Israel's Discriminatory Land Policies

Israel's Discriminatory Land Policies - by Stephen Lendman

Israel's late 1947 -1948 "War of Independence" took six months to create a new Jewish state, excluding Arabs to the greatest extent possible. To accomplish it, widespread war crimes and atrocities were committed as about 800,000 people were brutally uprooted, ethnically cleansed, or murdered in cold blood. In addition, 531 villages and 11 urban neighborhoods in Tel-Aviv, Haifa, Jerusalem and other cities were destroyed and erased except in the collective memories of their inhabitants and descendants who'll always consider them their rightful homes.

Shortly after, laws were passed to legitimize the seizure and exclusive Jewish use of Palestinian land. The June 1948 Abandoned Areas Ordinance referred to "any area or place conquered by or surrendered to armed forces or deserted by all or part of its inhabitants." It gave the Israeli government exclusive jurisdiction rights, including "expropriation and confiscation (authority over) movable and immovable property, within any abandoned area." It meant displaced Palestinians were prohibited from returning and claiming their property that by law was no longer theirs.

The September 1948 Area of Jurisdiction and Powers Ordinance stated that "Any law applying to the whole of the State of Israel" applies as well "to the whole of the area including....any part of Palestine which the Minister of Defence has defined by proclamation as being held by the Defence Army of Israel." It meant that Palestinians lost all rights and were subject to whatever laws Israel enacted.

In March 1950, the Absentees' Property Law (ABL) defined an absentee as:

"a person who, at any time during the period between (November 29, 1947) and (May 19, 1948) has ceased to exist (and no longer) was a legal owner of any property situated in the area of Israel...."

The ABL transfered property owner rights to a Custodian of Absentee Property. It made him liable to the real owner for the value, but prohibited the return of his land. Israeli law stole it to have Palestinians remaining in Israel relocated and declared "Absentees," no longer rightful owners of their property.

In July 1950, The Development Authority (Transfer of Property) Law was a legal ploy to shield Israel from being accused of having confiscated abandoned Palestinian land and whatever was on it.

The Development Authority (DA) was established as an independent body to buy, sell, lease, exchange, repair, build, develop and/or cultivate seized property. Henceforth, only transactions between Jews or a Jewish entity were allowed. It was understood that "under no circumstances should the (expelled) Arabs return to Israel."

In July 1960, Israel Lands Administration Law established an "Israel Lands Administration. (ILA)" At the same time, Israel's Basic Law affirmed that "ownership of Israel Lands, being the lands in Israel of the State, the Development Authority or the Keren Kayemet Le-Israel (KKL - Jewish National Fund, JNF), shall not be transferred either by sale or in any other manner." Lands were defined to mean "land, houses, buildings and any thing permanently fixed to land."

On its web site, the ILA states that it controls 93% of Israeli land as "public domain; that is, either property of the state, the Jewish National Fund (JNF) or the Development Authority (DA)." The ILA "is the government agency responsible for managing this land which comprises 4,820,500 acres (19,508,000 dunams). 'Ownership' of real estate usually means leasing rights from the ILA for 49 or 98 years."

ILA's legal framework stems from "four cornerstones:"

-- the 1960 Basic Law: Israel Lands;

-- the 1960 Lands Law;

-- the 1960 Israel Land Administration; and

-- the 1960 "Covenant between the State of Israel and the World Zionist Organization (Jewish National Fund)."

The Israel Land Council (ILC) determines ILA policy. The Council chairman is the "Vice Prime Minister, Minister of Industry, Trade, Labor and Communications."

The ILC is comprised of 22 members, 12 from government ministries and 10 representing the JNF.

ILA functions include:

-- assuring that national land use conforms with Israeli laws;

-- protecting and supervising state lands;

-- making them available for public use;

-- planning, developing and managing state land reserves;

-- initiating planning and development, including relocating existing occupants, meaning removing Palestinians to make way for Jews;

-- regulating and managing registration of state lands;

-- authorizing contracts and agreements with other parties; and

-- providing services to the general public.

ILA policy objectives include:

-- designating land areas for public and state requirements;

-- assuring the availability of land reserves for future needs;

-- preserving agricultural lands;

-- administering land use in accordance with the law; and

-- safeguarding state lands.

Overall, Israeli laws and ILA policy prohibit Arabs from buying, leasing or using land exclusively reserved for Jews. On May 21, 1997, Israel's largest circulation newspaper, Yediot Ahronot, quoted Yassar Arafat saying: "Israel has always confiscated land from Arabs and dispossessed them of the property. The land always goes from Arabs to the Jews," and he added that Palestinians who sell their land to Jews are traitors.

The Jewish National Fund (JNF)

In 1901, the Fifth Zionist Congress established it to "purchase, take on lease or in exchange, or otherwise acquire any lands, forests, rights of possession and other rights....for the purpose of settling Jews on (Palestinian) lands." About 80% of the land was confiscated, not bought, from its rightful owners - expelled Palestinians in Israel's "War of Independence."

JNF calls itself "Caretakers of the land of Israel for over a century (and) a global environmental leader by planting 240 million trees, building over 200 reservoirs and dams, developing over 250,000 acres of land, creating more than 1000 parks, providing infrastructure for over 1000 communities, (and) bringing life to the Negev Desert" exclusively for Jews on stolen Palestinian lands.

JNF develops land. It doesn't sell it, but it can lease it to Jews or any Jewish-controlled company, organization or entity. It holds these lands on behalf of "the Jewish People in perpetuity." In addition, its Himnuta subsidiary is charged with "redeeming" West Bank Palestinian land. A 1961 agreement between the State and JNF arranged for the ILA to manage 93% of Israeli land for Jews alone.

In 1973, former Israeli scholar, critic, and lifelong human rights activist, Israel Shahak (1933 - 2001), wrote a paper titled, "What is the Meaning of the Jewish State" in which he said:

"The real situation in Israel is really very simple: Israel is not an 'Israeli' state, or a state of its citizens but it is a 'Jewish state.' " With regard to land, "More than 90% of the inhabited areas of the State of Israel are under the rule of the Jewish National Fund regulations, under which non-Jews cannot rent or buy a house or flat, open a business, in short cannot live. This land is called in Hebrew 'the land' saved. The land which belongs to non-Jews is called unsaved not national (meaning Jewish) and by buying or confiscating it from a non-Jew by a Jew, the land is supposed to be 'saved.' "

It's only the beginning. Numerous privileges are afforded Jews alone that include:

-- not only the right to the land but to a mortgage or loan to finance it;

-- on confiscated West Bank land, "Jewish inhabitants enter into prepared houses, with water and electricity;" unconnected Arab villages are forbidden to use either; and

-- "A building project for the newly-married applies only for the Jewish newly-married and so forth; to be a Jew in a Jewish state is to be both a privileged being, and to be able to receive a lot of 'easy' money a non-Jew can not ever get."

Adalah's Challenge

As the Legal Center for Arab Minority Rights in Israel, Adalah petitioned the Israeli Supreme Court on October 13, 2004 "Challenging the Prohibition on Arab Citizens of Israel from Living on Jewish National Fund Land." It demanded an end to this discriminatory policy and cited other civil rights petitions for the same purpose.

On August 15, 2004 in a letter to Adalah, the ILA acknowledged that "JNF land tenders are only open to Jews." It said it supports the policy and "is bound to respect the objective of the JNF as detailed in the Covenant signed by the State of Israel and the JNF."

JNF's written response said it "is not the trustee of the general public in Israel. Its loyalty is given to the Jewish people in the Diaspora and in the state of Israel....The JNF, as the owner of the JNF land, does not have a duty to practice equality towards all citizens of the state."

In a July 29, 2007 press release, Adalah referred to "a (July 18, 2007) racist bill entitled the 'Jewish National Fund Law (JNFL)' " stipulating that JNF land is to be solely for Jews. It added a new provision to the 1960 ILA Law called "Management of the Jewish National Fund's Lands" saying:

"Despite whatever is stated in any law, leasing of Jewish National Fund's lands for the purpose of the settlement of Jews on these lands will not be seen as improper discrimination." Further, "For the purpose of every law, the association documents of the Jewish National Fund will be interpreted according to the judgment of the Jewish National Fund's founders and from a nationalist-Zionist standpoint."

The JNFL was introduced in the Knesset and passed its preliminary reading. In September 2007, Israel's Supreme Court held a hearing on Adalah's 2004 petition and approved a JNF and Attorney General proposal to delay further deliberation for three months. It stipulated that, during the interim period, Arabs could bid for JNF-controlled lands but that JNF would be compensated for Arab purchases by transferring other state lands to it.

Adalah's General Director Attorney Hassan Jabareen and Attorney Suhad Bishara rejected the proposal because it left Israel's discriminatory policy intact. In other words, newly seized land would replace Arab purchases, leaving them no better off than before. Adalah argued for ending Israel's discriminatory policy, not tinkering with it around the edges and accomplishing nothing.

So far, it hasn't happened. In addition, current law empowers the ILA further to restrict and prohibit Palestinian land development by:

-- putting large Arab areas under its control through the creation of regional councils;

-- enforcing rigid zoning restrictions for residential, agricultural, and industrial use; forbidding unlicensed construction, banning it on agricultural land, and stipulating where Jews and Arabs can live;

-- denying Palestinian areas room to expand while affording Jewish ones great latitude;

-- transferring public land adjacent to Arab communities to the JNF and mandating its use for Jews only;

-- declaring national priority town areas off-limits to Arabs;

-- delaying, restricting and prohibiting local development in Arab communities;

-- denying Palestinians representation on national planning committees; and

-- using forced evictions and home demolitions to make more areas available for Jews.

The Arab Association for Human Rights (HRA) and Ittijah (the Union of Arab NGOs) Position Regarding ILA Proposed Reform

HRA and Ittijah say the proposal "violates international law and universal values." Prior to 1948, Jews controlled 6% of historic Palestine. It's now 93% - an "unparalleled (situation) anywhere else in the world (under which) the State of Israel enjoys absolute control of the most significant resource...." Occupied Palestinians and millions of displaced refugees have suffered grievously. So have Israeli Arabs from discriminatory land distribution policies.

Until the mid-1990s, the ILA allocated land for just two Arab Nazareth and Umal-Fahm housing projects alone. Its approach emphasizes land redemption, meaning seizing it from its owners and transferring it to Jews.

The proposed law "attempts to remove the foundation for current and future claims to return to the homeland and to secure the land rights of Palestinian refugees, as well as (250,000) internal refugees (Israeli Arabs)." If passed, this law "effectively removes the future possibility of reaching a just solution to the" Israeli-Palestinian conflict. After 61 years, equitable land ownership resolution has yet to be achieved nor has Israel complied with international law. It prohibits the transfer of refugee land or other property and assets to the state or third parties.

Yet, the ILA does it anyway, and under the proposed law, urban land ownership will be transferred in a way that will disconnect the state "from the further residual ownership held in accordance with the contracts up to this point." This process will entail "the complete and final negation of the rights of ownership of the Palestinian refugees to these properties" so that they'll never be able to claim them again.

Fourth Geneva's Article 147 specifically prohibits this by stating:

"Grave breaches to which (the) preceding Article relates shall be those involving any of the following acts, if committed against persons or property protected by the present Convention:....taking of hostages and extensive destruction and appropriation of property, not justified by military necessity and carried out unlawfully and wantonly."

Various other international laws acknowledge the obligation of occupying powers to restore properties to their rightful owners and that failure to do so constitutes a serious lawless breach. HRA and Ittijah want expropriated property returned and internal refugees allowed back to their communities and land. A repressive Israel and dismissive world community stand in their way.

B'Tselem Calls Israeli Settlement Expansion "Un-natural Growth"

B'Tselem is the Israeli Information Center for Human Rights in the Occupied Territories. On July 7, it reported that Israel uses "natural growth" as fig leaf cover for its continued settlement expansion project. Internally last year, the population growth rate was 1.6%. It was 5.6% in West Bank settlements. Further, since Israel accepted the Road Map's mandated freeze provision, its settler population expanded 37% in six years - from 211,400 to over 289,600, besides over 190,000 more in Arab East Jerusalem.

Netanyahu claims barring "natural growth" will tear apart families. Unmentioned is the continued theft of Palestinians lands, a grave violation of international law. Yet, Israel argues that, by law, it can't reverse issued tenders after properties have been bought and construction begins. However, two 1992 High Court of Justice rulings disagreed. They held that the government could legally halt construction even after begun and that any losses incurred could be addressed in civil court. "The Israeli government has all the legal and administrative tools necessary to halt construction in the settlements." Further, international laws are binding to signatories, and no state can legislate around them.

Israel does it anyway and plans continued settlement expansions on expropriated Palestinian lands. Interior Minister Eli Yishai threatened to use every resource possible to the maximum. The Ofra settlement is indicative. At least 58% of it was built on privately owned Palestinian land, now lost to make way for Jews. The same pattern holds throughout the West Bank and East Jerusalem. Palestinians are being removed to accommodate an expanding Jewish population on all land that Israel values, and under Netanyahu's "natural growth" policy, it may accelerate faster than ever.

Stephen Lendman is a Research Associate of the Center for Research on Globalization. He lives in Chicago and can be reached at lendmanstephen@sbcglobal.net.

Also visit his blog site at sjlendman.blogspot.com and listen to The Global Research News Hour on RepublicBroadcasting.org Monday - Friday at 10AM US Central time for cutting-edge discussions with distinguished guests on world and national issues. All programs are archived for easy listening.

http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=14542

The Palestinian Centre for Human Rights 2008 Annual Report

The Palestinian Centre for Human Rights (PCHR) 2008 Annual Report - by Stephen Lendman

Established in 1995, PCHR functions independently in Gaza and enjoys "Consultative Status" with the UN's Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC). It's also an affiliate of the International Commission of Jurists-Geneva, the International Federation for Human Rights (FIDH) in Paris, the Euro-Mediterranean Human Rights Network in Copenhagen, the Arab Organization for Human Rights in Cairo, and the International Legal Assistance Consortium (ILAC) in Stockholm.

Palestinian lawyers and human rights activists established it to:

-- "protect human rights and promote the rule of law;"

-- create, develop and promote a democratic culture in Palestinian society; and

-- work for Palestinian self-determination and independence "in accordance with international law and UN resolutions."

PCHR is an "independent legal body dedicated to the protection of human rights, the promotion of the rule of law, and the upholding of democratic principles in the Occupied Territories." It issues documents, fact sheets, and reports like its latest 2008 Annual Report - divided in two parts.

Part One assesses the overall human rights situation in the Occupied Palestinians Territories (OPT) throughout 2008. Because they affect regional peace overall, this article focuses solely on Israeli crimes, not those committed by Palestinian elements in Gaza and the West Bank that pale by comparison. Part Two covers PCHR's local and international efforts over the same period.

Israeli Violations of Human Rights and International Humanitarian Law - Excessive Use of Force, Killings, and Other Violations of the Right to Life

Throughout 2008, the Israeli Occupation Force (IOF) repeatedly violated international law with regard to excessive force, willful killings, wanton destruction, and other right to life abuses against Palestinian civilians.

During the first five days of Operation Cast Lead alone, dozens of air strikes killed 411 Palestinians and wounded 996 others, many seriously. "Contrary to Israeli claims, the majority of victims were unarmed civilians," including 13 women and 38 children.

Over the entire 22-day period, the IOF killed 1417 Palestinians, including 1181 non-combatants. Of these, 926 were unarmed civilians (including 313 children and 116 women) and 255 police officers, 240 on the first day, including dozens in formation and vulnerable at their graduation ceremony. The number of wounded totaled 4336, the great majority being civilian men, women, and children.

Throughout 2008, the IOF committed willful killings and right to life violations, especially in the first six months. Numerous air strikes and incursions targeted civilians in Gaza. Extra-judicial assassinations also against persons accused of involvement in "hostilities against Israel," including anyone acting legitimately in self-defense as international law allows. From January through June, the IOF killed 409 Palestinians, including 225 civilians, 58 of whom were children and 16 women. Another 741 Palestinians were wounded.

On June 19, a six-month Tahdey'a (lull) was declared on the following terms:

-- Israel would stop attacking Palestinians, including shelling and extra-judicial assassinations; also, Gaza's border crossings would be gradually reopened to allow free movement in and out of people and goods; and

-- Palestinians would cease resistance attacks.

They complied but Israel reneged. The IOF greatly reduced its attacks but kept Gaza under siege. By October, Israeli incursions and targeted killings increased. Palestinians responded modestly in self-defense. By late December, Operation Cast Lead was launched, a clear case of premeditated, unprovoked aggression in violation of international law.

Throughout 2008 in the West Bank, repeated incursions and targeted executions continued, including during the Tahdey'a, mostly by IOF undercover units. In total, 42 Palestinian civilians, including 9 children, were killed.

PCHR 2008 tallies show 868 Palestinians died at the hands of the IOF and Israeli settlers - in Gaza and the West Bank combined. Another 2260 Palestinians were wounded. From the beginning of the September 2000 Intifada through 2008, Israel killed 5287 Palestinians, mostly civilian men, women and children. In addition, over the same period, "tens of thousands of Palestinians" were wounded, hundreds sustaining permanent disabilities.

According to eye-witness accounts, the IOF used excessive and disproportionate force against Palestinian civilians, a practice ongoing for over six decades through bombings, shellings, targeted killings, incursions, and attacks by Israeli settlers. In the first five days of Operation Cast Lead (and continuing for another 17 in 2009), Israel used massive air, ground, and sea power against a defenseless civilian population trapped inside Gaza under siege.

On the day after the Operation ended, attacks continued daily. One instance among many involved the IOF bombing of a five-story Gaza building near the Palestinian Governmental Complex in the densely populated Tal al-Hawa neighborhood - completely destroying it. Flying debris and shrapnel killed a woman on her way to a wedding and injured 46 others, including 19 children and three women. A large number of other houses and vehicles in the area were damaged.

Below are a few examples of 2008 attacks:

-- on February 5, a surface-to-surface missile targeting the Palestinian riot control police workplace in 'Abassan village, east of Khan Yunis, killed seven police officers and injured another; and

-- on February 7, 23, and March 1, the IOF killed eight members of one family, wounded another eight, and killed and wounded seven others.

Repeated attacks throughout the year were similar, mostly against civilian men, women and children.

Incursions into Palestinian Communities

Continuing its decades-long practice, Israel repeatedly conducted incursions into the OPT in 2008. In Gaza, they were particularly intensive from January through June, killing nearly 200 Palestinians before Operation Cast Lead began in December. Israel's pretext - to arrest wanted Palestinians and destroy home-made rocket launching sites and weapons. These are grievous war crimes for which Israel must be held responsible.

Significant examples:

From February 29 - March 2, the IOF conducted Operation Warm Winter, a wide scale offensive in Jabalya and surrounding areas using "their full-fledged arsenal and....excessive force without any consideration" for civilian Palestinian lives. Air strikes preceded a ground invasion. As a result, dozens of non-combatant lives were lost or wounded, including women and children. Also, ambulances and medical crews were attacked, and many houses and large areas of agricultural land destroyed - wantonly and maliciously.

The total death toll was 69, including 21 children and two women. Another 175 were wounded, including 44 children and six women.

On January 2, the IOF attacked the al-Shojaeya neighborhood in Gaza City. Clashes followed killing six Palestinian resistance fighters and wounding a seventh.

On January 3, the IOF killed seven Palestinians in al-Zanna and al-Qarara east of Khan Yunis, including a woman, her two sons, her daughter, and her nephew.

On January 15, the IOF killed 17 Palestinians and wounded another 30 during an incursion into the al-Shojaeya and al-Zaytoun neighborhoods in Gaza City.

In the West Bank on January 3, the IOF conducted a three day operation in Nablus and neighboring refugee camps, wounding 38 Palestinians and arresting 31 others. Indiscriminate firing occurred against "anything that moved," including medical crews, ambulances, and hospitals.

Repeated other incursions were made against numerous towns, villages and neighborhoods. Deaths and injuries resulted, including to innocent bystanders too close to the action, many of them women and children.

Extra-Judicial Assassinations

In 2008, the IOF committed them by bombing civilian establishments, houses and cars in Gaza and with West Bank undercover units. Israel's High Court and top government officials approved the practice in violation of international law.

Throughout the year, PCHR documented 53 assassinations, including 44 targeted persons - 31 in Gaza and 13 in the West Bank. In addition, dozens of civilians were wounded. From September 2000 through 2008, the IOF extra-judicially executed 743 Palestinians, including 513 targeted and 230 bystanders.

One example illustrates many. On March 12, four Palestinians in a car in the center of Bethlehem were intercepted by members of an IOF undercover unit. They opened fire at close range killing the four instantly and continued firing indiscriminately to secure their withdrawal.

In other cases, Israeli aircraft fire missiles at homes, vehicles, or other targets where wanted individuals are believed to be located. Often, innocent bystanders, including women and children, are killed or wounded and property destroyed.

Killing Palestinian Children

In 2008, the IOF killed 108 children, 99 in Gaza and nine in the West Bank. From September 2000 through 2008, the total was 919 children or nearly one-fourth of Palestinian deaths. The IOF has a history of willfully killing children and women - easy pickings for intrepid Israeli soldiers and airmen.

One instance is typical. On April 16, an Israeli aircraft fired two missiles at a number of Palestinian civilians gathered near al-Ihsan Mosque, about 300 meters away from where IOF troops were deployed. Nine deaths resulted, including six children, and 12 others were wounded.

Attacking Medical Crews

The IOF repeatedly attacks clearly marked ambulances and medical workers, grievously in violation of international law. PCHR documented three killings in 2008 and 27 since September 2000. Numerous others were wounded, some seriously - while they were carrying out their humanitarian mission to help the injured and dying.

