfelds', past Southwind, where the late James A. Michener wrote much of his epic novel "Chesapeake," Church Neck Road dead-ends at private Fuller Road on the left. About a quarter-mile up, past grazing cattle and sheep and four other homes, is Vice President Cheney's nine-acre place, Ballintober.
The house, built in 1930, is rambling and white. It has a five-car garage, a pool, stately formal gardens, a laundry chute and large, glass-walled waterside rooms for entertaining. Coldwell Banker's real estate listing called it an "individually designed dwelling." It is also unapproachable. "The last time I went up Fuller Road," Katie Edmonds, an agent at Meredith Real Estate, said, "S.U.V.'s came out of the woods at me."
Neighbors also complain about federal security agents' shutting down Church Neck Road to let the Cheneys pass in their speeding brigades of shiny black S.U.V.'s. But they don't complain much, because the newcomers are thought to be good for property values. If the Cheneys and Rumsfelds are willing to buy here, after all, who wouldn't be?
St. Michaels was traditionally a center of farming, boat building, crabbing and tonging for oysters. For 100 years, it has also attracted older, upper-crust retirees from Washington, Baltimore and Philadelphia who buy waterfront sites and, more recently, century-old houses downtown.
The second-home owners cannot vote in local elections, but their needs, whimsies and appetites set the tone of the town. Approaching St. Michaels, Route 33 - the only way in or out - passes a lumberyard's lawn full of rocking chairs. In the town itself, where 33 becomes Talbot Street, a flag hanging from one store declares, "Quilters welcome." There are at least 20 bed-and-breakfasts downtown or nearby, no neon signs, no stoplights and, except for the plants and waist-high pink ceramic flamingos that the Acme supermarket features in front, no obstructions blocking sidewalks.
Except for the Acme, shops on Talbot cater to people with money to burn: the Calico Gallery, St. Michaels Candy Company, the Cultured Pearl, the Scented Garden, Rings & Things, Gourmet-by-the-Bay (an upscale food shop and caterer that has made Thanksgiving pies for the Rumsfelds), Justine's ice cream parlor, Flying Fred's Gifts for Pets. Bistro St. Michaels and 208 Talbot are expensive restaurants.
Only Big Al's - an emphatically lowbrow seafood and souvenir shop where Joyce Rumsfeld, the secretary's wife, comes in for bushels of cooked blue crabs - breaks with the Laura Ashley look of St. Michaels. Two small picnic tables sit out front, and the proprietor, Al Poore, offers sandwiches of crab cake for $5.95, soft crab for $6.95, oysters for $5.95 and fish for $4.95. Mr. Poore, who is 71 and about 6 foot 4 with a thicket of tousled gray hair, sinks like a ball in a catcher's mitt into the cavernous black leather easy chair in his memento-strewn office at the rear of the store. He opened it in 1968. "When I came here," he said, "there was one place where you could stay overnight. Now we've got one on every corner."
Merchants say they're wary of intruding on the privacy of the Cheneys and Rumsfelds, but they do it anyway. "I'm a businessman," said Mr. Poore, a registered Democrat who voted twice for George W. Bush. "I probably mention them to customers five or six times a week. They bring a lot of prestige."
Paul Gardner, the front office manager at the $250-to-$700-a-night Inn at Perry Cabin, a plush waterside resort at the far end of town, said, "We've had Rumsfeld in for dinner." Once last year, the Cheney Chinook landed near the inn's laundry and maintenance facility. "We're very pleased to have them in the area," he said.
Some people view the new neighbors less cordially. On Railroad Avenue, which the Cheneys and Rumsfelds use to reach Church Neck, Cassandra Harrison, a mother of two who waits tables and cleans houses, was resting on the stoop of her one-story white ranch house.
She is grateful that the air space above the Cheneys' house is blocked. "It's a no-fly zone, and that's good," she said. "But I'm not happy. I don't think society's liking them so much." Ms. Harrison, 23, voted for the first time in 2004, she said, "just because I did not want him. I don't think that they tell us the truth."
But that is a minority view in Talbot County, which went 61 percent for Mr. Bush in 2000 and 58 percent in 2004. Support for the war in Iraq is waning here as it is most everywhere else. But the great majority of Mr. Nestlehutt's 790 parishioners, he said, are "tolerant," live-and-let-live urban Republicans, not hard-core social conservatives. Mr. Cheney and Mr. Rumsfeld, he said, seem to fit right in.
Comment: Rummy's house is called Mount Misery. How appropriate.
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Bush address pays tribute to armed forces
AP
Sat Jul 1, 2006
WASHINGTON - President Bush paid tribute to America's armed forces Saturday, calling Independence Day a time to thank the men and women who defend freedom.
"For more than two centuries, from the camps of Valley Forge to the mountains of Afghanistan, Americans have served and sacrificed for the principles of our founding," Bush said in his weekly radio address. "Today, a new generation of American patriots is defending our freedom against determined and ruthless enemies."
Bush plans to celebrate July Fourth at Fort Bragg, N.C., where he will have lunch with military personnel. The president will return to the White House Tuesday night to watch fireworks in the nation's capital.
On the holiday, Americans should recall the ideals that the nation's founders outlined in the Declaration of Independence, Bush said. He also encouraged every American to find a way to thank those who defend freedom.
He urged people to help America Supports You, a nationwide program set up by the Defense Department to communicate citizen support to military men and women at home and abroad.
"At this hour, the men and women of our armed forces are facing danger in distant places, carrying out their missions with all the skill and honor we expect of them," Bush said. "And their families are enduring long separations from their loved ones with great courage and dignity."
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Bin Laden warns US
Reuters
Sat Jul 1, 2006
DUBAI - A purported audio tape by Al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden warned Iraq's Shi'ite majority on Saturday of retaliation over attacks on Sunni Arabs and that his group would fight the United States anywhere in the world.
Bin Laden, making his second Internet broadcast in two days, also warned the world community to stay out of Somalia, where Islamists have fought their way to power in Mogadishu.
"We will fight (U.S.) soldiers on the land of Somalia ... and we reserve the right to punish it on its land and anywhere possible," said the speaker on the tape, sounding like the Saudi-born militant.
No immediate independent verification of the voice was immediately available but the tape was posted on an Internet site used by Islamists.
Bin Laden, a Sunni, said the Sunni Arab minority in Iraq was being annihilated.
"It is not possible that many of (the Shi'ites) violate, alongside America and its allies, (the Sunni cities of) Ramadi, Falluja, Mosul .... (and) that their areas would be safe from retaliation and harm," he said.
Bin Laden said he endorsed Abu Hamza al-Muhajir as the new leader of al Qaeda in Iraq after the killing of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi in a U.S. air strike on June 7.
On Somalia, he said: "We warn all of the countries in the world not to respond to America by sending international troops to Somalia."
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Only 483 Guard Working on Mexican Border
By AARON C. DAVIS
Associated Press
Jun 30, 2006
SACRAMENTO, Calif. - On the deadline to have 2,500 troops along the Mexican border, the National Guard said Friday that only 483 were in position and working with the U.S. Border Patrol as the Bush administration had directed.
But Guard officials said more than 2,000 others were somewhere inside the four southwestern border states, training or helping plan the deployment. He and Bush administration officials argued Friday that the presence of troops in those states spelled success in the first stage of the mission.
Lt. Gen. H. Steven Blum, chief of the National Guard Bureau, an arm of the Pentagon, had promised June 1 that by the end of the month 2,500 Guard troops would be working "on the border."
"As defined by the operation, the National Guard has met and exceeded its goal of deploying 2,500 soldiers and airmen to the four Southwest border states," said White House spokesman Blain Rethmeier. "Progress to date is real and the Guard's efforts are making a positive difference in this national effort."
As evidence, he said the early arrival of troops had allowed the Border Patrol to send 125 agents "back to the front lines," and helped the Border Patrol catch nearly 200 illegal immigrants, seize 123 pounds of marijuana, 18 pounds of cocaine and seven vehicles.
Through initial pay requests filed with the Air Guard and orders filed with the Army Guard, the Guard bureau verified 2,547 troops were in the four border states for the mission, said Daniel Donohue, a spokesman for the National Guard Bureau.
Only 483 were physically on the border, he conceded.
The remaining forces _ 1,816 _ are in training somewhere in the four states; 248 are assigned to headquarters and planning roles, Donohue said.
Asked to clarify, Blum spokesman Mark Allen responded by e-mail that the general had never specifically promised to deliver troops to a "geographically defined latitude and longitude."
Still, there were signs the deployment was picking up speed.
Texas Gov. Rick Perry said 1,000 Army and Air National Guardsmen were either on the border or "on their way," adding 500 to totals released Thursday. But his office said the additional troops didn't actually reach the border, but were considered deployed when they left Friday for two weeks of training.
Several states whose Guard leaders and governors had been contacted by the National Guard Bureau in the last 48 hours also made announcements Friday that they would send troops.
Gov. Mike Easley of North Carolina said he would reluctantly deploy 300 troops to the border in mid-July.
"I would prefer not to have any of the North Carolina National Guard deployed to other states at this time," he said. "However, the Guard units in the western states are spread thin as they battle raging wildfires. We must all step up and do our part to keep our country safe."
Kentucky announced it would send up to 650 National Guard troops. Arkansas also said it would send 200. New Jersey also said it would send up to 650 for three-week assignments.
Damon Foreman, senior patrol agent and spokesman for the Border Patrol in San Diego, said agents there eagerly await the Guard's help.
"We would welcome all the help we could get. We could absorb them as fast as we could give them instructions on what to do," Foreman said, adding that the delayed deployment, however, had not affected operations.
"We've been doing a considerably effective job for a long time now, we'll keep doing our job whether the whole number of Guard show up tomorrow, a week from tomorrow, or a month from now."
Bush's plan for stemming illegal immigration by using National Guardsmen in a support role called for 2,500 troops to be on the border by June 30, and 6,000 by the end of July.
Bush had said the mission would free up thousands of officers now on other duties to actively patrol the border. Guardsmen are expected to build fences, conduct routine surveillance and take care of other administrative duties for the border patrol.
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Cubans find backdoor route to U.S. soil
By ANDREW SELSKY
Associated Press
Sun Jul 2, 2006
MONA ISLAND, Puerto Rico - Taking the back door into the United States, droves of Cubans are crossing some of the world's stormiest seas and clambering onto this rugged speck of an island belonging to Puerto Rico.
Forsaking the heavily patrolled Florida Straits, Cubans are increasingly reaching the U.S. by flying to the Dominican Republic and traveling about 40 miles by boat to Mona Island.
In fiscal year 2001, no more than five Cubans landed on Mona. But in the past nine months 579 have arrived, Jorge Diaz, a senior U.S. Customs and Border Protection agent, said Tuesday.
Under the general U.S. "wet-foot, dry-foot" policy, Cubans who reach U.S. soil get to stay, while those caught at sea are sent back. A Puerto Rican nature reserve inhabited by a few park rangers and lots of iguanas, Mona Island, like the rest of Puerto Rico, is as much a part of the U.S. as Miami is.
On a recent morning, U.S. Customs and Border Protection agents, accompanied by an Associated Press reporter and photographer, sailed 45 miles from mainland Puerto Rico to Mona to pick up two groups of Cubans. Approached from the east, among leaping dolphins, the 6.7 square-mile island looks forbidding, rising in sulfur-colored cliffs. But on the western side, facing the Dominican Republic, a white-sand beach beckons.
Eight Cubans sat at a picnic table under a palm tree, having spent 12 hours in a smuggler's open-air boat. Arriving just past midnight, they spent the rest of the night on mattresses provided by the island's rangers.
They said they were scared they would either drown or be caught by authorities during the journey.
"We prayed for 12 hours, aloud or silent, but we prayed," said Richard Echevarria, his green T-shirt shirt stiff with sweat and salt spray. Another boat carrying nine Cubans had arrived two days earlier.
The Cubans said they flew to the Dominican Republic on commercial airliners. Even accomplishing that step required patience and luck. To leave Cuba legally, Cubans must generally get a visa from the country they're going to visit, plus a letter of invitation from a citizen of that country. They then must seek an exit visa from the Cuban government, which is sometimes denied. The process can take months.
The Cubans - who couldn't simply fly from the Dominican Republic to the United States without a U.S. visa - then paid between $1,500 and $2,000 to be taken by boat to Mona. That's at least $12,000 total for one boatload.
Dominican people-smugglers are turning huge profits in this growing industry, and few are prosecuted.
"If they hear you speaking with a Cuban accent in Santo Domingo, someone is going to come up to you and offer to arrange the trip," said Jorge Bueno, one of the new arrivals. Another Cuban said he hadn't left the Dominican capital's airport before someone sidled up with an offer.
"It's very lucrative. It's better than trafficking drugs," Bueno remarked as he donned an orange life vest and settled into the back of the Customs boat.
Few migrants of other nationalities plying these seas show up at Mona, which sits about halfway between the Dominican Republic and Puerto Rico, because they know they'll be sent back. Instead, they try to make it all the way to Puerto Rico's western shores. About 600 have been arrested since October, most of them Dominicans, Diaz said.
The trip aboard low-slung boats called yolas is hazardous and many have died in the 80-mile-wide Mona Passage between the Dominican Republic and Puerto Rico, where the Atlantic collides with the Caribbean and is often stormy.
In November a federal judge in Puerto Rico sentenced five Dominicans to prison terms of 10 to 17 years. They were captured after their yola capsized with 93 Dominican migrants aboard. At least seven of them drowned.
It was a rare victory over the smugglers. About 80 suspects were arrested in the Dominican Republic in the first three months of this year but nearly all were released for lack of evidence, said Adm. Delfin Bautista, the commander of a Dominican naval unit that searches for the yolas. Migrants hoping to make the voyage again refuse to testify for fear of being blacklisted by smugglers. Bautista said smugglers are treated locally as heroes.
When a Coast Guard cutter intercepts a yola, the pilot pretends to be one of the migrants, said Petty Officer First Class Howard Sanchez, of the Coast Guard cutter Matinicus.
"You can't tell who the smuggler is, and none of the migrants will point him out to us," the Brooklyn native said.
After taking the migrants aboard, the Coast Guard sets the yola on fire or sinks it with machine gun fire.
As the Customs boat headed back to Puerto Rico, it leaped over 10-foot swells and smashed into cavernous troughs, drenching the 17 Cubans aboard in spray. One threw up.
"Imagine if you were out there in one of those yolas," Agent Art Morrell shouted over the roar of the engine.
Three hours later, the boat docked in Boqueron, southwest Puerto Rico. Carlos Alvarez, a butcher from Higuey, Cuba, combed his hair. Wearing a red tank top, he was the first to step off the boat.
There was no ceremony or celebration. The exhausted migrants said they just wanted to get to the U.S. mainland, mostly to Florida, where relatives awaited them.
For those without money, help comes from a group of women in San Juan who left Cuba decades ago and devote themselves to aiding their newly arrived compatriots. They give them clothes, put them up in a San Juan hotel and help pay their passage to the mainland.
The migrants were locked in Customs vans and driven to a processing center on a former U.S. Air Force base. The agents checked the migrants' Cuban IDs and fingerprinted and photographed them. The agents can detect the distinctive Cuban accent but generally don't contact Cuban authorities to verify the migrants really are Cuban or have a criminal record.
These newly arrived migrants were among the lucky ones.
Capt. James Tunstall, commander of Coast Guard operations in the eastern Caribbean, says the traffic should be stopped before it leads to "a catastrophic event ... when you have an overladen yola coming across with men, women and children in a sea that can become very rough very quickly."
Alvarez, the butcher, said he had planned to bring out his wife and daughter by the Mona route. But after seeing how dangerous it is, he expressed second thoughts.
"I wouldn't want to put them through that," he said.
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Nature's Fury
Israel warns NASA about double asteroids
By JUDY SIEGEL-ITZKOVICH
Jun. 27, 2006 0:38 | Updated Jun. 27, 2006 3:55
Israeli scientists have been invited to present important new research on "double asteroids" at a US National Aeronautics and Space Administration workshop in Colorado.
The paper, to be presented this week by Tel Aviv University researchers at the "NEO [Near-Earth Object] Detection and Threat Mitigation" workshop, discusses the discovery of a high incidence of double "Aten-type" asteroids and the danger of their potential collision with Earth.
TAU runs a national information center (supported by the Israel Space Agency and the Science and Technology Ministry) on near-Earth asteroids and comets that are liable to cause our planet harm. At the TAU Wise Observatory in Mitzpe Ramon, researchers monitor these celestial bodies and study the light coming from them.
As part of his doctoral work at TAU, David Polishook investigated Aten-type asteroids that transverse the Earth's orbit but most of the time are located between the Earth and the Sun so that they are difficult to observe.
Out of eight bodies investigated, five were found to be double - a main asteroid several kilometers in diameter and a smaller "moon" that revolves around it. These moons are apparently several hundred meters in diameter and located only a few kilometers from the asteroids they circle.
This discovery is important because the presence of the moon disrupts scientists' plans of eliminating the danger to Earth posed by double asteroids either by changing their orbit or destroying them in a nuclear explosion.
Following the presentation on the discovery by TAU researchers, NASA workshop organizers are to write a report for the US Congress on the subject. Since only American citizens are permitted to present their research in person, the Israeli scientists were asked to send their data as a "white paper" for discussion.
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Water damage shuts D.C. museums for July 4
AP
Fri Jun 30, 2006
WASHINGTON - Flood damage kept the National Museum of American History and the National Archives closed Friday at the start of the busy Independence Day holiday weekend.
The Museum of Natural History and the Smithsonian Visitors Center castle, also closed since Monday because of basement flooding, were to reopen, said Smithsonian spokesman Peter Golkin.
Some of the most severe damage to Washington's cultural attractions is at the National Archives, home to the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution and the Bill of Rights. The historic documents were all safe in a vault, officials said, but other documents were at risk of mildew damage, and crews were using giant dehumidifiers to try to protect them.
Grime stained the walls after flood waters rose to 8 feet in a two-year-old theater on Monday, knocking out the power. Clumps of debris, carpet and ceiling tiles remained Thursday.
"It's starting to smell like the bayou, isn't it?" facility manager Tim Edwards said.
The flood damage at the Archives was expected to cost at least $2 million to repair, but the Archives still planned to host its annual Fourth of July reading of the Declaration of Independence on Tuesday, and officials hoped to reopen the building later next week.
The Archives, which finished a $100 million renovation three years ago, typically has 5,000 visitors a day in June and July.
No Smithsonian museum exhibits were damaged by flood waters, Golkin said. Most damage was limited to mechanical equipment, but at the American history museum had flooding in the lower-level cafeteria and gift shop.
Carpeting and other fixtures need to be replaced before the building can reopen, Golkin said. It wasn't immediately clear how long that would take.
Comment: Just in time for the 4th of July! How symbolic...
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Six dead, nine missing after storms in northern Romania
AFP
Sat July 1, 2006
VIENNA - Six people are dead and nine missing after a strong storm hit northern Romania overnight, Suceava county prefect Orest Onofrei has said.
Four members of one family in the village of Arbore were carried away in seconds after a small river burst its banks, witnesses said.
"Our priority is to find those missing and to pick up the corpses of animals to prevent the spread of diseases," Agriculture Minister Gheorghe Flutur, who travelled to the area during the night, told journalists Saturday.
Several hundred houses were damaged, as well as a number of roads.
Only last week, floods in northern Romania killed 12 people died and another three were missing.
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Tornado flips truck on New York highway
AP
Fri Jun 30, 2006
CHEEKTOWAGA, N.Y. - A tornado touched down in a Buffalo suburb Friday afternoon, flipping a truck driving along the New York State Thruway and a construction trailer with a worker inside. No serious injuries were reported.
The funnel cloud was sighted at about 3 p.m. and left a path that was 3 miles long and 100 yards wide, said Steve McLaughlin, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service.
Witnesses described watching a tractor-trailer being tossed onto its side amid hail and heavy rains.
"It was very scary, no doubt about it," said Albert Nigro of Amherst, who said he was driving about 200 yards behind the westbound truck.
Cars behind the truck spun out, he said. A shaken witness called a television station and said his car was lifted from the Thruway and dropped into oncoming traffic.
The truck driver had minor injuries.
A construction trailer near the Thruway was tossed into a nearby road, slightly injuring a worker inside, police said. The storm also ripped off tree limbs, damaged store signs and downed power lines.
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N.M. community severely limits water use
By TIM KORTE
Associated Press
Sat July 1, 2006
LAS VEGAS, N.M. - The drought in this community is now so severe that water isn't provided with restaurant meals unless a diner requests it, and then it's served in a paper cup. Car washes operate only two days each week.
The hotel pools are empty, and long-term guests must ask if they want linens changed more than once every four days.
"I sleep, eat and drink with worries about how we're going to get through this," said Richard Trujillo, the city's utilities administrator. "When it hasn't snowed or rained, people will want to know, 'What are you doing to solve this?' "
As in much of the Southwest, the high desert lands of New Mexico are locked in another drought cycle this summer, with wildfires raging in tinder-dry forests. According to the National Weather Service, statewide precipitation for May was 36 percent of the normal amount - the seventh straight excessively dry month.
Santa Fe has received only 1.2 inches of precipitation during the seven-month period since November, the lowest in 133 years of record keeping. The 0.41 inches in Albuquerque is the lowest in 114 years of data.
And in Las Vegas, a community along the eastern edge of the Sangre de Cristo Mountains, the 60-month data show precipitation 18.71 inches below normal, according to Charlie Liles, meteorologist in charge of the Weather Service in Albuquerque.
"That's essentially a year's precipitation over a five-year period," Liles said.
As a result, Las Vegas has imposed some of New Mexico's most restrictive water rules. Outdoor watering has been banned since last fall, leaving lawns withering in once-lush neighborhoods.
Deborah Martinez, who has lived for 42 years in the stately Victorian home where she grew up, gave up her vegetable garden this year. Where her grass hasn't yellowed, it has blown away, and the morning glories that once grew on her fence are history.
She and her husband, William, can only watch as the roses and vines adorning their porch wither. They've even begun to share their bath water.
"We'd rather have survival water," Mrs. Martinez said as the two sat on a porch swing. "It's OK if everything dies, as long as we don't."
Las Vegas relies almost entirely on surface water. Melting snowpack and rainfall collects to form the Gallinas River, and 98 percent of the water for the town's 18,000 residents is stored in two reservoirs in the mountains above town. The river then trickles through the meadows of Las Vegas, barely ankle-deep and a few yards wide this summer.
"Through the '70s and '80s, you'd usually see spring runoff last into June," Trujillo recalled. "By the middle of July, we'd get into the monsoon season. There was always enough water. It was like clockwork."
But the clock seems broken. It wasn't a snowy winter this year. And as months pass without rain, city reserves have dropped to 50 percent of capacity - enough to last only into September unless monsoonal rains sweep across New Mexico as they usually do in July and August.
Liles said forecasting models suggest precipitation should be close to average in July and August, meaning the late-summer downpours may be coming.
But he offered a word of caution: The most recent years for poor snowpack in New Mexico were 2000 and 2002 - close together over the 56-year study span. Liles wonders whether those years might indicate a trend toward deepening drought.
Despite the water restrictions, Trujillo said there have been few complaints. Residents are consuming about 1.3 million gallons daily, compared with 2.8 million gallons during normal usage last year.
"Our citizens have been great," Trujillo said. "We've been working since 2000 to implement year-round awareness programs to help conserve water during the droughts, and the response has been outstanding."
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Katrina shocks New Orleans visitors 10 months on
By Peter Henderson
Reuters
Sun Jul 2, 2006
NEW ORLEANS - Bill Friend thought he was ready to go home again. He had read the newspapers, watched TV and talked with friends about the devastation wreaked on New Orleans by Hurricane Katrina.
Still, he was shocked.
"You go down street after street after street and see nothing -- wreckage," said Friend, 80, who grew up in New Orleans and now lives in the Washington area. "The overall impression of it is how much of it there is."
Katrina hit New Orleans on August 29, flooding 80 percent of the city and killing more than 1,500 from Louisiana in one of the worst natural disasters the country has seen. So far, only about half the population has returned and vast stretches of the city are nearly deserted and still full of debris.
"Ten months later, you come away with the impression that the cleanup is only beginning," said Friend's wife, Louise. "Oh my goodness, where does anyone start?"
For visitors new to New Orleans, the storm appears to have just passed.
Residents see changes every day -- a store opens, stoplights work at an intersection with temporary stop signs, a government trailer shows up in the front yard of a damaged home in a sign that it will be reclaimed and rebuilt.
But visitors see other things -- such as the word "Baghdad" scrawled in black spray paint across a broken house in the Lower Ninth Ward of New Orleans, where it has been for months.
There is the roughly 6-foot-high (2-meter) dirty bathtub ring around miles of houses in areas flooded for weeks.
And many houses remain barely standing, twisted by the force of the storm in areas where Katrina broke through levees and saturated the city with putrid water.
"The devastation, the totality and the enormity of it is just so heartbreaking. If this were hit in a carpet-bombing of a war you couldn't have more devastation," U.S. Sen. George Allen (news, bio, voting record) of Virginia said during a visit just over a week ago.
BEYOND THE FRENCH QUARTER
Many believe they have seen great progress when they arrive, since the tourist centers of the airport, the French Quarter and the Garden District of old mansions survived relatively well. The most historic sections of the city are on the highest ground.
Walter Dupart, 53, remembers when his son's father-in-law arrived. "He said, man, looks like New Orleans is coming back, and I kind of chuckled," Dupart said.
So they got in the car and began what has become the city's unofficial tour, viewing the Lower Ninth Ward, where a barge floated through a canal breach and houses still lie smashed.
The tour continued through St. Bernard Parish, which includes more than 10 miles of shopping malls, restaurants and houses, almost every one a deserted hulk that was flooded.
Up toward Lake Pontchartrain, where other levees breached, gutted houses await repair next to wrecks moved off their foundations. An ancient oak tree sprawled onto one yard and house does not appear to have been touched by cleanup crews.
Dupart, who lives in the once-flooded Gentilly neighborhood, remembers the reaction of his friend, a soldier on leave from Iraq. "'The only way I can describe it is this is like the war zone I just left,"' the visitor had said.
Some are puzzled, angry or indignant at the lack of progress. Insurance money has begun flowing but direct aid to homeowners is not expected before the fall, and views of government's leadership vary sharply among residents.
Thailand-based relief worker Tom Kerr recalled tsunami devastation in Aceh, Indonesia, when he saw the Ninth Ward. "It looked a lot like Aceh when we visited six months after the storm," he said, asking why the United States had not done more.
"Most of the area could be improved very quickly, but it is deserted," said Somsook Boonyabancha, a colleague who is director of the Thai relief group. "If I was the government, I couldn't sleep at night."
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800 evacuated from northern Saskatchewan
Last Updated Sun, 02 Jul 2006 23:32:34 EDT
CBC News
About 800 residents of northern Saskatchewan have been forced to leave their homes because of forest fires, and the forecast holds little hope of relief.
Dry conditions, hot temperatures and strong winds early in the week will make it even more difficult for firefighters, who already are facing more than 120 blazes. More than half the fires are in the La Ronge area, where the threatened communities are located.
A fire service spokesperson said Sunday that 33 helicopters, 17 air tankers and heavy equipment are fighting the fires.
About 400 residents of Sucker River went to La Ronge, and 400 from Stanley Mission and Grandmother's Bay were evacuated to Saskatoon.
Brian Hardlott, band councillor at Stanley Mission, said people were evacuated from the community over the weekend by bus and by float plane. People were assembled to be bussed out and then Saskatchewan Environment reported that the fire had crossed the road.
"That's why we had to call in float planes to get the people out," Hardlott said.
Those evacuated included elders and people with respiratory or other medical conditions, a provincial spokesperson said.
More than 800 people are helping fight the fires.
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26 dead after torrential rains in China's southwestern region
AFP
Fri Jun 30, 2006
BEIJING - Torrential rain in southwestern China that began on June 28 has killed at least 26 people in three provinces, state press has reported.
In Sichuan province at least 11 people were dead and dozens injured after storms began dumping rain on the region on Wednesday, Xinhua news agency said.
In Luzhou prefecture several towns and villages were inundated with up to 18.3 centimeters (7.3 inches) of rain, the report said.
Nine of the fatalities occurred in Gulin county where over 1,300 homes were demolished by the downpour and where damages were estimated at 76 million yuan (9 million dollars), the report said.
In neighboring Guizhou province nine people were confirmed dead, while more than 2,400 people were evacuated from areas where up to 14.8 centimeters of rain has fallen, the report said.
Meanwhile, Yunnan province reported that five people died and two were missing after rainstorms that began Wednesday pelted Zhenxiong county, the report added.
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Chaotic Times
Gunman shot dead after Portuguese celebrations
03/07/2006
A French Riviera resident, angry over raucous revelry following Portugal's World Cup win over England, was shot dead by police after he shot and wounded two Portugal fans.
The man, a 58-year-old postal worker, was responding to noise outside his apartment in Cap d'Ail, near Nice, after Saturday's match, said police officer Benoit Kandel.
He fired at two fans, a man and a woman. The man was hit in the head and was in critical condition last night, Kandel said. The woman was operated on yesterday for arm wounds.
After the shootings, police arrived at the man's door, he opened it and threatened them with a sword.
The officers responded by shooting him, Kandel said.
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Central Texas woman run off road, raped
Associated Press
June 30, 2006
GROESBECK, Texas - A Central Texas woman was recuperating at a Temple hospital after she reported being run off a rural road, kidnapped and then raped and beaten by her abductors, authorities said.
The 18-year-old woman was in stable condition Thursday following surgery. She had walked and crawled a half-mile to find help after her abductors left her for dead along a highway early Wednesday morning, authorities said.
"She spent more than two hours in hell," Limestone County Sheriff Dennis Wilson said.
Wilson said Javier Guzman Martinez, 17, and Noel Darwin Hernandez, 22, both of Mexia, had been arrested for the crime and were charged Thursday with aggravated assault and aggravated kidnapping.
The suspects began following the woman late Tuesday night as she left Mexia, about 40 miles east of Waco, where she was visiting friends, authorities said. The suspects did not know the woman.
The woman told investigators she was driving at about 2:30 a.m. Wednesday on a state highway toward her home in a Limestone County town when a car rammed her sport utility vehicle and forced her off the road, Wilson said.
The woman told investigators that the men forced her into their car, and then drove around rural county roads while they sexually assaulted, stabbed and beat her, Wilson said.
The woman said the men left her about a mile south of Coolidge in a ditch, where she pretended to be dead until they left, Wilson said. She then found help at a nearby trailer.
Dena Lincoln said the woman, covered in blood, came to her trailer door at about 4:30 a.m.
"I will never, as long as I live, get that look that was on her face out of my mind," Lincoln said. "She kept saying, 'I'm going to die. I'm going to die.' I told her, 'No, honey, you are going to be all right. We are going to get you some help.'"
The woman was flown by helicopter to a Temple hospital with numerous cuts and stab wounds, including an injury that endangered one eye, Wilson said.
Wilson said investigators canvassed the area on Wednesday with the description of the suspects given by the women.
Officers found Martinez at his Mexia residence. Wilson said he confessed to the incident and told officers of Hernandez's involvement. U.S. Marshall's tracked Hernandez to a Waco bus station, where he was arrested Wednesday night.
Martinez was being held in the Limestone County Jail while Hernandez was to be transferred to Limestone County from McLennan County, officials said. Wilson said both men are apparently in the United States illegally and will be held without bond on immigration charges. Hernandez is from Honduras, and Martinez is from Mexico, Wilson said.
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Officer and suspect die in Ga. shootout
By DANIEL YEE
Associated Press
Sat Jul 1, 2006
STONE MOUNTAIN, Ga. - A police officer was fatally wounded in a foot-chase-turned-shootout that also killed the man he was pursuing at a cluster of apartment buildings where many Hurricane Katrina victims were relocated.
DeKalb County police Detective Dennis Carmen Stepnowski, 33, died Thursday at a hospital.
Lucas D. Palmer, 25, was wanted in a February slaying in his hometown of Lacombe, La., said Capt. George Bonnett, spokesman for the St. Tammany Parish Sheriff's Office. Neighbors at the Atlanta-area apartment complex said Palmer fled Louisiana after Katrina and had gotten out of jail hours before the shootout.
Stepnowski and another officer were on patrol when they saw a man who seemed suspicious and chased him, police spokesman Sgt. Charles Dedrick said.
At some point during the chase, "shots were fired," Dedrick said, without elaborating on who fired first.
Police shot the man to death in a grassy area bordered by a playground between four apartment buildings.
Witnesses said they heard at least 10 shots in rapid succession.
Neighbor Torrey Gails, 16, said Stepnowski was shot a couple of times in the throat before another officer shot the man they were chasing. Neighbor Vaughn Smith said the men were shot a few feet apart from each other, separated by a cluster of oak trees.
Stepnowski, who was married, was a member of the police SWAT unit and had been with the department for 10 years, his colleagues said.
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Car plows into crowd at boat race; 11 hurt
AP
July 3, 2006
MADISON, Ind. - A car careened through a throng of speedboat racing fans gathered for a boat race, injuring 11 people and plunging 25 feet out into the Ohio River.
Police said four of the people were injured seriously in the accident Sunday afternoon at the Madison Regatta. There were no fatalities.
"I saw one young lady just frozen in her path, just standing at the water's edge and the car ran directly over the top of her," said David Edds, of Owensboro, Ky. "It was the most horrifying thing that I have ever seen."
The driver, Michael Bowen, 18, was taken to a hospital in Louisville, Ky., about 40 miles away, officials said. Police said Bowen was slumped over the steering wheel as the vehicle approached a crowd barrier along the riverfront. He was unconscious when he was pulled from the water, Madison Police Chief Bob Wolf said.
A juvenile passenger in the car also was hospitalized.
Police did not know what caused the accident, but said charges could be filed. A news conference was scheduled for Monday morning.
Police said the car drove through the crowd, hit a golf cart used by officials who ducked for cover and then went airborne.
Madison is in southeast Indiana, midway between Louisville and Cincinnati. The annual race for unlimited hydroplanes draws thousands of people to the riverside community of about 13,000 every Fourth of July weekend.
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Hong Kong pro-democracy march draws more than 20,000
by Stephanie Wong
AFP
Sat Jul 1, 2006
HONG KONG - More than 20,000 Hong Kong residents have taken to the streets to demand full democracy for the former British colony, on the ninth anniversary of its handover to China.
Carrying banners that read "Justice, Equality, Democracy, Hope", the protesters flooded out of the gates of Victoria Park in the city centre, bound for downtown government offices some three kilometres (two miles) away on Saturday.
To beating drums, they shouted "We Want Universal Suffrage" and waved colourful placards that read "When will we have a timetable for universal suffrage?"
Protesters representing teachers and other workers as well as anti-racism, animal rights and harbour protection groups were also at the rally.
Police estimated that the turnout was about 28,000, while organisers said 58,000 marched, more than last year's 20,000 people.
Amid fading calls for democracy nine years after the 1997 handover, activists hoped the appearance of retired deputy leader secretary Anson Chan would reignite their once-formidable campaign for universal suffrage.
Chan said that her highly-publicised decision to join the protest was not an act of defiance against the government she once served.
"Today I come to take part in the march in support of democracy but this doesn't mean we are trying to challenge the government," Chan said, flanked by pro-democracy legislators and surrounded by hoards of photographers and reporters.
Wearing a broad-brimmed hat to brave the scorching weather, she dismissed claims that the booming economy had reduced Hong Kongers' hunger for democracy.
"Although the economy has been good it doesn't mean we don't need democracy. I call for people to come out and support democracy," she said, marching with her children in front of a banner that read: "Democracy is Key to Harmony".
Chan was cheered and applauded by the public along the way but was also shouted abuse by an elderly woman which caused brief chaos.
At the march, wheelchair bound protester Xo Kam-mui criticised the Chinese government for its tight control on the territory.
"The Chinese government said they want to build a harmonious and stable society but how can we be prosperous if we aren't allowed to choose our own chief executives? We don't have confidence in the government," he said.
Kwan Chun-yu, 45, who came with his family of four, turned out to fight for what he said was basic human rights.
"This is our right to be able to elect our leaders. A lot of developed countries are allowed this but why should we have to fight for it like this every year?"
In response to Saturday's march, the pro-Beijing camp held a celebration earlier in the day that included performances by Hong Kong-based Chinese troops, cultural groups and local pop stars.
The traditional handover anniversary speech by the city's political leader, Donald Tsang, was interrupted by outspoken pro-democracy legislator Leung Kwok-hung.
Leung, nicknamed Long Hair for his waist-length tresses, was hustled out of the auditorium by police after he began shouting slogans during Tsang's address.
The pro-democracy rallies began in 2003 when more than 500,000 people protested over issues including a proposed anti-subversion law forced upon the city by China. The law was later shelved.
In 2004 hundreds of thousands again marched to push for democracy in the wake of a ruling by China that stymied calls for urgent reform of the electoral system.
The city's chief executive is chosen by an 800-strong, Beijing-backed panel and only half the 60 members of the legislative council are directly elected.
Chan's high-profile decision to run has rekindled speculation she could be preparing a leadership challenge next year to chief executive Tsang.
At the march, Chan did not rule herself in or out, only saying she will take one step at a time. If she runs she will have to counter Tsang's popularity and win over Beijing loyalists on the election panel.
With some 76 percent of the public saying they would back Tsang's re-election, democratic lawmaker Ronny Tong called for continuous support from the people for democracy.
"This shows our determination and commitment. If we don't come out, we might never see universal suffrage in our life time. We have to let the government know that we haven't given up," he said.
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Red Cross laptop with donor data stolen
AP
Sat Jul 1, 2006
DALLAS - A laptop containing personal information from thousands of blood donors - including Social Security numbers and medical information - was stolen from a local office of the American Red Cross, but officials said the information was encrypted.
The data included matching names and birth dates of donors from Texas and Oklahoma, as well as donors' sexual and disease histories.
"We haven't viewed this as a security breach at this point," Darren Irby, spokesman for the national American Red Cross office, told The Dallas Morning News for its Saturday editions.
The laptop was one of three stolen from a locked closet in the Farmers Branch office of the American Red Cross in May, but the two others did not contain the personal information. There was no sign of forced entry, said Red Cross spokeswoman Audrey Lundy.
Local officials alerted police and national Red Cross offices, Lundy said. Donors were not notified about the missing information, and the Red Cross had no legal obligation to do so.
The laptops disappeared on two separate occasions in May, according to police reports. They could have been gone as long as a week before being reported missing.
Gordon Bass, acting chief information security officer for the national Red Cross, said supervisors have their own user names and passwords. Access is time-and-date based, so information can be accessed only during blood drives or when new information is uploaded to a central database.
The Farmers Branch Red Cross also lost a laptop with encrypted donor information in June 2005, Lundy said, but she could provide no details on circumstances of that incident or any follow-up investigation.
Security in the Farmers Branch office was tightened after the most recent disappearances, Lundy said.
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Stolen laptop with veterans' data recovered
By Vicki Allen Thu
Reuters
Jun 29, 2006
WASHINGTON - A stolen laptop computer containing sensitive information on more than 26 million U.S. military veterans and service members has been recovered and a preliminary review indicated no data was taken, the FBI and Veterans Affairs Department said on Thursday.
The laptop and the external hard drive taken in early May from a VA employee's residence in suburban Washington were recovered, authorities said.
"A preliminary review of the equipment by computer forensic teams has determined that the data base remains intact and has not been accessed since it was stolen," the agencies said in a statement. "A thorough forensic examination is underway, and the results will be shared as soon as possible."
A person whom the FBI did not identify turned the laptop in to the agency's Baltimore office on Wednesday, officials and veterans organizations said.
FBI spokeswoman Michelle Crnkovich said that no charges were filed against that individual, and that she no information on where the laptop was between the time of the theft and when it was turned in.
The theft of the laptop from a VA employee who had brought it to his home in Aspen Hill, Maryland, raised fears that nearly all military personnel were at risk of identity theft. Authorities have said the theft as part of a routine burglary in which other items were taken.
BIPARTISAN BLAST
Lawmakers and veterans' advocates have voiced alarm that the government failed to safeguard the data that included
Social Security numbers and disability ratings that could be used in credit card fraud and other crimes.
Senate Veterans Affairs Committee Chairman Larry Craig, an Idaho Republican, said "we are all holding our breath now for the FBI forensic analysis which we hope will confirm that the data has not been compromised."
Republicans and Democrats had blasted the administration for allowing the data to be lost and for responding slowly to the theft. Officials have said VA Secretary Jim Nicholson was first told of the May 3 crime on May 16 and only informed the public on May 22, almost three weeks after the theft occurred.
Cost of the theft was piling up for taxpayers. The White House this week asked Congress for $160 million to offer credit monitoring to military personnel worried of possible identity theft.
The VA also was spending millions of dollars to respond to the incident, including setting up a special call center to address veterans' concerns.
Rep. Steve Buyer (news, bio, voting record), an Indiana Republican who chairs the House of Representatives Veterans Committee, said that even though he was heartened by the laptop's recovery, the "history of lenient policies and lack of accountability within VA management must be rectified."
Jim Mueller, commander-in-chief of the Veterans of Foreign Wars of the U.S., said those responsible for the data loss and those who knew about the theft but did not tell Nicholson for 13 days should be held accountable.
"The secretary must act swiftly and decisively if he is to restore America's trust in the VA," Mueller said.
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Money Matters
Study: Money Does Not Buy Much Happiness
Sara Goudarzi
LiveScience.com
Thu Jun 29, 2006
Your next raise might buy you a more lavish vacation, a better car, or a few extra bedrooms, but it's not likely to buy you much happiness.
Measuring the quality of people's daily lives via surveys, the results of a study published in the June 30 issue of journal Science reveals that income plays a rather insignificant role in day-to-day happiness.
Although most people imagine that if they had more money they could do more fun things and perhaps be happier, the reality seems to be that those with higher incomes tend to be tenser, and spend less time on simple leisurely activities.
Scaling bad mood
In 2004, the researchers developed a survey tool that measures people's quality of daily lives. Then they asked 909 employed women to record the previous day's activities and their feelings towards them.
The study focused on women because the researchers wanted to study a homogeneous group while the surveys were in the early developmental stages.
Recently, the researchers revisited the data from the 2004 and focused on correlating the amount of income with the percentage of time each participant reported as being in a bad mood each day.
It was expected that those who made less than $20,000 a year would spend 32 percent more of their time in a bad mood than those that had an annual income greater than $100,000.
