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Nato warplanes bombard Tripoli after Gaddafi vows fight to the death

Xan Rice
Guardian UK
Fri, 10 Jun 2011 20:30 UTC
Image
© Ahmed Jadallah/Reuters
A truck damaged by coalition air strikes on Tripoli, according to the Libyan government.
Coalition forces carry out attacks within hours of Libyan leader's defiant television speech

Nato's intensified aerial bombardment of Tripoli continued early on Wednesday, hours after Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi made a rare speech on state television vowing to fight to the death.

Loud explosions rocked the city before dawn, marking the heaviest 24 hours of air strikes in the capital since Nato's operation began in March. The alliance said it conducted 66 strike sorties on Tuesday, with many of them in daylight hours. Previously, most airstrikes have taken place at night.

The targets struck in and around Tripoli included six command and control centres, two anti-aircraft guns, a radar system and a vehicle storage facility, according to Nato. The heaviest damage occurred at Gaddafi's Bab al-Aziziya compound, where several buildings were destroyed, sending giant plumes of smoke into the sky.
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Stormtrooper

Blair demands more allied military action

Andrew Grice
Independent UK
Fri, 10 Jun 2011 19:34 UTC
Image
© Arrow Books
Tony Blair
Britain and its allies should be ready to mount Libya-style interventions in other Arab countries, Tony Blair declares today.

The former Prime Minister, who committed British troops to military action in Afghanistan and Iraq, says that Europe and the United States must draw up a proper plan to support the so-called Arab Spring.

In a new introduction to the paperback version of his memoirs published today, Mr Blair says: "We need to have an active policy, be players and not spectators sitting in the sands, applauding or condemning as we watch. Like it or not, we have to participate."

He argues that a Libya-style operation should take place only when regimes have "excluded a path to evolutionary change". But he does raise the prospect of intervention in some circumstances in Bahrain, Saudi Arabia, Syria, Iran and Jordan.
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Chess

Why TSA, wars, state defined diets, seat-belt laws, the war on drugs, police brutality, and efforts to control the internet, are essential to the state

Butler Shaffer
LewRockwell
Fri, 10 Jun 2011 12:17 UTC
Whenever justice is uncertain and police spying and terror are at work, human beings fall into isolation, which, of course, is the aim and purpose of the dictator state, since it is based on the greatest accumulation of depotentiated social units.

~ Carl Jung
Image
© Unknown
The title of this article encompasses topics that arouse attention and criticism among persons of libertarian persuasion. The discussion of such matters usually treats each issue as though it were sui generis, independent of one another. Most of us respond as though the woman who is groped at the airport has no connection with the man who is tasered by a police officer; that the person serving time in prison for selling marijuana is unrelated to the men being held at Guantanamo. The belief that one person's maltreatment is isolated from the rest of us, is essential to the maintenance of state power.
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Dollar

Canada: Prime Minister Stephen Harper attends Game 4 of Stanley Cup final

Bruce Cheadle
The Canadian Press
Wed, 08 Jun 2011 00:00 UTC
Image
© The Canadian Press / Jonathan Hayward
Prime Minister Stephen Harper, centre, attends game 4 of NHL Stanley Cup Final hockey action between Vancouver Canucks and Boston Bruins at the TD Garden in Boston on Wednesday, June 8, 2011.
In the NHL season of the head shot, Prime Minister Stephen Harper should have seen this one coming.

The Conservative leader was at TD Garden on Wednesday night as the Bruins tried to even their best-of-seven series with the Vancouver Canucks in Boston.

But word of Harper's flight to Bean Town with his daughter Rachel and Heritage Minister James Moore on a government jet had opposition critics stepping up to the Tory blue-line to lower the boom.

Opposition MPs were incensed that Harper - who used to rail about government abuse of its executive jets - is flying to Boston on the taxpayers' dime for a hockey game even as his government is on a mission to slash some $4 billion per year in "fat" from federal programs and services.

"Excuse me, aren't we in a time of tightening our belts? Aren't we in a time of making sure that we use our money wisely?" fumed Liberal MP Jim Karygiannis.

New Democrat Charlie Angus noted "how important it is politically" for Harper to associate himself with the Stanley Cup and Canada's remaining team.