Attacking Journalists

They're willfully targeted to prevent coverage of human rights violations, including killings, denial of access to certain areas, entry into Israel or territory under its control, detention, confiscation and destruction of property, beatings, harassment, and intimidation. An October 2008 Reporters without Borders report placed Israel among "countries that extensively violate press freedoms, especially in areas beyond its borders."

In 2008, one journalist was killed and another 28 wounded. Since September 2000, the toll was nine deaths and at least 170 injured.

Closure and Prevention of Free Movement

Throughout 2008, the West Bank remained militarily occupied and Gaza continued under a medieval siege with access to vital food, medicines, fuels, electricity, and other essentials denied beyond woefully spotty and limited amounts. The result has been a humanitarian disaster with no signs of abating well into the new year. Besides the effects of Operation Cast Lead, the toll includes:

-- 80% of Gazans impoverished;

-- unemployment exceeding 55%;

-- movement in or out of the Territory denied even for emergency humanitarian needs;

-- permission denied to travel, work or study abroad;

-- Palestinians trapped on the Egyptian side of the Rafah International Crossing Point (into Gaza) refused reentry or restricted by long delays under severe humanitarian conditions;

-- intolerable shortages of everything; too little food to sustain nutrition; inadequate medicines and equipment for health and life; and fuel and power restrictions for heat, electricity, vehicles, hospitals, and workplaces;

-- severe movement restrictions in the West Bank by imposing hundreds of checkpoints, barriers, the Separation Wall built on stolen Palestinian land, and hundreds of kilometers of for-Jews only roads; overall, about one-third of the West Bank, including Occupied East Jerusalem, is inaccessible to Palestinians without IOF-issued permits that are extremely hard to get; the result is increasingly isolated Palestinian communities, cut off from each other, including farmers from their land; the sick from access to care; and everyone from family, friends, and a normal life people in the West take for granted;

-- the West Bank and Jerusalem totally cut off from Gaza;

-- Gazans denied essential industrial, agricultural, construction, transportation, fuel and power, and basic raw material needs; and

-- overall, the collective punishment of the civilian population causing "a chronic deterioration in all aspects of....life" that's decimating the lives of 1.5 million Gazans trapped in the world's largest open-air prison and being slowly suffocated.

Throughout 2008 and earlier, Gazan cities, villages, and refugee camps were paralyzed under a state of siege that continues unabated. Living conditions deteriorated steadily. UNRWA was forced to curtail its humanitarian and food distribution programs for days. Around 15 drinking water wells stopped, causing water shortages for more than 100,000 people. Another 125 water reservoirs were also affected. Transportation as well with 85% halted for lack of fuel. Wastewater treatment plants were forced to dump their untreated water in the sea. Additional environmental contamination occurred. Flour mills shut down. Warehouses ran out of flour and wheat. Most production stopped, and Gaza's economy collapsed.

Gaza's border crossings have been closed for over two years under Israel's collective punishment policy. The humanitarian effect is disastrous - against a civilian population oppressed for being Palestinians and for having elected the wrong government.

Throughout the year, hundreds of Gazans were denied access to Israeli and West Bank hospitals, including in Jerusalem. Nor to Arab ones in Egypt or elsewhere. As a result, 29 died and 50 since the tightened siege began in June 2007, including 17 women and 10 children.

International humanitarian law prohibits collective punishment, including closure. Artcle 33 of the Fourth Geneva Convention "relative to the Protection of Civilian Persons in Time of War" states:

"No protected person may be punished for an offense he or she has not personally committed. Collective penalties and likewise all measures of intimidation or of terrorism are prohibited."

Article 12(1) of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights states that "everyone lawfully within the territory of a State shall, within that territory, have the right to liberty of movement and freedom to choose his residence."

For over 60 years, Israel repeatedly, systematically, and willfully flouted international laws and norms with impunity. The result has been incalculable numbers of human deaths, suffering, and destruction to many tens of thousands of innocent Arab people who when they resist in self-defense are called "terrorists."

Arrests, Torture and Other Forms of Cruel and Inhuman Treatment

At year end 2008, from 9000 - 12,000 or more Palestinians were in Israeli detention facilities (mostly inside Israel), including at least 248 children and 69 women - in violation of the Fourth Geneva Convention that obligates an occupier to intern arrested persons inside the territory in question and only for just cause.

Israel continues to arrest anyone thought to represent a threat, including political leaders and ordinary civilian men, women and children. At year end 2008, at least 40 elected members of the Palestinian Legislative Council (PLC) were imprisoned, mostly from Hamas' Change and Reform parliamentary bloc. Included are Dr. 'Aziz al-Dweik, PLC Speaker, and Dr. Mahmoud al-Ramahi, PLC Secretary. Many were tried and unjustly sentenced to months or years in prison for belonging to the wrong political party.

Torture and Ill-Treatment

International laws leave no ambiguity on torture. It's prohibited at all times, under all circumstances, against anyone for any reason, with no allowed exceptions ever. Article 13 of the Third Geneva Convention (on the Treatment of Prisoners of War) states:

Prisoners "must at all times be humanely treated. Any unlawful act or omission by the Detaining Power causing death or seriously endangering the health of a prisoner of war in its custody is prohibited...."

Third Geneva's Article 17 states:

"No physical or mental torture, nor any other form of coercion, may be inflicted on prisoners of war" for any reasons whatsoever.

Fourth Geneva's Article 27 states:

Protected persons under occupation "shall at all times be humanely treated, and shall be protected especially against all acts of (physical and mental) violence or threats thereof...."

Fourth Geneva's Articles 31 and 32 prohibit torture and other "measures of brutality...."

All four Geneva Conventions have a Common Article Three requiring all non-combatants to be treated humanely at all times.

Even Section 277 of Israel's 1977 Penal Law prohibits torture by providing criminal sanctions against its use. Its language is very similar to the UN Convention against Torture that bans force, violence, or threats against anyone for purposes of extracting a confession or to obtain information relating to an offense.

Nonetheless, torture and degrading treatment are official Israeli policy, freely practiced against most Palestinian detainees. PCHR cited numerous ways:

-- violent beatings and insults in detention and during interrogations;

-- blindfolding and hitting detainees, especially in the face and abdomen;

-- strangling to cause extreme breathing difficulties;

-- humiliations and insults;

-- forcibly removing hair and beards;

-- hanging detainees by their feet, then beating them on sensitive body parts such as the genital area;

-- bridging under which three interrogators carry a detainee using chains, with his or her face down;

-- sexually abusing detainees - in some cases raping them with iron bars;

-- Shabeh - the practice of tying prisoners so they can't sit, stand, or kneel, or tied to a chair with their arms pulled back for hours or days at a time; the pain and pressure on joints becomes excruciating;

-- handcuffing or other shackling tight enough to restrict circulation and inflict pain; also tying hands and legs with plastic chains to cause pain;

-- employing various stress positions, including:

(1) the forced "banana" one involving bending the back in a painful arch while the body is extended horizontally to the floor on a backless chair with arms and feet bound beneath it;

(2) forced "frog" crouching on tiptoes with cuffed hands behind the back accompanied by shoving or beating until detainees lose balance and fall forward or backward; and

(3) detainees made to stand on tiptoes for prolonged periods.

-- sleep deprivation for long hours; and

-- other abusive practices, clearly prohibited under international law and that no civilized society should practice, let alone routinely against most detainees - up to 80% or more by some estimates.

The Public Committee against Torture in Israel says that detainees are first examined by a doctor who certifies they're healthy enough to withstand harsh interrogation methods amounting to torture. The Israeli judiciary sanctions it, including the High Court and top government officials.

Abusive ill-treatment continues throughout detention during which necessary medical care is denied, access to legal counsel obstructed and limited, and family visitations severely restricted or not allowed.

Administrative Detention

Hundreds of innocent Palestinians are arrested and held without charge or trial in administrative detention - for up to 36 months, then indefinitely renewed. At year end 2008, it affected at least 900 Palestinians by IOF issued orders.

This practice violates Article 78 of the Fourth Geneva Convention that states:

"If the Occupying Power considers it necessary, for imperative reasons of security, to take safety measures concerning protected persons, it may, at the most, subject them to assigned residence or to internment (that) include(s) the right of appeal (to) be decided with the least possible delay."

Detention According to the "Illegitimate Combatants Law"

Following the IOF's summer 2005 Gaza redeployment, Israel enacted an "Illegitimate Combatant" law applying to protected Palestinian civilian prisoners to justify detaining them. It lets the IOF Chief of Staff issue an arrest warrant against anyone so designated.

It's the same idea as America's 2006 Military Commissions Act definition of an "unlawful enemy combatant," applied to anyone the president claims is "engaged in hostilities against the United States who is not a lawful enemy combatant." Neither the Israeli or US position has any legitimacy in international law.

Palestinian Detainee Deaths in Israeli Jails

In 2008, at least two occurred, likely from abuse and medical negligence. Detained Palestinians with chronic illnesses, like diabetes or heart conditions, deteriorate badly during prolonged incarcerations, especially when subjected to torture and other abusive treatment. The situation may be life threatening if proper medical care is denied or inadequate.

Settlement Activities and Attacks by Settlers against Palestinian Civilians and Property

Israeli settlements are illegal under international law. Expanding them compounds the problem. They continue nonetheless, and during 2008, the IOF and civil authorities, such as the Municipality of Jerusalem, Ministry of Housing, Ministry of Interior, and Higher Council of Organization, took bids for constructing 2400 West Bank housing units. Approval was also given for 6570 units in East Jerusalem and suburbs. In all, 8970 new units were approved and/or started in 2008, mostly in East Jerusalem on seized Palestinian land.

Confiscation of Palestinian Civilian Property

This longstanding practice continued throughout 2008 - for settlement expansions in violation of international law. Israel's High Court supports the practice, and in "PCHR's view....has turned (it) into a tool to legalize illegal Israeli measures and settlement activities in the OPT."

Judiazation of East Jerusalem

The practice remains ongoing - to replace an Arab population with a Jewish one. The Israeli government cut off the city from its Palestinian extension in the West Bank, expanded settlements inside and around the city, and used the Separation Wall to seize more land.

Throughout 2008, the Municipality of Jerusalem continued to demolish Palestinian homes under false claims of unlicensed construction - by people on their own land to make way for Jewish expansion.

Judaizing Arab East Jerusalem began by annexing it to Israel, confiscating Palestinian property, establishing Jewish settlements, building the Separation Wall, preventing new Palestinian home construction, and demolishing existing ones. The idea is to transform all of Jerusalem into a Jewish city with at most a small, marginalized and segregated Arab population denied all rights afforded Jews in hopes they'll leave voluntarily and make Israel's job easier.

Attacks by Israel Settlers against Palestinian Civilians and Property

Israeli settlers do it with near-impunity, including by shootings, running down civilians with vehicles, and destroying or damaging Palestinian property. In 2008, settlers killed five Palestinian civilians. Since September 2000, the total was 45.

"Attacks by Israeli settlers often take place before the eyes of IOF, which even protect them." Palestinian complaints get short shrift enough to encourage settlers to keep doing it, knowing they can get away with murder. In 2008, PCHR documented 170 settler attacks in the West Bank cities of Hebron, Nablus, Ramallah, Qalqilya, Jerusalem, Salfit, Bethlehem, and Jenin:

-- 48 harassments;

-- 36 against houses;

-- 34 against farmers and shepherds and their property;

-- 13 shootings;

-- seven against religious sites;

-- five involved vehicles running down Palestinians; and

-- 27 others involved road closings, stone-throwing, and other abuses.

Israeli settlers openly carry (and use) automatic weapons like people in the West use cell phones.

Destruction of Houses and Other Civilian Property

For decades and throughout 2008, the IOF continued destroying Palestinian houses and property, especially in East Jerusalem. This constitutes a grave breach of Fourth Geneva's Article 53 that states:

"Any destruction by the Occupying Power of real or personal property belonging individually or collectively to private persons, or to the State, or to other public authorities, or to social or cooperative organizations, is prohibited, except where such destruction is rendered absolutely necessary by military operations."

In addition, Article 147 prohibits the "extensive destruction and appropriation of property, not justified by military necessity and carried out unlawfully and wantonly."

Such attacks constitute illegal collective punishment as defined under Fourth Geneva's Article 33 that states: "No protected person may be punished for an offence he or she has not personally committed."

Nonetheless throughout 2008 and earlier, Israel wantonly and maliciously attacked civilian property, including homes, schools, industrial and commercial facilities, public buildings, and farmland using illegal pretexts as justification.

Last year, PCHR documented 216 houses destroyed prior to Operation Cast Lead - 107 in the West Bank and 109 in Gaza. Also, 680 houses were badly damaged and 3424 donums of agricultural land razed. Numerous other structures were also destroyed to make way for Jewish ones or in retaliation for claimed provocative Palestinian acts, either exaggerated or false.

The West Bank's Separation Wall

In June 2002, the Sharon government began constructing it as another form of land theft, harassment, and policy of containing Palestinians in isolated cantons under the false claim of security.

In the past seven years, construction proceeded inside the West Bank, rather than along the Green Line separating the Territory from Israel. On July 9, 2004, the International Court of Justice (ICJ) ruled the construction violated international law. It ordered it halted, existing sections demolished, and for Palestinians to be compensated for harm done them. Israel ignored the ruling and continues new construction on annexed Palestinian land.

The Wall around Jerusalem

Construction in 2008 focused mainly around Jerusalem, according to Israeli Municipality of Jerusalem plans - building it along the city's municipal border. Work in the south, north, and east is part of a settlement project called the "Jerusalem envelope," running about 50 kilometers. In late December, prime minister Olmert ordered this portion completed by 2009 because it's "necessary for Israel's security." When finished, it will be 164.5 kilometers long, two-thirds of which was completed by year end. When completed, the entire Wall will exceed 700 kilometers.

Free Movement Restrictions Imposed on Palestinian Farmers

The IOF imposed severe restrictions on both sides of the Separation Wall, including limited gate opening hours that restrict farmers from free access to their land. They must also obtain permits to reach it on the other side of the barrier, and to get them, must be a registered owner - nearly impossible for many as most farmland is registered to deceased people, and their heirs don't all live in the West Bank or near the land in question.

As a result, thousands of Palestinians can't easily work their fields or market their crops when harvested. Farming is a major source of income in Palestinian communities along the Wall's route. Harming it has had an enormous detrimental affect to already beleaguered Palestinians, driving many more of them into poverty.

The Absence of Justice in Israeli Courts and Efforts to Prosecute Israeli War Criminals in International Ones

Justice for Palestinians in Israeli courts, especially military ones, is nearly impossible because of laws protecting Jews alone. "Through its long experience, PCHR has concluded that the Israeli judiciary is used to provide legal cover for the IOF to commit war crimes against Palestinian civilians, and that it is a means used to avoid resorting to the international justice directly under the pretext of the existence of a just Israeli national judiciary."

As a result, PCHR and other international legal and human rights organizations resort to "international legal means to prosecute Israeli war criminals." On June 24, 2008, PCHR filed a lawsuit at the National Court of Spain, the country's highest judicial council, against seven former senior Israeli military officials, all accused of committing war crimes in Gaza in July 2002. The Spanish Court accepted the case as a first step toward launching a formal prosecution.

In May 2008, PCHR worked with Dutch law firm Bohler Franken Koppe Wijngaarden (BFKW) to submit a complaint to the prosecutor's office asking that Ami Ayalon (currently Minister without Portfolio in Israel) be arrested and prosecuted in the Netherlands regarding the torture of Khaled al-Sharmi in 1999 - 2000 when he was Shin Bet Director, the Israeli General Security Service.

In October, PCHR petitioned the Court of Appeal in the Hague for an Order requiring the Prosecutor to start a criminal investigation and issue an extradition order or international arrest warrant. Getting any nation to challenge Israel is daunting at best. In all previous cases when arrest warrants were issued, executive bodies were so hesitant that no follow-through occurred in time, allowing suspects to flee to safe havens. PCHR and other committed groups continue pursuing justice anyway. It's just a matter of time before they and others succeed.

On June 30, 2009, a PCHR press release explained that the "the Spanish Appeals Court voted 14 - 4 in favor of closing the (National Court's) investigation into the" July 2002 attack. The resolution was voted on but not issued. It marks a "major setback in the pursuit of international justice and victims' rights....To date, neither the State of Israel nor individuals accused of committing war crimes have been brought" to justice. PCHR will appeal to the Spanish Supreme Court.

PCHR's Commitment to Human Rights and Social Justice

Throughout 2008 and currently, PCHR focused on the following issues:

-- stepped-up efforts to bring Israeli war criminals to justice before an international tribunal; as explained above, on June 24, 2008, PCHR filed a lawsuit at the National Court of Spain against seven senior Israeli military officials; also, an arrest application was submitted to Dutch authorities for Israel's former Shin Bet director;

-- cooperative efforts with civil society organizations over the deteriorating human rights situation in Occupied Palestine; in November, PCHR and other organizations co-hosted a human rights conference in Cairo - focused on extra-judicial assassinations and prosecuting Israeli war criminals; other efforts aim to restore Palestinian unity against a common adversary, getting political prisoners released, lifting Gaza's siege, ending the death penalty, and working for peace and Palestinian self-determination;

-- overall coordination and cooperation with other human rights organizations to make their combined efforts more effective;

-- overall cooperation with international civil society organizations; and

-- promoting activities related to gender issues that often get far too little attention.

PCHR also provides legal aid for Palestinian prisoners in spite of the enormous obstacles in doing it effectively given that Israel affords Palestinians no chance for justice. Still, PCHR represents them in court, visits them as able, submits complaints and appeals, and tries to stop torture and ensure medical aid and better detention conditions are provided. PCHR also seeks compensation for victims of injustice and represents them on numerous other issues such as denying them free movement, including for vital medical care.

Overall, PCHR and similar human rights organizations address the "essential (unresolved) elements of the Palestinian issue - the right to self-determination, the right to an independent Palestinian state with its capital in Jerusalem, the right of return for Palestinian refugees, and the right to remove illegal Israeli settlements from the Occupied Territories."

International laws affirm these rights, but for Palestinians they're unfulfilled. Peace, justice, and democratic freedom as well. As a result, PCHR and others keep working "to protect (and restore) Palestinian human rights from ongoing violations by the Israeli government and courts," and to demand that an uncaring world community address these issues.

Stephen Lendman is a Research Associate of the Centre for Research on Globalization. He lives in Chicago and can be reached at lendmanstephen@sbcglobal.net.

Also visit his blog site at sjlendman.blogspot.com and listen to The Global Research News Hour on RepublicBroadcasting.org at 10AM US Central time for cutting-edge discussions with distinguished guests on world and national issues. All programs are archived for easy listening.

http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=14542

Reviewing F. William Engdahl's "Full Spectrum Dominance:" Part II

Reviewing F. William Engdahl's "Full Spectrum Dominance: Totalitarian Democracy in the New World Order:" Part II - by Stephen Lendman

For over 30 years, F. William Engdahl has been a leading researcher, economist, and analyst of the New World Order with extensive writing to his credit on energy, politics, and economics. His newest book is titled "Full Strectrum Dominance: Totalitarian Democracy in the New World Order."

Part I was reviewed earlier. Part II continues the story of America's quest for global dominance and why its own internal rot may defeat it.

The Significance of Darfur in Sudan

In a word - oil in the form of huge potential reserves with Chinese companies involved in discovering them. Washington's genocide claim is a hoax. Yet it's trumpeted by the media and foolhardy celebrities used as props for the charade. By 2007, China was getting up to 30% of its oil from Africa prompting its "extraordinary series of diplomatic initiatives that left Washington furious" and determined to respond.

Beijing offers African countries "no-strings-attached dollar credits" compared to exploitive IMF and World Bank terms. It paid off with important oil deals with Nigeria, South Africa, and Sudan's Darfur region. China National Petroleum Company (CNPC) is now Sudan's largest foreign investor, around $15 billion in the past decade, and it co-owns a refinery near Khartoum. It also built an oil pipeline from southern Sudan to Port Sudan on the Red Sea from where tankers ship it to China.

With its need for oil growing at around 30% a year, China must have all the secure sources it can arrange, so what Africa can supply is crucial. Hence the Darfur confrontation, fake genocide charges, and Washington pressuring the government to sever its ties with China, something Khartoum won't countenance.

For years as well, America used proxy Chad, Eritrea, and other forces, poured arms into Southeastern Sudan and Darfur, and trained the Sudan People's Liberation Army's (SPLA) John Garang at the School of the Americas for his role as a Pentagon's stooge. His campaign in the country's south, and that of others in Darfur, killed tens of thousands and left several million displaced. At stake is vital energy and other resources from Sudan and elsewhere, including the Democratic Republic of Congo, long reeling from Washington-initiated aggression using proxy forces for the dirty work.

For one, Chad's thuggish "President for life" Idriss Deby's elite troops, trained and armed by the Pentagon, for attacks in Darfur and to aid rebel forces against the Khartoum government in Southwestern Sudan. A US/World Bank-financed pipeline also extends from Chad to the Cameroon coast as "part of a far grander scheme to control the oil riches of Central Africa from Sudan to the Gulf of Guinea" - an area with reserves potentially on a par with the Persian Gulf making it a great enough prize to go all out for.

Enter China with "buckets of aid money" offered Chad the result of Deby wanting a greater share of the revenues, creating his own oil company, SHT, and threatening to expel Chevron for not paying its required taxes. Things got resolved, "but the winds of change were blowing" with China taking advantage, something "not greeted well in Washington."

