There’s industrial unrest in Britain — wildcat strikes because of jobs that are going to foreign workers.Ugly anti-Semitic incidents have occurred in Iceland and the UK, among other places.
And the unpleasant words between Shimon Peres and Recep Tayyip Erdogan at Davos may or may not have permanent repercussions — it depends on which article you read.
Thanks to C. Cantoni, Insubria, JD, KGS, RRW, VH, Vlad Tepes, and all the other tipsters who sent these in. Headlines and articles are below the fold.
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ACORN to Get Big Payoff — From You
You know about ACORN — the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now — the shakedown artists currently under investigation for violations of election laws in at least 12 states.
This racketeering operation probably played a significant role in getting Barack Obama elected, not to mention Democratic members of the House and Senate, in 2008.
ACORN’s shock troops have been linked to or already convicted of perjury, forgery, identity theft and election fraud.
With a track record like that, you might think the organization would be forced to disband, or that its tax-exempt status would be revoked, or that its entire leadership would be prosecuted.
But you would be wrong.
In fact, under Democratic rule in Washington, there are plans to redistribute up to $5.2 billion of taxpayer money — that’s your money — to ACORN.
And why not? The Democrats who control the federal purse strings got a lot of bang for the buck out of ACORN. Now they hope to use the ACORN nuts to maintain permanent power — doing what they do best: registering dead people, registering illegal aliens, registering pets and other animate and inanimate objects to vote, for Democrats, of course.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Bill — Concerning Mobile Phones Containing Digital Cameras
To require mobile phones containing digital cameras to make a sound when a photograph is taken.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Can Government Repeal the Laws of Nature?
Pundits and politicians are regurgitating phrases such as: “the worst since the great depression …; highest unemployment rate since …; largest deficit since…” Few acknowledge that government is the most significant cause of the current dilemma, or that its determined efforts to solve the problem can only make the problem worse.
The underlying cause of the current crisis is government’s efforts to repeal the laws of nature.
The first law of nature is: everything changes. The second law of nature is: change forces adaptation or extinction. The third law of nature is: whenever government sets out to repeal these laws, it only makes things worse.
These three laws of nature are validated by history. All the progress made by society since the beginning of time is the result of individual effort and creativity. Government has produced nothing. Government can produce nothing. Government can only limit, restrict, redirect and generally impede the progress of individuals.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Colo. Man Accused of Threatening Obama Surrenders
DENVER — A Colorado man has been indicted on charges of threatening to kill President Barack Obama and blow up the Mall of America in suburban Minneapolis. The man said the threat against Obama was a prank.
Timothy Ryan Gutierrez, 20, surrendered Thursday at the FBI’s office in Durango and was being held without bond, the U.S. attorney’s office said.
[…]
In an interview Thursday, Gutierrez told the Cortez Journal that the threat against Obama was just a prank because the president misrepresented himself.
“I’m not mad about him becoming president, but he’s not doing what he said he was going to do,” he said. “He’s not doing anything for the lower class — just the middle and upper class. Medications are going up, not lowering, and jobs are being lost. His actions are going to get him in trouble.”
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Congress Sued to Remove Prez From White House
‘Defendants had to ensure the Constitution is upheld’
A new lawsuit is challenging Barack Obama’s eligibility to be president, and this one targets Congress as a defendant for its “failure” to uphold the constitutional demand to make sure Obama qualified before approving the Electoral College vote that actually designated him as the occupant of the Oval Office.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
How Big is $1 Trillion, Really?
Size of Obama ‘stimulus’ almost beyond comprehension
NEW YORK — The Obama administration is the first government in human history to propose going $1 trillion in debt for any reason, let alone on the premise that borrowing and spending that amount would be a solution rather than another problem.
To answer the question of how big a problem borrowing $1 trillion will be, we decided to examine just how large 1 trillion actually is.
* One trillion is the number “1” followed by 12 zeroes, as in: 1,000,000,000,000.
* One trillion seconds of ordinary clock time = 31,546 years.
[…]
* Craig Smith, founder and CEO of Swiss America, estimates it would take approximately four generations of Americans to pay off the interest of the U.S. Treasury bonds sold as debt to fund the $1 trillion stimulus package, factoring in a 3-percent growth rate in the economy throughout that time.
[…]
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Obama: Follow FDR — in This Case, Anyway
One of Obama’s first acts as president was to fulfill his campaign pledge to shut down Guantanamo Bay prison camp for foreign terrorists who fought against, wounded or killed American soldiers. This prison camp was established in 1898 and has been under the control the U.S. since 1903. Since 2002 this base has housed the worst of the worst enemy combatants. All of the 270 men currently held there are Muslims who have waged jihad against America and the West on battlefields in Iraq, Afghanistan and throughout the world. To date, 62 prisoners from this camp have been set free, and 100 percent of them have returned to the battlefield to continue their murderous campaign to kill as many Americans as possible. These are the irredeemable people Obama wants to set free.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Prison Cell in Oregon Didn’t Stop Ex-CIA Spy
WASHINGTON — Harold Nicholson, the highest-ranking CIA officer convicted of espionage, has been locked up in a federal prison in northwest Oregon since 1997.
But even as federal inmate No. 49535-083, Nicholson never really retired as a Russian spy, federal prosecutors say. In an indictment unsealed Thursday, Nicholson and son Nathan, 24, were charged with having used prison visits, coded letters and clandestine overseas meetings to sell more secrets to the Russians in the past three years, in a scheme Nicholson hatched from his prison cell. The two were accused of conspiring to act as agents of a foreign government and money laundering.
“You have been brave enough to step into this new unseen world that is sometimes dangerous but always fascinating,” Harold Nicholson wrote to his son in July, the indictment says, in what apparently was an allusion to the scheme.
The elder Nicholson pleaded guilty in 1997 to selling the Russians the identities of fellow CIA officers for $300,000. According to prosecutors, he “trained and tasked” his son in spycraft from his prison cell beginning in 2006 and helped his son meet with Russian handlers in Mexico, San Francisco, Peru and a T.G.I. Friday’s restaurant in Cyprus to pass on information intended to help current Russian agents evade detection, prosecutors said.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Writer at Huffpo Blames FBI for Not Preventing Somali Terrorist Recruitment in US
First, I couldn’t believe my eyes when I saw this opinion piece at the Huffington Post this morning that readily admits terrorist recruitment and indoctrination is occurring in the US Somali community. The writer, Faisal Roble (of Wardheernews) begins with a summary of the Minneapolis missing youths that I’m repeating here in case we have new readers unfamiliar with the ever-expanding story.
It is believed that as many as 20 naturalized Somali Americans have recently vanished without any prior knowledge of their parents and joined the more radical Al-Shabab, “the youth” — an Islamist firebrand aligned to al-Qaeda. Al-shabab is an extremist group whose political objective is to establish a non-secular Sharia-based government in Somalia. So far, at least one naturalized American citizen had committed suicide in this past October, killing 30 people in northern Somalia. Most available evidence points at the Al-Shabab group who either train or commit the vanished youth to suicidal acts.
Then he goes on to blame the FBI (and the Somali families) for not spotting or reporting what is going on. My first instinct is to defend the FBI, but I can’t. I have heard first hand that people have attempted since 9/11 to alert the FBI to strange things going on in the Somali community and have been rebuffed by the agency…
| — Hat tip: RRW | [Return to headlines] |
Battisti: Frattini, Genro Speaks Demagogy and Rhetoric
(AGI) — Rome, 30 Jan. — Franco Frattini uses the words “demagogy” typical of “political rhetoric” to comment the words of Brazilian minister Tarso Genro who stated that Italy is proving that it is still “buried under the lead years of the ‘70s”. In a note issued by Italy’s foreign ministry, minister Frattini states that “I will not be unnerved and I will not comment on expressions that belong to demagogy and political rhetoric. We know what the ‘Lead Years’ (i.e. the seventies) meant for Italy, and it is us that will decide how to best end that season that is still unrepentant, arrogant and full of assassins that still finds some degree of support. We knew how to deal and do away with terrorism by using the law. It is with the same spirit that we have decided to engage in a legal battle with Brazil’s supreme justice authorities, a battle that concerns not only Italy because it runs the risk of soiling the value of a major word: refugee”.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Battisti: Advisor Sarkozy, No Role French Services
(AGI) — Rome, Jan. 30 — Fabien Raynaud, the European affairs advisor of French President Nicolas Sarkozy, denies that French secret services have played a role in the escape of Cesare Battisti to Brazil, Pdl MP and president of the Schengen Committee Margherita Boniver said. Raynaud participated this morning in a meeting of the European Policies Commission in the Italian Chamber of Deputies and was asked about the Battisti case. ‘‘I’ve pointed out to the advisor of President Sarkozy’’ said Boniver ‘‘that the public opinion in Italy is upset by the Battisti case and I’ve stressed that people were even more astonished when they read about Battisti’s statements on the role of French intelligence. Battisti remains a convicted serial killer’’. Raynaud, the MP concluded, ‘‘said Battisti’s remarks are not true’’ and added that Sarkozy ‘‘has considered the ‘Mitterrand doctrine’ as no longer valid for some time’’.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Cyprus to Conduct Second Search of Suspected Iran Arms Ship
The saga of a ship suspected of carrying arms from Iran to Gaza grew more complicated Saturday as Cypriot authorities searched the ship, then backed away from previous assertions that it was violating United Nations resolutions.
Authorities will now conduct a second search, the Cypriot foreign minister said.
Suspicions that the Cypriot-flagged container ship Monchegorsk was ferrying arms from Iran to the militant Palestinian organization Hamas had been raised by the United States. The U.S. military stopped the vessel in the Red Sea last week but could not legally detain it or seize its cargo.
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The ship continued on to Port Said, Egypt, then headed for Cyprus, where it arrived Thursday. It remains anchored off the island nation’s southern port of Limassol under tight marine police security.
Cypriot Foreign Minister Markos Kyprianou said Saturday that a first inspection of the Monchegorsk was complete. He said authorities were still trying to determine whether the ship’s cargo contravened United Nations resolutions.
On Friday, Cypriot President Dimitris Christofias had said without qualification that the ship had violated U.N. resolutions. […]
| — Hat tip: VH | [Return to headlines] |
Czech Republic Helping Baathist Syria; Czech Social Democratic Party Siding With Hamas, Accused of Secret Police Ties
Now isn’t this all too uncomfortable, that the Czech Republic which is leading the European Union is siding with Baathist Syria when it comes to ignoring its support for Hamas during the recent conflict. Aside from that, the leader of the Czech Social Democratic Party-Jiri Paroubek, who is accused of having ties with the old Czech secret police is also siding with Hamas!