In reality, the low-income group spent only 12 percent more time in a bad mood than their wealthier counterparts. This suggests that the link between income and mood has been perhaps overstated.
The researchers once again surveyed another group of women in 2005. In this study, participants not only recorded their overall satisfaction with life but a moment-to-moment account of their contentment.
The results showed that higher income had less of a correlation with momentary happiness than with overall life satisfaction.
"If people have high income, they think they should be satisfied and reflect that in their answers," said study team member Alan Krueger, an economist from Princeton University. "Income, however, matters very little for moment-to-moment experience."
More chores, less fun
Krueger and colleagues also looked at data from a Bureau of Labor Statistics survey to see how people in different income brackets spent their time.
What they found was that those with higher incomes had more chores and less fun.
They devoted more time to working, commuting, childcare, and shopping and were under more stress and tension than those in lower income brackets.
According to government statistics, men who make more than $100,000 a year spend 19.9 percent of their time on passive leisure activities such as watching television and socializing. Meanwhile, men whose annual income were less than $20,000 spent more than 34 percent of their time dedicated to passive leisure.
Although the correlation between income and life satisfaction is weak, people are highly motivated to increase their income. This illusion may lead to more time spent on activities like commuting while sacrificing time spent on socializing, something that people consider amongst the best moments of their daily life, the researchers said in the study.
The scientists are now conducting a national survey with both male and female sample groups.
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Budget impasse shuts down N.J. government
By TOM HESTER Jr.
Associated Press
Sat Jul 1, 2006
TRENTON, N.J. - Gov. Jon S. Corzine closed the state government Saturday amid a bitter dispute with fellow Democrats in the Assembly over his plan to increase the sales tax, threatening to shutter beaches, parks and possibly casinos in the coming days.
After Saturday's constitutional deadline to adopt a new balanced budget passed without agreement, Corzine signed an executive order just after 9:30 a.m., a grim climax to weeks of budget squabbling among Democrats who control state government but haven't been able to agree on a budget bill.
"It gives me no joy, no satisfaction, no sense of empowerment to do what I'm forced to do here," Corzine said.
Within minutes of Corzine signing the order, road construction projects were required to begin winding down. Motor vehicle offices planned to close at noon. About 45,000 state employees were immediately furloughed. State courts were closed for anything but emergencies.
State-run parks, beaches and historic sites were to be closed by Wednesday but were expected to remain open through the July Fourth holiday.
Services such as state police, prisons, mental hospitals and child welfare were to keep operating. The casinos could be forced to close because they require state monitoring, though the casino industry is challenging a possible closure in court.
A bid by Atlantic City's 12 casinos Friday to get state monitors declared "essential employees" who would stay on the job despite a government shutdown is now before an emergency appellate court panel, casino association lawyer John Kearney said Saturday.
The dispute centers on Corzine's determination to raise the state sales tax from 6 percent to 7 percent to help close a $4.5 billion budget deficit.
Corzine sees the increase as a vital step toward providing reliable annual revenue, but most Democrats in the Assembly - the lower house of the state Legislature - and several Senate Democrats say the plan is unnecessary.
Opponents have questioned the need for a sales tax increase, predicting voter backlash and demanding that any increase be reserved for property tax reform. No formal talks between Corzine and legislators were scheduled Saturday.
The shutdown marks the first time the state government has had to close because of a budget dispute.
"What's happening in the Statehouse is shameful," said Assembly Minority Leader Alex DeCroce, a Republican.
The state Constitution requires a balanced budget by July 1, but the deadline has been missed four times in five years. Nothing happened when deadlines were missed before, but the state never went past the morning of July 2 without an adopted budget. Without one, the state has no authority to spend money. The shutdown lasts until a budget agreement is signed.
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Trade envoy echos pessimism at WTO talks
PARIS, June 30, 2006 (AFP)
French junior trade minister Christine Lagarde said Friday she was pessimistic about the chances of reaching agreement at World Trade Organisation (WTO) talks this week in Geneva.
"This morning we are all rather pessimistic," Lagarde told LCI news television.
Using football metaphors, Lagarde said: "The Europeans are on the field," and were "waiting for balls and looking to play."
Emerging countries such as Brazil "are playing squarely on defense" while the United States "is totally out of the game."
"We are worried about positions on overtures being considered by the (EU) trade commissioner Peter Mandelson," she added.
Mandelson had said Thursday that the European Union's position was not entrenched and that the 25-nation EU and was willing to approach that of the G20 group of emerging countries.
His spokesman Peter Power nonetheless said later Thursday: "It is extremely unlikely to have an agreement this weekend."
Talks were still scheduled to go ahead on Friday in an effort to break the enduring deadlock over the mathematics for cutting trade barriers such as subsidies and customs duties.
The WTO gathering is part of a timetable agreed at a conference in Hong Kong last year, which was meant to steer the Doha Round to a conclusion by December 2006.
The round, which aims to harness trade liberalisation to boost the economies of developing countries, was launched in the Qatari capital in 2001 and was originally meant to end in 2004.
On Thursday, Power told AFP: "The positions are too far apart in the G6," in reference to a grouping of WTO heavyweights, the EU, Australia, Brazil, Japan, India and the United States.
Top officials from the G6 had gathered Thursday evening ahead of wider talks expected to last several days at the Geneva base of the 149-nation WTO.
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Chavez urges Africa to unite against US
China Daily
2006-07-02
Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez called on Africa on Saturday to forge closer ties with Latin America to combat what he called a threat of US hegemony.
Chavez, whose repeated criticism of America has raised hackles in Washington, called on an African Union summit to cooperate with Latin America in everything from oil production to university education to counter "colonial" meddling in developing nations.
Citing the example of Venezuela and Bolivia, he urged Africa to seize greater control of its energy resources. He described the low royalty payments made by some foreign oil companies as "robbery."
"We should march together, Africa and Latin America, brother continents with the same roots ... Only together can we change the direction of the world," he told the opening day of the AU summit, to applause.
"The world is threatened by the hegemony of the North American empire," said the former paratrooper, following speeches from African leaders which had criticized colonialism.
Africa's abundant natural resources -- ranging from precious metals to iron ore and oil -- should make it a wealthy continent if it were freed from outside exploitation, Chavez said.
"Africa has everything to become a pole of world power in the 21st century. Latin America and the Caribbean are equipped to become another pole," he said.
In a nod to another outspoken opponent of US foreign policy, Chavez hailed Iran's right to develop nuclear technology for peaceful purposes.
Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is also attending the summit in the Gambian capital Banjul.
The Venezuelan leader called for a commission to evaluate joint energy projects between Africa and Latin America, as well as a media venture dubbed Telesur (TeleSouth) and a joint bank Banco del Sur (Bank of the South).
"In Venezuela, we were tired of all our oil going to Count Dracula," said Chavez, referring his government's decision to raise taxes on US oil companies. "Now Venezuela is free and we have recovered control over our oil."
Venezuela is the world's fifth largest oil exporter.
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Airline passengers in France face new tax to help world's poor
AFP
July 02, 2006
Passengers boarding planes in France are now paying a new tax on their tickets to help the world's poor, after the measure came into effect on the weekend.
The tax, championed by President Jacques Chirac and backed by UN Secretary General Kofi Annan, adds a surcharge of between one and 40 euros (1.25 and 50 dollars) depending on the destination and class of seat.
Money raised is to go to an international fund to buy treatments for AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria.
A number of countries -- Brazil, Chile, Cyprus, Congo, Gabon, Ivory Coast, Jordan, Luxembourg, Madagascar, Mauritius, Nicaragua and Norway -- have all signed on to the initiative, and France hopes others will follow suit.
The United States, Canada and Germany, though, oppose the levy, and several airlines have complained that it will simply add to the cost of air travel at a time of high fuel prices.
The money from the tax on flights from France is expected to generate 200 million euros a year for an International Drug Purchase Facility, also known as Unitaid.
The fund will be used to bulk-buy medicines for countries -- mainly in Africa -- that cannot afford them.
Under the measure, passengers flying out of French airports will pay one euro in economy class, and 10 euros in business, if their destination is in the EU. For flights outside Europe, the surcharges are between four and 40 euros, depending on the class.
Passengers who make a stopover in France of less than 12 hours, or who stay longer because of delays, are exempt.
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Pennies may soon be a thing of the past
By JEFF DONN
Associated Press
Sun Jul 2, 2006
PLYMOUTH, Mass. - In this village settled by thrifty Pilgrims, you can still buy penny candy for a penny, but tourist Alan Ferguson doubts he'll be able to dig any 1-cent pieces out of his pockets.
He rarely carries pennies because "they take up a lot of room for how much value they have." Instead, like so many other Americans, he dumps his pennies into a bucket back home in Sarasota, Fla.
Pity the poor penny!
It packs so little value that merry kids chuck pennies into the fountain near the candy store, just to watch them splash and sink. Stray pennies turn up everywhere: in streets, cars, sofas, beaches, even landfills with the rest of the garbage.
A penny bought a loaf of bread in early America, but it's a loafer of a coin in an age of inflation and affluence, slowly sliding into monetary obsolescence.
For the first time, the U.S. Mint has said pennies are costing more than 1 cent to make this year, thanks to higher metal prices. "The penny is going to disappear soon unless something changes in the economics of commodities," says Robert Hoge, an expert on North American coins at The American Numismatic Society.
That very idea of spending 1.2 cents to put 1 cent into play strikes many people as "faintly ridiculous," says Jeff Gore, of Elkton, Md., founder of a little group called Citizens for Retiring the Penny.
And yet, while its profile of Abe Lincoln marks time in the bottom of drawers and ashtrays, the penny somehow carries a reassuring symbolism that Americans hesitate to forsake.
"It's part of their past, so they want to keep it in their future," says Dave Harper, editor of Numismatic News.
Gallup polling has shown that two-thirds of Americans want to keep the penny coin. There's even a pro-penny lobby called Americans for Common Cents.
The Mint's announcement is a milestone, though, because coins have historically cost less to produce than the face value paid by receiving banks. They are moneymakers for the government.
U.S. Rep. Jim Kolbe (news, bio, voting record), of Arizona, wants to keep it that way. But when he asked Congress to phase out the penny five years ago he failed; he intends to try again this year. If he fails again, he joked recently, he may open a business melting down pennies to resell the metal.
The idea of a penniless society began to gain currency in 1989 with a bill in Congress to round off purchases to the nearest nickel. It was dropped, but the
General Accounting Office in a 1996 report unceremoniously acknowledged that some people consider the penny a "nuisance coin."
In 2002, Gallup polling found that 58 percent of Americans stash pennies in piggy banks, jars, drawers and the like, instead of spending them like other coins. Some people eventually redeem them at banks or coin-counting machines, but 2 percent admit to just plain throwing pennies out!
"Today it's a joke. It's outlived its usefulness," says Tony Terranova, a New York City coin dealer who paid $437,000 for a 1792 penny prototype in what is believed to be the denomination's highest auction price.
"Most people find them annoying when they get them in change," he adds. "I've seen people get pennies in change and actually throw them on the floor."
Not Edmond Knowles, of Flomaton, Ala.
No, he hoarded pennies for nearly four decades as a hobby. He ended up with more than 1.3 million of them - 4.5 tons - in several drums in his garage. His bank refused to take them all at once, but he finally found a coin-counting company, Coinstar, that wanted the publicity.
In the biggest known penny cash-in ever, they sent an armored truck last year, loaded his pennies, and then watched helplessly as it sank into the mud in his yard. They needed a tow truck to redeem it. "I still got a few ruts in the yard," says Knowles.
His years of collecting brought him about $1 a day - $13,084.59 in all.
A penny saved was a penny earned for Knowles, but he took another lesson from the experience, too: "I don't save pennies anymore. It's too big a problem getting rid of them."
Another problem: deciding what to make the penny from. Copper, bronze and zinc have been used, even steel in 1943 when copper was desperately needed for the World War II effort. In 1982, zinc replaced most of the penny's copper to save money, but rising zinc prices are now bedeviling the penny again.
"I'm very surprised they haven't gone to plastic," muses Bill Johnson, a wheat-penny collector who owns the Plimoth Candy Co. (It uses an old spelling of Plymouth.)
Even in his shop where a penny still buys a Tootsie Roll, he leaves a few pennies scattered on top of the cash register for customers like Lindsay Taylor, of Westwood, who is buying $1.78 worth of candy.
She is carrying no pennies because her sons have taken them for their old-fashioned piggy banks, which automatically flip coins inside. Her 2-year-old, she says, "just loves pushing the button."
Others have their own reasons for valuing the humble coin, which borrowed its colloquial name from British currency. The "cent" - meaning 1 percent of a dollar - has been struck every year except 1815, when the United States ran out of British-made penny blanks in the wake of the War of 1812.
"It's part of the fabric of American culture," says David Early, a spokesman for the government's Lincoln Bicentennial Commission.
The penny took on the profile of President Lincoln, beloved as the Union's savior during the Civil War, on the centennial of his birth in 1909. The first ones carried ears of wheat on the tails side, but the Lincoln memorial has replaced those. Four new tails designs with themes from Lincoln's life are planned for 2009, with a fifth permanent one afterward to summarize his legacy.
This redesign, the first major one since 1959, has heartened penny lovers.
Those who want to keep the penny coin include small merchants who prefer cash transactions, contractors who help supply pennies, and consumer advocates who fear rounding up of purchases.
"We think the penny is important as a hedge to inflation," says director Mark Weller of Americans for Common Cents. "Any time you have more accurate pricing, consumers benefit."
Joining with the lobby, the wireless network Virgin Mobile USA recently launched a save-the-penny campaign. Its penny truck will travel cross-country to gather pennies for charity.
Scores of charities esteem the penny, which many Americans donate without a second thought. Like shouts in a playground, pennies can multiply quickly.
"People don't like carrying them around, so we dump them into the nearest bowl," says Teddy Gross, who founded the Penny Harvest charity drive in New York City schools. "By the end of any given year, most Americans have got a stash of capital which is practically useless, but it's within easy reach of a young person."
Last year, his children raked in 55 million pennies, which had to be redeemed with help from the Brink's security company. They also bagged about 200,000 spare nickels.
By the way, the Mint says nickels are also costing more to produce than they're worth. Pity the poor nickel?
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UK News
Britons tire of cruel, vulgar US: poll
AFP
Sun Jul 2, 2006
LONDON - People in Britain view the United States as a vulgar, crime-ridden society obsessed with money and led by an incompetent president whose Iraq policy is failing, according to a newspaper poll.
The United States is no longer a symbol of hope to Britain and the British no longer have confidence in their transatlantic cousins to lead global affairs, according to the poll published in The Daily Telegraph.
The YouGov poll found that 77 percent of respondents disagreed with the statement that the US is "a beacon of hope for the world".
As Americans prepared to celebrate the 230th anniversary of their independence on Tuesday, the poll found that only 12 percent of Britons trust them to act wisely on the global stage. This is half the number who had faith in the Vietnam-scarred White House of 1975.
A massive 83 percent of those questioned said that the United States doesn't care what the rest of the world thinks.
With much of the worst criticism aimed at the US adminstration, the poll showed that 70 percent of Britons like Americans a lot or a little.
US President George W. Bush fared significantly worse, with just one percent rating him a "great leader" against 77 percent who deemed him a "pretty poor" or "terrible" leader.
More than two-thirds who offered an opinion said America is essentially an imperial power seeking world domination. And 81 per cent of those who took a view said President George W Bush hypocritically championed democracy as a cover for the pursuit of American self-interests.
US policy in Iraq was similarly derided, with only 24 percent saying they felt that the US military action there was helping to bring democracy to the country.
A spokesman for the American embassy said that the poll's findings were contradicted by its own surveys.
"We question the judgment of anyone who asserts the world would be a better place with Saddam still terrorizing his own nation and threatening people well beyond Iraq's borders," the paper quoted the unnamed spokesman as saying.
"With respect to the poll's assertions about American society, we bear some of the blame for not successfully communicating America's extraordinary dynamism.
"But frankly, so do you (the British press)."
In answer to other questions, a majority of the Britons questions described Americans as uncaring, divided by class, awash in violent crime, vulgar, preoccupied with money, ignorant of the outside world, racially divided, uncultured and in the most overwhelming result (90 percent of respondents) dominated by big business.
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We face defeat in Afghanistan, Army chiefs warn Blair
Monday July 03, 2006 (0941 PST)
KABUL: Army chiefs have warned Tony Blair that British forces face defeat in Afghanistan unless more troops and equipment are sent out immediately, it has been claimed.
According to a senior military source, Army top brass have told the Government there is a possibility of failure in Afghanistan, where British soldiers have met significant resistance from the Taliban forces defeated by the US-Anglo invasion five years ago.
The source said that officers at the Services' Permanent Joint Headquarters at Northwood, North London, run by Major General Nick Houghton, had told Ministers that 'strategic failure' - military jargon for defeat - could not be ruled out.
The report comes amid growing pressure on Defence Secretary Des Browne to reinforce the 3,300-strong contingent of British troops in Afghanistan, where two Special Forces soldiers were killed last week after fighting with the Taliban.
Conservative frontbencher Patrick Mercer said: 'This has turned into a shooting war and our forces do not have the firepower to deal with it.
Army chiefs have told Mr Blair they urgently need more soldiers on the ground, extra artillery, more helicopters to ensure that wounded soldiers can be airlifted to medical centres, and GR7 Harriers to attack Taliban bases.
'The British forces are having difficulty in coping,' a military source said. 'They were sent in there as peacekeepers and now find themselves in what is, in all but name, another war.
'They cannot get proper supplies and if men are injured, it is proving difficult to fly them out of the danger zone. That cannot go on.'
Extra resources
Both Lieutenant General David Richards, commander of the Nato force in Afghanistan, and General Sir Mike Jackson, Chief of the General Staff, are calling for extra resources.
When British forces were switched to Afghanistan from Iraq last year in a deal with America, former Defence Secretary John Reid said their main task would be peacekeeping. But they were soon taking on insurgents determined to bring down the democratic government of Afghanistan elected after the Taliban regime was toppled.
The British force was sent to Helmand Province, the Taliban stronghold, and is now involved in daily battles with its guerrillas. The resurgence in the Taliban has taken Britain and America by surprise.
In spite of several victories against Taliban fighters, the British force has been hampered by other problems. Because of the size of the area for which they are responsible, they have to fly troops to the front line to avoid Taliban forces attacking long-distance lorry convoys almost at will.
In an added complication, the Chinook helicopters they rely on are unable to operate in the intense heat of the Afghan summer.
Ministry of Defence aides say there is irritation in Downing Street that Spain and Germany, both with troops in safer parts of Afghanistan, are reluctant to divert forces to relieve the British contingent.
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Two British soldiers killed as Afghan poppy crop booms
By Tom Coghlan in Kabul and Kandhar
03 July 2006
Two more British soldiers have died in Afghanistan, as Western officials in the country have admitted that the country is to produce its largest ever poppy harvest.
The deaths, the fourth and fifth in three weeks, come as Western military commanders and counter-narcotics officials appear increasingly at odds over how to approach the drugs problem in the south of the country. Military officers are fearful the $1bn (£540m) a year campaign to eradicate the drug is helping pull in recruits for the Taliban.
"The trends indicate that the area of cultivation will be considerably higher than in 2004," said a representative of the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, which will publish its annual report of the Afghan opium harvest next month.
In 2004, about 130,000 hectares of opium poppy was cultivated, which has been the largest so far, despite poor growing conditions that year. Better conditions across the country this year will help produce the largest tonnage of opium ever. But Afghanistan is already responsible for about 87 per cent of the world's opium and more than 90 per cent of the heroin consumed in Britain.
Hamid Karzai, the President, and his government announced last year a
jihad on poppy production, backed by a near-$1bn campaign, led by the UK. It led to a fall by 21 per cent drop in the area under cultivation. Those gains have now been wiped out.
One Western official, who declined to be named, predicted a considerable rise, but not as extreme as that predicted by the UNODC. "The evidence collected so far indicates that the harvest will be significantly up on 2005 and perhaps around the 130,000hectare mark."
About one-third of this year's harvest has come from Helmand, where 3,300 British troops are heavily engaged against Taliban guerrillas. British troops have fought firefights with them almost every day for the past week in the north of the province.
Some military commanders argue that eradication operations in the south should be suspended for a year or more. "We may have to say to the farmer we are not yet ready to provide an alternative livelihood," a Nato officer told The Independent. "There may have to be a period of grace where we say that by a certain time frame there can be no more poppy cultivation and at that point we will eradicate your poppy."
The officer said that such an approach would give Western forces the "moral high ground" against the Taliban's ongoing campaign to present itself as the defender of poppy farmers, a campaign which has had considerable effect in Helmand this year.
Another Western official said that "full and frank" exchanges were ongoing between military commanders and counter-narcotics officials over the issue of eradication. Counter-narcotics officials contend that a suspension of eradication, and removal of any punitive measures would only produce a further surge in poppy production. They argue this would help to fund elements with a vested interest in maintaining the current instability; instability that has killed more than 1,600 people in the first six months of this year.
The drugs economy is valued at $2.7bn, equivalent to more than 50 per cent of Afghanistan's legal economy. By contrast the government managed to generate legal revenues, outside of foreign aid, of only $330m last year. With most government officials on salaries of about $50 a month and a cost of living that is artificially inflated largely by the drugs economy, corruption is endemic.
Farmers in the south claim that in the absence of any other economic activity, poppy cultivation and high wages paid by the Taliban to fight for them offer the only sources of income to huge numbers of unemployed young men. Poppy cultivation, they say, is the only means of wealth creation without capital.
"If you cultivate poppy the smugglers pay you in advance, so you don't need any money to buy the seed or fertiliser," Haji Mohammad Sarwar, 45, an elder in the Punjwai district of Kandhar province, told The Independent. "You can make enough to buy some land. Five jiribs [1 hectare] of poppy is $5,000 profit even after the costs of labour and fertilizer."
Shamsuddin Tanwir, of Afghanistan's Independent Human Rights Commission in Kandahar, said: "In Taliban-held areas everyone cultivates poppy. They do not get any problems so they prefer Taliban."
Amid the general gloom, Western officials stress the long-term nature of the war on drugs and the several positive signs amongst this year's early findings. In the east of the country, where a 96 per cent drop in poppy cultivation was recorded last year, officials feared a large resurgence after unrealistic expectations of Western aid on the part of poppy farmers were not met. That resurgence was much smaller than feared and Nangahar province remains largely drug free.
Western officials also point to improvements in governance. Reforms of the police force have seen police chiefs, known to be capable and not corrupt, installed in a number of provinces in the south, including Helmand.
The new police chief in Helmand replaces a man who was named in leaked US intelligence documents as running heroin shipments in police vehicles. But there are still widespread claims that figures high in the government control the drugs trade, including allegations against President Karzai's brother Ahmed Wali Karzai, who is head of the provincial council for Kandahar province.
"There is no evidence for this claim," he told The Independent. "When people want to attack the President they say these things about me. It is like the spice on a dish." In Washington there is increasing pressure for a more radical approach to the drugs problem with the threat of aerial eradication being held up as the ultimate sanction if the softer methods favoured by the British and Afghan governments don't work.
Western sources have said that US counter-narcotics teams are exploring the possibility of using a form of Agent Orange, a defoliant that become notorious for turning large parts of south Vietnam into a lunar landscape during the Vietnam War. One Western official said: "Aerial spraying will definitely not be used as part of the poppy eradication for 2007, period. But if a decrease in poppy cultivation is not achieved soon it is something that will increasingly be brought to the front for consideration."
The official stressed that any aerial spraying would only be undertaken with Afghan consent.
The United Nations remains completely opposed to such a move. "We really hope that all relevant parties and stakeholders will see that aerial spraying will contribute to the conflict and will play into the hands of the insurgents, and based on this insight will not start this measure at all," said a representative of UNODC.
Farmers from Kakhrez, near the town of Musa Qala in north Helmand, told The Independent this month that helicopters dropped an unknown substance during April on to their fields:
"It was in Boom village," said Lal Mohammed. "The helicopters were heard overhead in the night. A white powder was on the plants in the morning. There were red and yellow spots on the trees. Eight jiribs of poppy (1.6 hectares) were affected. I saw the plants, they grew very small, they didn't bloom and they dried out." Western Counter-Narcotics officials denied the claim. Similar claims were made in Jalalabad in December 2004. They were never substantiated.
Two more British soldiers have died in Afghanistan, as Western officials in the country have admitted that the country is to produce its largest ever poppy harvest.
The deaths, the fourth and fifth in three weeks, come as Western military commanders and counter-narcotics officials appear increasingly at odds over how to approach the drugs problem in the south of the country. Military officers are fearful the $1bn (£540m) a year campaign to eradicate the drug is helping pull in recruits for the Taliban.
"The trends indicate that the area of cultivation will be considerably higher than in 2004," said a representative of the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, which will publish its annual report of the Afghan opium harvest next month.
In 2004, about 130,000 hectares of opium poppy was cultivated, which has been the largest so far, despite poor growing conditions that year. Better conditions across the country this year will help produce the largest tonnage of opium ever. But Afghanistan is already responsible for about 87 per cent of the world's opium and more than 90 per cent of the heroin consumed in Britain.
Hamid Karzai, the President, and his government announced last year a
jihad on poppy production, backed by a near-$1bn campaign, led by the UK. It led to a fall by 21 per cent drop in the area under cultivation. Those gains have now been wiped out.
One Western official, who declined to be named, predicted a considerable rise, but not as extreme as that predicted by the UNODC. "The evidence collected so far indicates that the harvest will be significantly up on 2005 and perhaps around the 130,000hectare mark."
About one-third of this year's harvest has come from Helmand, where 3,300 British troops are heavily engaged against Taliban guerrillas. British troops have fought firefights with them almost every day for the past week in the north of the province.
Some military commanders argue that eradication operations in the south should be suspended for a year or more. "We may have to say to the farmer we are not yet ready to provide an alternative livelihood," a Nato officer told The Independent. "There may have to be a period of grace where we say that by a certain time frame there can be no more poppy cultivation and at that point we will eradicate your poppy."
The officer said that such an approach would give Western forces the "moral high ground" against the Taliban's ongoing campaign to present itself as the defender of poppy farmers, a campaign which has had considerable effect in Helmand this year.
Another Western official said that "full and frank" exchanges were ongoing between military commanders and counter-narcotics officials over the issue of eradication. Counter-narcotics officials contend that a suspension of eradication, and removal of any punitive measures would only produce a further surge in poppy production. They argue this would help to fund elements with a vested interest in maintaining the current instability; instability that has killed more than 1,600 people in the first six months of this year.
The drugs economy is valued at $2.7bn, equivalent to more than 50 per cent of Afghanistan's legal economy. By contrast the government managed to generate legal revenues, outside of foreign aid, of only $330m last year. With most government officials on salaries of about $50 a month and a cost of living that is artificially inflated largely by the drugs economy, corruption is endemic.
Farmers in the south claim that in the absence of any other economic activity, poppy cultivation and high wages paid by the Taliban to fight for them offer the only sources of income to huge numbers of unemployed young men. Poppy cultivation, they say, is the only means of wealth creation without capital.
"If you cultivate poppy the smugglers pay you in advance, so you don't need any money to buy the seed or fertiliser," Haji Mohammad Sarwar, 45, an elder in the Punjwai district of Kandhar province, told The Independent. "You can make enough to buy some land. Five jiribs [1 hectare] of poppy is $5,000 profit even after the costs of labour and fertilizer."
Comment: Under the taliban, opium production was all but extinguished, now, under new free and democratic Afghanistan, it is booming, which is just one of the payoffs for the CIA from the Afghanistan invasion.
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For Your Health
Holocaust Survivors at Higher Long-Term Cancer Risk
By Alan Mozes
HealthDay Reporter
Fri Jun 30, 2006
FRIDAY -- A new study finds that rates of cancer and cancer-related death are especially high among survivors of the Holocaust in Israel.
An Israeli research team found that Holocaust survivors who emigrated from Europe to Israel following World War II are at higher risk for cancer compared to European Jews who moved there before the war began.
Much of the difference can be attributed to cancers found among the youngest Holocaust survivors. Specifically, male and female immigrants born in Europe between 1940 and 1945 faced the highest odds of developing breast or colorectal cancers, the researchers found.
While the findings may have implications for survivors of mass atrocities in general, they are of immediate concern to the 238,600 Holocaust survivors still living in Israel, said study co-author Dr. Micha Barchana.
"The bad news is that Holocaust survivors are at a higher risk to get cancer, but the good news is that we can do something [about it]," he said. "We are focusing on the practical implementation of the research results: the need for survivors to participate in early-detection programs that are offered in Israel as well as in most modern countries, due to the finding that classifies them as a high-risk population," he explained.
Barchana serves as the director of the National Cancer Registry in the Israeli Health Ministry and is also a senior lecturer in the school of public health at the University of Haifa in Israel.
He and his colleagues presented their research earlier this year at the International Agency for Research on Cancer, held in Lyon, France. The work was funded by the Israel Cancer Society.
Barchana's team reviewed records from the Israeli government's Central Bureau of Statistics to first draft a list of all Jewish immigrants to Israel born in Europe between 1920 and 1945.
They then turned to the Israeli Health Ministry's National Cancer Registry to compile cancer incidence and death rates among these immigrants.
The researchers found that those immigrants born between 1920 and 1945 who came to Israel between the end World War II and 1989 were at significantly higher risk for cancer than immigrants born between 1920 and 1939 who migrated to Israel before the onset of World War II.
Barchana said his team does not know how many of the post-war European immigrants suffered through the experience of Nazi concentration camps or wartime Jewish ghettos. However, he said his team assumed that many or most did, and that, in any case, "all the Jews in Europe at war time had gone through severe food deprivation and other stresses."
Higher cancer risks seemed to linger for decades for this group, the researchers found. Male Holocaust survivors experienced a 14 percent higher cancer incidence rate than pre-war immigrants and were 2.4 times more likely to get cancer than their pre-war compatriots.
Female Holocaust survivors had a 21 percent higher rate of cancer than pre-war immigrants and were 2.3 times more likely to have a cancer diagnosis than pre-war immigrants.
Breaking down cancer incidence by specific diseases, the authors found that Holocaust survivors were at a significantly higher risk for lung cancer, Kaposi's sarcoma (a rare form of skin malignancy), and prostate cancer.
Heightened risks for certain other cancers stood out. For example, male Holocaust survivors were nine times more likely to be diagnosed with cancer of the large intestine than pre-war immigrants. Female Holocaust survivors faced more than double the risk for cancer of the large intestine and a 50 percent higher risk of developing breast cancer, the study found.
In addition, Barchana's team found that the younger the Holocaust survivor was during the war, the greater their risk for getting cancer. In fact, most of the increase in risk among Holocaust survivors was borne by those who were 14 years of age or younger during World War II.
Barchana said that finding has been shown in other studies involving survivors of terrible events. "Research on A-bomb survivors in Japan clearly shows that women that were at a young age are at higher risk of developing cancer later in life," he said. Similar data is emerging among those affected by the Chernobyl nuclear plant accident, Barchana added.
Patients who had survived the Holocaust also had a tougher battle to fight off the disease once it was diagnosed, the researchers found. According to Barchana, that may be due to the fact that "Holocaust survivors are being diagnosed at later stages compared to the control group."
Five-year cancer survival rates were 5 percent to 13 percent lower among Holocaust survivors compared to other immigrants, regardless of sex or age.
Comment: Those people exposed to high levels of radiation in Hiroshima or after the Chernobyl accident would understandably be at increased risk for developing cancer. Holocaust survivors weren't generally exposed to large doses of such radiation. The only explanation given in this article for higher cancer rates among Holocaust survivors is lack of proper nutrition and "other stresses". Well, what stresses, exactly? It seems that knowing exactly what causes Holocaust survivors' cancer would be a priority, especially since their cancer rates have been compared to those involved in nuclear attacks and accidents.
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Hospital has 6 sets of twins in 32 hours
AP
Fri Jun 30, 2006
LANSING, Mich. - It all began with Chastity Keeler, who delivered twin boys. Keeler gave birth at 9:05 a.m. and 9:06 a.m. Tuesday. Over the next 32 hours, five more mothers gave birth to twins at Lansing's Sparrow Hospital.
Sparrow nurses, doctors and officials think that's probably a record for the hospital.
"We have a number of experienced nurses, and it's the first time within their collective memory that we've had six sets of twins born in such close proximity," Sparrow spokeswoman Nan Simons told the Lansing State Journal for a story Friday.
Keeler, of Jackson, said it's a story she'll tell her sons, Nick and Ty, as they grow up.
"That was an extraordinary couple of days, and they were part of it," Keeler said. "They will forever be known in Sparrow history, and that's kind of cool."
Five sets of the twins were boys. The other two infants were girls.
"It's fun for Sparrow to mark a record like this," Simons said. "Six sets of twins: That's a lot of babies."
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Witchcraft ban ends in Zimbabwe
Sunday, 2 July 2006, 23:31 GMT 00:31 UK
Zimbabwe has unbanned the practice of witchcraft, repealing legislation dating back to colonial rule.
From July the government acknowledges that supernatural powers exists - but prohibits the use of magic to cause someone harm.
In 1899, colonial settlers made it a crime to accuse someone of being a witch or wizard - wary of the witch hunts in Europe a few centuries earlier which saw many people burned at the stake after such accusations.
But to most Zimbabweans, especially those who grew up in the rural areas, it has been absurd to say that the supernatural does not exist.
In fact, it is not hard to find vivid stories about the use of magic.
Alfred, for example, believes that he was bewitched at work some years ago, making him partly bald.
He described how after supper one evening as he and his wife were retiring to bed his hair disappeared.
"When my wife came into the bedroom she look at me and said, 'What happened to your hair? Where's it gone?'
"She saw a bald patch from the forehead going back on the side of the head. There was no trace of it," he says.
He spent seven months visiting traditional healers to make it grow back.
"She made some incisions round the bald patch, put some powdery muti (medicine) and lo and behold within a few day the hair had grown."
Fetishes
There are many other accounts of the use of magic, and the new law effectively legitimises many practices of traditional healers.
These include rolling bones to foretell the future, divination, attempts to communicate with the dead, using muti - traditional powders and fetishes - to ensure the desired sex of a child.
But there will be some legal grey areas, like whether it is legal for a husband to place some charms in his bedroom - charms that may injure his wife if she is unfaithful.
Professor Claude Mararikei - a sociologist and the chairman of Zimbabwe's Traditional Medical Practitioner's Council - argues that witchcraft has some positive benefits in the modern world.
He cites the example of a man who stole some bewitched cement that became stuck to the thief's shoulders so he could not remove the bag.
"So if you have that knowledge to capture a thief in a cattle kraal when he comes for the cows, well and good. It's like electrifying the fence round your house," he says.
'Waste of time'
Others believe that the country would be better off without elevating the supernatural.
"I think it's a waste of time and energy. The urban areas are not really caught up in these supernatural issues," says social commentator Thomas Deve.
"Claims of witchcraft need to be investigated instead of putting down every disorder in society that is taking in our society to witchcraft or modern magic," he adds.
The church in Zimbabwe has always believed that witchcraft exists, but it has been careful to establish the source of such supernatural powers.
"As Christians we've got to recognise that supernatural forces are good if they originate from God - now witchcraft is one of the things that originates from the Satanic world," says Reverend Roy Musasiwa who runs a theological college in the capital, Harare.
The Witchcraft Suppression Act was used fairly frequently, but prosecuting someone under the new legislation may prove difficult.
The new Criminal Law Codification and Reform Act will demand proof that a person has supernatural powers and that they are using them to harm others.
"It's not going to be easy task," says Custom Kachambwa, a judge with years of experience in the legal field.
He says witnesses will often be traditional healers, who could be accused of practising harmful magic in the future.
But whatever the problems, the repealing of the witchcraft laws is another sign that Zimbabwe's government is continuing to move away from Western values and placing more emphasis on the country's own traditions.
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Last but not Least
Mexico Presidential Race Too Close to Call
By TRACI CARL
Associated Press
Jul 03, 2006
MEXICO CITY - Mexico's presidential election was too close to call Sunday, with a leftist offering himself as a savior to the poor and a conservative free-trader both declaring themselves the winner. Officials said they won't know who won for days.
Electoral officials said they could not release the results of Sunday night's quick count of the votes, which they previously said would happen only if the leading candidates were within one percentage point of each other. Luis Carlos Ugalde, president of the Federal Electoral Institute, said an official count would begin Wednesday, and a winner will be declared once it's complete.
Felipe Calderon, 43, of outgoing President Vicente Fox's National Action Party, had been running an exceedingly close race with Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, 52, of the leftist Democratic Revolution Party. The Institutional Revolutionary Party's Roberto Madrazo, 53, had been trailing in third place.
Fox appealed for calm amid fears that a close result would raise the potential for violence.
Thousands of Lopez Obrador supporters, waiting for hours in the cold rain in Mexico City's central plaza, began shouting "Fraud! Fraud!" when Ugalde came on live television to announce the delay. Lopez Obrador said late Sunday that he would respect the delay in declaring a winner, "but I want the Mexican people to know that our figures show we won."
Calderon spoke minutes later, saying he too will respect the results _ but that the official preliminary results, as well as the exit polls, show that he's the winner.
"We have no doubt that we have won," he said.
The race exposed deep divisions between Mexico's rich and poor in a nation desperately trying to match the success of its northern neighbor.
Comment: Boy, it's just one "too close to call" election after another these days...
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Japanese media cool on Koizumi's rosy ties with Bush
AFP
Sun Jul 2, 2006
TOKYO - Japan should seek a more mature relationship with the United States rather than one based on personal bonding, the country's media said after Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi's trip to Washington.
Koizumi displayed his media savvy by crooning Elvis Presley hits during a visit to Graceland with US
President George W. Bush, with whom he has forged a close friendship over his five years in office.
But the Mainichi Shimbun newspaper said Japan's diplomacy should not be so dependent on the prime minister's personal ties.
"It was disappointing that Koizumi failed to make full use of his friendly Japan-US relationship on the real international scene," the newspaper said, bemoaning "Japan's failure" to win a permanent seat on the UN Security Council.
Tokyo failed to get a formal commitment of support from Washington for its bid to obtain a permanent seat on the Council, which was blocked by China.
The Mainichi said that failure had "exposed the limits of Koizumi's diplomacy, that depended on his personal relationship and lacked strategies".
One of Japan's leading dailies, Asahi Shimbun, praised Koizumi for tackling several thorny issues left over from previous administrations, including the controversial realignment of US troops stationed in Japan.
But the liberal daily also said he had failed to resolve several key issues before handing the reins to his successor in September.
"Koizumi lacked strategies to finish up the breakthrough (on key issues) to the final stage," the Asahi said.
Meanwhile, the Tokyo Shimbun daily called for a better balance in US-Japanese relations, warning the government against ever revising its pacifist constitution to satisfy the needs of Washington.
"It should be noted that the joint statement (issued after the latest Japan-US summit) did not mention the (Japanese) constitution," it said.
"Japan is bound by a limit it cannot not cross. Japan should have made sure the United States will not overly expect" military cooperation from Japan, the paper said.
Koizumi returned home Saturday from a five-day visit to Canada and the United States that was heavy on symbolism as he wraps up his premiership.
Bush and Koizumi warned North Korea over its weapons programs at a White House summit before heading to Graceland on Friday to visit Presley's estate.
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Saddam's daughter and wife on wanted list
By Ahmed Rasheed
Reuters
Sun Jul 2, 2006
BAGHDAD - Iraq on Sunday named Saddam Hussein's eldest daughter and first wife on a most-wanted list along with top Baathists and al Qaeda's new leader in Iraq, a day after the bloodiest bombing in three months killed over 60.
The remains of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, who was killed in a U.S. air strike last month, have been buried in Iraq in a secret grave after the U.S. military handed over the body to the Iraqi government, Iraqi officials and the U.S. military said.
Al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden had called on the U.S. military to release the body of Jordanian Zarqawi to his family in a Web site audio tape on Friday and said Jordan's King Abdullah should allow him to be buried in his home town, Zarqa.
Iraqi, U.S. and Jordanian authorities have been anxious, however, that the tomb of a man hailed by bin Laden as a "lion of Jihad" not become a place of pilgrimage for militants.
National Security Adviser Mowaffaq al-Rubaie announced the list of 41 "most wanted" a day after a car bomb devastated a market in a Shi'ite district of Baghdad in the deadliest attack since a Shi'ite-led unity government was formed six weeks ago.
The blast in the Shi'ite militia stronghold of Sadr City drew angry responses from radical Shi'ites against Shi'ite Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki's national reconciliation plan and his efforts to reach out to the once-dominant Sunni minority.
The carnage, by far the worst since Zarqawi was killed on June 7, has raised the prospect of sectarian civil war.
The list, which offers a $10 million bounty for former Saddam deputy Izzat Ibrahim al-Douri, accuses Saddam's daughter, Raghd, and her mother of using millions stolen by the former Iraqi leader to finance the Sunni insurgency.
Raghd has taken a leading role in organizing her father's legal defense in his trial for crimes against humanity. Aged about 40, she lives in Jordan having been granted asylum there, along with her sister Rana and their children, in 2003.
Raghd and Rana's husbands, both brothers and themselves related to Saddam, were killed by fellow tribesmen on returning to Iraq in 1996 after having defected and betrayed Saddam.
BOUNTY
His first wife Sajida, mother of Raghd, is also on the list, which includes the new head of al Qaeda in Iraq, Abu Ayyub al-Masri. The Iraqi government also offered a $50,000 reward for Masri -- far less than the $5 million bounty the United States placed on the man named to succeed Zarqawi.
"We are releasing this list so that our people can know their enemies," Rubaie said.
He declined to say if arrest warrants had been issued for Raghd and Sajida but said Interpol had received the list.
Also included in the document was a former Saddam intelligence chief as well as senior Baathists, who fled their posts in the wake of invading U.S. forces and are now playing a key role in the insurgency that has killed over 2,500 Americans.
Some, like Douri, are still on the three-year-old "deck of cards," a list of 55 wanted Baathist officials issued by the U.S. military. Most of the 55 are dead or in captivity but Douri, at times reported killed, appears still to be at liberty.
ZARQAWI
Rubaie told Reuters Zarqawi, who led a bloody campaign against Shi'ites in a bid to ignite civil war in Iraq, had been buried in a secret location somewhere in Iraq.
"The Iraqi authorities recently buried the body of Zarqawi in a marked but secret place," Rubaie said.