"Chad and Darfur (are) part of a significant Chinese effort to secure oil at the source(s), all across Africa," a matter Washington's Africa policy is addressing with AFRICOM and various military bases on the continent plus others planned. Washington wants global control of oil. Because of its growing needs, China represents a challenge everywhere but especially in Africa and Latin America. The result - "an undeclared, but very real, New Cold War (is on) over oil."

Tibet is another battleground with unrest unleashed ahead of the 2008 Beijing Olympics. The operation dates from when George Bush met the Dalai Lama publicly in Washington for the first time, signaled his backing for Tibetan independence, and awarded him the Congressional Gold Medal. It clearly angered China that considers Tibet part of its territory.

China also worried that Washington targeted Tibet with a Crimson Revolution much like earlier ones in Georgia, Ukraine and elsewhere while at the same time embarrassing Beijing ahead of its Olympics - intended to display its prosperity to a world television audience round the clock from August 8 - 24. The stakes on both sides are huge and remain so going forward.

The Dalai Lama plays a pivotal role, but not what most people think. Although promoted in the West as spiritual and concerned for human rights and justice, as far back as the 1930s he "traveled in rather extreme conservative political circles," including with extremist Nazis when he was a boy.

Later in 1999, he joined with Margaret Thatcher and GHW Bush in demanding the British government release Augusto Pinochet, under house arrest in London, and not extradite him to Spain for prosecution. Also, US government documents dating from 1959 revealed that he was was financed and backed by "various US and Western intelligence services and their gaggle of NGOs." He continues to serve them today and got a White House meeting and Congressional Gold Medal for his efforts.

In 1959, the CIA helped him flee Tibet to Dharamsala, India where he's lived for the past 50 years, surfacing where Washington sends him for whatever purpose is intended. He's also gotten millions of NED dollars to engage in disruptive activities benefitting the West against designated adversaries.

"The most prominent pro-Dalai Lama Tibet independence organization in the destabilization attempt of 2008 was the International Campaign for Tibet (ICT), founded in Washington in 1988." Its board of directors includes former US State Department officials revealing Washington's clear involvement. For the past 15 years, NED provided funding for its usual type mischief. Other anti-Beijing organizations are also active, including the US-based Students for a Free Tibet (SFT), founded in 1994 as a US Tibet Committee project, financed by NED for "made-in-the-USA" subversion.

Tibet is also important as one of the world's most valued water sources and for its "treasure of minerals....oil (and) some of the world's largest uranium and borax deposits, one half of the world's lithium, the largest copper deposits in Asia, enormous iron deposits, and over 80,000 gold mines." Also its forests contain China's largest timber reserve, and its "treasure basin" border with Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region has 57 types of mineral reserves, including oil, natural gas, coal, crude salt, potassium, magnesium, lead, zinc and gold worth an estimated $1.8 trillion. Truly a "treasure" worth contesting for and the reason for America's interest. Human rights and promoting democracy are subterfuge, the same as everywhere America has a strategic interest, usually focused on resources.

Destabilizing Tibet "was part of a shift of great significance....at a time when the US economy and the US dollar....were in the worst crisis since the 1930s....By the end of 2008 (America looked) more and more like the British Empire of the late 1930s - a global imperium in terminal decline" yet determined to impose its will on an increasingly reluctant world wanting better alternatives than they're getting. Quashing it requires "full spectrum dominance," something the Pentagon clearly understands. So do nations like China, Russia, Venezuela, Bolivia, Ecuador, and others on every continent.

Global Bases As the Basis of Empire

NATO currently includes 28 member states, including 10 former Soviet Republics and Warsaw Pact countries. Prospective new candidates include Georgia, Ukraine, Croatia, Albania and Macedonia and potentially others later to more tightly encircle Russia. At the same time, the Middle East and part of Eurasia have been increasingly militarized with a network of US bases from Qatar to Iraq, Afghanistan and beyond - a clear breach of GHW Bush's promise to Mikhail Gorbachev that paved the way for unifying Germany in 1990 and dissolving the Soviet Union.

The Pentagon has hundreds of bases globally, 1000 or more by some estimates, including secret and shared ones for greater control - at a time when no nation threatens America yet trillions of dollars are spent anyway and over time may bankrupt the nation.

Many of them were built in the last 10 years starting with Camp Bondsteel in occupied Kosovo. Numerous others followed in Hungary, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Albania, Macedonia, Iraq, Afghanistan, and new ones planned for Eastern Europe, Central Asia, Africa, Latin America, and the Caribbean - to be closer to potential targets like Russia, China, Iran, Venezuela, Bolivia, Ecuador, and Cuba.

In recent years, it's become clear that America seeks more than the strategic control of resources. It wants global dominance, without challenge, by political, economic and military means. In other words, "full spectrum dominance" to become master of the universe.

Along with encroachment, encirclement and control, another agenda is in play - over a dozen built or planned Afghanistan bases to defend the country's opium fields and the lucrative billions they provide. Much like Southeast Asia's Golden Triangle in the 1960s and 1970s, they supply CIA with significant drug revenues, then laundered through front company banks abroad and at home to finance covert and intelligence activities along with the agency's generous black budget.

Pentagon planners regard Afghanistan as strategically crucial - to project military power against Russia, China, Iran, and other oil-rich Middle East States. It's also for a proposed oil pipeline from the Caspian Sea to the Indian Ocean and close to Kyrgyzstan where another US base is planned at Bishkek's international airport. In all, 13 new US bases will cross Eurasia, including three in Pakistani cities. Most, perhaps all, are permanent, especially in occupied Iraq and Afghanistan.

America in Terminal Decline?

Like ancient Rome, Ottoman Turkey, Britain, Austria-Hungary, and dozens of other previous empires, America increasingly shows signs of "terminal decline as Bush and Cheney launched their bold military policies to extend its imperial life, or as George HW Bush (called it), the New World Order." Friendly persuasion no longer works. Raw military power is the strategy, "a de facto admission of the failure of the American Century" and a sign of its terminal decline.

At the end of the Cold War, a "leaner and meaner" nuclear force" was deployed with little fanfare, including (post-2004) Conplan 8022 (for contingency plan) putting nuclear bombers on Ready Alert status from global locations - to conduct "Global Strikes" anywhere with devastating force, nuclear or conventional. In addition, NATO "would be subject to US desires and adventures" - a very disquieting situation for potential targets and planet earth if nuclear weapons are used.

The Curious History of "Star Wars"

As mentioned above, Ronald Reagan proposed the Strategic Defense Initiative (dubbed "Star Wars") on March 23, 1983 even though the whole idea is fantasy as independent experts then and now assert. MIT's Theodore Postal for one, a leading authority on ballistic missile defenses. He flatly states:

"the National Missile Defense System has no credible scientific chance of working (and) is a serious abuse of our security system."

Nonetheless, the program was launched, and according to a former economic studies head of the Soviet Union's Institute of World and Economy & International Relations (IMECO), it forced his country to spend so much that it contributed greatly to the Warsaw Pact's collapse and Germany's 1990 reunification.

NASA and Military Secrecy

In 1958, the National Aeronautics and Space Act created NASA's Space Program in response to the Soviet's successful October 1957 Sputnik 1 launching. The Space Race was on to see which side could trump the other but not without inevitable problems.

A major one happened on January 28, 1986 when the Space Shuttle Challenger exploded in flight killing all on board. Official causes cited faulty O-rings to hide the truth. Contrary to NASA being "devoted to peaceful purposes for the benefit of mankind," it's really to control space, weaponize it, launch first-strikes against adversaries like Russia, and achieve "full spectrum dominance."

In December 2000, prior to Donald Rumsfeld becoming Defense Secretary, the Pentagon's newly released Strategy Report for Europe and NATO included a Theater Missile Defense section in clear violation of the ABM Treaty. Russia and China expressed "grave concern," and with good reason. They're the main targets and they know it.

"Missile defense" is for offense, but not against "rogue states" or "terrorists." It's for nuclear supremacy ("unilateral assured destruction") and "full spectrum dominance." It's also to intimidate rivals like Russia and China, and potentially unleash a first-strike attack with catastrophic consequences if it happens.

Iran threatens no other nation, and so far as known, its commercial nuclear program complies with NPT unlike notorious nuclear outlaw states - Israel, India and Pakistan. Nonetheless, Tehran may also be targeted for its huge oil and natural gas reserves and to remove Israel's main regional rival. But that's a sideshow. "Full spectrum dominance" depends on eliminating any challenge from Russia mainly, a nuclear superpower, then China, a less formidable nuclear threat but growing economic rival.

Washington's Nuclear Obsession

Russia knows that "missile defense" is for offense and nuclear supremacy to enforce America's will on the world without challenge. After September 11, 2001, the Bush administration renounced its treaty obligations, like ABM, then pursued "explicitly banned weapons....with hardly a peep of protest from Congress" or most other nations.

Studies like the 1995-96 Air Force 2025 elaborately detailed "hundreds of technologically advanced, super-sophisticated space-based weapons systems intended to provide the United States with global combat support capabilities in space (to let America) remain the dominant air and space force in the future...."

One example is a laser cannon to:

"successfully attack ground or airborne targets by melting or cracking cockpit canopies, burning through control cables, exploding fuel tanks, melting or burning sensor assemblies and antenna arrays, exploding or melting munitions pods, destroying ground communications and power grids, and melting or burning a large variety of strategic targets (of every imaginable kind) - all in a fraction of a second."

During the Cold War, Mutually Assured Destruction (MAD) restrained both sides. However, with space-based capabilities, America could think the unthinkable - the insane idea that nuclear war harms only the target, not the US or rest of the world. That's "really and truly mad."

Secretly under development since the 1970s, Nuclear Missile Defense (NMD) includes:

-- radar installations to detect enemy missile launches and track them; and

-- ground-based interceptor missiles to destroy them in flight before they reach US air space.

The Bush administration planned interceptor sites in California, Alaska, and Poland. Installing "infrastructure in East Europe was far and away the most reckless enterprise of a cabal that had already demonstrated its bent for dangerous and foolish brinkmanship." With missile "defenses" within minutes of Russian targets, Moscow wouldn't know if they were nuclear armed or not, but the possibility puts the world "on a hair-trigger to possible nuclear war, by design or miscalculation," and thus the greatest ever threat to possible Armageddon if leaders on either side react wrongly.

Yet that's precisely the path still on with Obama pursuing the same recklessness as George Bush and Donald Rumsfeld - "full spectrum dominance, the New World Order, and the elimination of Russia, once and for all, as a potential rival for power." China potentially as well. Installing NMD is one part of the grand scheme. Launching offensive nuclear missiles another, and today the chance it may happen is greater than ever, despite the sheer madness of doing it.

Yet NMD is "coupled with the Top Secret order by the Secretary of Defense....to implement Conplan 8022, 'which provides the President a prompt, global strike capability.' (It means Washington) decided to make nuclear war an 'option' " - an absolutely insane strategy.

Dr. Strangelove Lives!

The 1964 Stanley Kubrick film portrayed a nuclear Doomsday Machine with the subtitle: "How to stop worrying and love the bomb." It ended with "an accidental, inadvertent, pre-emptive US nuclear attack on the Soviet Union," today more possible than ever, something the film only portrayed as black comedy.

Conplan 8022 is offensive and preemptive on "the mere perception of an imminent threat, and carried out by Presidential order," with no Congressional authorization, internal debate, or consultation with allies. Today, the world risks Armageddon based solely on perception, US intentions, and whether the president of the United States pulls the nuclear trigger.

The Permanent War State Lobby

Post-WW II, US dominance "depended on two main pillars:"

-- maintaining the dollar as the world's reserve currency, with oil and other hard commodities dollar denominated; and

-- unchallengeable US military power.

The American Security Council

Founded in 1956, the Washington-based American Security Council (ASC) is "One of the least-known and most influential organizations to formulate policy initiatives for (the) military-industrial complex....(It's) played a prominent role in almost every important foreign policy or national security program since World War II." According to its web site, its "inner circle" included some "of the most influential names in the American establishment of the day."

Figures like Time magazine's founder Henry Luce and his wife Clare Boothe Luce, closely tied to CIA chief Allen Dulles who considered Henry one of his key media assets. Noteworthy others as well - a who's who, including Walt Disney, Averell Harriman, Senator Thomas Dodd (Chris Dodd's father), Senator Henry (Scoop) Jackson, General Douglas MacArthur, House Speaker Sam Rayburn, Nelson Rockefeller, Eugene Rostow, Senator John Tower, Admiral Elmo Zumwalt, and "some of the most aggressive military organizations in the United States."

Throughout the Cold War, "the ASC was at the heart of propaganda and lobbying initiatives which supported the military-industrial complex and the establishment of America's permanent Security State and war economy."

After the Soviet Union's dissolution, a New Military-Industrial Complex emerged, according to writers Ian Mount, David Freedman, and Matthew Maier in the March 2003 issue of Business2.0. It embraced "the latest generation of high-tech weaponry (and) the military's new doctrine of faster, lighter, smarter warfare - combat in which cutting-edge technology becomes US troops' deadliest weapon."

The Pentagon calls it a Revolution in Military Affairs (RMA) or a blueprint for "full spectrum dominance." Its proponents include "some of the most powerful people ever (in) Washington, including Donald Rumsfeld and Dick Cheney," out of office but still influential.

The Revolution in Military Affairs (RMA)

Afghanistan and Iraq are examples of "alternative methods to secure the American Century well into the future." So is the notion of first-strike with enough force to prevent any significant retaliation. The Pentagon's notion of "counterforce" means the ability to destroy an adversary's nuclear missiles pre-launch with Ballistic Missile Defense (BMD), then "cleaning up" the few still remaining to precude retaliation.

The idea isn't new and first surfaced in the 1970s under Nixon, Kissinger, and other prominent military-industrial complex figures. In a word, it's that "nuclear war is not only 'thinkable,' it was do-able" to secure US Nuclear Primacy.

In January 1974, in the midst of the Watergate crisis, Nixon signed National Security Decision Memorandum 242 (NSDM-242) titled "Policy for Planning for Employment of Nuclear Weapons....for Deterrence." It stated that:

"The United States will rely primarily on US and allied conventional forces to deter conventional aggression by both nuclear and non-nuclear powers. Nevertheless, this does not preclude US use of nuclear weapons in response to conventional aggression." It also said "The fundamental mission of US nuclear forces is to deter nuclear war (and) attacks - conventional and nuclear" and implied that first-strike would be used to do it as part of new nuclear war options. "The USA was going for it all."

Defense Secretary James Schlesinger directed the development of new technologies to achieve it, including:

-- miniaturization of nuclear warheads enough for one missile nose cone to carry up to 17; and

-- atomic physics and computerized navigational device advances to improve accuracy to within 50 feet of a target.

These breakthroughs gave America a first ever strategic edge - the ability to destroy hardened silos, submarines and aircraft. Even so, the "essential element to make the entire program workable and operational remained (elusive): a Ballistic Missile Defense (BDM) system to take out any (surviving) Soviet missiles" that could be launched in retaliation.

So in 1973, RAND think-tank specialist Dr. Andrew W. Marshall became Director of the Office of Net Assessment, US Defense Department, and created what was called the Revolution in Military Affairs (RMA). He described it as:

"a major change in the nature of warfare brought about by the innovative application of new technologies which, combined with dramatic changes in military doctrine and operational and organizational concepts, fundamentally alters the character and conduct of military operations."

Marshall became known as "Yoda," referring to the Star Wars film character Grand Master of the Jedi Order. At age 86, he's still active because of his expertise, skills, and value. His job is "to assess regional and global military balances and to determine long-term trends and threats."

Developing first-strike systems continued after Richard Nixon, including Jimmy Carter's Presidential Directives PD 18 - 59 calling for:

-- developing Anti-Satellite weapons (ASAT) to destroy Soviet early warning systems;

-- Pershing II missiles to decapitate the Soviet leadership; and

-- a Counterforce Nuclear First Strike to destroy almost all Soviet nuclear weapons.

During his tenure, Carter "authorized the greatest commitment to war-fighting of any President in history." Nonetheless, an effective anti-missile defense remains "the missing link to a First Strike capability." The Cold War ended in 1990. America's quest for a First Strike advantage still continues. It's considered the "grand prize for global domination through Nuclear Primacy."

That along with a new way of waging wars: "by spy satellites and long-range missiles, by computer viruses that would disable the enemies' offensive and defensive systems, and by a 'layered' defense system that would make the US impenetrable."

The political climate and neoliberal heyday under Bill Clinton held new military technological advances at bay. That changed under George Bush, even before 9/11, with Andrew Marshall still around and active at an advanced age. His proteges include a rogues gallery of hawks, including Donald Rumsfeld, Paul Wolfowitz, and Dick Cheney who with others comprised the hard core defense and intelligence team, neocons in the Bush administration.

"As a group, Andrew Marshall's proteges formed the most powerful military lobby in the US policy establishment in the first years of the 21st century. They advocated radical force transformation, deployment of anti-missile defense, unilateral pre-emptive aggression, and militarization of space in order to use the US military to achieve for the United States and its closest allies, total domination of the planet (and) outer space. It was perhaps the most dangerous group of ideologues in United States history," and their influence remains.

Marshall advocates weaponizing new technologies and testing them in real conflicts like Iraq and Afghanistan. Obama's security appointments reflect the same ideas and goals so expect continuation of Bush policies ahead. He favored preemptive aggressive wars. So does Obama as evidenced by his stepped up offensive in Afghanistan and Pakistan, permanent occupation of Iraq, challenging Russia with offensive missiles, and encirclement with new military bases.

Challenging the Official 9/11 Scenario

Skeptics abound and with good reason. The idea that 19 Arab terrorists "could commandeer, with only primitive boxcutters, four sophisticated Boeing commercial jets and redirect three of them, successfully, as apparently poorly-trained amateurs in air maneuvers which seasoned pilots claimed were near impossible" seemed utterly preposterous.

Eckehardt Werthebach, former German domestic intelligence service president said:

"the deathly precision and the magnitude of planning behind the attacks would have needed years of planning (and would require the) fixed frame (of a state intelligence organization unavailable to a) loose group" of terrorists. Werthebach's conclusion: the attacks were "state organized actions."

Andreas von Bulow, a former German Parliamentary Commission member in charge of three branches of German secret service, believes the Israeli Mossad and CIA were responsible for the attacks using corrupt "guns for hire" to pull it off. The lack of an open and serious investigation was incomprehensible in their view and proof of an official cover-up. Other experts agree. The 9/11 story is preposterous on its face - concocted to hide the truth.

Just as Franklin Roosevelt used Japan's Pearl Harbor attack (known well in advance to be coming) to launch The American Century, the neocons around George Bush used 9/11 for the Global War on Terror, attacking Afghanistan and Iraq, and waging permanent war on the world ever since with defense appropriations topping a trillion dollars annually in spite of America having no enemies.

In a bid for "full spectrum dominance" to extend many years into the future, "It was to be an increasingly desperate bid to prop up a crumbling empire, that like ancient Rome, the Ottoman Empire, Czarist Russia, the British Empire," and all others in history, "had already rotted far too deeply from within." The price of imperial arrogance yields bitter fruit. America is no exception. It's not a question of if it will fall, just when and with what fallout.

Full Spectrum Dominance or Fully Mad

Under George Bush, "defense" spending "exploded beyond all precedent" and annually way exceeds $1 trillion dollars now with all categories included. The official Pentagon budget alone more than doubled from $333 billion in FY 2001 to $711 billion for FY 2009, and Obama's proposed FY 2010 budget is the highest ever requested. Today, America accounts for around half of all global military spending - at a time it has no enemies but seeks global dominance through wars, intimidation or other means.

Supporting a "Mafia state" in Kosovo is one example. When Kosovars declared their independence in early 2008, Washington extended recognition despite objections from several EU countries and the fact "Kosovo independence and its recognition openly violated UN resolutions for Kosovo, making a farce of the UN, as well as violating international law."

Equally troublesome is Kosovo's prime minister, Hashim Thaci, a known criminal whom Interpol and German BND intelligence connect to organized crime, including drugs trafficking, extortion, and prostitution. No matter, as Washington, NATO, and the EU embrace a man they can control, and for America it secured a strategic foothold in Southeast Europe - "a major step in consolidating NATO's control of Eurasia...." Moscow objected vehemently as it compromises its own security.

Georgia's August 2008 South Ossetia invasion did as well, another provocation very troublesome to the Kremlin, and with good reason. Like most others, it was made-in-the-USA and Moscow knew it, especially after uncovering incriminating evidence besides what was already known about Washington and Israel's involvement.

After Russia easily defeated the Georgian army, its spy satellite spotted a convoy with Georgian special troops en route to Poti, the port city under Russian occupation. It was captured along with its weapons and "a large trove of top-secret NATO documents concerning their hightly secret satellite technology." It was analyzed, used to capture large stocks of US military equipment stored in Georgia, and humiliate Washington and Israel at the same time.

It was also learned that captured Pentagon electronic equipment was manufactured in the Ukraine (a non-NATO state) under US license, yet "NATO-compatible sensitive military equipment" was being made there sub rosa. The discovery for Russia "totally compromised both the American and Israeli intelligence networks set up in Georgia (to spy) on Iran, Russia and Turkey."

Later it was learned that Ukraine president Viktor Yushchenko was involved in illegal Georgian arms sales, fraudulently under-reported their value to his own tax authorities, and engaged in extensive embezzlement exceeding $1 billion for himself and associates.

Yet along with Georgia, Washington supports Ukraine's admission to NATO for greater chokehold control over Russia. Gangster dictatorships in both countries make them all the more attractive to America's strategic aim for global dominance.