Unbelievable that this particular Czech party would do such a thing. Along with also, members of the Czech Social Democratic Party have often been traditional allies of the Czech Communist Party. they even merged together when most of the unapproved Czech parties left for London, and some of them were involved with dealings with Joseph Stalin that the Soviets could “liberate” the Czech Republic which explains how the Soviets made it quite easy grab to take control of the Czech Republic without a major fight.
It would then bring no major reason why these Czech Social Democrats would be engaged in supporting Hamas:
Czech Foreign Minister Stresses Syria’s Important Role in Region
Jan 30, 2009
Prague,SANA_Czech Foreign Minister Karel Schwarzenberg stressed Friday the importance of Syria’s role in the region due to its central location and being the cradle of civilization and the liberal movements.
Receiving a delegation of the People’s Assembly, headed by Chairman of the Arab and Foreign Relations committee Solaiman Haddad, Schwarzenberg saw that efforts should be focused now on fixing the cease-fire in Gaza and starting actual talks that lead to the achievement of peace, especially that conditions have become more appropriate under the new U.S. administration.
The importance of more effective European role in the Middle East and the necessity of an international inquiry into the crimes committed by Israel in the Gaza Strip were discussed also by Schwarzenberg, whose country holds the current EU Presidency, and the parliamentary delegation.
Haddad stressed the necessity for the European Union to move to contribute to the formation of an international investigation committee to probe the crimes committed by Israel during the recent aggression on Gaza.
The delegation also met with Head of the People’s Social Democratic Party Jiri Paroubek, the former Prime Minister who stressed that he sensed during his recent visit to Syria her keenness on achieving peace.
Paroubek expressed his anger over Israel’s crimes in Gaza, adding that his party told the Israeli ambassador in Prague this position. He criticized the positions of some Czech parties biased to Israel.
The meeting was attended by Syrian Ambassador to the Czech Republic Mrs. Nadera Sayyaf.
| — Hat tip: VH | [Return to headlines] |
European Elections: Ferrero, 4%? a Berlusconi-Veltroni Coup
(AGI) — Rome, 28 Jan. — The 4% threshold for the European elections? “A true coup d’etat, a tailor made law where Berlusconi favours Veltroni, trying to keep the left out of the European parliament as well. We fully object to this new breach of democracy”. Rifondazione comunista’s secretary Paolo Ferrero stated as much during a press conference held in front of the Democratic party’s offices to protest against the agreement between majority and opposition on the election law for the European elections.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Global Taxes and Global TV Now on the Agenda
President Obama’s pick for Treasury Secretary, Timothy Geithner, is being urged to lay the foundation for “global governance” by considering “international taxation” measures to loot more money from U.S. taxpayers.
The recommendation is included in the report, “The Global Agenda 2009,” which is being considered by the World Economic Forum (WEF), meeting in Davos, Switzerland, January 28 — February 1. The WEF is not an official government group but does include dozens of government, corporate and labor leaders at its annual meetings.
[…]
“The Global Agenda 2009” report says that “sovereign states do not adequately address problems reaching across borders” and that “international taxation” may be needed to generate the “additional resources” for “global governance.”
Could this become a source of new bailout money here and abroad?
“As current global governance problems come from market failures, sovereign failures and intergovernmental failures that cross boundaries, sacrificing sovereignty for greater gain may become an option,” the report says.
The report says the U.N.’s Law of the Sea Treaty, which is a top priority for Senate ratification under the Obama Administration, is a measure that has “earned the acceptance and compliance” of most nations. The treaty would turn over oil, gas, and mineral resources to the U.N. and authorize access to them through payment of a global tax to a U.N. body.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Icelandic Anti-Semitic Protest
To protest against the Israeli operation in Gaza and show solidarity with Hamas, a bicycle shop in Reykjavik, capital of Iceland, shows a poster reading “Jews are not welcome”. [picture in article]
According to an Icelandic source, the word used ‘Judar’ has a negative tone in the local language whereas ‘Gyndingur’ is the correct neutral word.
| — Hat tip: VH | [Return to headlines] |
London: Protest Against IDF Officer
4 arrested during protest across from London Jewish center; protesters call for reserves colonel to be put on trial
Four people were arrested, Friday, as dozens protested in London against the visit of Israel Defense Force reservist, Col. (res) Geva Rapp, to a Jewish center in the city.
British media reported that between 80 to 100 protesters gathered in front of the Jewish London Student Center in protest of the colonel’s arrival. One, who was holding a ‘Free Palestine’ sign, attempted to scale the building and was detained after reaching a first-floor window.
According to the reports, protesters demanded that the officer be arrested. Demonstrators dispersed after a police officer announced Rapp would not be arriving. […]
Earlier this week, the cabinet endorsed a resolution meant to provide IDF soldiers and commanders with moral and legal backing in wake of Operation Cast Lead in Gaza.
| — Hat tip: VH | [Return to headlines] |
UK: Bloody Beating in Golders Green
An Orthodox man from Golders Green yesterday spoke of his determination to continue living an openly Jewish life after he was viciously beaten and left with blood pouring from his face, in one of the most serious incidents of an unprecedented wave of anti-Semitism afflicting Britain.
Wearing a kippah and his long Shabbat coat, Michael Bookarz was walking home from La Fiesta restaurant on Golders Green Road on Saturday night when he was set upon by two hooded attackers. “I was walking towards the A406 at about 10.20pm when I noticed a guy was walking towards me,” the 31-year-old told TJ.
“He suddenly started running and punched me in the face. When I was on the ground, another person ran over and they both started kicking me and stamping on my body and head.
“One of them said this is because of what’s happened to the Palestinians in Gaza. Someone must have looked out the window because they suddenly just ran off leaving me on the floor.
“I was scared but the main thought running through my head as it was happening was self-preservation and defending myself. The second the attack finished my next thought was to get help. I took my phone out to dial 999 and I could see blood covering the screen of the phone — there was blood pouring down from my nose.”
The software developer — who suffered extensive bruising and swelling — was taken to hospital where he spent several hours undergoing X-Rays of his skull and left hand. On doctors orders, he spent the past few days recuperating before returning to work yesterday, despite still suffering pain.
“One of the things I feel very sad about is that I can’t walk around in England safely,” he said. “This morning when I was walking to shul I saw a guy across the road with a cap on and a scarf over his face. It was a cold morning but I looked twice just to make sure he wasn’t dangerous. I wouldn’t have done that a few days ago.”
But Michael is nevertheless determined to try to ensure that the attack does not affect the way he lives his life and he urged others not to shy away from wearing kippot in public. He said: “I want to continue leading my life as a Jew in this country, I want to lead it as a free person. I’m not going to let them win.”
The attack on Michael was one of three assaults in recent days, contributing to the more than 220 anti-Semitic incidents in Britain since the start of Israel’s anti-terror operation in Gaza in late December. That includes at least 12 incidents of daubings at London synagogues and in Jewish neighbourhoods on Thursday and Friday last week.
The CST’s Mark Gardner said: “It is likely that the end of the conflict in Gaza will calm the situation here in Britain, but we have seen a dreadful outpouring of anti-Semitic rage, and this will certainly not disappear overnight.”
Anyone with information on the attack on Michael should call Barnet Police on 0300 123 1212 or Crimestoppers anonymously on 0800 555111.
| — Hat tip: VH | [Return to headlines] |
UK: Dawn of New Age of Industrial Unrest as Wildcat Strikes Spread Across UK
Gordon Brown’s pledge to create “British jobs for British workers” came back to haunt him yesterday when a dispute over foreign labourers sparked a wave of industrial unrest.
Wildcat strikes flared at more than 19 sites across the country in response to claims that British tradesmen were being barred from construction jobs by contractors using cheaper foreign workers.
Mr Brown, in Davos for the World Economic Forum, was caught by surprise when a ten-day-old strike at an oil refinery in Lincolnshire sparked copy-cat action at other energy plants. Unions claim that British workers are being barred from jobs because of a European Union directive which allows companies to bring in foreign labour for less than they would have to pay to Britons.
The Prime Minister was forced to order an investigation into the claims by the Arbitration and Conciliation Service in order to contain the spreading unrest. But Labour MPs last night emphasised that the wildcat strikes were a warning of mass industrial unrest ahead as the grip of recession tightens on the economy. Jon Cruddas, the Labour MP for Dagenham, urged ministers to act urgently to take the race issue out of the jobs market.
Thousands of engineering, construction and maintenance staff from at least 19 sites around the country took action in support of the Lindsey oil refinery employees. Many held placards quoting Mr Brown’s soundbite. Oil refineries, power stations and chemical plants were affected as thousands of staff downed tools.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
UK: The Word Went Out on the Web: Every Skilled Man Should Strike
As the shift arrived at Aberthaw power station in South Wales yesterday morning, a crowd of workers were already shivering outside the main gates.
Fifteen minutes later, at 6.30am, 400 men began to gather outside the Wilton chemical complex on Teesside behind a banner demanding “British jobs 4 British workers”. At 8am 700 workers refused to enter the Ineos refinery in Grangemouth, Scotland.
By mid-morning the dispute had spread to a dozen power stations, oil refineries and chemical plants.
At lunchtime thousands of highly skilled engineers and construction workers at at least 19 sites had quit for the day. With the prospect of an early start to the weekend, most spent only a couple of hours on the picket line before heading home or to the pub.
The South Wales protest had marked the start of wildcat strikes not seen for 30 years and the most widespread direct action since the fuel protests in 2000. Employers, politicians and trade union leaders were left on the back foot as the apparently spontaneous action spread across the UK.
Anger had been bubbling for weeks, with websites for skilled manual workers full of resentful messages about foreigners being employed in Britain. The catalyst for the strikes was the decision to bring in hundreds of Italian and Portuguese contractors to work on the £200 million Lindsey oil refinery in North Lincolnshire. Six hundred British contractors walked out of the plant on Wednesday. Contractors at Aberthaw and other sites voted on Thursday to strike in sympathy.
In online forums used by construction and engineering workers, news of the spreading strikes was greeted with enthusiasm. Union sources said that details of the disputes were also being spread by text messages to encourage others to join in.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
UK: This is a Race to the Bottom
These strikes aren’t about xenophobia. Free markets and the large corporations have run out of control
The wave of strikes across the country should come as no surprise. Popular anger is overcoming complacency and fear. The recession is exposing the true nature of the British economy. We are a country that has been ransacked by the free flow of capital. The strikes are not about xenophobia, they’re about large corporations and free markets that are out of control.
The Lincolnshire refinery where the current dispute began is owned by the US oil company Total. It employs the giant American engineering company Jacobs which then subcontracts to an Italian firm, IREM, which cut its labour costs by using its own Italian and Portuguese workers. Big engineering contractors have been recruiting compliant and cheap foreign labour for years.