A U.S. military spokesman said Zarqawi's body had been turned over to the Iraqi government and buried in accordance with Muslim custom. He declined further comment.
The Jordanian government also refused to comment. Zarqawi's family had asked that the former militant be buried in Jordan.
Bin Laden endorsed him in an Internet recording on Saturday and warned Iraqi Shi'ites they would face "retribution."
A Shi'ite member of Iraq's parliament escaped an attempt to kidnap her on Sunday but several bodyguards were abducted in the second such attack on a woman lawmaker around Baghdad in as many days. Another woman lawmaker, a Sunni, was kidnapped on Saturday, prompting colleagues to walk out of parliament.
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Secret burial for Iraq's al Zarqawi
Last Updated Sun, 02 Jul 2006 13:11:08 EDT
CBC News
The body of slain insurgent leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi has been buried in a "secret location" in Baghdad, Iraq's national security adviser says.
Mouwafak al-Rabaie gave no other details about the burial of the Jordanian-born militant, who was killed June 7 in a U.S. air strike.
In a statement e-mailed to the Associated Press, the U.S. military confirmed the national security adviser's statement.
"The remains of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi were turned over the appropriate government of Iraq officials and buried in accordance with Muslim custom and traditions," the statement said.
Al-Zarqawi, head of the organization Al Qaeda in Iraq, was the most wanted insurgent in the country. He died in combined U.S. Iraqi military operation that included air strikes to enable ground troops to launch an assault on a group of buildings northeast of Baghdad, where the militant leader had been in hiding.
An autopsy performed by U.S. military doctors listed the cause of death as "primary blast injury of the lung," and it later emerged that he survived for nearly an hour after the air strike.
Neither the Iraqis nor the Americans said why a secret burial was thought necessary but fears that a public funeral might become a rallying point for insurgents have been expressed by officials.
Elsewhere in Iraq, violence continued in and around Baghdad.
Small arms and rocket fire were reported in the Sunni Muslim neighbourhood of Adhamiya, while a car bombing in the town of Mahmoudiya, just south of the capital, killed three people at an outdoor market.
On Saturday, a bomb in a pickup truck exploded in Sadr City, a Shia district in Baghdad, leaving nearly 70 dead and 80 wounded.
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11,000-year-old grain shakes up beliefs on beginnings of agriculture
Jun. 18, 2006 0:24 | Updated Jun. 18, 2006 10:45
By JUDY SIEGEL-ITZKOVICH
Bar-Ilan University researchers have found a cache of 120,000 wild oat and 260,000 wild barley grains at the Gilgal archaeological site near Jericho that date back 11,000 years - providing evidence of cultivation during the Neolithic Period.
The research, performed by Drs. Ehud Weiss and Anat Hartmann of BIU's department of Land of Israel studies and Prof. Mordechai Kislev of the faculty of life sciences, appears in the June 16 edition of the prestigious journal Science.
It is the second time in two weeks that Kislev and Hartmann have had an article in Science. They recently wrote about their discovery of 10,000-year-old cultivated figs at the same Jordan Valley site.
According to the researchers, the newest find shows that the transition from nomadic food gathering and the beginning of agriculture were quite different than previously thought. Until now, the general assumption has been that agriculture was begun by a single line of human efforts in one specific area. But the BIU researchers found a much more complicated effort undertaken by different human populations in different regions, drawing a completely new picture of the origins of agriculture.
Agriculture, the BIU researchers suggest, originated through human manipulations of wild plants - sometimes involving the same species - that took place in various spatially and temporally distinct communities. Moreover, some of these occasions were found to be much earlier than previously thought possible.
The researchers analyzed archeo-botanical data from Near Eastern archeological sites to locate human attempts to grow early crops. Several plant species, which they term "pioneer crops," were found to be the earliest plants manipulated by humans. Some of these attempts succeeded, which means that domestication and continuity were achieved, while others were abandoned. They offer a model of a pioneer agriculture with its disappointments and achievements.
They were certain that the grains found at Gilgal were cultivated and not found naturally in the environment because they were found in such large quantities and because field observations showed that only moderate amounts could be gathered from natural growing sites in this part of the Jordan Valley, even in rainy years.
Although pioneer crops such as barley, lentils, rye and oats yielded satisfactory crops, early farmers faced the problem that their seeds would fall off immediately after ripening. One way to solve this problem was through domestication (causing a process by which plants would retain their seeds, rather than shedding them, to facilitate collection by farmers).
But the researchers found that not all crops were easily domesticated, causing our ancestors, the researchers maintain, to abandon certain crops (such as oats) for thousands of years, until different farmers in other parts of the world finally domesticated them.
This new hypothesis turns the spotlight on the peoples who were involved in creating a revolutionary new agricultural way of life. According to the researchers, it was not a particular individual or community who changed the way we live our lives today, but rather many human groups scattered throughout the world who manipulated several different local wild plants. Some of these groups failed in their attempts and some succeeded. Some plants were domesticated and some were abandoned.
Moreover, some of the plants abandoned during the Neolithic Period were later domesticated in other parts of the world. Barley and, most likely, oats, were cultivated in the Jordan Valley, represented by the early Neolithic site Gilgal.
However, domesticated oats appeared some seven thousand years later in Europe, several thousand kilometers away. Another domesticated plant - rye - was found to be cultivated by several Turkish communities, from the Neolithic Period onward, for several millennia. Some of these communities even succeeded in domesticating rye, but they apparently abandoned it. Rye apparently traveled from Turkey to Europe in the form of a weed that grew in fields of barley and wheat. As in the case of oats, the last stage of rye domestication occurred not in Turkey but in Europe, and several thousands of years later.
The wild lentil plant's path of domestication comprised two stages: loss of dormancy (most of the seeds do not germinate in the first year) and development of pod indehiscence (pods that do not spontaneously release their seeds). The researchers noted that the first evidence of lentil domestication - loss of dormancy - was found in the beginning of the Neolithic Period in Jerf el-Ahmar, Syria, and quickly spread south to Netiv Hagdud in the Jordan Valley.
Undoubtedly, the final stage of lentil domestication is represented by the huge, approximately 1.4 million lentil seed hoard found in later Neolithic Period Yiftah'el, near Nazareth, some 600 kilometers southwest of Jerf el-Ahmar.
According to the researchers, a similar phenomenon occurred in North America, where the chenopod, marsh elder, squash and sunflower became domesticated under indigenous group management between 4,000 and 5,000 years ago. The erect knotweed, little barley and maygrass were cultivated and later abandoned, eventually to be replace by maize-centered agriculture and the arrival of the common bean.
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Editorial: Morning Came: A letter from Palestine
Peace Palestine
07/02/06
Please forward widely
Morning came and we found that 90 of the nation's best men were captured by Israel from their homes in the night. Our mayor, who was released from four years in prison just a month ago. Someone for whom I have the utmost respect and admiration, as do his people here, political allies and opponents alike. And our vice mayor, too. The last time I talked with him, earlier this week, he was struggling a lot with chronic back pain. I wonder where they are now. If they have been fed today, or tortured. If they will sleep on beds tonight, or not at all. If they will be home tomorrow. If we will never see some of them again alive.
It's the first time Palestinians have captured an Israeli soldier in a long time; families of prisoners have begged the resistance not to release him until there is a prisoner exchange no matter what the consequences to the community -- being well acquainted with the suffering that implies. Everyone went about their business today, wedding processions in the streets, families eating ice cream and watermelon in the sticky heat. Some with the heavy numb shock of loved ones vanished suddenly, shock without surprise; they expected that the price that has been paid, and paid, and paid, for keeping one's spirit from being broken, must be paid again.
Myself, I couldn't keep from crying from time to time, although for me it is just a very small taste of the shock, seeing two good men that I know a little, powerful in their community with the power the community has entrusted them with, suddenly made helpless, pieces of meat for Israeli intelligence officers somewhere to enjoy, and knowing that if I knew them more, if I knew others, the sense of anger and sorrow and disbelief would be multiplied. I know that for the people around me these tears fell years and years ago. The anger and sorrow and loss and disbelief have happened too many times to count, but it does not diminish, to the world it is one more added to a large number, for each mother and sister and wife it is an unconsolable agony, an irreplaceable loss, an unimaginable theft, a violation of a family, a marriage, that might never be able to recover from the traumas and abuses that are being suffered, will be suffered in the days ahead.
Israel has over 10,000 Palestinian hostages, hundreds of them children, and slaughters Palestinians of any age on a daily basis. When Palestinians take 2 Israeli hostages and kill two soldiers, Israeli bombs Gaza. Bombs out the power stations, the water reticulation; no electricity, no water, bridges blasted severing cities from each other. Gaza Strip, the most densely populated area on earth on account of Israel using it as a specially designed human garbage can where refugees are disposed off and hermetically sealed off from the rest of the world.. Brilliant, but unsuccessful. If you treat humans as garbage and they know that they are humans and not garbage, they will not quietly disappear. You will never sleep safe at night. You will never have the right to sleep safe at night. May you never sleep safe at night.
A young woman in my neighborhood asked, can you believe Israel kidnapped most of our government last night? Imagine waking up to hear that Palestinian forces had kidnapped 90 Israeli government leaders. It's hard to imagine that Israel would leave one house standing, one person uninjured.
Imagine if Palestinians had the military capacity to punish Israel on a comparable scale for every 2 hostages it takes and 2 it kills. Imagine if Americans, and Europeans, valued the blood of Palestinians and Iraqis as much as their own blood. Imagine if the nations of the world used their armies to protect the lives of the innocent and bring to justice thieving, raping, murdering states. A couple days ago I sat with someone I know, who was taken hostage last night. He explained part of Hamas' interpretation of the Qur'an as follows: there are three kinds of people that Muslims have to deal with. 1) Those who treat you with respect. In this case, it is a crime against God to treat them with anything but respect, kindness, and hospitality. In other words, if a Jew wanted to immigrate to Palestine with full respect for the people here, wishing to become a member of Palestinian society, he should be welcomed. 2) Then there are those who do not respect you, and oppose you. You have no obligation to extend hospitality to them. 3) Then there are those who have no respect for your humanity, your property or your religion, they take power over your land and your lives, destroy your land and kill your people. In this case you have an obligation to fight against them to protect your land and your people. If they kill your people, you can kill their people.
Today I visited with another friend who thinks he may be captured tonight; so many of his friends were captured last night. He said, Israel doesn't care too much about the lives of the Israeli hostages, in the past there were cases of them killing the hostages themselves by indiscriminate bombing of communities. But Israel has been waiting since Hamas' election for Hamas' first military operation, and so they knew this massive attack on the community would come, sooner or later. Even though different groups have participated in the Palestinian military operations in the past few days, all of Israel's targets are Hamas leaders. Israel wants to see Hamas destroyed, Europe and America want to see Hamas destroyed, and Abu Mazen seems to be trying his best to join them. Many of those arrested were among the Hamas members that Israel exiled to the no mans land between Israel and Lebanon, a decade ago. He told me some of his friend's stories from those three terrible years, living in tents through snowy winters. He talked about the warm spirit that thrived in the tents during freezing months. He told of how hungry men went to an apricot orchard and couldn't find the owner, so they took some fruit and then tied some money in a handkerchief to the tree. When the owner found it, he tracked them down, and said to them, with tears coming down his face, what kind of men are you, starving and rejected by the world, who have such principles that you will not even take fruit that you find on a tree. I give you my fruit, I give you my orchards! I felt the poverty of being from the West, where the media can say nothing about these men except to endlessly regurgitate simpleminded slander... of those captured I know just a few names, and little of their stories. For anyone here, each of these names represents a rich story, decades of struggles, of suffering, heroism, years of prison, of pain, of courage, of trying again, of hopes betrayed, of disappointment and endurance that continues forward to find new hope.
We had this conversation over lunch in his daughter's home. She and her husband were active with Hamas and he was seized by Israel and killed in prison, leaving her with their 3 small children. Don't forget, it is America that gives Israel everything it needs to do this to us, she said. When we left, she and her three boys kissed him over and over, not knowing if tomorrow they will wake up to hear that her dad, their grandpa, has become a prisoner. This week I spent with a French student, an orphan of war in Bangladesh, who is doing research on women's views of dignity. Dignity is a word thrown around a lot in international law but without definition; people have a "right to dignity" but since no one knows what it is, when it comes right down to it violations of this right cannot be prosecuted. I helped her interview dozens of women this week, from Fatah, Hamas, PFLP, poor and wealthy, educated and illiterate, young and old. We would sit down with strangers and as soon as dignity, al karame, was mentioned, the room burst into life with passionate opinions, terrible stories, and incredibly brave and inspiring statements. Here are some of the things I heard about dignity.
There is no dignity in Palestine; we face humiliation at checkpoints, restriction from visiting our families or going to school, soldiers in our homes during the night, prison... Israel's war is first of all against our dignity which Israel attacks from every angle and with every means possible, because if it can succeed in destroying our dignity, we will not be able to resist anymore. There is tremendous dignity in Palestine; perhaps more than anywhere else in the world, because the occupation with all its mechanisms for humiliation makes us aware of our dignity; the more they try to destroy our dignity the stronger our dignity becomes; they are getting the opposite results that they want. There are two kinds of dignity: one that you get from others, when you are treated with dignity, the other comes from inside of you, from what you know about who you really are before God, and no one has the power to take this away from you unless you let them. Even if as women we are captured by Israel, stripped naked and raped in the prisons, if we resist every attack upon our dignity it will not be lost. A woman was told at a checkpoint to remove her scarf. She refused, and the soldier showed her a metal rod and said he would drive it through her eyes if she did not take it off. You can have your eyes, or you can have your dignity. She refused. He drove it through her eyes. She survived, but she is blind. And she did not lose her dignity. A friend of the Prophet Mohammad, a woman, was tied to the ground by a man who made her choose between her dignity or her life. The only thing she was able to do was to spit in his face, and she did. He killed her. But he did not destroy her dignity.
Arab people have a great source of dignity from the rich and deep history of our culture. But now all Arab lands are captive and only in Iraq and Palestine are we free within ourselves, because we do not accept the enslavement that is forced upon us; our resistance gives us great dignity.
We get our dignity from our land. It is our life. As long as we are in our land, no matter how much we suffer, we will have our dignity. If they succeed in expelling us to Jordan, our dignity will be lost forever. I have my family's olive trees. Every year I used to have precious olive oil from my own trees that I could give generously to my friends and neighbors. Now Israel has killed half of my trees and imprisoned the rest. These trees are like my own children. It is a terrible, terrible sorrow and shame for me each day to know that I am powerless to help them. Now, when we need olive oil for ourselves, we have to go to the store and buy it. But I was one who could generously give olive oil to my friends and relatives.
We get our dignity from Islam, as women, and as human beings. In our culture, before Islam, women were just seen as property, baby girls could be buried alive. We see women in many parts of the world who have no dignity. Islam has given us our full rights as women in every sense, and full equality with every other human being. In the Qur'an God says that he has given the same dignity to every human being - it does not depend on whether you are male or female, or whether you are Muslim or from another religion, each of us has the same worth.
What do you expect and hope for in the future?
Things will get much, much worse. It is written that we will suffer like this until near the end.
Our hope comes from knowing that Jesus will come back and will remove all injustice from the earth, and at last the race of mankind will be free to live in peace and equality.
What do you believe should be the political outcome for Palestine?
If only they would all go back where they came from, we could live in peace in our homes and land again.
We can never live with them; if someone has killed your children, can you accept them as a neighbor?
We already live with them, of course we can in the future.
We cannot live with them, we must have a state, and they must have a state. About all the refugees who have their homes and lands in Israel, I don't know........
We can live with them in one state, the refugees must be given back their homes and their land.
If we have an Islamic state on all of Palestine, it is the only way we will be able to live together, us and them, because Islam is the only system where equality between people of different religions is protected.
Do you think negotiations or armed struggle is the best strategy at this time?
Of course, if we could get our rights back without violence, that would be the best way. If negotiations ever worked, then we should use that instead of armed struggle, but they have never produced anything. We have to keep fighting to protect our land and our community. How could it be right to do nothing when daily they are attacking our lives and our land?
As a woman would you participate in armed struggle?
I admire women who do, but I myself don't think I'm capable of it.
My contribution is to study and be a good mother to my children.
No, I don't think women should carry weapons.
Yes! It would be a great honor to fight for my country! Yes! How I wish we had the chance to be trained as soldiers like all the Israeli women are. I am not married yet, but I hope that one day I will have a son who will give his life for our country to be free.
The Americans, Europeans and Israelis place more value on the blood of their dogs and cats than they do on the blood of Palestinians. None of us can ever forget the sight of little Huda screaming for her father on the beach of Gaza, throwing herself on the sand next to his dead body over and over. No one in the world has expressed their outrage, or even sorrow, to us about these atrocities against us. They care deeply about the Mundial, and Huda's agony is an interruption, a distraction, from the soccer score. Our blood is so, so cheap to the world, and Israeli blood is so valuable. They do not see our humanity at all.
How do you find your sense of your own humanity, when all the world is telling you your life, your death, your blood is worthless?
When it comes down to that, we know that God sees us, even if we are suffering in an Israeli torture chamber and no one in our family knows if where we are or if we are alive or dead, we know that God sees us and knows our value, our humanity. We belong to him, and in that is our worth, and our hope, our fates are in his hands and our lives are very precious to him, no matter how worthless they are to our brothers and sisters in the human race, and in the end, that is what matters. We know who we are. Our lives, our deaths, our suffering, our hopes, our disappointment, are not insignificant.
Yesterday I met a new appointee from the German government in Jerusalem, a young guy with an American accent. He was happy that Hamas and Fatah had agreed on the Prisoners' Document. Great, we've gotten Hamas to recognize Israel, he said. Now we just have to get them to renounce armed struggle, and then get rid of these ideas of an Islamic state. The problem is when we bring democracy to the middle east, we always have to deal with the challenge of making sure there is a secular state when so many people want an Islamic state. (Jewish states, apparently, are just dandy.) What these Palestinians just don't understand, he said, is that armed struggle won't get them anywhere. Haven't they learned anything, after all these years? It's really hurting their image in the international community. Well, I said sarcastically, since you understand this so well, and none of the Palestinians have been able to grasp it, maybe you should explain it to them then. Oh, I am, every Palestinian I meet, he said with sincerity.
And what is that dazzling offer that Europe will extend, if Palestinians promise to sit on their hands and open their mouths? In exchange for your dignity, what? Maybe longlife, lifelong food rations? Maybe the chance to clean toilets in Israel, and the dream that your grandchildren could do the same?
I have not been here too long, but it is long enough to be sure of one thing: It is the Europeans, the Israelis, and the American who fail to grasp the central truth, after all these decades of trying to finetune the catastrophe they have engineered in Palestine: these women and men and children, who carry their heads so high, know who they are. They are prepared to sacrifice their lives, but they are not prepared to sacrifice their dignity. While the world discusses the moral or strategic aspects of armed resistance, there is no confusion about these issues here. Undefended, dignity, and the land, would be lost, and death would be better. With or without your permission, they will continue to fight.
[ Original ]
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Editorial: Signs Economic Commentary
Donald Hunt
Signs of the Times
July 3, 2006
Gold closed at 616.20 dollars an ounce on Friday, up 5.2% from $586.00 for the week. The dollar closed at 0.7819 euros on Friday, down 2.3% from 0.7996 at the close of the previous week. The euro, then, closed at 1.2790 dollars compared to 1.2507 at the end of the week before. Gold in euros would be 481.78 euros an ounce, up 3.9% from 463.61 at the previous week's close. Oil closed at 73.85 dollars a barrel Friday, up 4.2% from $70.84 for the week. Oil in euros would be 57.74 dollars a barrel, up 1.9% compared to 56.64 the Friday before. The gold/oil ratio closed at 8.34, up 0.8% from 8.27 for the week. In the U.S. stock market, the Dow closed at 11,150.22 up 1.5% from 10,989.09 at the close of the previous week. The NASDAQ closed at 2,172.09, up 2.4% from 2,121.47 for the week. In U.S. interest rates the yield on the ten-year U.S. Treasury note closed at 5.14%, down eight basis points from 5.22 at the end of the previous Friday.
Friday was the end of the second quarter, so let's look at the numbers for 2006 so far.
The price of gold in dollars went from $583.50 to $616.20 in the second quarter, an increase of 5.6%. For the year, gold went from $519.70 to $616.20, an increase of 18.6%.
Gold in euros was virtually unchanged in the second quarter, rising from 481.52 an ounce to 481.78. For the year gold priced in euros went from 438.60 to 481.78, a rise of 9.8%.
The dollar went from 0.8252 euros to 0.7819 euros in the second quarter, a drop of 5.5%. For the year, the dollar went from 0.8440 euros to 0.7819, a drop of 7.9%. The euro went from 1.1849 dollars to $1.2790 for the year and from 1.2118 for the quarter.
The price of oil in dollars went from 66.35 to 73.85 dollars a barrel in the second quarter, a rise of 11.3%. For the year, oil went from $61.04 to $73.85, a rise of 21.0%.
Oil in euros went from 54.75 euros a barrel to 57.74 for the quarter, a rise of 5.5%. For the year oil went from 51.43 euros a barrel to 57.74, a rise of 12.3%.
The gold/oil ratio went from 8.79 to 8.34 for the quarter (meaning the price of oil rose faster than the price of gold) a drop of 5.4%.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average went from 11,109.32 to 11,150.22 for the quarter, a rise of 0.4%. For the year it went from 10,717.50 to 11,150.22, a rise of 4.0%. The NASDAQ went from 2,339.79 to 2,172.09 for the quarter, a drop of 7.7%. For the year, it went from 2,205.32 to 2,172.09, a drop of 1.5%.
The yield on the ten-year U.S. Treasury note went from 4.85% to 5.14% in the second quarter, a rise of 29 basis points. For the year it went from 4.39 to 5.14, a rise of 75 basis points.
Looking at the year so far, a few things stand out. The price of oil has risen steadily. Gold has risen as well but not as steadily, given the recent correction which seems to have found a bottom in the mid-$580s. The dollar has been able to maintain its value, due in large part to rising short term interest rates by the U.S. Federal Reserve Board. As we will see, that may not last much longer.
So far no crash. That's the good news. They have managed to keep the system afloat for another six months -- not a bad accomplishment. One might even be tempted to think "they" know what they are doing. Nick Beams, discussing the annual report of the Bank of International Settlements, argues that they don't:
Bankers' bank puzzles over state of world economy
By Nick Beams
30 June 2006Recently in an email to the WSWS a reader drew a contrast between what she called the "explosive situation" in China - an "unregulated economy within a dictatorship" - and the United States where the economy is "regulated, open and handled by the best business-brains available."
While not often stated so baldly, the views expressed here are quite widely held; that while there may be problems in what could be called the extremities of the world economy, the heart is basically sound and functions under the watchful eye of central bankers and financial regulators ready to intervene if necessary.
Anyone who subscribes to such a view would do well to examine the annual report of the Bank for International Settlements (BIS) published this week. Set up in the late 1920s to organise World War I reparations payments from Germany, the BIS is a unique body in the world of finance. Not tied to any particular national banking authority and functioning as a kind of "central bankers' bank", it often provides analyses of the world economy not found elsewhere.
The main press commentary on this year's BIS report has focused on remarks by general manager Malcolm Knight that interest rates will have to be further tightened. "It would be imprudent," he said, "to count on the happy combination of strong growth and low inflation lasting indefinitely. At some point, central banks may have to act more forcefully on policy rates than they have in the past few years."
One of the report's central themes was that while the recent period of low inflation resulting from globalisation has been beneficial, the low interest rate regime that has followed may have created other problems in the form of asset price inflation and global trade imbalances.
These problems are dealt with in some detail in the conclusion to the report. It makes clear that far from financial markets operating under the regulation of the "best brains", they are wracked by a series of contradictions which central bankers do not really understand, much less know how to control.
For example, the report notes that the compression of interest rates between more secure and riskier assets "remains a puzzle", the surge in equity and housing prices globally "seems hard to reconcile with wide differences in domestic growth prospects" and that the "explosion in merger and acquisition activity, particularly in Europe, also seems difficult to rationalise."
Like many other financial institutions, the BIS insists that the present global imbalances, above all the growing US current account deficit and the continued accumulation of foreign currency reserves by China and the East Asian economies, are not sustainable in the long run. However, "given the complexity of the situation and the limits of our knowledge, it is extremely difficult to predict how all this might unfold."
One scenario is a "bang" of market turbulence. Another is the "whimper" of a long period of slow growth.
There are a number of possible triggers for a market "bang", including: the tightening of interest rates, protectionist legislation relating to China or Middle East oil exporters, or the sudden failure of a large firm with major financial interests. But it could be something else entirely, for, as the report points out, "the triggers for most of the financial crises observed over the last few decades were almost entirely unexpected."
One of the major problems confronting would-be regulators is the exponential expansion of financial markets in recent years, especially because of the operations of hedge funds and the ever-more widespread use of derivatives. These are contracts which by their nature involve speculation about the movement of interest rates, currency rates, share prices, debt ratings among other indices. Accordingly, there are "several market-specific reasons" for concern. "In the main industrial countries, there are many new participants in financial markets and many new financial products, of increasing complexity and opacity. Market liquidity in this new environment has yet to be put to the test."
In other words, while the use of complex derivatives is supposed to lessen financial turbulence through the spreading of risk, no one knows whether this is really the case. In fact, complex global financial connections mean that problems in one area may become amplified, rather than dampened, as trades unwind across the world. Accordingly, "there is a reasonable likelihood that if one market were to come under significant stress, it would spill over to others."
The drop in the dollar and the rise in the price of gold last week were both attributed to the announcement by the U.S. Federal Reserve Board that it might stop raising interest rates:
Gold in New York Rises Most Since September 2001
June 30 (Bloomberg) -- Gold in New York surged the most since the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks in the U.S. after the Federal Reserve suggested it may take a break from raising interest rates, eroding the value of the dollar.
Gold jumped 4.6 percent to $616 an ounce after the Fed yesterday said more rate increases may be needed only if statistics warrant. The dollar fell against the euro on speculation the European Central Bank may raise rates faster than in the U.S. Gold is up 16 percent this year as the dollar fell 7.3 percent against the euro. Silver also gained.
Comments by the Fed are "very friendly to the gold market," said Michael Guido, director of hedge fund marketing and commodity strategy at Societe Generale in New York. "All the sideline buyers are thinking this could be the bottom of the gold market for the year. There's a lot more confidence to adding to positions."
Gold futures for August delivery rose $27.10 on the Comex division of the New York Mercantile Exchange. The 4.6 percent gain was the biggest since Sept. 14, 2001, the first day of trading after the terrorist attacks closed U.S. markets. The metal reached a 26-year high of $732 on May 12...
Rate Expectations
The Philadelphia Stock Exchange Gold and Silver Index of 16 companies rose, led by silver producer Coeur d'Alene Mines Corp. and Kinross Gold Corp. The index gained 2 percent to 143.57, the highest settlement since May 16.
Interest-rate futures show traders see 59 percent odds of a quarter-percentage point increase in the overnight lending rate between banks, to 5.5 percent, in August. Two days ago, the figure was 85 percent.
"The Fed's comments yesterday indicate there is going to be no more interest-rate increases and this is pushing up gold,"said Ron Schouten, a precious-metals trader at Hollandsche Bank-Unie in Amsterdam. "The stronger euro-dollar is also helping."
Fed officials are trying to avoid a hard landing for the U.S., where higher t rates may restrain job growth and curtail spending. The Fed had increased rates for 17 straight times to curb inflation.
Inflation Pressure
U.S. consumer prices climbed at an annual rate of 5.2 percent in the five months ended May, up from 3.6 percent a year earlier. Excluding food and energy, so-called core prices rose at an annual rate of 3.1 percent, compared with a 2.4 percent gain a year earlier.
"The combination of inflation pressures and a slowdown in economic growth are positive for gold," said Michael Widmer, an analyst at Macquarie Bank Ltd. in London. "There is limited scope for the U.S. dollar to move higher now. Some uncertainty has been removed."
Investors buy gold as an alternative to the dollar.
"The psychology now is to sell the dollar and buy the euro and other currencies," said Richard Franulovich, a senior currency strategist at Westpac Banking Corp. in New York.
Since April 1, the correlation between gold and euro has increased to 0.55, compared with 0.37 in the first quarter. The coefficient measures to what degree two variables move in lockstep. The dollar weakened to $1.2786 per euro at 1:17 p.m. in New York, from $1.2664 late yesterday, reaching the lowest since June 8.
European Confidence
A report today showing European confidence in the economy was the highest in five years "is fueling speculation the EU will have to speed up rate hikes in the region," said John Licata, chief investment strategist for Blue Phoenix Inc., a precious-metals and energy firm in New York. "The dollar is under heavy pressure against the euro, which is causing a nice premium in gold prices."
The Fed yesterday raised its overnight lending rate by a quarter-point to 5.25 percent. Some investors interpreted accompanying statements to mean the central bank may pause after nudging rates higher at each meeting for two years.Gold as Insurance
"Gold looks more attractive," said Zach Liggett, who helps manage $550 million in individual accounts and the Utopia Fund at Traverse City, Michigan-based Financial & Investment Management Group. "It's good to have gold as insurance in case central banks lose their nerve and slow down this tightening campaign."
An end to the cycle of interest-rate increases by the Fed would leave the European Central Bank set to outpace its American counterpart, after ECB policy makers this week said they may quicken their pace of rate boosts.
"We've increased our investments on gold," said Christoph Eibl, head of commodities trading at Tiberius Asset Management AG in Stuttgart, Germany. "There's dollar weakness and oil prices are strong."
Crude oil rose for an eighth straight day, approaching $74 a barrel. Prices are up 21 percent this year.
Frightened by the prospect of a crash, it seems the Fed is reversing course. The problem they face is that the period of low interest rates we have not yet left has given the world excessive, asset bubbles, and global imbalances. Keeping interest rates low will only exacerbate those problems. Here's Michael Shedlock on the continued expansion of credit:
I was recently asked if I saw anything whatsoever that suggested lenders are tightening at all in the face of declining collateral and rising debt service pressures on their customers.
The answer to that question is a resounding no. In fact the latest data shows the opposite: credit standards are still getting easier and businesses are still trying to expand or capture market share regardless of the consequences down the road.
Bank Lending Survey
According to the April 2006 Senior Loan Officer Opinion Survey on Bank Lending Practices
- On net, 12 percent of domestic institutions indicated that they had eased standards on business loans to large and middle-market firms.
- About 60 percent of domestic respondents, a notably larger net fraction than in the previous survey, reported that they had trimmed spreads of loan rates over their cost of funds for such firms.
- Almost 40 percent of domestic institutions, again a larger net fraction than in the January survey, indicated that they had reduced the costs of credit lines over the past three months.
- About one-fifth of domestic banks, noted that they had increased the maximum maturity of C&I loans or credit lines that they were willing to extend to their business borrowers.
- For C&I loans to small firms, 7 percent of domestic respondents noted that they had eased lending standards in the April survey.
- On balance, almost 50 percent of respondents indicated that they had narrowed spreads of loan rates over their cost of funds
- About 30 percent of respondents reported having reduced the cost of credit lines over the same period.
- Most respondents reporting easing of their lending standards cited more aggressive competition as an important reason for having done so.
Perhaps lending standards have changed given the market downdraft in equity markets in May but I doubt it. Note that housing starts were up this month even though inventories are skyrocketing and buyer traffic is back at 1990 levels. "Have Funding Will Build" seems to be the homebuilder motto of the day.
Housing Starts
Here is another angle on housing starts:
Bloomberg is reporting Copper Rises After U.S. Housing Starts Gain More Than Expected.Copper in London and Shanghai rose after home construction rebounded in the U.S. last month, spurring optimism for sustained demand in the world's second- biggest user of the metal.
Housing starts rose a greater-than-expected 5 percent to an annual rate of 1.957 million, the Commerce Department said yesterday in Washington. The average U.S. home contains about 400 pounds (181.4 kilograms) of copper wire and pipes, according to the New York-based Copper Development Association.
"Prior to these numbers, there was some concern that the U.S. property market was cooling, but the announcement showed that is not the case," Cai Luoyi, a metals analyst at China International Futures (Shanghai) Co., said by phone.
So there was "some concern" about US housing but I see that one month of data removes all that concern. By any chance is Cai Luoyi the replacement for the rogue trader that cost China $200 million by shorting copper futures last year?
Flashback to November 25th. The Washington Post reported Losses on Copper Futures Have Leadership Spinning?
Fast forward to today:
There are now record numbers of unsold homes on the market. There were 565,000 new and 3.4 million existing residences for sale in April according to the National Association of Realtors and the Commerce Department. That is a lot of supply and home builders keep adding to it every month at a far faster pace than sales.
Danielle DiMartino writing for the Dallas Morning News is asking Which builders will be left standing?After I had mulled over the troubling 5 percent rise in May housing starts, a brilliantly simple explanation hit my inbox.
"Builders with no starts are 'unemployed,' " wrote James Bandy of Dallas, "and they will never be voluntarily unemployed."
Mr. Bandy said he recalls Texas in the mid-1980s well enough to recognize the sequel to the high-stakes game of musical chairs.
Given that we all know how the game ends, it's hard to see why so many builders continue to be willing participants. Yet they play on.
In case you've missed the most massive buildup since the Cold War, inventories of new and existing homes are at the highest levels ever recorded. Combine existing and new construction and you get a cool 4 million unsold units.
With this much supply, you'd think starts would be down by more than 3.8 percent from January's 33-year high.
Wouldn't it be smarter to show a bit of restraint and shelter what profit margins do remain? It's not as if retaining sales volumes to keep up appearances is still a legitimate excuse. Wall Street long ago pummeled homebuilder stocks.
In fact, the meltdown in share prices has freed homebuilders to shift their focus back to profits. Rather than pile on more incentives to stanch plummeting demand, those with an eye on survival could simply cancel, or at least postpone, groundbreakings.
It's painfully apparent that, somewhere along the way, the industry abandoned concern for its customers' long-term well-being.
Maybe builders just don't appreciate how critical a role they play. Oversupply is but one issue when viewed in isolation - as is the risk to the labor market, as is the threat to the banking system.
Add them together, though, and we're not talking child's play. We're talking about a seriously brutal session of musical chairs.
One has to laugh about that musical chairs analogy but it goes beyond homebuilding into every aspect of this financial economy totally dependent on ever increasing amounts of risk. Not only are more and more players struggling to get into the game (with no additional chairs being added) those already in it are struggling to increase leverage.
...Let's look at one more interesting article from Danielle DiMartino. This one is called Not feeling at home with risk.Three weeks ago the portfolio manager at Pacific Investment Management Co. sold his house and moved into an apartment with his wife. Though his wife wasn't exactly happy with the move, his sense is "she will look back on our sale and view it as a good one."
Curiously, Mr. Kiesel's specialty is corporate bonds, which he says have given him a unique perspective on the U.S. housing market.
"Rising home prices have been the key driver of U.S. economic growth, which in turn has played a major role in the tightening of corporate bond spreads," Mr. Kiesel said.
Many of these companies are buying back their stock, which weakens bondholders' cash cushion on the balance sheet. "In this environment, bondholders should be demanding covenant protection as well as higher spreads on homebuilder bonds."
Because housing has driven the economy for so long, the slowdown will bring, among other things, tighter lending standards, less willingness to take risk, lower asset price appreciation outside housing, less liquid financial markets and rising volatility.
"At that point, 'For Sale' will not just be a sign you see in front of your neighbor's yard," Mr. Kiesel added. "Investors may also put a 'For Sale' sign on risk assets as well."
Judging from the huge swings we've seen in emerging markets, stocks and commodities in recent weeks, big institutional investors have already started to shift away from risk, something that carries deeper implications for bondholders.Junk bond spreads are widening, the Fed is still hiking, housing inventory is soaring, but builders are still building, companies are still wasting cash on share buybacks at inflated prices, and credit standards amazingly are still headed lower. It's not readily apparent right now but I suspect there will be a severe shortage of chairs when Bernanke's Big Band stops the rate hike music.
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Editorial: The Failed Administration of George W. Bush
July 3, 2006
Rodrigue Tremblay
The New American Empire
"We now live in a nation in which the president has the omnipotent power to ignore all constitutional restraints on his power."
Jacob Hornberger ( Future of Freedom Foundation)
"Simply stated, there is no doubt that Saddam Hussein now has weapons of mass destruction,"
Vice President Dick Cheney, August 26, 2002
"The defense policy of the United States is based on a simple premise: The United States does not start fights. We will never be an aggressor."
President Ronald Reagan
George W. Bush has failed as president. Indeed, it looks like the political legacy that George W. Bush will leave behind will be a terrible heritage. His administration, (which should more appropriately be called 'the Bush-Cheney administration' because of the predominant and crucial role played by Vice President Dick Cheney) will be remembered as an administration built on lies, fabricated "evidence", duplicity, deception, manipulation, propaganda, improvisation, bad policies and gratuitous warmongering. In other words, the 'Bush-Cheney administration' is the reverse of what you would like a democratic government to be. The end result is an administration that has profoundly corrupted the daily working of the U. S. government.
President Bush Jr. is already the least liked American president since polls have been taken, with a disapproval rating of 71 percent, beating the runner-up in this category, President Richard 'Dick' Nixon, who scored 66 percent. He may also turn out to be the most incompetent and the most disliked president ever.
Under Bush Jr.'s watch, -the price of gasoline is in the stratosphere, -the dollar is in the dumps, -the federal debt is exploding under massive deficit military spending, -the poor are getting poorer while a small group of super rich are getting richer, -consumers have built up unsustainable debts, -46 million Americans have no health insurance whatsoever, -the real estate market has begun to tank, -American external trade deficits, at more than $800 billion a year, are out of control, -politics dominates international trade talks and trade liberalization programs are stalled, -illegal immigration by the tens of millions goes unchecked, -the military-industrial complex decried by President Dwight D. Eisenhower, is stronger than ever, -the U. S. is officially in the business of torturing prisoners and massacring civilians (Abu Ghraib...Guantánamo...Fallujah...Haditha...etc.), -the international reputation of the USA is at an all time low, -the United Nations has de facto been destroyed, -international law is in shambles, -the country has been set on a path of permanent war abroad, -the Constitution and the Bill of Rights, especially the right of Habeas Corpus and the right to privacy, not counting the Geneva Convention, have been violated, -the equivalent of a domestic secret police run by the Pentagon has been created, -divisive religion has been brought into the daily functioning of government, -corruption in his administration is endemic, -and the ugly head of an unlimited and unaccountable executive dictatorship has risen for the first time in U. S. history. -Besides all that, ...everything is fine!
Bush Jr. is a dangerous man in many respects. First, he has attempted to turn his personal religious faith into a partisan asset for partisan political benefit, going as far as asking a theologian to write his speeches. Some have seen in his religious propensity to appropriate the Almighty, coupled with a sense of divine mission, a sure sign of paranoia. In this, Bush Jr. rejoins Osama bin Laden who also seems to suffer from a delirium of persecution and of grandeur. It seems as if these two individuals, to whom we may add the Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, who also hears voices and talks to the clouds, feed on each other's fanaticism and take turns in speaking to deities in order to justify their reprehensible actions.
Dr. Gerald Alper, in his new book titled 'Paranoia of Everyday Life: Escaping the Enemy Within' explains "paranoia" as follows: "A paranoid point of view develops when our natural desire to protect ourselves crosses an invisible line, which varies greatly from one person to another, and begins to become unconsciously irrational. It is characterized by a kind of runaway vigilance, an increasingly pointless and draining around-the-clock guardedness that can only be maintained at a steep psychological price. ... People in the grip of paranoia unwittingly construct a melodramatic, suspense-filled interior world, a baffling maze of plots and counterplots wherein real people are reduced to one-dimensional, cartoon caricatures." It is thus no surprise that paranoid people become one-track minded, disregarding facts and reality in favor of their own personal craze.
Renown Polish Psychologist Andrew M. Lobaczewski has also explained, in his new book titled 'Political Ponerology: The Scientific Study of Evil Adjusted for Political Purposes' how people suddenly propelled to a situation of power and authority can be prone to develop symptoms of "psychopathy", even though they may be passing as "normal." Normal people know that something is wrong, but they cannot quite put their finger on it. As Andrew Lobaczewski puts it, "pathology among people in power can have disastrous effects on all of the people under the control of such pathological individuals."
These two books go a long way in understanding why "sociopaths", while only representing between 4 and 10 percent of a population, can nevertheless be found, sometimes, at the very high levels of some governments and other organizations. As history shows, if unchecked, their psychopathic behavior can lead to horror and tragedy on a very large scale.
Secondly, because of his errors of appreciation of reality and his "don't bother me with the facts" attitude, Bush Jr. has dug himself into a political hole. In breaking with the U. S. government tradition to act as a peace broker between Israel and the Palestinians, and by endorsing wholeheartedly one party in the Israel-Palestinian conflict, George W. Bush has violated a cardinal principle of strategy, i.e. the need to minimize the number of one's enemies. By de facto adopting the state of Israel's positions on everything, without nuances, Bush Jr. has inherited Israel's enemies, and Israel's problems have become America's problems. Mind you, this is what the Neocons in the Bush-Cheney administration wanted all along, i. e. joining the two countries at the hip, but it can be argued, as professors Mearsheimer and Walt have done recently, if this is really in America's long term interests.
For over half a century, the 'realist' U. S. foreign policy in the Middle East strove to maintain political stability, in order to preserve the flow of oil from predominantly Muslim Arab countries. U.S. support for Israel was tempered with the need to treat the Palestinians with justice and decency. Bush II abandoned this prudent policy and decided to adopt a 100 percent pro-Israel neocon policy of siding only with the 6 million Israelis, against the 300 million Arabs. In fact, George W. Bush reduced the United States to the dubious role of Israel's proxy in pursuing the overall neocon goal of destabilizing and dominating militarily the entire Middle East, in order to enhance Israeli security, make examples to the world, and, in the process, take over these countries' resources.
In so doing, Bush II has brought upon himself the animosity of most Arab countries and of most Muslim countries around the world, and has provoked the creation of hostile coalitions against the United States in other parts of the world. In geopolitical terms, this can be called a major blunder, which can be attributed to a lack of judgment and intellectual fortitude.