AFRICOM, China and Resource Wars

China's rapid growth requires increasing amounts of all types of resources, especially oil, natural gas and all others for its industries plus enough food to feed its huge and growing population. Getting them puts it in competition with America that wants global control of them all.

For its part, geologists believe Africa holds the world's largest mineral riches. The Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) for one, an immense country the size of Western Europe with its Kivu region bordering Rwanda, Uganda, and Burundi in the East being one of the most mineral-rich regions in the world, which is why so much conflict vies to control it.

Overall, Congo has over half the world's cobalt, one-third of its diamonds, and three-fourths of its vital columbite-tantalite or "coltan," essential for computer chips, circuit boards, mobile phones, laptops, and other electronic devices. Having the right leadership in the country and its neighbors is thus crucial, and when any outlive their usefulness they're removed, by assassination or other means.

"The common thread linking Kivu with Darfur" and other vital regions of the continent is that America wants control of their resources to be able to deny them to China and other non-strategic partners. For its part, Beijing needs a reliable present and future supply and has taken effective non-military means to secure them.

The toll on Congolese has been horrific, the result of Washington-engineered conflict to split the country and control its eastern riches. According to the International Rescue Committee, over 5.4 million civilians have been killed in ongoing fighting since 1996, without a word of outcry from the Western media compared to fraudulent genocide claims in Darfur.

Also unreported was that Congo's president, Joseph Kabila, was negotiating a $9 billion trade agreement with China - his "irreversible choice" as preferred trading partner to the displeasure of Washington. Shortly afterwards, eastern fighting broke out with regional US stooges attacking the DRC - Rwanda's president Paul Kagame (trained at Fort Leavenworth, KS) and Laurent Nkunda (another Fort Leavenworth product), his ally and henchman with all signs pointing to a US role sure to intensify with the establishment of AFRICOM.

America's two key Eastern Africa military partners, Rwanda and Uganda, are used freely against Eastern Congo to counter China's influence in the region. "The balkanization of Congo appeared to be a major objective behind the organized chaos (and mass slaughter) in the Great Lakes region."

Throughout the continent, the Pentagon under George Bush signed base agreements with numerous countries, including Botswana, Gabon, Ghana, Kenya, Mali, Morocco, Namibia, Sao Tome and Principe, Senegal, Sierra Leone, Tunisia, Uganda, and Zambia - besides many others in Iraq and other Middle Eastern oil-rich states.

China is the target - seen as a threat to Washington's control of the continent's riches. Its rapid industrialization requires growing amounts of "every mineral commodity imaginable...." AFRICOM was established to secure them for America and deny them to Beijing by blocking its economic presence in the region.

Obama supports it, and it's why he retained Robert Gates as Defense Secretary. He's said publicly that he backs offensive missiles in Poland and connected radar in the Czech Republic - both targeting Russia, not Iran, the official claim. In addition, Marine General James Jones, a former NATO commander, was appointed National Security Advisor and played a central role in establishing AFRICOM. After retiring, he served on the boards of Boeing and Chevron Oil and is closely connected to the military-industrial-oil complex as well as neocons in the Bush administration. Obama also appointed Admiral Dennis Blair, a former Pacific Fleet commander and China specialist, as Director of National Intelligence - the top intelligence job.

Afghanistan as "The Main Geopolitical Prize"

Straightaway in his new administration, Obama ordered an additional 17,500 more troops to the country, potentially more to follow, and just recently appointed a new commander, General Stanley McChrystal, described earlier as a hired gun with a reputation for brutishness and indifference to slaughtering civilians.

America's interest in Afghanistan has nothing to do with bin Laden (likely dead since December 2001), Al Qaeda, or the Taliban. It's all about "geopolitics and the geopolitical encirclement of both China and Russia" with Eurasia the grandest of grand prizes. To do it after the 2001 invasion, America built at least 19 military bases in Central East Asia and Middle Asia, including 14 in Afghanistan - for regional control and "air and space surveillance systems to monitor air traffic throughout all of Eurasia, from China to Russia."

America's obsession with militarism includes the homeland with an array of post-9/11 police state laws destroying constitutional checks and balances and Bill of Rights protections. Illegal spying on Americans is now widespread and commonplace, and the Pentagon, for starters, ordered 20,000 combat troops deployed inside the country by 2011. In addition, the Bush administration funded FEMA with hundreds of millions of dollars to retrofit former military bases and construct other facilities as detention camps.

Currently, over 800 are in every state, ready if ordered, with enough capacity for many tens of thousands of internees. They're not ordinary in any sense. They're concentration camps for dissidents or others targeted by order of the president or others he directs. In addition, National Guard forces will be employed, and local police have been militarized to work cooperatively with the Pentagon to achieve police state enforcement on the pretext of "respond(ing) to a nuclear terrorist attack or other domestic catastrophe."

It's why this writer calls the country Police State America, and unless addressed will get more hardline until fast disappearing civil liberties no longer exist and the nation is isn't safe or fit to live in. That's where we're heading without a hint from Big Media.

Equally alarming is an Obama administration proposal calling for a National Civilian Security Force that will be "at least as powerful and well-funded as the US military."
Early in the new administration, it's clear that continuity, not change, is planned with "full spectrum dominance" the goal, globally, including hardline in America. What's unclear is "the extent to which the most devastating economic crisis since the Great Depression would affect the ability of Washington policymakers to project that power."

Going forward, today's choices "could spell the end of the American Century from the rot of its own internal policy since the Vietnam War." The nation's militarism threatens its own survival "as a functioning democracy" and the planet.

In his writings, Chalmers Johnson explains that America is plagued by the same dynamic that doomed past empires unwilling to change - "isolation, overstretch, the uniting of local and global forces opposed to imperialism, and in the end bankruptcy" along with authoritarian rule and loss of personal freedom. Nixon's chief economic advisor, Herb Stein, explained it saying: "Things that can't go on forever, won't."

Stephen Lendman is a Research Associate of the Centre for Research on Globalization. He lives in Chicago and can be reached at lendmanstephen@sbcglobal.net.

Also visit his blog site at sjlendman/blogspot.com and listen to The Global Research News Hour on RepublicBroadcasting.org Monday - Friday at 10AM US Central time for cutting-edge discussions with distinguished guests on world and national issues. All programs are archived for easy listening.

http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=14334

"Breaking the Silence:" Testimonies of Israeli Soldiers

"Breaking the Silence:" Testimonies of Israeli Soldiers - by Stephen Lendman

"Breaking the Silence is an organization of veteran Israeli soldiers that collects anonymous testimonies of soldiers who served in the Occupied Territories during the Second Intifada." They recount experiences that deeply affected them, including abusing Palestinians, looting, destroying property, and other practices "excused as military necessities, or explained as extreme and unique cases."

They believe otherwise in describing "the depth of corruption which is spreading in the Israeli military" to which Israeli society and most Western observers turn a blind eye. "Breaking the Silence" was established to force an uncomfortable reality into the open to "demand accountability regarding Israel's military actions in the Occupied Territories perpetrated by us in our name."

Its new booklet features 54 damning testimonies from 30 Israeli soldiers on their experiences in Operation Cast Lead. They recount what official media and government sources suppressed with comments like:

"You feel like an infantile little kid with a magnifying glass looking at ants, burning them."

Another referred to "not much said about the issue of innocent civilians." Anyone and anything were fair game, and laws of war went out the window.

They explained wanton destruction, crops uprooted, human slaughter, women and children killed in cold blood, illegal weapons used, free-fire orders to shoot to kill anywhere at anything that moved, and using civilians as human shields.

Israeli commanders refuted their accounts as groundless, but B'Tselem reported that the military "refused to open serious, impartial investigations," even when provided with detailed information, including victims' names, exact dates, and precise locations of incidents.

On its own, B'Tselem collected testimonies from Gaza residents in which 70 Palestinian civilians were killed, over half of them children. Israeli military sources were unresponsive, except to acknowledge receipt of some information, nothing more or that a serious investigation would be conducted. It never was.

Anonymous Testimonies to Protect Soldiers from Recriminations - First From Earlier Operations

A Nachal unit first sergeant recounted Israeli tanks entering a West Bank village and crushing a car beneath the treads. "Yes, I saw it from the APC we were in. I peeped out. Suddenly we heard a car being crushed....I can't understand why a tank should run over a car when the road's open." It wasn't an isolated incident. It happens often, wanton destruction for its own sake.

He also said that "When we got back from that operation, we had loot so to speak. There were IDs confiscated, uniforms, Kalachnikovs. For army intelligence."

A Nachal elite unit first sergeant said missions were explicitly intended to harass people. Homes were entered, arrests made. "At various points while closing in on a house there are varying open-fire instructions. When the whole house is surrounded, crews placed all around it, the guy who runs out of the house is considered an 'escaper' and must be stopped. If he exits running in a suspect manner (he) must be shot (and) kill(ed). Shot to be stopped: in other words, shoot to kill."

When entering villages, armed Palestinian policemen "at certain points in time....were considered enemy troops (so) we had to shoot to kill if we saw any." Orders were to shoot when in doubt. In describing the atmosphere and command orders, they were "Kill, kill, kill, kill. We want to see bodies."

He explained his anti-terrorism training saying: "Terrorist in sight, that's what it's called, when you run into them. It's some sort of code. It used to be 'hostages.' So you reach the terrorist, you confirm the kill. You don't confirm the kill, you confirm the guy has been 'neutralized,' no chance of his getting back to you because he's been shot in the head. That's confirming he's neutralized."

A 401 Armor unit staff sergeant described the freedom he had to fire a lot - "automatic fire, directed at the whole city, at houses and at doors, was something that everybody did, not just me. I do not know why I did it. I (had) a gun. I did not think. In the army I never thought. I did what I was told to do. And besides, everybody did it. That was the custom - officers and such, everybody knew."

A Battalion 55 Artillery corp first sergeant said when his unit "return(ed) from operations we would throw stun and smoke grenades into the bakeries that opened between 4:00 and 5:00 am because people in the village threw stones....Once I fired over 1500 rounds from a machine gun at the houses in the city." Nobody cared, it was just at Palestinians.

An Armoured Corps first sergeant recounted earlier Gaza and West Bank operations for the "main purpose (of) either demolish(ing) terrorists' houses or places where they manufacture mortars, and other such stuff, or...You would come in and ruin everything you see." At times, "open-fire orders (were to kill) every person you see on the street....kill him....shoot to kill. Don't mind whether he has or has no gun on him."

Operation Cast Lead Testimonies

One soldier said:

"....In training you learn that white phosphorus is not used, and you're taught that it's not humane. You watch films and see what it does to people who are hit, and you say, 'There, we're doing it too.' That's not what I expected to see. Until that moment I had thought that I belonged to the most humane army in the world."

Other testimonies describe white phosphorous used in densely populated neighborhoods, wanton killing and destruction "unrelated to any direct threat to Israeli forces, and permissive rules of engagement that led to the killing of innocents."

More comments reflected the "moral deterioration" of the army and Israeli society, even affecting the rabbinate that blessed mass slaughter and destruction prior to engagements.

Soldier testimonies bear witness to disturbing Israeli values "on a systemic level." Operation Cast Lead's rein of terror was "a direct result of IDF policy, and especially (its) rules of engagement (that sanction) shoot (first) and (don't) ask questions."

Breaking the Silence participants offered their testimonies as "an urgent call to Israeli society and its leaders to sober up and investigate anew the results of our actions....(a disturbing) slide together down the moral slippery slope" that affects them and all Jews globally.

Testimony 1 - Human Shield

People are called "Johnnie. They're Palestinian civilians" in Gaza neighborhoods. In checking out houses, "we send the neighbor in, the 'Johnnie,' and if there are armed men inside, we (use) 'pressure cooker' procedures....to get them out alive....to catch the armed men." When necessary, combat helicopters are called in to fire anti-tank missiles at civilian homes. Then send a "Johnnie" in to check for dead and wounded.

In one home, two were dead and another alive, so supersized Caterpillar D-9 bulldozers start "demolishing the house over him until the neighbor went in" and got him out.

Human shields were also used to check for booby-traps and perform other services. "Sometimes the force would enter while placing rifle barrels on a civilian's shoulder, advancing into the house and using him as a human shield. Commanders said these were the instructions and we had to do it."

Testimony 2 - House Demolitions

Residential buildings at strategic points were taken over by force. Neighborhoods were described with "lots of destroyed houses....ruins....more and more ruins, and even the houses still standing, most of them kept getting shelled...." Other houses were blasted....blown "up in the air" with explosives.

"Operational necessity" sometimes meant a whole neighborhood was destroyed so as "not to jeopardize Israeli soldiers (and with) the day after" in mind, meaning to disrupt Gaza life to the maximum and leave it that way after forces pulled out.

Testimony 3 - Rules of Engagement

Descriptions included "enter(ing) a yard and out of sheer fear the family was waiting in an exposed spot - a father, grandfather, young mother and babies. As we were coming in, the commander was firing a volley, and mistakenly killed an innocent. We got to the house....he goes in with live fire....the family was hiding from the bombings....he happened to kill an elderly guy....it really seems insane....if I look at it from the (other) side, there are people who deserve to go to jail."

Testimony 4 - Rules of Engagement & Home Occupation

Tactics taught are "dry" and "wet" entries. In Gaza, there was "no such thing as a dry entry. All entries were wet," meaning free-firing with missiles, tank shells, machine guns, grenades, everything. On the ground, wet entry orders were to "shoot as we enter a (house or) room (so) no one there could fire at us."

Testimony 5 - Atmosphere

What "bothered me? Many things....all that destruction. All that fire at innocents. This shock of realizing with whom I'm in this together....the hatred, and the joy of killing....I killed a terrorist....blew his head off....There's nothing to hold you back." They're just Arabs.

Testimony 6 - Bombardment

The new 120mm Mortar was used in Gaza with "95 - 100%" accuracy. When it hits, it scatters shrapnel all around. It was used against neighborhoods. Innocents were hit, and "our artillery fire there was insane...."

"Most of the time firing was for softening resistance I think....We simply received orders. If we hit terrorists, then I guess that was the purpose."

Testimony 7 - Rules of Engagement

The commander stressed using "fire power" from the air and on the ground. "You see something and you're not quite sure? You shoot....Fire power was insane. We went in and the booms were just mad. The minute we got to our starting line, we simply began to fire at suspect places....a house, a window....In urban warfare, anyone is your enemy. No innocents." Houses were taken over with soldiers positioned inside "according to plan."

Testimony 8 - Rules of Engagement & Use of White Phosphorous

Some of the younger soldiers "think it's cool to wield such power with no one wanting to rein them in. They (were given) permission to open fire" even at most people who "definitely (are) not terrorists." Free fire used all weapons against "everything (including) houses," whether or not they looked suspect. "I know (that some) crews....even fired white phosphorous. Our battalion mortars (and tanks) were also using phosphorous."

Sometimes an order was given: "Permitted, phosphorous in the air." At times, it was used "because it's fun. Cool. I don't understand what it's used for."

Testimony 9 - Rules of Engagement & House Demolitions

"From the onset....the brigade commander and other officers made it very clear to us that any movement must entail gunfire" with or without being shot at. Alerts were given about a suicide bomber or sniper in the area, but "none of (these) materialized as far as our company was concerned."

"Houses were demolished everywhere." They were fired at "with tremendous power. We didn't see a single house that remained intact....The entire infrastructure, tracks, fields, roads (were) in total ruin." D-9 bulldozers demolished everything "in our designated area. It looked awful, like in those World War II films where nothing remained. A totally destroyed city."

Testimony 10 - Briefings

Formal briefings covered "going off to war (and in war) no consideration of civilians was to be taken. Shoot anyone you see....this pretty much disgusted me. There was a clear feeling, and this was repeated whenever others spoke to us, that no humanitarian consideration played any role in the army at present."

Language used in one briefing was something like: "Don't let morality become an issue. That will come up later. Leave the nightmares and horrors that will come up for later, now just shoot."

Testimony 11 - Use of White Phosphorous & Rules of Engagement

"We walked (with another battalion) and saw all the white phosphorous bombs....we saw glazing on the sand (resulting) from white phosphorous (use), and it was upsetting." Houses were targeted and many around them were destroyed with people inside them.

Testimony 12 - Rules of Engagement

Moving into an area, orders were to "hold the junction, control it." Vehicle movement wasn't allowed and those advancing were fired on. Whole areas were abandoned. In entering houses, strict procedure is followed, including "setting red lines. It means that whoever crosses this line is shot, no questions asked." Orders always were shoot to kill, including women and children.

Testimonies 13 and 14 - Rules of Engagement

Houses were entered with gunfire and taken over. Some civilians were killed. Anyone out at night was called a terrorist even if it was clear he had no weapons.

Testimonies 15 and 16 - Rabbinate Unit

Promoting "Jewish Awareness," rabbis talked with soldiers and gave out materials, the Book of Psalms and some brochures. War got a religious tone against "four enemies:" Hamas, Iran, the Palestinian Authority even though it doesn't control Gaza, and Arab citizens of Israel. Rabbinate briefings said "they (all) undermine us."

Also that Israel was fighting a "war of choice, (a) holy war (with) differing rules." The message "aimed at inspiring the men with courage, cruelty, aggressiveness (and feeling) no pity, God protects you, everything you do is sanctified....Palestinians are the enemy....everyone."

Soldiers were told to be "crusaders," to have a "proper fighting spirit," and show no mercy. Distributed pamphlets said: "Palestinians are like the Philistines of old, newcomers who do not belong in the land, aliens planted on our soil which should clearly return to us."

One man introduced as Rabbi Chen presented his talk in points, also covered in pamphlets. First was "the sanctity of the People of Israel. He put it this way: he said while going in there, we should know there is no accounting for sins in this case." In other words, "whatever we do is fine."

Another point referred to the "sons of light" waging war against the "sons of darkness" to turn the IDF into a messianic force in a battle of good versus evil.

Testimony 17 - House Demolitions & Rules of Engagement

"Pressure cooker" tactics were used. D-9 bulldozers "worked nonstop to raze orchards and take down houses suspected of containing tunnels" or stopping sniper fire. "The feeling is it's all sand dunes, all the streets were destroyed and there were shell pits from the bombings before the ground offensive." After a week, "our officer decided he'd hold a grenade-launching practice....So we went into a house next door, took an inner room, and each person came along and threw a grenade inside. The house was totally devastated."

Testimony 18 - Briefings & Rules of Engagement

Before the operation began, the battalion commander "said we were going to exercise insane fire power with artillery and air force....There were no clear red lines. In urban areas it's very much at the commanders' own discretion....we were told to enter every house (using) live fire....a grenade or two, shooting, and only then we enter."

Testimony 19 - Bombardment

It was designed "to gain control of the area....The whole cover thing starts, massive fire, auxiliary fire, and then my company goes it....In the first phase, we open fire in every zone." Every house in a designated area is entered....At the end of the day the platoons are set up in the houses. Each house becomes a small army outpost with positions...." Then other houses are occupied and searched. Families inside were assembled in one room, then told to leave and walk into the city. In some houses, the men were gathered together and shackled.

Testimony 20 - Rules of Engagement

"Our objective was to split the Gaza Strip, fragment it," take total control.

Testimony 21 - Briefings & Rules of Engagement

The commander said don't "feel bad about destruction because it is all done for the safety of our own soldiers." If someone is suspect, "we should not give him the benefit of the doubt. Eventually this could be an enemy, even if it's some old woman approaching the house. It could be an old woman carrying an explosive charge."
We had constant reports about suspect women or pairs, stuff like that, but never ran into any.

"There are two phases: there's the primary phase of taking objectives....whatever is suspect is targeted for fire." Youngsters in the ranks "are out for action and most of them have pretty racist views....some of them say (they) don't want wars, but what can (they) do, this is how things are and we'll never have peace with the Arabs." Those with more moderate views are in the minority. For most soldiers, "there are two possibilities: either you're terribly scared or terribly gung-ho. Better gung-ho than frightened, for this way you can do a better job of it."

Testimony 22 - Bombardment

One home "was known as a Hamas activist's house. This automatically gets acted upon...the house was bombed while these guys were inside. A woman came out, holding a child, and escaped southward." Reports were that people inside were unarmed. "But that's not the point. The point is that four men standing outside the house conferring look suspect."

Testimony 23 - Rules of Engagement & Home Searches

"In routine work there are outposts, windows, observation posts and stairs....you go out, take the house, spend (enough time) inside, then go back to the same house or to another one....You're also told to wreck floor tiles to check for tunnels. Television sets, closets (everything). Many explosive charges were found, they also blew up, no one was hurt."

Before going in you shoot....we didn't really need to shoot after the tank had wrecked the house....Physically the houses were ruined." In some, drawings were made on walls, even with lipstick, and "the closets were all trashed. It sounded retarded....you go into a house and turn it all inside out."

Testimony 24 - Briefings & House Demolitions

Initial briefings by commanders never mentioned "the lives of civilians (or) showing consideration to civilians." Here it wasn't mentioned. "Just the brutality, go in there brutally....In case of any doubt, take down houses. You don't need confirmation for anything...."

D-9 operators "cannot show consideration. If he's ordered to demolish a house, he" does it...."houses and agricultural areas as well, orchards and hothouses." At the end of the operation, the commander said "We demolished 900 houses....a really huge number. We demolished a lot."

Testimony 25 - Briefings & Rules of Engagement

"The battalion commander said there would be lots and lots of terrorists and we should really watch out but don't worry, everyone will have taken plenty of people down (because) insane fire power (gives us an) advantage over them."