"The whole world would love to be in his shoes, but we are not and he is the man saying again and again ... we are going to do things differently," said Angus. "Well, there's two rules, there is one for Mr. Harper and his gang and one rule for everyone else."
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Bizarro Earth

Syria Prepares Response to Jisr al-Shughour 'Massacre'

Jim Muir
BBC News
Wed, 08 Jun 2011 09:13 UTC
Image
© The Associated Press
The Syrian government claims members of the security forces were killed in a rampage
The events in the north-western town of Jisr al-Shughour may turn out to be some sort of turning point in Syria's uprising, as it moves towards completing its first three months with no end in sight.

The reported killing of more than 120 security forces personnel in and around the town in recent days is by far the biggest frontal challenge to Bashar al-Assad's regime since the revolt began in March.

The authorities have made it clear they will act decisively and forcefully to restore control.

It is a challenge they cannot ignore without admitting that they have lost control of a significant chunk of territory.

Preparations are under way for what local residents fear will be "another massacre", with troops and tanks from dependably loyalist units reported to be making their way towards the area.

The current lull is clearly the calm before the storm.

Syrian state television has been preparing the way for the campaign, repeating gruesome footage of some of the dead bodies, interviewing wounded survivors and loyal citizens calling for army intervention, and declaring that there is a "popular consensus" behind a military crackdown.

Activist internet sites, in counterbalance, have been carrying footage of night-time vigils and demonstrations in many towns and villages throughout the country, declaring solidarity with Jisr al-Shughour and calling for the overthrow of the regime.
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Blackbox

Hmm...Reward? Clinton may quit State Department for World Bank

Lesley Wroughton
MSNBC / Rueters
Thu, 09 Jun 2011 17:51 UTC
Image
© Karim Sahib/AFP/Gett
Secretary of State Hillary Clinton gestures speaks to the press after a meeting of the International contact group on Libya in Abu Dhabi Thursday.
U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has been in discussions with the White House about leaving her job next year to become head of the World Bank, sources familiar with the discussions said on Thursday.

The former first lady and onetime political rival to President Barack Obama quickly became one of the most influential members of his cabinet after she began her tenure at State in early 2009.

She has said publicly she did not plan to stay on at the State Department for more than four years. Associates say Clinton has expressed interest in having the World Bank job should the Bank's current president, Robert Zoellick, leave at the end of his term, in the middle of 2012.

"Hillary Clinton wants the job," said one source who knows the secretary well.

A second source also said Clinton wants the position.

A third source said Obama has already expressed support for the change in her role. It is unclear whether Obama has formally agreed to nominate her for the post, which would require approval by the 187 member countries of the World Bank.

The White House declined to comment.
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Bad Guys

Rift Widens in Israel over War on Iran


Press TV
Wed, 08 Jun 2011 11:57 UTC
Former Mossad chief Meir Dagan & Netanyahu
© Press TV
Former Mossad chief Meir Dagan (L) and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu
Friction among Israeli spy officials and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu are on the rise over the prospect of a military conflict with Iran.

Israeli Minister for the Home Front Defense Matan Vilnai and former Mossad chief Meir Dagan have both warned Netanyahu that should the regime launch an attack on Iran, more than 1,000 rockets will hit "central Israel for an undetermined period of time" on a daily basis, Haaretz reported on Tuesday.

In a series of remarks in May, the former Mossad chief said that any Israeli aerial attack against Iran's nuclear facilities would be "the stupidest thing," and warned that any such measure "could start a regional war which will include missile fire from Iran."

Earlier in the month, a source close to prominent Iraqi cleric Muqtada al-Sadr's group said Israeli jet fighters had conducted drills at a military base in Iraq in order to strike targets inside Iran.
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Magic Hat

Propaganda alert! 'Syrian Blogger Amina Arraf' is a stolen identity

John Stevens
UK Daily Mail
Thu, 09 Jun 2011 05:15 UTC
Image

The Amina Arraf Campaign, brought to you by The Secret Team: Thousands of people have joined a Facebook group calling for the release of Amina Arraf
  • London woman says photo of U.S. lesbian blogger 'kidnapped in Syria' is actually her
  • Jelena Lecic said: 'I don't know how this happened, I've never met her. This has put me in danger'
  • Blogger's 'girlfriend' admits she's never met her
  • Story of alleged kidnap was reported across the globe
The reported kidnap of a U.S. lesbian blogger in Syria has come into question after a woman in Britain claimed that photos being used to call for her release are actually her.