Thirdly, George W. Bush has undertaken by himself the impossible (and illegal) task of changing by force the governments of other nations he does not like or approve of. -Armed with the impractical and unlawful 'Bush Doctrine' of 'preventive' war, or of "war on suspicion", Bush Jr. has led his country into a legal, moral and military quagmire by recklessly planning and undertaking an attack, an invasion and an occupation of a defenseless Iraq, without the proper authorization of the U. N. -Single-mindedly, he has brought chaos and mayhem to Iraq. Moreover, with his threatening and bellicose posture against Islamic countries, George W. Bush has been a major driving force behind the political polarization and rise of Islamic fundamentalist and Wahhabist political parties in many Muslim countries (Iraq, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Pakistan, etc.), and in many Western cities.
In a sense, Bush Jr. has become their rallying point -their own Hitler, and as such, he has radicalized the masses in these countries and turned them against the West and Western values. Bush Jr. himself is the major reason why global opinion of the United States has plummeted so much since he took office. In fact, in most of the world, thanks to George W. Bush, the U.S. in Iraq is considered a greater threat than Iran to peace and stability in the Middle East. In other words, the USA, under Bush-Cheney, is slowly becoming a rogue state in the eyes of the world.
To get out of this mess and public relations disaster, the Bush-Cheney team may be tempted to take some reckless actions that will make matters worse and, in the process, hurt many people. Indeed, always under the neocon ideological influence, Bush Jr. may try to reappropriate the mantle of 'Commander-in-chief' once more, even if it is badly tarnished by his ill-conceived war against Iraq. -That may be the only card left for this administration. Bush Jr. may be willing to risk everything to mark his place in history as the man who stopped Iran from getting nukes. The greater fear, however, is that he ends up becoming the first person to pull the nuclear trigger since Hiroshima and Nagasaki. - Then, for sure, his place in the history books will be assured, not as a democrat but as a tyrant. It is widely reported that Bush's incompetent Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld (so say many American generals publicly and in private!) is already busy drawing plans to bomb Iran or other countries that are identified in the Neocons' grand plan.
On practical grounds, the Bush-Cheney administration has also failed in its strategic goal to secure cheap oil supplies for the U. S. economy. World oil supplies are more uncertain than ever and the price of oil reflects this uncertainty and is pushing higher. Bush Jr.'s goal of US strategic dominance of oil resources in the Middle East has been a complete failureand has backfired.
It was on May 1, 2003, that Mr. Bush did his flamboyant and childish victory jig on the aircraft carrier Abraham Lincoln. It was on May 1, 2005, two years after the invasion of Iraq, that The Sunday Times of London published the so-called Downing Street memo and revealed the extent of Bush Jr.'s deception to launch an illegal war of aggression. All during 2002, while pretending otherwise and faking a request for U. N. authorization, Bush Jr. and his accomplices were determined to fix "the intelligence and facts" around its predetermined 'faith-based' policy of going to war in Iraq. His biggest lie, to deliberately mislead the American public, came about when he used forged documents to claim, in his infamous 2003 State of the Union Address, that "The British government has learned that Saddam Hussein recently sought significant quantities of uranium from Africa." This was a false statement widely known as such within the CIA and the Bush-Cheney administration..
The president still has not since leveled with the American people and with the world. As late as last March 2006, George W. Bush repeated at a public forum that he had never said "there was a direct connection between September the 11th and Saddam Hussein." Journalists were quick to point out that the president, on countless public occasions, had repeatedly made a direct connection between Iraq and the tragic events of 9/11: "With those attacks the terrorists and their supporters declared war on the United States," he uttered on May 1, 2003, "and war is what they (the Iraqis) got."
The sad thing is that George W. Bush seemed to have decided early to put all his eggs in the militarist basket in order to have a successful presidency. He was imprudent enough to tell Mickey Herskowitz, whose services were retained in 1999 to ghost-write Bush's autobiography "A Charge To Keep": "One of the keys to being seen as a great leader is to be seen as commander in chief. My father had all this political capital built up when he drove the Iraqis out of Kuwait and he wasted it. If I have a chance to invade, if I had that much capital, I'm not going to waste it. I'm going to get everything passed that I want to get passed and I'm going to have a successful presidency." The ill-fated Iraq adventure is the direct result of such a cynical frame of mind.
This may explain why early on, Bush Jr. and his entourage engaged in a simplistic, belligerent (and wrong) cowboy-style diplomacy, as illustrated by the comment that GWB made, on January 30, 2003, saying he would give diplomacy over Iraq "weeks, not months."-Incredibly, Bush Jr. used exactly the same bullying language, three years later, on June 9, 2006, about Iran: "We've given the Iranians a limited period of time - you know, weeks, not months," to suspend its nuclear research program.
As one neocon writer put it recently, the United States "acts as the world's government"... for benevolent reasons. For whose interests? Under what legitimacy? The force of arms? -This is what can be called a very jingoistic, triumphalist, unilateralist, delusional, apologist view of international affairs. In fact, this is the same old bankrupt neocon idea of a benevolent American empire, put forward, in 1996, by William Kristol and Robert Kagan, i.e. a military empire that can kill its way in the world and still be respectable. An empire that kills is not a benevolent empire; it is a criminal empire.
The incompetence of Vice President Dick Cheney and Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld was also well demonstrated when they said, three days before the onslaught of the many years long Iraq War, that the war would end "relatively quickly," in "weeks, not months," and that invading American troops would be "greeted as liberators." On the contrary, after more than three years of carnage and dislocations, a large majority of Iraqis want U. S. soldiers out of their country and the situation is so bad that Bush Jr. has made Saddam Hussein look good in the eyes of many Iraqis.
Bush Jr.'s failures have not only been geopolitical; they have also been economic and financial. Today, the world is on the brink of a major economic downturn, because of his mismanagement and his failed policies. George W. Bush should rightfully be known as the "double deficits man," because of the huge fiscal and external deficits his administration has registered.
Not very competent himself, Bush Jr. has surrounded himself with other incompetent people and with rabid neocon ideologues whose narrow agenda had to be attained at all costs. These yes-men and manipulators have reinforced his weaknesses and his own righteousness. An incompetent politician who surrounds himself with competent people can pull it off. However, if he is dumb enough to surround himself with like-minded people, failure becomes a certainty.
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Editorial: American Patriots
The Nation
Sun July 2, 2006
Patriotism, Tom Paine observed, is not best measured in times of national comfort and quiet. It is in times of crisis, when the summer soldiers and sunshine patriots have retreated to the safety of official talking points and unquestioning loyalty, that those who truly understand the meaning and merit of the American experiment come to its defense. On the 230th anniversary of the launch of that experiment, let us reflect on those who have met the test, noting in particular that some of the boldest expressions of patriotism have come from groups not necessarily associated with dissent.
Consider America's librarians. Since the enactment of the Patriot Act in 2001, the American Library Association (ALA) has been at the forefront of the fight to defend freedom of inquiry and thought from provisions of the act that allow the Justice Department to subpoena the records of libraries and bookstores. The librarians succeeded in getting the House to adopt language protecting library records in 2005--only to have it stripped from the bill to which it was attached by an Administration-friendly House-Senate conference committee.
But the librarians have not just been lobbying to change the Patriot Act, they've been on the front lines of exposing its abuses. When four Connecticut librarians challenged an attempt by the FBI to use a National Security Letter to obtain records of who was reading what in that state, the Justice Department slapped a gag order on them. But the 64,000-member ALA and its Freedom to Read Foundation stood up for the librarians, working with the American Civil Liberties Union, the Association of American Publishers and the American Booksellers Foundation for Free Expression to make a federal case of the issue. In May, after the FBI dropped its defense of the gag order--and shortly before it withdrew its demand for the records--a federal appeals court declared that order moot, and the librarians were at last free to speak out. Peter Chase, director of the Plainville, Connecticut, public library, explained that he and his fellow librarians decided to fight because of their frustration at receiving the National Security Letter even as "the government was telling Congress that it didn't use the Patriot Act against libraries and that no one's rights had been violated. I felt that I just could not be part of this fraud being foisted on our nation."
The ALA isn't the only group challenging the Administration's disregard for basic liberties. The American Bar Association is investigating whether George W. Bush exceeded his constitutional authority when he reserved the right to ignore more than 750 laws enacted since he took office. The American Medical Association has adopted guidelines that make it unethical for physicians to participate in interrogating detainees. And 399 communities and eight states have answered the Bill of Rights Defense Committee's call for passing resolutions upholding civil liberties.
Those defenders of basic rights are the patriotic heroes of this Fourth of July, as are those who exercise those rights, like the Code Pink members, who will fast for peace outside the Bush White House on the Fourth, and the Raging Grannies, who will join parades and picnics around the country. Fittingly, in the city where it all began, a fife-and-drum corps will lead a parade of anti-Iraq War activists through the streets of Philadelphia on the eve of the Fourth to a gathering where they will sign a Declaration of Peace. They are responding to Paine's call, as relevant now as it was more than 200 years ago: "Ye that dare oppose not only the tyranny but the tyrant, stand forth!"
[ Original ]
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How to Start WWIII
Israel warns: free soldier or PM dies
Middle East correspondent Martin Chulov
July 01, 2006
SRAEL last night threatened to assassinate Palestinian Prime Minister Ismael Haniyeh if Hamas militants did not release a captured Israeli soldier unharmed.
The unprecedented warning was delivered to Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas in a letter as Israel debated a deal offered by Hamas to free Corporal Gilad Shalit.
It came as Israeli military officials readied a second invasion force for a huge offensive into Gaza.
Hamas's Gaza-based political leaders, including Mr Haniyeh, had already gone into hiding.
But last night's direct threat to kill Mr Haniyeh, a democratically elected head of state, sharply raised the stakes.
The bid to free Corporal Shalit was brokered by Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak, who last night warned Hamas it faced severe consequences if it did not curb its "extreme stance" and described the growing conflict as a lightning rod for Palestinian vengeance.
Jerusalem has made no official comment, but Egyptian state media said Israel had found the offer unacceptable. Israel has not spelt out the terms demanded by Hamas, but earlier this week it refused to buy into talk of a prisoner swap.
Thousands of Hamas supporters protested in Gaza City late on Thursday over the arrest by Israeli forces of up to 32 Hamas MPs on the West Bank that day.
A Hamas spokesman said the group would never recognise Israel, in spite of a deal its leaders signed this week offering implicit recognition of the Jewish state in return for easing an economic blockade.
Israeli fighter jets bombed 20 targets in Gaza, including the Interior Ministry, which it said had been used by militants to stage meetings, while artillery hit the northern strip with 500 shells in the 24 hours until yesterday morning.
Jewish settler Eliyahu Asheri, who was murdered by militants this week, was buried on Thursday as leaders of the Popular Resistance Committees pledged to seize more hostages in the West Bank. No further word has emerged about another suspected Jewish hostage, Noach Moskowitz, who Israeli police said was found dead hours after Mr Asheri's remains were found.
Much of Gaza, including two main hospitals, was without power and running water as a UN aid chief warned that the 1.4 million residents of the strip were three days away from a humanitarian crisis.
"They are heading for the abyss unless they get electricity and fuel restored," said emergency relief co-ordinator Jan Egeland, who urged militants to free Corporal Shalit and stop firing rockets into Israel.
Residents complain that sonic booms caused by Israeli jets traumatise children and that shelling confines families to their homes.
Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert has vowed the military will do all it can to avoid civilian deaths if a full-scale assault is launched.
Mr Olmert said the decision to invade northern Gaza had already been delayed to allow Mr Mubarak's negotiations to continue.
The arrested Hamas legislators have been sent to security prisons and many will stand trial on terrorism offences. The detentions have hurt Hamas's already limited ability to govern and are likely to force a regime change.
Israel claims it has intelligence about the area where Corporal Shalit is held, but has been unable to pinpoint the exact location. Mr Olmert said the military would leave the strip if he was unconditionally and safely returned.
Egypt and the neighbouring Arab states of Jordan and Lebanon fear a war between Israel and the Palestinians could lead to uprisings within their own borders, which house many Palestinian refugees.
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Israel strike hits Palestinian PM's office
By IBRAHIM BARZAK
Associated Press
July 2, 2006
GAZA CITY, Gaza Strip - Israeli aircraft blasted the Palestinian prime minister's office early Sunday during the fifth straight night of airstrikes aimed at winning the freedom of an Israeli soldier held captive by Hamas militants in Gaza.
The attack on Ismail Haniyeh's empty office came amid continued diplomatic efforts involving Egypt and other regional players to end the standoff, which have been under way since Cpl. Gilad Shalit, 19, was seized a week ago in a cross-border raid.
Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and Defense Minister Amir Peretz were to meet with security officials later Sunday to discuss whether to give diplomacy more time or to escalate the military operation.
Late last week, Olmert called off plans to broaden the Israeli incursion from southern Gaza to the coastal strip's north in a nod to the diplomatic activity.
On Sunday, he hinted at possible escalation when he said his government had instructed the military to "do all it can" to return Shalit safely.
Palestinians said two missiles fired by attack helicopters set Haniyeh's office ablaze, but it was empty because of the late hour, witnesses said. One bystander was slightly injured.
Inspecting the wreckage, Haniyeh called the attack senseless. "They have targeted a symbol for the Palestinian people," he said.
The Israeli military said, however, it would "employ all means at its disposal ... to secure the safe return" of Shalit. Roni Bar-On, an Israeli Cabinet minister, said the attack was also meant to "compromise the Hamas government's ability to rule."
"We will strike and will continue to strike at (Hamas') institutions," he said. "They have to understand that we will not continue to let them run amok."
Hamas, whose charter calls for Israel's destruction, took power after winning Palestinian parliamentary elections in January.
Although Israel has said repeatedly in the past that Haniyeh could be a target for assassination, the gunmen holding Shalit are thought to take their orders from Hamas'
Syria-based political chief, Khaled Mashaal, so the attack on Haniyeh's office appeared to be more symbolic than aimed at killing him.
In other airstrikes after midnight, Israeli aircraft hit a school in Gaza City and Hamas facilities in northern Gaza, where a Hamas militant was killed and another wounded, Palestinian officials said. The military said the two were "planning terror attacks against Israel."
The 34-year-old Hamas gunman, Shaaban Manoun, was the second militant killed in the offensive.
Exerting pressure on Hamas from various directions, Israel continued to hold 64 Hamas leaders, including eight Cabinet ministers, rounded up in the West Bank on Thursday. Military officials said the government would bring the detainees to court by midweek to seek permission to extend their detention.
After the Israeli airstrike on his office, Haniyeh met with Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas for an hour to discuss the Israeli attacks and efforts to keep the government functioning despite the arrests, the prime minister's office said.
In a statement, Haniyeh called for foreign intervention to stop the Israeli offensive. "The international community must shoulder its responsibility," he said.
Israel, meanwhile, planned to reopen its main cargo crossing with Gaza later Sunday to allow food and medical supplies to reach the impoverished strip, the Defense Ministry said. The Karni passage, sealed after the militant attack, will be open four days this week, the ministry said.
While food shortages have not been reported, human rights groups have cautioned that Gaza could face a humanitarian crisis because nearly half the territory's electricity supply was knocked out after Israeli missiles struck Gaza's only power station. Israel has since increased its supply of electricity to Gaza, the Israeli army said Saturday.
Fuel supplies were also dwindling after Israel cut off the flow to Gaza through a pipeline. Israel Radio reported that a separate crossing in southern Israel would be opened later Sunday to allow fuel through, but the Defense Ministry did not confirm this.
On Saturday, Hamas demanded the release of more than 1,000 prisoners held by Israel and a halt to the offensive, but Israel rejected the conditions out of hand. On Sunday, Bar-On reiterated that Israel wouldn't negotiate Shalit's release.
Hamas government spokesman Ghazi Hamad urged Israel to be more flexible.
"I think that if the Israeli government will understand that it's possible to release prisoners, things will end OK," Hamad told Army Radio. "If not, I think the situation will be very difficult for us and for you, too. ... Maybe there will be a (military) escalation and people will die."
Peretz met with senior security officials Saturday night and then called U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice to urge the Bush administration to step up pressure on Syria to work for Shalit's release, Israeli officials said on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to make a formal statement.
Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan of Turkey, a predominantly Muslim country that has close ties with Israel, called President Bush on Saturday and talked for 30 minutes about the crisis.
"The president said that the initial goal should be freeing the Israeli soldier - that is the key to ending the crisis," said Frederick Jones, spokesman for the National Security Council at the White House.
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Israeli forces gather along Gaza border
By RAVI NESSMAN
Associated Press
July 3, 2006
GAZA CITY, Gaza Strip - Israel massed tanks and troops along Gaza's northern border early Monday, firing artillery and unleashing more airstrikes in a show of force after the prime minister ordered his army to "do all it can" to free an abducted soldier.
At daybreak Monday, a small force of Israeli tanks entered northern Gaza, but the military said it was a "limited" mission to find explosives and tunnels near the border fence.
Prime Minister Ehud Olmert's warning signaled the government was losing patience with diplomatic efforts to end the week-old crisis over the captive soldier, Cpl. Gilad Shalit, and was preparing for a possible escalation of its military offensive.
However, political and security officials said that Israeli military and political leaders have not ruled out swapping 19-year-old Shalit for Palestinian prisoners who weren't involved in hostile activity against Israel, though they didn't think a deal was near. The officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were discussing private conversations.
Publicly, Israel has refused to discuss the captive with Palestinian militants and rejected their demand to release some of the 9,000 Palestinian prisoners held in Israeli jails.
Israeli aircraft went back into action early Monday, hitting several targets around the Gaza Strip including a building in Gaza City where the Al Aqsa Martyrs' Brigades has an office, Palestinians and the military said. Al Aqsa is a violent offshoot of moderate Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas' Fatah movement.
A missile struck the second floor of the two-story building, setting it on fire. No one was in the office at the time of the attack, after midnight. A family living on the first floor escaped harm. Other areas hit in the airstrikes included a building in northern Gaza and empty fields.
Israel also shelled northern Gaza early Monday, slightly wounding one person in a house on the outskirts of the town of Beit Hanoun, Palestinians said. The military confirmed artillery was fired in the area.
Shelling from the sea, Israeli navy ships aimed at a beachfront Hamas camp but missed, Palestinian security officials said.
Israeli aircraft, gunboats and artillery have pounded Gaza since troops and tanks took up positions in the south of the coastal strip on Wednesday. The operation is aimed at pressuring Palestinians to free Shalit. Five Palestinian fighters had been reported killed, four of them on Sunday.
Israel has been massing forces across from Beit Hanoun in northern Gaza. Olmert called off a planned invasion late last week, but there were signs that the military was ready to roll again.
Hamas-affiliated militants holding Shalit have offered to give Israel information about him in exchange for the release of hundreds of prisoners in Israeli jails, a deal Israel rejects.
"These are difficult days for Israel, but we have no intention of giving in to any form of blackmailing," Olmert said Sunday. "Everyone understands that giving in to terror today means an invitation to the next act of terrorism, and we will not act that way."
Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice called Olmert Sunday to discuss the situation, Olmert's office said in a statement. He told Rice Israel would use all means at its disposal to get Shalit released and said there was no humanitarian crisis in Gaza.
Palestinian officials had warned Saturday that a shortage of fuel threatened to shut down generators used to pump water and power hospitals.
Israel reopened the main cargo crossing with Gaza to allow 50 trucks of food, medical supplies and fuel into Gaza from Israel, Israeli officials said. Trucks carrying diesel fuel, gasoline and natural gas also began entering northeastern Gaza through the Nahal Oz border crossing.
"I take personal responsibility for what is happening in Gaza. I want nobody to sleep at night in Gaza. I want them to know what its like," Olmert told his Cabinet. "People are saying it's uncomfortable. It will be uncomfortable, (but) nobody dies from being uncomfortable."
Olmert told the Cabinet he had instructed the military to "do all it can" to get Shalit back safely, but added that the offensive would end immediately if he was released, according to a meeting participant who spoke on condition of anonymity.
Last week, Israel arrested eight Cabinet ministers in the Hamas-led Palestinian government and dozens of other Hamas lawmakers in the West Bank.
Olmert indicated to the Cabinet that more such arrests may be coming in Gaza, Hamas' power base where many of its leaders including Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh, live.
Egypt has been working to broker a compromise to free the soldier and end the standoff, but negotiations were complicated by confusion over who was in charge of Shalit's fate.
The Palestinian government, led by the Islamic militants of Hamas since January elections, said it had no contact with the kidnappers. Israel assumes Shalit's captors answer to Hamas leader Khaled Mashaal, who lives in Syria, but the group's foreign leadership denied having any authority over the matter.
"We have no contact with those holding the prisoner," said Osama Hamdan, a top Hamas leader based in Lebanon.
Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak was trying to enlist Syrian President Bashar Assad's help to persuade Hamas leaders to free Shalit, while Egypt's intelligence chief was talking with Mashaal directly, an Egyptian official said. But Israeli Vice Premier Shimon Peres said Sunday that Syria has not acted to help free the soldier.
Raising the stakes, Israeli aircraft launched two missiles into the Palestinian prime minister's empty office building before dawn Sunday, damaging offices and leaving parts of the building smoldering.
Abbas, a rival of Haniyeh's from the moderate Fatah Party, surveyed the damage with Haniyeh and called the attack "a dirty, criminal act."
The strike, which came after Israel destroyed the interior minister's office, was a clear signal no one was immune.
"I remain very concerned about the need to preserve Palestinian institutions and infrastructure," U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan said Sunday. "They will be the basis for an eventual two-state solution and are thus in the interests of both Israel and the Palestinians. It would therefore seem inadvisable to carry out actions that will have the opposite effect."
Hamas militants said they would retaliate if Israel continued attacking Palestinian institutions. Hamas is responsible for dozens of deadly suicide bombings in Israel.
An airstrike Sunday hit a school in Gaza City and Hamas facilities in northern Gaza, where a Hamas militant became the second Palestinian fatality since the offensive started, Palestinian officials said. The Israeli military said the militant was "planning terror attacks against Israel."
In other violence Sunday, Israeli artillery pounded open areas near the southern town of Khan Younis. Israeli troops shot dead three armed Palestinians near the long-closed Gaza airport, two of them carrying explosive belts, the military said.
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Gaza Camp swelters with little power or water
Chris McGreal in Nuseirat refugee camp
Monday July 3, 2006
The Guardian
For the 58,000 residents of Nuseirat, a refugee camp south of Gaza City, life has got very much tougher over recent days as Israel squeezes ordinary Palestinians in an effort to win the release of Corporal Gilad Shalit, who was captured a week ago by Palestinian militias and is thought to be held in a Gaza refugee camp.
Nuseirat not only lost electricity, along with most of the rest of the Gaza Strip, when Israel bombed the territory's power station last Wednesday, but its water supply was all but severed when a bridge carrying the main pipe was blown up by an Israeli jet.
Amal al-Najar and her sister, Fatma al-Hor, have 12 children between them. "When you have children, not having water is a real problem," said Mrs Najar. "I can't clean my children properly. I can't clean my house. I can't wash clothes."
The UN estimates that about 130,000 Gazans have been left without a regular supply of fresh water and that many more receive it only sporadically or in sufficient quantities for drinking and cooking but not for bathing and laundry.
The Gaza Strip lost about 60% of its electricity when the Israeli airforce struck six transformers with missiles at the territory's only power plant. Gaza gets its remaining power from Israel and that is now being rationed with each town and refugee camp receiving electricity for a few hours a day. But without regular refrigeration meat has turned rotten and dairy products cannot be kept.
Israel also shut down deliveries of fuel. On Saturday there were long queues for petrol but by yesterday the pumps had dried up and garages were closed. There is also a dire shortage of diesel for generators.
In the summer heat and without power for fans, the Najar family spend the nights outside in the cool air, at least until the early hours, when Israeli jets rouse Gaza's population with sonic booms.
The planes break the sound barrier over Gaza, creating waves of pressure and noise that in the first instance are hardly distinguishable from a real and massive explosion. The sound bomb appears to be very close by no matter where a person is. The booms are powerful enough to blow out windows.
"The sonic booms are terrible for the children," said Mrs Hor. "They wake up and scream and come running out of their room. We adults get used to it because although it is very loud and shocking we know it is not a bomb. But the children are frightened every time."
An Israeli MP said yesterday that the prime minister, Ehud Olmert, had told the military to "make sure no one sleeps in Gaza at night".
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Gaza: 'The children wake up screaming. I am worried it will damage them'
UK Independent
By Donald Macintyre
03 July 2006
Mahmoud Mughari speaks bluntly. "I normally wash and shower twice a day. Now I can only do it every four or five days. The children smell. We all smell. We are worried that this will cause diseases."
Outside the home in central Gaza he and his own family share with his elderly parents, five married brothers and their children - 48 in all - Mr Mughari was describing the impact made by Israel's air strikes in Gaza last week, one of which severed the water pipe serving this refugee camp of 57,000 people.
The first problem, Mr Mughari, says, is that power - which would normally be running, among much else, refrigeration and fans in the current 91F (33C) temperatures - has been cut from 24 hours a day to eight hours a day.
This is itself a function of Palestinian engineers reallocating some of the electricity half of Gaza takes from Israel to the other half previously dependent on the Gaza power station whose transformers were destroyed in Wednesday's missile attack. The second is that water previously available two days out of three is now available for only four to five hours every third day. And the third is that the impossibility so far of ensuring electricity and water coincide makes it impossible to pump the water up to the roof tanks and provide a steady supply through the taps.
They have been storing their rationed supplies in two blue 250- litre barrels, saving most of it for drinking and - when it is possible - for cooking. And to escape the heat, he says, members of the family have started sleeping on mattresses on the pavement outside the house. The latest crisis has compounded the problems of the Mughari family ever since Hamas provoked an international economic blockade of the Palestinian Authority by winning last January's election.
Mr Mughari, one of only two brothers working - the other three are unemployed tailors - has not received the £134-per-month salary for three months from the job creation scheme on which he works. While the family are eligible for UN food aid, he says their meat consumption has fallen from three or four times a week to once a fortnight.
The family is also coming to terms with the resumption of the deliberate sonic booms, or "bombs", generated by Israeli F-16s overflying Gaza, starting in the predawn hours. "The children wake up screaming and run into my room," he says. "Some of them understand that this is just a very loud noise, but Mai, my four-year-old daughter thinks it is a real bombardment. I am worried that it will affect them psychologically in the future."
If the purpose of Israel's military campaign so far is to secure a major shift in Palestinian public opinion, it does not appear to have worked. Flanked by his parents and many of his own and his brothers' children, Mr Mughari says that even if there is an Israeli ground incursion: "We'll take it even if it gets worse."
There are few overt signs of preparations by militants, but Mr Mughari adds: "If [the Israelis] come here they will not get roses. There will be resistance." He adds of Cpl Shalit's abduction: "My personal opinion is that there should be a prison exchange."
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Flashback: Iran And Syria Sign Defense Agreement
by Farhad Pouladi
AFP
June 16, 2006
Tehran - Defense ministers from close allies Iran and Syria on Thursday signed an agreement for military cooperation against what they called the "common threats" presented by Israel and the United States. In a joint press conference, Iranian Defense Minister Mostafa Mohammad Najjar and visiting Syrian counterpart Hassan Turkmani said their talks had been aimed at consolidating their defense efforts and strengthening support for one another.
"Our cooperation is based on a strategic pact and unity against common threats. We can have a common front against Israel's threats," Turkmani told reporters after two intensive rounds of talks with Najjar.
"Our cooperation with the Iranians against Israeli threats is nothing secret and we regularly consult about this with our friends," he said.
Before the press conference, Iran's defense ministry said the two sides "stressed strengthening mutual ties and the necessity to preserve peace and stability in the region."
The defense ministry statement also said they discussed "ridding the region of weapons of mass destruction," in an apparent reference to the widely held belief that Israel possesses nuclear warheads.
The United States has led opposition to Iran's nuclear program, which Tehran insists is aimed at civilian energy purposes but which Washington suspects is a cover for atomic weapons-making.
US President George W. Bush has advocated diplomacy to resolve the international row over Iran's aims but has also said "all options are on the table" if Iran refuses to halt sensitive uranium enrichment work.
Washington has included Syria in its so-called axis of evil that also comprises Iran and North Korea, citing these nations as "supporters of terrorism."
Asked about US threats against Damascus and Tehran, both top brass brushed off the importance of such threats.
"This is nothing new, we will resist these threats," the Syrian defense minister said.
However, Turkmani dismissed the possibility of hosting an Iranian military base on Syrian soil.
"The language of a (foreign) military base in our country is alien to us. I want to say that it is not on the agenda," he added.
The Iranian defense minister said: "US threats are a kind of psychological operation. It is not new. With unity among the region's nations, these threats will not prevail."
Although the two refused to give specifics about the agreement for military cooperation, Najjar said Iran "considers Syria's security its own security, and we consider our defense capabilities to be those of Syria."
Najjar also shrugged off reports that Iran could pose a threat to the region.
"Iran is ready to sign a non aggression pact with regional countries," he said.
"Our military warfare equipment is based on deterrent policies and strategy. Enemies should know about our capabilities and should not even think about an assault against us," he said in response to a question about the optimization process going on for the medium range Shahab-3 missile.
Iran's Shahab-3 missiles have a range of 2,000 kilometers (1,280 miles), capable of hitting arch-enemy Israel and US bases across the Middle East.
Najjar added that the Syrian side has purchased some Iranian military equipment, but did not elaborate on the purchased items and did not say whether the purchases were made as part of Thursday's agreement.
Turkmani started an official visit to Tehran on Sunday.
During his trip, Turkmani has also met with President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, the Islamic republic's military chiefs and visited Iranian military factories in Isfahan and Tehran.
Comment: So, Iran and Syria band together, Bush gives Iran until July 5th to give up its "nuclear weapons programs", and Israel invades Gaza and accuses Syria of harboring terrorists. Yes indeed, things are progressing quite nicely...
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Nuke programme 'will continue'
News24.com
01/07/2006
Tehran - Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has said Tehran will continue its uranium enrichment programme, despite international calls to halt the sensitive project, reported state television on Saturday.
"The Iranian government and the people have decided, and without any doubt with dignity and glory we will pass this phase," said Ahmadinejad, after explaining Iran's fuel cycle programme to Ivory Coast President Laurent Gbagbo in Gambia.
Ahmadinejad is in Gambia to address the African Union summit.
Tehran is under mounting pressure to respond to an international offer that would defuse the nuclear standoff.
World powers gave Iran one more week on Thursday, to provide a "clear and substantive response" to an international proposal on suspending uranium enrichment.
Tehran has rejected the deadline.
Iran will reply to proposal in August
Foreign ministers of the G8 group of leading nations said European Union foreign policy chief Javier Solana and Iran's head nuclear negotiator, Ali Larijani, would meet to discuss the plan on Wednesday.
"We expect to hear a clear and substantive Iranian response to these proposals at the planned meeting," said the ministers in a statement from Moscow, where they were preparing a July 15 to 17 summit in Saint Petersburg.
But speaking at the United Nations in New York, Iranian foreign minister Manouchehr Mottaki said Tehran would not respond before late August.
Solana handed Iran the proposal from the five permanent UN security council members - Britain, China, France, Russia and the United States - as well as Germany, on June 6.
The proposal promises incentives and multilateral talks if Iran agrees to temporarily halt uranium enrichment.
Diplomats said Iran was asked to reply by June 29. Last week, Ahmadinejad said Tehran would take until August 22 to answer.
Iran said its nuclear programme was to generate electricity and that uranium enrichment was needed to provide the fuel.
The EU and the US suspect Iran of concealing a military weapons project.
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FBI and Western Union helped Israel With targeted assassinations
By Shmuel Rosner
Haaretz Correspondent
06/30/06
WASHINGTON - From the spring of 2003 until autumn 2004, the Shin Bet security service tracked down Palestinian terror cells in the West Bank thanks to information from the Western Union money transfer service, which was passed on by the FBI.
This fact was disclosed in a book published this week about America's war on terror after September 11, 2001. In "The One Percent Doctrine," author Ron Suskind connects the transfer of intelligence from the FBI to the Shin Bet with several targeted assassinations carried out by Israel during this period.
Suskind, who is considered a reliable journalist, describes how major private companies cooperated with government agencies such as the FBI, the CIA, the National Security Agency and the Treasury to monitor communications and financial transfers after September 11, in operations of questionable legality.
The FBI's most important connection during this period was with First Data, an Omaha-based electronic fund transfer company with a global reach. The company offered to assist the U.S. government in the war against terror.
FBI Financial Crimes Section chief Dennis Lormel and his colleagues at other intelligence agencies eventually realized that the information supplied by the company could be used not only to locate and freeze the assets of terror groups, but also to track them in real time - in other words, to follow the money trail directly to the sources and destinations of the funds.
First Data subsidiary Western Union, with branches throughout the Arab world and a high volume of money transfers, was in a perfect position to help. American intelligence agents and company officials cooperated in tracking the data trail and in monitoring security cameras installed in Western Union branches in order to see who was picking up the funds.
According to the book, then Shin Bet head Avi Dichter, whom Suskind calls an agent of change in the U.S. war against terror, was briefed by Lormel on the new monitoring capabilities during one of his frequent visits to Washington.
In April 2003, Dichter called Lormel to ask for the FBI's help in this regard. Dichter told officials that the Shin Bet had information about a courier who was expected to be bringing money to Israel from Lebanon shortly. The source of the money was known, but not the identity of the person for whom its was destined.
In early April, 2003, an Islamic Jihad activist went to a Western Union office in Lebanon and ordered a money transfer to Hebron. The Justice Department authorized Western Union to release this information to the FBI and the CIA, and eventually to the Shin Bet. According to Suskind, all this took just minutes, enabling Israeli intelligence to track the person who collected the transfer in Hebron and to uncover the terror cell.
According to the book, this method was used successfully many times over the next year and a half, until autumn 2004, when Palestinian operatives realized that their Western Union transfers were being used to trap them.
Dichter told Haaretz on Wednesday that he has never spoken with Suskind.
Intelligence cooperation between the U.S. and Israel has increased over the past several years, but until now, Israel's use of information from American companies had been kept secret.
The Homeland Security Committee of the U.S. House of Representatives approved a bill last week aimed at further increasing intelligence ties with Israel and other countries by establishing a new office for international cooperation programs within the Department of Homeland Security.
This atmosphere of cooperation, Suskind states in his book, has reinforced the sense that President George Bush wants to assist Israel and was not disturbed by the military operations that Ariel Sharon's government authorized in the territories. Suskind quotes Bush as saying during his first National Security Council meeting that the U.S. must refrain from active mediation in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
To then secretary of state Colin Powell's argument that such behavior could be interpreted by Sharon's government as a green light to apply force, Bush responded that sometimes a show of force can clarify the issue at hand.
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Israeli rally opposes Gaza offensive
Rachel Shabi
Sunday 02 July 2006
Al-Jazeerah
Hundreds of protesters gathered outside the Israeli prime minister's home on Saturday night to denounce the government as war criminals and demand an end to the Gaza invasion.
Demonstrators stood outside Ehud Olmert's official residence in Jerusalem holding banners that read, "Stop, war crimes ahead," and "Swap hostages now!"
The protest follows smaller actions on the same theme in the past few days at the Sufa army base near the southern Gaza border and outside the defence ministry in Tel Aviv.
Last night's demonstration was organised by Yesh Gvul, the peace movement that supports refusal to serve in the Israeli Army.
Police and organisers estimated 600 people attended the protest.
Yishai Menuhin, a spokesman for Yesh Gvul, said: "We call for our government to stop targeting Palestinian civilians - the targeting of civilians is a war crime - and start negotiating with the elected Palestinian leaders, not to arrest them."
Military solution
Aviv Sela, a 19-year-old who has been jailed for refusing to serve in the army, said at the protest: "The military solution is not a solution."
He added that, while not everyone is prepared to go to prison, "everyone has the strength to say no" to the attack on Gaza.
Other demonstrators chanted, "The occupation is terror, the refuser is a hero."
Within Israel, the Gaza invasion is being portrayed as an attempt to release an Israeli hostage, 19-year-old corporal Gilad Shalit.
The soldier was snatched during a raid on Israeli positions outside Gaza last Sunday, in which two Israeli soldiers and two Palestinian attackers were killed.
Prisoner of war
Tamar Gozansky, a former Knesset member, said on Saturday night: "The soldier is not a hostage, he is a prisoner of war. Israel is holding about 7,000 Palestinian prisoners in jail."
Demonstrators believe that the Gaza invasion had little to do with the kidnapped soldier. "It is not self-defence and it is not new - Israel has been dropping artillery shells on Gaza and attacking the population for months," said Zvi Schuldiner, who attended the protest.
"People have been in the army and know the difference between acts of terrorism and this classic and very daring commando act, of fighters against soldiers," said veteran peace activist, Uri Avneri.
Commentators on the left say that the wider Israeli public is critical of the Gaza invasion, not least because there is little trust for the leadership of Olmert and the defence minister, Amir Peretz.
"There is a growing doubt about it, the gap between what the government says and what logic says is getting bigger from day to day," said Avneri.
A recent poll in the newspaper Yediot Aharonot shows 58% in favour of a prisoner swap to release Shalit.
But Saturday night's demonstrators were not hopeful of getting such a message through to the government.
Would the prime minister be paying attention to the demonstration outside his house? "We hear he's really enjoying the world cup," said Menuhin.
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Israel to release prisoners without "terror conviction"
www.chinaview.cn 2006-07-03 17:14:46
JERUSALEM, July 3 (Xinhua) -- Israeli army officials have said that Palestinian prisoners who are not convicted of "terror activities" will be freed if a deal of swap is reached to bring about the release of a kidnapped Israeli soldier, local newspaper Ha'aretz reported on Monday.
However, the officials also said that they did not think Israel and the Palestinians were close to reaching such a deal.
The prisoners to be released are those who have not been involved in planning or carrying out "terror attacks", the officials were quoted as saying, adding that those "with blood on their hands" will not be set free.
They also said that the Israeli army would be willing to release Hamas ministers and legislators, as well as security prisoners jailed for relatively minor offenses, according to the report.
The army has formulated a draft deal to gain the release of the 19-year-old Corporal Gilad Shalit who was abducted by Palestinian militants on June 25 after days of discussion among Defense Minister Amir Peretz, Israel Defense Forces Chief of Staff Dan Halutz and top defense brass, said the report.
The draft deal also agrees to stop an ongoing broad military operation in Gaza in exchange for a halt to Palestinian militant rocket firing, attacks on Israeli troops and citizens and abductions, the report added.
The deal, meanwhile, reserves Israel's right to defense itself and to foil attacks by Palestinian militants, it said.
Earlier, Palestinian militants who held Shalit hostage set an early Tuesday ultimatum for Israel to meet their demands to release Palestinian women and minors and 1,000 prisoners in Israeli jails.
The militants also threatened unspecified consequences if Israel failed to do so.
Israel, however, has so far rejected a prisoner swap, insisting on the unconditional release of Shalit.
Israeli troops entered the Gaza Strip on June 28 in a bid to rescue the kidnapped Shalit.
It is the first major Israeli ground offensive in Gaza since Israel quit the desert coastal strip last summer after 38 years of occupation.
Meanwhile, Israeli troops launched a large-scale arrest campaign in the West Bank last week, detaining eight ministers of the Hamas-led Palestinian government and dozens of Hamas lawmakers.
Hamas' armed wing took part in the June 25 attack on an Israeli army post near the Gaza border during which Shalit was snatched.
But the Palestinian government led by Hamas, or the Islamic Resistance Movement, said it did not order the abduction and had no foreknowledge of the attack.
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Premier tells troops to do all they can to free soldier
Posted on Mon, Jul. 03, 200By RAVI NESSMAN
The Associated Press
"I take personal responsibility for what is happening in Gaza. I want nobody to sleep at night in Gaza. I want them to know what it's like," Olmert told his Cabinet. "People are saying it's uncomfortable. It will be uncomfortable, [but] nobody dies from being uncomfortable."
GAZA CITY, Gaza Strip -- Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert stepped up pressure on the Palestinian government Sunday, telling his military to "do all it can" to free an abducted soldier and hinting that Israel might arrest more Hamas leaders.
Coming just hours after an Israeli airstrike blasted offices of the Palestinian prime minister, Olmert's threat signaled that the government is losing patience with diplomatic efforts to end the crisis.
Israel shelled northern Gaza early today, slightly wounding one person in a house on the outskirts of the town of Beit Hanoun, Palestinians said. The military confirmed that artillery was fired in the area.
Israeli aircraft, gunboats and artillery have pounded Gaza since troops and tanks took up positions in the south of the coastal strip Wednesday. The operation is aimed at pressuring Palestinians to free Cpl. Gilad Shalit, the Israeli soldier abducted a week ago. Five Palestinian fighters have been reported killed, four of them Sunday.
Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice called Olmert on Sunday to discuss the situation, Olmert's office said in a statement. He told Rice that Israel would use all means at its disposal to get Shalit released and said there is no humanitarian crisis in Gaza.
Palestinian officials had warned Saturday that a shortage of fuel threatened to shut down generators used to pump water and power hospitals.
Israel reopened the main cargo crossing with Gaza to allow 50 trucks of food, medical supplies and fuel in from Israel, Israeli officials said. Trucks carrying diesel fuel, gasoline and natural gas also began entering northeastern Gaza through the Nahal Oz border crossing.
"I take personal responsibility for what is happening in Gaza. I want nobody to sleep at night in Gaza. I want them to know what it's like," Olmert told his Cabinet. "People are saying it's uncomfortable. It will be uncomfortable, [but] nobody dies from being uncomfortable."
Comment: Israeli is carrying out what is called "collective punishment" against the Palestinians for the capture of an Israeli soldier. Collective punishment is illegal under international law, but, then, we all know that Israel doesn't care about international law. Collective punishment means punishing the entire community for the act of an individual or individuals.
When Israel destroys the house of a co-called "suicide bomber", even if that bomber was encouraged and manipulated by Israeli agents, it is collective punishment because the rest of the family has had nothing to do with the bombing.
But Israel doesn't care about international law.
Israel care about one thing: killing off or driving out every Palestinian from the land they claim their god gave them over 3000 years ago. Moreover, they are extremely successful in this policy because their propagandists in the Western media tell us that Israel wants peace. We are told the Palestinians are the aggressors when it is Palestinian land that was stolen to form Israel in the first place.
For a look at the way Israel manipulates Western media, in particular that of the US, we recommend the documentary Peace, Propaganda, and the Promised Land.
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Israel rejects Palestinian ultimatum
Last Updated Mon, 03 Jul 2006 08:50:42 EDT
CBC News
Israel has rejected an ultimatum by Palestinian groups believed to be holding an Israeli soldier, which had demanded the country start releasing 1,500 Palestinian prisoners by Tuesday morning.