Testimony 26 - Briefings & Rules of Engagement

Before going in, "the battalion commander....defined the operation goals: 2000 dead terrorists, not just stopping the missiles launched at (Israeli) communities around the Gaza Strip. He claimed this would bring Hamas down to its knees....No one said 'kill innocents.' " But orders were for the army to kill everyone thought to be suspect.

"The issue of civilians became irrelevant as soon as you'd enter combat - the rules change. You shoot. It's war. In war no questions are asked."

Testimony 27 - House Demolitions

Suspect houses were targeted with white phosphorous shells "to serve as an igniter, simply make it all go up in flames," and in the process destroy weapons and tunnels.

Testimony 28 - Rules of Engagement

Neighborhoods were cleaned out, areas "where infantry had not yet entered." After going in, "terrorists" were identified and killed. "We kept working with snipers, infantry 'straw widows,' where they identify targets for you and you fire shells....You shoot even if (targets not) identified."

Testimony 29 - House Demolitions & Bombardment

In controlled areas, orders were "to raze as much as possible....Such razing is a euphemism for intentional, systematic destruction, enabling total visibility....so no one could hide anything from us" and operational objectives could be accomplished - destroying suspected booby-trapped houses and tunnels. Also leaving behind minimal infrastructure after the operation was concluded.

The destruction in Gaza "was on a totally different scale (than anything) I had previously known....the ground was....constantly shaking. I mean, there were blasts all the time. Explosions were heard all day long, the night was filled with flashes, an intensity we had never experienced before. Several D-9 bulldozers were operating around the clock, constantly busy....What is a suspect spot? It means you decided it was suspect and could take out all your rage at it."

Testimony 30 - House Demolitions & Bombardment

Most "mosques were demolished. (Our) brigade commander (said) we should not hesitate to target mosques. Nothing is immune, nothing and no area. He explicitly mentioned mosques....If you see sand bags, you shoot without the shadow of a doubt....You run into a curve in the road and know there's an angle from which you cannot monitor a certain area, first you shoot, see if anything happens, then you proceed....If you don't know what's in a building, you fire at it. Such were the general instructions...."

Testimony 31 - Rules of Engagement

"We weren't told outright to shoot anything we saw moving but that was the implication. I asked, 'What if I see a girl outside?' She has no business being outside. 'So what do I do?' Check if she's armed - then shoot her." For anyone engaged at short range, it's "understood from (our) briefing that it's better to shoot first and ask questions later."

Testimony 32 - Briefings

"There was less talk of values, more of professionalism, not a moral issue." The atmosphere placed little value on Palestinian lives. Jewish ones were another matter.

Testimony 33 - Rules of Engagement

"We fired rounds at houses in front of us (in) which we didn't see movement....But these were houses that we identified as looking out over us. We fired into windows, before the ceasefire....everyone started shooting. I heard this happened in other areas as well."

Testimony 34 - Rules of Engagement

Even though Israeli forces faced no resistance on entering Gaza, orders were that everyone is suspect. "There is no such thing as suspect arrest procedure. If I detect a (possible threatening) suspect - I shoot (to kill)."

Commander briefings stressed "aggressive action," protecting soldier lives, and having no regard for civilians. They're all suspects.

Testimony 35 - Vandalism

Soldiers "took out notebooks and text books and ripped them. One guy smashed cupboards for kicks, out of boredom....The deputy company commander's staff wrote 'Death to Arabs' on their walls." Lip service only was paid to looting. Don't ask, don't tell was how it was.

Testimony 36 - Rabbinate Unit

They gave pep talks and handed out booklets about "the importance of serving the People of Israel who have been persecuted all these years and (are) now back in (their) homeland and need to fight for it." The usual hot button issues were mentioned - the Holocaust, defending God, and the rights of Israeli Jews. Arab ones don't matter.

Testimony 37 - House Demolitions & Vandalism

Houses were entered with live gunfire, grenades, and other destructive force. Extensive damage was done. Soldiers inside did much more. They had no regard for "even the simplest most basic sanitary stuff like going to the toilet, basic hygiene. I mean you could see they had defecated anywhere and left the stuff lying around." No one cared.

Testimony 38 - Rules of Engagement & House Demolitions

"The amount of destruction was incredible....Not one stone left standing over another. You see plenty of fields, hothouses, orchards, everything devastated. Totally ruined. It's terrible. It's surreal....in my own company there were plenty of people who fired just for the hell of it, at houses, water tanks. They love targeting water tanks." D-9 operators also...."love to demolish, and when the commander sends them off, 'Go take down that house,' they're happy."

Testimony 39 - Vandalism

Doors inside houses were blasted open. Contents were smashed, television and computer screens. Things of value were looted. "The guys would simply break stuff. Some were out to destroy and trash the whole time. They drew a disgusting drawing on the wall. They threw out sofas. They took down (pictures) just to shatter (them)." They did what they wanted. Who'd stop them? The assumption was "everyone is a terrorist (so) it's legitimate to do just anything we please."

Testimony 40 - Bombardment

Targeted houses were bombed, destroying others nearby. Indiscriminate bombing was commonplace.

Testimony 41 - Bombardment

Helicopters and UAVs (unmanned aerial vehicles) were directed against suspect houses. "I'm not certain what is considered suspect and what proper rules of engagement are. We responded to anything that seemed suspect to us." In one area, all houses were fired on. "There was massive fire."

Testimony 42 - Home Demolitions & Use of White Phosphorous

Shells were fired at a house suspected of being booby-trapped. "Then some order arrived to ignite it. The way to do that was to actually fire phosphorous shells from above. (It) ignites the whole house."

Testimony 43 - Rules of Engagement

"One guy said he just couldn't finish this operation without killing someone. So he killed someone...." It was war.

Testimony 44 - Vandalism

Houses were cleared with live fire and people inside taken away. There was no control. Soldiers did what they wanted. At times, they "went crazy." They did "unnecessary damage to property, smashing stuff, looting. Commanders didn't care.

Testimony 45 - House Demolitions & Vandalism

More demolitions. Another neighborhood ruined. "Some of the houses had been demolished because they sheltered armed combatants, other(s) suspected of having tunnels underneath, yet others blocked our line of vision....they were taken down, whole orchards were razed."

Testimony 46 - Vandalism

"In primary searches for weapons, we go in and then suddenly a guy opens a cupboard, sees china and begins to throw it all on the floor (to) show it to the Arabs." Stuff was thrown out windows and walls written on also.

Testimony 47 - House Demolitions

"It was amazing." So many were destroyed that "At first you go in and see lots of houses. A week later, after the razing, you see the horizon further away, almost to the sea. They simply took down all the houses around so the terrorists would have nowhere else to hide." All around you see rubble.

Testimony 48 - Briefings

Briefing stressed "going in there and getting things back in order," that, of course, meant terrorizing Gazans into submission. "An army that does these things, that takes apart houses because there was sporadic shooting nearby, is an unprofessional army."

Testimony 49 - Bombardment

Soldiers were forbidden to go up on rooftops because helicopters, planes, and UAVs fired on persons detected there. "Whoever climbed to the roof was doomed."

Testimony 50 - Rules of Engagement

All Palestinians were suspects, so even ones waving white flags were shot. "The soldiers were made to understand that their lives (mattered), and that there was no way (they'd risk being killed) for the sake of leaving civilians the benefit of the doubt. We were allowed to fire in order to spare our lives." Orders were to shoot at everyone, "even an old woman - take them down."

Testimony 51 - Human Shields

Some soldiers were worried about moral issues like using people as human shields. "Personally I'm unhappy about it....I certainly don't intend to serve in the Occupied Territories any longer....I'm not feeling good....having been there and taken part in (operations making him) very uneasy....You always have another option."

Testimony 52 - House Demolitions

"....most of the destruction that went on....was not necessary....the battalion commander said that as far as we were concerned this was war."

Testimony 53 - Rules of Engagement

...."at a certain time soldiers (use) a machine gun, rifle and grenade launcher (to) take a house....and target it for a blast of deterrent fire. The idea is to sow confusion, keep shifting the direction of warfare."

Testimony 54 - Atmosphere

"Going in, the atmosphere was 'gung-ho' and the whole country was behind us. While inside, all of that disappeared....Listen, coming out of there I did not feel any heroic elation or sacrifice, just that it was sickening and unglamorous and boring and stupid. People suffered....human beings become nothing....It is impossible to conceive of such an extent of suffering as that which we inflicted on Gaza....that is what I take with me in particular, how people can be indifferent to suffering or see it as trivial."

Final Comments

Defense minister Ehud Barak claims Israel has "the most moral army in the world." The above testimonies say otherwise. They show:

-- deep moral degradation;

-- insensitivity to human lives and suffering;

-- clear evidence of indiscriminate slaughter and destruction for its own sake;

-- civilians targeted like combatants;

-- women and children treated no differently than men;

-- the elderly, the very young, it didn't matter;

-- being Palestinian makes them terrorists;

-- rules of engagement were "shoot first and ask questions later" if at all.

For over six decades, Israel defiled international law by committing the most egregious crimes of war and against humanity against Palestinian civilians and neighboring Arab states. The world community hardly blinks.

Stephen Lendman is a Research Associate of the Centre for Research on Globalization. He lives in Chicago and can be reached at lendmanstephen@sbcglobal.net.

Also visit his blog site at sjlendman.blogspot.com and listen to The Global Research News Hour on Republic Broadcasting.org Monday - Friday at 10AM US Central time for cutting-edge discussions with distinguished guests on world and national issues. All programs are archived for easy listening.

http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=14334

Z Street - The New Zionist Extremist Group

Z Street: The New Zionist Extremist Group - by Stephen Lendman

On July 6, co-founders Lori Lowenthal Marcus and Allyson Rowen Taylor announced: "Z Street is launched, Will end J Street Treason." More on that below.

Continuing they said: "welcome to Z street! No more appeasement, no more negotiating with terrorists, no more enabling cowards who fear offending more than they fear another Holocaust. Z STREET is for those who are willing not only to support - but to defend - Israel, the Jewish State."

Never mind that no nation threatens Israel nor has for decades. It's a regional superpower - nuclearized and defended by the world's fourth most powerful military, armed with the latest state-of-the-art weapons and technology, and not reluctant to use them.

Its only adversaries are self-made and are needed to justify oppression, a culture of violence, an ethnocracy, exclusivity, privilege, and Jewish exceptionalism over others deemed inferior, legitimate enemies, and terrorists.

Zionism is corrosive, destructive, racist, extremist, undemocratic and hateful.

-- it claims Jewish supremacy, specialness and uniqueness as God's "chosen people;"

-- espouses violence, not peaceful coexistence;

-- confrontation over diplomacy;

-- strength through militarism, intimidation, and naked aggression;

-- is what Joel Kovel calls "a machine for the manufacture of human rights abuses" led by real terrorists posing as democrats;

-- what others say is repugnant, indefensible, destructive and malignant; and

-- what author Alan Hart calls "the real enemy of the Jews;"

-- an ideology contemptuous of Judaism's moral values and ethical principles;

-- the driving force behind a re-awakened anti-Semitism; and

-- a monster that's consuming its host and threatening humanity.

That's what Z Street supports.

Its Founders Have Disturbing Resumes

Based in Philadelphia, Lori Lowenthal Marcus writes about Israel and the Middle East for media outlets like the pro-Israeli American Thinker. She's also affiliated with the extremist Zionist Organization of America (ZOA).

From Los Angeles, Allyson Rowen Taylor is associate director of the 2001-founded Stand With Us, a pro-Israeli front group calling itself:

-- "an international education organization that ensures that Israel's side of the story is told in communities, campuses, libraries, the media and churches through brochures, speakers, conferences, missions to Israel, and thousands of pages of Internet resources."

In other words, it's a pro-Israeli mouthpiece promoting Zionist extremism at the expense of truth and an equitable resolution of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

Some of Taylor's Amazon book review comments give her away:

-- on (Fox News) Sean Hannity's "Let Freedom Ring: Winning the War of Liberty over Liberalism," she "wonder(s) if anyone other than those who respect and understand the issues of Jihad, Marxism and 'Facism' will read this book. But I recommend it....I love Sean."

-- on John Mearsheimer's "The Israel Lobby and US Foreign Policy," she rants about authors blaming everything on Jews. This "book should have been funded by Henry Ford, or the 'Thrid' Reich. Even Norman Finkelstein, a staunch hater of the Israeli State, found flaws in this sad excuse for a book....Give me a break, 'Anti Semites' are just 'anti Semites,' " and

-- on Jimmy Carter's "Palestine: Peace Not Apartheid," she calls the book "a mess....This is a work of a man who 'clarly' is in cahoots with the radical Islamofacists..it should be filed in the 'fiction' section of the library."

Taylor is also CEO and president of the August 2008-founded People Against Hate Speech, another pro-Israeli front group affiliated with the Simon Wiesenthal Center, notoriously pro-Zionist with over 300,000 global members and support from prominent figures like George W. Bush, Barack Obama, Senator Charles Schumer and Hillary Rodham Clinton.

Z Street's Charter

"Z STREET is an organization of Zionists who join together at this time of great danger to the Jewish State of Israel and, increasingly, to world Jewry.

Fact check: Israel creates its own enemies through extremism, lawlessness, wars of choice, and decades of contempt for Palestinians, other Arabs and Islam.

"I. Z STREET proudly asserts the right of the Jewish people to a state."

Fact check: Israel denies one to Palestinians, occupies their land, and expropriates it for its own use in violation of international law.

"II. Z STREET proudly reclaims the words 'Zionist' and 'Jewish State' as ones to wear with pride, in direct opposition to their recent branding as shameful or impolite terms."

Fact check: Zionism's extremist, destructive ideology is explained above.

"III. Z STREET maintains that Jews have the right to live anywhere in the world, including, and especially, within greater Israel."

Fact check: Palestinians are denied all rights, including to live securely on their own land in their own country in peace.

"IV. Z STREET is dedicated to maintaining and strengthening the Jewish State of Israel in the firm belief that there can be no compromises or agreements with, and no concessions to, any Terrorist Entity or any individual Terrorists."

Fact check: For over six decades, Israel has committed slow-motion genocide against indigenous Palestinians who want peace, not conflict; are willing to recognize the Jewish state in return for their own; and who deserve equal rights to Jews and all others, but are denied them by an oppressive occupier.

"V. Z STREET is dedicated to rejecting and refuting the condemnation of any actions taken by Israel which are not similarly condemned when taken by any other individuals or political entities."

Fact check: Israel acts lawlessly, chooses violence over peace, and calls legitimate self-defense "terrorism."

"VI. Z STREET is dedicated to constantly and consistently declaring and affirming the facts which fully support the legal, moral and historical right of the Jewish State to exist in peace and security without physical or verbal assault against its sovereignty or legitimacy. This necessarily entails adamantly opposing the dismantling of and/or handing over territory to any other entity or entities."

Fact check: Israel demands special rights as "God's chosen people" but denies any to indigenous Palestinians. In addition, its settlements and human rights abuses violate international law.

"VII. Z STREET is dedicated to constantly and consistently declaring and affirming the facts that reveal the fallacious narratives of Terrorist Entities, Terrorists, and their supporters undermining the legal, moral and historical right of the Jewish State to exist in peace and security without physical or verbal assault against its sovereignty or legitimacy."

Fact check: The "narratives" are true, and so-called "Terrorists" are, in fact, peace-loving people who by law may defend themselves when attacked.

"VIII. Z STREET insists that terrorists or other threats against Israel be unequivocally condemned, and that those members of the world community failing to actively condemn those threats also be branded as active or passive supporters of a second genocide against the Jewish people."

Fact check: Israel is the region's real terrorist threat.

"IX. Z STREET declares that Israel's respect for women's, religious and other minorities' rights, provides a welcome beacon - particularly in the Middle East - to be acknowledged and respected by all people of good will."

Fact check: Israel promotes Zionist extremism, demeans Arabs and Islam, and calls Muslims "Islamofascists."

"X. Z STREET recognizes the existence of 22 officially Muslim countries and 19 Christian countries, whose status the world does not challenge, while only Israel, the Jewish State, is demonized for asserting its legitimate right to be a religion-affiliated State, and which religion, Judaism, is the world's oldest monotheistic faith."

Fact check: Israel denies equal rights to its non-Jewish citizens, a practice found nowhere else in the civilized world.

"XI. Z STREET recognizes the value of other Zionist organizations whose activities include lobbying, producing publications, the sponsorship of scholars and scholarship centers, honoring generous donors and/or other important programs. Z STREET is not intended to supercede those other Zionist organizations. Z STREET is intended to serve as an alternative to many mainstream and other Jewish organizations that, to meet donors' requirements or for ideological reasons, cannot affirm the principles set out in the Z STREET Charter."

Fact check: All Zionist organizations are extremist, hateful, and preach Jewish supremacy over Islam and Muslims.

"XII. Z STREET has no need to, and will not negotiate with, nor seek to gain the approval from, any government, Israeli or Diaspora organization, or individuals supporting the diminution or weakening of Israel either because of ideological conviction, animosity towards a strong, Jewish State, cowardice, or the misguided belief that compromise with Terrorist Entities can lead to peace in the Middle East or global peace."

Fact check: Like Israel, Z Street is uncompromisingly hard line, extremist, militant and racist.

"XIII. Z STREET will serve as an educational force that will FIGHT WITH FACTS. Z STREET undergirds its positions with facts and provides that essential ingredient to exponentially increasing its membership ranks."

Fact check: Z Street distorts facts to fit its ideology and attract new extremist members.

"XIV. Z STREET is a new, entirely volunteer organization for those who affirm the foregoing and dedicate themselves to upholding and ensuring respect for these principles. Its primary purpose of which is to provide a proud banner for Zionists behind which to rally."

Fact check: Z Street supports Zionist extremism, militancy and racism. It demeans other views and affirms that "Israel is the homeland of the Jewish people," no others, "and must remain a Jewish state." It challenges critics as neo-Nazis and calls persons, groups, or entities defending themselves against Israeli aggression "terrorists." It champions Jewish exceptionalism and demeans Arabs as inferior Islamofascists.

It believes Jews have colonization rights to dispossess indigenous Arabs for a "greater Israel" in all Judea, Samaria, the Golan, Jerusalem and Gaza.

Z Street's Opposition to J Street

Z Street was founded to counter more moderate Jewish organizations like Americans for Peace Now and J Street, a US-based Israeli advocacy group. Founded (in April 2008) by its Executive Director Jeremy Ben-Ami, it calls itself "The new address for Middle East peace and security (as) the political arm of the pro-Israel, pro-peace movement" and says:

"(It) was founded to promote meaningful American leadership to end the Arab-Israeli and Israeli-Palestinian conflicts peacefully and diplomatically. (It) support(s) a new direction for American policy in the Middle East and a broad public and policy debate about the US role in the region."

It represents Jews and non-Jews "who support Israel and its desire for security as the Jewish homeland, as well as the right of the Palestinians to a sovereign state of their own - two states living side-by-side in peace and security....based on the 1967 borders with agreed reciprocal land swaps (and) resolution of the refugee issue within the new Palestinian state and in current host countries."

It supports "a new regional approach to cooperation and security;" diplomatic solutions over military ones; multilateral conflict resolution, including with Iran; an equitable Israeli-Syrian peace agreement; dialogue instead of confrontation; and for America to provide leadership to achieve it.

It "oppose(s) alliances with the religious right or any radical religious ideologues in the name of supporting Israel as well as efforts to demean and fan fears of Islam or of Muslims." It omits Zionism or Zionist goals in its Statement of Principles, Issues, Policy, and Actions.

Executive Director Ben-Ami held a number of senior positions as Bill Clinton's Deputy Domestic Policy Advisor and Howard Dean's presidential campaign Policy Director. He's also been a senior vice president at Fenton Communications and was communications director for the pro-Israeli New Israel Fund. His father was born in Israel, and much of his family still lives there.

On October 27, Z Street supporters plan a pro-Israeli White House rally at the same time J Street holds its first annual meeting in Washington - the organization it accuses of "Treason."

Co-founder Marcus said, "the presence of Z Street will ensure that the true Zionist voice will be heard: that we will not stand by quietly as apartheid is imposed on Jews in the Israeli territories, and we will not stand by quietly as the Iranians continue racing madly towards obtaining weapons to wipe whole peoples off the globe while politicians send polite letters and invitations to parties."

Co-founder Taylor added: "This grass roots effort will compete for media attention with the slick packaging of several well-funded anti-Zionist organizations (specifically J Street), and unless those of us who are committed to maintaining a strong, unified Jewish State of Israel stand up and speak out together, the weak will continue to appear strong and the strong will continue to appear weak."

In October on Washington streets, Z Street's extremism will be vocal in full public view against J Street's message of peaceful resolution and equity for all sides of the Middle East conflict.

Stephen Lendman is a Research Associate of the Centre for Research on Globalization. He lives in Chicago and can be reached at lendmanstephen@sbcglobal.net.

Also visit his blog site at sjlendman.blogspot.com and listen to The Global Research News Hour on RepublicBroadcasting.org Monday - Friday at 10AM US Central time featuring cutting-edge discussions with distinguished guests on world and national issues. All programs are archived for easy listening.

http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=14334

Obamacare - A Health Care Rationing Scheme to Enrich Insurers, Drug Companies and Large Hospital Chains

Obamacare: A Health Care Rationing Scheme to Enrich Insurers, Drug Companies and Large Hospital Chains - by Stephen Lendman

On February 24, Barack Obama told a joint session of Congress that "we must....address the crushing cost of health care....caus(ing) a bankruptcy in America every thirty seconds. By the end of the year, it could cause 1.5 million Americans to lose their homes. In (each of) the last eight years....one million....Americans have lost their health insurance....Given these facts, we can no longer afford to put health care reform on hold....health care reform cannot wait, it must not wait, and it will not wait another year."

