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Ethnic Weapons

Yesterday we picked up a story that David Kelly was involved with ultra secret work at Israel’s Institute for Biological Research.

A report on November 15, 1998 by the Sunday Times suggests that this Institute "is working on a biological weapon that would harm Arabs but not Jews".

Israel planning 'ethnic' bomb as Saddam caves in

The London Times
November 15 1998

ISRAEL is working on a biological weapon that would harm Arabs but not Jews, according to Israeli military and western intelligence sources. The weapon, targeting victims by ethnic origin, is seen as Israel's response to Iraq's threat of chemical and biological attacks.

A scientist there said the task was hugely complicated because both Arabs and Jews are of Semitic origin. But he added: "They have, however, succeeded in pinpointing a particular characteristic in the genetic profile of certain Arab communities, particularly the Iraqi people."

It is widely accepted that Israel has the largest stockpile of nuclear weapons in the region, and it is assumed that this applies to their stockpiles of biological and chemical weapons. A quick search on the web turned up a long list of articles on the subject, including the following:

Report: Secret Israeli chemical tests kill 4, wound 25

Arabic News.Com
August 21 1998

Tests carried out by an Israeli secret laboratory recently killed four persons and other 25 have been reported wounded in Neis Zayouna district near Tel Aviv, an Israeli daily reported.

Israel flatly denied the report. "No person has ever been killed in a work accident at the Biological Institute since its inception 45 years ago," Prime Minister Netanyahu's media advisor stated today.

This just happens to be the Institute cited above. And if these deaths were due to field tests, they wouldn't be "work accidents". But it is evidence that something is going on in Israel that could be related to the development of these types of weapons. There is also this comment from Ariel Sharon, while he was still Foreign Minister. His attitude hasn't changed in the intervening years as his active sabotage of the so-called "Peace Map" shows.

Report: Israel developing biological weapons targeting Arabs

Regional-Israel, Military, 11/16/1998

Last year the Pentagon warned in a secret report against the possibility of developing biological elements through genetic engineering to manufacture new weapons of mass destruction.

Within the same context, Israeli Foreign Minister Ariel Sharon reiterated that, "Israel reserves its right to repel any possible Iraqi attack."

At the conclusion of his meeting on Sunday with the US secretary of commerce, Sharon added: "Israel can defend itself and knows how to prevent being attacked."

A different type of evidence is found in the following written by the webmaster at www.konformist.com who published a good article on ethnic weapons in 2000 that we will look at later. He is discussing the reader response to the article:

What is interesting is that, though I received quite a few Emails from the Zionist community, none denied the accuracy of the story. Instead, they brashly admitted it was true, then added it was necessary because Israel needed to defend itself from its Arab neighbors. What is most telling is that many letters included references to Arabs that were derogatory and dehumanizing. That such a destructive philosophy is accepted by so many uncritically in Israel explains much of the vicious thuggery performed against the Palestinians over the last four months (not to mention the last 33 years).

These comments are completely in keeping with Sharon's, so we can put a high probability that Israel is developing something along these lines.

The progress on the Human Genome Project now makes it possible to target specific groups of individuals based upon certain genetic signatures. This is the logical next step in the progression of biological weapons. These weapons have been around for thousands of years. The Romans used to dump dead animals into the water supply of their enemies to inflict disease. The American "settlers" used small pox in blankets to target the Native American populations. The American Native population is still subjected to this type of attack:

#16 Human Genome Project Opens the Door to Ethnically Specific Bioweapens

In this country, continuing a historic policy toward Native Americans, it has been revealed that the American Indian Health Service (IHS—funded by the Federal Government, who employ the doctors and nurses) coerced Native American men and women into forced sterilizations in the early to mid 1970s. The General Accounting Office (GAO) estimated that 3,400 people (mostly women) underwent the treatment, but their study only covered four of twelve IHS regions for four years.

Activists put the estimate much higher, at 60,000 to 70,000. This, coupled with the suspicion raised by the hantavirus outbreak in the Four Corners region of Arizona/New Mexico/Colorado/Utah keeps suspicion and fingers pointed at the federal government and at least some government policies toward the American Indian population. (Hantavirus is one of many "new" diseases that have come under suspicion of having their origins in genetic engineering or biowarfare labs.)

As reported in a 1994 Project Censored update, Utah's Dugway Proving Grounds biowarfare research site was also reopened despite local residents' protests over fears that the facility was originally closed because of safety concerns. Fort Dietrick, the site of the most notorious CIA drug and army biowarfare research in the United States now houses major research facilities of the National Cancer Institute, raising issues of conflict (or collusion) or interest.

But with the development of the chemical industry, bio-warfare took a new turn. Greg Bishop, in the article referred to above, first published at konformist.com, looks at some of the major points:

Ethnic Weapons For Ethnic Cleansing

Greg Bishop
March 2000

[T]his "theoretical possibility" was recognized over 25 years ago, if not before. It was originally brought to the attention of potential customers with the publication of an article in the Military Review of November 1970.

This journal for command-level military personnel was published by the US Army Command and General Staff College in Fort Leavenworth, Kansas. The feature, entitled "Ethnic Weapons," authored by Carl A. Larson, outlines the history, desirability, and possibilities of engineered biological pathogens which would affect only those races which historically have no natural defense against certain "enzyme inhibitors."

Larson is listed as head of the "Department of Human Genetics at the Institute of Genetics, Lund, Sweden" as well as a licensed physician. The Hippocratic oath was apparently not administered in Sweden when Larson received his accreditation.

Larson explains that many of the chemical activities and functions within the human body are caused by the interactions of enzymes. One of the more significant activities enabled by enzyme chemical reactions are the contraction and relaxation of muscle tissue. If the activities of these enzymes are blocked, the victim will be paralyzed, even to the point of death by asphyxiation.

Not coincidentally, the enzyme-blocking action of compounds called organophosphates were discovered in Germany in the 1930s when experimental insecticides killed the people unlucky enough to have used them. This discovery led to the mass production of a substance named "Trilon," later used to impressive effect in the extermination of groups of people the Nazis considered little more than insects. This substance and others of similar makeup became known as "nerve gas."

A concentration of 40 milligrams per cubic meter can kill in about 10 minutes. Stronger agents were later developed which can do the job with a single drop on the skin.

[...] Larson is even more explicit in a way that would probably never make it into the mainstream press. In a passage that would make Doctor Strangelove proud, he muses uncontrollably on the possibilities of genetically-sensitive chemicals to subdue enemy populations:

"Friendly forces would discriminatingly use incapacitants in entangled situations to give friend and foe a short period of enforced rest to sort them out. By gentle persuasion, aided by psychochemicals, civilians in enemy cities could be reeducated. The adversary would use incapacitants to spare those whom he could use for slaves."

This was published in a serious, staid professional journal read by US military strategists. He concludes with the statement that "the functions of life [now] lie bare to attack."

According to Charles Piller and Keith Yamamoto in their 1988 book Gene Wars, Larson's article was the first time that the subject of ethnically targeted CBWs was broached publicly, and that in "the military's private circles it was old news." The authors further state that in 1951 the Mechanicsburg, PA Naval Supply Depot was the site of a classified test using a benign organism delivered to personnel to mimic the behavior of an actual bioweapon: "

According to documents declassified in the late 1970s, the site was chosen because 'Within this system there are employed large numbers of laborers, including many Negroes, whose incapacitation would seriously affect the operation of the supply system."