The three Palestinian militant groups faxed their demand to media outlets on Monday, warning that Israel would "bear all the consequences" unless the prisoner release started soon.
"We give the Zionist enemy until 6:00 tomorrow morning, Tuesday, July 4," said the declaration, which was posted on the website of the military wing of Hamas, whose political wing leads the Palestinian Authority government.
"If the enemy does not respond to our humanitarian demands mentioned in previous leaflets on the conditions for dealing with the issue of the missing soldier ... we will consider the current file of the soldier to be closed ... and then the enemy must bear all the consequences of the future results," the statement said without specifying what the consequences would be.
'There will be no negotiations': Israeli PM
Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert quickly rejected the ultimatum.
"There will be no negotiations to release prisoners," he said in a statement, which held the ruling Hamas party partly responsible for the return of Cpl. Gilad Shalit.
Shalit, 19, was taken on June 25 when Palestinian militants tunnelled into southern Israel and attacked an Israeli army outpost.
The three militant groups believed to be holding the soldier have demanded the release of about 1,500 Palestinians currently held by Israel.
Israel launched a military campaign in the Gaza Strip in the past week to pressure the militants into releasing the soldier. Air strikes have hit bridges and a power station in the region, which is home to about 1.5 million people.
Israel continues to fire on Gaza
The campaign continued on Monday, as Israeli tanks fired rounds of artillery into northern Gaza.
At least three Palestinian militants were killed. Israeli military officials said two of them were wearing bomb belts.
Early Sunday, Israeli troops gathered across from the border with northern Gaza in what appeared to be preparations for an invasion. On the weekend, Omert vowed his government would do everything it could to secure Shalit's release.
The London-based newspaper Al Hayat reported on Monday that Egyptian negotiators saw Shalit alive and that he was being treated by doctors. The report didn't say when the visit happened.
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Israel's act of war is inexcusable
By Will Hutton
The Observer
07/02/06
In a conflict as long-standing and bloody as the one in the Middle East, both sides know the rules and the impact of their actions on their enemies. The Palestinian factions, including Hamas militants, which captured Corporal Shalit last Sunday, will have known that Israel would respond fiercely, but also how the reaction would undermine Palestine's emerging common front. And Israel, in turn, knew precisely the impact of its incredibly disproportionate response, both on its enemies and on the political balance within its own society.
Which is why, whatever the outcome, last week was so depressing. The calculations have been made by those opposed to any long-term deal. Israel's destruction of Gaza and illegal political detention of members of the Palestinian government and parliament were to teach Hamas a lesson. But it was not the lesson Hamas needs right now as it gropes its way towards political reality and acceptance of Israel's right to exist. Israel is now less safe than it was. It has betrayed its own deep hunger for a settlement and peace.
Israel has frequently resorted to the doctrine of disproportionate response: not an eye for an eye, but 10 or 20 Palestinian deaths for every Israeli loss. Twelve years ago, Yitzhak Rabin sealed off the West Bank to allow Israeli special operation units to rescue kidnapped Corporal Waxman. That operation ended in his death, but even by those standards, what happened last week was extraordinary.
Gaza, unlike the 1994 West Bank, is supposed to be a semi-autonomous sovereign territory. By bombing its main power station, Israel has deprived most of Gaza of electricity, including water-pumping stations. Sealing off access to water and food can only inflict acute discomfort on the people there; already, frailer Palestinians are dying.
Even more extraordinary were the overnight raids that led to the detention and arrest of eight cabinet members of a sovereign government, including its finance minister, 30 members of parliament and up to another 30 officials. Israel threatens to put some or all on trial for terrorism.
In any other context, this would be a declaration of war.
It is breathtaking, but this is the Middle East. The Hamas government has not yet renounced its commitment to the elimination of Israel or to the use of terrorism. Missiles from Gaza are regularly fired at Israel.
Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert has committed to withdraw Israel from parts of the West Bank, regarded by the Israeli right and Zionist fundamentalists as the ultimate sell-out (even if Israel simultaneously confiscates compensating land). Olmert needed to show that he was no pushover.
But disproportionality on such a scale is self-defeating. It casts Israel as the rogue state and Palestinians as victims. These are not the actions of a government that wants to be a 'partner for peace'.
Worse, it suggests that Israel will find it impossible to accommodate a just settlement.
Every parent, manager and successful politician knows the importance of achieving ends by consent and that entails respect. Subjugation, repression and humiliation do not work as strategies. Yet Israel, overwhelmingly the more powerful player, is governed by an attitude that would not survive days in a family, factory or political party.
Worse, it trashes encouraging developments. Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas challenged Hamas to recognise that the only way out of the conflict was a two-state solution, in effect, recognising Israel and its gains in the 1967 war, or he would call a national referendum. Hamas backed down, knowing he would win, and reached a national unity pact with Mr Abbas's Fatah. The basis for resuming negotiations was being put in place.
The dark interpretation of Israel's reaction in Gaza is that it does not want a politically viable negotiating partner in Palestine. It suits Israel to characterise Hamas as terrorist fundamentalists who are beyond the pale. Thus it can proceed with its unilaterally imposed settlement, wall and land grab, in turn fanning the flames of Palestinian extremism.
We all have a stake in breaking this vicious circle. The best response to the rise of Islamic terrorism would be a just settlement in the Middle East. Israel's actions are linked by a bloody thread to the next terrorist attack on us, now more likely. Britain, with the EU and US, was right to insist that the incoming Hamas government had to recognise Israel and to back that demand with sanctions.
Now that Hamas signals changes, we must be no less uncompromising about condemning Israeli action. The mealy-mouthed reaction of the G8 that we have 'particular concerns' is pathetic. What happened last week was an international disgrace. We need to say so. We hold Hamas to account for its words and actions. The same applies to Israel.
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US Troops In Iraq
Muslim group condemns reports of U.S. rape
AP
July 2, 2006
BAGHDAD, Iraq - An influential Sunni Muslim organization Sunday strongly condemned reports that U.S. troops raped an Iraqi women then killed her and her family, saying it shows "the truth of the ugly American face."
The Association of Muslim Scholars said that what U.S. troops have done by "raping this girl then mutilating her is shameful and will remain as a sign of shame to American invaders."
U.S. investigators believe that American soldiers spent nearly a week plotting an attack in which they raped the Sunni Muslim woman, then killed her and her family in a religiously mixed area about 20 miles south of Baghdad.
The Americans entered the home, separated three family members from the woman, then raped her and set fire to her body, a U.S. military official said Saturday on condition of anonymity because the investigation is ongoing.
The three others, apparently including a child, were also slain, another official said.
The association said in its statement that it "condemns this ugly crime and declares to the whole world that this mean behavior and terrible violations committed by the invaders show the truth of the ugly American face and also shows that their claims of calling for humanity and liberation are not true."
"We put the world and all humanitarian organizations as witnesses to this ugly crime and call them to face the American recklessness that went way too far," said the association, a strong critic of American presence in
Iraq.
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Did Suspected GIs Plan Rape-Slaying?
July 1, 2006
CBS News
Investigators Believe U.S. Soldiers Under Investigation Plotted Attack For Nearly A Week
U.S. officials said they knew of the deaths but thought the victims died due to sectarian violence. But Mahmoudiya police Capt. Ihsan Abdul-Rahman said Iraqi officials received a report March 13 alleging that American soldiers had killed the family.
(CBS/AP) Investigators believe the U.S. soldiers suspected of raping an Iraqi woman, then killing her and members of her family plotted the attack for nearly a week, a U.S. military official said Saturday.
The official, who is close to the investigation, told The Associated Press that flammable liquid was used to burn the woman's body in a cover-up attempt, although it was not clear if it was gasoline or lighter fluid.
The official, speaking on condition of anonymity because the investigation is ongoing, said it appeared the attack was "totally premeditated" and that the soldiers "studied them for about a week."
According to the official, the Sunni Arab family had just moved into a new home in the insurgent-riddled area around Mahmoudiya, south of Baghdad. The Americans entered the home, separated three males from the woman, then raped her and set fire to her body, the official said. The three males were also slain.
U.S. officials said they knew of the deaths but thought the victims died due to sectarian violence. But Mahmoudiya police Capt. Ihsan Abdul-Rahman said Iraqi officials received a report March 13 alleging that American soldiers had killed the family. The incident occurred in the Khasir Abyad area, about 6 miles north of Mahmoudiya, he said.
There were some discrepancies over how many soldiers were being investigated. The U.S. official said it was at least four. Two other U.S. officials said Friday that five were under investigation but one already had been discharged for unspecified charges unrelated to the killings and was believed to be in the United States.
In Baghdad, the U.S. military issued a terse statement Friday, saying only that Maj. Gen. James D. Thurman, commander of the 4th Infantry Division, ordered a criminal investigation into the alleged slaying of a family of four in Mahmoudiya, 20 miles south of Baghdad.
The four still in the Army have had their weapons taken away and are confined to a U.S. base near Mahmoudiya, officials said. If convicted of premeditated murder, the soldiers could receive a death sentence under U.S. military law.
The suspects in the killing were from the same platoon as two soldiers kidnapped and killed south of Baghdad this month, another official close to the investigation said Friday. Their mutilated bodies were found June 19, three days after they were abducted by insurgents near Youssifiyah southwest of Baghdad.
The military has said one and possibly both of the slain soldiers were tortured and beheaded. The official said the mutilation of the slain soldiers stirred feelings of guilt and led at least one member of the platoon to reveal the rape-slaying on June 22.
One soldier was arrested after admitting his role in the alleged attack on the family, he said on condition of anonymity because the case is under way. The official said the rape and killings appear to have been a "crime of opportunity," noting that the soldiers had not been attacked by insurgents but had noticed the woman on previous patrols.
One of the family members they allegedly killed was a child, said a senior Army official who also requested anonymity because the investigation is ongoing. The senior official said the alleged incident was first revealed by a soldier during a routine counseling-type session. The official said that soldier did not witness the incident but heard about it.
A second soldier, who also was not involved, said he overhead soldiers conspiring to commit the crimes and then later saw bloodstains on their clothes, the official said.
The allegations of rape could generate a particularly strong backlash in Iraq, a conservative, strongly religious society in which many women will not even shake hands with men who are not close relatives.
The case is among the most serious against U.S. soldiers allegedly involved in the deaths of Iraqi civilians. At least 14 U.S. troops have been convicted.
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Flashback: US soldiers accused of sex assaults
Suzanne Goldenberg in Washington
Tuesday March 8, 2005
The Guardian
Soldiers from the 3rd Infantry Brigade - the same military unit whose troops fired on the car carrying the freed Italian hostage Giuliana Sgrena - were under investigation last year for raping Iraqi women, US army documents reveal.
Four soldiers were alleged to have raped the two women while on guard duty in a Baghdad shopping precinct. A US army investigator interviewed several soldiers from the military unit, the 1-15th battalion of the 3rd Infantry Brigade - but did not locate or interview the Iraqi women involved - before shutting down the inquiry for lack of evidence.
Transcripts of the investigation, obtained by the Guardian from the American Civil Liberties Union, show only the most cursory attempts by the investigator to establish whether the women were raped.
The soldiers claimed the women were prostitutes, or denied any knowledge of any one in their unit having sex while deployed in Iraq. The statements went largely unchallenged. "I know the women were Iraqi. I however don't know if they were raped, or were prostitutes, or just wanted sex," one soldier told investigators.
Jameel Jaffar, an attorney for the ACLU, which has led a long legal struggle for the Pentagon to release documents of its investigations, argues that the failure to conduct a thorough investigation on such serious charges as rape was part of a disturbing pattern. "There are always questions in these files about whether the investigator was sufficiently aggressive in pursuing leads and tracking down evidence," he said.
The allegations of rape were contained in 1,200 pages of documents released yesterday by the ACLU. Together, the documents cover investigations into 13 cases of suspected abuse. However, no action was taken against any soldier as a result.
The documents also provide further evidence that US troops have destroyed evidence of abuse, in order to avoid a repetition of last year's Abu Ghraib prison abuse scandal.
In the latest such episode, an officer is believed to have destroyed a home-made DVD showing members of the Florida National Guard abusing Iraqi detainees, and manipulating the hand of a dead Iraqi to wave at the camera. Another scene shows a soldier hitting a bound prisoner on the head with a rifle butt.
At least one of the soldiers - a sergeant - was identified from the DVD. However, no criminal charges were brought in that investigation after military lawyers concluded that the DVD showed "inappropriate rather than criminal behaviour".
The DVD, which the soldiers called Ramadi Madness, was discovered by a civilian public affairs employee at the unit's headquarters in West Palm Beach, Florida. The DVD was later destroyed by an officer who had learned the case was under investigation.
Mr Jaffer said: "We have to start to ask the question of whether there is a whole layer of abuse out there that we are not seeing because the evidence of abuse has been covered up."
The investigation into the allegations of rape was launched last April after a report appeared in Playboy magazine alleging that the unit had engaged in various war crimes from rape to hogtieing and beating up an Iraqi detainee. By July 26, 2004, the inquiry was over. "Investigation established there was insufficient evidence to prove or disprove the allegations," the report concluded.
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Flashback: U.S. Soldiers Accused Of Raping Iraqi Women Escape Prosecution
Democracy Now Interview
March 29 2005
On International Women's Day, Guardian reporter Suzanne Goldenberg broke the story about how soldiers from the 3rd Infantry Brigade accused of rape were able to escape the charges. The soldiers were from the same military unit whose troops fired on the car carrying freed Italian hostage Giuliana Sgrena. [includes rush transcript] Suzanne Goldenberg's article appeared in the Guardian newspaper.
It began: "Soldiers from the 3rd Infantry Brigade -- the same military unit whose troops fired on the car carrying freed Italian hostage Giuliana Sgrena -- were under investigation last year for raping Iraqi women, U.S. Army documents reveal. Four soldiers were alleged to have raped two women while on guard duty in a Baghdad shopping precinct. A U.S. Army investigator interviewed several soldiers from the military unit, the 1-15th battalion of the 3rd Infantry Brigade, but did not locate or interview the Iraqi women involved before shutting down the inquiry for lack of evidence.
"Transcripts of the investigation, obtained by the Guardian from the American Civil Liberties Union, show only the most cursory attempts by the investigator to establish whether the women were raped. The soldiers claimed the women were prostitutes, or denied any knowledge of anyone in their unit having sex while deployed in Iraq. The statements went largely unchallenged. "I know the women were Iraqi. I however don't know if they were raped, or were prostitutes, or just wanted sex," one soldier told investigators.
"Jameel Jaffar, an attorney for the ACLU, which has led a long legal struggle to get the Pentagon to release documents of its investigations, argues that the failure to conduct a thorough investigation on such serious charges as rape was part of a disturbing pattern. 'There are always questions in these files about whether the investigator was sufficiently aggressive in pursuing leads and tracking down evidence,' he said."
We are joined by Suzanne Goldenberg in our D.C. studio.
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Flashback: Rape of Iraqi girls by US mercenaries and soldiers was rampant in Baghdad
May 6, 2004
La Voz de Aztlan
One victim was a 9 year old girl who suffered permanent vaginal injuries
Los Angeles, Alta California - (ACN) The recent apology by President George Bush to the Iraqi people is not sufficient to undo the horrible pillage and rape of Iraqi women and girls that took place during the early days of the US occupation of Baghdad. There is some evidence that the invading US forces were provided with amphetamines and pornographic materials to incite their thorough ravaging of Baghdad.
Reports of sexual violence and abduction of women and girls abounded in Baghdad during the early days of the occupation reports that the US government chose to ignore. Human rights groups, medical practitioners, victims, and witnesses had documented many of the crimes. Human rights organizations were concerned that many other cases went unreported and uninvestigated because some of the Iraqi women and girls feared that reporting sexual violence and rapes would provoke "honor" killings and social stigmatization.
A large number of the abductions and rapes were committed and filmed by hired mercenaries of the Pentagon and many of these photographs and videos wound up in for-pay pornographic websites based in the United States. One of these websites has shut down ever since La Voz de Aztlan made this information public. The website called "Iraq Babes", believed owned by Jewish pornographers, advertised it with the following banner: "Horny soldiers having extreme sex in war"! The website at http://www.iraqbabes.com/ has been shut down and presently only shows one web page with a stick drawing of a horse. The website showed photographs and videos of Iraqi women and girls being brutally raped. We hope the website has shut down permanently for it only reinforces the allegation that the USA is really "The Great Satan" Islam talks about.
There are numerous cases of the brutal rape of Iraqi women and babies as young as nine years old. We are reporting the following two just as examples:
Case 1:
On May 22, 2003, in Baghdad, a nine-year-old girl was abducted from the stairs of the building where she lived, taken to an abandoned building nearby, and raped. A family friend who saw the young girl immediately following the rape informed international human rights groups.
The report quotes the family friend, "She was sitting on the stairs, here, at 4:00 p.m. It seems to me that probably they hit her on the back of the head with a gun and then took her to [a neighboring] building. She came back fifteen minutes later, bleeding [from the vaginal area]. [She was still bleeding two days later, so] we took her to the hospital."
A human rights group saw a copy of the medical report by the U.S. military doctor who treated the baby girl six days later. The report documented bruising in the vaginal area, a posterior vaginal tear, and a broken hymen. Lieutenant Monica Casmaer, a physician's assistant attached to a U.S. military unit, examined the nine year old girl. with the pediatrician. She described the injuries as fairly severe, especially given the time that had elapsed before she was examined.
Case 2:
A young Iraqi woman told an international human rights group that armed men abducted her from her home on a Thursday night in early May, 2003. She said her captors gang-raped her at an unknown location before dropping her in an unfamiliar district of Baghdad the following morning.
The report of the woman says, "I was here, on the stairs by the door when a car pulled up with four men. My daughter was on the upper floor, I was on the ground floor. The four men got out of the car and approached me. They were armed, they put guns to my head and said come with us. I screamed and said take the pistol away. My daughter started to scream. They pulled my hair and pushed me in the car and they started shooting at the house, more than fifty shots. My daughter was screaming the whole time. Many neighbors started to shoot too, but they couldn't catch them".
The victim added "In the car they made me put my head down between my legs, and put a pistol to my head. They said that if I moved my head I'd be killed, so I don't know where they took me.... [Then they took me into a building where] they were hitting me on the head and arms, and I still can't stretch out because my whole body hurts. They used hot water on my head, my eyes still burn from that and my arms. They raped me, in many, many ways. They kept me until the next day, I begged them, I said I have a young child, I said she might die if I leave her alone. And so then they left me alone. When I came home my appearance was so bad, my hair was a mess, my mouth was bloody and my legs too. They burned my legs with cigarettes. They bit me, on my shoulders and arms. All of them raped me, there were five or six more than the four who kidnapped me, there were ten of them total and I was raped by all ten of them.
The most unconscionable aspect of these heinous rapes in Iraq is that many were filmed for the depraved enjoyment of perverts in the USA. Only a thorough Congressional investigation will begin the process of bringing the Pentagon rapists and sodomists to justice. Congress must investigate the connection between the rape of Iraqi women and girls and the Jewish pornographic industry in the USA. A thorough investigation might even save the lives of many American girls who are also being abducted and utilized for the same purpose. There are hundreds of underage girls that disappear in the USA yearly never to be seen again. Many of these young American girls lose their lives in the production of "kiddie porn snuff films".
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Flashback: Army Condones Rape by US Soldiers in Iraq
Afsc.org
May 2004
According to investigative reports in The Denver Post, the US Army is routinely refusing to prosecute US soldiers in Iraq who are accused of rape.
According to a report on January 25, 2004, "At least 37 female service members have sought sexual-trauma counseling and other assistance from civilian rape crisis organizations after returning from war duty in Iraq, Kuwait, and other overseas stations, The Denver Post has learned. The women, ranging from enlisted soldiers to officers, have reported poor medical treatment, lack of counseling and incomplete criminal investigations by military officials. Some say they were threatened with punishment after reporting assaults."
A follow-up report in The Denver Post on April 12, 2004, based on records from 41 closed rape investigations obtained through the Freedom of Information Act, found that the system of giving the power to decide whether to prosecute or not to the commanders of the accused, not to prosecutors, frequently resulted in terminated investigations, dropped charges, and light administrative punishments, even in cases with substantial evidence.
The Post reported, "In the case of [a] sergeant accused of assaulting three battalion soldiers - two incidents occurring in shower stalls - he even admitted to the crimes, documents show. And despite a prosecutor's note that 'sufficient admissible evidence is available to prosecute the subject for the offenses,' the commander chose only to reprimand the sergeant. No explanation was given, a trend in all the cases." These cases indicate that mild administrative punishments are more the rule than the exception.
Preceding the revelations in May 2004 about systematic abuse in the US administered prisons in Iraq, the Post reported that, "In one investigation, three Fort Bragg, NC, soldiers with the 519th Military Intelligence Battalion were accused of assaulting an Iraqi woman held in the Abu Ghraib prison. Although no details were provided, the report notes that the enlisted men were each fined at least $500 and demoted in rank."
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Flashback: Iraqi Woman Recalls Abu Ghraib Rape Ordeal
Ira Chernus
July 21 2004
IslamOnline.net
- The rape ordeal she suffered at the hands of US soldiers, both males and females, in the notorious Abu Gharib prison will continue to haunt Nadia for the rest of her life.
Though freed now, she is "imprisoned" in painful memories that left her psychologically and physically scarred, paying the price of the brutality and sadism of her American jailers.
Nadia, the name given by a freed Iraqi female prisoner to Al-Wasat, a weekly supplement of the respectable London-based Al-Hayat newspaper, felt it incumbent upon herself to speak out and expose the less-talked-about abuse of female prisoners in US-run detention camps across Iraq.
Her visit to a relative ended up in her detention by American troops, who stormed the home under the preferable excuse of "searching for weapons".
"I tried in vain to convince the impeded interpreter I was a guest, but I lost consciousness to find myself later in a dingy dark cell all by myself," Nadia recalled...
With tears rolling down her cheeks, she told the paper how she was stripped by her "liberators" of the most precious thing an Arab and Muslim women can have: Her virginity.
"A thrill of fear ran through me when I saw US soldiers laughing hysterically with a female solider telling me mockingly in an Arabic accent 'I never heard about female arms dealer in Iraq'," Nadia said.
"As I tried hard to explain to her that I was wrongly rounded up, the female soldier started accosting and kicking me with my cries and pleas falling on dead ears."
She went on: "She gave me a cup of water and no sooner had I started sipping it than I went into a deep trance to find myself later naked and raped."
'Like Animals'
Only then Nadia realized that hard times and an uncertain fate were lying ahead.
And days proved her right. The other day, five soldiers fondled and raped her one after another in a distasteful sex orgy on the tunes of culturally offensive heavy metal music.
"One month later, a soldier showed up and told me in broken Arabic to take a shower. And before finishing my bath, he kicked the door open. I slapped him but he raped me like animals and called two of his colleagues, who forced me to have sex with them," added Nadia.
"Four months later, the female soldier came along with four male soldiers with a digital camera. She stripped me naked and started fondling me as if she was a man while her male colleagues broke into laughter and started taking photos.
"Reluctant as I was, she fired four shots close to my head and threatened to kill me if I resist. Then, four soldiers raped me sadistically and I lost conscience. Later, she forced me to watch a clip of my raping, saying bluntly: 'Your were born to give us pleasure'."
Naida was set free from the US hell in Abu Gharib after spending up to six months there.
The American soldiers dumped her along the highway of Abu Gharib and gave her a meager of 10,000 dinars to "start a new life".
Too ashamed to return home, she now works as a housemaid for an Iraqi family.
Britain's mass-circulation The Guardian revealed on May 12 that US soldiers in Iraq have sexually humiliated and abused several Iraqi female detainees in Abu Gharib.
In its May 10-17 issue, the Newsweek said that yet-unreleased Abu Gharib abuse photos "include an American soldier having sex with a female Iraqi detainee and American soldiers watching Iraqis have sex with juveniles."
The Iraqi abuse scandal exploded onto the world stage on April 29 after the CBS news network published several shocking photos of Iraqi detainees tortured and sexually abused by US soldiers.
In a damning report presented to the administration in February, before the outbreak of the scandal, US Major General Antonio Taguba found numerous "sadistic, blatant and wanton criminal abuses" at the prison complex.
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Flashback: Hersh: children raped at Abu Ghraib, Pentagon has videos
Seymour Hersh
New Yorker
July 2004
BoingBoing.net
Seymour Hersh speaking at an ACLU event said the US government has videotapes of children being raped at Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq.
"Some of the worst things that happened you don't know about, okay? Videos, um, there are women there. Some of you may have read that they were passing letters out, communications out to their men. This is at Abu Ghraib ... The women were passing messages out saying 'Please come and kill me, because of what's happened' and basically what happened is that those women who were arrested with young boys, children in cases that have been recorded. The boys were sodomized with the cameras rolling. And the worst above all of that is the soundtrack of the boys shrieking that your government has. They are in total terror. It's going to come out."
Excerpt from statement provided by Abu Ghraib Kasim Mehaddi Hilas, Detainee #151108, on January 18 2004:
"I saw [name deleted] fucking a kid, his age would be about 15 - 18 years. The kid was hurting very bad and they covered all the doors with sheets. Then when I heard the screaming I climbed the door because on top it wasn't covered and I saw [name deleted] who was wearing the military uniform putting his dick in the little kid's ass. I couldn't see the face of the kid because his face wasn't in front of the door. And the female soldier was taking pictures. [name deleted], I think he is [deleted] because of his accent, and he was not skinny or short, and he acted like a homosexual (gay). And that was in cell #23 as best as I remember."
Link to pdf of testimony
Another testimony alleging abuse of minors from a statement provided by Thaar Salman Dawod, Detainee #150427, on January 17, 2004:
"I saw lots of people getting naked for a few days getting punished in the first days of Ramadan. They came with two boys naked and they were cuffed together face to face and Grainer was beating them and a group of guards were watching and taking pictures from top and bottom and there was three female soldiers laughing at the prisoners. The prisoners, two of them, were young. I don't know their names."
Here's a update (sub required) on Capitol Hill plans for hearings on new (and as-yet unreleased) material documenting torture at Abu Ghraib. And there's this snip from a CBS interview with "leash girl" Pfc. Lynndie England, the guard seen grinning and pointing at Iraqi prisoners in the infamous photos:
When England was asked if there were other things that happened at Abu Ghraib, things that were not photographed, she said, "Yes." When asked if there were worse things that happened, she said "Yes," but would not elaborate.
Link to first PDF, Link to second PDF.
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U.S. probes possible 'friendly fire' death
By TINI TRAN
Associated Press
Sat Jul 1, 2006
KABUL, Afghanistan - The U.S. military on Saturday said it was investigating the death of a soldier in eastern Afghanistan as a possible "friendly fire incident."
The Defense Department said Pfc. Justin R. Davis, 19, of Gaithersburg, Md., died on June 25 in eastern Kunar province when he came in contact with indirect fire - a term used for mortar shelling - while on patrol during combat operations.
"The circumstances of the soldier's death are under investigation as a possible friendly fire incident," the statement said.
In Afghanistan, the U.S.-led coalition released a statement saying an investigation into the incident is under way.
"We are looking into Pfc. Davis' death to determine what happened. No final determination has been made and we will not release any information relating to the investigation till it is complete," the statement said.
Davis had been assigned to the 1st Battalion, 32nd Infantry Regiment, 3rd Brigade Combat Team, 10th Mountain Division based in Fort Drum, N.Y.
His mother, Paula Davis, told The Frederick News Post that Davis "was passionate about joining the service.
"He would always say, 'This is my dream. I am going to follow it,'" Paula Davis told the newspaper. "He died doing what he loved."
Justin Davis had been in Afghanistan since March and had plans to come home for several weeks in August.
"It was a calling," she said. "It was a life that fit him."
Davis' body arrived at Dover Air Force Base in Delaware on Tuesday, Paula Davis said. He will be buried in Arlington National Cemetery with full military honors July 10.
Coalition troops have been operating in eastern Afghanistan to battle insurgents active along the Pakistan border.
According to U.S. Army data earlier this year, 17 soldiers have died from friendly fire in the past four years - 10 in
Iraq and seven in Afghanistan. They occurred in 11 separate incidents.
The most famous case was the 2004 death of former NFL player Pat Tillman, an Army Ranger and corporal, who died during a gunbattle near the Pakistan-Afghanistan border. That case triggered a criminal investigation that is still pending.
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Baghdad car bombing kills 66 in Shiite market
by Ammar Karim
AFP
Sat Jul 1, 2006
BAGHDAD - At least 66 people have been killed by a car bomb in a busy Baghdad market in a Shiite district despite a massive security crackdown in the Iraqi capital.
The second deadliest attack this year came a day after Al-Qaeda supremo Osama bin Laden vowed the war would go on in
Iraq regardless of a peace plan launched by Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki.
A Sunni woman MP was also kidnapped in north Baghdad Saturday along with eight of her bodyguards.
The sprawling Shiite district of Sadr City, a stronghold of Mehdi Army militiamen loyal to radical leader Moqtada Sadr, has been a repeated target for Sunni Arab insurgents amid mounting sectarian violence.
The massive bomb exploded as a police patrol passed through Al-Ula market which was packed with morning shoppers, an interior ministry official said Saturday.
Deputy Health Minister Sabah al-Hussein said at least 66 people were killed and 98 wounded in the bombing.
It was the deadliest attack since a suicide bomber killed 67 people and wounded 105 at a police recruitment centre in the insurgent bastion of Ramadi, west of Baghdad, on January 5.
"The explosion happened in a very crowded market frequented by many people even from outside the area," Hussein told state television.
"At the beginning of this market, the criminal blew up his dynamite-packed truck after trying to go over the pavement."
The market contains shops selling everything from bridal gowns to kitchenware. Many vendors also have stalls along the main market street and in packed alleyways selling fruits, vegetables and other goods.
The force of the blast torched nearby stalls and around 20 vehicles.
Fearful residents were seen desperately searching through the mangled wreckage for missing loved ones.
A US military vehicle which attempted to approach the blast scene withdrew in a hail of stones thrown by angry residents.
Major General Jihad Taher al-Luaibi, head of the interior ministry's anti-explosives unit, said: "The martyrs were of all sexes and ages -- innocent people. Their bones and flesh were crushed together.
"The impact of the explosion scattered pieces everywhere, as far as 500 metres (yards) from the scene," he told state television.
The body of one young girl was found on the roof of a nearby gymnasium.
Stressing that the security forces had asked for new equipment to detect car bombs, Luaibi pleaded: "If the prime minister is listening, please approve our request because this will save human lives."
An unknown Sunni insurgent group claimed responsbility for the attack.
"Your mujahedeen brethren in 'the Supporters of the Sunni Community' decided to teach the Rawafidh (a derogatory term for Shiites) a lesson they will not forget as long as they are alive," said a statement on an Internet website usually used by insurgent groups.
"A booby-trapped car loaded with a huge amount of highly explosive material was introduced today into the stronghold of the Mehdi Army in the so-called Sadr City, the fortified trench of the Rawafidh from which they launch the ugliest operations of treachery and killing against Sunnis," it said.
The car was "detonated near a den where the Rawafidh meet and against patrols of the Mehdi Army disguised as police ... killing at least 100 Rafidhi, mostly from the Mehdi Army, and wounding more than 100 others."
Following the attack Mehdi militiamen threatened to take over patrolling the district.
"The Iraqi forces are not doing their job properly... they are not checking cars that are entering the area. If this is the case, we will take the security of the area into our own hands," Fuad, a Shiite militiaman who gave only one name told AFP.
Hardline Shiite MP Sheikh Jalaleddin al-Saghir said after meeting revered Shiite cleric Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani in the southern shrine city of Najaf that the bombing was "a conspiracy being hatched by outside enemies".
Saghir has always accused neighbouring Sunni-dominated Arab countries such as Saudi Arabia and Jordan of turning a blind eye to their extremists flocking to Iraq to attack Shiites.
Riyadh al-Nuri, a senior aide to Sadr, blamed the attack on those who were part of the government but continued to "pander to terrorists" in a veiled reference to Sunni Arabs.
Sunni Vice President Tareq al-Hashemi's Iraqi Islamic Party said: "We condemn the bombing in Sadr City and we hold the interior and defense ministers and Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki responsible for an impotent security plan that is unable to prevent such attacks."
Taiseer Najeh Awad al-Mashhadani, an MP from the National Concord Front, the largest Sunni Arab bloc in parliament, was seized in Baghdad, security sources said.
Her abduction came after Maliki, a Shiite, launched a national reconcilation plan aimed at wooing members of the disenchanted Sunni community away from the protracted insurgency and back into the political process.
The violence was a reminder of the precarious security situation in the capital despite a massive security clampdown that has seen over 60,000 US and government troops patrolling Baghdad streets in recent weeks.
Elsewhere in Iraq eight people were killed and eight bodies were found.
As part of Maliki's plan, 495 detainees were released Saturday, the seventh such batch to be freed since he first floated the idea of a partial amnesty on June 6.
Maliki on Saturday reached Jeddah as part of his tour of Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Kuwait to gain support for his peace plan.
Meanwhile, US officials announced Friday that the military was probing allegations that at least two US soldiers raped an Iraqi woman and then murdered her and three family members.
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Back in Bushland
US Attorney General defends special military tribunals
by Joelle Bassoul
AFP
Sat Jul 1, 2006
CAIRO - US Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales has defended special military tribunals for terrorist suspects, saying they serve "a viable role in the war on terror."
"We are carefully reviewing the decision by the US Supreme Court," Gonzales told reporters during a trip to Cairo after meeting with Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak Saturday morning.
"We intend to work with Congress to develop procedures and practices that will meet the requirements set forth by the Supreme Court, but we continue to believe that military commissions would serve a viable role in the war on terror," he said.
The US Supreme Court on Thursday ruled that US President George W. Bush had overstepped his powers by creating military war crimes tribunals for Guantanamo Bay inmates.
In a 5-3 vote, the high court ruled that a military commission established to try Salim Ahmed Hamdan, a 36 year old Yemeni -- Osama bin Laden's former driver -- charged with conspiracy to commit war crimes and terrorism, violated US military law and the Geneva Conventions.
Following the ruling, the White House and other administration officials signalled they would try to consult with Congress to refine rules for such commissions, in line with the landmark Supreme Court judgement.
Gonzales said he hoped to try the suspects "in military commissions once we establish the procedures that will meet the requirements set forth by the Supreme Court."
Refering to the detention center in Guantanamo Bay, Gonzales said the US continued to believe it was "necessary".
"When the US captures someone on the battlefield, we have to have some way of holding them so that they do not come back and fight against us or fight against our friends and allies," he said.
Asked about the practice of renditions, the secret transfer of detainees by the CIA to their home countries, where in some cases they risk being tortured, Gonzales insisted that the US seeks assurances before returning the suspects.
"When we have in our custody an individual and their home country wants them returned, we are not going to return them without adequate assurances that they are not being mistreated," said Gonzales who refused to comment on renditions cases to Egypt specifically.
"We look at past records of the country in the treatment of people in their custody," he said.
"In respect to Egypt, let me say that we welcome the progress that is occuring here in Egypt," he said refering to constitutional ammendments recently passed.
Italy has accused CIA operatives of involvement in what it says was a clandestine operation to kidnap Egyptian national Abu Omar in 2003, handing him over to Egyptian authorities for interrogation.
The cleric -- who was under investigation in Italy as part of an inquiry into international terrorism -- was the imam of a Milan mosque which had been under close surveillance since the September 11, 2001 attacks in the United States.
He was snatched from the street in February 2003 and flown from a US military base in northern Italy to Egypt, where his supporters say he was tortured.
"We do have a legal obligatin not to render someone back to a country where we know they might be mistreated or tortured,' Gonzales reiterated.
Gonzales, who is the first US attorney general to visit Egypt, said that his department will send a permanent envoy to Cairo to "further cement the relationship" between the two countries.
Earlier in the day, Gonzales discussed with Mubarak the situation in the Gaza strip, calling Mubarak's mediation efforts between the Israelis and the Palestinians "important in resolving this matter in a peaceful manner," in reference to the abduction Sunday of an Israeli soldier by Palestinian militants.
The Israeli army on Wednesday launched a large-scale offensive in the Gaza strip to rescue the soldier.
During his three-day visit, Gonzales met with justice minister Mahmud Abou Leil and interior minister Habib al-Adli.
Comment: Huh? Gonzalez and the author of this article need to get their facts straight. Rendition is not "sending prisoners back" to their home countries; it is when the US government sends prisoners to another country to be imprisoned and tortured.
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Roberts Is at Court's Helm, but He Isn't Yet in Control
By LINDA GREENHOUSE
The New York Times
July 2, 2006
WASHINGTON - As the dust settled on a consequential Supreme Court term, the first in 11 years with a change in membership and the first in two decades with a new chief justice, one question that lingered was whether it was now the Roberts court, in fact as well as in name.
The answer: not yet.
Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. was clearly in charge, presiding over the court with grace, wit and meticulous preparation. But he was not in control.
In the court's most significant nonunanimous cases, Chief Justice Roberts was in dissent almost as often as he was in the majority. His goal of inspiring the court to speak softly and unanimously seemed a distant aspiration as important cases failed to produce majority opinions and members of the court, including occasionally the chief justice himself, gave voice to their frustration and pique with colleagues who did not see things their way.
The term's closing weeks were particularly ragged. The court issued no decision in a major patent case that had drawn intense interest from the business community, announcing two months after the argument, over the dissents of three justices, that the case had been "improvidently granted" - they should not have agreed to decide it - in the first place.
So if it wasn't yet the Roberts court, what exactly was it?
Perhaps it was the Kennedy court, based on the frequency with which Justice Anthony M. Kennedy cast the deciding vote in important cases.
Or perhaps it was more accurately seen as the Stevens court, reflecting the ability of John Paul Stevens, the senior associate justice in tenure as well as in age, to deliver a majority in the case for which the term will go down in history, the decision on military commissions that rejected the Bush administration's view of open-ended presidential authority.
Chief Justice Roberts did not participate in that case because he had ruled on it a year earlier as an appeals court judge. Based on his vote to uphold the administration's position then, he almost certainly would have joined Justices Antonin Scalia, Clarence Thomas and Samuel A. Alito Jr., the newest member of the court, in dissent.
If none of these labels - Roberts court, Kennedy court, Stevens court - seem to fit precisely, it is probably because what the Supreme Court really was in its 2005-6 term was a court in transition.
For the justices, it was a time of testing, of battles joined and battles, for the moment, postponed.
The term's early period of unanimity, during which cases on such contentious subjects as abortion and federalism were dispatched quickly, with narrowly phrased opinions, reflected agreement not on the underlying legal principles but rather on the desirability of moving on without getting bogged down in a fruitless search for common ground. This was especially so in the term's early months, when Justice Sandra Day O'Connor was still sitting but was counting the days until a new justice could take her place.
Once Justice O'Connor retired in late January, after Justice Alito's confirmation, and as the court moved into the heart of the term, some of the court's early inhibitions seemed to fall away. Yet when its most conservative members reached out aggressively to test the boundaries of consensus in the term's major environmental case, Justice Kennedy unexpectedly pushed back and left them well short of their goal.
In that case, Chief Justice Roberts along with Justices Alito, Scalia and Thomas tried to cut back on federal regulators' expansive view of their authority under the Clean Water Act to define wetlands.
Justice Kennedy also deserted the conservatives in a redistricting case from Texas when he found a violation of the Voting Rights Act in the dismantling of a Congressional district that had previously had a Mexican-American majority. The action of the Republican-led Texas Legislature had deprived the Latinos of the ability to elect the candidate of their choice, Justice Kennedy said, leaving Chief Justice Roberts to complain in dissent, "It is a sordid business, this divvying us up by race."
Nonetheless, there was little doubt that in its transition, the court was becoming more conservative. A statistical analysis by Jason Harrow on the Scotusblog Web site showed that Justice Alito voted with the conservative justices 15 percent more often than Justice O'Connor had.
A separate analysis, by the Supreme Court Institute at Georgetown University Law Center, showed that Justice Alito and Chief Justice Roberts had the highest agreement rate of any two justices in the court's nonunanimous cases, 88 percent, slightly higher than the agreement rate between Justice O'Connor and Justice David H. Souter in the first half of the term, 87.5 percent.
Chief Justice Roberts agreed with Justice Scalia in 77.5 percent of the nonunanimous cases and with Justice Stevens, arguably the court's most liberal member, only 35 percent of the time. The least agreement between any pair of justices was between Justices Alito and Stevens, 23.1 percent.
The court decided 69 cases with signed opinions in the term that began on Oct. 3 and ended on June 29. Nearly half were decided without dissent, a greater number than usual, although not dramatically so. Sixteen cases were decided by five-justice majorities, either 5 to 4 or 5 to 3, a proportion very close to the 10-year average.
One measure of the court's shift to the right is in dissenting votes. In the previous term, the justice who dissented least often was Stephen G. Breyer, who dissented in 10 of the term's 74 decisions. But this term, he had the second-highest number of dissents, 16; Justice Stevens had the most, 19. Justice Thomas and Justices Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Souter were also frequent dissenters. Of those who served the full term, Chief Justice Roberts had the fewest dissents, seven. Justice Kennedy had the second fewest, with nine.
Chief Justice Roberts's dissents, while few, came in some important cases. In addition to dissenting from the Voting Rights Act portion of the Texas redistricting decision, he also dissented from a decision reopening a 20-year-old death penalty case on the basis of new evidence; a federalism case, in which the majority found the states not immune from private bankruptcy suits; and a ruling that invalidated the personal assertion of authority by John Ashcroft, the former attorney general, to penalize doctors in Oregon who follow that state's Death With Dignity Act and prescribe lethal doses of medication for terminally ill patients who request it.
The court's next term, which begins Oct. 2, looms as a major test of the justices' fortitude and ability to work together, with cases challenging precedents on abortion and affirmative action already on the docket.
With the court having indicated in Hamdan v. Rumsfeld, the military commission case, that lawsuits now pending in the lower courts on behalf of dozens of detainees at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, are still alive, the justices are likely to have further opportunities to address the profound issues of presidential power and judicial authority that these cases raise. This time, the chief justice will not need to stay silent, and the country that is just getting to know him will hear his voice.
Following are summaries of the term's major rulings.
Presidential Power
The court repudiated the Bush administration's plan to use military commissions to try Guantánamo detainees, ruling 5 to 3 that the commissions were unauthorized by statute and violated a provision of the Geneva Conventions.