Thousands of campaigners joined protest groups after media outlets across the world reported that Amina Arraf, a blogger known for her frank posts about her sexuality and her open criticism of President Bashar Assad had been detained.

But a woman in London came forward today claiming the photos being circulated were actually her, raising questions about the existence of the blogger.

Jelena Lecic found out that pictures of her were being used by the blogger when she saw her photo used next to an article in a British newspaper.

Comment: It would seem that recent "poster child" of this revolution and her story of woe, which western media has been so happy to promote, doesn't actually exist. As to the numbers of people killed by Syrian troops in recent months, if the psy-ops campaign against Libya in the run up to Operation Odyssey Dawn is anything to go by, then the numbers are probably inflated and don't take into account that Syrian authorities are dealing with an armed insurrection led by 'previously unknown terror groups'.

Just like the Kuwaiti ambassador's daughter crying before Congress about Saddam's troops throwing babies out of hospital incubators in Kuwait in the run-up to the Gulf War...

Just like the wrong image of Neda Soltani was strobe-flashed across the world after someone (among many others) was murdered under mysterious circumstances during the orchestrated riots that followed Iran's presidential election in 2009...

Just like Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani, the Iranian activist supposedly stoned to death by 'them brutal Iranians', accompanied feature articles about her that were carried by mainstream media outlets the world over. SOTT.net found out that this story was first leaked by Radio Farda, the Iranian branch of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, a CIA propaganda mill, in conjunction with The Media Line, a Zionist propaganda mill. This Jerusalem Post article broached the story of the non-stoning to the mainstream media on June 30, 2010...

Just like the Libyan 'rebels' telling us that "Gaddafi's army will kill half a million", when in all probability the 'rebels' are actually a clandestine unit of the Secret Team.

How can anyone have faith in ANY Western media story that paints Iran or Libya or Syria in a negative light when the psychopaths in Washington and Tel Aviv have been openly stating that they want to invade these countries as they did Iraq and slaughter millions more. If you fall for this one and agree with British Foreign Secretary William Hague that it's time to carpet-bomb Syria, then you've fallen for the oldest trick in the book: the pity ploy psy-ops. How many times do you want to played for a fool?

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War Whore

US intensifying secret campaign of Yemen airstrikes

Mark Mazzetti
The New York Times
Wed, 08 Jun 2011 22:22 UTC
Image
© Jeff Pachoud/AFP/Getty Images
Washington - The Obama administration has intensified the American covert war in Yemen, exploiting a growing power vacuum in the country to strike at militant suspects with armed drones and fighter jets, according to American officials.

The acceleration of the American campaign in recent weeks comes amid a violent conflict in Yemen that has left the government in Sana, a United States ally, struggling to cling to power. Yemeni troops that had been battling militants linked to Al Qaeda in the south have been pulled back to the capital, and American officials see the strikes as one of the few options to keep the militants from consolidating power.

On Friday, American jets killed Abu Ali al-Harithi, a midlevel Qaeda operative, and several other militant suspects in a strike in southern Yemen. According to witnesses, four civilians were also killed in the airstrike. Weeks earlier, drone aircraft fired missiles aimed at Anwar al-Awlaki, the radical American-born cleric who the United States government has tried to kill for more than a year. Mr. Awlaki survived.

The recent operations come after a nearly year-long pause in American airstrikes, which were halted amid concerns that poor intelligence had led to bungled missions and civilian deaths that were undercutting the goals of the secret campaign.
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Bad Guys

It's not just Dominique Strauss-Kahn. The IMF itself should be on trial

Johann Hari
The Indepedent
Fri, 03 Jun 2011 13:25 UTC
Imagine a prominent figure was charged, not with raping a hotel maid, but with starving her, and her family, to death

Sometimes, the most revealing aspect of the shrieking babble of the 24/7 news agenda is the silence. Often the most important facts are hiding beneath the noise, unmentioned and undiscussed.

So the fact that Dominique Strauss-Kahn, the former head of the International Monetary Fund (IMF), is facing trial for allegedly raping a maid in a New York hotel room is - rightly - big news. But imagine a prominent figure was charged not with raping a maid, but starving her to death, along with her children, her parents, and thousands of other people. That is what the IMF has done to innocent people in the recent past. That is what it will do again, unless we transform it beyond all recognition. But that is left in the silence.
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