The black workers in the Depot were supposedly more susceptible to a strain of Valley Fever than were whites, but instead of using the actual virus, a substitute fungal organism was used. Valley Fever is more often fatal to blacks than to whites. It was recently revealed that the truth and reconciliation hearings in South Africa had presented witnesses who testified that scientists working for the apartheid regime had pursued efforts along similar lines.

Another possible example of field testing of ethnic weapons (or at least an interesting case for study by those interested in their development) may be the famed "Four Corners" virus, which seems only to affect Native Americans living in northern New Mexico and Arizona. Most reports identified or compared the disease to the Hantavirus, which killed victims relatively quickly following the occurrence of a prolonged fever and fluid which rapidly filled the lungs and asphyxiated the patient. Supposedly contracted through deer mice droppings, the mystery disease has claimed at least a dozen victims in the last ten years.

The most recent outbreak occurred this last summer [1999], coming on the heels of El Niño, which the major news media blamed for the renewed threat. Some area residents believe that the virus may have been released either accidentally or intentionally from a bioweapons cache at Fort Wingate, an army facility a few miles east of Gallup. The munitions storage at Wingate is now officially closed.

We learn that the work on such weapons was begun in Nazi Germany. The victims of these weapons were largely Jews. When Larson published his paper in 1970, "the military's private circles it was old news." Which means it had been discussed for a long time by the US military, most likely with the Nazis brought into the US after World War II via Operation Paperclip. Tests were carried out as far back as 1951 on Blacks working at the Mechanicsburg, PA Naval Supply Depot. For more information on tests carried out by the US government against its own citizens, refer to our timeline.

An early form of ethnic specific weapon were the malororants, developed to control crowds (of people dissenting against the Bush Reich, perhaps?).

Pentagon Tests Ethnically-Targeted Crowd Control Weapons

Sunshine-Project
19. February 2002

Almost sixty years ago, the US developed a nauseating 'bathroom odor' chemical for use as a weapon. But according to the Army, the old malodorant will not work outside of the US and Western Europe, because "it was found that people in many areas of the world do not find 'fecal odor' to be offensive, since they smell it on a regular basis." Therefore, according to the Army, new agents are needed for overseas missions. These new malodorants are to be specifically adapted for their victims. According to a 1998 document: "The objective of this work is the development of a comprehensive set of [malodorants] that can be applied against any population set around the world to influence their behavior."

The documents describe the Army research procedure. A group of subjects selected "based on a diversity of geographic origins and cultural heritage" is systematically exposed to candidate malodorants to develop "culture-response data" based on ethnic categories. That data is aggregated into "odor response profiles" that suggest the types and quantities of malodorants necessary to "elicit a favorable behavioral response" (i.e. incapacitation, panic, or flight) when used for crowd control on a particular ethnic group.

[...] Whether the malodorants work or fail, research on any ethnic weapon raises serious legal questions and could set a very dangerous precedent. If the Pentagon saw any major legal barriers to ethnic weapons it would not have approved the malodorant research. The Pentagon's conclusion that ethnic weapons are permissible must be challenged.

As horrible as these weapons are in their practice and in what they reveal about the people developing them, it was the work on the Human Genome that really opened the door to a new generation of bioweapons, weapons that could be fine-tuned to one's genetic make-up. We have been subjected to reams of paper and hours of air-time discussing the benefits of genetic research, the ability to target individual genes to "repair" them. Look at the flip-side:

GE Biological "Ethnic" Weapons Loom on the Horizon

Date: Thu, Jan 21, 1999
By Patricia Reaney
Reuters

The designer weapon works on a similar principle to gene therapy but instead of replacing faulty genes that don't work it exploits genetic variations to target its victims.

For example, micro-organisms could be genetically engineered to attack known receptor sites on the cell membrane or viruses could be targeted at specific DNA sequences inside cells.

This is the technology that Israel is using. But it did not originate in Israel:

Biowar and the Apartheid Legacy

By Salim Muwakkil, In These Times
June 6, 2003

A two-part story in the Washington Post on April 20 and 21 revealed that biological agents developed by the South African government during its apartheid days have fallen into private hands. Written by Post reporters Joby Warrick and John Mintz, the piece noted that unique, race-specific strains of biotoxins were available on the world market – for the right price or the right ideology.

[...] The top-secret program that Basson directed was called Project Coast, and it lasted from 1981 to 1993. The South African National Defense Force created it at a time when the white-minority regime was under increasing threat by indigenous black South Africans. Daan Goosen, the former director of Project Coast's biological research division, told the Post he was ordered by Basson to develop ways "to suppress population growth among blacks" and to "search for a 'black bomb,' a biological weapon that would select targets based on skin color."

[...] The Washington Post even noted, "Goosen says many scientists kept copies of organisms and documents in order to continue work on 'dual-use' projects with commercial as well as military applications." A May 2002 story on Project Coast in the Wall Street Journal reported that Goosen said he has been "visited by scores of people looking for 'stuff to kill the blacks.'" Race-specific weapons naturally are in hot demand among racists, so it's no surprise that South Africa's race-specific research is highly coveted.

[...] Reported links between Israel's ethnic weapons and South Africa's Project Coast are tentative; some would say tenuous. But the possibility of such links is terrifying, and justifies as much scrutiny as was focused on Iraq's imaginary arsenal.

It also appears that the anthrax incidents of 2001, in which five people died and 13 were sickened, may also have a South African connection. The Post noted that officials found evidence in a Frederick, Maryland, pond that may explain how the perpetrators of the deadly attacks used water to handle the lethal toxin without infecting themselves or loosing the anthrax spores.

On May 11, the Post said the water theory is the result of the FBI's interest in one person, Steven J. Hatfill, a medical doctor and bioterrorism expert who formerly worked for the U.S. Army, and who lists South African diplomas in diving and underwater medicine on his résumé.

A June 2002 article in the Hartford Courant reported that Hatfill also worked with a guerilla unit of the white-supremacist Rhodesian army from 1978 to 1980, when "an anthrax outbreak killed hundreds and sickened thousands of villagers." He also lived in South Africa, "where he completed various military-medical assignments."

The Apartheid regime in South Africa. Israel. The United States. Not the most progressive regimes in the world.

Note the reference to the Great Anthrax Scare following 9/11, the ability to manipulate the anthrax virus without getting infected. And the connection of this to Steven J. Hatfill. Curious, isn't it, how the anthrax story just died when it was discovered that the strain used to attack Americans wasn't from a foreign sourse but came a military base in Maryland?

Anthrax Attacks Pushed Open an Ominous Door

22 September, 2002

PURCHASE, N.Y. -- On this first anniversary of the anthrax attacks, a number of conclusions can be drawn even without an arrest by the FBI. First, the strain and properties of the weaponized anthrax found in the letters show that it originated within the U.S. biodefense program, where the necessary expertise and access are found. Government officials recognized that the anthrax source was domestic less than two weeks after they learned of the letters, and nothing in their investigation has led them to say otherwise since.

One can also conclude that, given the origin of the anthrax and the warnings contained in the letters, the perpetrator's motive was not to kill but rather to raise public fear and thereby spur Congress to increase spending on biodefense. In this, the attacks have been phenomenally successful.[...]

Although biodefense has gotten a shot in the arm, it is important to understand that the goal of defending against bioweapons is not primarily public protection--which is largely impossible, as last year's attacks demonstrated.

It is rather "to allow the military forces of the United States to survive and successfully complete their operational missions ... in battlespace environments contaminated with chemical or biological warfare agents," according to the annual report of the Department of Defense's Chemical and Biological Defense Program. [...]