Britain has lost control of key industries and their labour procurement procedures. The Lincolnshire dispute is a small symptom of a big problem. Britain is a country that no longer owns the productive processes that create its wealth. Crucial economic sectors have been handed over to unaccountable foreign ownership. The government has abandoned workers to exploitation, more concerned with making them fit the global market than in protecting their interests. In Labour’s working-class heartlands there is a powerful feeling of being dispossessed.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
GSPC Founder Calls for Al-Qaeda Surrender in Algeria
Hassan Hattab, founder of Algeria’s Salafist Group for Preaching and Combat (GSPC), issued a fresh call on Monday (January 19th) for members of al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb to lay down their weapons.
In the written document, which was released to the Algerian press, Hattab appealed to terrorists to renounce armed struggle in order to benefit from the law on civil concord. Drawing on a verse from the Qur’an and two hadiths from the Prophet Mohammed, he condemned the terrorist attacks perpetrated in Algeria in the name of Islam.
The former GSPC leader issued his call just as radical Islamists are demanding jihad in Gaza. “What law or moral code could allow this?” he asked in the statement. “Is this really a jihad that would please God?”
Hattab simultaneously condemned and repented for acts of terrorism, “which do nothing for Islam or Muslims and against which I have already given warnings in the past”.
Advising his “brothers” to obey God and halt their activities, he implored them to “return to society and your families; society is ready to welcome you and heal the wounds”.
Monday’s appeal was not Hattab’s first. Last August, he responded to an attack on the police academy in Issers with a statement calling for terrorists to abandon their violent agenda.
Hassan Hattab left the GSPC in 2003 after a dispute with current leader Abdelmalek Droukdel over the legitimacy of targeting civilians. In September 2006 the group rallied to Osama bin Laden’s cause, changing its name to al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb.
Hattab surrendered to Algerian authorities in late September 2007.
Salima Tlemçani, a terrorism specialist, told El Watan that the message follows a statement by Droukdel “calling for attacks against the interests of Westerners — particularly Americans, French and Israelis — throughout the world”.
The Droukdel communiqué was no longer available, however, just hours after its release, noted Tlemçani. Previous messages about Algeria are still available online.
According to the expert, Droukdel’s organisation has suffered heavy losses in recent months, to the point where it has been unable to regain ground, except for sporadic roadblocks. This has raised questions about the future of the group.
Journalists suggest that differences at the heart of the terrorist organisation have rendered it unable to carry out attacks as visible as those of last year. This is believed to be the result of both a series of surrenders within the heart of the group and a government crackdown.
According to Nayla Berrahal of Algerian daily Echorouk, the al-Qaeda organisation “is in a really difficult position since the start of the events in Gaza… due to the reaction of the public”.
She said the people believe the terrorist organisation is attempting “to profit from the situation to clean up its image following a series of suicide attacks and crimes targeting civilians”.
Rather than garnering the support of impassioned youths, Berrahal suggests Droukdel’s group has alienated itself. “These young people have risen up against the terrorist organisation, which they accuse of executing foreigners’ plans and strategies,” she said.
For many civilians, the former GSPC can no longer fool young people about its real intentions.
Lotfi Amine, a student, said the group “has no legitimacy or credibility to support Palestine, given the crimes it has committed against the sons and daughters of its own country”.
Fellow student Djamel Alek went a step further, accusing al-Qaeda of being “mercenaries”. Speaking to Magharebia, he addressed the terrorists: “Those who live in Gaza are pure and their blood is sacred. We do not want it to be mingled with the blood of mercenaries like you.”
| — Hat tip: VH | [Return to headlines] |
Libya: USA Ambassador in Tripoli, Obama is a New Era
(ANSAmed) — TRIPOLI, JANUARY 30 — Gene Cretz, the American ambassador to Libya since December 27, who fills the role which had been left un-appointed for 36 years, said in an interview with ANSA that the standardisation of US-Libyan relations, a process launched during the Bush years, could be fully re-launched by Barack Obama’s new administration. Cretz has already met with the Libyan leader, Muammar Gaddafi, and said that “it is time to turn the page, and reinitiate cooperation on all levels, in economics, culture, oil, and military affairs, we need to set the right tone so that decent American goods arrive in Libya where Libya is requesting them”. The route to the reopening of diplomatic relationships between Washington and Tripoli has been eased along recently with the adoption of the ‘Compensation Claims Package’ established by the Compensation Fund, which Libya has provided for the American victims of terrorism. Cretz reported, “We have just come out of a period of complex negotiations during the Bush administration, which have led to Libya’s reintegration, and this progress is due to the fact that both sides are making great efforts to keep up the negotiations, without forgetting that Libya has compensation claims due to the Americans, just remember what happened in 1986.” The US ambassador stated that the crisis in Gaza over the past few weeks had not adversely affected the relationship between the two countries, and that the Obama administration “will certainly continue the positive trend”. Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton and George Mitchell are “all people ready to face up to these difficult issues, and keep the dialogue open”. As for the initiation of standard consular relations, at least until next summer, when the new American consul is due to arrive, visas for the United states will remain limited to only a few categories of people, who will nonetheless need to travel through Tunis. Although there are no meetings with Gaddafi scheduled in the short term, ambassador Cretz is ready to present his country’s position towards Libya to its leader as soon as president Obama has defined what it might be. Cretz added that the new embassy in Tripoli is provisional, in expectation of the definitive building which will be built on land belonging to the US government.(ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Mideast: Egyptian Firm Accused of Feeding Israelis During Gaza Raids
Cairo, 30 Jan. (AKI) — An Egyptian firm based in the city of al-Sadat is alleged to have supplied Israeli soldiers with provisions during the recent Gaza military offensive despite restrictions on the flow of humanitarian aid for Palestinians, according to an Egyptian magazine.
“While Egyptians were pained by what was happening in Gaza, and the imams launched appeals to God to save the innocent in the Gaza Strip, Israeli soldiers fed on Egyptian delicacies,” said the article published by Egyptian magazine al-Usbua.
The article, written by Egyptian journalist Akram Khamis in the magazine’s latest edition, claims that during Israel’s three-week long offensive, the firm’s trucks carried food to Israeli soldiers through the al-Awja border area, 70 kilometres south of the Gazan town of Rafah.
“Many Egyptian trucks went back and forth along the road that takes you from Sadat City to the Israeli border, on the eastern part of Egypt, to deliver the goods of the food-producing firm, to another one that works for the Israeli army,” the magazine claimed.
The journalist presented as proof certificates and permits issued by Egyptian authorities to enable to this commercial operation to be carried out.
The documents showed the name of the firm’s owner and the delivery dates which coincided with the closing of the Rafah border by Egyptian authorities.
The government of Egyptian president Hosni Mubarak was widely criticised in the Arab world for failing to open the border crossings with Gaza to allow in humanitarian aid.
More than 1,330 Palestinians were killed and another 5,400 were injured during Israel’s Operation Cast Lead. Thirteen Israelis were killed during the conflict.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Morocco: Ex-Italian Imam Jailed for Suicide Attacks
Rabat, 30 Jan. (AKI) — The former imam of the northern Italian city of Varese, Abdelmajid Zergout, has been sentenced to five years in prison for a series of suicide bomb attacks in Casablanca in 2003.
Forty-five people were killed — including 12 suicide bombers — in several attacks which occurred in the Moroccan city in May 2003. The bombings were the deadliest terrorist attacks in the country’s history.
In April 2008, nine people were convicted over the bombings and one of them was sentenced to death, while six others received life imprisonment.
According to media reports, prosecutors had been seeking a 30-year sentence during the trial that took place in Rabat.
Among the charges, the former imam was accused of “founding a criminal gang to undermine public security”.
Zergout (photo) had already faced two trials in Italy on charges that he founded the Moroccan group and was extradited to stand trial in Morocco after facing judges in a Milan appeals court.
The former imam is married with three children.
| — Hat tip: KGS | [Return to headlines] |
Cyprus and Egypt Stop Iranian Ships With Weapons for Hamas and Hezbollah
Cypriot president Demetris Christofia confirms the detainment: the ship was “in contravention of security council resolutions.” On January 28, Egypt blocked an Iranian ship at the entrance to the Suez Canal: it was transporting weapons for Hamas. The Egyptian foreign minister accuses Iran of fomenting tension in order to escape pressure from the West on the nuclear question.
Cairo (AsiaNews/Agencies) — Cypriot authorities have stopped an Iranian ship loaded with weapons and traveling towards Syria. A diplomatic source for the European Union says that Cyprus acted on instructions from the United States and Israel.
The incident took place yesterday. The ship, which was Iranian but flying the Cypriot flag, was ordered to dock at Limassol for inspection. On board, Cypriot authorities found a load of weapons, including heavy artillery, rockets, and documents. According to Jerusalem, the weapons were being sent to Hezbollah in Lebanon or to Hamas, in the Gaza Strip.
Cypriot president Demetris Christofia confirmed the detainment of a ship, because the cargo seemed to be “in contravention of security council resolutions,” according to which ships leaving from Iran are not permitted to transport weapons. He did not want to provide any additional details, but he confirmed the efforts of his country to deal with the question “in a responsible manner.” He said that any other comments could “cause more problems,” but confirmed that “we are investigating to see what it is carrying.”
On January 28, another Iranian cargo ship transporting weapons to Hamas was blocked by the Egyptian authorities at the entrance to the Suez Canal. Egyptian foreign minister Ahmed Aboul Gheit criticized Hamas, Iran, and Hezbollah of working to fostering the clashes in Gaza in order to provoke conflict all over the Middle East. According to the minister, the situation of tension in the area is to the advantage of Iran, “which is trying to use its cards to escape Western pressure . . . on the nuclear file.”
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Ending the West’s Proxy War Against Israel
As the world decries Israel’s attempt to defend itself against the rocket attacks coming from Gaza, consider this: When Hamas routed Fatah in Gaza in 2007, it cost nearly 350 lives and 1,000 wounded. Fatah’s surrender brought only a temporary stop to the type of violence and bloodshed that are commonly seen in lands where at least 30% of the male population is in the 15-to-29 age bracket.
In such “youth bulge” countries, young men tend to eliminate each other or get killed in aggressive wars until a balance is reached between their ambitions and the number of acceptable positions available in their society. In Arab nations such as Lebanon (150,000 dead in the civil war between 1975 and 1990) or Algeria (200,000 dead in the Islamists’ war against their own people between 1999 and 2006), the slaughter abated only when the fertility rates in these countries fell from seven children per woman to fewer than two.
The warring stopped because no more warriors were being born.
In Gaza, however, there has been no such demographic disarmament. The average woman still bears six babies. For every 1,000 men aged 40-44, there are 4,300 boys aged 0-4 years. In the US the latter figure is 1,000, and in the UK it’s only 670.