Behind the facade of reform, Obama and leading Democrats ruled universal, single-payer coverage off the table before debate even began. Instead they've focused on taxing more, rationing care, placing profits above human need, disdaining vital change, shifting the cost burden to individuals and requiring everyone to be insured; imposing fines up to $1000 for non-compliance, and making a broken system even worse.

On June 10, Physicians for a National Health Program advisor Walter Tsou told the House Education and Labor Committee:

"Attempting to reconcile the dual imperatives of universal coverage and cost control through alternative methods besides single payer is an exercise in futility. When some congressional leaders declare that single payer is off the table, they are in effect saying that insurers will be protected, leaving the pain to patients, taxpayers and health care providers."

At the same hearing, the California Nurses Association and National Nurses Organizing Committee co-president Geri Jenkins said:

"The current system rations care based on an ability to pay. Right now we are the only nation on earth that barters human life for money."

The administration and lawmakers have been unresponsive in moving ahead with House and Senate legislation to enrich health insurers, Big Pharma, and large hospital chains. It will ration care, curb expensive treatments and surgeries for those who can't afford them, leave millions in the country uncovered, deny it altogether to undocumented immigrants even though they pay income, payroll and other taxes, and claim it's real reform like they always do.

On May 20, S. 1099: Patients' Choice Act was introduced "to provide comprehensive solutions for the health care system of the United States, and for other purposes." It was referred to the Senate Finance and Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committees (HELP) for consideration.

The Senate Finance Committee may craft its own version. On July 15 along party lines, HELP voted 13 - 10 to approve a $615 billion Democrat-sponsored bill that's substantially similar to House legislation with provisions that Obama wants.

On July 14, HR 3200: America's Affordable Health Choices Act of 2009 was introduced "To provide affordable, quality health care for all Americans and reduce the growth in health care spending, and for other purposes." It was referred to the following House committees for consideration: Energy and Commerce, Ways and Means, Education and Labor, Oversight and Government Reform, and Budget.

House and Senate bills stress cost-containing "evidence-based" solutions with Obama appearing on a June 24 ABC News "Questions for the President: Prescription for America" infomercial touting his plan to carefully selected reporters and others invited to the White House East Room for a scripted Q & A.

Cutting costs and free-market solutions were emphasized, not real reform stressing human need with Obama saying "If we don't drive down costs, then we're not going to be able to achieve all of those other things." Which ones he didn't say before stressing the need for "evidence-based care," meaning less is better for those unable to pay so that millions will be sacrificed on the alter of cost containment while enriching private insurers, Big Pharma, and large hospital chains that will flourish as community and public ones shut down for lack of enough resources.

Obama was callous in saying "Loading up on additional tests or additional drugs" must be curbed. "Maybe (some would be) better off not having....surgery, but taking (a) painkiller" instead. He showed disdain and indifference in stating that "the chronically ill and those toward the end of their lives are accounting for potentially 80% of the total health care bill out there" - the inference being ration their care and let 'em die to cut costs.

At the same time, he favored big insurers by saying that "One of the incentives for (them) to get involved in this process is that potentially they're going to have a whole bunch of new customers, paying customers....insurance companies will thrive" under this plan.

As for a "public option" to fill holes, Obama was receptive to alternatives but adamantly against universal single-payer coverage in saying: "For us to completely change our system, root and branch, would be hugely disruptive." Only market-based solutions will be considered along with huge cost-containment measures, mostly affecting millions of working Americans, the poor, elderly, and chronically ill.

Over the next decade, Medicare and Medicaid may lose over $600 billion in funding with recipients, of course, making up the difference or foregoing care. About $317 billion is proposed for "efficiencies" with another $313 billion in cuts for hospitals that treat the poor and uninsured. Many of them are already severely strapped as unemployment soars, charitable donations are down, expenses rise, vital services and staffs have to be cut to stay afloat, and growing numbers won't make it as economic conditions worsen.

Instead of helping to fill budget gaps, Obama plans less aid to shut them down. It will leave some areas dependent on more distant ones for treatment, and let large chains consolidate for greater dominance. Accessible quality care will be less available and affordable so, of course, patients will lose out - mostly the elderly, chronically ill, those on society's lower rungs, and all working Americans because an uncaring administration and Congress threw them overboard for profit and "efficiencies."

If "Obamacare" passes, most working people, the disadvantaged, and those singled out as less important will experience large rollbacks in quality, readily accessible coverage. For them, future health problems will be more hazardous than ever because a callous nation doesn't care.

On July 17 as expected, two of three key House committees passed HR 3200. Largely along party lines, Ways and Means voted 23 - 18. Education and Labor approved 26 - 22 with a Kucinich amendment that may not survive a floor vote or make it to the Senate.

It leaves HR 3200 intact but lets states create single-payer plans. Eight are now considering them - California, Colorado, Illinois, Maine, Pennsylvania, Minnesota, Missouri, and Washington with perhaps more to follow.

On June 11 in Pennsylvania, HealthCare4ALLPA organized over 400 people for a state capital rally, and its Executive Director Chuck Pennachio predicts pending legislation passage later in the year because bipartisan support backs it. So do most Pennsylvanians, and Governor Ed Rendell said he'll sign what comes to his desk.

Kucinich hailed its importance in saying:

"There are many models of health care reform from which to choose around the world - the vast majority of which perform far better than ours. The one that has been the most tested here and abroad is single-payer. Under (it) everyone in the US would get a card that would allow access to any doctor at virtually any hospital. Doctors and hospitals would continue to be privately run, but the insurance payments would be in public hands. By getting rid of the for-profit insurance companies, we can save $400 billion per year and provide coverage for all medically necessary services for everyone in the US."

Tens of billions more annually could be saved if the government negotiated drug prices like it does for the Veterans Administration and Medicaid. The Congressional Budget Office estimated it would be $110 billion over 10 years for Medicare recipients alone, comprising about 15% of Americans. For the entire population, it would be much greater even though over-aged 65 people use more prescription drugs than any other age group.

A Fly in Obamacare's Ointment

One emerged on July 16 when Congressional Budget Office (CBO) Director Douglas Elmendorf told the Senate Budget Committee that health care bills under consideration will raise, not cut costs. "We do not see the sort of fundamental changes that would be necessary to reduce the trajectory of federal health spending. On the contrary, the legislation significantly expands the federal responsibility for health care costs" even though much of it is shifted to individuals.

Reversing its earlier opposition, the influential American Medical Association (AMA) endorsed the House bill after a new payments provision was added to halt scheduled 2010 cuts to doctors under Medicare.

AMA's president, Dr. James Rohack, said:

"We pledge to work with the House committees and leadership to build support for passage of health reform legislation to expand access to high quality affordable health care for all Americans." The AMA calls it "an important step, but one of many steps in the process," including income-increasing measures for their members and "individual responsibility for health insurance, including premium assistance for those who need it."

Opposing Obamacare are advocates for universal single-payer coverage like Physicians for a National Health Program (PNHP). On July 16, it said the House health reform bill is a "proven failure" and called for an amendment to overturn it and implement a Medicare-for-all system.

PNHP's Dr. Quentin Young said similar state efforts repeatedly foundered. Citing Massachusetts' experience, he explained that "The state is dumping 30,000 legal residents off insurance, and the largest safety-net hospital is suing the state for decimating the hospital's budget to shore up reform. Meanwhile 1 in 6 (state) residents (can't) pay their medical bills, and 18% (of them) with insurance skipped care last year because they couldn't afford it. The Massachusetts model is no solution." Neither are House and Senate bills that will make a broken system worse. It will backtrack from real reform and make it harder than ever to implement. The time to do it right is now.

That's what Single Payer Action believes - "1,000,000 Strong for Single Payer, everybody in, nobody out." They're activists for "Medicare for all in our lifetimes." They're "sick that 22,000 Americans die every year from lack of health insurance; (that) health insurance companies (jack) up premiums while their....CEO's make out like bandits." They deplore pre-existing condition exclusions, "high deductibles, co-pays, and in-network, out-of-network Rube Goldberg" shenanigans in today's system. They'll keep confronting government and corporate officials until single-payer is the law of the land and America treats health care coverage like all other Western nations.

Democrats on Damage Control

After CBO Director Elmendorf's cost alert, Rep. Mike Ross (D. Ark.) said "There's no way they can pass this bill (as is) on the House floor. Not even close." Other House and Senate Democrats also expressed unease. Damage control followed.

Speaker Pelosi said a bill is on track for a floor vote before the House and Senate August 10 through Labor Day weekend recess. "We're in excellent shape," she told reporters in response to questions about growing breaks in the ranks.

Obama was just as positive in saying "Those who are betting against this happening this year are badly mistaken." In a lengthy prepared statement, he cited "unprecedented progress" so far "that will finally lower costs, guarantee coverage, and provide more choice....Let me repeat: Health insurance reform cannot add to our deficit over the next decade and I mean it....eventually this is going to happen."

Perhaps so with New York Times backing. A March 7 editorial said "President Obama has shown both courage and sound judgment pressing for quick action on comprehensive health care reform, even in the midst of the country's deep economic crisis. He has rightly stressed the urgency of reining in skyrocketing health care costs that are straining the budgets of families, businesses, and federal and state governments." Unmentioned was that insurance and drug company profiteers cause the problem or that universal single-payer coverage is the obvious, fairest, and only solution.

In a July 6 editorial, The Times referred to the "bloated, inefficient health care system," but stressed cost control on the backs of recipients, not providers, and perhaps raising taxes.

"The first task is to find savings. Some respected analysts suggest that as much as 30 percent of all health care spending in this country - some $700 billion a year - may be wasted on tests and treatments that do not improve the health of the recipients."

Unconsidered was the right of doctors and patients to assess problems and choose treatments, not elected officials, bureaucrats, unnamed analysts, or Times editorial writers. Yet the paper stressed the importance of "reallocating hundreds of billions of dollars from projected spending on Medicare and Medicaid (and) impos(ing) additional cuts after a few years if savings are less than projected." Again, The Times and other media sources stress market-based solutions and are mindless to the harm that Obama's plan will cause.

Possible Intrusive Provisions in Obamacare

On July 16, CNSNews.com's Editor-in-Chief Terence Jeffrey covered another concern that needs watching. He cited the "official summary" of the approved Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee's version of S. 1099 that:

"Authorizes a demonstration program to improve immunization coverage. Under this program, CDC will provide grants to states to improve immunization coverage of children, adolescents, and adults through the use of evidence-based interventions." The word "interventions" causes concern. "States may use funds to implement interventions that are recommended (or perhaps mandated) by the Community Preventive Services Task Force, such as reminders or recalls for patients or providers, or home visits." Including "home visits" suggests that perhaps immunization teams will intervene at personal residences to assure everyone is vaccinated if federal mandates order it.

S. 1099's Title III is also worrisome: "Improving the Health of the American People." Under Subtitle C: "Creating Healthier Communities," the Health and Human Services (HHS) secretary may "establish a demonstration program to award grants to states to improve the provision of recommended immunizations for children, adolescents, and adults through the use of evidence-based, population-based interventions for high-risk populations."

Under one of Title III's provisions, grant money may be used for home visit immunization "interventions." Specifically:

"Funds received under a grant under this subsection (Title III, Method E) shall be used to implement interventions that are recommended by the Task Force on Community Preventive Services (as established by the secretary, acting through the Director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention) or other evidence-based interventions, including:"

"(A) providing immunization reminders or recalls for target populations of clients, patients, and consumers; (B) educating target populations and health care providers concerning immunizations in combination with one or more other interventions; (C) reducing out-of-pocket costs for families for vaccines and their administration; (D) carrying out immunization-promoting strategies for participants or clients of public programs, including assessments of immunization status, referrals to health care providers, education, provision of on-site immunizations, or incentives for immunization; (E) providing for home visits that promote (or perhaps mandate) immunization through education, assessments of need, referrals, provision of immunizations, or other services; (F) providing reminders or recalls for immunization providers; (G) conducting assessments of, and providing feedback to, immunization providers; or (H) any combination of one or more interventions described in this paragraph."

All Vaccines Are Hazardous

In three recent articles, this writer cited scientific evidence of hidden dangers in all vaccines. They contain squalene-based adjuvants that cause a host of annoying to life-threatening autoimmune diseases and must be avoided, even if mandated. It's also known that vaccines don't protect against diseases they're designed to prevent and often cause them.

Currently at issue is concern over Swine Flu and WHO's June 11 declaration of a global pandemic even though no forensic evidence links any deaths to H1N1. Yet experimental, untested, toxic and extremely dangerous vaccines are being rushed to market for potentially mandated immunizations globally as the fall flu season approaches. If enacted in time, Obamacare may provide cover, and if not, other US laws empower the HHS and Defense secretaries to declare a national emergency and compel everyone in the country to be vaccinated, even though submitting risks serious health consequences.

Staying alert is essential as Obamacare's passage will shift more of the health care burden on those who can least afford it and prepare Americans for hazardous mandatory Swine Flu vaccinations in the fall. Grassroots opposition to both schemes is vital to the health and well-being of everyone.

Stephen Lendman is a Research Associate of the Centre for Research on Globalization. He lives in Chicago and can be reached at lendmanstephen@sbcglobal.net.

Also visit his blog site at sjlendman.blogspot.com and listen to The Global Research News Hour on RepublicBroadcasting.org Monday - Friday at 10AM US Central time for cutting-edge discussions with distinguished guests on world and national issues. All programs are archived for easy listening.

http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=14334

Dangerous, Untreated Wastewater in the West Bank

Dangerous Untreated West Bank Wastewater - by Stephen Lendman

B'Tselem is the Jerusalem-based independent Israeli Information Center for Human Rights in the Occupied Territories (OPT) with a well-deserved reputation for accuracy and integrity. It was founded in 1989 to "document and educate the Israeli public, policymakers (and concerned people everywhere) about human rights violations in the OPT, combat the phenomenon of denial prevalent among the Israeli public (and elsewhere, especially among Jews), and create a human rights culture in Israel" to convince government officials to respect human rights and comply with international law.

It conducts wide-ranging, carefully researched, and thoroughly cross-checked reports, most recently its June one titled, "Foul Play: Neglect of wastewater treatment in the West Bank." This article discusses its findings as further evidence of how Israel violates international humanitarian law as an occupying power. Because no global authority holds it accountable, over 2.8 million West Bank Palestinians suffer along with another 1.5 million under siege in Gaza for over two years and counting.

Introduction

Human activity produces wastewater for which treatment is essential "to prevent and reduce sanitation and environmental hazards" that otherwise would result - from dangerous viruses, bacteria, parasites, heavy metals, and other toxic substances that pollute water, farm crops, flora, and fauna, and reduce land fertility.

Israeli West Bank and Jerusalem settlements produce about 91 million cubic meters of wastewater annually, more than double the amount from Palestinian communities. Yet most of it goes untreated. As an occupying power, international humanitarian law requires it be done, yet Israel violates its obligations across the board making Palestinians suffer grievously as a result.

Wastewater from Settlements and Jerusalem

Israel's Civil Administration environmental protection staff officer, Benny Elbaz, told B'Tselem that (other than outpost wastewater) all of it from settlements gets "adequate" treatment, and raw effluent isn't allowed to flow freely.

However, an August 2008 study refutes his assertion. Jointly conducted by the Nature and Parks Authority Environment Unit, the Ministry of Environmental Protection's Water and Streams Department, and the Civil Administration, it showed that in 2007, only 81 of 121 West Bank settlements were connected to wastewater treatment facilities. Also, over half of treatment plants (38 of 74) are small facilities able to service only a few hundred families, way short of what's needed.

In addition, to operate properly, plants need "round-the-clock maintenance," but because the per-capita cost is high, "maintenance of most of the facilities is defective." They experience frequent problems, sometimes shut down entirely, and can't handle the volume channeled to them. As a result, "raw wastewater from settlements floods West Bank valleys," Israel's disclaimer notwithstanding.

In large settlements, built in the 1970s and 1980s, no wastewater is treated or facilities in place "have been neglected for decades." Among them are:

-- Kirat Arba, founded in 1972; its wastewater flows into the Hebron stream that runs into Israel;

-- Ofra, founded in 1975; its sewage flows into the Mountain Aquifer and pollutes groundwater; in 2008, Israel began constructing a settlement treatment plant, but it's being built on Palestinian land without Civil Administration approval;

-- Kfar Adumim, founded in 1979; instead of being treated, its wastewater is disposed of in cesspits cut into the ground for effluent disposal; from there, it pollutes land and groundwater; and

-- Bat Ayin, founded in 1989; it has a partial collection system, and residents dispose of their wastewater in cesspits.

Other settlements, like those below, experience frequent breakdowns that shut facilities for extended periods:

-- Ariel's treatment plant was defective for a decade, then shut down in 2008; thereafter wastewater flowed into the Shilo stream, a major Yarkon River tributary;

-- Elqana's treatment plant stopped operating; its wastewater flows into the Rava stream, another Yarkon tributary; renovation funding was allocated to make it operable by the end of 2009;

-- Qedumim's two treatment plants ceased functioning in 2007; its wastewater flows into the Abu Jamus stream; in March 2008, one plant resumed operations;

-- Beit Ariyeh's plant stopped functioning in 2008; its effluent flowed into the Shilo stream until renovations let it resume operations in January 2009;

-- Qedar, Ma'aleh Amos, Nokdim, Otni'el, Etz Ephraim, and Enav settlements dispose of their wastewater in septic tanks, "from which it seeps into the groundwater and pollutes it;" and

-- 25 Jordan Valley settlements' wastewater is only partially treated in sedimentation basins and oxidation ponds, an outdated method not used inside Israel.

Overall, Israeli and independent studies show that settlements' waterwater treatment inadequacies are long-standing and serious - confirmed by the Ministry of Environmental Protection saying that many settlements "do not have a proper solution to wastewater." According to Yael Mason, the Industrial Wastewater and Polluted Lands Department director, some settlement plants "do not meet requisite standards and pollute both the Mountain Aquifer and streams."

Conditions were as bad in 1998 when a Municipal Environmental Association of Judea survey found half the plants (where over 40,000 settlers lived), polluted the environment "to a great or moderate extent," and only 13 plants (for 16,000 people) performed "to a reasonable extent."

A 2002 Municipal Environmental Association of Samaria report (responsible for 100 settlements,) showed 14 left their wastewater untreated. Eleven others either didn't treat it or only partially did for 25 years until the Kana stream conduit was completed in 2006.

Other reports document the same neglect, citing defective maintenance, no electrical connection, raw sewage seepage into groundwater, "usually primitive" factory wastewater treatment, and pollution caused by "cow pens."

For over 40 years of occupation, "Israel has not built advanced regional wastewater treatment plants in the settlements to match those inside Israel" even though a 1983 master plan was formulated. After its cost was estimated to be $110 million, budgetary constraints stopped its implementation. The single recent facility addition began operating in 2006, servicing six settlements.

Under still in force Jordanian West Bank building and planning laws, provisions for treatment must be approved before proceeding. However, Israeli authorities ignore the requirement and allow building occupancies and industrial operations anyway. The Modi'in Illit settlement was approved even though raw sewage from 17,000 people flowed into the Modi'im stream, and construction was never completed for a Meitarim industrial area treatment plant.

Blurred authority between the Civil Administration and Ministry of Environmental Protection complicates the problem. The former ensures that building plans include treatment solutions, but enforcement power lies with the latter. From 2000 - September 2008, it was used only 53 times for not treating wastewater. Most were warnings. Only four indictments were filed. By comparison, in 2006 alone, 230 enforcement measures were taken inside Israel, mostly warnings on suspected Water Law violations. In Israel, building plans are stopped until proper hook-up to wastewater treatment is in place. "Across the Green Line," no similar action is taken.

Jerusalem's Wastewater Channeled East

Since the 1940s, untreated wastewater has been channeled from West and East Jerusalem to the Kidron Basin in the city's southeast. It flows into an open duct from where it moves over 30 kilometers into the Dead Sea.

A Horqaniya Valley diversion facility treats some of it for Jordan Valley settlements' irrigation, while the rest flows freely into the Mountain Aquifer, "an area sensitive to pollution." It creates dangerous sanitation and environmental hazards, including groundwater pollution. Yet it's used as livestock drinking water and for Palestinian farmland irrigation, "despite the (considerable) health risk."

Since the 1970s, remediation plans were proposed and rejected - according to Israel's Jerusalem Municipality because of a lack of Palestinian Authority (PA) cooperation, not gotten because giving it would grant legitimacy to the settlements.

More recently, Jerusalem's Ministry of Environmental Protection director warned Israeli officials about criminal responsibility for failure to address this growing problem. Only then were various treatment options suggested, including piping it from its origin through Abu Dis and Eizariya to the Og Reservoir facility to be expanded with added capacity. However, PA opposition over the "geopolitical situation" suspended the plan. Jerusalem's District Planning and Building Committee scheduled discussion of alternative options, but nothing so far has materialized.

Despite inadequate solutions, Jerusalem's population growth exacerbates the problem. For example, residents moved into the Pisgat Ze'ev settlement before a treatment facility was completed - in violation of by-law provisions that Jerusalem's District Planning and Building Committee chose to ignore, either there or in other settlements.

Wastewater from Palestinian Communities

Only 20% of Palestinian homes are connected to sewage systems. Yet they're outdated, often leak, can't handle the volume, and thus spill into cesspits along with effluent from the other 80% of Palestinians. As a result, groundwater gets seriously contaminated because 90 - 95% of Palestinian sewage isn't treated at all, and only one treatment plant for it is functioning.