Two weeks ago, I attended an informal meeting in Geneva where diplomats from six continents struggled in the face of U.S. Intransigence to map out a joint strategy for combating the global biological threat. The United States had demanded that a formal Biological Weapons Convention conference, scheduled to take place during two weeks in November, should instead disband in one day with only an agreement not to meet again until 2006.

To make sure that the American resolve prevails in this setting where international consensus is de rigueur, the U.S. demand was accompanied by an overt threat to disrupt any further proceedings with accusations that would make productive international action impossible.

At that Geneva meeting, the assembled diplomats, representing the political spectrum from our closest allies to declared enemies, were uniformly frustrated. They find it hard to comprehend why a country that has just been the victim of bioterrorism should stand in the way of peaceful efforts supported by all its allies to deter bioterrorism.

The following article suggests that the evidence for a link between the Israeli program and the South African program is neither tentative nor tenuous as the above would suggest. It is the same author writing earlier. Perhaps he found new info. Perhaps something else happened...

DOUBLE STANDARDS HAUNT AMERICA'S FOREIGN POLICY

By Salim Muwakkil.
Published: Monday, November 23, 1998

Goosen's comments jibe well with conclusions reached by South Africa's recently concluded Truth and Reconciliation Commission, which heard testimony that Wouter Basson, the director of the country's chemical-biological warfare program, conducted extensive research on weapons that exclusively targeted blacks.

Incidentally, the commission's concluding report noted that South Africa's chemical-biological weapons team received considerable assistance from their American counterparts during the apartheid era. And it's easy to see why: Ethno bombs are a dream weapon on a planet so preoccupied with ethnic conflicts. Of course, that's also why such weapons are so remarkably menacing.

[...] The article noted that the ethno-bomb claims were given further credibility by a report in "Foreign Report," a publication of the respected Jane's group, that Israeli scientists used some of "the South African research in trying to develop an 'ethnic bullet' . . ."

Once more the thread comes back to the US: "South Africa's chemical-biological weapons team received considerable assistance from their American counterparts during the apartheid era".

So let's look more at America's links to the development of these weapons. We saw above that this started after World War II. But, in fact, there are links back to the Eugenics program started in the US at the turn of the century.

#16 Human Genome Project Opens the Door to Ethnically Specific Bioweapens

The U.S. has a long history of interest in such genetic research. The current home of the Human Genome Project is the Cold Springs Harbor laboratory on Long Island, NY—the exact site of the notorious Eugenics Research Office that was started in 1910 by the Harriman family. The project’s 1910 agenda included governmental imposition of sanctions on such human rights as reproduction, and on U.S. immigration, based on the alleged inferiority of particular ethnic groups.

The Eugenics Research Project established medical and psychological conditions that would qualify one for sterilization or euthanasia. Prominent advocates of the program such as the Rockefeller family, Henry Ford, and Margaret Sanger helped smooth the way for the passage of forcible sterilization laws in 25 states. These laws allowed the forcible sterilization of tens of thousands of people, mostly of minority status, during the first half of the 20th century.

So we have one policy, begun in the early 20th century, funded by the Rockefellers, Henry Ford, the Harrimans, many of the same people who were financing the Nazi Party in Germany during the thirties. The work goes underground after the Second World War until it reemerges as part of the new "genetic research".

Biological Warfare: Genetically-Engineered Weapons Cannot Be Excluded

By K.P. Kavanaugh
Journal of the Federation of American Scientists (F.A.S.)
Volume 52, Number 2
March/April 1999

It has long been rumored that modern biological weapons could be designed to attack specific vulnerabilities of particular ethnic groups. Early in the development of the US offensive biological weapons program Colonel Creasey, Chief of Research and Engineering of the US Chemical Corps, suggested that agents may be selected because of known susceptibility of the target population.

This shows that the differential susceptibility of different populations to various diseases had been considered at that time and, according to scientists at Defense Advance Research Projects Agency (DARPA), is continuing today.

Indeed ethnic-specific biological warfare predated the advent of the biotechnology revolution. Smallpox was almost certainly deliberately used against the Native Americans centuries ago and there are other examples. U.S. and British officials believe an ethnic-specific weapon would be used today if it became available during a severe conflict between two deeply antagonistic groups. [...]

Today, warnings are coming not only from the medical community, but also from other specially credible sources. There have been indications, for example, that the US Secretary of Defense is concerned about the possible development of genetic weapons.

In June 1997, Jane's Defense Weekly reported that Secretary Cohen "quoted other reports about what he called 'certain types of pathogens that would be ethnic specific so that they could eliminate certain ethnic groups or races.'" Then after a later interview with the Defense Secretary in August 1997, it was stated again in Jane's Defense Weekly that "he also continued to insist that the science community is 'very close' to being able to manufacture 'genetically engineered pathogens that could be ethnically specific'".

Early Accounts, Then Silence

In accounts during the 1980s of the possible development of genetic weapons, a frequent source of scientific data was a paper by Carl A. Larson, then head of the Department of Human Genetics, University of Lund, Sweden, published in the journal Military Review in November 1970. Larson's paper was mainly concerned with the possible development of a new range of chemical weapons, including incapacitants.

Individual differences in response to chemical agents had been known for some time, but Larson reviewed what was known of differences between populations in reaction to drugs and saw the basis of such population differences as genetic. Larson seems to have been pointing to possible future developments rather than near-term practical possibilities. The question is whether, almost 30 years later: have genetically engineered weapons become a practical possibility?

There does not appear to have been subsequent detailed open publication by reputable scientists of the application of modern biotechnology to genetically -engineered weapons until the 1990s. Then in 1992 the journal Defense News carried a report which noted a scientist arguing that genetic engineering may enable us to:

...recognize DNA from different people and attach different things that will kill only that group of people...You will be able to determine the difference between blacks and whites and Asians and Jews and Swedes and Finns and develop an agent that will kill only a particular group.

Shown this quotation in February, scientists within the DOD confirmed that defensive research was being done specifically in this area. Thus the threat would appear to slide along the spectrum from the merely theoretical through the potentially possible to the patently workable.

Such arguments have been set out at greater length in an appendix to the 1993 Stockholm Peace Research Institute's Yearbook . The most pertinent aspect of the appendix entitled, "Benefits and threats of developments in biotechnology and genetic engineering," reads:

While modern biotechniques are revolutionizing medicine and agriculture, the possibility exists of their misuse for political ends, for clandestine production and refinement of biological weapons (BW), and for future development of weapons of mass extermination which could be used for genocide.

Particular reference is then made to the possible misuse of knowledge gained from the Human Genome Project and knowledge about genetic diversity. The element of critical significance here is contained in the last sub-section of section VI where the question is clearly stated, "Can't genetic weapons be developed?" The answer is that if:

investigations provide sufficient data on ethnic genetic differences between population groups, it may be possible to use such data to target suitable micro-organisms to attack known receptor sites for which differences exist at a cell membrane level or even target DNA sequences inside cells by viral vectors... [...]

Flashback: Scientists' deaths are under the microscope

So we have governments financing the development of these weapons, envisioning them as the Ultimate Weapon in their battles against their enemies. Or should we say "Final Solution" because it is racially based. It makes targets of people because of their genes.

Note: It is governments that do these things. But when this is discussed in the press, where are our fears turned? Who are portrayed as the real villains?

Genetic weapons: a 21st-century nightmare?