And so the killing continues. In 2005, when Israel was still an occupying force, Gaza lost more young men to gang fights and crime than in its war against the “Zionist enemy.” Despite the media’s obsession with the Mideast conflict, it has cost many fewer lives than the youth bulges in West Africa, Lebanon or Algeria. In the six decades since Israel’s founding, “only” some 62,000 people (40,000 Arabs, 22,000 Jews) have been killed in all the Israeli-Arab wars and Palestinian terror attacks. During that same time, some 11 million Muslims have been killed in wars and terror attacks — mostly at the hands of other Muslims.
What accounts for the Mideast conflict’s relatively low body count? Hamas and their ilk certainly aim to kill as many Israelis as possible. To their indignation, the Israelis are quite good at protecting themselves. On the other hand, Israel, despite all the talk about its “disproportionate” use of force, is doing its utmost to spare civilian deaths. Even Hamas acknowledges that most of the Palestinians killed by Israeli air raids are from their own ranks. But about 10%-15% of Gaza’s casualties are women and minors — a tragedy impossible to prevent in a densely settled area in which nearly half the people are under 15 and the terrorists hide among them.
THE REASON for Gaza’s endless youth bulge is that a large majority of its population does not have to provide for its offspring. Most babies are fed, clothed, vaccinated and educated by UNRWA, the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East. Unlike the UN High Commission for Refugees, which deals with the rest of the world’s refugees and aims to settle them in their respective host countries, UNRWA perpetuates the Palestinian problem by classifying as refugees not only those who originally fled their homes, but all of their descendants as well.
UNRWA is benevolently funded by the US (31%) and the European Union (nearly 50%) — only 7% of the funds come from Muslim sources. Thanks to the West’s largesse, nearly the entire population of Gaza lives in a kind of lowly but regularly paid dependence. One result of this unlimited welfare is an endless population boom. Between 1950 and 2008, Gaza’s population has grown from 240,000 to 1.5 million. The West basically created a new Near Eastern people in Gaza that at current trends will reach three million in 2040. Within that period, Gazans may alter the justifications and directions of their aggression but are unlikely to stop the aggression itself.
The Hamas-Fatah truce of June 2007 allowed the Islamists again to direct all their energy on attacking Israel. The West pays for food, schools, medicine and housing, while Muslim nations help out with the military hardware. Unrestrained by such necessities as having to earn a living, the young have plenty of time on their hands for digging tunnels, smuggling, assembling missiles and firing 4,500 of them at Israel since 2006.
While this gruesome activity has slowed the Palestinian internecine slaughter, it forced some 250,000 Israelis into bomb shelters.
THE CURRENT situation can only get worse. Israel is being pushed into a corner. Gazan teenagers have no future other than war. One rocket master killed is immediately replaced by three young men for whom a martyr’s death is no less honorable than victory. Some 230,000 Gazan males, aged 15 to 29, who are available for the battlefield now, will be succeeded by 360,000 boys under 15 (45% of all Gazan males) who could be taking up arms within the coming 15 years.
As long as we continue to subsidize Gaza’s extreme demographic armament, young Palestinians will likely continue killing their brothers or neighbors. And yet, despite claiming that it wants to bring peace to the region, the West continues to make the population explosion in Gaza worse every year. By generously supporting UNRWA’s budget, the West assists a rate of population increase that is 10 times higher than in their own countries. Much is being said about Iran waging a proxy war against Israel by supporting Hizbullah and Hamas. One may argue that by fueling Gaza’s untenable population explosion, the West unintentionally finances a war by proxy against the Jews of Israel.
If we seriously want to avoid another generation of war in Gaza, we must have the courage to tell the Gazans that they will have to start looking after their children themselves, without UNRWA’s help. This would force Palestinians to focus on building an economy. Of course, every baby lured into the world by our money up to now would still have our assistance.
If we make this urgently needed reform, then by at least 2025 many boys in Gaza — like in Algeria — would enter puberty as only sons. They would be able to look forward to a more secure future in a less violent society.
| — Hat tip: VH | [Return to headlines] |
European Reactions to Israel’s Gaza Operation
Tamas Berzi
- Many countries such as Italy, Germany, and the Czech Republic showed understanding for Israel and described Israel’s actions as self-defense. These countries generally used strong language against Hamas and demanded that it stop the rocket attacks unconditionally.
- At the time of the start of the Israeli airstrikes, the European presidency was held by France. On December 27, the Presidency of the Council of the European Union condemned both the Israeli air raids and the Palestinian rocket strikes on Israel from Gaza and called for an immediate end to these activities. The statement also condemned the disproportionate use of force.
- As of January 1, 2009, the Czech Republic took over the role of the Presidency of the European Union. On January 3, the presidency described the Israeli ground operations as an act of self-defense.
- This drew heavy criticism from many European countries, and the Czechs apologized for the “misunderstanding” and issued a new statement, but one that did not call for an “immediate” ceasefire. In diplomatic language there is a significant difference between “as soon as possible” and “immediate.”
- France has been traditionally the main driving force behind European foreign policy. The separate Sarkozy visit to Israel and his humanitarian ceasefire proposal showed that France was not ready to relinquish its positions to the Czech Republic.
- The Czech positions during Israel’s Gaza operation indicate that the current presidency will work toward a more favorable international environment for Israel. However, Israel should try to make the most of it, since the upcoming Swedish presidency, which starts on July 1, 2009, will most likely be a more difficult time for Israel…
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Gaza: Peres Says Relations Unchanged After Erdogan Argument
(ANSAmed) — DAVOS (SWITZERLAND), JANUARY 30 — Israeli President Shimon Peres has today said that relations with Turkey will not be changed by his heated exchange of words with Turkish Premier Tayyip Erdogan at the Davos Forum yesterday. “We do not want tension with Turkey. We have a conflict with the Palestinians”, said Peres to journalists at the Forum after Erdogan yesterday stormed out of a debate in which both leaders were participating. Peres added that he talked with Erdogan by phone yesterday evening, following the incident. “I do not see what happened as a personal or national problem. Relations remain the same. My respect for him remains unchanged. It was an exchange of opinions, and opinions are just opinions”, clarified the Israeli president. Peres went on to add that he hoped that Turkey would continue be a force of moderation in the Middle East: “Turkey should be a response to Iran…they offer a choice to the Middle East. I hope they will continue to do so”, concluded the Israeli president. (ANSAmed).
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Gaza: Radio Reports Peres Did Not Apologise to Erdogan
(ANSAmed) — TEL AVIV, JANUARY 30 — A spokesperson of Israeli President Shimon Peres has told a military radio station that the president did not apologise to Turkish Premier Tayyip Erdogan for his behaviour in the debate at the World Economic Forum in Davos during their phone conversation last night. The claims thereby contradict reports that had come out earlier in Turkey. The spokesperson said that several misunderstandings were clarified in the conversations, but Peres made no apologies. (ANSAmed).
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Holy Land’s ‘Oldest Church’ Found at Armageddon
As if Megiddo, the biblical city of Armageddon — scene of three millennia of battles, the last cavalry charge of the first world war and the final showdown between good and evil — did not have enough on its plate. Archaeologists now claim to have unearthed the remains of the oldest Christian church discovered in the Holy Land.
Unfortunately for Israel’s beleaguered tourism industry, the find was made behind the walls of one of the country’s maximum security prisons.
Inmates were put to work alongside the specialists to excavate a corner of Megiddo jail for the construction of a new cell block ready for the next intake of Hamas and Islamic Jihad militants.
Toiling behind the barbed wire and watchtowers, they uncovered a detailed and well-preserved mosaic, the foundations of a rectangular building, and pottery dated to the third or early fourth century. One of several inscriptions on the mosaic floor in ancient Greek said the building was dedicated to “the memory of the Lord Jesus Christ”.
Other inscriptions name a Roman army officer, Gaianus, who donated money to build the floor, and a woman called Ekoptos who “donated this table to the God Jesus Christ in commemoration”. The table is believed to have served as an altar.
“There are no crosses on the mosaic floor,” said Yotam Tepper, an archaeologist who led the dig on behalf of the Israeli Antiquities Authority. “In their place is a picture of two fish lying side by side — a very early Christian symbol.
“This is an extremely dramatic discovery, because such an old building of this type has never been found either in the land of Israel or anywhere else in the entire region. The structure and the mosaic floor date back to the period before Christianity became an officially recognised religion, before St Constantine.
“Normally we have from this period in our region historical evidence from literature, not archaeological evidence. There is no structure you can compare it to — it is a unique find.”
The Roman empire forbade Christian rituals before AD313 and Christians were forced to worship in secret. The earliest churches, until this discovery at Megiddo, include the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem, said to stand on the site of Christ’s crucifixion, dating from about AD330, and the church of the Nativity in Bethlehem. The inscriptions at Megiddo were interpreted by Professor Leah Di Segni of the Hebrew University.
“I was told these were Byzantine but they seem much earlier than anything I have seen so far from the Byzantine period. It could be from the third or the beginning of the fourth century,” she said.The use of the word “table” in one inscription instead of “altar” might advance the study of Christianity, she said, because it is widely believed that rituals based on the Last Supper were held around a table used as an altar.
The church might never have been discovered had it not been for the needs of Israel’s ever-demanding security apparatus. Megiddo prison is home to about 1,200 “security prisoners” who are held in “administrative detention” without ever being told exactly what it is they are accused of.
The prison is a series of fenced-in compounds with the bulk of inmates sleeping in long brown army tents enclosed by barbed wire and surrounded by open sewers. The prisoners nicknamed the jail “Jabaliya” after a poor and overcrowded refugee camp in the Gaza strip.
Megiddo has long been described by religious scholars and archaeologists as the most important biblical site in Israel. Over the centuries, more than 25 cities rose and fell at Megiddo. Some were powerful commercial centres on the ancient thoroughfare between Egypt and Mesopotamia.
Five of the conflicts fought in the 30-mile-wide Jezreel valley around Megiddo are recorded in the Old Testament. The New Testament names Armageddon — a Greek corruption of the Hebrew word “har”, meaning mount, and Megiddo — as the scene of the final great battle between good and evil.
Some specialists remain sceptical about the latest discovery. “I think this is a little myth to boost tourism,” said Michel Piccirillo, a respected biblical archaeologist. “The idea that it is ancient comes from the pottery and the shape of the letters on the inscriptions, but this is not definitive.”