Israeli neglect is the problem. In the early 1970s, it built four treatment facilities - in Jenin, Tulkarm, Hebron and Ramallah, but their effectiveness has been "minimal to poor" and three of them no longer function. The one Ramallah operating one is small with inadequate capacity to handle the city's wastewater. As a result, it's barely treated.

The 1995 Israeli-Palestinian Interim (West Bank and Gaza) Agreement stipulated that both sides cooperate on taking "all necessary measures" to prevent water pollution or contamination. An Israeli-Palestinian Joint Water committee (JWC) was established with unanimity required for all decisions. Yet no dispute resolution mechanism exists so Israel can unilaterally approve or reject all water and wastewater treatment requests and it does. As a result, new facilities haven't been built despite an urgent need for them.

Besides adequate funding, approval procedures are prolonged and complicated because of environmental and other considerations. In addition, Israel's approval is needed, and a large land area (away from residential neighborhoods) is required for an initial facility with plenty of room for expansion.

Years elapse with no resolution, so today the Palestinian Water Authority says Israel is currently delaying or obstructing 140 water and wastewater projects. For example:

-- in 1996, a Tulkarm plan was submitted; yet it took until 2006 before the JWC agreed on an Area C location - under Israeli control on matters relating to land, planning and building; in December 2008, the Civil Administration's International Organizations Desk chief recommended that "establishment of the facility in Area A (under Palestinian control) be examined, and that care be taken that it does not extend into Area C;" the project is now in jeopardy;

-- in 1997, the JWC received a West Nablus plan; the Civil Administration twice demanded a location change, and it took until May 2008 for construction permits to be issued, yet nothing so far has proceeded; another East Nablus proposal was cancelled because of delays in obtaining approval; and

-- in 1999, a West Ramallah proposal was submitted to the JWC; it was approved, but the Civil Administration demanded a location change because it was close to the Separation Wall's planned route; a final plan has yet to be introduced for approval.

From 1996 - 1999, Israel required Palestinian facilities to treat settlements' wastewater, way beyond their proposed capacity and something the PA won't do because it would grant legitimacy to the settlements in violation of international law.

Israel creates other obstacles as well. In 2002, the Civil Administration required a proposed Hebron plant to meet advanced treatment standards, not demanded for settlement facilities or in Israel until 2005 under a plan for gradual implementation through 2015 because of the cost involved.

Israeli policy exploits the situation to its advantage. It treats some Palestinian wastewater flowing into Israel but charges the PA for doing it. Also ignored is a proper Palestinian water treatment solution and the contamination that results.

Consequences of Neglecting Wastewater Treatment in the West Bank

Settlers rely on Israel's water supply system with no problems. Palestinians, however, suffer from pollution and a shortage of safe drinking water. Also, using wastewater for irrigation contaminates crops and endangers human health. Over time, land fertility is also diminished.

A 2002 UN Environmental Program report showed that raw sewage polluted West Bank Palestinian water sources. A 1998 Al-Quds University study of the Jordan Valley, Nablus, Jenin and Tulkarm found one-third of samples with higher than WHO recommended nitrate levels. A 1999 Bethlehem University investigation showed over 99% of 400 spring water samples with high concentrations of coliform bacteria requiring removal before use. Later studies revealed similar problems - exacerbated because most settlements are on ridges and hilltops so their wastewater flows down to nearby Palestinian communities. The problem is extremely serious.

Three years ago it was exacerbated when the Elon Moreh settlement facility broke down causing wastewater to flow toward nearby Palestinian villages. Elon Moreh processed very toxic effluent from leather and meat-processing plants - containing extremely high acidity levels able to cause burns on contact. Lab analysis confirmed "a grave sanitation risk to humans and animals (likely to) cause loss of life (and an) environmental and health disaster."

The wastewater destroyed crops and olive trees for up to 30 meters on either side of its channel. Azmut farmers couldn't sell their contaminated crops, and a severe mosquito problem and powerful stench caused allergies, dizziness and headaches among nearby village residents. A woman called life their "terrible...as if we're living in a swamp. We can't even eat our food."

Other villages were also affected the same way. In 2008, B'Tselem demanded that action be taken to stop this. Only then did the Municipal Environmental Association of Samaria take any remediation measures that diminished but didn't eliminate the problem.

Similar conditions exist throughout West Bank areas, exacerbated by growing settler populations and scant attention to Palestinian needs and welfare. Ariel is one of the largest settlements, yet its facility experiences frequent breakdowns. In 2006, the Ministry of Health reported that it was non-functional, and in 2008, the Civil Administration's environmental protection officer told B'Tselem that the "facility can't handle the load."

It stopped operating the same year, and ever since, raw sewage has flowed into the Shilo stream, a tributary of the Yarkon River, then southwest toward the town of Salfit and west to Brukin and Kafr a-Dik villages. Despite its best efforts, Salfit Local Council member, Dr. Bassam Madi, said infectious diseases occur as well as damaged crops, livestock, and the virtual extinction of deer, rabbits and foxes once common to the area. Natural vegetation like hyssop also disappeared.

Until 2004, the Ministry of Environmental Protection turned a blind eye to the situation. It then merely warned of a Water Law violation. Enforcement measures were frozen after agreement was reached to build a collection pipeline to move Ariel's wastewater to the Dan Bloc Wastewater Treatment Plant in Israel. Its estimated completion date is 2011, but so far no financing has been arranged, and the pipeline's planner said the project "would take years" once final approval is gotten.

Wadi Fukin village is gravely harmed by Betar Illit settlement wastewater. About 20 meters above its fields, the Housing Ministry built a facility that directs effluent to the Soreq treatment site. Frequent breakdowns occur because a growing settlement population overtaxes the facility causing spillage into Wadi Fukin fields, including ones near the village center that produce a severe stench.

A Bethlehem University study showed that test samples from nine adjacent springs contained coliform bacteria concentrations and high nitrate levels. It concluded that the water was unfit to drink. Betar Illit settlement assumes no responsibility for the problem, and until mid-2008, did nothing minimally to address it. It remains a major problem

Israeli Breaches of International Law

Israel is a serial offender, including repeated violations of its obligations as an occupying power. Its failure to address wastewater issues is one of many examples, and B'Tselem puts it this way:

"Neglect in treating wastewater in the West Bank infringes the rights of Palestinians to (clean) water and sanitation and their right to gain a livelihood from their agricultural crops."

Fourth Geneva's Article 56 requires an occupier to "ensur(e) and (maintain), with the cooperation of national and local authorities....public and hygiene in the occupied territory, with particular reference to the adoption and application of the prophylactic and preventive measures necessary to combat the spread of contagious diseases and epidemics."

Israel is obligated to assure safe water sources to ensure "public order and safety" and protect the population from harm. The High Court of Justice interprets this to mean a duty to take "all means necessary to ensure growth, change and development (and do what's essential through) investments and carrying out long-term plans for the benefit of the local population (even if they remain in place) after the military government ends." The Court also held that this duty "applies to the varied living requirements of the inhabitants, including medical needs, sanitation....and other needs that people require in modern society."

In 1966 for the first time, the UN's Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (CESCR) defined clean drinking water as a right, given that it's essential to life, health and well-being. So do other UN Conventions, including the 1981 Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women and the 1989 Convention on the Rights of the Child.

In 2006, the UN Sub-Commission on the Promotion of Human Rights adopted CESCR recommendations for safe drinking water and sanitation. They require nations to prevent water pollution and assure that all persons have the "right to access adequate and safe sanitation that protects public health and the environment." UNICEF also calls access a "basic human right" to assure health and human dignity. The UN 2000 Millennium Declaration affirmed a goal of halving by 2015 the world population without these fundamental essentials, and a UN Human Rights Council 2008 resolution, among others, included the same declaration.

Conclusions and Recommendations

Of the West Bank's 2.8 million Palestinians, wastewater for over two million of them goes untreated, the result of Israel's willful neglect in violation of international humanitarian law and its obligation as an occupier. As a result, the Nature and Parks authority warns that "sooner or later, critical damage will be caused to Israeli and Palestinian water sources."

The Palestinian Applied Research Institute Jerusalem calls neglect "a grave environmental threat," and a UN Environmental Program delegation said "urgent action" is needed to address the problem. Israel remains unresponsive to a worrisome situation, and its growing settlement population exacerbates it.

It's essential for a joint Israeli - Palestinian initiative to address it responsibly, but Israel must take the lead. B'Tselem puts it this way:

So long as Israel is an occupying power and its "settlements remain, all their wastewater (and that of Palestinians) must be treated in accordance with treatment standards (applied) inside Israel, and the law must (strictly) be enforced against polluting settlements." In cooperation with each other, remediation projects must be undertaken to serve both sides, and "ultimately....Palestinians, if the settlements are evacuated," as international law so states.

Stephen Lendman is a Research Associate of the Centre for Research on Globalization. He lives in Chicago and can be reached at lendmanstephen@sbcglobal.net.

Also visit his blog site at sjlendman.blogspot.com and listen to The Global Research News Hour on Republic Broadcasting.org Monday - Friday at 10AM US Central time for cutting-edge discussions with distinguished guests on world and national issues. All programs are archived for easy listening and are accessible through Global Research.ca.

http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=14333

ICRC - Israel Traps Gazans in Deprivation and Despair

ICRC: Israel Traps Gazans in Deprivation and Despair - by Stephen Lendman

Founded in Geneva, Switzerland in 1863, the International Committee of the Red Cross is an "impartial, neutral and independent organization whose exclusively humanitarian mission is to protect the lives and dignity of victims of armed conflict and other situations of violence and to provide them with assistance." It also tries "to prevent suffering by promoting and strengthening humanitarian law and universal humanitarian principles."

It's legally mandatd to do it under the 1949 Geneva Conventions and has had a permanent presence in Gaza since 1968. Currently 109 ICRC staff work there, including 19 expatriates. They remained throughout Operation Cast Lead and witnessed firsthand the carnage and destruction that took place.

Cooperatively with the Palestine Red Crescent Society (PRCS), they evacuated hundreds of people, some severely wounded in the conflict. As able, they also repaired power and water supply lines and provided hospitals with vital medicines and supplies. In addition, ICRC surgeons performed operations in Gaza's Shifa Hospital working alongside Palestinian doctors.

Post-conflict, ICRC and PRCS collected information on Israeli violations of international humanitarian laws. They also distributed vital items, including plastic sheeting, cooking sets, mattresses, blankets, hygiene kits, and more to over 72,000 Gazans whose homes were partially or totally destroyed.

ICRC is currently providing eight hospitals with medicines, other medical supplies, equipment, spare parts, and is helping with needed repairs. It's also fitting amputees with artificial limbs and offering needed physiotherapy.

It's helping to upgrade water and sanitation services to keep Gaza's water network running as best it can. It's aiding farmers and others with land rehabilitation, compost production, and "cash-for-work." It promotes international humanitarian law and calls on all sides to observe it.

In June 2009, it issued a report titled, "Gaza: 1.5 million people trapped in despair" that described the Territory as "look(ing) like the epicentre of a massive earthquake" in the wake of Operation Cast Lead and went on to detail how severely.

No Reconstruction Allowed - Public Health at Risk

Despite billions pledged for reconstruction, practically none of it has come because of Israel's tight embargo on virtually everything needed. As a result, thousands of displaced and destitute families live in cramped quarters with relatives or in tents as their only other alternative.

Some emergency repairs were carried out, but "only to the already unsatisfactory level prevailing before December 2008." Overall, the infrastructure is inadequate, overloaded, and subject to breakdown. Although chlorine is available to disinfect water, sewage and other waste matter seepage remains a major threat to public health. Each day, 69 million liters of partially or untreated effluent are pumped into the Mediterranean for lack of an ability to handle it.

Poor Access to Health Care

Gaza's health care system is in disrepair and can't adequately treat patients with serious illnesses. In addition, with the Territory under siege and a strict embargo imposed, most people can't leave to seek care elsewhere. Those allowed out endure a bureaucratic nightmare and wait months before permission is granted. For some, it's too late and for others their condition has worsened.

Twenty-six year old Do'aa is typical. She has pancreatic cancer, needs surgery, yet explains her despair. "At first, there was hope that I would be given an operation, but as time went by I stopped hoping. I am in pain and I know all too well that my disease is life threatening." She's waited six months for permission, so far not granted.

Reaching Jordan is no easy task. It requires passing through Erez crossing into Israel and doing it is arduous. ICRC describes the process:

"Patients on life-support machines have to be removed from ambulances and placed on stretchers, then carried 60 - 80 metres through the crossing to ambulances waiting on the other side. Patients who can walk unassisted may face extensive questioning before they are allowed through the crossing for medical treatment - or, as sometimes happens, before they are refused entry into Israel and turned back."

As for treatment in Gaza, everything needed falls short. What's available comes from the Palestinian Authority's (PA) Ministry of Health in the West Bank, but the supply chain is unreliable given obstacles that Israel imposes and tensions between Fatah and Hamas.

Getting imports is more complicated still because of embargo restrictions of even the most basic items like painkillers and X-ray film developers. Patients go wanting as a result, a serious problem for the most ill.

For those needing prosthetic appliances as well because getting them is a lengthy, arduous process. Fourteen-year old Gassan lost his older brother and both his legs. He loves football, but doctors told him he'd walk again. Six months later, he's still waiting for both of his limbs to be fitted.

A Strangled Economy

The combination of siege and Operation Cast Lead devastated Gaza's already fragile economy. On May 1, the Palestinian Chamber of Commerce reported that unemployment reached 65%, poverty hit 80%, and the longer isolation continues the higher these figures will go. Currently, about 96% of Gaza's industrial operations are shuttered, and over 80% of its residents depend on humanitarian aid and supplies from the World Food Program, UNRWA, and what comes in through tunnels from Egypt to survive.

A May 2008 ICRC household survey showed that over 70% of Gazans had personal incomes of $1 dollar a day excluding whatever humanitarian assistance they received. On average, Territory workers have to support six to seven other immediate family members and several others in their extended family. Cutting household expenses is essential, even at the cost of a healthy balanced diet, no longer affordable for most.

So cheap alternatives substitute for fruits, vegetables, meat and fish. Vitamin and mineral deficiencies result. Children, the elderly and sick are especially impacted. For youths it means stunted bone growth, improper teeth development, and a reduced capacity to learn. It makes everyone infection and illness-prone by lowering their resistance and destroying their overall state of well-being.

Most of the poor "have exhausted their coping mechanisms." Their savings are gone, and they've sold personal belongings, including jewelry, furniture, farm animals, land, fishing boats, cars and other possessions - anything to raise cash. They've cut back on food and other essentials as much as possible. Still their situation is grave. Israel is slowly sucking life out of 1.5 million people with no opposition stepping up to stop it.

Farming in the Danger Zone

Farm families comprise over one-fourth of Gaza's population, and they, too, been badly hit. "Exports of strawberries, cherry tomatoes and cut flowers used to be" important cash crops. No longer as they've been virtually halted. Farmers lost half their income and struggle to sell what they can internally at far lower prices than obtainable from exports to Israel or Europe.

Operation Cast Lead destroyed thousands of citrus, olive and palm groves as well as irrigation systems, wells and greenhouses. In addition, many farmers lack fertilizers and many seedling types. They also lost access to around 30% of their land, the portion inside a "no-go" buffer zone straddling Israel and Gaza. It extends up to a kilometer inside an Israeli-erected fence on which farmers risk being shot if they work there. Under these conditions, productive agriculture is severely curtailed and in some places not possible.

Fishermen has been just as hard hit by Israel's coastal restrictions extending up to six nautical miles offshore. Reduced catches have resulted as bigger fish and sardines, comprising 70% of earlier harvests, are found in deeper waters.

Trapped

ICRC states:

"People in Gaza are trapped. Because Israel has shut the crossing points, Gazans have scant opportunity for contact with relatives abroad or for further education or professional training." Palestinian staff members of international organizations, including ICRC, are also impacted.

The emotional fallout especially affects families whose relatives are imprisoned inside Israel. In June 2007, Israel stopped ICRC-supported visits of about 900 families and prevented spouses and children from staying close to their loved ones.

Students, professors, teachers, and health professionals also get no exit permission for education, training, seminars, and other skills and expertise-building methods. Ibrahim Abu Sobeih is a 24-year-old Gaza student. Pennsylvania's Clarion University awarded him a scholarship, but he can't attend. In frustration, he said:

"Being stuck here gives me a sombre view of the future. I would like to be educated and to make something of myself. I want to be able to help my family financially. But it is very difficult when I am trapped. I feel very angry and hopeless."

So do 1.5 million other Gazans - trapped in the world's largest open-air prison, under siege for over two years, getting way inadequate outside help, and none whatever from Western powers that support Israel's slow-motion genocide against a civilian population unable to stop it.

Stephen Lendman is a Research Associate of the Centre for Research on Globalization. He lives in Chicago and can be reached at lendmanstephen@sbcglobal.net.

Also visit his blog site at sjlendman.blogspot.com and listen to The Global Research News Hour on RepublicBroadcasting.org Monday - Friday at 10AM US Central time for cutting-edge discussions with distinguished guests of world and national issues. All programs are archived for easy listening.

http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=14333

Mandatory Swine Flu Vaccine Alert

Mandatory Swine Flu Vaccination Alert - by Stephen Lendman

On July 13, a World Health Organization (WHO) Global Alert headlined, "WHO recommendations on pandemic (H1N1) 2009 vaccinations" suggest that universally mandated ones are coming. It stated that on July 7, the pharmaceutical industry-dominated Strategic Advisory Group of Experts (SAGE) on Immunization held an "extraordinary meeting in Geneva to discuss issues and make recommendations related to vaccine for the pandemic (H1N1) 2009."

There's no pandemic nor until recently a single death anywhere attributable to Swine Flu. Yet WHO said the virus "is considered unstoppable," while admitting little evidence of spread so far, most cases are mild, and many people recover unaided. Nonetheless, all countries will need vaccines and should follow these priorities as initial supplies will be limited:

-- immunize health care workers "to protect the essential health care infrastructure;" then

-- pregnant women; children over six months of age "with one of several chronic medical conditions;" healthy young adults aged 15 - 49; healthy children; healthy adults aged 50 - 64; and finally healthy adults aged 65 or older.

WTO suggested the risks in stating "new technologies are involved in the production of some pandemic vaccines, which have not yet been extensively evaluated for their safety in certain population groups..." As a result, "post-marketing surveillance" and "post-marketing safety and effectiveness studies" are essential so that countries can adjust their vaccination policies.

WHO "recommendations" are binding on all 194 member countries in case a pandemic emergency is declared under the 2005 International Health Regulations Act and April 2009 WHO pandemic plan.

It's crucial to understand that these vaccines are experimental, untested, toxic and extremely dangerous to the human immune system. They contain squalene-based adjuvants that cause a host of annoying to life-threatening autoimmune diseases. They must be avoided, even if mandated. It's also known that vaccines don't protect against diseases they're designed to prevent and often cause them. They should be banned but proliferate anyway because they're so profitable, and if globally mandated to the greatest extent ever.

Get ready because that's precisely what's coming - universal orders to risk toxic vaccine hazards. In the coming weeks, the dominant media globally will get into high gear fear-mongering mode to convince people voluntarily to submit to jeopardizing their health and well-being. It's essential to refuse and be safe and international law absolutely protects us.

Stephen Lendman is a Research Associate of the Center for Research on Globalization. He lives in Chicago and can be reached at lendmanstephen@sbcglobal.net.

Also visit his blog site at sjlendman.blogspot.com and listen to The Global Research News Hour on RepublicBroadcasting.org Monday - Friday at 10AM US Central time for cutting-edge discussions with distinguished guests on world and national issues. All programs are archived for easy listening.

Veronza Bowers - Another Victim of America's Criminal Justice System

Veronza Bowers, Jr. - Another Victim of America's Criminal Justice System - by Stephen Lendman

On September 15, 1973, Veronza Bowers, Jr. was arrested in Mill Valley, California and charged with robbery and possession of stolen property. After state charges were dropped for lack of probable cause to obtain a search warrant, the FBI arrested Bowers and charged him with the first-degree murder of National Park Service ranger Kenneth Patrick on August 5, 1973 at Point Reyes National Seashore near San Francisco.

At trial, testimonies from two government informants, Alan Veale and Jonathan Shoher, proved crucial. Both were also charged with the killing. Yet there were no independent eye-witnesses, and no evidence incriminated Bowers besides the word of these two men who had every incentive to cooperate with the Department of Justice.

Veale and Shoher were convicted bank robbers. In return for their testimony, their murder charges were dropped, and one of them served no prison time, was paid $10,000, and placed in the government's witness protection program.

Allegations were that the three men were at Point Reyes National Seashore to poach deer, ranger Patrick confronted them, and Bowers shot him three times. At trial, he testified for himself and steadfastly denied the charge. His wife's alibi testimony was dismissed as well as assertions by two relatives of the informants who insisted they were lying.

In April 1974, Bowers was convicted in San Francisco District Court and sentenced to life in prison. He's currently held at the United States Penitentiary (USP), Atlanta, Georgia.

In August 1979, after a failed prison escape from the Lompoc Federal Correctional Institution, Bowers became a model prisoner by focusing on his spiritual self. He became an author, musician, and student of Asian healing arts. He developed a strong interest in Buddhist meditation and hands-on healing techniques. He's an honorary Lompoc Tribe of Five Feathers member, a Native American spiritual and cultural group, and a mentor and founder of the All-Faith Meditation Group, a non-denominational spiritual organization devoted to healing meditation using the traditional Japanese shakuhachi flute.