Ethirajan Anbarasan

Most of the nearly 30,000 scientists who were involved in biological research in the USSR during the 1980s are now out of a job because of the country’s economic difficulties. Last year, some of them disclosed that they had been approached by certain countries which have shown particular interest in learning about microbes that can be used in war to destroy or protect crops, as well as genetic engineering techniques that could be used to make deadly germs for which there may be no antidotes.

One prospect that alarms arms control experts is that biological weapons will fall into the hands of terrorist or cult groups.

But they are already in the hands of the Israelis who have not ratified a single international treaty allowing inspections of their nuclear, biological, or chemical weapons. No, what is important is to vilify the invisible "terrorist", the "cult", to inculcate in the minds of the readers that the danger is widespread, invisible, and ready to pounce at any moment. Be afraid. Be very afraid.

Yes. But be afraid because these governments are prepared to use them on their enemies...and that may well include their own citizens.

Mystery pneumonia is being caused by America's weapons of mass destruction: A theory

by Steve Hesske August 8, 2003

Could America's mainstream media be any more perfidious and derelict in its so-called reporting of the current so-called pneumonia epidemic among U.S. service personnel in Iraq and a few nearby countries?

A quick, informal survey of this week's coverage of the pneumonia story by our bastions of truth and enlightenment — CNN, Fox, CBS, ABC, MSNBC, The New York Times, The Washington Post — shows that while all covered the story, none mentioned Gulf War Syndrome which befell maybe as much as 20% of the 700,000 Americans who served in the 1991 Persian Gulf War (PGW) or depleted uranium (DU) a radioactive weapon of mass destruction (WMD), outlawed by international treaty and world courts, that was used exclusively and extensively by the United States during the PGW and that was used by the U.S. during the recent invasion of Iraq at 10 times its PGW rate.

Here's what the mainstream press does tell you: Army brass have dispatched teams to Iraq and to Landstuhl Army Hospital in Germany to investigate over 100 mysterious cases of pneumonia that have stricken American troops currently serving in the Persian Gulf. The puzzling disease has killed two and put another dozen or so in serious peril. According to the Army, a common geographical thread can not be established, a common bacteria can not be isolated.

True enough. A military spokeswoman goes on to say that those who have fallen ill have not been exposed to biological or chemical weapons, a bald-faced lie. DU is a chemical WMD of the most destructive and virulent kind. The documentation is in. And the connection between DU and a "mysterious pneumonia-like disease" was established over 10 years ago. [...]

The [British] government's microbiological research establishment at Porton Down spread bacteria through the London Underground system in the 1960s are contained in two files released to the public record office in Kew yesterday.

The trials, which were revealed in the Guardian last year, show how a powder compact filled with bacteria was dropped on to the Northern line and samples taken to see how contamination spread over the network.

We again refer you to our Timeline of Cosmic COINTELPRO subversion through the last few centuries to see more of this.

Given that these new strands of bioweapons need to be tested, we might think that the recent outbreak of SARS could be a field test. The pneumonia from Iraq. But these are not the only ones. There have been so many of these new strains recently that the US Government has set up centers to watch for "Unexplained Deaths" in four US states:

Unexplained Deaths Due to Possibly Infectious Causes in the United States: Defining the Problem and Designing Surveillance and Laboratory Approaches

EID Volume 2 * Number 1
January-March 1996

Many new infectious diseases have been identified in the United States during the last several decades (1). Among these are AIDS, Legionnaires' disease, toxic-shock syndrome, hepatitis C, and most recently, hantavirus pulmonary syndrome; all caused serious illness and death.

In each instance, the disease was recognized through investigation of illness for which no cause had been identified. Retrospective studies of these and other newly recognized infectious diseases often identified cases that occurred before the recognition of the new agent; therefore, a more sensitive detection system may make the earlier recognition of new infectious agents possible.

[...] A more systematic public health approach for the early detection of unknown infectious agents is needed. This need was acknowledged in Addressing Emerging Infectious Diseases Threats: A Prevention Strategy for the United States, a CDC publication about emerging infections (13). CDC has established an emerging infections program (EIP) network to conduct special population-based surveillance projects, develop surveillance methods, pilot and evaluate prevention strategies, and conduct other epidemiologic and laboratory studies.

In late 1994, CDC funded four programs based at state health departments and academic institutions in California (Alameda, Contra Costa, Kern, and San Francisco counties), Connecticut, Minnesota, and Oregon. Some projects are conducted at all program sites and others, depending on local interest and expertise, at only one or two sites.

Surveillance for unexplained deaths due to possibly infectious causes (UDPIC) for early detection of new infectious diseases is one of the core activities being conducted at all sites.

Great way to track the field tests, is it not?

In looking over the press reports in the last few years, we see that Israel is being singled out, especially since the "suicide" of David Kelly. This is somewhat normal because much attention has been focused in recent years on the barbarity of the Israeli actions against the Palestinians.

As Greg Bishop writes above, the Germans considered the Jews "insects". Now the Jews turn on the Palestinians in the same way. So Israel, from the Balfour Declaration through today, is being set up and portrayed as villains, maneuvered into a particular situation.

What they do is odious. But is there something even more odius behind the curtain?

Arms Sellers Behind World's Wars

Mahathir Reuters • Agence France Presse, Arab News

KUALA LUMPUR, 10 August 2003 — Weapon sales by rich countries were responsible for the proliferation of wars, Malaysian Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad said yesterday.

The outspoken veteran leader said wars were being waged as an excuse to try out new weapons. “If there is no war then all these very expensive weapons would be a waste,” Mahathir told a peace conference in the Malaysian capital.

“Off and on a fairly major war would be launched deliberately for no very good reason. And the weapons are gleefully used in these real life tests.” Mahathir, a fierce critic of the US-led war on Iraq, accused “high pressure arms salesmen” of forcing poor nations to buy weapons.

“To encourage (poor countries to buy), it was pointed out that their neighbors have already bought or are about to buy these weapons,” he said. The 77-year old, who steps down in October after 22 years at the helm, earned US President George W. Bush’s praise a year ago for his help in the war against terror and has clamped down on Islamic radicals in mainly Muslim Malaysia.

But Mahathir raised the ire of Washington earlier this year with his stinging criticism of US foreign policy. The veteran leader remained unflinching in his rebuke of the United States yesterday. “While frustrated and angry young people crashed their aircraft into buildings, killing a few thousand innocent people, the retaliation that this triggered is no less brutal, killing innumerable innocent people, unconnected with Sept. 11,” Mahathir said. [...]

At the press conference, Mahathir pressed for democratic reforms in the United Nations so that the world would not always live in fear of war. He said the “risk of being invaded and occupied is real” because no one dared to criticize powerful countries.

He said it was unfortunate that countries had to invest heavily in defense because “warlike predators” remained in the world.

A Closer Look At Those Who Cry 'Anti-Semitism'

By Edward J. Toner Jr.
Atlantic Highlands Herald
8-10-3

Dear Congressman Smith;

I must comment on the article in The Asbury Park Press of 29 July which you wrote "Efforts to combat anti-Semitism deserve more attention in NJ."

Let me start by saying I admire you as a man, and as a Representative. You are honest, and helpful to your constituents as few in your position are. You helped me recently with a Medicare problem.

However, in the article in question, you state that government policies regarding Israel should not give license to any hatred of the Jewish people. Hatred, no, but animosity, yes. There is a fine line between the two.

I was never one to stoop to toppling Jewish grave stones, or painting Swastikas etc., but I do resent the policies of our government, supported by yourself as far as I can tell, which so favor Israel over the Gentile states in the region. As long as Israel calls itself The Jewish State, animosity is bound to be felt by Jews, even though many, to their credit, are not inclined to be Zionists. This is human nature.