Israel’s tourism minister, Avraham Hirchson, is not deterred. “If we nurture this properly, then there will be a large stream of tourists who could come to Israel. There is great potential … “ he told national television.
| — Hat tip: VH | [Return to headlines] |
Middle East: Mitchell Postpones His Visit to Turkey
(ANSAmed) — ANKARA, JANUARY 30 — U.S. President Barack Obama’s Special Envoy for Middle East George Mitchell postponed his trip to Turkey which was planned earlier as part of a regional tour. Mitchell’s visit to Turkey was postponed due to technical reasons and scheduling conflicts, the U.S. Embassy in Ankara said on Friday. “The way the schedule was very tight, we have tried very hard to make a trip to Turkey fit in, and it just could not for technical reasons,” Embassy Spokesperson Kathryn Schalow told the Anatolia news agency. Schalow said it was not clear when Mitchell would visit Turkey. As part of his Mideast tour, Obama’s special envoy Mitchell visited several countries including Egypt, Israel and West Bank. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Thousands of Al-Qaeda Supporters Active in Gaza
Ynet learns that thousands of Global Jihad supporters currently active in Gaza Strip; most are Hamas, Popular Resistance Committees members who objected to lull, any kind of compromise, Gaza source says
Thousands of global Jihad supporters, mostly concentrated in southern Gaza, are currently active in the Strip according to a Ynet inquiry with various Palestinian sources.
According to Ynet’s inquiry, the overwhelming majority of Qaeda supporters are in fact Hamas or Popular Resistance Commiittees (PRC) members who were unimipressed with Hamas’ decision to join the political establishment and run in the Palestinian elections. These members claimed that this prompted Hamas to abandon the path of Jihad, which they felt is the only way to liberate Palestinian lands from Israel’s control.
A source in an Islamic group in Gaza told Ynet that “these thousands of activists were educated that the war with the Jews must continue with no comprises or shortcuts, until judgment day arrives.”
“Once Hamas chose the political path alongside the path of resistance, thousands of people sought an alternative framework,” the source said, adding that the jihadists received the blessing of Sheikhs and religious clerics.
Another source in a Gaza group told Ynet that the Qaeda activists are not necessarily Palestinians who left Hamas or the PRC, “but rather, people who chose not to blindly abide by the decision to take part in the elections and the lull, and continued the path of war.”
According to the source, joining global Jihad gave Hamas members an opportunity to carry out attacks under a different umbrella, while Hamas seemingly remained committed to the lull.
Improved relationship
Fundamentalist Islam features a sometimes deep theological and ideological disagreement between the Islamic Brotherhood’s perception, represented in Gaza by Hamas, and the Global Jihad perception, represented by al-Qaeda. While the Islamic Brotherhood espouses resistance alongside tactical moves such as lulls, Global Jihad groups believe there is no room for tactics, but rather, only for a ceaseless holy war. PRC spokesman and senior figure Abu Abir is considered to be one of the most prominent representatives of the latter camp.
Yet despite the disagreements, the two camps usually operate in Gaza in complete coordination, with the exception of a few clashes. One such prominent dispute pitted the Army of Islam against Hamas. The two groups collaborated on the abduction of IDF soldier Gilad Shalit, yet later on Army of Islam members said Hamas was oppressing them because of their commitment to armed struggle and rejection of the lull. Meanwhile, Hamas said most Army of Islam members were in fact Fatah members who chose the cover of Global Jihad in order to destabilize Hamas’ Gaza rule.
However, the Gaza War improved the relationship between al-Qaeda and Hamas. During the war, senior Qaeda figures, including Osama Bin Laden himself, expressed solidarity with and support for Hamas in the wake of the group’s struggle against the Gaza siege and its decision not to renew the lull in the Strip.
| — Hat tip: VH | [Return to headlines] |
Ahmadinejad Praises Erdogan’s Words in Davos
Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad praised Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan for his statements against Operation Cast Lead at the World Economic Conference in Davos.
“This was a brave act and exactly what I expected him to do,” he said. (AFP)
| — Hat tip: VH | [Return to headlines] |
Mideast: TV, Mahmoud Abbas (PNA) to Ankara Next Week
(ANSAmed) — ANKARA, JANUARY 30 — The president of the Palestinian National Authority (PNA), Mahmoud Abbas, will visit Ankara next week for talks with the highest leaders of the Turkish government, announced private television channel Ntv without specifying a date. Ntv said that Abbas will certainly meet President Abdullah Gul but if there will also be a meeting with Premier Tayyip Erdogan is not yet clear. According to the network, the visit of the Palestinian president to Turkey has now become more important from a political-diplomatic level after yesterday’s incident in Davos between Israeli President Shimon Peres and Erdogan. Erdogan left the stage because he was angry for not getting an opportunity to reply to Israeli leader. (ANSAmed).
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Turkey-Iran: Ankara Aims to Raise Trade to 20 Billion USD
(ANSAmed) — ANKARA, JANUARY 27 — Turkish State Minister Kursad Tuzmen on Tuesday said that Turkey aims to raise its trade volume with Iran to 20 billion USD p.a. “Our trade with Iran was around 1.3 billion USD in 2002, but it was over 10 billion USD last year,” he told journalists aboard a plane to Iranian capital of Tehran, as Anatolia agency reports. Tuzmen is visiting Iran with a delegation comprised of 160 people and is scheduled to attend a seminar on improving economic and commercial cooperation between the two countries. The minister said that Turkey also aimed to export products to Iran more easily, and import Iranian products more easily, reduce customs tariffs, and form a regional economic zone with Iranian businessmen. Tuzmen said that Turkey also wanted to remove the fuel oil price difference with Iran. The Turkish minister underlined importance of trade with nation monetary units of countries, and said that Turkey was planing to achieve it with Iran. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Turkey: Talks With IMF Suspended for 10 Days, Says Premier
(ANSAmed) — ANKARA, JANUARY 27 — Talks between Turkey and the International Monetary Fund on a loan deal have been suspended for 10 days, Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan said on Tuesday. “We decided to suspend the talks for 10 days” Erdogan told reporters. “Sensitive issues had been overcome although some others remain to be solved”, Erdogan said. The Turkish Prime Minister also said that he would meet IMF First Deputy Managing Director John Lipsky at the World Economic Forum in Davos. An IMF team has been in Ankara since January 8 for talks on an accord to replace the previous USD 10 billion standby loan agremeent that expired in May and help Turkey weather a global financial crisis. A few hours earlier, Economy Minister Mehmet Simsek told reporters that the talks would be temporarily suspended and that some issues remained to be discussed. (ANSAmed).
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Turkey Needs an Agreement With IMF, Turkish CB Governor Says
(ANSAmed) — ANKARA, JANUARY 28 — Head of Turkey’s Central Bank (CB) said Wednesday that Turkey needed an agreement with the International Monetary Fund (IMF). Speaking to private TV channel NTV in Davos where he will be attending the World Economic Forum annual meeting, Durmus Yilmaz said that major issues in the way of an agreement with the IMF had been resolved. When asked to comment on the timing of the agreement, Yilmaz said “the sooner the better.” He said a stand-by agreement to be signed with the IMF could ease the credit crunch and pull the interest rates down a notch noting that effects of the recent measures taken by the CB would be seen in the summer. Yilmaz said the CB took a different growth target as reference, rather than the government’s target of 4%, adding that they did not declare it as talks with IMF were still in progress. Yilmaz who signalled that further cuts in interest rates would be made with more restraint, said he did not expect fluctuations in foreign exchange rates to push the inflation rate up. CB recently pulled down short term interest rates by 2%. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Turkey: Thousands Welcome PM After Peres Clash
Istanbul, 30 Jan. (AKI) — Thousands of people gathered in Turkey’s Istanbul airport to welcome prime minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, a day after he stormed out of a debate with Israeli president Shimon Peres during the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland.
Turkish demonstrators carried banners and chanted slogans in support of Erdogan (photo), who angrily left the forum when he was denied the chance to respond to Peres’ remarks defending Israel’s recent military offensive in Gaza.
“Why did they fire rockets? There was no siege against Gaza, Why did they fight us, what did they want? There was never a day of starvation in Gaza,” Peres had stated.
While attempting to respond to Peres’ statements about the war in Gaza, Erdogan responded by saying Israel had carried out “barbarous” actions in Gaza.
“I find it very sad that people applaud what you have said because you know how to kill people,” shouted Erdogan before he left. There was more applause when he left the stage.
During a media conference after the incident, Erdogan clarified he walked out because he had been given much less time to speak than Peres.
“My reaction here was towards the moderator. Such moderation will cast a shadow over peace efforts,” Erdogan told the media, adding the moderator gave each speaker around 12-15 minutes to speak but he allowed Peres to talk for 25 minutes.
During the forum discussion, Erdogan sat next to United Nations secretary-general Ban Ki-Moon and Arab League secretary-general Amr Moussa. The latter was criticised by an editorial in pan-Arab daily al-Quds al-Arabi.
“It did not shock us to see Turkish premier Tayyip Erdogan, abandon the Davos Forum for not having been given the chance to reply to Shimon Peres. It did shock us to see Arab League secretary-general Amr Moussa remain in his seat,” said the editorial.
After he arrived in Istanbul, Erdogan addressed the crowd and held a media conference. Turkish daily Hurriyet says that the road in front of Erdogan’s residence in Istanbul was covered with carnations.
However, on Friday, Peres and Erdogan spoke by telephone and agreed not to let the incident harm Turkey-Israel relations.
“I am very sorry for what happened. Friends can sometimes have an argument. I have always had a great respect for the Republic of Turkey and you as the prime minister. I consider myself as a friend of Turkey and Premier Erdogan,” Peres said during their phone conversation, quoted by Israel Radio.
Turkey, a key regional ally that had been sponsoring informal talks between Israel and Syria, was among the countries that condemned the Jewish state for its recent offensive in the Gaza Strip that killed more than 1,330 Palestinians and injured at least 5,400 others.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
The Furious Passage of Tayyip Erdogan
By Robert Ellis
This is a guest column written by Robert Ellis; he is a regular commenter on Turkish affairs in the Danish press and his columns appeared in Turkish Daily News (now Hurriyet English) regularly.
Turkey’s prime minister, Tayyip Erdogan, is not a man who brooks being contradicted and a panel debate on the Gaza war at the World Economic Forum was no exception. What was hoped to be a bridge-building exercise to ameliorate Erdogan’s harsh criticisms of Israel’s incursion into Gaza and support for Hamas has turned out to be a public relations disaster.
Erdogan delivered his own presentation in a forceful tone, calling for Hamas to be included in the solution and expressing Turkey’s willingness to be included in the process. However, after Israel’s president, Shimon Peres, had made his presentation, Erdogan responded with a tirade against Peres but was reminded by the moderator of a time limit. Erdogan pushed the moderator away, rose to his feet and left the stage, declaring he did not think he would be coming back to Davos, because he had not been allowed to speak.
