Puppet MastersS


Black Cat

War Criminal Tony Blair a Pariah in His Own Land

Matthew Norman
The Independent
Wed, 18 Jul 2012 00:00 UTC
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Abandon hope of reading anything remotely original, all ye who enter here. That pre-emptive warning may be implicit in the byline above, but I make it explicit today because what you are about to enter is the tragically unlost Danteian tenth circle of hell that is Mr Tony Blair. If he bores the bejeesus out of this crazily obsessive student of his works, what on earth will another article about him do to those of you in better psychiatric health?

Before you tut, "No, not the bleeding Blair rant, not again," and shift to my friend Mark Steel, a final plea for your attention. There is something scintillatingly fresh to be said of him after all. Mr Tony, the Daily Mail reveals, has become besotted with deep sea fishing. "And we're not talking about him standing about on deck... dangling a rod over the side," a friend is quoted as saying. "Apparently, he gets strapped into one of those high-tech seats with a harness, like in Jaws."

Loss of power is a hateful thing to the average victim of undiagnosed narcissistic personality disorder, so no one will begrudge him the chance to replace the adrenaline rushes as he prefers. The difference of opinion only arises when the scent of rehabilitation brings him home. Just when you thought it was safe to go back in the water, here he is encircling the upper echelons of public life once again - and if his dream of rehabilitation is to be harpooned, we're going to need a bigger boat.
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Vader

Programmed to Kill: Tourists, including young children, venture to West Bank to 'shoot terrorists'

Akiva Novick
Ynetnews
Thu, 19 Jul 2012 19:02 UTC
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© Alex KolomoiskyThree seconds to take terrorist down
Thrill-seeking tourists of all ages brave West Bank shooting range to be taught by settlers how to shoot terrorists.

Summer camp, warfare style: Like a frozen turkey plunged into boiling oil, a group of American tourists descend from an air-conditioned van into the scorching heat of the West Bank. Flashing smiles all around, they march into Caliber 3, a local shooting range.

"Move it!" the Israeli guide suddenly yells. "Destroy that terrorist," he orders them, and they charge, guns loaded, at cardboard targets.

Gush Etzion has become a hot destination in recent months for tourists seeking an Israeli experience like no other: The opportunity to pretend-shoot a terror operative. Residents of the nearby settlements, who run the site, offer day-trippers a chance to hear stories from the battleground, watch a simulated assassination of terrorists by guards, and fire weapons at the range.
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Vader

Israel preparing the legal groundwork to annex most of West Bank

Jonathan Cook
The National
Wed, 18 Jul 2012 18:47 UTC
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© Najeh Hashlamoun / APA ImagesIsrael’s nonexistent occupation of the West Bank
The recently published report by an Israeli judge concluding that Israel is not in fact occupying the West Bank - despite a well-established international consensus to the contrary - has provoked mostly incredulity or mirth in Israel and abroad.

Leftwing websites in Israel used comically captioned photographs to highlight Justice Edmond Levy's preposterous finding. One shows an Israeli soldier pressing the barrel of a rifle to the forehead of a Palestinian pinned to the ground, saying: "You see - I told you there's no occupation."

Even Benjamin Netanyahu, Israel's prime minister, seemed a little discomfited by the coverage. He was handed the report more than a fortnight earlier but was apparently reluctant to make it public.

Downplaying the Levy report's significance may prove unwise, however. If Netanyahu is embarrassed, it is only because of the timing of the report's publication rather than its substance.
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USA

Best of the Web: Assassination Nation: The Fifty Year U.S. Killing Spree

Doug Noble
CounterPunch
Thu, 19 Jul 2012 16:31 UTC
US assassination map
© Richard D. Vogel / William Blum
Fifty Years of US Targeted 'Kill Lists': From the Phoenix Program to Predator Drones
"A broad-gauged program of targeted assassination has now displaced counterinsurgency as the prevailing expression of the American way of war." - Andrew Bacevich [1]
This spring the US drone killing program has come out of the closet. Attorney General Eric Holder publicly defended the drone killing of an American citizen [2], while Obama's counter terrorism czar John Brennan publicly explained and justified the target killing program [3]. And a New York Times article by Jo Becker and Scott Shane chronicled Obama's personal role in vetting a secret "Kill List." [4]
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Handcuffs

Journalist arrested in Belarus for publishing pictures of teddy bears

Roy Greenslade
Dailymail
Thu, 19 Jul 2012 16:22 UTC
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© Unknown
If it wasn't so serious, it would be laughable. Belarusian security agents have arrested a website editor for publishing photographs of teddy bears, such as the one above.

Anton Suryapin, who runs a site called Belarusian News Photos, carried the pictures on his site after the toys were airdropped over Minsk on 4 July. The bears were pinned with press freedom messages.

The airdrop was carried out by Studio Total, a Swedish advertising agency. On its website, it explains that it did so in order to highlight the international media's neglect of press freedom violations in Belarus. It said it purchased a small plane and flew illegally to Belarus from neighbouring Lithuania.

That resulted last Friday in Suryapin being detained by members of the KGB, the nation's security service, for alleged complicity in an illegal border crossing, a charge that can lead to a seven-year jail term.

Although the airdrop was widely reported in the regional media, Belarusian authorities have since denied it ever took place. The defence ministry told Interfax, the Russian news agency, that its experts had concluded that the photos and videos were fabricated and that the information about the stunt was false and a provocation.
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Bomb

'Suicide bombers' of the world, unite!