I am a retired TWA Captain, as well as a retired LCDR USNR. I received my Commission at Kings Point in 1953. I appreciate your efforts in supports of my Alma Mater. During my 30 years with TWA, I had many occasions to lay over for rest in Tel Aviv. While there, I observed first hand how Christians are treated in The Jewish State. We are the underdogs, just as Jews were in Nazi Germany. Government policy in Israel is blatantly anti-Gentile. Israel is NOT a Democracy, as they claim to be, but are in fact a Theocracy, where it is Juden uber alles, and we had better not forget it.

I learned a lot of this from a Christian woman who was my maid in the Tel Aviv Hilton for many trips. Her life was a living Hell in The Jewish State.

You mention the ADL, as if this is a good organization. Sir, I beg to differ with you here. The ADL is a despicable organization bent on censorship of any news that reflects negatively on The Jewish State and believe me Chris, there is much negative to reflect upon. I started writing letters to the editor of local newspapers, critical of Israel, citing real flaws in our huge monetary support of Israel, at a cost of animosity from much of the world, especially the Arab nations.

My letters were hard-hitting, and difficult to rebut. Enter Mr. Suall, of the ADL. In a letter to my Chief Pilot, Captain Richard Forristal, he complained loudly about how there was an anti-Semite flying TWA's airplanes, to Tel Aviv, of all places. How does TWA expect its Jewish passengers feel with a maniac like this flying them? I was hauled in to the office and asked to explain myself. I did. I told Mr. Forristal I was exercising my freedom of the press, and I was not involving the company in my letters. I also pointed out that the Gentiles in Israel were Semites, whereas most of the Jews were not.

Apparently, Suall became enraged that no action was taken. More letters followed in which I was described as insane, dangerous, a poor pilot, a drunk, a wife beater, a child abuser, etc. and for G-d's sake, shut this man up!. All this was nonsense, of course. I have a lovely Irish wife and 6 healthy, happy children. When asked by Forristal what I had to say for myself, I called Suall a liar. I asked if there was any proof of what he said. There was none. By this time I brought the union into the picture. I was a member of the Air Line Pilots Association. It was agreed that so long as I did not mention TWA, or ALPA in my letters, it was hands off.

Every time I would be called into the office to explain myself for yet another letter, I would ask Foristall for a copy. It only worked once. I wanted to sue the ADL with these letters as the basis of a libel suit. The union contract called for my jacket to be available to me, and that I was entitled to be copied on any negative material in it. There was nothing in it.

It was then I discovered that there were 2 jackets, one of which was kept from me, which was in violation of the contract. I went to Queens DA Mario Merolla and told him about this, and pointed out that libel was a criminal as well as civil offense in NY (I was working out of JFK). He promptly told TWA to cease this, and hand over the other jacket. By the time I went back to the office, it had "accidentally" gone into the shredder. Too bad, but the harassment ceased, and I continued my career to get 30 years in, retiring in 1987 at the age of 56.

They didn't quit there. Being beaten by me, the ADL went to the head of the NJ JWV. He wrote to Tillinghast, TWA CEO at the time, and demanded Captain Toner be fired. When that failed, the JDL stepped in, threatened to kill me, my wife and 6 kids, rape them, blow up my home and car, etc.. I called the FBI in on this and it was investigated by Special Agent James Trahone. Using the FOIA, I was able to obtain the complete file. The file is Manhattan Bur. File # 9A-NY-228125. It has 86 pages. If you would like to examine it, please let me know. I will mail it to you.

In conclusion, I ask you to take a closer look at our support for Israel, and its fanatical supporters, who cry "Anti-Semitism" every time a voice is raised against The Jewish State, the citizens of which are not really Semites for the most part, but trace their ancestry back to Russia, Poland and other Eastern European nations. A microcosm of these people exist in Lakewood, NJ.

Very respectfully,

Edward J. Toner Jr.
Brick NJ

Israel strikes back after boy dies in shelling

18:54 Sunday 10th August 2003

Israeli warplanes have attacked suspected guerrilla positions in southern Lebanon, hours after Hezbollah militants shelled an Israeli town, killing a 16-year-old boy.

Lebanese security officials say Israeli warplanes fired at least one missile at an area near the village of Teir Harfa, about 2 miles from the Lebanese-Israeli border. [...]

Israeli Rifle Takes Aim at U.S. Ally's M-16

Sun August 10, 2003 08:52 AM ET
By Dan Williams
KFAR SAVA, Israel (Reuters)

Israel is replacing its world-famous Uzi sub-machinegun and U.S.-supplied M-16 assault rifle with a new flagship firearm.

The design of the Tavor is based largely on lessons learned during military operations in the West Bank and Gaza Strip against a 34-month-old Palestinian uprising for independence. [...]

Comment: We shudder to think what to expect from a weapon inspired by the need to optimize the murder of innocent civilians.

A 16-Year-Old in Palestine: Life is an ID Card

By DAOUD KUTTAB
August 9, 2003

For most teenagers, the world over, the age of sixteen is supposed to be a happy one. However, reaching 16 for Palestinians, especially those living in East Jerusalem, is not much fun. This is the age that they are supposed to start carrying the dreaded identification card and in turn the soldiers (not much older than them) can take pot shots at them without much concern or worry. Any young Palestinian looking close to 16 better have an ID or a birth certificate showing that he/she is under this age.

My daughter Tamara who spent her 16th birthday as a senior in an Ohio High School as an exchange student, came home for the summer to obtain her ID. Her cousin, Manuel Abu Ali, who just turned sixteen, has been moving around Jerusalem with difficulty, using his mother's ID (which has his name listed) along with his school picture ID.

For Palestinians of Jerusalem, getting a personal ID, which ought to be a simple affair, has become the new via de la Rosa. Unlike Israelis who get a five or ten year passport, Palestinians in Jerusalem can travel only on a laisser passier which can be issued for only a year, thus adding to an exasperating problem where 250,000 Palestinians are served by a single office of the Ministry of Interior and are denied the right to use any other office to get official document they need.

Palestinians in Jerusalem wishing to obtain any of these official government certificates (birth, marriage license, travel document or even death certificates) face the impossible task of simply entering the Interior Ministry offices.

A few months ago, my brother had to move the Israeli supreme court to enter these premises without having to wait all day in line - even that doesn't guarantee you get a turn that day. Entering the Ministry's office has become next to impossible for years because of a policy of lack of regard for the population, leaving frustrated Palestinians to fight tooth and nail just to preserve a place in line, while scores of Israeli police and private security staff watch in amusement. [...]

'Bring us home': GIs flood US with war-weary emails

An unprecedented internet campaign waged on the front-line and in the US is exposing the real risks for troops in Iraq. Paul Harris and Jonathan Franklin report on rising fears that the conflict is now a desert Vietnam

Sunday August 10, 2003 The Observer

Susan Schuman is angry. Her GI son is serving in the Iraqi town of Samarra, at the heart of the 'Sunni triangle', where American troops are killed with grim regularity.

Breaking the traditional silence of military families during time of war, Schuman knows what she wants - and who she blames for the danger to her son, Justin. 'I want them to bring our troops home. I am appalled at Bush's policies. He has got us into a terrible mess,' she said.

Schuman may just be the tip of an iceberg. She lives in Shelburne Falls, a small town in Massachusetts, and says all her neighbours support her view. 'I don't know anyone around here who disagrees with me,' she said.