The majority opinion in Hamdan v. Rumsfeld, No. 05-184, by Justice Stevens, set minimum procedural protections that any future commissions, even those authorized by Congress, would have to provide. Justices Kennedy, Souter, Ginsburg and Breyer joined the opinion. Justices Scalia, Thomas and Alito dissented. Chief Justice Roberts, who had voted as an appeals court judge to uphold the commissions, did not participate.
Elections
A splintered decision rejected a challenge to the Republican-driven mid-decade redistricting of Texas's Congressional map, finding that it was not an impermissible partisan gerrymander. Justice Kennedy wrote the opinion in League of United Latin American Citizens v. Perry, No. 05-204. Agreeing with the judgment on the gerrymander challenge were Chief Justice Roberts and Justices Alito, Scalia and Thomas. Justices Stevens and Breyer dissented. Justices Souter and Ginsburg expressed no view on the issue, making the vote 5 to 2 to 2.
In the same case, the court ruled that the dismantling of a district in southwestern Texas with a Latino majority, an action the State Legislature had taken to shore up the faltering prospects of the Republican incumbent, violated the Voting Rights Act. On this question, Justice Kennedy spoke for a 5-to-4 majority that included Justices Stevens, Souter, Ginsburg and Breyer.
The court voted 6 to 3 to strike down Vermont's campaign finance law, which both limited the amount that candidates could spend on their own campaigns and placed the country's lowest ceilings on contributions to candidates from individuals and political parties.
The fragmented majority did not offer a unified approach to contribution limits, leaving the court's path in this area uncertain. Justice Breyer wrote the controlling opinion in the case, Randall v. Sorrell, No. 04-1528, joined by Chief Justice Roberts and Justice Alito. Justices Kennedy, Thomas and Scalia joined the judgment.
Criminal Law
In Georgia v. Randolph, No. 04-1067, the court held that when the police lack a search warrant, they cannot enter a home if one occupant objects, even if another occupant gives permission. The vote was 5 to 3, with Justice Alito not participating. In his majority opinion, Justice Souter said the decision comported with "widely shared social expectations" about privacy in the home. Chief Justice Roberts filed his first dissenting opinion in this case. Justices Scalia and Thomas also voted in dissent.
The court ruled that evidence the police find when they search a home to execute a search warrant can be admitted in court despite an officer's failure to observe the constitutional requirement to "knock and announce" before entering. Justice Scalia, writing for the 5-to-4 majority, said the ordinary rule against admitting unconstitutionally obtained evidence should not apply in this circumstance - nor, he implied, in many other circumstances currently governed by the "exclusionary rule."
This case, Hudson v. Michigan, No. 04-1360, was argued for a second time after Justice Alito joined the court; his vote with the majority determined the outcome. The others in the majority were Chief Justice Roberts and Justices Thomas and Kennedy.
The court was unanimous in ruling that inmates facing execution by lethal injection can invoke a federal civil rights law to challenge the state's choice of drugs and the manner in which they are administered. The decision, Hill v. McDonough, No. 05-8794, opened the door to lawsuits that would be prohibited by tight restrictions on petitions for habeas corpus. Justice Kennedy wrote the opinion.
The court ruled 5 to 3 that new evidence in a Tennessee murder case, including DNA evidence, sufficiently undermined the prosecution's theory of the case to require a new federal court hearing for the man who was convicted and sentenced to death for the crime 21 years ago.
The case, House v. Bell, No. 04-8990, was the first in which the court factored the results of modern DNA testing into consideration of whether a prisoner might qualify for a chance at habeas corpus that would otherwise be prohibited by procedural obstacles. Justice Kennedy wrote for the majority. Chief Justice Roberts dissented, along with Justices Scalia and Thomas. Justice Alito did not participate.
The court ruled 6 to 3 that foreign criminal defendants who have not been notified of their right under an international treaty to contact one of their country's diplomats are not entitled to special accommodation from courts in the United States. The decision, Sanchez-Llamas v. Oregon, No. 04-10566, rejected claims brought under the Vienna Convention on Consular Relations by foreign citizens convicted in Oregon and Virginia. Chief Justice Roberts wrote for the majority. Justices Breyer, Stevens and Souter dissented.
In a unanimous opinion, the court ordered a new trial for an inmate on South Carolina's death row on the ground that an evidentiary rule used in that state's courts had prevented the inmate from putting on a complete defense. Justice Alito, writing his first opinion for the court, said the rule was irrational and arbitrary. The case was Holmes v. South Carolina, No. 04-1327.
The court was deeply split on a basic question of death penalty law: the validity of the death penalty statute in Kansas under which a death sentence is automatic if the jury finds that the mitigating evidence and aggravating evidence are of equal weight. Voting 5 to 4 in an opinion by Justice Thomas, the court upheld the law, which the State Supreme Court had declared unconstitutional. Justice Alito's vote, following a reargument after he joined the court, made the difference. Justices Souter, Stevens, Ginsburg and Breyer dissented in the case, Kansas v. Marsh, No. 04-1170.
The court considered defendants' rights to cross-examine the state's witnesses, a right protected by the Confrontation Clause of the Sixth Amendment, in a pair of cases that were decided in a single opinion by Justice Scalia.
In the first part of the opinion in Davis v. Washington, No. 05-5224, the court was unanimous in ruling that a crime victim's emergency telephone call to 911 can be introduced as evidence at trial, even if the victim is not present for cross-examination, because a call to 911 does not produce the kind of "testimonial statement" to which the Confrontation Clause is addressed.
The court then went on to hold, by a vote of 8 to 1, with Justice Thomas dissenting, that a crime victim's statement to police officers who arrive at a scene should be considered "testimonial" if the police are investigating the crime rather than providing emergency assistance. Such a statement should therefore be banned from the trial if the person who gave it is not available for cross-examination, Justice Scalia said.
In another Sixth Amendment case, on the right to the assistance of counsel, the court ruled 5 to 4 that defendants who are wrongly deprived of the right to hire a lawyer of their choice are entitled to have a conviction overturned without the need to show that the first-choice lawyer would have achieved a better result. Justice Scalia wrote the opinion in the case, United States v. Gonzalez-Lopez, No. 05-352, joined by Justices Stevens, Souter, Ginsburg and Breyer.
Government Authority
The court ruled 6 to 3 that John Ashcroft, the former attorney general, acted without legal authority when he declared that doctors in Oregon who followed the procedures of that state's Death With Dignity Act to help patients commit suicide would lose their federal prescription rights and thus forfeit, as a practical matter, their ability to practice medicine.
No statute authorized the attorney general to take such action unilaterally contrary to "the background principles of our federal system," Justice Kennedy said in the majority opinion. The decision, Gonzales v. Oregon, No. 04-623, was a rebuff of the Bush administration, which had embraced Mr. Ashcroft's personal fight against assisted suicide and carried on the case after he left the government.
Chief Justice Roberts joined a dissenting opinion written by Justice Scalia. Justice Thomas also dissented. Justice Alito was not yet on the court when the case was decided, with Justice O'Connor in the majority, on January 17.
A pair of decisions on the question of state immunity from suit, also issued in January, before Justice Alito joined the court, gave strong indications that the Rehnquist court's federalism battles were far from over.
The court was unanimous in permitting a disabled Georgia prison inmate's lawsuit against the state to go forward under the Americans With Disabilities Act. But the unanimity was achieved only because the court limited the decision, Goodman v. Georgia, No. 04-1203, to little more than the statement of a truism: that Congress has the power to make the states liable to lawsuit when they violate the Constitution.
In this case, the inmate claimed that his mistreatment had been so egregious as to violate not only the disabilities law, but also the Constitution. Justice Scalia's opinion said that to this extent, the lawsuit could proceed.
In the second decision, the court split 5 to 4 in ruling that states are not immune from private lawsuits brought under federal bankruptcy law. Justice O'Connor joined the majority opinion by Justice Stevens in this case, Central Virginia Community College v. Katz, No. 04-885. The dissenters were Chief Justice Roberts and Justices Scalia, Kennedy and Thomas, who wrote the dissenting opinion supporting state immunity.
The court ruled that as a matter of constitutional due process, the government must take reasonable steps to make sure that homeowners have been notified before it sells a house for nonpayment of taxes. Chief Justice Roberts wrote for the 5-to-3 majority in this case, Jones v. Flowers, No. 04-1477. Justices Thomas, Scalia and Kennedy dissented, and Justice Alito did not participate.
The justices ruled 7 to 1 that the Postal Service may be sued by people who trip over packages that letter carriers have carelessly left in their path. The majority opinion by Justice Kennedy in this case, Dolan v. United States Postal Service, No. 04-848, was based on an interpretation of the Federal Tort Claims Act, not on the Constitution. Justice Thomas dissented, and Justice Alito did not participate.
Environment
A fractured decision in the term's major environmental case, defining federal jurisdiction over wetlands in the Clean Water Act, did not produce a majority opinion but did retain the ability of the government to continue enforcing the 1972 statute vigorously.
The court split 4 to 1 to 4 in the case, Rapanos v. United States, No. 04-1034, with Justice Kennedy in the middle. One group of four - Justices Scalia, Thomas and Alito, and Chief Justice Roberts - denounced federal regulators' open-ended approach to wetlands as "beyond parody" and would have redefined the term to land adjacent to open water and actually wet most of the time.
The other foursome, Justices Stevens, Souter, Ginsburg and Breyer, would have deferred to the longstanding judgment of the Army Corps of Engineers that a "wetland" can often appear dry and can be miles from a body of water, as long as it sometimes performs a filtering or runoff-control function. Justice Kennedy voted with the first group to send the case back to a lower court, but he proposed a standard much closer to that of the Stevens group.
In a second case under the Clean Water Act, the court ruled unanimously that operators of hydroelectric dams must meet a state's water quality requirements to qualify for a federal license. Justice Souter wrote the opinion in this case, S. D. Warren Company v. Maine Board of Environmental Protection, No. 04-1527.
Religion
In a significant application of the Religious Freedom Restoration Act, the court ruled 8 to 0 that a small religious sect based in Brazil has the right to import a hallucinogenic tea that the federal government had wanted to seize as a banned narcotic.
The tea, known as hoasca, is central to the sect's rituals, Chief Justice Roberts noted in his opinion for the court. He said the government had not met the religious freedom act's demanding standard for applying a generally applicable law - federal narcotics law, in this instance - in a way that impinges on religious observance. Justice Alito did not participate in the case, Gonzales v. O Centro Espírita Beneficente União do Vegetal, No. 04-1084.
Education
Voting 8 to 0, the court upheld a federal law that requires universities to forfeit all federal financing if any part of the university does not provide military recruiters with the same access to students as it provides other potential employers.
The law, known as the Solomon Amendment, was challenged by a coalition of law schools that objected to the military's exclusion of openly gay men and women. The law schools argued that their First Amendment rights to free speech and association had been violated by the requirement that they open their doors to military recruiters.
Writing for the court in this case, Rumsfeld v. Forum for Academic and Institutional Rights, No. 04-1152, Chief Justice Roberts said the speech in question was that of the government, not of the law schools, which he noted remained free to criticize the military and to express their views on its policies. Justice Alito did not participate.
The court ruled 6 to 2 that parents who disagree with a public school system's special-education plan for their children have the legal burden of proving that the plan will fail to provide the "appropriate" education that a federal law guarantees to children with disabilities. Justice O'Connor wrote the decision in the case, Schaffer v. Weast, No. 04-698. Chief Justice Roberts did not participate, and Justice Alito was not yet on the court.
Separately, the court ruled 6 to 3 that parents who prevail at a special-education hearing are not entitled to reimbursement for the cost of hiring expert witnesses. Justice Alito wrote this opinion, Arlington Central School District v. Murphy, No. 05-18. Justices Souter, Breyer and Stevens dissented.
Employees' Rights
The court gave employees substantially enhanced protection against retaliation for complaining about discrimination on the job. Justice Breyer wrote the opinion in the case, Burlington Northern & Santa Fe Railway Company v. White, No. 05-259, which interpreted the anti-retaliation provision of the Civil Rights Act of 1964.
The court defined retaliation broadly as any "materially adverse" employment action that "might have dissuaded a reasonable worker" from making the complaint. Eight justices joined the majority opinion, and Justice Alito filed a separate concurring opinion.
Addressing the free-speech rights of government workers, the court ruled 5 to 4 that the Constitution does not protect public employees against retaliation for what they say in the course of performing their assigned duties.
Justice Kennedy's majority opinion in this case, Garcetti v. Ceballos, No. 04-473, drew a distinction between public employees' official speech, which he said supervisors were entitled to control, and their speech as citizens contributing to "civic discourse," for which they retained constitutional protection. The dissenters were Justices Stevens, Souter, Breyer and Ginsburg.
Abortion
The justices papered over, at least for this term, their fundamental differences on abortion, ruling narrowly and unanimously in a case from New Hampshire on access to abortion for teenagers facing medical emergencies. In an opinion by Justice O'Connor, her last before leaving the bench, the court reaffirmed that a medical-emergency exception was constitutionally required in a law that placed obstacles, like a parental-notice requirement and a waiting period, in the path of teenagers seeking abortions.
The more difficult question in the case, Ayotte v. Planned Parenthood of Northern New England, No. 04-1144, was that of what to do about New Hampshire's failure to include such an exception in its parental notice law. The justices sent the case back to the federal appeals court in Boston, which had banned enforcement of the law in its entirety, even for teenagers not facing a medical emergency.
That "most blunt remedy" would be justified, Justice O'Connor said, only if it was clear that New Hampshire's legislature, which enacted the law in 2003, would have preferred no law at all to one with the necessary health exception. Otherwise, she said, the appeals court should come up with a more limited remedy for the constitutional problem.
Patents
Indicating new interest in intellectual property law, the justices considered several patent cases but failed to offer much guidance in this burgeoning legal area.
The court handed a limited victory to eBay in its patent dispute with MercExchange, which successfully sued eBay for patent infringement on the method behind the online auction company's "Buy It Now" feature. The United States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit, which has sole jurisdiction over patent appeals, then granted an injunction against eBay's use of the technology, under the view that an injunction should automatically follow a finding of infringement.
In a unanimous opinion by Justice Thomas, the justices instructed the appeals court to make a case-by-case determination rather than apply an automatic injunction rule. But the opinion, eBay v. MercExchange, No. 05-130, left it unclear what presumptions and factors should go into that determination, and it was evident that the justices themselves had not agreed on a standard.
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Supreme Court Ruling Troubles GOP Senators
By PETE YOST Associated Press Writer
© 2006 The Associated Press
July 3, 2006, 7:51AM
WASHINGTON - Of all the steps the Supreme Court could have taken to undercut President Bush's legal position in the war on terror, applying international law to al-Qaida probably would have been the worst.
That development came to pass Thursday and now Republicans are rushing to protect the cornerstone of Bush's thinking: Suspected terrorists are not entitled to protection under the Geneva Accords.
Sens. Mitch McConnell and Lindsey Graham said Sunday that Congress must address the Supreme Court ruling embracing Article 3 of the conventions in the military commission case of Osama bin Laden's former driver.
Article 3 prohibits outrages upon personal dignity, "in particular humiliating and degrading treatment," and bars violence, including murder, mutilation and torture.
In an election year, declaring that international law governs the war on terror reminds voters of some of the Republican administration's lowest moments: controversies over Justice Department "torture" memos and allegations of abuse against detainees at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.
McConnell, R-Ky., the second-ranking GOP leader in the Senate, said the 5-3 court decision "means that American servicemen potentially could be accused of war crimes."
"I think Congress is going to want to deal with that," McConnell said on NBC's "Meet the Press." He called the ruling "very disturbing."
The Geneva Conventions' Article 3 is "far beyond our domestic law when it comes to terrorism, and Congress can rein it in, and I think we should," said Graham, R-S.C., assigned as a Reserve Judge to the Air Force Court of Criminal Appeals. Graham spoke on "Fox News Sunday."
Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., also expressed concern about the decision, saying it "is somewhat of a departure, in my view, of people who are stateless terrorists." McCain appeared on ABC's "This Week."
McConnell wants Congress to deal with the Geneva Accords issue at the same time it addresses the court's overturning of the military commissions created to try a limited number of detainees at Guantanamo Bay.
Addressing the commission issue, McCain and Senate Judiciary Committee chairman Arlen Specter, R-Pa., said Congress might devise broader changes than the White House wants in trials of detainees at Guantanamo Bay.
As a starting point for debate, McCain said Congress should embrace the Uniform Code of Military Justice, the bedrock of military law protecting the rights of accused soldiers. The Bush administration has skirted the code for nearly five years in dealing with Guantanamo Bay prisoners it has classified as enemy combatants.
Specter said "we have to reconcile" what the Bush administration thinks it can do and what the Supreme Court decision says. Specter spoke on CBS' "Face the Nation."
Many Republicans in Congress say detainees in the war on terror should not have the same legal protections as those in the military. Congress, they say, should give its imprimatur with little or no change to the Pentagon's military commissions.
McCain agreed that justice afforded to enemy combatants "shouldn't be exactly the same as applied to a member of the military." He added, however, that the Uniform Code of Military Justice is "a good framework."
The Supreme Court said Bush's military commissions violate the Uniform Code of Military Justice and the four Geneva Conventions signed in 1949.
Under military commission rules, the court noted, such panels may block an accused and his civilian lawyer from ever learning of evidence the prosecution presents that is classified. In addition, commissions can permit the admission of any evidence it deems to have probative value to a reasonable person.
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Supreme Court's decision in Hamdan vs. Rumsfeld could expose officials to prosecution
By Rosa Brooks
Los Angeles Times
06/30/06
THE SUPREME Court on Thursday dealt the Bush administration a stinging rebuke, declaring in Hamdan vs. Rumsfeld that military commissions for trying terrorist suspects violate both U.S. military law and the Geneva Convention.
But the real blockbuster in the Hamdan decision is the court's holding that Common Article 3 of the Geneva Convention applies to the conflict with Al Qaeda - a holding that makes high-ranking Bush administration officials potentially subject to prosecution under the federal War Crimes Act.
The provisions of the Geneva Convention were intended to protect noncombatants - including prisoners - in times of armed conflict. But as the administration has repeatedly noted, most of these protections apply only to conflicts between states. Because Al Qaeda is not a state, the administration argued that the Geneva Convention didn't apply to the war on terror. These assertions gave the administration's arguments about the legal framework for fighting terrorism a through-the-looking-glass quality. On the one hand, the administration argued that the struggle against terrorism was a war, subject only to the law of war, not U.S. criminal or constitutional law. On the other hand, the administration said the Geneva Convention didn't apply to the war with Al Qaeda, which put the war on terror in an anything-goes legal limbo.
This novel theory served as the administration's legal cover for a wide range of questionable tactics, ranging from the Guantanamo military tribunals to administration efforts to hold even U.S. citizens indefinitely without counsel, charge or trial.
Perhaps most troubling, it allowed the administration to claim that detained terrorism suspects could be subjected to interrogation techniques that constitute torture or cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment under international law, such as "waterboarding," placing prisoners in painful physical positions, sexual humiliation and extreme sleep deprivation.
Under Bush administration logic, these tactics were not illegal under U.S. law because U.S. law was trumped by the law of war, and they weren't illegal under the law of war either, because Geneva Convention prohibitions on torture and cruel treatment were not applicable to the conflict with Al Qaeda.
In 2005, Congress angered the administration by passing Sen. John McCain's amendment explicitly prohibiting the use of cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment of detainees. But Congress did not attach criminal penalties to violations of the amendment, and the administration has repeatedly indicated its intent to ignore it.
The Hamdan decision may change a few minds within the administration. Although the decision's practical effect on the military tribunals is unclear - the administration may be able to gain explicit congressional authorization for the tribunals, or it may be able to modify them to comply with the laws of war - the court's declaration that Common Article 3 applies to the war on terror is of enormous significance. Ultimately, it could pave the way for war crimes prosecutions of those responsible for abusing detainees.
Common Article 3 forbids "cruel treatment and torture [and] outrages upon personal dignity, in particular humiliating and degrading treatment." The provision's language is sweeping enough to prohibit many of the interrogation techniques approved by the Bush administration. That's why the administration had argued that Common Article 3 did not apply to the war on terror, even though legal experts have long concluded that it was intended to provide minimum rights guarantees for all conflicts not otherwise covered by the Geneva Convention.
But here's where the rubber really hits the road. Under federal criminal law, anyone who "commits a war crime ... shall be fined ... or imprisoned for life or any term of years, or both, and if death results to the victim, shall also be subject to the penalty of death." And a war crime is defined as "any conduct ... which constitutes a violation of Common Article 3 of the international conventions signed at Geneva." In other words, with the Hamdan decision, U.S. officials found to be responsible for subjecting war on terror detainees to torture, cruel treatment or other "outrages upon personal dignity" could face prison or even the death penalty.
Don't expect that to happen anytime soon, of course. For prosecutions to occur, some federal prosecutor would have to issue an indictment. And in the Justice Department of Atty. Gen. Alberto Gonzales - who famously called the Geneva Convention "quaint" - a genuine investigation into administration violations of the War Crimes Act just ain't gonna happen.
But as Yale law professor Jack Balkin concludes, it's starting to look as if the Geneva Convention "is not so quaint after all."
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Journalists and 'leakers' feel heat
By CHARLES J. HANLEY
AP Special Correspondent
Sat Jul 1, 2006
NEW YORK - Headline by headline, a trickle of news leaks on
Iraq and the antiterror campaign has grown into a steady stream of revelations, and from Pennsylvania Avenue to Downing Street, Copenhagen to Canberra, governments are responding with pressure and prosecutions.
The latest target is The New York Times. But the unfolding story begins as far back as 2003, when British weapons expert David Kelly was "outed" as the source of a story casting doubt on his government's arguments for invading Iraq, and he committed suicide.
And it will roll on this fall, when Danish journalists face trial for reporting their government knew there was no evidence of banned weapons in Iraq.
In London's Central Criminal Court, too, accused leakers will be in the dock this fall, for allegedly disclosing
President Bush talked of bombing al-Jazeera, the Arab television station. The British government threatens to prosecute newspapers that write any more about that leaked document.
Media advocates are alarmed at what they see as a mounting assault on press freedom in country after country, arguing it is potentially chilling the pursuit of truth as U.S. and European leaders pursue wars on terror and in Iraq.
"It's grotesque that at a time when political rhetoric is full of notions of democracy and liberty that we should have this fundamental right of journalists to investigate and report on public interest matters called into question," Aidan White, general-secretary of the Belgium-based International Federation of Journalists, told The Associated Press.
But others counter that national interest requires stopping leaks of classified information, and that some media reports endanger lives by tipping terrorists to government tactics.
"We cannot continue to operate in a system where the government takes steps to counter terrorism while the media actively works to disclose those operations without any regard for protection of lives, sources and legal methods," Sen. Pat Roberts (news, bio, voting record) said in Washington.
The Kansas Republican was reacting to a June 23 report by the Times - and other papers - detailing a U.S. government program that taps into a huge international database of financial records to try to track terror financing.
Some Republican lawmakers called for criminal investigations of the journalists responsible and of the government insiders who leaked the information.
Investigations are already under way in other U.S. cases, reaching back to 2003, when whistleblower Joseph Wilson questioned a Bush administration claim about Iraq's supposed nuclear program. Times reporter Judith Miller spent three months in jail in that complex case last year, as investigators sought whoever leaked the name of Wilson's
CIA-agent wife.
The Washington Times says the Justice Department is also investigating New York Times and Washington Post reporters - the Times for disclosing in 2005 that the government was monitoring Americans' phone calls without court warrants and the Post for reporting that the CIA was operating secret prisons for suspected terrorists in eastern Europe. The CIA in April fired a top analyst as an alleged source for the reports on covert prisons.
Just as the stories cross borders, so do the crackdowns.
Swiss investigators are looking for the leaker of an intelligence document attesting to the CIA prison network and are weighing criminal charges, under secrecy laws, against three journalists at the weekly SonntagsBlick who reported the story.
In Britain, revelations and retributions have filled news columns and airwaves since the U.S.-British invasion of Iraq in 2003, when the British Broadcasting Corp., citing an unidentified government source, said allegations of Iraqi weapons of mass destruction - now known to have been false - had been "sexed up."
In July that year, bioweapons expert David Kelly informed superiors he was the BBC's source. He expected confidentiality, but his identity was disclosed and he was compelled to testify, under harsh questioning, before two parliamentary committees. Within days, Kelly killed himself.
In 2004-05, at London's Daily Telegraph and then at The Times, correspondent Michael Smith reported on leaked memos from Prime Minister
Tony Blair's government indicating the Bush administration was long committed to invading Iraq, and weapons intelligence was "fixed" around that aim. Smith says he has been investigated under Britain's Official Secrets Act, but neither he nor any leaker has been charged.
For David Keogh, a former British Cabinet Office spokesman, and Leo O'Connor, an ex-Parliament aide, the outcome was different.
Both are charged under the secrecy act in the alleged leaking of a classified memo about a Bush-Blair meeting in 2004 at which Blair was said to have argued against a Bush suggestion of bombing al-Jazeera's headquarters in Qatar. Keogh and O'Connor face up to two years in prison if convicted this fall.
After London's Daily Mirror reported on that memo last November, Britain's attorney general warned other editors they could face prosecution if they divulged any more of the leaked document.
Across the North Sea, Michael Bjerre and Jesper Larsen of Berlingske Tidene, a major Danish daily, face two years in prison at their trial this fall - the first such prosecution of journalists in Denmark's modern history.
They reported in 2004 that before joining the Iraq invasion, the Danish government was told by military intelligence there was no firm evidence of banned weapons in Iraq, a finding the Danes presumably based on U.S. and British information.
Because it involved going to war, "the articles published were obviously in the public interest," the newspaper's chief editor, Niels Lunde, told AP.
The Danish leaker, a former intelligence officer, was convicted and jailed for four months last year. Now "the court must decide whether the penal code provision banning publishing secret information applies to these journalists," said prosecutor Karsten Hjorth. The government contends the leak damaged its intelligence relations with other nations.
Elsewhere:
-Two journalists in Romania face up to seven years in prison for possessing classified documents about the Romanian military's operations in Iraq and Afghanistan, even though their newspapers never published the information.
-A German parliamentary report May 26 disclosed Berlin's foreign intelligence agency had been illegally spying on German journalists since the 1990s to find the sources of leaks.
-De Telegraaf, the Netherlands' biggest paper, had to go to court to win a ruling last month ordering the Dutch secret service to stop wiretapping calls of two reporters who obtained leaked information about official corruption.
"Systematic surveillance is becoming one of the most worrying features in relations between authorities and media worldwide," said the journalist federation's White.
Even whistleblowers who don't divulge state secrets can feel the heat - like Australia's Rod Barton.
After the Canberra government dismissed what he privately reported about phony weapons "intelligence" and prisoner abuse in Iraq, the former Iraq weapons inspector went public last year with the information. Soon Barton's government contract work evaporated, he was "disinvited" from official functions, and former colleagues were ordered to shun him.
"Although there is still freedom of speech, it is not entirely free. There is a price," he told AP.
Comment:
"Systematic surveillance is becoming one of the most worrying features in relations between authorities and media worldwide," said the journalist federation's White.This is about more than just a battle between state and media, security and the people's right to know. It is perhaps the greatest battle for what remains of "democracy" in many Western countries. If the pathocratic government officials win, freedom of speech will be officially gone. Governments will be able to operate with impunity. If a reporter - or anyone else - finds out that his government lied to get that nation involved in some crazy imperialist scheme, too bad! He'll either keep his mouth shut, or go to prison. Welcome to the New World...
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NORAD air base on heightened alert - No reason given for 'Bravo-Plus' security level
WorldNetDaily.com
July 3, 2006
As the U.S. continues to express concern about the possibility of a North Korean missile test directed toward American territory and the rest of the world holds its breath over a close encounter with an asteroid, several U.S. air bases are on heightened alert.
But no one is talking about why.
The Cheyenne Mountain Air Station, which houses NORAD - charged with monitoring the North Korea situation - is now at "Bravo-Plus."
Other air bases in Colorado, California and Florida are also on heightened alert status.
There are five levels of alert: normal, Alpha (low), Bravo (medium), Charlie (high) and Delta (critical). "Bravo-Plus" is slightly higher than a medium threat level.
The Bush administration has urged North Korea to abandon its plans to test a long range missile. The Pentagon believes the missile is capable of reaching the United States.
NORAD and the U.S. Northern Command in Colorado would play a big role in both detecting and responding to a missile launch if it ever occurred.
The U.S. missile defense system is only a few years old, but could be tested if North Korea chooses to act.
Meanwhile, in a development that may or may not be related to the heightened security alert, an asteroid up to half a mile wide is due to brush past the Earth early today.
Scientists who have been tracking asteroid 2004 XP14 say it will approach almost as close as the Moon, traveling at 10.5 miles per second.
It has been classified as a Potentially Hazardous Asteroid (PHA), along with 782 known others.
Initially there were concerns that the asteroid might collide with the Earth later this century. However, further analysis of its orbit has ruled this out - at least for the foreseeable future.
If XP14 did hit the Earth the effects would be devastating.
"It would probably be big enough to wipe out a small country," said Dr David Asher, from the Armagh Observatory in Northern Ireland.
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Pentagon sees Iran bombing as unsuccessful: report
Reuters
Sun Jul 2, 2006
WASHINGTON - Top Pentagon officers have told the Bush administration that bombing Iranian nuclear facilities would probably fail to destroy that country's nuclear program, the New Yorker magazine reported on Sunday.
The senior commanders also warned that any attack launched if diplomacy fails to end the standoff over
Iran's nuclear ambitions could have "serious economic, political, and military consequences for the United States," the article said, citing unidentified U.S. military officials.
"A crucial issue in the military's dissent, the officers said, is the fact that American and European intelligence agencies have not found specific evidence of clandestine activities or hidden facilities; the war planners are not sure what to hit," according to the report.
The U.S. military's experience in Iraq, where no weapons of mass destruction were found and the war continues, has affected its approach to Iran, the magazine quoted a high-ranking general as saying.
"The target array in Iran is huge, but it's amorphous," the unidentified general was quoted as saying. "We built this big monster with Iraq, and there was nothing there.
"This is son of Iraq."
The United States on Friday spurned Iranian calls for more time to study an offer of incentives to curb its nuclear fuel program, insisting Tehran must reply by the Group of Eight industrialized nations' deadline on July 5.
The article, by journalist Seymour Hersh, also questioned the effectiveness of U.S. targeting potential nuclear sites.
"Intelligence has also shown that for the past two years the Iranians have been shifting their most sensitive nuclear-related materials and production facilities, moving some into urban areas, in anticipation of a bombing raid," it said.
Another parallel U.S. military leaders drew with Iraq is the administration's desire for a swift and cheap intervention in Iran without sufficient regard for economic and political consequences, including oil supplies and a backlash in the broader Muslim world and in Europe.
"If you're a military planner, you try to weigh options," one senior military official was quoted as saying. "What is the capability of the Iranian response, and the likelihood of a punitive response like cutting off oil shipments? What would that cost us?"
Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld and his aides "really think they can do this on the cheap, and they underestimate the capability of the adversary," the official told the magazine.
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Weekends With the President's Men
Maureen Dowd
The New York Times
June 30, 2006
ST. MICHAELS, Md. - JUST an hour and a half from Washington, across the 4.3-mile Chesapeake Bay Bridge, or less than 30 minutes in a government-issue Chinook helicopter, is the Eastern Shore of Maryland and the primly groomed waterside village of St. Michaels.
St. Michaels has begun to lure V.I.P.'s who, some boosters would have it, could propel it into the gilded realm of the Hamptons and Nantucket. But that will take a while. There's little for the young - just a few bars and no beaches or nightclubs - and these new householders are too circumspect and perhaps too old to be showcasing their excesses, baubles and abs.
One is Vice President Dick Cheney, 65, who paid $2.67 million last September for a house that resembles a wide, squat Mount Vernon. Another is his old friend Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld, 73, who in 2003 paid $1.5 million for a brick Georgian that was last a bed-and-breakfast. Among other recognizable owners in the area are Tony Snow, President Bush's new press secretary; Joe Trippi, Howard Dean's presidential campaign manager in 2004; Nicholas Brady, President George H. W. Bush's treasury secretary; and John S. D. Eisenhower, a writer and historian and the son of President Dwight D. Eisenhower.
St. Michaels, population 1,200 within the city limits and perhaps a thousand more in the same ZIP code, sits on the wrist of a peninsula that bends deep into Chesapeake Bay. With two broad clawlike fingers, spotted and wrinkled by coves and creeks that reach beyond the town and down to Tilghman Island and Nelson Point, it is a place of waterfront sunsets and white sails, of oysters and crabs, of birding, fishing and hunting, and of affluent retirees, tourists and weekenders. Most, like the Cheneys and Rumsfelds, are past 50.
With many less luminous who have made their marks in business, medicine, law, government and the military, St. Michaels is too proud and indifferent for celebrity gawking. "They're just people living in town," said the Hawaiian shirted bartender at the Carpenter Street Saloon, who thought giving his name would be indiscreet. "They're not the first important people living in town, and they're not the last. They're just here."
The town is beginning to contend, however, with 21st-century perils to its composure. After eight years of resistance, construction will soon start on a development that will bring around 250 new homes and swell the year-round population by about 50 percent. In summer, traffic is choking and decivilizing Talbot Street, the only road through town. Housing developments are crowding Tilghman Island, once almost exclusively home to fishermen - or watermen, as they're called.
One morning in May, Francis Zeglen put on a khaki windbreaker and his wife, Georgia, a turquoise sweater for a shopping stroll along Talbot. They were in a crosswalk when a light-brown pickup knocked them down.
Urged not to move, they were lying there blinking, Mr. Zeglen, 76, on his back, Mrs. Zeglen, 78, on her side. The Rev. Mark Nestlehutt, a tall young sailor and the rector of Christ Episcopal Church, hurried over, not solely on a spiritual mission. He is also chairman of the town's Advisory Committee for Traffic Planning and Pedestrian Friendly Streets - which, in a place with a speed limit of 25 miles an hour and few hot-blooded young drivers, they usually are.
The Zeglens were treated at a hospital in nearby Easton, he for a broken left arm, she for immobilizing bruises, and drove home to Philadelphia the next day. "I turned and looked," Mr. Zeglen said when he gave his own account of the accident, "and he just kept coming." The driver of the pickup was charged with failure to stop for a pedestrian in a crosswalk. It had been a more eventful morning than most, the first pedestrian accident in 23 years - at least the first that the town manager, Cheril S. Thomas, could recall.
In St. Michaels, you also don't see much of the one-upping of Joneses or architectural bullying found in showier coastal resorts. The old farm families and the wealthy weekenders like the Rumsfelds and Cheneys look out over acres of lawn rolling down to the sea grass and their own private docks. But the homes are hidden down two-lane roads with cunning yellow signs on utility poles that say, menacingly and untruthfully, "No Outlet," and then down driveways shrouded by trees and lined with thick and impenetrable hedgerows.
The houses have names. Mr. Rumsfeld's is Mount Misery and is just across Rolles Creek from a house called Mount Pleasant. On four acres, with four bathrooms, five bedrooms and five fireplaces, built in 1804, the Rumsfeld house is just barely visible at the end of a gravel drive.
Thomas M. Crouch, a broker at the Coldwell Banker office in town, says one legend attributes the name to the original owner, said to have been a sad and doleful Englishman. His merrier brother then built a house, and to put him on, Mr. Crouch supposes, named it Mount Pleasant.
But there is some historical gravity to the name, too. By 1833, Mount Misery's owner was Edward Covey, a farmer notorious for breaking unruly slaves for other farmers. One who wouldn't be broken was Frederick Douglass, then 16 and later the abolitionist orator. Covey assaulted him, so Douglass beat him up and escaped. Today, where the drive begins, Mount Misery seems a congenial place, with a white mailbox with newspaper delivery sleeves attached, a big American flag fluttering from a post by a split-rail fence and a tall, one-hole birdhouse of the sort made for bluebirds - although the lens in the hole suggests another function.
Less than two miles from the Rumsfelds', past Southwind, where the late James A. Michener wrote much of his epic novel "Chesapeake," Church Neck Road dead-ends at private Fuller Road on the left. About a quarter-mile up, past grazing cattle and sheep and four other homes, is Vice President Cheney's nine-acre place, Ballintober.
The house, built in 1930, is rambling and white. It has a five-car garage, a pool, stately formal gardens, a laundry chute and large, glass-walled waterside rooms for entertaining. Coldwell Banker's real estate listing called it an "individually designed dwelling." It is also unapproachable. "The last time I went up Fuller Road," Katie Edmonds, an agent at Meredith Real Estate, said, "S.U.V.'s came out of the woods at me."
Neighbors also complain about federal security agents' shutting down Church Neck Road to let the Cheneys pass in their speeding brigades of shiny black S.U.V.'s. But they don't complain much, because the newcomers are thought to be good for property values. If the Cheneys and Rumsfelds are willing to buy here, after all, who wouldn't be?
St. Michaels was traditionally a center of farming, boat building, crabbing and tonging for oysters. For 100 years, it has also attracted older, upper-crust retirees from Washington, Baltimore and Philadelphia who buy waterfront sites and, more recently, century-old houses downtown.
The second-home owners cannot vote in local elections, but their needs, whimsies and appetites set the tone of the town. Approaching St. Michaels, Route 33 - the only way in or out - passes a lumberyard's lawn full of rocking chairs. In the town itself, where 33 becomes Talbot Street, a flag hanging from one store declares, "Quilters welcome." There are at least 20 bed-and-breakfasts downtown or nearby, no neon signs, no stoplights and, except for the plants and waist-high pink ceramic flamingos that the Acme supermarket features in front, no obstructions blocking sidewalks.
Except for the Acme, shops on Talbot cater to people with money to burn: the Calico Gallery, St. Michaels Candy Company, the Cultured Pearl, the Scented Garden, Rings & Things, Gourmet-by-the-Bay (an upscale food shop and caterer that has made Thanksgiving pies for the Rumsfelds), Justine's ice cream parlor, Flying Fred's Gifts for Pets. Bistro St. Michaels and 208 Talbot are expensive restaurants.
Only Big Al's - an emphatically lowbrow seafood and souvenir shop where Joyce Rumsfeld, the secretary's wife, comes in for bushels of cooked blue crabs - breaks with the Laura Ashley look of St. Michaels. Two small picnic tables sit out front, and the proprietor, Al Poore, offers sandwiches of crab cake for $5.95, soft crab for $6.95, oysters for $5.95 and fish for $4.95. Mr. Poore, who is 71 and about 6 foot 4 with a thicket of tousled gray hair, sinks like a ball in a catcher's mitt into the cavernous black leather easy chair in his memento-strewn office at the rear of the store. He opened it in 1968. "When I came here," he said, "there was one place where you could stay overnight. Now we've got one on every corner."
Merchants say they're wary of intruding on the privacy of the Cheneys and Rumsfelds, but they do it anyway. "I'm a businessman," said Mr. Poore, a registered Democrat who voted twice for George W. Bush. "I probably mention them to customers five or six times a week. They bring a lot of prestige."
Paul Gardner, the front office manager at the $250-to-$700-a-night Inn at Perry Cabin, a plush waterside resort at the far end of town, said, "We've had Rumsfeld in for dinner." Once last year, the Cheney Chinook landed near the inn's laundry and maintenance facility. "We're very pleased to have them in the area," he said.
Some people view the new neighbors less cordially. On Railroad Avenue, which the Cheneys and Rumsfelds use to reach Church Neck, Cassandra Harrison, a mother of two who waits tables and cleans houses, was resting on the stoop of her one-story white ranch house.
She is grateful that the air space above the Cheneys' house is blocked. "It's a no-fly zone, and that's good," she said. "But I'm not happy. I don't think society's liking them so much." Ms. Harrison, 23, voted for the first time in 2004, she said, "just because I did not want him. I don't think that they tell us the truth."
But that is a minority view in Talbot County, which went 61 percent for Mr. Bush in 2000 and 58 percent in 2004. Support for the war in Iraq is waning here as it is most everywhere else. But the great majority of Mr. Nestlehutt's 790 parishioners, he said, are "tolerant," live-and-let-live urban Republicans, not hard-core social conservatives. Mr. Cheney and Mr. Rumsfeld, he said, seem to fit right in.
Comment: Rummy's house is called Mount Misery. How appropriate.
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Bush address pays tribute to armed forces
AP
Sat Jul 1, 2006
WASHINGTON - President Bush paid tribute to America's armed forces Saturday, calling Independence Day a time to thank the men and women who defend freedom.
"For more than two centuries, from the camps of Valley Forge to the mountains of Afghanistan, Americans have served and sacrificed for the principles of our founding," Bush said in his weekly radio address. "Today, a new generation of American patriots is defending our freedom against determined and ruthless enemies."
Bush plans to celebrate July Fourth at Fort Bragg, N.C., where he will have lunch with military personnel. The president will return to the White House Tuesday night to watch fireworks in the nation's capital.
On the holiday, Americans should recall the ideals that the nation's founders outlined in the Declaration of Independence, Bush said. He also encouraged every American to find a way to thank those who defend freedom.
He urged people to help America Supports You, a nationwide program set up by the Defense Department to communicate citizen support to military men and women at home and abroad.
"At this hour, the men and women of our armed forces are facing danger in distant places, carrying out their missions with all the skill and honor we expect of them," Bush said. "And their families are enduring long separations from their loved ones with great courage and dignity."
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Bin Laden warns US
Reuters
Sat Jul 1, 2006
DUBAI - A purported audio tape by Al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden warned Iraq's Shi'ite majority on Saturday of retaliation over attacks on Sunni Arabs and that his group would fight the United States anywhere in the world.
Bin Laden, making his second Internet broadcast in two days, also warned the world community to stay out of Somalia, where Islamists have fought their way to power in Mogadishu.
"We will fight (U.S.) soldiers on the land of Somalia ... and we reserve the right to punish it on its land and anywhere possible," said the speaker on the tape, sounding like the Saudi-born militant.
No immediate independent verification of the voice was immediately available but the tape was posted on an Internet site used by Islamists.
Bin Laden, a Sunni, said the Sunni Arab minority in Iraq was being annihilated.
"It is not possible that many of (the Shi'ites) violate, alongside America and its allies, (the Sunni cities of) Ramadi, Falluja, Mosul .... (and) that their areas would be safe from retaliation and harm," he said.