The reaction has not been long coming. This morning AJC, the American Jewish Committee, issued a statement calling Tayyip Erdogan’s attack “a public disgrace” and “gasoline on the fire of surging anti-Semitism”. Furthermore, last week AJC and four other American Jewish organizations sent a letter to Erdogan, expressing concern over the current wave of anti-Semitism in Turkey, and Erdogan’s outburst has done nothing to allay these fears.
Unfortunately the Turkish prime mnister has a track record of shooting himself in the foot, which, if the sport became an Olympic discipline, would guarantee him a number of gold medals.
At the EU summit in Copenhagen in December, 2002, when Turkey tried to press the EU to fix a date for starting accession talks, European leaders were shocked by Turkey’s “blackmail campaign”, and one prime minister called Erdogan’s behaviour “very counter-productive”. The French prime minister, Jacques Chirac, a representative of Old Europe, told a summit dinner: “It’s not enough to respect European law, you also have to be polite and civilized”.
At the EU summit two years later, when Turkey was finally given a starting date, Luxembourg’s foreign minister, Jean Asselborn, declared “We were gobsmacked”, when at the end of the summit Erdogan suddenly refused to recognize Cyprus. The summit was almost derailed, and Erdogan’s volte-face caused Asselborn to remark: “We are not carpet dealers here in Europe.”
The Danish prime minister, Anders Fogh Rasmussen, also experienced the Turkish leader’s abrasive style when Erdogan paid an official visit to Denmark in November 2005. After lunch there should have been a joint press conference, but when Erdogan learned that there would be a representative of the Kurdish tv station, Roj-tv, present, he immediately left for the airport, leaving Fogh Rasmussen to stand alone on the podium like an abandoned bride at the altar.
A fortnight ago Tayyip Erdogan paid his first visit to Brussels since the EU summit in December 2004 to revive Turkey’s flagging hopes of EU membership, but he immediately started off on the wrong foot. In a thinly veiled threat he informed the European Commission that he would review his support for the Nabucco gas pipeline if Cyprus continued to block the opening of the energy chapter of its accession talks. José Manuel Barroso, the EU Commission’s president, dismissed any connection between the two issues, and Erdogan, backtracking, declared that the project had enjoyed Turkey’s full support “all the time”.
At the same time Erdogan used his Brussels visit to express his support for Hamas, and called on Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas and the whole world to respect the election results as the will of the people “so that democracy could win in the Palestinian Autonomy and not to satisfy Mahmoud Abbas”.
Tayyip Erdogan’s latest outburst could threaten his ambition to be the Middle East mediator, and as he outlined in his presentation at Davos, Turkey has hosted five rounds of talks in the Israel-Syria question as a prelude to direct talks. There could be other fallout too. Turkey’s efforts to block the Armenian genocide resolution in Congress are contingent on the support of the Jewish lobby, and these efforts could come unstuck if President Obama keeps his pre-election pledge to recognize
the events of 1915 as genocide.
There could be another form of backlash. If Israel compares its struggle with Hamas to Turkey’s efforts to combat the PKK, and if the Jewish lobby in the USA seconds this motion, Turkey’s efforts to maintain its territorial integrity could be undermined.
There is also the shadow side of the humanitarian concern Tayyip Erdogan emphasized in his presentation. When the Turkish prime minister visited Khartoum in 2006, he declared that no genocide had been committed in Darfur, and Sudan’s president Omar al-Bashir has twice been cordially received in Ankara. This raises the question of the sincerity of Mr Erdogan’s commitment and whether this is colored by his preoccupation with Islam.
Robert Ellis is a regular commentator on Turkish affairs in the Danish press and was also a frequent contributor to Turkish Daily News.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Afghanistan: How We Lost the War We Won
[Comment from JD: Note the slant and the glowing descriptions. For those who don’t know, Rolling Stone is a leftist publication. Comments below the article are interesting.]
The highway that leads south out of Kabul, the capital of Afghanistan, passes through a craggy range of arid, sand-colored mountains with sharp, stony peaks. Poplar trees and green fields line the road. Nomadic Kuchi women draped in colorful scarves tend to camels as small boys herd sheep. The hillsides are dotted with cemeteries: rough-hewn tombstones tilting at haphazard angles, multicolored flags flying above them. There is nothing to indicate that the terrain we are about to enter is one of the world’s deadliest war zones. On the outskirts of the capital we are stopped at a routine checkpoint manned by the Afghan National Army. The wary soldiers single me out, suspicious of my foreign accent. My companions, two Afghan men named Shafiq and Ibrahim, convince the soldiers that I am only a journalist. Ibrahim, a thin man with a wispy beard tapered beneath his chin, comes across like an Afghan version of Bob Marley, easygoing and quick to smile. He jokes with the soldiers in Dari, the Farsi dialect spoken throughout Afghanistan, assuring them that everything is OK.
As we drive away, Ibrahim laughs. The soldiers, he explains, thought I was a suicide bomber. Ibrahim did not bother to tell them that he and Shafiq are midlevel Taliban commanders, escorting me deep into Ghazni, a province largely controlled by the spreading insurgency that now dominates much of the country.
[…]
The government of Pakistan, seeking to retain influence over what it views as its back yard, began helping the Taliban regroup. With the Bush administration focused on the war in Iraq, money poured into Afghanistan from Al Qaeda and other Islamic extremists, who were eager to maintain a second front against the American invaders. The Taliban — once an isolated and impoverished group of religious students who knew little about the rest of the world and cared only about liberating their country from oppressive warlords — are now among the best-armed and most experienced insurgents in the world, linked to a global movement of jihadists that stretches from Pakistan and Iraq to Chechnya and the Philippines.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Indonesia: City Mosques Reject Islamic Formalisation
Indonesia — the world’s most populous Muslim country- has a 235 million inhabitants and 90 percent of them are Muslim. Most practise a moderate form of the faith.
Jakarta, 30 Jan. (AKI/The Jakarta Post) — Most managers of mosques in the Indonesian capital Jakarta embrace a moderate brand of Islam and support the unitary state of Indonesia, a university survey reveals.
Only a few wish for Indonesia — the world’s largest Muslim country — to become an Islamic state, it added.
“Some 88.8 percent of the respondents approve of ‘Pancasila’ or state ideology and view the 1945 Constitution as the best model for Indonesia. As many as 78.4 percent agree that democracy is the best system of governance for Indonesia,” Center for the Study of Religion and Culture research coordinator Ridwan Al-Makassary told the media.
“However, we found a kind of split personality among the mosque managers. As citizens they support ‘Pancasila’ as the state ideology for the country, but as Muslims they support the establishment of an Islamic country,” another CSRC senior researcher Sukron Kamil said at the same forum.
The survey reveals that 31 percent of the respondents agree that Indonesians should enforce Islamic sharia law, 56 percent reject the notion, and 13 percent did not answer.
Some 74 percent did not agree that the main purpose of jihad was to wage war, and 15 percent said it was.
The study shows 75 percent reject that suicide bombing can be considered jihad, and 9 percent said it was acceptable, the study said.
However, when asked whether the state should have the authority to regulate Muslims’ dress code, a surprising 60 percent of the respondents said they agreed and 33 percent opposed the idea.
“Generally, the majority of mosques in Jakarta embrace moderate Islamic ideas and thoughts. Nevertheless, among the total is a small number with a tendency toward increasing radical Islamic ideas,” Ridwan said.
Masdar Farid Mas’udi of Nahdlatul Ulama (NU), the country’s largest Muslim organization, said mosques were often used by clerics to preach “provocative sermons”, particularly aimed against people of other beliefs.
“Mosque preachers tend to create enemies and look for friends, while failing to bridge differences among other groups,” he told a discussion at the launch of another study, which would survey mosques in other regions, and in particular those affiliated with NU, which is widely known as a moderate Islamic organization.
The survey, released on Thursday, was conducted by the CSRC at Jakarta’s Syarif Hidayatullah State Islamic University between November 2008 and January 2009. It surveyed 250 takmir masjid (mosque managers) in Jakarta.
Although the country has the largest number of Muslims in the world, Indonesia has substantial Christian, Buddhist and Hindu minorities. The country’s constitution recognises five religions and allows all its citizens to run for public office.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Indonesia: MP Jailed for Corruption in Anti-Graft Drive
Jakarta, 29 Jan. (AKI)- Indonesia’s anti-corruption court has sentenced former parliamentarian Sarjan Taher to four-and-a-half years in prison for accepting bribes related to a protected forest conversion in South Sumatra. He is the latest leader to be sentenced in the country’s anti-corruption drive.
Sarjan, who is from president Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono’s Democratic Party, was jailed on Wednesday for receiving hundreds of thousands of dollars in bribes in return for allowing forest clearing on the island of Sumatra.
Taher was paid five billion rupiah (445,000 dollars) in bribes by authorities in South Sumatra province and distributed the money to fellow lawmakers, chief judge Gusrizal told the court.
After the sentence was announced, Adnan Topan Husodo from Indonesia Corruption Watch told Adnkronos International (AKI) that the verdict was “positive” but more needed to be done to overhaul corruption in Indonesia.
“The verdict is positive but the parliamentarians are the product of a corrupt system and if this is not changed, I cannot see how we can resolve the problem,” Husodo said.
Husodo said the problem is related to how candidates are selected and the fact that MPs have to pay their own parties and spend money before parliamentary elections.
“When they arrive in Parliament they are already part of a culture of corruption. The difference now is they are thinking about the moment they accept it,” he told AKI.
In a separate case, another lawmaker was handed an eight-year jail sentence, while another is still on trial.
The conviction of Sarjan could see other legislators and officials face justice.
After the verdict, deputy Corruption Eradication Commission (KPK) chairman for enforcement, Bibit Samad Riyanto, said the investigation would be expanded to include several other people implicated in the case.
The panel of judges found Sarjan guilty of receiving bribes from the South Sumatra administration to smooth the House’s approval of the conversion of a 600-hectare protected mangrove forest in Pantai Air Telang, Banyuasin regency, into the Tanjung Api-api seaport.
Sarjan’s sentence was six months lighter than that sought by prosecutors. His wife, attending the hearing, burst into tears when the sentence was handed down.
Sarjan said he would decide within seven days on whether to appeal, and asked the KPK to investigate the others involved in the case.
In response, Bibit said the KPK would collect evidence to bring other implicated parties to trial.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Indonesia: Senior Muslim Clerics in Jakarta Oppose Suicide Bombers and Radical Islam
Religious leaders in Indonesia’s capital back national unity and view democracy as the best form of government. Almost three quarters (74 per cent) are not against the separation of state and religion; 80 per cent reject the notion that violence is necessary to spread Muslim religion.