Schuman's views are part of a growing unease back home at the rising casualty rate in Iraq, a concern coupled with deep anger at President George W. Bush's plans to cut army benefits for many soldiers. Criticism is also coming directly from soldiers risking their lives under the guns of Saddam Hussein's fighters, and they are using a weapon not available to troops in previous wars: the internet.

Through emails and chatrooms a picture is emerging of day-to-day gripes, coupled with ferocious criticism of the way the war has been handled. They paint a vivid picture of US army life that is a world away from the sanitised official version.

In a message posted on a website last week, one soldier was brutally frank. 'Somewhere down the line, we became an occupation force in [Iraqi] eyes. We don't feel like heroes any more,' said Private Isaac Kindblade of the 671st Engineer Company.

Kindblade said morale was poor, and he attacked the leadership back home. 'The rules of engagement are crippling. We are outnumbered. We are exhausted. We are in over our heads. The President says, "Bring 'em on." The generals say we don't need more troops. Well, they're not over here,' he wrote.

One of the main outlets for the soldiers' complaints has been a website run by outspoken former soldier David Hackworth, who was the army's youngest colonel in the Vietnam war and one of its most decorated warriors. He receives almost 500 emails a day, many of them from soldiers serving in Iraq. They have sounded off about everything from bad treatment at the hands of their officers to fears that their equipment is faulty.

The army-issue gas mask 'leaks under the chin. This same mask was used during Desert Storm, which accounts for part of the health problems of the vets who fought there. My unit has again deployed to the Gulf with this loser,' ranted one army doctor. [...]

Comment: Why would US army personnel be issued with faulty gas masks? Are US troops being used in a live experiment in chemical warfare? The results of Gulf War I would suggest this is the case, and if the fatality rate of those veterans is anything to go by, then we can expect to see anything up to 100,000 dead soldiers over the next 10 years.

Indeed there is ample evidence that the US government has been involved in such illegal and inhuman experimentation for a long time. A 1994 congressional report (chaired by John D Rockefeller no less) states:

"During the last 50 years, hundreds of thousands of military personnel have been involved in human experimentation and other intentional exposures conducted by the Department of Defense (DOD), often without a servicemember's knowledge or consent. [...] the Department of Defense (DOD) conducted numerous "man-break" tests, exposing soldiers to chemical weapons in order to determine the exposure level that would cause a casualty, i.e., "break a man."

In Yesterday's Signs we posted The War Against Ourselves: An Interview with Major Doug Rokke. Major Rokke mentions that, "...the casualty rate now for Gulf War veterans is approximately 30 percent." He also shared that, "The General Accounting Office verified that the gas masks leak, the chemical protective suits leak. Unbelievably, Defense Department officials recently said the defects can be fixed with duct tape."

Three killed in second day of violence in Basra

11 August 2003

BASRA: A foreign security guard and two Iraqis were killed in a second day of violence in Basra yesterday in which British troops fired warning shots as crowds attacked vehicles and blocked streets with burning tyres. [...]

Iraq guerrillas have 5,000 fighters, central command

Sunday, 10-Aug-2003 2:20PM

NEW YORK, Aug 10 (AFP) - An Iraqi resistance group that calls itself the Army of Mohammed has 5,000 fighters and an organized central command, according to three guerrillas interviewed by Newsweek magazine.

The group does not support the return of ousted president Saddam Hussein, according to the interview. "We want to make a new government, without Saddam but in the same style," one of the fighters told Newsweek. [...]

Atom experts reject CIA case

By David Rennie in Washington

A key plank of the pre-war case against Saddam Hussein - discovery of high-strength aluminium tubes intended for use in a uranium centrifuge - was unanimously rejected by the American government's own nuclear physicists, it was reported yesterday. [...]

A Debate Over U.S. 'Empire' Builds in Unexpected Circles

By Dan Morgan
Washington Post Staff Writer
Sunday, August 10, 2003

At forums sponsored by policy think tanks, on radio talk shows and around Cleveland Park dinner tables, one topic has been hotter than the weather in Washington this summer: Has the United States become the very "empire" that the republic's founders heartily rejected?

Liberal scholars have been raising the question but, more strikingly, so have some Republicans with impeccable conservative credentials. [...]

US pulls out of joint military exercises in Egypt

CAIRO (AFP)
Aug 10, 2003

The US military will not participate in multinational military exercises with Egypt this year due to its mounting troop commitments elsewhere in the world, the US embassy in Cairo said Sunday. [...]

Peace Strained in Congo

Sunday, August 10, 2003 @ 11:13:59 CDT

TORONTO (NFTF.org) -- Despite the installation of a caretaker government made up of the major former adversaries in the Democratic Republic of Congo's (DRC) civil war, many Congolese citizens are likely unaware that they are actually at peace now. The five-year civil war, the bloodiest conflict since World War II, has officially come to an end but the country is still plagued with ethnic divisions. Those divisions are continuing to produce death and are providing a real test for the United Nations peacekeepers deployed in DRC under the direction of French troops. [...]

NATO takes command of Afghan peacekeeping force

Monday August 11, 11:32 AM

NATO will take over command of the international peacekeeping force helping ensure security in the Afghan capital in the first mission outside the alliance's traditional European arena in its 54-year history.

Afghan President Hamid Karzai, German Defence Minster Peter Struck and top Dutch and NATO officials are due to attend the ceremony at Amani school in central Kabul at which outgoing ISAF commander Lieutenant General Norbert van Heyst will hand over command to a fellow German, NATO Lieutenant General Goetz Gliemeroth. [...]

Visa program robs U.S. technology workers of jobs, dignity

By Rachel Konrad
ASSOCIATED PRESS

SAN JOSE, Calif. — Scott Kirwin clung to his computer programming job, but it was tough for him to relish his final assignment: training a group of workers from India who would replace him within a year.

"They called it 'knowledge acquisition,'" the Wilmington, Del., resident said. "We got paid our normal salaries to train people to do our jobs. The market was so bad we couldn't really do anything about it, so we taught our replacements."

Laid off from a large investment bank in April, Mr. Kirwin, 36, sent out 225 resumes before landing a temporary position without benefits at a smaller bank and swallowing a 20 percent pay cut. [...]

Take This Jobless Recovery and Shove It

By Genevieve Roja, AlterNet
August 11, 2003

In the larger scheme of President Bush's agenda, it's people like me who don't really matter. And why would I? I'm no CEO of a big monied corporation. I'm neither a fundraiser nor a politico.

It's worse – I'm unemployed.

While the President is horseback-riding around his Crawford, Texas ranch during his month-long hiatus, my fellow unemployeds and I try to land the job of today, rather than the job of our dreams. That's what happens when you're out of work – you take the measly scraps and wait for the steak dinner. [...]

Nothing can replace that feeling of making a important contribution toward the greater good. Also irreplaceable is the feeling of waking up in the morning not in a state of panic, but in a state of employed serenity. [...]

Comment: It certainly is sickening how Bush and gang are only concerned with their own well-being and their imperialist endeavors. But the author seems to yearn for that state of "employed serenity" in which one can forget about the ills of the world and go back to being an obedient servant of the system, a cog in the capitalistic, psychopathic machine that is the American socioeconomic norm. States of panic, or shocks, can be used as a tool.

Playing the Word-Count Game

The 296 Congressmen and 77 Senators who, out of fear of political blowback voted to make assassination and mass murder the foreign policy of this great nation are liars

By Sheila Samples

08/10/03: If it's true that words come back to haunt you, it must also be true -- like the late, great "Comical Ari" Fleischer once warned -- folks need to "watch what they say..."