Bin Laden said he endorsed Abu Hamza al-Muhajir as the new leader of al Qaeda in Iraq after the killing of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi in a U.S. air strike on June 7.
On Somalia, he said: "We warn all of the countries in the world not to respond to America by sending international troops to Somalia."
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Only 483 Guard Working on Mexican Border
By AARON C. DAVIS
Associated Press
Jun 30, 2006
SACRAMENTO, Calif. - On the deadline to have 2,500 troops along the Mexican border, the National Guard said Friday that only 483 were in position and working with the U.S. Border Patrol as the Bush administration had directed.
But Guard officials said more than 2,000 others were somewhere inside the four southwestern border states, training or helping plan the deployment. He and Bush administration officials argued Friday that the presence of troops in those states spelled success in the first stage of the mission.
Lt. Gen. H. Steven Blum, chief of the National Guard Bureau, an arm of the Pentagon, had promised June 1 that by the end of the month 2,500 Guard troops would be working "on the border."
"As defined by the operation, the National Guard has met and exceeded its goal of deploying 2,500 soldiers and airmen to the four Southwest border states," said White House spokesman Blain Rethmeier. "Progress to date is real and the Guard's efforts are making a positive difference in this national effort."
As evidence, he said the early arrival of troops had allowed the Border Patrol to send 125 agents "back to the front lines," and helped the Border Patrol catch nearly 200 illegal immigrants, seize 123 pounds of marijuana, 18 pounds of cocaine and seven vehicles.
Through initial pay requests filed with the Air Guard and orders filed with the Army Guard, the Guard bureau verified 2,547 troops were in the four border states for the mission, said Daniel Donohue, a spokesman for the National Guard Bureau.
Only 483 were physically on the border, he conceded.
The remaining forces _ 1,816 _ are in training somewhere in the four states; 248 are assigned to headquarters and planning roles, Donohue said.
Asked to clarify, Blum spokesman Mark Allen responded by e-mail that the general had never specifically promised to deliver troops to a "geographically defined latitude and longitude."
Still, there were signs the deployment was picking up speed.
Texas Gov. Rick Perry said 1,000 Army and Air National Guardsmen were either on the border or "on their way," adding 500 to totals released Thursday. But his office said the additional troops didn't actually reach the border, but were considered deployed when they left Friday for two weeks of training.
Several states whose Guard leaders and governors had been contacted by the National Guard Bureau in the last 48 hours also made announcements Friday that they would send troops.
Gov. Mike Easley of North Carolina said he would reluctantly deploy 300 troops to the border in mid-July.
"I would prefer not to have any of the North Carolina National Guard deployed to other states at this time," he said. "However, the Guard units in the western states are spread thin as they battle raging wildfires. We must all step up and do our part to keep our country safe."
Kentucky announced it would send up to 650 National Guard troops. Arkansas also said it would send 200. New Jersey also said it would send up to 650 for three-week assignments.
Damon Foreman, senior patrol agent and spokesman for the Border Patrol in San Diego, said agents there eagerly await the Guard's help.
"We would welcome all the help we could get. We could absorb them as fast as we could give them instructions on what to do," Foreman said, adding that the delayed deployment, however, had not affected operations.
"We've been doing a considerably effective job for a long time now, we'll keep doing our job whether the whole number of Guard show up tomorrow, a week from tomorrow, or a month from now."
Bush's plan for stemming illegal immigration by using National Guardsmen in a support role called for 2,500 troops to be on the border by June 30, and 6,000 by the end of July.
Bush had said the mission would free up thousands of officers now on other duties to actively patrol the border. Guardsmen are expected to build fences, conduct routine surveillance and take care of other administrative duties for the border patrol.
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Cubans find backdoor route to U.S. soil
By ANDREW SELSKY
Associated Press
Sun Jul 2, 2006
MONA ISLAND, Puerto Rico - Taking the back door into the United States, droves of Cubans are crossing some of the world's stormiest seas and clambering onto this rugged speck of an island belonging to Puerto Rico.
Forsaking the heavily patrolled Florida Straits, Cubans are increasingly reaching the U.S. by flying to the Dominican Republic and traveling about 40 miles by boat to Mona Island.
In fiscal year 2001, no more than five Cubans landed on Mona. But in the past nine months 579 have arrived, Jorge Diaz, a senior U.S. Customs and Border Protection agent, said Tuesday.
Under the general U.S. "wet-foot, dry-foot" policy, Cubans who reach U.S. soil get to stay, while those caught at sea are sent back. A Puerto Rican nature reserve inhabited by a few park rangers and lots of iguanas, Mona Island, like the rest of Puerto Rico, is as much a part of the U.S. as Miami is.
On a recent morning, U.S. Customs and Border Protection agents, accompanied by an Associated Press reporter and photographer, sailed 45 miles from mainland Puerto Rico to Mona to pick up two groups of Cubans. Approached from the east, among leaping dolphins, the 6.7 square-mile island looks forbidding, rising in sulfur-colored cliffs. But on the western side, facing the Dominican Republic, a white-sand beach beckons.
Eight Cubans sat at a picnic table under a palm tree, having spent 12 hours in a smuggler's open-air boat. Arriving just past midnight, they spent the rest of the night on mattresses provided by the island's rangers.
They said they were scared they would either drown or be caught by authorities during the journey.
"We prayed for 12 hours, aloud or silent, but we prayed," said Richard Echevarria, his green T-shirt shirt stiff with sweat and salt spray. Another boat carrying nine Cubans had arrived two days earlier.
The Cubans said they flew to the Dominican Republic on commercial airliners. Even accomplishing that step required patience and luck. To leave Cuba legally, Cubans must generally get a visa from the country they're going to visit, plus a letter of invitation from a citizen of that country. They then must seek an exit visa from the Cuban government, which is sometimes denied. The process can take months.
The Cubans - who couldn't simply fly from the Dominican Republic to the United States without a U.S. visa - then paid between $1,500 and $2,000 to be taken by boat to Mona. That's at least $12,000 total for one boatload.
Dominican people-smugglers are turning huge profits in this growing industry, and few are prosecuted.
"If they hear you speaking with a Cuban accent in Santo Domingo, someone is going to come up to you and offer to arrange the trip," said Jorge Bueno, one of the new arrivals. Another Cuban said he hadn't left the Dominican capital's airport before someone sidled up with an offer.
"It's very lucrative. It's better than trafficking drugs," Bueno remarked as he donned an orange life vest and settled into the back of the Customs boat.
Few migrants of other nationalities plying these seas show up at Mona, which sits about halfway between the Dominican Republic and Puerto Rico, because they know they'll be sent back. Instead, they try to make it all the way to Puerto Rico's western shores. About 600 have been arrested since October, most of them Dominicans, Diaz said.
The trip aboard low-slung boats called yolas is hazardous and many have died in the 80-mile-wide Mona Passage between the Dominican Republic and Puerto Rico, where the Atlantic collides with the Caribbean and is often stormy.
In November a federal judge in Puerto Rico sentenced five Dominicans to prison terms of 10 to 17 years. They were captured after their yola capsized with 93 Dominican migrants aboard. At least seven of them drowned.
It was a rare victory over the smugglers. About 80 suspects were arrested in the Dominican Republic in the first three months of this year but nearly all were released for lack of evidence, said Adm. Delfin Bautista, the commander of a Dominican naval unit that searches for the yolas. Migrants hoping to make the voyage again refuse to testify for fear of being blacklisted by smugglers. Bautista said smugglers are treated locally as heroes.
When a Coast Guard cutter intercepts a yola, the pilot pretends to be one of the migrants, said Petty Officer First Class Howard Sanchez, of the Coast Guard cutter Matinicus.
"You can't tell who the smuggler is, and none of the migrants will point him out to us," the Brooklyn native said.
After taking the migrants aboard, the Coast Guard sets the yola on fire or sinks it with machine gun fire.
As the Customs boat headed back to Puerto Rico, it leaped over 10-foot swells and smashed into cavernous troughs, drenching the 17 Cubans aboard in spray. One threw up.
"Imagine if you were out there in one of those yolas," Agent Art Morrell shouted over the roar of the engine.
Three hours later, the boat docked in Boqueron, southwest Puerto Rico. Carlos Alvarez, a butcher from Higuey, Cuba, combed his hair. Wearing a red tank top, he was the first to step off the boat.
There was no ceremony or celebration. The exhausted migrants said they just wanted to get to the U.S. mainland, mostly to Florida, where relatives awaited them.
For those without money, help comes from a group of women in San Juan who left Cuba decades ago and devote themselves to aiding their newly arrived compatriots. They give them clothes, put them up in a San Juan hotel and help pay their passage to the mainland.
The migrants were locked in Customs vans and driven to a processing center on a former U.S. Air Force base. The agents checked the migrants' Cuban IDs and fingerprinted and photographed them. The agents can detect the distinctive Cuban accent but generally don't contact Cuban authorities to verify the migrants really are Cuban or have a criminal record.
These newly arrived migrants were among the lucky ones.
Capt. James Tunstall, commander of Coast Guard operations in the eastern Caribbean, says the traffic should be stopped before it leads to "a catastrophic event ... when you have an overladen yola coming across with men, women and children in a sea that can become very rough very quickly."
Alvarez, the butcher, said he had planned to bring out his wife and daughter by the Mona route. But after seeing how dangerous it is, he expressed second thoughts.
"I wouldn't want to put them through that," he said.
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Nature's Fury
Israel warns NASA about double asteroids
By JUDY SIEGEL-ITZKOVICH
Jun. 27, 2006 0:38 | Updated Jun. 27, 2006 3:55
Israeli scientists have been invited to present important new research on "double asteroids" at a US National Aeronautics and Space Administration workshop in Colorado.
The paper, to be presented this week by Tel Aviv University researchers at the "NEO [Near-Earth Object] Detection and Threat Mitigation" workshop, discusses the discovery of a high incidence of double "Aten-type" asteroids and the danger of their potential collision with Earth.
TAU runs a national information center (supported by the Israel Space Agency and the Science and Technology Ministry) on near-Earth asteroids and comets that are liable to cause our planet harm. At the TAU Wise Observatory in Mitzpe Ramon, researchers monitor these celestial bodies and study the light coming from them.
As part of his doctoral work at TAU, David Polishook investigated Aten-type asteroids that transverse the Earth's orbit but most of the time are located between the Earth and the Sun so that they are difficult to observe.
Out of eight bodies investigated, five were found to be double - a main asteroid several kilometers in diameter and a smaller "moon" that revolves around it. These moons are apparently several hundred meters in diameter and located only a few kilometers from the asteroids they circle.
This discovery is important because the presence of the moon disrupts scientists' plans of eliminating the danger to Earth posed by double asteroids either by changing their orbit or destroying them in a nuclear explosion.
Following the presentation on the discovery by TAU researchers, NASA workshop organizers are to write a report for the US Congress on the subject. Since only American citizens are permitted to present their research in person, the Israeli scientists were asked to send their data as a "white paper" for discussion.
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Water damage shuts D.C. museums for July 4
AP
Fri Jun 30, 2006
WASHINGTON - Flood damage kept the National Museum of American History and the National Archives closed Friday at the start of the busy Independence Day holiday weekend.
The Museum of Natural History and the Smithsonian Visitors Center castle, also closed since Monday because of basement flooding, were to reopen, said Smithsonian spokesman Peter Golkin.
Some of the most severe damage to Washington's cultural attractions is at the National Archives, home to the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution and the Bill of Rights. The historic documents were all safe in a vault, officials said, but other documents were at risk of mildew damage, and crews were using giant dehumidifiers to try to protect them.
Grime stained the walls after flood waters rose to 8 feet in a two-year-old theater on Monday, knocking out the power. Clumps of debris, carpet and ceiling tiles remained Thursday.
"It's starting to smell like the bayou, isn't it?" facility manager Tim Edwards said.
The flood damage at the Archives was expected to cost at least $2 million to repair, but the Archives still planned to host its annual Fourth of July reading of the Declaration of Independence on Tuesday, and officials hoped to reopen the building later next week.
The Archives, which finished a $100 million renovation three years ago, typically has 5,000 visitors a day in June and July.
No Smithsonian museum exhibits were damaged by flood waters, Golkin said. Most damage was limited to mechanical equipment, but at the American history museum had flooding in the lower-level cafeteria and gift shop.
Carpeting and other fixtures need to be replaced before the building can reopen, Golkin said. It wasn't immediately clear how long that would take.
Comment: Just in time for the 4th of July! How symbolic...
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Six dead, nine missing after storms in northern Romania
AFP
Sat July 1, 2006
VIENNA - Six people are dead and nine missing after a strong storm hit northern Romania overnight, Suceava county prefect Orest Onofrei has said.
Four members of one family in the village of Arbore were carried away in seconds after a small river burst its banks, witnesses said.
"Our priority is to find those missing and to pick up the corpses of animals to prevent the spread of diseases," Agriculture Minister Gheorghe Flutur, who travelled to the area during the night, told journalists Saturday.
Several hundred houses were damaged, as well as a number of roads.
Only last week, floods in northern Romania killed 12 people died and another three were missing.
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Tornado flips truck on New York highway
AP
Fri Jun 30, 2006
CHEEKTOWAGA, N.Y. - A tornado touched down in a Buffalo suburb Friday afternoon, flipping a truck driving along the New York State Thruway and a construction trailer with a worker inside. No serious injuries were reported.
The funnel cloud was sighted at about 3 p.m. and left a path that was 3 miles long and 100 yards wide, said Steve McLaughlin, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service.
Witnesses described watching a tractor-trailer being tossed onto its side amid hail and heavy rains.
"It was very scary, no doubt about it," said Albert Nigro of Amherst, who said he was driving about 200 yards behind the westbound truck.
Cars behind the truck spun out, he said. A shaken witness called a television station and said his car was lifted from the Thruway and dropped into oncoming traffic.
The truck driver had minor injuries.
A construction trailer near the Thruway was tossed into a nearby road, slightly injuring a worker inside, police said. The storm also ripped off tree limbs, damaged store signs and downed power lines.
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N.M. community severely limits water use
By TIM KORTE
Associated Press
Sat July 1, 2006
LAS VEGAS, N.M. - The drought in this community is now so severe that water isn't provided with restaurant meals unless a diner requests it, and then it's served in a paper cup. Car washes operate only two days each week.
The hotel pools are empty, and long-term guests must ask if they want linens changed more than once every four days.
"I sleep, eat and drink with worries about how we're going to get through this," said Richard Trujillo, the city's utilities administrator. "When it hasn't snowed or rained, people will want to know, 'What are you doing to solve this?' "
As in much of the Southwest, the high desert lands of New Mexico are locked in another drought cycle this summer, with wildfires raging in tinder-dry forests. According to the National Weather Service, statewide precipitation for May was 36 percent of the normal amount - the seventh straight excessively dry month.
Santa Fe has received only 1.2 inches of precipitation during the seven-month period since November, the lowest in 133 years of record keeping. The 0.41 inches in Albuquerque is the lowest in 114 years of data.
And in Las Vegas, a community along the eastern edge of the Sangre de Cristo Mountains, the 60-month data show precipitation 18.71 inches below normal, according to Charlie Liles, meteorologist in charge of the Weather Service in Albuquerque.
"That's essentially a year's precipitation over a five-year period," Liles said.
As a result, Las Vegas has imposed some of New Mexico's most restrictive water rules. Outdoor watering has been banned since last fall, leaving lawns withering in once-lush neighborhoods.
Deborah Martinez, who has lived for 42 years in the stately Victorian home where she grew up, gave up her vegetable garden this year. Where her grass hasn't yellowed, it has blown away, and the morning glories that once grew on her fence are history.
She and her husband, William, can only watch as the roses and vines adorning their porch wither. They've even begun to share their bath water.
"We'd rather have survival water," Mrs. Martinez said as the two sat on a porch swing. "It's OK if everything dies, as long as we don't."
Las Vegas relies almost entirely on surface water. Melting snowpack and rainfall collects to form the Gallinas River, and 98 percent of the water for the town's 18,000 residents is stored in two reservoirs in the mountains above town. The river then trickles through the meadows of Las Vegas, barely ankle-deep and a few yards wide this summer.
"Through the '70s and '80s, you'd usually see spring runoff last into June," Trujillo recalled. "By the middle of July, we'd get into the monsoon season. There was always enough water. It was like clockwork."
But the clock seems broken. It wasn't a snowy winter this year. And as months pass without rain, city reserves have dropped to 50 percent of capacity - enough to last only into September unless monsoonal rains sweep across New Mexico as they usually do in July and August.
Liles said forecasting models suggest precipitation should be close to average in July and August, meaning the late-summer downpours may be coming.
But he offered a word of caution: The most recent years for poor snowpack in New Mexico were 2000 and 2002 - close together over the 56-year study span. Liles wonders whether those years might indicate a trend toward deepening drought.
Despite the water restrictions, Trujillo said there have been few complaints. Residents are consuming about 1.3 million gallons daily, compared with 2.8 million gallons during normal usage last year.
"Our citizens have been great," Trujillo said. "We've been working since 2000 to implement year-round awareness programs to help conserve water during the droughts, and the response has been outstanding."
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Katrina shocks New Orleans visitors 10 months on
By Peter Henderson
Reuters
Sun Jul 2, 2006
NEW ORLEANS - Bill Friend thought he was ready to go home again. He had read the newspapers, watched TV and talked with friends about the devastation wreaked on New Orleans by Hurricane Katrina.
Still, he was shocked.
"You go down street after street after street and see nothing -- wreckage," said Friend, 80, who grew up in New Orleans and now lives in the Washington area. "The overall impression of it is how much of it there is."
Katrina hit New Orleans on August 29, flooding 80 percent of the city and killing more than 1,500 from Louisiana in one of the worst natural disasters the country has seen. So far, only about half the population has returned and vast stretches of the city are nearly deserted and still full of debris.
"Ten months later, you come away with the impression that the cleanup is only beginning," said Friend's wife, Louise. "Oh my goodness, where does anyone start?"
For visitors new to New Orleans, the storm appears to have just passed.
Residents see changes every day -- a store opens, stoplights work at an intersection with temporary stop signs, a government trailer shows up in the front yard of a damaged home in a sign that it will be reclaimed and rebuilt.
But visitors see other things -- such as the word "Baghdad" scrawled in black spray paint across a broken house in the Lower Ninth Ward of New Orleans, where it has been for months.
There is the roughly 6-foot-high (2-meter) dirty bathtub ring around miles of houses in areas flooded for weeks.
And many houses remain barely standing, twisted by the force of the storm in areas where Katrina broke through levees and saturated the city with putrid water.
"The devastation, the totality and the enormity of it is just so heartbreaking. If this were hit in a carpet-bombing of a war you couldn't have more devastation," U.S. Sen. George Allen (news, bio, voting record) of Virginia said during a visit just over a week ago.
BEYOND THE FRENCH QUARTER
Many believe they have seen great progress when they arrive, since the tourist centers of the airport, the French Quarter and the Garden District of old mansions survived relatively well. The most historic sections of the city are on the highest ground.
Walter Dupart, 53, remembers when his son's father-in-law arrived. "He said, man, looks like New Orleans is coming back, and I kind of chuckled," Dupart said.
So they got in the car and began what has become the city's unofficial tour, viewing the Lower Ninth Ward, where a barge floated through a canal breach and houses still lie smashed.
The tour continued through St. Bernard Parish, which includes more than 10 miles of shopping malls, restaurants and houses, almost every one a deserted hulk that was flooded.
Up toward Lake Pontchartrain, where other levees breached, gutted houses await repair next to wrecks moved off their foundations. An ancient oak tree sprawled onto one yard and house does not appear to have been touched by cleanup crews.
Dupart, who lives in the once-flooded Gentilly neighborhood, remembers the reaction of his friend, a soldier on leave from Iraq. "'The only way I can describe it is this is like the war zone I just left,"' the visitor had said.
Some are puzzled, angry or indignant at the lack of progress. Insurance money has begun flowing but direct aid to homeowners is not expected before the fall, and views of government's leadership vary sharply among residents.
Thailand-based relief worker Tom Kerr recalled tsunami devastation in Aceh, Indonesia, when he saw the Ninth Ward. "It looked a lot like Aceh when we visited six months after the storm," he said, asking why the United States had not done more.
"Most of the area could be improved very quickly, but it is deserted," said Somsook Boonyabancha, a colleague who is director of the Thai relief group. "If I was the government, I couldn't sleep at night."
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800 evacuated from northern Saskatchewan
Last Updated Sun, 02 Jul 2006 23:32:34 EDT
CBC News
About 800 residents of northern Saskatchewan have been forced to leave their homes because of forest fires, and the forecast holds little hope of relief.
Dry conditions, hot temperatures and strong winds early in the week will make it even more difficult for firefighters, who already are facing more than 120 blazes. More than half the fires are in the La Ronge area, where the threatened communities are located.
A fire service spokesperson said Sunday that 33 helicopters, 17 air tankers and heavy equipment are fighting the fires.
About 400 residents of Sucker River went to La Ronge, and 400 from Stanley Mission and Grandmother's Bay were evacuated to Saskatoon.
Brian Hardlott, band councillor at Stanley Mission, said people were evacuated from the community over the weekend by bus and by float plane. People were assembled to be bussed out and then Saskatchewan Environment reported that the fire had crossed the road.
"That's why we had to call in float planes to get the people out," Hardlott said.
Those evacuated included elders and people with respiratory or other medical conditions, a provincial spokesperson said.
More than 800 people are helping fight the fires.
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26 dead after torrential rains in China's southwestern region
AFP
Fri Jun 30, 2006
BEIJING - Torrential rain in southwestern China that began on June 28 has killed at least 26 people in three provinces, state press has reported.
In Sichuan province at least 11 people were dead and dozens injured after storms began dumping rain on the region on Wednesday, Xinhua news agency said.
In Luzhou prefecture several towns and villages were inundated with up to 18.3 centimeters (7.3 inches) of rain, the report said.
Nine of the fatalities occurred in Gulin county where over 1,300 homes were demolished by the downpour and where damages were estimated at 76 million yuan (9 million dollars), the report said.
In neighboring Guizhou province nine people were confirmed dead, while more than 2,400 people were evacuated from areas where up to 14.8 centimeters of rain has fallen, the report said.
Meanwhile, Yunnan province reported that five people died and two were missing after rainstorms that began Wednesday pelted Zhenxiong county, the report added.
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Chaotic Times
Gunman shot dead after Portuguese celebrations
03/07/2006
A French Riviera resident, angry over raucous revelry following Portugal's World Cup win over England, was shot dead by police after he shot and wounded two Portugal fans.
The man, a 58-year-old postal worker, was responding to noise outside his apartment in Cap d'Ail, near Nice, after Saturday's match, said police officer Benoit Kandel.
He fired at two fans, a man and a woman. The man was hit in the head and was in critical condition last night, Kandel said. The woman was operated on yesterday for arm wounds.
After the shootings, police arrived at the man's door, he opened it and threatened them with a sword.
The officers responded by shooting him, Kandel said.
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Central Texas woman run off road, raped
Associated Press
June 30, 2006
GROESBECK, Texas - A Central Texas woman was recuperating at a Temple hospital after she reported being run off a rural road, kidnapped and then raped and beaten by her abductors, authorities said.
The 18-year-old woman was in stable condition Thursday following surgery. She had walked and crawled a half-mile to find help after her abductors left her for dead along a highway early Wednesday morning, authorities said.
"She spent more than two hours in hell," Limestone County Sheriff Dennis Wilson said.
Wilson said Javier Guzman Martinez, 17, and Noel Darwin Hernandez, 22, both of Mexia, had been arrested for the crime and were charged Thursday with aggravated assault and aggravated kidnapping.
The suspects began following the woman late Tuesday night as she left Mexia, about 40 miles east of Waco, where she was visiting friends, authorities said. The suspects did not know the woman.
The woman told investigators she was driving at about 2:30 a.m. Wednesday on a state highway toward her home in a Limestone County town when a car rammed her sport utility vehicle and forced her off the road, Wilson said.
The woman told investigators that the men forced her into their car, and then drove around rural county roads while they sexually assaulted, stabbed and beat her, Wilson said.
The woman said the men left her about a mile south of Coolidge in a ditch, where she pretended to be dead until they left, Wilson said. She then found help at a nearby trailer.
Dena Lincoln said the woman, covered in blood, came to her trailer door at about 4:30 a.m.
"I will never, as long as I live, get that look that was on her face out of my mind," Lincoln said. "She kept saying, 'I'm going to die. I'm going to die.' I told her, 'No, honey, you are going to be all right. We are going to get you some help.'"
The woman was flown by helicopter to a Temple hospital with numerous cuts and stab wounds, including an injury that endangered one eye, Wilson said.
Wilson said investigators canvassed the area on Wednesday with the description of the suspects given by the women.
Officers found Martinez at his Mexia residence. Wilson said he confessed to the incident and told officers of Hernandez's involvement. U.S. Marshall's tracked Hernandez to a Waco bus station, where he was arrested Wednesday night.
Martinez was being held in the Limestone County Jail while Hernandez was to be transferred to Limestone County from McLennan County, officials said. Wilson said both men are apparently in the United States illegally and will be held without bond on immigration charges. Hernandez is from Honduras, and Martinez is from Mexico, Wilson said.
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Officer and suspect die in Ga. shootout
By DANIEL YEE
Associated Press
Sat Jul 1, 2006
STONE MOUNTAIN, Ga. - A police officer was fatally wounded in a foot-chase-turned-shootout that also killed the man he was pursuing at a cluster of apartment buildings where many Hurricane Katrina victims were relocated.
DeKalb County police Detective Dennis Carmen Stepnowski, 33, died Thursday at a hospital.
Lucas D. Palmer, 25, was wanted in a February slaying in his hometown of Lacombe, La., said Capt. George Bonnett, spokesman for the St. Tammany Parish Sheriff's Office. Neighbors at the Atlanta-area apartment complex said Palmer fled Louisiana after Katrina and had gotten out of jail hours before the shootout.
Stepnowski and another officer were on patrol when they saw a man who seemed suspicious and chased him, police spokesman Sgt. Charles Dedrick said.
At some point during the chase, "shots were fired," Dedrick said, without elaborating on who fired first.
Police shot the man to death in a grassy area bordered by a playground between four apartment buildings.
Witnesses said they heard at least 10 shots in rapid succession.
Neighbor Torrey Gails, 16, said Stepnowski was shot a couple of times in the throat before another officer shot the man they were chasing. Neighbor Vaughn Smith said the men were shot a few feet apart from each other, separated by a cluster of oak trees.
Stepnowski, who was married, was a member of the police SWAT unit and had been with the department for 10 years, his colleagues said.
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Car plows into crowd at boat race; 11 hurt
AP
July 3, 2006
MADISON, Ind. - A car careened through a throng of speedboat racing fans gathered for a boat race, injuring 11 people and plunging 25 feet out into the Ohio River.
Police said four of the people were injured seriously in the accident Sunday afternoon at the Madison Regatta. There were no fatalities.
"I saw one young lady just frozen in her path, just standing at the water's edge and the car ran directly over the top of her," said David Edds, of Owensboro, Ky. "It was the most horrifying thing that I have ever seen."
The driver, Michael Bowen, 18, was taken to a hospital in Louisville, Ky., about 40 miles away, officials said. Police said Bowen was slumped over the steering wheel as the vehicle approached a crowd barrier along the riverfront. He was unconscious when he was pulled from the water, Madison Police Chief Bob Wolf said.
A juvenile passenger in the car also was hospitalized.
Police did not know what caused the accident, but said charges could be filed. A news conference was scheduled for Monday morning.
Police said the car drove through the crowd, hit a golf cart used by officials who ducked for cover and then went airborne.
Madison is in southeast Indiana, midway between Louisville and Cincinnati. The annual race for unlimited hydroplanes draws thousands of people to the riverside community of about 13,000 every Fourth of July weekend.
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Hong Kong pro-democracy march draws more than 20,000
by Stephanie Wong
AFP
Sat Jul 1, 2006
HONG KONG - More than 20,000 Hong Kong residents have taken to the streets to demand full democracy for the former British colony, on the ninth anniversary of its handover to China.
Carrying banners that read "Justice, Equality, Democracy, Hope", the protesters flooded out of the gates of Victoria Park in the city centre, bound for downtown government offices some three kilometres (two miles) away on Saturday.
To beating drums, they shouted "We Want Universal Suffrage" and waved colourful placards that read "When will we have a timetable for universal suffrage?"
Protesters representing teachers and other workers as well as anti-racism, animal rights and harbour protection groups were also at the rally.
Police estimated that the turnout was about 28,000, while organisers said 58,000 marched, more than last year's 20,000 people.
Amid fading calls for democracy nine years after the 1997 handover, activists hoped the appearance of retired deputy leader secretary Anson Chan would reignite their once-formidable campaign for universal suffrage.
Chan said that her highly-publicised decision to join the protest was not an act of defiance against the government she once served.
"Today I come to take part in the march in support of democracy but this doesn't mean we are trying to challenge the government," Chan said, flanked by pro-democracy legislators and surrounded by hoards of photographers and reporters.
Wearing a broad-brimmed hat to brave the scorching weather, she dismissed claims that the booming economy had reduced Hong Kongers' hunger for democracy.
"Although the economy has been good it doesn't mean we don't need democracy. I call for people to come out and support democracy," she said, marching with her children in front of a banner that read: "Democracy is Key to Harmony".
Chan was cheered and applauded by the public along the way but was also shouted abuse by an elderly woman which caused brief chaos.
At the march, wheelchair bound protester Xo Kam-mui criticised the Chinese government for its tight control on the territory.
"The Chinese government said they want to build a harmonious and stable society but how can we be prosperous if we aren't allowed to choose our own chief executives? We don't have confidence in the government," he said.
Kwan Chun-yu, 45, who came with his family of four, turned out to fight for what he said was basic human rights.
"This is our right to be able to elect our leaders. A lot of developed countries are allowed this but why should we have to fight for it like this every year?"
In response to Saturday's march, the pro-Beijing camp held a celebration earlier in the day that included performances by Hong Kong-based Chinese troops, cultural groups and local pop stars.
The traditional handover anniversary speech by the city's political leader, Donald Tsang, was interrupted by outspoken pro-democracy legislator Leung Kwok-hung.
Leung, nicknamed Long Hair for his waist-length tresses, was hustled out of the auditorium by police after he began shouting slogans during Tsang's address.
The pro-democracy rallies began in 2003 when more than 500,000 people protested over issues including a proposed anti-subversion law forced upon the city by China. The law was later shelved.
In 2004 hundreds of thousands again marched to push for democracy in the wake of a ruling by China that stymied calls for urgent reform of the electoral system.
The city's chief executive is chosen by an 800-strong, Beijing-backed panel and only half the 60 members of the legislative council are directly elected.
Chan's high-profile decision to run has rekindled speculation she could be preparing a leadership challenge next year to chief executive Tsang.
At the march, Chan did not rule herself in or out, only saying she will take one step at a time. If she runs she will have to counter Tsang's popularity and win over Beijing loyalists on the election panel.
With some 76 percent of the public saying they would back Tsang's re-election, democratic lawmaker Ronny Tong called for continuous support from the people for democracy.
"This shows our determination and commitment. If we don't come out, we might never see universal suffrage in our life time. We have to let the government know that we haven't given up," he said.
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Red Cross laptop with donor data stolen
AP
Sat Jul 1, 2006
DALLAS - A laptop containing personal information from thousands of blood donors - including Social Security numbers and medical information - was stolen from a local office of the American Red Cross, but officials said the information was encrypted.
The data included matching names and birth dates of donors from Texas and Oklahoma, as well as donors' sexual and disease histories.
"We haven't viewed this as a security breach at this point," Darren Irby, spokesman for the national American Red Cross office, told The Dallas Morning News for its Saturday editions.
The laptop was one of three stolen from a locked closet in the Farmers Branch office of the American Red Cross in May, but the two others did not contain the personal information. There was no sign of forced entry, said Red Cross spokeswoman Audrey Lundy.
Local officials alerted police and national Red Cross offices, Lundy said. Donors were not notified about the missing information, and the Red Cross had no legal obligation to do so.
The laptops disappeared on two separate occasions in May, according to police reports. They could have been gone as long as a week before being reported missing.
Gordon Bass, acting chief information security officer for the national Red Cross, said supervisors have their own user names and passwords. Access is time-and-date based, so information can be accessed only during blood drives or when new information is uploaded to a central database.
The Farmers Branch Red Cross also lost a laptop with encrypted donor information in June 2005, Lundy said, but she could provide no details on circumstances of that incident or any follow-up investigation.
Security in the Farmers Branch office was tightened after the most recent disappearances, Lundy said.
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Stolen laptop with veterans' data recovered
By Vicki Allen Thu
Reuters
Jun 29, 2006
WASHINGTON - A stolen laptop computer containing sensitive information on more than 26 million U.S. military veterans and service members has been recovered and a preliminary review indicated no data was taken, the FBI and Veterans Affairs Department said on Thursday.
The laptop and the external hard drive taken in early May from a VA employee's residence in suburban Washington were recovered, authorities said.
"A preliminary review of the equipment by computer forensic teams has determined that the data base remains intact and has not been accessed since it was stolen," the agencies said in a statement. "A thorough forensic examination is underway, and the results will be shared as soon as possible."
A person whom the FBI did not identify turned the laptop in to the agency's Baltimore office on Wednesday, officials and veterans organizations said.
FBI spokeswoman Michelle Crnkovich said that no charges were filed against that individual, and that she no information on where the laptop was between the time of the theft and when it was turned in.
The theft of the laptop from a VA employee who had brought it to his home in Aspen Hill, Maryland, raised fears that nearly all military personnel were at risk of identity theft. Authorities have said the theft as part of a routine burglary in which other items were taken.
BIPARTISAN BLAST
Lawmakers and veterans' advocates have voiced alarm that the government failed to safeguard the data that included
Social Security numbers and disability ratings that could be used in credit card fraud and other crimes.
Senate Veterans Affairs Committee Chairman Larry Craig, an Idaho Republican, said "we are all holding our breath now for the FBI forensic analysis which we hope will confirm that the data has not been compromised."
Republicans and Democrats had blasted the administration for allowing the data to be lost and for responding slowly to the theft. Officials have said VA Secretary Jim Nicholson was first told of the May 3 crime on May 16 and only informed the public on May 22, almost three weeks after the theft occurred.
Cost of the theft was piling up for taxpayers. The White House this week asked Congress for $160 million to offer credit monitoring to military personnel worried of possible identity theft.
The VA also was spending millions of dollars to respond to the incident, including setting up a special call center to address veterans' concerns.
Rep. Steve Buyer (news, bio, voting record), an Indiana Republican who chairs the House of Representatives Veterans Committee, said that even though he was heartened by the laptop's recovery, the "history of lenient policies and lack of accountability within VA management must be rectified."
Jim Mueller, commander-in-chief of the Veterans of Foreign Wars of the U.S., said those responsible for the data loss and those who knew about the theft but did not tell Nicholson for 13 days should be held accountable.
"The secretary must act swiftly and decisively if he is to restore America's trust in the VA," Mueller said.
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Money Matters
Study: Money Does Not Buy Much Happiness
Sara Goudarzi
LiveScience.com
Thu Jun 29, 2006
Your next raise might buy you a more lavish vacation, a better car, or a few extra bedrooms, but it's not likely to buy you much happiness.
Measuring the quality of people's daily lives via surveys, the results of a study published in the June 30 issue of journal Science reveals that income plays a rather insignificant role in day-to-day happiness.
Although most people imagine that if they had more money they could do more fun things and perhaps be happier, the reality seems to be that those with higher incomes tend to be tenser, and spend less time on simple leisurely activities.
Scaling bad mood
In 2004, the researchers developed a survey tool that measures people's quality of daily lives. Then they asked 909 employed women to record the previous day's activities and their feelings towards them.
The study focused on women because the researchers wanted to study a homogeneous group while the surveys were in the early developmental stages.
Recently, the researchers revisited the data from the 2004 and focused on correlating the amount of income with the percentage of time each participant reported as being in a bad mood each day.
It was expected that those who made less than $20,000 a year would spend 32 percent more of their time in a bad mood than those that had an annual income greater than $100,000.
In reality, the low-income group spent only 12 percent more time in a bad mood than their wealthier counterparts. This suggests that the link between income and mood has been perhaps overstated.
The researchers once again surveyed another group of women in 2005. In this study, participants not only recorded their overall satisfaction with life but a moment-to-moment account of their contentment.
The results showed that higher income had less of a correlation with momentary happiness than with overall life satisfaction.
"If people have high income, they think they should be satisfied and reflect that in their answers," said study team member Alan Krueger, an economist from Princeton University. "Income, however, matters very little for moment-to-moment experience."
More chores, less fun
Krueger and colleagues also looked at data from a Bureau of Labor Statistics survey to see how people in different income brackets spent their time.
What they found was that those with higher incomes had more chores and less fun.
They devoted more time to working, commuting, childcare, and shopping and were under more stress and tension than those in lower income brackets.
According to government statistics, men who make more than $100,000 a year spend 19.9 percent of their time on passive leisure activities such as watching television and socializing. Meanwhile, men whose annual income were less than $20,000 spent more than 34 percent of their time dedicated to passive leisure.
Although the correlation between income and life satisfaction is weak, people are highly motivated to increase their income. This illusion may lead to more time spent on activities like commuting while sacrificing time spent on socializing, something that people consider amongst the best moments of their daily life, the researchers said in the study.
The scientists are now conducting a national survey with both male and female sample groups.
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Budget impasse shuts down N.J. government
By TOM HESTER Jr.
Associated Press
Sat Jul 1, 2006
TRENTON, N.J. - Gov. Jon S. Corzine closed the state government Saturday amid a bitter dispute with fellow Democrats in the Assembly over his plan to increase the sales tax, threatening to shutter beaches, parks and possibly casinos in the coming days.
After Saturday's constitutional deadline to adopt a new balanced budget passed without agreement, Corzine signed an executive order just after 9:30 a.m., a grim climax to weeks of budget squabbling among Democrats who control state government but haven't been able to agree on a budget bill.
"It gives me no joy, no satisfaction, no sense of empowerment to do what I'm forced to do here," Corzine said.
Within minutes of Corzine signing the order, road construction projects were required to begin winding down. Motor vehicle offices planned to close at noon. About 45,000 state employees were immediately furloughed. State courts were closed for anything but emergencies.
State-run parks, beaches and historic sites were to be closed by Wednesday but were expected to remain open through the July Fourth holiday.
Services such as state police, prisons, mental hospitals and child welfare were to keep operating. The casinos could be forced to close because they require state monitoring, though the casino industry is challenging a possible closure in court.
A bid by Atlantic City's 12 casinos Friday to get state monitors declared "essential employees" who would stay on the job despite a government shutdown is now before an emergency appellate court panel, casino association lawyer John Kearney said Saturday.
The dispute centers on Corzine's determination to raise the state sales tax from 6 percent to 7 percent to help close a $4.5 billion budget deficit.
Corzine sees the increase as a vital step toward providing reliable annual revenue, but most Democrats in the Assembly - the lower house of the state Legislature - and several Senate Democrats say the plan is unnecessary.
Opponents have questioned the need for a sales tax increase, predicting voter backlash and demanding that any increase be reserved for property tax reform. No formal talks between Corzine and legislators were scheduled Saturday.
The shutdown marks the first time the state government has had to close because of a budget dispute.
"What's happening in the Statehouse is shameful," said Assembly Minority Leader Alex DeCroce, a Republican.
The state Constitution requires a balanced budget by July 1, but the deadline has been missed four times in five years. Nothing happened when deadlines were missed before, but the state never went past the morning of July 2 without an adopted budget. Without one, the state has no authority to spend money. The shutdown lasts until a budget agreement is signed.
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Trade envoy echos pessimism at WTO talks
PARIS, June 30, 2006 (AFP)
French junior trade minister Christine Lagarde said Friday she was pessimistic about the chances of reaching agreement at World Trade Organisation (WTO) talks this week in Geneva.
"This morning we are all rather pessimistic," Lagarde told LCI news television.
Using football metaphors, Lagarde said: "The Europeans are on the field," and were "waiting for balls and looking to play."
Emerging countries such as Brazil "are playing squarely on defense" while the United States "is totally out of the game."
"We are worried about positions on overtures being considered by the (EU) trade commissioner Peter Mandelson," she added.
Mandelson had said Thursday that the European Union's position was not entrenched and that the 25-nation EU and was willing to approach that of the G20 group of emerging countries.
His spokesman Peter Power nonetheless said later Thursday: "It is extremely unlikely to have an agreement this weekend."
Talks were still scheduled to go ahead on Friday in an effort to break the enduring deadlock over the mathematics for cutting trade barriers such as subsidies and customs duties.
The WTO gathering is part of a timetable agreed at a conference in Hong Kong last year, which was meant to steer the Doha Round to a conclusion by December 2006.
The round, which aims to harness trade liberalisation to boost the economies of developing countries, was launched in the Qatari capital in 2001 and was originally meant to end in 2004.
On Thursday, Power told AFP: "The positions are too far apart in the G6," in reference to a grouping of WTO heavyweights, the EU, Australia, Brazil, Japan, India and the United States.
Top officials from the G6 had gathered Thursday evening ahead of wider talks expected to last several days at the Geneva base of the 149-nation WTO.
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Chavez urges Africa to unite against US
China Daily
2006-07-02
Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez called on Africa on Saturday to forge closer ties with Latin America to combat what he called a threat of US hegemony.
Chavez, whose repeated criticism of America has raised hackles in Washington, called on an African Union summit to cooperate with Latin America in everything from oil production to university education to counter "colonial" meddling in developing nations.
Citing the example of Venezuela and Bolivia, he urged Africa to seize greater control of its energy resources. He described the low royalty payments made by some foreign oil companies as "robbery."
"We should march together, Africa and Latin America, brother continents with the same roots ... Only together can we change the direction of the world," he told the opening day of the AU summit, to applause.
"The world is threatened by the hegemony of the North American empire," said the former paratrooper, following speeches from African leaders which had criticized colonialism.
Africa's abundant natural resources -- ranging from precious metals to iron ore and oil -- should make it a wealthy continent if it were freed from outside exploitation, Chavez said.
"Africa has everything to become a pole of world power in the 21st century. Latin America and the Caribbean are equipped to become another pole," he said.
In a nod to another outspoken opponent of US foreign policy, Chavez hailed Iran's right to develop nuclear technology for peaceful purposes.
Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is also attending the summit in the Gambian capital Banjul.