Jakarta (AsiaNews/Agencies) — An overwhelming majority of senior Muslim clerics in Jakarta reject suicide bombings, believe in national unity and consider democracy is the best form of government, this according to a report released today.
The study was conducted by the Center for the Study of Religion and Culture (CSRC) at Jakarta’s Syarif Hidayatullah State Islamic University between November 2008 and January 2009. It surveyed 250 takmir masjid (mosque managers) in Jakarta.
Some 88.8 per cent of them approve of Pancasila [Indonesia’s state ideology] and consider the 1945 Constitution as the best model for Indonesia.
As many as 78.4 per cent agree that democracy is the best system of government for Indonesia.
“However, we found a kind of split personality among the mosque managers. As citizens they support Pancasila as the state ideology for the country, but as Muslims they support the establishment of an Islamic country,” CSRC senior researcher Sukron Kamil said.
Only 31 per cent support the introduction of Sharia or Islamic law, 56 per cent are against and 13 per cent did not answer.
Some 74 per cent said they would not fight a government that refuses to implement Sharia law against 14 per cent who said they would.
Significantly, some 74 per cent did not agree that the main purpose of jihad was to wage war
“On the question of whether violence is allowed to uphold amar ma’ruf nahi munkar [guiding people to the right path], 89 per cent of the respondents reject it, 9 per cent agree and the remaining 2 per cent are undecided,” CSRC research coordinator Ridwan Al Makassary said.
The survey all shows that for 75 per cent of respondents suicide bombing cannot be considered jihad compared to 9 per cent who said it was.
“Generally, the majority of mosques in Jakarta embrace moderate Islamic ideas and thoughts.
Nevertheless, among the total there is a small number with a tendency toward increasingly radical Islamic ideas,” Ridwan said.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Pakistan: Christian Activist’s Life in Danger After Arrest on Blasphemy Charges
Hector Aleem was arrested at night at his home after he was accused of sending a blasphemous text message. Since then he has been allowed to see his family only once. Muslim clerics want the court to hand him over to them so that they can execute him. The blasphemy law under which he was arrested also penalises members of other minorities. Five members of the Ahmadi community were in fact arrested on the same charges; four of them minors.
Islamabad (AsiaNews) — The life of Hector Aleem, the Christian peace activist arrested on 22 January in the Pakistani capital on blasphemy charges, is in danger, this according to his 24-year-old daughter Mehvish who told AsiaNews that a mob of Muslim clerics went to court demanding he be handed over to them so that they can put him to death.
Aleem was first brought before Pakistan’s Anti Terrorism Court on 23 January. At this initial hearing the 55-year-old director of Peace Worldwide was remanded into custody for five days at the RA Bazaar Police Station.
“The situation is very tense”, Mehvish Aleem said. “Police didn’t even allow us to see our father when he was produced in the court on 27 January for fear of extremists. [. . .] I see every one is under pressure by Muslim clerics. That is why we are not getting justice.”
“During this sad event we could only meet our father once with the help of Joseph France”, she added. Mr France heads the Centre for Legal Aid Assistance and Settlement (CLAAS), an organisation that has agreed to represent Mr Aleem in court.
Hector Aleem was arrested over night on 21-22 January. “Suddenly many people jumped in the house,” his wife said, “some were in police uniform; others were in plain clothes.”
After turning everything upside down and scaring the family half to death, agents sought “to take my 13-year-old son, David John,” Ms Aleem said.
Aleem’s accuser is a militant in an Islamic organisation, claiming that the director of Peace Worldwide sent him a blasphemous text message on his cellphone.
Such incidents are commonplace in Pakistan, involving Muslims as well.
In fact five members of the Ahmadi community, a Muslim minority considered heretical by other Muslims, were arrested today according to a news report.
They are accused of writing offensive words about Muhammad in the latrines of a mosque in the village of Chank, Punjab province. One of them is 45-year-old man and the others are one 16-year-old and three 14-year-old boys.
An Ahmadi community spokesman said that since blasphemy legislation was introduced in Pakistan in 1986, 266 members of his community were arrested (as of December 2008).
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Singapore Team Manager: Jordan Threatened: “Come to Jordan, You Die”
Those five words are what allegedly sparked off the tunnel brawl between the Singapore Lions and their conquered Jordanian counterparts after their Asian Cup qualifier match at the National Stadium on Wednesday.
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It’s what the Singapore team are claiming in the police report made by team manager Eugene Loo after the match which the Lions won 2-1.
But who had said it?
The remark was in reference to when the Lions travel to Jordan to play the return match on 3 Mar next year, which could determine if Singapore qualifies for the first time for the Asian Cup finals in 2011.
The New Paper brought Mr Loo to the office yesterday to see if he could identify the person whom, he claimed, openly made the threat to the entire Singapore team in the dressing room tunnel.
After seeing various pictures taken of the Jordan team at the stadium and yesterday morning at Changi Airport before they left for home, Mr Loo pointed out the Jordan team official in pictures taken at both venues.
After looking at more close-ups, he was sure it was this man whom he claims had ‘started it all’. A check on the Jordan team website revealed this man’s identity. He is Mr Jamal Abu Abed, assistant coach to Jordan’s head coach Eduardo Vingada [and FIFA ambassador for SOS Children’s Villages]
‘Spat on floor’
Mr Loo, 36, recounted to The New Paper what he had said in the police report: ‘We were walking back to our dressing room, and some of the boys were happy and celebrating.
‘The Jordan players were already in their own dressing room next door, and slammed the door when they heard us. Some of our boys naturally celebrated louder.’
‘But there was this Jordan official standing outside, smoking. He said something in his language, then said to us loudly for everyone to hear, ‘Come to Jordan, you die’.
‘He then spat on the floor.’
Mr Loo said this incensed some of the Lions. He alleged: ‘The Jordan players then opened their door and came out, and threw punches and that’s how the scuffle started.’
Mr Kahar, a volunteer Singaporean liaison officer of the Jordanian team, claimed he overheard a Jordan official later talking to the police at their hotel. He told The New Paper: ‘I overheard the Jordan official saying, ‘It is very easy for us to keep them in Jordan a few more days if we want to.
‘Since they are making it difficult now for us, we can do the same too’.’
A police spokesman told The New Paper that investigations are still going on regarding ‘a dispute at the changing rooms of the National Stadium on 28 Jan at about 9.50pm’ between ‘two groups of soccer players’.
Mr Loo also clarified earlier claims in media reports that the Jordan players had attacked the Lions with ‘brooms, a metal fan and a dustbin’. He said: ‘A group of them (the Jordan team) went back into the dressing room to take these items, and they only threatened to use them. That’s all. This is what was mentioned in the police report. But water bottles were thrown.
‘By that time, security personnel and Certis Cisco officers had already come in to help break up the scuffle.’
Players like Mustafic Fahrudin, fitness trainer Aleksandar Bozenko and reserve goalkeeper Hyrulnizam Juma’at were allegedly punched and hit during the scuffle. Mr Loo said: ‘Everyone was fine after, as the scuffle was broken up quickly. No one went to see the doctor. We had to act in self-defence.’
Match commissioner Subramaniam Rasamanickam, who was at the stadium, will submit his own independent report to the ruling Asian Football Confederation (AFC), said Mr P Sivakumar, Football Association of Singapore’s deputy general secretary. Mr Sivakumar also added that Singapore’s trip to Jordan next year for the return fixture will likely be classified as a ‘high-risk’ game.
He said: ‘This means there must be additional measures ensured by our Jordanian hosts to keep our visit free of unnecessary distractions or actions. ‘This applies to the hotel, to the playing venue, transportation and security. Otherwise, we can call the AFC and report any complaint on the spot.’
Mr Loo said the Lions plan to take their own chef ‘to ensure their food intake is done properly’. They will also take along their own security officers to ensure their needs are met.
Mr Sivakumar added: ‘We’ll surely get a hostile reception in Jordan, but we have confidence in our Jordanian hosts to treat us fairly. ‘We must also have confidence in ourselves and stay focused in our task to win in Jordan next March.’
| — Hat tip: VH | [Return to headlines] |
China: State Media Goes Global
[Comment from JD: This differs from the West’s MSM which is fair balanced and impartial. /sarc]
Even as the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) is projecting hard power across the four corners of the earth, the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) is mapping out a multi-pronged strategy to publicize globally the apparent viability of the “China model”.
The administration of President Hu Jintao is spending around 45 billion yuan (US$6.58 billion) to boost what party insiders call “overseas propaganda” (waixuan gongzuo). Prominent state media including CCTV and Xinhua news agency will vastly enhance programs and news feeds in different languages for Western and Asian audiences, and an English news channel modeled on al-Jazeera is set to let the world get the Chinese take on issues and events ranging from politics and finance to culture and religion.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Don’t Expect China to Get the West Out of This Mess
With the markets crashing once more and the last rites being pronounced over Western capitalism, the consensus is that autumn 2008 is when global economic power will have been seen to pass to Asia in general and China in particular. This is the new economic powerhouse. Its growth may slow a little while the West flounders, but it will emerge from this recession as the world’s centre of economic and financial gravity. Goodbye, USA. Hello, the Chinese Communist party.
It is fashionable foolishness that ignores some brute realities. The first is that Asia, except Japan, remains in essence a subcontractor to the West. Two-thirds of China’s exports, for example, are made by foreign companies who essentially reprocess imports of semi-manufactured goods that are then shipped to Europe and the US. It is an economy that does not innovate — it is the great copier and counterfeiter of Western technology. This may change over the next 200 years, but not during the lifetime of most of the people reading this column.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Caracas Synagogue Vandalized
Venezuelan Jews alarmed by increasing anti-Semitism after vandals daub ‘Jews get out’ on synagogue walls
“We don’t want Jews here” and “Jews get out” were the slogans daubed on a Caracas synagogue’s walls Saturday.
David Bitan, vice president of the Jewish community in Venezuela, told Ynet that late Friday night a number of assailants broke down the synagogue’s door and threw scripture books on the floor, then proceeded to graffiti the hateful slogans on the walls.
“We found the guard on the floor, he had been threatened with a gun,” Bitan said. “Until 3 am they destroyed the offices, opened the Ark of the Covenant, and threw the Torah books on the floor.”
He said the Jewish community had filed an official complaint with the police. “This is a very complicated situation for the Jews in Venezuela. The slogans were not against Israel but against the Jews,” he said.