The entire political apparatus is jones'n out on Bush's January 2003 State of the Union speech, or at least the 16 words where he said, "The British government has learned that Saddam Hussein recently sought significant qualities of uranium from Africa." They're shocked -- shocked -- to discover that here, six months, 260 dead American soldiers and counting, and more than 7,000 dead Iraqi civilians later, their president may have -- just may have -- unintentionally created this chaos by telling a...well, he may have embossed the tru...or maybe he just mis-spoke because he was misled...yeah, that's it -- Bush mis-spoke -- and besides, even if it was, well you know, that other thing -- it was only a tiny white one...

Lie. The word is Lie. And, considering the devastation loosed upon the world by a litany of even more irresponsible, unsubstantiated lies over the past two years, it's a bit late for those who have known the truth all along to feign outrage, don't you think? The 296 Congressmen and 77 Senators who -- out of fear of political blowback -- voted to make assassination and mass murder the foreign policy of this great nation -- are liars. Every last one of them. It's called aiding and abetting with malice and forethought. And no amount of crawdadding and gandy-dancing in the political arena as we head into Campaign 2004 is going to change that fact. [...]

Bush campaign sees California, New York as ripe for taking

By Joseph Curl
THE WASHINGTON TIMES

The Bush-Cheney campaign plans to make a strong play to take California and New York in 2004, despite the states' recent history of supporting Democratic presidential candidates.

Both states are ripe for the taking, according to election strategists, even though California has preferred Democrats since President Bush's father won there in 1988 and New York has leaned liberal since Ronald Reagan took the state in 1984. [...]

The two states are the top prizes in any national election. California holds 55 electoral votes, New York, 31. While the Republicans can hold on to the White House without winning either state — Mr. Bush captured neither when he won in 2000 — Democrats must take California and New York to remain competitive.

While the mission appears difficult at best, a few factors will aid Mr. Bush's re-election efforts. In California, he holds an approval rating hovering in the mid to high 60s, and Gov. Gray Davis, a Democrat, is facing a recall effort from voters incensed over a $38 billion budget shortfall.

New York has a Republican governor, a Republican mayor of New York City and a very popular former city mayor — Rudolph Giuliani — and will be the site of the Republican National Convention in late August and early September, just two months before the general election. [...]

All That's Missing Is the Popcorn

By KAREN TUMULTY AND TERRY MCCARTHY
Sunday, Aug. 10, 2003

It's too bad there's not an Academy Award for head fakes. As Arnold Schwarzenegger prepared to step onto the Tonight Show stage last week, Jay Leno asked him how he was going to make the expected announcement that he was not going to run for Governor of California. Schwarzenegger murmured, "I am bowing out." And that's what everyone was expecting to hear.

In fact, top adviser George Gorton stood at the edge of the set, holding the official statement that began, "I am not running for Governor ..." When Gorton offered one last word of regret over the campaign that wasn't to be, the former Mr. Universe threw a muscular arm around his shoulder and said, "Let's go do it." He did it, all right. A few moments into the show's afternoon taping, Schwarzenegger declared to a squealing studio audience, "I am going to run for Governor of the state of California." [...]

As a political debut, it was dazzling stagecraft. But even before Schwarzenegger was introduced into the equation with his rallying cry to "clean house in Sacramento," California's Oct. 7 vote on whether to kick Gray Davis out of the Governor's office was shaping up to be the most surreal spectacle since the 2000 Florida recount. Now it's must-see politics, a reality show for the cable news channels, in which the prize is a budget mess to clean up and 34 million ungovernable Californians to lead. [...]

A Dream Of a Mountain, A Nightmare Of a Volcano

Mount Rainier Called 'Monumental Threat'

By Blaine Harden
Washington Post Staff Writer
Monday, August 11, 2003

[...]"A monumental threat," said William E. Scott, scientist in charge of the Cascades Volcano Observatory, a USGS center that monitors volcanoes from California to Alaska.

Volcanologists determined in the late 1990s that the mountain is far more unstable than previously thought, and they have since persuaded local emergency management officials to launch an early-warning system and a major public-awareness campaign. Tens of thousands of people are being told to "enjoy the volcano in your back yard" but to be prepared to run away from it -- fast. [...]

Beneath its dreamy mantel of snow, Mount Rainier is an active volcano, and it is rotting from the inside out, especially on its western flank, which drains toward population centers. The volcano has a long, spotty history of spontaneous collapse and massive mudflows called lahars. [...]

No volcano in the lower 48 states packs so much risk so close to so many people, Scott said [...]

Comment:

July 4, 1998

Q: (L) Okay, you just said we are going to have a reversal in our weather. Are there any other conditions that we should be aware of at the present time?

A: Point is to watch, look, listen. [...] How about a shattering subductionquake in Pacific Northwest of U.S.? We estimate 10.4 on the Richter scale. We have warned of Rainier. Imagine a 150 meter high tsunami in Puget Sound...

Q: (L) Anything else other than a tsunami in Puget Sound and a big subduction quake... 10.4 on the Richter scale is almost inconceivable.

A: Rainier... caldera.

Q: (L) What about the caldera?

A: Expect one.

Q: (L) Other than floods, anything else for Florida upcoming?
A: All areas experience accelerating "freak weather patterns."

Q: (L) Okay, all of these freaky weather patterns and bizarre things going on the planet, how does it relate to the comet cluster and the brown star? Is it related?

A: Human experiential cycle intersects.

Q: (L) Any specific physical manifestation of either this brown star or this comet cluster or this realm border, that is related to these events on the planet?

A: Approach of wave stimulates precursor activity which in turn causes effects which in turn stimulates further "heating up" of activity...

Yellowstone thermal activity increases

Monday, August 11, 2003 (AP)

YELLOWSTONE NATIONAL PARK (USA) -- Scientists plan to set up a temporary network of seismographs, Global Positioning System receivers and thermometers to monitor increasing hydrothermal activity in the Norris Geyser Basin and gauge the risk of a hydrothermal explosion. [...]

Woman recalls horror of historic earthquake

By JOAN HAINES
Bozeman Daily Chronicle

[...] Between 1920 and 1960, Montana experienced a hefty earthquake every 10 years, but the state hasn't had a temblor that measured 6 or higher on the Richter scale for 44 years. Some geologists believe the state is due for a big one. But in this modern era, when scientists can predict the coming of most major disasters, they don't have a handle on this one. [...]

Townsville awaits aftershocks after earthquake

In north Queensland, Townsville and its surrounds have been shaken this afternoon by an earthquake measuring four on the Richter scale.

[...]While no damage has been reported, Mr Spiliopoulos says an aftershock measuring around three on the Richter scale may be expected in the next 12 to 20 hours.

He says earthquakes of this size are not frequently felt in Australia.

Undersea volcano might be next Aleutian island

[...]Volcanologists say the new cone could tell more about the workings of the Aleutian volcanoes, created by immense geologic forces as the Pacific tectonic plate gets squashed deeper into Earth's crust beneath the North American plate. [...]

Scientists offer new theory on isles’ deep lava source

By Mary Vorsino
Associated Press

Nature's dispensers of magma from the Earth's mantle -- called hotspots -- have long been thought stationary.

But a team of researchers studying the hotspot that created the Hawaiian Islands has released a theory that the formations drift, just like tectonic plates. [...]

100° F: Britain's hottest day

By Michael McCarthy and Cahal Milmo
11 August 2003

Britain entered a new hot-weather era yesterday when the temperature record was broken by a substantial margin, the thermometer exceeding the 100F mark for the first time.