The Venezuelan leader called for a commission to evaluate joint energy projects between Africa and Latin America, as well as a media venture dubbed Telesur (TeleSouth) and a joint bank Banco del Sur (Bank of the South).
"In Venezuela, we were tired of all our oil going to Count Dracula," said Chavez, referring his government's decision to raise taxes on US oil companies. "Now Venezuela is free and we have recovered control over our oil."
Venezuela is the world's fifth largest oil exporter.
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Airline passengers in France face new tax to help world's poor
AFP
July 02, 2006
Passengers boarding planes in France are now paying a new tax on their tickets to help the world's poor, after the measure came into effect on the weekend.
The tax, championed by President Jacques Chirac and backed by UN Secretary General Kofi Annan, adds a surcharge of between one and 40 euros (1.25 and 50 dollars) depending on the destination and class of seat.
Money raised is to go to an international fund to buy treatments for AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria.
A number of countries -- Brazil, Chile, Cyprus, Congo, Gabon, Ivory Coast, Jordan, Luxembourg, Madagascar, Mauritius, Nicaragua and Norway -- have all signed on to the initiative, and France hopes others will follow suit.
The United States, Canada and Germany, though, oppose the levy, and several airlines have complained that it will simply add to the cost of air travel at a time of high fuel prices.
The money from the tax on flights from France is expected to generate 200 million euros a year for an International Drug Purchase Facility, also known as Unitaid.
The fund will be used to bulk-buy medicines for countries -- mainly in Africa -- that cannot afford them.
Under the measure, passengers flying out of French airports will pay one euro in economy class, and 10 euros in business, if their destination is in the EU. For flights outside Europe, the surcharges are between four and 40 euros, depending on the class.
Passengers who make a stopover in France of less than 12 hours, or who stay longer because of delays, are exempt.
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Pennies may soon be a thing of the past
By JEFF DONN
Associated Press
Sun Jul 2, 2006
PLYMOUTH, Mass. - In this village settled by thrifty Pilgrims, you can still buy penny candy for a penny, but tourist Alan Ferguson doubts he'll be able to dig any 1-cent pieces out of his pockets.
He rarely carries pennies because "they take up a lot of room for how much value they have." Instead, like so many other Americans, he dumps his pennies into a bucket back home in Sarasota, Fla.
Pity the poor penny!
It packs so little value that merry kids chuck pennies into the fountain near the candy store, just to watch them splash and sink. Stray pennies turn up everywhere: in streets, cars, sofas, beaches, even landfills with the rest of the garbage.
A penny bought a loaf of bread in early America, but it's a loafer of a coin in an age of inflation and affluence, slowly sliding into monetary obsolescence.
For the first time, the U.S. Mint has said pennies are costing more than 1 cent to make this year, thanks to higher metal prices. "The penny is going to disappear soon unless something changes in the economics of commodities," says Robert Hoge, an expert on North American coins at The American Numismatic Society.
That very idea of spending 1.2 cents to put 1 cent into play strikes many people as "faintly ridiculous," says Jeff Gore, of Elkton, Md., founder of a little group called Citizens for Retiring the Penny.
And yet, while its profile of Abe Lincoln marks time in the bottom of drawers and ashtrays, the penny somehow carries a reassuring symbolism that Americans hesitate to forsake.
"It's part of their past, so they want to keep it in their future," says Dave Harper, editor of Numismatic News.
Gallup polling has shown that two-thirds of Americans want to keep the penny coin. There's even a pro-penny lobby called Americans for Common Cents.
The Mint's announcement is a milestone, though, because coins have historically cost less to produce than the face value paid by receiving banks. They are moneymakers for the government.
U.S. Rep. Jim Kolbe (news, bio, voting record), of Arizona, wants to keep it that way. But when he asked Congress to phase out the penny five years ago he failed; he intends to try again this year. If he fails again, he joked recently, he may open a business melting down pennies to resell the metal.
The idea of a penniless society began to gain currency in 1989 with a bill in Congress to round off purchases to the nearest nickel. It was dropped, but the
General Accounting Office in a 1996 report unceremoniously acknowledged that some people consider the penny a "nuisance coin."
In 2002, Gallup polling found that 58 percent of Americans stash pennies in piggy banks, jars, drawers and the like, instead of spending them like other coins. Some people eventually redeem them at banks or coin-counting machines, but 2 percent admit to just plain throwing pennies out!
"Today it's a joke. It's outlived its usefulness," says Tony Terranova, a New York City coin dealer who paid $437,000 for a 1792 penny prototype in what is believed to be the denomination's highest auction price.
"Most people find them annoying when they get them in change," he adds. "I've seen people get pennies in change and actually throw them on the floor."
Not Edmond Knowles, of Flomaton, Ala.
No, he hoarded pennies for nearly four decades as a hobby. He ended up with more than 1.3 million of them - 4.5 tons - in several drums in his garage. His bank refused to take them all at once, but he finally found a coin-counting company, Coinstar, that wanted the publicity.
In the biggest known penny cash-in ever, they sent an armored truck last year, loaded his pennies, and then watched helplessly as it sank into the mud in his yard. They needed a tow truck to redeem it. "I still got a few ruts in the yard," says Knowles.
His years of collecting brought him about $1 a day - $13,084.59 in all.
A penny saved was a penny earned for Knowles, but he took another lesson from the experience, too: "I don't save pennies anymore. It's too big a problem getting rid of them."
Another problem: deciding what to make the penny from. Copper, bronze and zinc have been used, even steel in 1943 when copper was desperately needed for the World War II effort. In 1982, zinc replaced most of the penny's copper to save money, but rising zinc prices are now bedeviling the penny again.
"I'm very surprised they haven't gone to plastic," muses Bill Johnson, a wheat-penny collector who owns the Plimoth Candy Co. (It uses an old spelling of Plymouth.)
Even in his shop where a penny still buys a Tootsie Roll, he leaves a few pennies scattered on top of the cash register for customers like Lindsay Taylor, of Westwood, who is buying $1.78 worth of candy.
She is carrying no pennies because her sons have taken them for their old-fashioned piggy banks, which automatically flip coins inside. Her 2-year-old, she says, "just loves pushing the button."
Others have their own reasons for valuing the humble coin, which borrowed its colloquial name from British currency. The "cent" - meaning 1 percent of a dollar - has been struck every year except 1815, when the United States ran out of British-made penny blanks in the wake of the War of 1812.
"It's part of the fabric of American culture," says David Early, a spokesman for the government's Lincoln Bicentennial Commission.
The penny took on the profile of President Lincoln, beloved as the Union's savior during the Civil War, on the centennial of his birth in 1909. The first ones carried ears of wheat on the tails side, but the Lincoln memorial has replaced those. Four new tails designs with themes from Lincoln's life are planned for 2009, with a fifth permanent one afterward to summarize his legacy.
This redesign, the first major one since 1959, has heartened penny lovers.
Those who want to keep the penny coin include small merchants who prefer cash transactions, contractors who help supply pennies, and consumer advocates who fear rounding up of purchases.
"We think the penny is important as a hedge to inflation," says director Mark Weller of Americans for Common Cents. "Any time you have more accurate pricing, consumers benefit."
Joining with the lobby, the wireless network Virgin Mobile USA recently launched a save-the-penny campaign. Its penny truck will travel cross-country to gather pennies for charity.
Scores of charities esteem the penny, which many Americans donate without a second thought. Like shouts in a playground, pennies can multiply quickly.
"People don't like carrying them around, so we dump them into the nearest bowl," says Teddy Gross, who founded the Penny Harvest charity drive in New York City schools. "By the end of any given year, most Americans have got a stash of capital which is practically useless, but it's within easy reach of a young person."
Last year, his children raked in 55 million pennies, which had to be redeemed with help from the Brink's security company. They also bagged about 200,000 spare nickels.
By the way, the Mint says nickels are also costing more to produce than they're worth. Pity the poor nickel?
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UK News
Britons tire of cruel, vulgar US: poll
AFP
Sun Jul 2, 2006
LONDON - People in Britain view the United States as a vulgar, crime-ridden society obsessed with money and led by an incompetent president whose Iraq policy is failing, according to a newspaper poll.
The United States is no longer a symbol of hope to Britain and the British no longer have confidence in their transatlantic cousins to lead global affairs, according to the poll published in The Daily Telegraph.
The YouGov poll found that 77 percent of respondents disagreed with the statement that the US is "a beacon of hope for the world".
As Americans prepared to celebrate the 230th anniversary of their independence on Tuesday, the poll found that only 12 percent of Britons trust them to act wisely on the global stage. This is half the number who had faith in the Vietnam-scarred White House of 1975.
A massive 83 percent of those questioned said that the United States doesn't care what the rest of the world thinks.
With much of the worst criticism aimed at the US adminstration, the poll showed that 70 percent of Britons like Americans a lot or a little.
US President George W. Bush fared significantly worse, with just one percent rating him a "great leader" against 77 percent who deemed him a "pretty poor" or "terrible" leader.
More than two-thirds who offered an opinion said America is essentially an imperial power seeking world domination. And 81 per cent of those who took a view said President George W Bush hypocritically championed democracy as a cover for the pursuit of American self-interests.
US policy in Iraq was similarly derided, with only 24 percent saying they felt that the US military action there was helping to bring democracy to the country.
A spokesman for the American embassy said that the poll's findings were contradicted by its own surveys.
"We question the judgment of anyone who asserts the world would be a better place with Saddam still terrorizing his own nation and threatening people well beyond Iraq's borders," the paper quoted the unnamed spokesman as saying.
"With respect to the poll's assertions about American society, we bear some of the blame for not successfully communicating America's extraordinary dynamism.
"But frankly, so do you (the British press)."
In answer to other questions, a majority of the Britons questions described Americans as uncaring, divided by class, awash in violent crime, vulgar, preoccupied with money, ignorant of the outside world, racially divided, uncultured and in the most overwhelming result (90 percent of respondents) dominated by big business.
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We face defeat in Afghanistan, Army chiefs warn Blair
Monday July 03, 2006 (0941 PST)
KABUL: Army chiefs have warned Tony Blair that British forces face defeat in Afghanistan unless more troops and equipment are sent out immediately, it has been claimed.
According to a senior military source, Army top brass have told the Government there is a possibility of failure in Afghanistan, where British soldiers have met significant resistance from the Taliban forces defeated by the US-Anglo invasion five years ago.
The source said that officers at the Services' Permanent Joint Headquarters at Northwood, North London, run by Major General Nick Houghton, had told Ministers that 'strategic failure' - military jargon for defeat - could not be ruled out.
The report comes amid growing pressure on Defence Secretary Des Browne to reinforce the 3,300-strong contingent of British troops in Afghanistan, where two Special Forces soldiers were killed last week after fighting with the Taliban.
Conservative frontbencher Patrick Mercer said: 'This has turned into a shooting war and our forces do not have the firepower to deal with it.
Army chiefs have told Mr Blair they urgently need more soldiers on the ground, extra artillery, more helicopters to ensure that wounded soldiers can be airlifted to medical centres, and GR7 Harriers to attack Taliban bases.
'The British forces are having difficulty in coping,' a military source said. 'They were sent in there as peacekeepers and now find themselves in what is, in all but name, another war.
'They cannot get proper supplies and if men are injured, it is proving difficult to fly them out of the danger zone. That cannot go on.'
Extra resources
Both Lieutenant General David Richards, commander of the Nato force in Afghanistan, and General Sir Mike Jackson, Chief of the General Staff, are calling for extra resources.
When British forces were switched to Afghanistan from Iraq last year in a deal with America, former Defence Secretary John Reid said their main task would be peacekeeping. But they were soon taking on insurgents determined to bring down the democratic government of Afghanistan elected after the Taliban regime was toppled.
The British force was sent to Helmand Province, the Taliban stronghold, and is now involved in daily battles with its guerrillas. The resurgence in the Taliban has taken Britain and America by surprise.
In spite of several victories against Taliban fighters, the British force has been hampered by other problems. Because of the size of the area for which they are responsible, they have to fly troops to the front line to avoid Taliban forces attacking long-distance lorry convoys almost at will.
In an added complication, the Chinook helicopters they rely on are unable to operate in the intense heat of the Afghan summer.
Ministry of Defence aides say there is irritation in Downing Street that Spain and Germany, both with troops in safer parts of Afghanistan, are reluctant to divert forces to relieve the British contingent.
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Two British soldiers killed as Afghan poppy crop booms
By Tom Coghlan in Kabul and Kandhar
03 July 2006
Two more British soldiers have died in Afghanistan, as Western officials in the country have admitted that the country is to produce its largest ever poppy harvest.
The deaths, the fourth and fifth in three weeks, come as Western military commanders and counter-narcotics officials appear increasingly at odds over how to approach the drugs problem in the south of the country. Military officers are fearful the $1bn (£540m) a year campaign to eradicate the drug is helping pull in recruits for the Taliban.
"The trends indicate that the area of cultivation will be considerably higher than in 2004," said a representative of the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, which will publish its annual report of the Afghan opium harvest next month.
In 2004, about 130,000 hectares of opium poppy was cultivated, which has been the largest so far, despite poor growing conditions that year. Better conditions across the country this year will help produce the largest tonnage of opium ever. But Afghanistan is already responsible for about 87 per cent of the world's opium and more than 90 per cent of the heroin consumed in Britain.
Hamid Karzai, the President, and his government announced last year a
jihad on poppy production, backed by a near-$1bn campaign, led by the UK. It led to a fall by 21 per cent drop in the area under cultivation. Those gains have now been wiped out.
One Western official, who declined to be named, predicted a considerable rise, but not as extreme as that predicted by the UNODC. "The evidence collected so far indicates that the harvest will be significantly up on 2005 and perhaps around the 130,000hectare mark."
About one-third of this year's harvest has come from Helmand, where 3,300 British troops are heavily engaged against Taliban guerrillas. British troops have fought firefights with them almost every day for the past week in the north of the province.
Some military commanders argue that eradication operations in the south should be suspended for a year or more. "We may have to say to the farmer we are not yet ready to provide an alternative livelihood," a Nato officer told The Independent. "There may have to be a period of grace where we say that by a certain time frame there can be no more poppy cultivation and at that point we will eradicate your poppy."
The officer said that such an approach would give Western forces the "moral high ground" against the Taliban's ongoing campaign to present itself as the defender of poppy farmers, a campaign which has had considerable effect in Helmand this year.
Another Western official said that "full and frank" exchanges were ongoing between military commanders and counter-narcotics officials over the issue of eradication. Counter-narcotics officials contend that a suspension of eradication, and removal of any punitive measures would only produce a further surge in poppy production. They argue this would help to fund elements with a vested interest in maintaining the current instability; instability that has killed more than 1,600 people in the first six months of this year.
The drugs economy is valued at $2.7bn, equivalent to more than 50 per cent of Afghanistan's legal economy. By contrast the government managed to generate legal revenues, outside of foreign aid, of only $330m last year. With most government officials on salaries of about $50 a month and a cost of living that is artificially inflated largely by the drugs economy, corruption is endemic.
Farmers in the south claim that in the absence of any other economic activity, poppy cultivation and high wages paid by the Taliban to fight for them offer the only sources of income to huge numbers of unemployed young men. Poppy cultivation, they say, is the only means of wealth creation without capital.
"If you cultivate poppy the smugglers pay you in advance, so you don't need any money to buy the seed or fertiliser," Haji Mohammad Sarwar, 45, an elder in the Punjwai district of Kandhar province, told The Independent. "You can make enough to buy some land. Five jiribs [1 hectare] of poppy is $5,000 profit even after the costs of labour and fertilizer."
Shamsuddin Tanwir, of Afghanistan's Independent Human Rights Commission in Kandahar, said: "In Taliban-held areas everyone cultivates poppy. They do not get any problems so they prefer Taliban."
Amid the general gloom, Western officials stress the long-term nature of the war on drugs and the several positive signs amongst this year's early findings. In the east of the country, where a 96 per cent drop in poppy cultivation was recorded last year, officials feared a large resurgence after unrealistic expectations of Western aid on the part of poppy farmers were not met. That resurgence was much smaller than feared and Nangahar province remains largely drug free.
Western officials also point to improvements in governance. Reforms of the police force have seen police chiefs, known to be capable and not corrupt, installed in a number of provinces in the south, including Helmand.
The new police chief in Helmand replaces a man who was named in leaked US intelligence documents as running heroin shipments in police vehicles. But there are still widespread claims that figures high in the government control the drugs trade, including allegations against President Karzai's brother Ahmed Wali Karzai, who is head of the provincial council for Kandahar province.
"There is no evidence for this claim," he told The Independent. "When people want to attack the President they say these things about me. It is like the spice on a dish." In Washington there is increasing pressure for a more radical approach to the drugs problem with the threat of aerial eradication being held up as the ultimate sanction if the softer methods favoured by the British and Afghan governments don't work.
Western sources have said that US counter-narcotics teams are exploring the possibility of using a form of Agent Orange, a defoliant that become notorious for turning large parts of south Vietnam into a lunar landscape during the Vietnam War. One Western official said: "Aerial spraying will definitely not be used as part of the poppy eradication for 2007, period. But if a decrease in poppy cultivation is not achieved soon it is something that will increasingly be brought to the front for consideration."
The official stressed that any aerial spraying would only be undertaken with Afghan consent.
The United Nations remains completely opposed to such a move. "We really hope that all relevant parties and stakeholders will see that aerial spraying will contribute to the conflict and will play into the hands of the insurgents, and based on this insight will not start this measure at all," said a representative of UNODC.
Farmers from Kakhrez, near the town of Musa Qala in north Helmand, told The Independent this month that helicopters dropped an unknown substance during April on to their fields:
"It was in Boom village," said Lal Mohammed. "The helicopters were heard overhead in the night. A white powder was on the plants in the morning. There were red and yellow spots on the trees. Eight jiribs of poppy (1.6 hectares) were affected. I saw the plants, they grew very small, they didn't bloom and they dried out." Western Counter-Narcotics officials denied the claim. Similar claims were made in Jalalabad in December 2004. They were never substantiated.
Two more British soldiers have died in Afghanistan, as Western officials in the country have admitted that the country is to produce its largest ever poppy harvest.
The deaths, the fourth and fifth in three weeks, come as Western military commanders and counter-narcotics officials appear increasingly at odds over how to approach the drugs problem in the south of the country. Military officers are fearful the $1bn (£540m) a year campaign to eradicate the drug is helping pull in recruits for the Taliban.
"The trends indicate that the area of cultivation will be considerably higher than in 2004," said a representative of the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, which will publish its annual report of the Afghan opium harvest next month.
In 2004, about 130,000 hectares of opium poppy was cultivated, which has been the largest so far, despite poor growing conditions that year. Better conditions across the country this year will help produce the largest tonnage of opium ever. But Afghanistan is already responsible for about 87 per cent of the world's opium and more than 90 per cent of the heroin consumed in Britain.
Hamid Karzai, the President, and his government announced last year a
jihad on poppy production, backed by a near-$1bn campaign, led by the UK. It led to a fall by 21 per cent drop in the area under cultivation. Those gains have now been wiped out.
One Western official, who declined to be named, predicted a considerable rise, but not as extreme as that predicted by the UNODC. "The evidence collected so far indicates that the harvest will be significantly up on 2005 and perhaps around the 130,000hectare mark."
About one-third of this year's harvest has come from Helmand, where 3,300 British troops are heavily engaged against Taliban guerrillas. British troops have fought firefights with them almost every day for the past week in the north of the province.
Some military commanders argue that eradication operations in the south should be suspended for a year or more. "We may have to say to the farmer we are not yet ready to provide an alternative livelihood," a Nato officer told The Independent. "There may have to be a period of grace where we say that by a certain time frame there can be no more poppy cultivation and at that point we will eradicate your poppy."
The officer said that such an approach would give Western forces the "moral high ground" against the Taliban's ongoing campaign to present itself as the defender of poppy farmers, a campaign which has had considerable effect in Helmand this year.
Another Western official said that "full and frank" exchanges were ongoing between military commanders and counter-narcotics officials over the issue of eradication. Counter-narcotics officials contend that a suspension of eradication, and removal of any punitive measures would only produce a further surge in poppy production. They argue this would help to fund elements with a vested interest in maintaining the current instability; instability that has killed more than 1,600 people in the first six months of this year.
The drugs economy is valued at $2.7bn, equivalent to more than 50 per cent of Afghanistan's legal economy. By contrast the government managed to generate legal revenues, outside of foreign aid, of only $330m last year. With most government officials on salaries of about $50 a month and a cost of living that is artificially inflated largely by the drugs economy, corruption is endemic.
Farmers in the south claim that in the absence of any other economic activity, poppy cultivation and high wages paid by the Taliban to fight for them offer the only sources of income to huge numbers of unemployed young men. Poppy cultivation, they say, is the only means of wealth creation without capital.
"If you cultivate poppy the smugglers pay you in advance, so you don't need any money to buy the seed or fertiliser," Haji Mohammad Sarwar, 45, an elder in the Punjwai district of Kandhar province, told The Independent. "You can make enough to buy some land. Five jiribs [1 hectare] of poppy is $5,000 profit even after the costs of labour and fertilizer."
Comment: Under the taliban, opium production was all but extinguished, now, under new free and democratic Afghanistan, it is booming, which is just one of the payoffs for the CIA from the Afghanistan invasion.
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For Your Health
Holocaust Survivors at Higher Long-Term Cancer Risk
By Alan Mozes
HealthDay Reporter
Fri Jun 30, 2006
FRIDAY -- A new study finds that rates of cancer and cancer-related death are especially high among survivors of the Holocaust in Israel.
An Israeli research team found that Holocaust survivors who emigrated from Europe to Israel following World War II are at higher risk for cancer compared to European Jews who moved there before the war began.
Much of the difference can be attributed to cancers found among the youngest Holocaust survivors. Specifically, male and female immigrants born in Europe between 1940 and 1945 faced the highest odds of developing breast or colorectal cancers, the researchers found.
While the findings may have implications for survivors of mass atrocities in general, they are of immediate concern to the 238,600 Holocaust survivors still living in Israel, said study co-author Dr. Micha Barchana.
"The bad news is that Holocaust survivors are at a higher risk to get cancer, but the good news is that we can do something [about it]," he said. "We are focusing on the practical implementation of the research results: the need for survivors to participate in early-detection programs that are offered in Israel as well as in most modern countries, due to the finding that classifies them as a high-risk population," he explained.
Barchana serves as the director of the National Cancer Registry in the Israeli Health Ministry and is also a senior lecturer in the school of public health at the University of Haifa in Israel.
He and his colleagues presented their research earlier this year at the International Agency for Research on Cancer, held in Lyon, France. The work was funded by the Israel Cancer Society.
Barchana's team reviewed records from the Israeli government's Central Bureau of Statistics to first draft a list of all Jewish immigrants to Israel born in Europe between 1920 and 1945.
They then turned to the Israeli Health Ministry's National Cancer Registry to compile cancer incidence and death rates among these immigrants.
The researchers found that those immigrants born between 1920 and 1945 who came to Israel between the end World War II and 1989 were at significantly higher risk for cancer than immigrants born between 1920 and 1939 who migrated to Israel before the onset of World War II.
Barchana said his team does not know how many of the post-war European immigrants suffered through the experience of Nazi concentration camps or wartime Jewish ghettos. However, he said his team assumed that many or most did, and that, in any case, "all the Jews in Europe at war time had gone through severe food deprivation and other stresses."
Higher cancer risks seemed to linger for decades for this group, the researchers found. Male Holocaust survivors experienced a 14 percent higher cancer incidence rate than pre-war immigrants and were 2.4 times more likely to get cancer than their pre-war compatriots.
Female Holocaust survivors had a 21 percent higher rate of cancer than pre-war immigrants and were 2.3 times more likely to have a cancer diagnosis than pre-war immigrants.
Breaking down cancer incidence by specific diseases, the authors found that Holocaust survivors were at a significantly higher risk for lung cancer, Kaposi's sarcoma (a rare form of skin malignancy), and prostate cancer.
Heightened risks for certain other cancers stood out. For example, male Holocaust survivors were nine times more likely to be diagnosed with cancer of the large intestine than pre-war immigrants. Female Holocaust survivors faced more than double the risk for cancer of the large intestine and a 50 percent higher risk of developing breast cancer, the study found.
In addition, Barchana's team found that the younger the Holocaust survivor was during the war, the greater their risk for getting cancer. In fact, most of the increase in risk among Holocaust survivors was borne by those who were 14 years of age or younger during World War II.
Barchana said that finding has been shown in other studies involving survivors of terrible events. "Research on A-bomb survivors in Japan clearly shows that women that were at a young age are at higher risk of developing cancer later in life," he said. Similar data is emerging among those affected by the Chernobyl nuclear plant accident, Barchana added.
Patients who had survived the Holocaust also had a tougher battle to fight off the disease once it was diagnosed, the researchers found. According to Barchana, that may be due to the fact that "Holocaust survivors are being diagnosed at later stages compared to the control group."
Five-year cancer survival rates were 5 percent to 13 percent lower among Holocaust survivors compared to other immigrants, regardless of sex or age.
Comment: Those people exposed to high levels of radiation in Hiroshima or after the Chernobyl accident would understandably be at increased risk for developing cancer. Holocaust survivors weren't generally exposed to large doses of such radiation. The only explanation given in this article for higher cancer rates among Holocaust survivors is lack of proper nutrition and "other stresses". Well, what stresses, exactly? It seems that knowing exactly what causes Holocaust survivors' cancer would be a priority, especially since their cancer rates have been compared to those involved in nuclear attacks and accidents.
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Hospital has 6 sets of twins in 32 hours
AP
Fri Jun 30, 2006
LANSING, Mich. - It all began with Chastity Keeler, who delivered twin boys. Keeler gave birth at 9:05 a.m. and 9:06 a.m. Tuesday. Over the next 32 hours, five more mothers gave birth to twins at Lansing's Sparrow Hospital.
Sparrow nurses, doctors and officials think that's probably a record for the hospital.
"We have a number of experienced nurses, and it's the first time within their collective memory that we've had six sets of twins born in such close proximity," Sparrow spokeswoman Nan Simons told the Lansing State Journal for a story Friday.
Keeler, of Jackson, said it's a story she'll tell her sons, Nick and Ty, as they grow up.
"That was an extraordinary couple of days, and they were part of it," Keeler said. "They will forever be known in Sparrow history, and that's kind of cool."
Five sets of the twins were boys. The other two infants were girls.
"It's fun for Sparrow to mark a record like this," Simons said. "Six sets of twins: That's a lot of babies."
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Witchcraft ban ends in Zimbabwe
Sunday, 2 July 2006, 23:31 GMT 00:31 UK
Zimbabwe has unbanned the practice of witchcraft, repealing legislation dating back to colonial rule.
From July the government acknowledges that supernatural powers exists - but prohibits the use of magic to cause someone harm.
In 1899, colonial settlers made it a crime to accuse someone of being a witch or wizard - wary of the witch hunts in Europe a few centuries earlier which saw many people burned at the stake after such accusations.
But to most Zimbabweans, especially those who grew up in the rural areas, it has been absurd to say that the supernatural does not exist.
In fact, it is not hard to find vivid stories about the use of magic.
Alfred, for example, believes that he was bewitched at work some years ago, making him partly bald.
He described how after supper one evening as he and his wife were retiring to bed his hair disappeared.
"When my wife came into the bedroom she look at me and said, 'What happened to your hair? Where's it gone?'
"She saw a bald patch from the forehead going back on the side of the head. There was no trace of it," he says.
He spent seven months visiting traditional healers to make it grow back.
"She made some incisions round the bald patch, put some powdery muti (medicine) and lo and behold within a few day the hair had grown."
Fetishes
There are many other accounts of the use of magic, and the new law effectively legitimises many practices of traditional healers.
These include rolling bones to foretell the future, divination, attempts to communicate with the dead, using muti - traditional powders and fetishes - to ensure the desired sex of a child.
But there will be some legal grey areas, like whether it is legal for a husband to place some charms in his bedroom - charms that may injure his wife if she is unfaithful.
Professor Claude Mararikei - a sociologist and the chairman of Zimbabwe's Traditional Medical Practitioner's Council - argues that witchcraft has some positive benefits in the modern world.
He cites the example of a man who stole some bewitched cement that became stuck to the thief's shoulders so he could not remove the bag.
"So if you have that knowledge to capture a thief in a cattle kraal when he comes for the cows, well and good. It's like electrifying the fence round your house," he says.
'Waste of time'
Others believe that the country would be better off without elevating the supernatural.
"I think it's a waste of time and energy. The urban areas are not really caught up in these supernatural issues," says social commentator Thomas Deve.
"Claims of witchcraft need to be investigated instead of putting down every disorder in society that is taking in our society to witchcraft or modern magic," he adds.
The church in Zimbabwe has always believed that witchcraft exists, but it has been careful to establish the source of such supernatural powers.
"As Christians we've got to recognise that supernatural forces are good if they originate from God - now witchcraft is one of the things that originates from the Satanic world," says Reverend Roy Musasiwa who runs a theological college in the capital, Harare.
The Witchcraft Suppression Act was used fairly frequently, but prosecuting someone under the new legislation may prove difficult.
The new Criminal Law Codification and Reform Act will demand proof that a person has supernatural powers and that they are using them to harm others.
"It's not going to be easy task," says Custom Kachambwa, a judge with years of experience in the legal field.
He says witnesses will often be traditional healers, who could be accused of practising harmful magic in the future.
But whatever the problems, the repealing of the witchcraft laws is another sign that Zimbabwe's government is continuing to move away from Western values and placing more emphasis on the country's own traditions.
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Last but not Least
Mexico Presidential Race Too Close to Call
By TRACI CARL
Associated Press
Jul 03, 2006
MEXICO CITY - Mexico's presidential election was too close to call Sunday, with a leftist offering himself as a savior to the poor and a conservative free-trader both declaring themselves the winner. Officials said they won't know who won for days.
Electoral officials said they could not release the results of Sunday night's quick count of the votes, which they previously said would happen only if the leading candidates were within one percentage point of each other. Luis Carlos Ugalde, president of the Federal Electoral Institute, said an official count would begin Wednesday, and a winner will be declared once it's complete.
Felipe Calderon, 43, of outgoing President Vicente Fox's National Action Party, had been running an exceedingly close race with Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, 52, of the leftist Democratic Revolution Party. The Institutional Revolutionary Party's Roberto Madrazo, 53, had been trailing in third place.
Fox appealed for calm amid fears that a close result would raise the potential for violence.
Thousands of Lopez Obrador supporters, waiting for hours in the cold rain in Mexico City's central plaza, began shouting "Fraud! Fraud!" when Ugalde came on live television to announce the delay. Lopez Obrador said late Sunday that he would respect the delay in declaring a winner, "but I want the Mexican people to know that our figures show we won."
Calderon spoke minutes later, saying he too will respect the results _ but that the official preliminary results, as well as the exit polls, show that he's the winner.
"We have no doubt that we have won," he said.
The race exposed deep divisions between Mexico's rich and poor in a nation desperately trying to match the success of its northern neighbor.
Comment: Boy, it's just one "too close to call" election after another these days...
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Japanese media cool on Koizumi's rosy ties with Bush
AFP
Sun Jul 2, 2006
TOKYO - Japan should seek a more mature relationship with the United States rather than one based on personal bonding, the country's media said after Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi's trip to Washington.
Koizumi displayed his media savvy by crooning Elvis Presley hits during a visit to Graceland with US
President George W. Bush, with whom he has forged a close friendship over his five years in office.
But the Mainichi Shimbun newspaper said Japan's diplomacy should not be so dependent on the prime minister's personal ties.
"It was disappointing that Koizumi failed to make full use of his friendly Japan-US relationship on the real international scene," the newspaper said, bemoaning "Japan's failure" to win a permanent seat on the UN Security Council.
Tokyo failed to get a formal commitment of support from Washington for its bid to obtain a permanent seat on the Council, which was blocked by China.
The Mainichi said that failure had "exposed the limits of Koizumi's diplomacy, that depended on his personal relationship and lacked strategies".
One of Japan's leading dailies, Asahi Shimbun, praised Koizumi for tackling several thorny issues left over from previous administrations, including the controversial realignment of US troops stationed in Japan.
But the liberal daily also said he had failed to resolve several key issues before handing the reins to his successor in September.
"Koizumi lacked strategies to finish up the breakthrough (on key issues) to the final stage," the Asahi said.
Meanwhile, the Tokyo Shimbun daily called for a better balance in US-Japanese relations, warning the government against ever revising its pacifist constitution to satisfy the needs of Washington.
"It should be noted that the joint statement (issued after the latest Japan-US summit) did not mention the (Japanese) constitution," it said.
"Japan is bound by a limit it cannot not cross. Japan should have made sure the United States will not overly expect" military cooperation from Japan, the paper said.
Koizumi returned home Saturday from a five-day visit to Canada and the United States that was heavy on symbolism as he wraps up his premiership.
Bush and Koizumi warned North Korea over its weapons programs at a White House summit before heading to Graceland on Friday to visit Presley's estate.
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Saddam's daughter and wife on wanted list
By Ahmed Rasheed
Reuters
Sun Jul 2, 2006
BAGHDAD - Iraq on Sunday named Saddam Hussein's eldest daughter and first wife on a most-wanted list along with top Baathists and al Qaeda's new leader in Iraq, a day after the bloodiest bombing in three months killed over 60.
The remains of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, who was killed in a U.S. air strike last month, have been buried in Iraq in a secret grave after the U.S. military handed over the body to the Iraqi government, Iraqi officials and the U.S. military said.
Al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden had called on the U.S. military to release the body of Jordanian Zarqawi to his family in a Web site audio tape on Friday and said Jordan's King Abdullah should allow him to be buried in his home town, Zarqa.
Iraqi, U.S. and Jordanian authorities have been anxious, however, that the tomb of a man hailed by bin Laden as a "lion of Jihad" not become a place of pilgrimage for militants.
National Security Adviser Mowaffaq al-Rubaie announced the list of 41 "most wanted" a day after a car bomb devastated a market in a Shi'ite district of Baghdad in the deadliest attack since a Shi'ite-led unity government was formed six weeks ago.
The blast in the Shi'ite militia stronghold of Sadr City drew angry responses from radical Shi'ites against Shi'ite Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki's national reconciliation plan and his efforts to reach out to the once-dominant Sunni minority.
The carnage, by far the worst since Zarqawi was killed on June 7, has raised the prospect of sectarian civil war.
The list, which offers a $10 million bounty for former Saddam deputy Izzat Ibrahim al-Douri, accuses Saddam's daughter, Raghd, and her mother of using millions stolen by the former Iraqi leader to finance the Sunni insurgency.
Raghd has taken a leading role in organizing her father's legal defense in his trial for crimes against humanity. Aged about 40, she lives in Jordan having been granted asylum there, along with her sister Rana and their children, in 2003.
Raghd and Rana's husbands, both brothers and themselves related to Saddam, were killed by fellow tribesmen on returning to Iraq in 1996 after having defected and betrayed Saddam.
BOUNTY
His first wife Sajida, mother of Raghd, is also on the list, which includes the new head of al Qaeda in Iraq, Abu Ayyub al-Masri. The Iraqi government also offered a $50,000 reward for Masri -- far less than the $5 million bounty the United States placed on the man named to succeed Zarqawi.
"We are releasing this list so that our people can know their enemies," Rubaie said.
He declined to say if arrest warrants had been issued for Raghd and Sajida but said Interpol had received the list.
Also included in the document was a former Saddam intelligence chief as well as senior Baathists, who fled their posts in the wake of invading U.S. forces and are now playing a key role in the insurgency that has killed over 2,500 Americans.
Some, like Douri, are still on the three-year-old "deck of cards," a list of 55 wanted Baathist officials issued by the U.S. military. Most of the 55 are dead or in captivity but Douri, at times reported killed, appears still to be at liberty.
ZARQAWI
Rubaie told Reuters Zarqawi, who led a bloody campaign against Shi'ites in a bid to ignite civil war in Iraq, had been buried in a secret location somewhere in Iraq.
"The Iraqi authorities recently buried the body of Zarqawi in a marked but secret place," Rubaie said.
A U.S. military spokesman said Zarqawi's body had been turned over to the Iraqi government and buried in accordance with Muslim custom. He declined further comment.
The Jordanian government also refused to comment. Zarqawi's family had asked that the former militant be buried in Jordan.
Bin Laden endorsed him in an Internet recording on Saturday and warned Iraqi Shi'ites they would face "retribution."
A Shi'ite member of Iraq's parliament escaped an attempt to kidnap her on Sunday but several bodyguards were abducted in the second such attack on a woman lawmaker around Baghdad in as many days. Another woman lawmaker, a Sunni, was kidnapped on Saturday, prompting colleagues to walk out of parliament.
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Secret burial for Iraq's al Zarqawi
Last Updated Sun, 02 Jul 2006 13:11:08 EDT
CBC News
The body of slain insurgent leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi has been buried in a "secret location" in Baghdad, Iraq's national security adviser says.
Mouwafak al-Rabaie gave no other details about the burial of the Jordanian-born militant, who was killed June 7 in a U.S. air strike.
In a statement e-mailed to the Associated Press, the U.S. military confirmed the national security adviser's statement.
"The remains of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi were turned over the appropriate government of Iraq officials and buried in accordance with Muslim custom and traditions," the statement said.
Al-Zarqawi, head of the organization Al Qaeda in Iraq, was the most wanted insurgent in the country. He died in combined U.S. Iraqi military operation that included air strikes to enable ground troops to launch an assault on a group of buildings northeast of Baghdad, where the militant leader had been in hiding.
An autopsy performed by U.S. military doctors listed the cause of death as "primary blast injury of the lung," and it later emerged that he survived for nearly an hour after the air strike.
Neither the Iraqis nor the Americans said why a secret burial was thought necessary but fears that a public funeral might become a rallying point for insurgents have been expressed by officials.
Elsewhere in Iraq, violence continued in and around Baghdad.
Small arms and rocket fire were reported in the Sunni Muslim neighbourhood of Adhamiya, while a car bombing in the town of Mahmoudiya, just south of the capital, killed three people at an outdoor market.
On Saturday, a bomb in a pickup truck exploded in Sadr City, a Shia district in Baghdad, leaving nearly 70 dead and 80 wounded.
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11,000-year-old grain shakes up beliefs on beginnings of agriculture
Jun. 18, 2006 0:24 | Updated Jun. 18, 2006 10:45
By JUDY SIEGEL-ITZKOVICH
Bar-Ilan University researchers have found a cache of 120,000 wild oat and 260,000 wild barley grains at the Gilgal archaeological site near Jericho that date back 11,000 years - providing evidence of cultivation during the Neolithic Period.
The research, performed by Drs. Ehud Weiss and Anat Hartmann of BIU's department of Land of Israel studies and Prof. Mordechai Kislev of the faculty of life sciences, appears in the June 16 edition of the prestigious journal Science.
It is the second time in two weeks that Kislev and Hartmann have had an article in Science. They recently wrote about their discovery of 10,000-year-old cultivated figs at the same Jordan Valley site.
According to the researchers, the newest find shows that the transition from nomadic food gathering and the beginning of agriculture were quite different than previously thought. Until now, the general assumption has been that agriculture was begun by a single line of human efforts in one specific area. But the BIU researchers found a much more complicated effort undertaken by different human populations in different regions, drawing a completely new picture of the origins of agriculture.
Agriculture, the BIU researchers suggest, originated through human manipulations of wild plants - sometimes involving the same species - that took place in various spatially and temporally distinct communities. Moreover, some of these occasions were found to be much earlier than previously thought possible.
The researchers analyzed archeo-botanical data from Near Eastern archeological sites to locate human attempts to grow early crops. Several plant species, which they term "pioneer crops," were found to be the earliest plants manipulated by humans. Some of these attempts succeeded, which means that domestication and continuity were achieved, while others were abandoned. They offer a model of a pioneer agriculture with its disappointments and achievements.
They were certain that the grains found at Gilgal were cultivated and not found naturally in the environment because they were found in such large quantities and because field observations showed that only moderate amounts could be gathered from natural growing sites in this part of the Jordan Valley, even in rainy years.
Although pioneer crops such as barley, lentils, rye and oats yielded satisfactory crops, early farmers faced the problem that their seeds would fall off immediately after ripening. One way to solve this problem was through domestication (causing a process by which plants would retain their seeds, rather than shedding them, to facilitate collection by farmers).
But the researchers found that not all crops were easily domesticated, causing our ancestors, the researchers maintain, to abandon certain crops (such as oats) for thousands of years, until different farmers in other parts of the world finally domesticated them.
This new hypothesis turns the spotlight on the peoples who were involved in creating a revolutionary new agricultural way of life. According to the researchers, it was not a particular individual or community who changed the way we live our lives today, but rather many human groups scattered throughout the world who manipulated several different local wild plants. Some of these groups failed in their attempts and some succeeded. Some plants were domesticated and some were abandoned.
Moreover, some of the plants abandoned during the Neolithic Period were later domesticated in other parts of the world. Barley and, most likely, oats, were cultivated in the Jordan Valley, represented by the early Neolithic site Gilgal.
However, domesticated oats appeared some seven thousand years later in Europe, several thousand kilometers away. Another domesticated plant - rye - was found to be cultivated by several Turkish communities, from the Neolithic Period onward, for several millennia. Some of these communities even succeeded in domesticating rye, but they apparently abandoned it. Rye apparently traveled from Turkey to Europe in the form of a weed that grew in fields of barley and wheat. As in the case of oats, the last stage of rye domestication occurred not in Turkey but in Europe, and several thousands of years later.
The wild lentil plant's path of domestication comprised two stages: loss of dormancy (most of the seeds do not germinate in the first year) and development of pod indehiscence (pods that do not spontaneously release their seeds). The researchers noted that the first evidence of lentil domestication - loss of dormancy - was found in the beginning of the Neolithic Period in Jerf el-Ahmar, Syria, and quickly spread south to Netiv Hagdud in the Jordan Valley.
Undoubtedly, the final stage of lentil domestication is represented by the huge, approximately 1.4 million lentil seed hoard found in later Neolithic Period Yiftah'el, near Nazareth, some 600 kilometers southwest of Jerf el-Ahmar.
According to the researchers, a similar phenomenon occurred in North America, where the chenopod, marsh elder, squash and sunflower became domesticated under indigenous group management between 4,000 and 5,000 years ago. The erect knotweed, little barley and maygrass were cultivated and later abandoned, eventually to be replace by maize-centered agriculture and the arrival of the common bean.
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