Pepe Escobar
Asia Times
Fri, 20 Jul 2012 16:04 UTC
General Dawoud Rajiha
© AFP/Getty ImagesSyrian defence minister, General Dawoud Rajiha, was killed in the bombing
It is, literally, a bomb. What kind of wily actor managed to get the precious intel needed to penetrate, disrupt and destroy a meeting at the National Security building in Damascus - killing Defense Minister Dawoud Rajha and his deputy Assef Shawkat, Bashar al-Assad's brother-in-law?

What really happened is still murky. Reuters said it was a suicide bomber working as a bodyguard for Assad's inner circle. Agence France-Presse reported it was a suicide bomber detonating his belt. Beirut's Al-Akhbar said it was a planted bomb. Same for Lebanon's Al-Manar TV - detailing it was a 40-kilogram bomb.

So who was it? The Central Intelligence Agency (CIA)? The MI6? Saudi intel? Turkish intel? Or that oh so pliable ghost - al-Qaeda?
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Card - MC

WikiLeaks Nearly Out of Cash

Jeanne Whalen
Wall Street Journal
Wed, 18 Jul 2012 12:20 UTC
wikileakslogo
© TechCrunch
WikiLeaks said it is close to running out of money, a problem the site blamed on Visa and MasterCard, which have prohibited users from donating to the site.

WikiLeaks' cash reserves have fallen from €800,000 ($983,600) in December 2010 to less than €100,000 at the end of June, the site said, adding that its funds would run out "within a few months" unless donations dramatically increase.

In the first six months of 2012, WikiLeaks said it spent €246,600 while collecting donations of just €32,800. According to a two-page financial report released by the German foundation that processes WikiLeaks' bills, in the first half of 2012 the site spent €20,000 on general and technical "infrastructure," €104,900 on "campaigns" and "external communications," €97,700 on logistics, €17,900 on legal advice and €6,100 on administration.

WikiLeaks said it needed to raise "a minimum of €1 million immediately" in order to "effectively continue its mission." In a news release, it said it has set up a new donation pathway through French credit card system Carte Bleue, which it said is "coupled with the Visa/MasterCard system globally."
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Star of David

Best of the Web: Was Arafat murdered?

Jamal Kanj
Gulf Daily News
Thu, 19 Jul 2012 07:19 UTC
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Murdered by Israel? Yasser Arafat
Most Palestinians, whether they supported their late leader Yasser Arafat or not, were in agreement that he did not die of natural causes. They believed he was murdered by Israel or its agents.

But are Palestinians justified in blaming Israel for his death?

French doctors treating Arafat did not issue a conclusive report identifying the cause of his illness. The French public medical report pointed to the destruction of red blood cells as a reason for his death, but did not identify the cause of the red cell failure.

According to an Al Jazeera report, tests by scientists at the Institute of Radiation Physics in Lausanne, Switzerland, suggested that traces found on Arafat's stained underwear and other personal belongings pointed to an "unexplained, elevated amount of unsupported polonium-210", which could explain his red cell abnormality.

The Swiss lab is the same medical institute that uncovered traces of the radioactive isotope polonium-210 on former KGB agent Alexander Litvinenko's belongings.

The Russian dissident died in 2006 following a meeting with Russian officials after ingesting tea laced with the substance.

After scanning Arafat's belongings, lab officials found an "unexplained level of polonium", concluding the possibility that he died of "poisoning".

Israel is the only nation in the region with a proven capability to produce polonium-210.
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Eagle

CIA Sued Over Targeted-Kill Drone Strikes


RT
Thu, 19 Jul 2012 00:00 UTC
ACLU
© Agence France-Presse/Karen Bleier
For killing three of US citizens overseas without bringing them to trial, the Central Intelligence Agency and the US Defense Department are being sued by the American Civil Liberties Union in the latest episode involving its drone program.

The ACLU filed a suit on Wednesday against the CIA and the Pentagon over the extrajudicial killings conducted last year aimed at alleged affiliates of al-Qaeda. Anwar al-Awlaki, his son Abdulrahman al-Awlaki and Samir Khan - all US citizens - were executed during two separate drone strikes conducted last year in the country of Yemen.

The 2012 targeted kills have become one of the more memorable moments of America's unmanned aerial vehicle program, which has been reportedly tied to the executions of hundreds of civilians overseas during the last few years. The 2012 executions aimed at the alleged al-Qaeda affiliated - and the United States' reluctance to reveal the details in full - have only escalated contempt against the drone strikes in the months since.
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Bad Guys

False Flag Alert! Israel official: "Suicide Bomber" Attacked Israelis in Bulgaria, Eighth Body Found

Barak Ravid
Haaretz
Thu, 19 Jul 2012 00:00 UTC
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© ReutersA man and a woman react after an explosion at Bulgaria's Burgas airport July 18, 2012.
New investigative direction counters previous estimates, according to which bomb was planted in the Israeli tour bus in the coastal city of Burgas.

The bombing in Bulgaria Wednesday is committed by a suicide bomber and not by a charge planted in the bus beforehand as believed at first, a senior official in the Israeli Foreign Ministry told Haaretz.

Eight people were killed in the bombing, six of them Israeli tourists, one of them the Bulgarian bus driver, with authorities estimating that the eighth may be the terrorist who perpetrated the attack. An additional 32 Israelis were wounded in the attack.

During the night, two Israeli aircrafts carrying medical staff, a casualty identification team, a police forensic team, as well as, Israeli diplomats to assist in the return of Israelis who lost their identification in the attack.

Comment: For more information on this new false flag operation please read:
Sott Focus: One Man's Suicide Bomber - National Security Building Bomb in Damascus and Bourgas Bus Bomb
To learn about the origins of "suicide bombings", read:
Sott Focus: The British Empire - A Lesson In State Terrorism

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