Bitan added that the community has been troubled by numerous anti-Semitic acts over recent years, and a spokesman for the Federation of Jewish Communities in Venezuela, Daniel Ben-Naim, said the incident testified to the increasing hatred of Jews in the country…
| — Hat tip: Vlad Tepes | [Return to headlines] |
Spain: 20,000 Requests for Spanish Passports From Cuba
(ANSAmed) — MADRID, JANUARY 29 — The Spanish Consulate in Havana received 20,000 requests for citizenship from Cubans in the last month, says the online version of El Mundo. An additional clause to the Historic Memory law approved in Spain last December 29 allows first and second generation descendents of Spaniards exiled during the civil war to have Spanish passports. The Consulate has already approved 40 requests. Sources say that 300,000 to 400,000 requests are expected, and around 150,000 should receive a positive response and a Spanish passport by the end of 2010, when the period for application expires, although it will probably be extended for another year. An additional statement explains that any Spaniard who abandoned the country between July 18 1936 and December 31 1955 will be considered an exile. The Consulate has taken on extra personnel to guarantee the handling of 325 cases per day beginning in March. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Tunisia: Emigration Attempts Foiled
(ANSAmed) — TUNIS, JANUARY 30 — Two groups of would be illegal immigrants have been halted in Tunisia by the country’s National Guard. The first case, which resulted in the arrest of eight people, took place in Nabeul, an area on the gulf of Hammamet. This group of eight were halted on the beach just before they were to board a small fishing boat heading to Lampedusa. The second group, which comprised ten men, were stopped in a vehicle which they were using to cross the Sahara in order to pass into Libya undetected, before continuing their journey by sea. These ten, like the other eight, have been arrested and will be trialled. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Driver’s Licenses Let Applicants Pick Gender
State allows men to identify themselves as women
The state of Massachusetts, which has been at the forefront of normalizing homosexual relationships in law, has taken a bold new step to allow applicants for drivers licenses to select their gender on officials documents.
The decision by Rachel Kaprielian became public when an organization promoting family values obtained a copy of a letter she dispatched to a homosexual lobbying organization.
The letter to Marc Solomon of MassEquality said the state Registry of Motor Vehicles “has amended its policy to enable transgendered individuals to more easily change the gender designation on their licenses and identity cards.”
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Books: What Arabs Think of a Hussein in the White House
(ANSAmed) — ROME, JANUARY 2 — “There are many Obamas in the Arab world. There are those who portray him as a man with all the necessary qualifications for writing a new chapter in the history of relations between the USA and the Middle East, and there are those, instead, who see him as yet another puppet dangling from the fingers of the powerful. And there are many positions between these two extremes: ‘Arab thought’ is a complex thing, especially today”, thanks to the burgeoning new media. The words come from Donatella Della Ratta and Augusto Valeriani, two young researchers who have become seasoned travellers between the capital cities of the Middle East and adept at navigating the blogs of the Arab world. They are speaking about the book they have edited, ‘Un Hussein alla Casa Bianca. Cosa pensa il mondo arabo di Barack Obama’ (A Hussein in the White House: What the Arab World Thinks of Barack Obama), published by Odoya. It is the work of many hands, of a group of young scholars and with an introduction by Khaled Fouad Allam, who is careful to make it clear that this is no attempt to reduce “the extreme complexity” of the Arab World to simple schemata, but instead to open some “windows” on a variegated universe. And so the choice falls naturally on Al Jazeera, the Qatar-based satellite TV station which has wrought a revolution in the media of the area, as on a series of other pan-Arab titles — such as the London-based dailies Al Hayat, Al Sharq Al Awsat and Al Quds al Arabi — which also address and influence the outlook of another Arab audience, this time of the Diaspora in the West. But their gaze also falls on a champion of those tens of thousands of blogs which have emerged from these countries in recent years, especially from Egypt, with the aim of gathering popular opinion. And so significant differences come to the fore between the expectations of US Arabs and the concerns and scepticism of the Palestinians, or of the visions of students in Amman. It is a panorama compiled by some exponents of what the two editors choose to refer to, sardonically, as “a self-convened and self-financed research group” which would perhaps be called a ‘think tank’ in Obama’s country, they observe acerbically, but which in today’s Italy, “which is often incapable of seeing beyond its own image” and does not invest in its own future, they can only hope to introduce “a breath of fresh air and openness to other worlds”. Supporting them in this enterprise is Bologna-based Odoya, which has decided to make the text of the book available online in collaboration with Creative Commons, which offers six different forms of copyright restrictions for those wanting to share their own works with a broad readership. It was a choice, says publisher, Marco De Simoni, which is intended to be “a first step on a work in progress which thrives on opinion, debate and public discussion” whether on the Web or via events, being also a “proposal to the world of the media and journalism”. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Calls for Banning Moroccan Film Deemed Offensive to Veil
Despite international praise, the award-winning Moroccan film “Veil of Love” is facing strong criticism at home. Member of Parliament Abdelbari Zamzemi told Aujourd’hui Le Maroc on Friday (January 9th) that the movie is “spreading a clear call to abandon the veil”.
The film, directed by Aziz Salmi, opens in theatres at the end of the month.
According to Salmi, “Veil of Love” depicts the realities of five women, each with her own position towards the veil. It talks about the day-to-day lives of the women and the problems they have to endure in a traditional community.
“I presented an ordinary issue that exists in our society,” Salmi said, “which is the suffering of an average girl lost between modernity and conservatism; between observation of religious values and being lost in love.”
Zamzemi, who represents the Islamist Party of Renaissance and Virtue, said it is not as simple as that. The movie offends the Muslim community and traditions, he said. “The film shows a veiled girl having an illegitimate relationship with a young man,” Zamzemi said in his interview. “It also shows veiled girls smoking the hookah.”
Zamzemi vowed to take the argument to the parliament and maybe further. “I will work on having a decision passed by the Minister of Communications to ban the film,” he said. “I also demand that the government shoulder its responsibilities.”
Director Salmi insists there should be no opposition to his movie, saying it does not offend Muslims. He said his main character wears the veil only during the holy month of Ramadan “as most Arab women do”.
“In my work, I didn’t address religious, permanently-veiled women.”
“Through my film,” Salmi added, “I wanted to raise discussion over the contradictions in Moroccan society; between authenticity and modernity… I only dealt with the questions that can be posed today about the issue of veil, and how it is taken by some women as a means to an end. In this way, I’m not generalising the issue for all veiled women.”
Salmi said scenes that include couples kissing and other intimate moments were taken from reality. He said that in his preparations to direct the movie, he walked around in a park in Casablanca and recorded seeing women in veils walking hand-in-hand with men, and in some cases kissing.
“Therefore, I only depicted daily social practices.”
Salmi said he wanted the public to judge his product.
Cinema critic Ahmed Boughaba said that nowadays the veil does not necessarily represent religion. Some women put the veil on as a complement to what they wear, as an accessory. “The film talks about this contradiction and discusses the meaning of religious identity in relation to the veil.”
The movie was screened outside official competition at the Marrakech International Film Festival in November. In December, it won the award for best leading actress at the 10th National Film Festival in Tangier.
Student Souhaïla Berradi said it appears that the movie ventured into stigmatisation and belittlement. “I believe the director lacks inspiration,” she said, “because there are many other causes that Moroccan cinema could defend.”
Noureddine Jammali, an IT worker, defended the director’s actions. “The artist has the right and privilege to create whatever he wants without requiring approval or permission from those whose job it is to wield the arbitrary powers of censorship,” he said.
| — Hat tip: VH | [Return to headlines] |
Tear Down the Amazon Rainforest Idol
‘Save the trees’ more political myth than environmental truth
Major media sources are finally beginning to acknowledge what WorldNetDaily has been reporting for years: The world’s rainforests aren’t the desperately endangered and depleted resources that the environmentalist mantra makes them out to be.
Eight years ago, WND reported on scientists, studies, Brazilian natives and even disillusioned environmental activists who testified that the Amazon rainforest, far from disappearing at human hands, is actually thriving and replenishing itself through the secondary growth that emerges after a section of older trees is eliminated.
This week, the New York Times reported that scientists are now recognizing that secondary growth around the world is happening much faster and much more effectively than environmentalists advertise.
“These new ‘secondary’ forests,” the Times reads, “are emerging in Latin America, Asia and other tropical regions at such a fast pace that the trend has set off a serious debate about whether saving primeval rainforest — an iconic environmental cause — may be less urgent than once thought.”
The Times continues, “By one estimate, for every acre of rainforest cut down each year, more than 50 acres of new forest are growing in the tropics on land that was once farmed, logged or ravaged by natural disaster.”
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
US-EU Trade War Looms as Barack Obama Bill Urges ‘Buy American’
The prospect of a trade war between the US and Europe is looming after “Buy American” provisions were added to President Barack Obama’s $820 billion (£573 billion) stimulus package.
The EU trade commissioner vowed to fight back after the bill passed in the House of Representatives late on Wednesday included a ban on most purchases of foreign steel and iron used in infrastructure projects.
The Senate’s version of the legislation, which will be debated early next week, goes even further, requiring that any projects related to the stimulus use only American-made equipment and goods.
The inclusion of protectionist measures has quickly raised hackles in Europe.
A spokesman for Catherine Ashton, the EU trade commissioner, said: “We are looking at the situation. The one thing we can be absolutely certain about, is if a bill is passed which prohibits the sale or purchase of European goods on American territory, that is something we will not stand idly by and ignore.”
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
WWIII: the Super Revolution — Lay-Offs Will Lead to Violence — the Communist & Far Left Hell Dream…
[Jeff Nyquist and I often discussed the idea that a massive financial crunch like this is the communists’ dream. They would like to use this type unrest and unhappiness to spread Marxism and create worldwide revolution including in First World countries like the USA. The idea would be to foment massive revolution as a pre-cursor to World War III. This scenario could be becoming real the way things are going. We are in for one hell of a time. I’m watching the DOW as today it edged right to the verge of 8,000, which I’ve always thought could be an important number if it dives below it.
Most interestingly, Obama wants to spend $800+ billion, but less than 6 months ago, Bush floated a $700 billion aid package. That is $1.5 trillion spent in 6 months! In many ways, US Economics has some shades of Zimbabwe in it.
But, bad news is good news, and I don’t mind if the communists want to start world wide revolutions. I just want to see how many communists we can get to KILL! Jan]
Belem — Lay-offs around the world brought on by the economic crisis will result in social upheaval and violence that could herald the death of capitalism, unions meeting at the World Social Forum in Brazil said.
Such unrest would be a painful but necessary step towards a new world order that is being delayed by efforts to save the old, crippled one, argued the labour organisations, mostly from Latin America.
“It’s obvious the effects of this crisis will be large-scale social conflicts,” Martha Martinez, the Americas director for the World Federation of Unions, told trade unionists on Thursday. […]
[…] “The crisis is something good and positive, because it has opened the way to discuss and to revise the (world economic) model,” Sonia Latge, the political science director for Brazil’s Workers’ Central of Brazil, said.
“I think the future of the planet is socialist,” she said. — AFP
| — Hat tip: VH | [Return to headlines] |