In the mid-afternoon of a sweltering day in southern England the temperature at Heathrow airport was recorded at 37.9C (100.2F), higher than the previous record of 37.1C (98.8F) set at Cheltenham in August 1990. It was the hottest temperature since records began in 1659.

Heatwave kills 50 in Paris region, hospital official says

PARIS (AFP) Aug 11, 2003

At least 50 people have died in the last four days from the heatwave in the French capital, a top Parisian hospital official said on Sunday, while government officials denied the claim.

"In the last four days there have been practically 50 deaths due to the heat," the president of the French emergency doctors' association, Patrick Pelloux, said in a television interview.

"The weakest are dropping like flies," Pelloux told commercial TV station TF1, accusing the authorities of standing idly by. [...]

Heat threatens safety of nuclear reactors as France girds for electricity rationing

By Alex Duval Smith in Paris
11 August 2003

The French government is considering national electricity rationing after engineers warned that they can no longer guarantee the safety of the country's 58 nuclear power reactors because the heatwave is defeating efforts to cool them.

A crisis meeting this morning at the Prime Minister's office will be told that France - which depends more heavily on atomic energy than any other European country - faces the prospect of shutting down half its power grid. [...]

Pope Urges Prayers for Rain in Europe

Europe - AP
Sun Aug 10, 6:58 AM ET

CASTEL GANDOLFO, Italy - Pope John Paul II urged people to pray for rain Sunday to ease Europe's seemingly relentless heat wave and expressed worry about the wildfires devouring much of the continent's woodlands. [...]

Bush to Promote Wildfire Plan in Arizona

Mon August 11, 2003 01:14 AM ET
By Steve Holland

CRAWFORD, Texas (Reuters) - President Bush will promote an initiative to help control wildfires in a fire-blackened section of Arizona on Monday on his way to raising campaign money in Colorado. [...]

He will go on a tour and make remarks pushing his "healthy forest initiative," which backers tout as cutting the risk of fires, but opponents see as a way for timber firms to gain easier access to forests. [...]

The legislation eases procedural and judicial requirements for removing small underbrush and trees on 20 million acres of forest land susceptible to wildfires. [...]

Three killed as torrential rains wreak devastation in Mauritania

NOUAKCHOTT (AFP)
Aug 10, 2003

Three people were killed, including a child, as torrential rains wreaked devastation across southern Mauritania over the past three days, official sources and witnesses said Sunday. [...]

Some southern districts had almost a full year's average rainfall in 24 hours, destroying houses and flooding markets. [...]

Storms trigger flood watch

08/11/03

As if you needed to be told, the National Weather Service in Ruskin issued a flood watch Sunday afternoon that remains in effect until 5 p.m. today. [...]

Bradenton received almost 7 inches of rain in seven hours Saturday, and one unidentified man who tried to cross a flooded street on a bicycle was swept away in front of onlookers. [...]

The culprit is a huge trough of low pressure sitting like a giant slug over the East Coast, from Canada to Florida. It hasn't moved for weeks. [...]

Japanese Police Raid Cult Headquarters

TOKYO (AP)--Japanese police raided the headquarters of a religious cult Sunday following the death of a member under mysterious circumstances.

More than 100 investigators poured into the Pana Wave Laboratory's main center in Fukui state on suspicion that its members beat the victim, police said.

Recent media reports have identified the victim as Satoshi Chigusa, a 40-year-old assistant university professor, who died Thursday after being rushed to hospital from the cult's facility.

An autopsy linked his death to heat stroke and trauma from external injuries. Wounds that appeared to have been caused by a beating were found on his back, TV Asahi reported Sunday. No arrests have been made.

The Kyodo news service, citing police sources, said Sunday the group regularly beat its members with wooden sticks, believing it protected them from electromagnetic waves that it considers harmful. [...]

Comment: If you haven't already, be sure to read Laura's analysis of the Pana Wave Cult issue: Will the World End on Thursday?

Huge consumer database cracked

By Online Staff
August 11, 2003

An attacker gained access to one of the world's largest consumer databases last week and was able to download information about some customers of the company's clients, according to a report at SecurityNewsPortal. [...]

Army To Search For Mustard Gas Canisters In Central Fla.

BROOKSVILLE, Fla. -- The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers will search for the remnants of 127 mustard gas canisters buried in a Central Florida airfield more than five decades ago because the chemicals could be dangerous to the public. [...]

Mustard gas bombs were loaded onto planes at the airfield, and dropped in the nearby Withlacoochee State Forest so the Army could study how the chemical spread. [...]

Mice Become Antibody Factories in Experiment

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. researchers said on Sunday they had come up with a system for turning mice into custom-made, high-output antibody factories.[...]

Newsweek: Law-Enforcement Officials Note Marked Nationwide Increase in Teen Prostitution; Trends Show Kids Getting Younger, More from Middle-Class Homes

"Everyone Thinks They Are Runaways with Drug Problems from the Inner City... It's Not True, This Could Be Your Kid," Says Detective [...]

Child advocates are especially concerned that pimps are increasingly targeting girls at the local mall [...]

Child advocates are just as worried about, and puzzled by, girls like Stacey, who aren't forced into prostitution but instead appear to sell themselves for thrills, or money, or both. Richard Estes, a University of Pennsylvania researcher, says so-called designer sex is becoming more common in cities across the country. [...]

Some Seek Preschool Nuke Evacuation Plans

MIDDLETOWN, Pa. (AP) -- If an accident or terrorist attack at a nuclear power plant required an evacuation, plans already exist to get school children and nursing home residents out of harm's way.

But preschools and day care centers around nuclear plants aren't required to have evacuation plans, and child-care officials say many don't. [...]

Vibrating shaver sparks airport alert

A battery-operated shaver that suddenly vibrated in a bag belonging to a Japanese tourist forced a security alert at a Malaysian airport. [...]

Online future for Nuremberg archive

[...]One million pages of documents from the Nuremberg trials of Nazi war criminals will be made available on the internet if Boston's Harvard University can find the necessary money. [...]

Tires being loosened, police warn

ROBERTA AVERY
THE STAR

BRACEBRIDGE—When Bruce Kruger looked out of his restaurant window and saw a car nearly lose its rear wheel as it left the nearby mall parking lot, he decided it was time to do something about the rash of wheel-nut loosening incidents that's been plaguing cottage country.

"It's outrageous to think someone is out there doing this. There was a woman with three small children in that car; they could have been killed," said Kruger yesterday. [...]

The myth of suicidal lemmings

Disney documentary faked bogus behavior

By Riley Woodford
Alaska Department of Fish and Game

[...] According to a 1983 investigation by Canadian Broadcasting Corp. producer Brian Vallee, the lemming scenes were faked. The lemmings supposedly committing mass suicide by leaping into the ocean were actually thrown off a cliff by the Disney filmmakers. The epic "lemming migration" was staged using careful editing, tight camera angles and a few dozen lemmings running on snow covered lazy-Susan-style turntable. [...]

Comment: Just because we see it on TV does not mean it is real. Interesting, that in the strange times we live in, the television has become the arbitrator of reality.

Pair spot mystery objects

UNIDENTIFIED sightings of a mysterious object in the night sky over Loughton have left two women baffled. [...]

Woman eats mother's hair

Ananova.com
08:17 Monday 11th August 2003

An Indian woman who likes eating her mother's hair is recovering in hospital after doctors removed a half kilogram bundle of it from her digestive system. [...]

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