At the expense of having his parole appeals denied, Bowers consistently maintains his innocence. Friends and supporters stand with him and offer testimony in his behalf.

Neoma Kenwood is a California Appellate Project attorney who represented Bowers pro bono for many years. On August 14, 1991, he wrote to the Parole Commission, mainly as a friend, and said this was his first ever letter like this. He did it because "Mr. Bowers is in a special category....(he's) very different; I have found him to possess much more integrity and decency than many of my fellow professionals."

Prison Administrator J. Harrison praised Bowers in a 1991 letter for his "contributions to the operations and programs of the (US Penitentiary Terre Haute, IN) Recreation Department," calling them "numerous and significant." He added that he "can be depended upon to willingly and cheerfully perform any extra task which the staff of this department might ask of him, (and) strongly endorsed" his parole.

Numerous other support letters were similar, including one by Maynard Garfield. He's treasurer of the Veronza Bowers, Jr. legal defense fund. He describes him as mature, intelligent, thoughtful and compassionate, and considers it "a privilege and a pleasure to call him my friend." Yet he's been denied parole at his hearings. Garfield said:

"I have pleaded with him. Just tell them: 'I was young and did wrong. But I have found my way. I am a born-again Christian. I have found salvation.' "

Bowers responds:

"Don't you understand. I have been here for 35 years. If the only way I can get out is to lie and say I am guilty, then my whole life if a sham. I will rot here in prison before I will do that."

According to Garfield, rot he may without considerable help, and that's why this article is written - to urge readers to go www.veronza.org for information about him and learn how to help. Numerous times before, he was approved for parole and given release dates, only to have them rescinded at the last moment.

On October 5, 2005, he was due for Mandatory Parole but again was denied. On July 18, 2005 Bryan Gaynor, Alan Chaset and Monty Levenson representing him explained as follows:

"The National Parole Commission has again blocked Veronza Bowers, Jr.'s right to be released on mandatory parole after serving more than 31 years in prison....(its) third in a series of high-handed and improper actions to deny (him) his right....in complete disregard of the Commission's legal obligation to follow applicable federal statutes as well as its own rules and regulations. We believe this latest and most egregious decision, made at the request of Attorney General Alberto Gonzales, is politically motivated, disregards Veronza's exceptionally good conduct in prison, and is an unlawful denial of his right to due process."

The lawyers also provided background information and explained that Bowers was legally entitled to "mandatory parole" since April 7, 2004 because:

-- no evidence showed he might commit a crime if released;

-- he hadn't violated prison rules; or

-- committed serious infractions during his years of incarceration; in fact, he's a model prisoner.

Nonetheless, his parole was denied. Then on October 26, 2004, Federal Judge William Terrell Hodges of the Middle District of Florida ruled on a habeas writ and ordered the Commission to hold a hearing within 30 days and release Bowers on "mandatory parole" if he complied with the above three qualifications.

A December 21, 2004 hearing was held at which nationally-recognized criminologist and Clinical Director of the National Center of Institutions and Alternatives Hans H. Selvog testified. He administered a battery of psychological tests and determined that Bowers is normal, socially well-adjusted with no criminal disposition, and an excellent candidate for parole.

Examiner Rob Haworth also testified that Bowers was eligible for "mandatory parole." He said he believed he was one of the most worthy candidates he'd encountered and recommended that he be released on February 18, 2005. Commissioner Cranston Mitchell ordered it based on Haworth's assessment.

Yet on that date, at the last moment, the Commission notified the Coleman Correction Facility warden that the parole was rescinded, and the five-member Commission would reconsider his case. Besides political pressure from Washington, the ruling was based on unsupported allegations of ranger Patrick's widow and members of the Fraternal Order of Police (FOP). The woman supported her dead husband with no knowledge of the facts. FOP members cited spurious allegations of prison rule violations, including arranging for two contract killings.

Earlier on August 26, 2005, Association of National Park Rangers president Lee Werst wrote Thomas Hutchinson, chief of staff, US Parole Commission as follows:

"....we believe a decision by the Commission to parole Mr. Bowers would send the wrong message to the federal law enforcement community we all depend on to protect our public lands and citizens. Indeed, it would send the wrong message to Mr. Patrick's family and friends, to every employee of the National Park Service, and to all federal agency personnel - that the memory of Ranger Patrick's ultimate sacrifice somehow holds lesser importance than the early release of a convicted murderer."

On March 21, 2005, a rehearing was held and affirmed the previous December's recommendations: namely, that no credible evidence supported denying Bowers release. Between March 21 and May 16, the Commission exercised its "original jurisdiction" and voted two in favor, two opposed, and one abstention on parole. Anything less than a majority meant Bowers should be freed. June 21, 2005 was his scheduled release date, but on June 14, at the request of AG Alberto Gonzales, the Commission rescinded it without notifying his lawyers so they and Bowers could respond.

Attorneys Gaynor, Chaset and Levenson considered this action "to be without a proper basis in law. There is no statutory authority whatsoever (for it). It is our position that the original jurisdiction decision by the Commission constituted final agency action and any further action taken in this matter violates due process."

What's most objectionable is how the politicization of Bowers' case made an impartial administrative process impossible. Gonzales' intervention was "illegal, unprecedented and pander(ed) to the political agenda of his administration's constituents." It defiled the case's merits and kept him incarcerated to this day, over four years later.

On June 6, 2009, Atlanta Journal-Constitution writer Rhonda Cook said "US Magistrate Susan Cole....wrote in a final report and recommendation order that US Attorney (General) Alberto Gonzales improperly meddled in (his) case (and that Bowers should) be paroled immediately."

Cole said Gonzales "had no statutory or regulatory authority" to get involved and by doing so affected the Commission's impartiality. In a recommendation to US District Judge Charles Moye, assigned to handle Bowers' 2008 lawsuit, she added that the decision to keep Bowers imprisoned "cannot stand." A Commission spokesperson declined to comment. Current Bowers attorney Charles D. Weisselberg was confident that an honest review of the case would yield a favorable decision for his client.

On August 13, 2005, former political prisoner Ashanti Alston read Bowers' prepared statement at a Washington, DC Justice Rally. He said:

"....I am Veronza Bowers, Jr. I am a former member of the original Black Panther Party (more on that below) and have been held in federal prison for almost 32 years. I am just one of the many long-held Political Prisoners whom government officials officially claim do not exist....I was convicted (mainly on the testimonies) of two paid 'informants (sound familiar?) in (a) shooting death (I had no part in)."

"....your sons and daughters, brothers and sisters and friends are filling up these prisons with sentences longer than they've been on this earth....they are filling the graveyards before they've had a chance to live. Something is dreadfully wrong with this picture...Please, can we have a full minute of silence to remember and honor all those who have gone before us in our struggle. For a better future for us all. After the silence, I salute and thank you."

The Original Black Panther Party

As Bowers said above, he was "a former member of the original Black Panther Party." This writer's October 2008 article on the San Francisco Eight former members contained the section below - slightly edited here to explain what party members stood for, an agenda far different from mainstream propaganda about them.

In October 1966, Huey Newton and Bobby Seale founded the Black Panther Party for Self-Defense. It was progressive, activist, militantly for ethnic justice, racial emancipation, and real economic, social, and political equality across gender and color lines - radical ideas then and now. The party's ten-point program expressed them:

(1) freedom and "power to determine the destiny of our black community;"

(2) full employment for black people and everyone;

(3) "an end to the robbery by the capitalists of our black community;"

(4) decent housing;

(5) education to expose "the true nature of this decadent American society (and teach) us our true history and our role in the present-day society;"

(6) for "all black men to be exempt from military service" at a time they were drafted for foreign wars;

(7) "an immediate end to police brutality and murder of black people;"

(8) "freedom for all black men held in federal, state, county and city prisons and jails" as political prisoners;

(9) for black people in court "to be tried....by a jury of their peer group or people from their black communities;" and

(10) "land, bread, housing, education, clothing, justice and peace."

It added words from the Declaration of Independence at the end:

-- "that all men are created equal";

-- "to secure (their) rights, governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed;"

-- "that, whenever any form of government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the right of the people to alter or abolish it, and institute a new government;"

-- "to throw off (despotism), and to provide new guards for (peoples') future security."

They believed in the rule of law, published a newspaper with 250,000 readers that articulated fundamental wants and needs, and practiced what they preached with:

-- nutritious breakfasts for poor children;

-- groceries for needy families;

-- free clinics for medical care;

-- a free ambulance service;

-- help for the homeless;

-- free legal aids and bussing to prisons;

-- after-school and summer classes teaching black history; and

-- voter registration drives for blacks that helped elect Oakland's first black mayor, Lionel Wilson, in the city where the Panthers were founded.

They were young, idealistic, and willing to put their lives on the line for their beliefs and activism. Their goal was to make the world a better place - for black people and everyone. They were revolutionaries, hostile to repression. In Huey Newton's words they were: "never a group of angry young militants full of fury toward the 'white establishment.' The Party operated on love for black people, not hatred of white people." Their 2000 members demanded change and struggled for it from over 30 branches nationwide.

They wanted redress of longstanding grievances - slavery, Jim Crow laws and practices, segregation, neglect and abuse, and claimed their right of self-defense against them. It was a revolutionary agenda that included ideas Jefferson preached, but for practicing them the US government targeted them for destruction and largely succeeded. The 1960s civil rights gains as well so that today blacks are repressed, impoverished, and segregated. They're stripped of their voting rights, and consigned to second class status by a society disdaining them, other people of color, and all non-Christians or Jews.

The October 2008 article focused on the San Francisco Eight (SF 8) - innocent men targeted by the FBI's infamous COINTELPRO - a gangster operation that never ended. Because of their Black Panther activism, they were framed for crimes they didn't commit from 1968 - 1973.

Updated Status of the SF 8

On July 6, California state prosecutors dropped charges against four members for lack of sufficient evidence - Ray Boudreaux, Richard Brown, Hank Jones and Harold Taylor. Jalil Muntaqim pled no contest to conspiracy to commit voluntary manslaughter, received credit for time served and three years probation. He'll now return to New York to seek parole. Attorney Soffiyah Elijah said: "This is finally the disposition of a case that should never have been brought in the first place."

Francisco Torres still faces an August 10 court hearing. He steadfastly maintains his innocence, according to his attorney Charles Bourdon who'll file a motion to dismiss charges to have his client released.

Herman Bell pled guilty to the reduced charge of involuntary manslaughter and received a sentence of five years probation with no additional incarceration.

Albert Nuh Washington died in prison.

Veronza Bowers, Jr. was targeted for the same reason as the SF 8 - for being black and committed to social justice for all people equally. Today, others as dedicated risk the same fate at a time we're all watched and as vulnerable as Veronza.

A Brief Legal History of Bowers' Case

Throughout his incarceration, the Parole Commission consistently violated its own rules and regulations in denying Bowers due process - even after the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals (in 1993) determined that it acted improperly. It granted him relief, and instructed the District Court to have the Commission recompute his parole eligibility.

Nonetheless, the Commission ignored the order and ruled (without explanation) that Bowers must stay in prison until his mandatory April 26, 2004 release date. A final appeal to the National Parole Commission failed to reverse the decision.

Bowers became eligible for parole on December 6, 1983 after serving 10 years in prison. In November, he had his first hearing before the US Parole Commission, was denied, and was ordered to serve another 10 years before reconsideration. All subsequent legal appeals failed until the 1993 Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals ruling. It was also ignored, and Bowers remains incarcerated despite considerable efforts on his behalf and the below listed factors about him:

-- his exemplary conduct and achievements as a model prisoner, including attaining a community college associates of arts degree and receiving a commendation for saving guards from assault or possible death by intervening in a hostile prison confrontation;

-- his activities as an author, musician and therapeutic healer - through music, accupressure, and therapy message;

-- his spirituality, strong emotional state, and belief in nonviolence;

-- his receiving the highest possible "salient factor" score of 10 - the Parole Commission rating to determine his eligibility and prognosis if paroled; and

-- the active support of prison staff, family, friends, and community for his release.

Bowers' lawyers and supporters continue their struggle to free him, the National Jericho Movement among them that seeks "Recognition and Amnesty" for political prisoners in America. It calls holding them "an act of terror" and says this as an advocate for Bowers:

"TOGETHER, we can help force the US Parole Commission and the federal prison system honor its obligation to let Veronza Bowers go free" - after unjustly being imprisoned for 35 years, yet courageously enduring it with dignity and steadfast adherence to his principles.

Stephen Lendman is a Research Associate of the Centre for Research on Globalization. He lives in Chicago and can be reached at lendmanstephen@sbcglobal.net.

Also visit his blog site at sjlendman.blogspot.com and listen to The Global Research News Hour on RepublicBroadcasting.org Monday - Friday at 10AM US Central time for cutting-edge discussions with distinguished guests on world and national issues. All programs are archived for easy listening.

http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=14148

HR 2749 - An Agribusiness Empowering Act

HR 2749: A Stealth Agribusiness Empowering Act - by Stephen Lendman

America is the truest example of what George Bernard Shaw meant when he said "Democracy is a form of government that substitutes election by the incompetent many for the appointment by the corrupt few." Obama is upholding the tradition and then some.

In fact, in less than six months, he's done the impossible. With congressional Democrats, he's compiled a worse record than even his fiercest critics feared, worse than George Bush, straight across the board on both domestic and foreign policies that include:

-- looting the nation's wealth, wrecking the economy, and consigning growing millions to impoverishment without jobs, homes, savings, social services, or futures;

-- proposing greater Fed empowerment and global monetary control, disguised as financial reform;

-- expanding unbridled militarism through continued foreign wars, occupations, and stepped up aggression on new fronts with the largest defense budget in history - greater than the rest of the world combined at a time America has no enemies;

-- its first coup d'etat in Honduras against its democratically elected president, an attempted regime change in Iran, and perhaps others ahead against independent leaders called national security threats while continuing to support the world's most ruthless and corrupt tyrants;

-- presiding over a bogus democracy under a homeland police state apparatus;

-- continuing the worst of the Bush administration's torture policies and practice of lawlessness;

-- targeting whistleblowers, dissenters, Muslims, and environmental and animal rights activists called terrorists;

-- illegally spying on Americans as aggressively as under George Bush;

-- destroying decades of hard won labor rights;

-- eroding Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid and other New Deal and Great Society social gains;

-- trying to control the media more aggressively than Richard Nixon, according to veteran White House correspondent Helen Thomas;

-- refusing help for budget-stricken states like California; forcing them to impose austerity by gutting welfare programs, education, health care for the poor, and other vital services at a time they're most needed; to be followed by bailout-rich banks, real estate developers, and other profiteers using "shock doctrine" tactics to buy state and other troubled assets on the cheap;

-- continuing to commodify education, end government responsibility for it, and make it another business profit center;

-- proposing health care reform that will tax more, provide less, place profits above human need, disdain vital change, and leave a broken system in place;

-- readying Americans for dangerous, mandatory vaccinations that jeopardize human health, well-being, and may even cause death;

-- the (June 26) House-passed American Clean Energy and Security Act to let corporate polluters reap huge windfall profits by charging consumers more for energy and fuel, create a new bubble through carbon trading derivatives speculation, yet do nothing to address environmental issues;

-- trying to revive the Real ID Act of 2005 with S. 1261: Pass ID Act, introduced on June 15 and referred to the Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee; if enacted, it will erode personal freedoms by requiring all US citizens and legal residents to have a national identity card that will be needed to open a bank account, board an airplane, be able to vote, or conduct virtually all types of essential business; if embedded with an RFID chip, universal monitoring will be possible everywhere, all the time; and

-- the proposed HR 2749: Food Safety Enhancement Act (FSEA) of 2009 discussed below.

HR 2749 - the Agribusiness Empowerment Act

Introduced on June 8, it "amend(s) the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act (FFDCA) to improve safety in the global market, and for other purposes."

Passed in 1938 to ensure public safety, FFDCA gives the FDA regulatory power over food, drugs, and cosmetics, later updated to include other biological products, medical devices, and products that emit radiation.

On June 10, FSEA was fast-tracked from the House Health Subcommittee to the Energy and Commerce Committee where on June 17 it cleared and was referred to the full House "for later consideration."

Like legislation introduced earlier this year but so far not passed, food safety is the presumed issue, but it's merely for cover. Current laws and regulations work well but they're not enforced, an issue this writer addressed in a previous article. It explained that the USDA is woefully understaffed, under-budgeted, and only perfunctorily carries out inspections.

A March 3, 2008 OMB Watch report highlighted the problem. Headlined, "Federal Meat Inspectors Spread Thin as Recalls Rise," it explained that USDA's Food Safety and Inspection Service (FSIS) is charged with ensuring safe meat, poultry and eggs, but its budget and staff haven't kept pace with its mandate.

In FY 1981, it had about 190 workers per billion pounds of meat and poultry inspected. By FY 2007, it was fewer than 88 or less than half as many. Yet under federal law, FSIS must inspect all meat, poultry, and egg products intended for commercial use. Its web site states: "Slaughter facilities cannot operate if FSIS inspection personnel are not present (and) Only Federally inspected establishments can produce products that are destined to enter commerce."

For these and other agribusiness products, reality belies the mandate as processors, manufacturers, and other corporate operators circumvent procedures, and according to inspectors interviewed, understaffing and lax policies contribute to the problem. An unsafe food supply results. Government policy is to blame, and FSEA and earlier proposed legislation aren't designed to help. They're vehicles to empower food giants, destroy small farmers, and harm the consuming public.

The Farm-to-Consumer Legal Defense Fund (FTCLDF) Reacts

FTCLDF is an NGO representing farmers and consumers to:

-- "Protect the constitutional right of the nation's family farms to provide processed and unprocessed farm foods directly to consumers through any legal means.

-- Protect the constitutional right of consumers to obtain unprocessed and processed farm foods directly from family farms, (and)

-- Protect the nation's family farms from harassment by federal, state, and local government interference with food production and on-farm food processing."

Run by industry officials, the FDA is a front group for agribusiness, Big Pharma, and other related industries it "regulates." If enacted, FSEA will greatly increase its power and limit judicial restraints on its actions. Although some provisions address improving the "mainstream food system," the potential for "inappropriate application and enforcement" is worrisome because the bill's language is vague and deceptive. It also doesn't define greater FDA authority or explain how it will empower agribusiness giants at the expense of small farms, "local artisanal producers" and consumers.

As a result, FTCLDF opposes HR 2749 because it will "adversely impact small farms and food producers, without providing significant reforms in the industrial food system." It also fails to address underlying food safety problems, including "agricultural practices" and industry consolidation. FTCLDT denounces FSEA for enhancing abusive powers at the expense of long-standing family farm freedoms and consumer choice.

Its specific concerns are as follows:

Current law requires "food facilities" to register one time at no charge with the Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary. Under FSEA, annual registration and a yearly $500 fee is required except for farms that do the following:

-- ones in a single physical location that grow and harvest crops, raise animals or seafood;

-- "that pack or hold food, provided that all food used in such activities is grown, raised, or consumed on that farm or another under the same ownership; and

-- facilities that manufacture/process food, provided that all food used in such activities is consumed on that farm or another farm under the same ownership."

Farm processing doesn't qualify unless it complies with the above provisions. If foods are produced elsewhere, farmers buying them lose their "farm" designation and become subject to annual registration procedures, henceforth done electronically in violation of Amish and other Mennonite customs that consider this practice a violation of their faith.

Extensive registration paperwork will also have to include:

-- certification of a hazard analysis;

-- identifying, implementing, and validating effective preventive controls and monitoring;

-- instituting and verifying corrective measures to address problems; and

-- maintaining records of all of the above and re-analyzing for hazards.

These requirements apply to local as well as others engaged in interstate commerce.

A detailed food safety plan is required as well that includes effective controls, monitoring, corrective action, verification, extensive record keeping, and other procedures that will be time consuming and expensive enough to put many small producers out of business.

All registered facilities will be subject to federal inspection in contrast to current law that applies only to ones engaged in interstate commerce. FSEA also requires all food producers to make their records available to FDA inspectors on demand. It applies to "production, manufacture, processing, packing, transporting, distribution, receipt, (and) holding of (food) in any format and at any location."

According to FTCLDF, the "FDA would now be empowered to go on a 'fishing expedition' and search records without any evidence whatsoever" of a violation. Further, "farmers selling direct to consumers would have to provide the (FDA) with records on where they buy supplies, how they raise their crops, and a list of customers."

Currently, examination only applies if there is "a reasonable belief that an article of food is adulterated and presents a threat of serious adverse health consequences or death to humans and animals."

FSEA also imposes "traceability" provisions that require producers, processors, packers, transporters, and other food handlers to:

-- "maintain the full pedigree of the origin and previous distribution history of the food;

-- link that history with the subsequent history of the food;

-- establish and maintain a system for tracing the food (and)

-- use a unique identifier for each facility for such person for such purpose."

The above requirements leave many questions unanswered and may empower the FDA to enforce them onerously against small farmers, but loosely, if at all, for agribusiness because corporate officials run the agency and decide policy.

FSEA also empowers the FDA to impose growing standards called "science-based (ones) for the safe growing, harvesting, packing, sorting, transporting, and holding of raw agricultural commodities that - (1) are from a plant or a fungus; and (2) for which the Secretary has determined that such standards minimize the risk of serious adverse health consequences or death to humans or animals."

This and other bill provisions mask FDA's dubious track record of serving corporate interests to the detriment of small farmers and consumers. By imposing costly and burdensome regulations, it will be easier to claim independent producers don't comply, ban their output as adulterated, and put them out of business.

Under current law, the FDA can prohibit food sales based on "credible evidence or information indicating (it) presents a threat of serious adverse health consequences or death to human or animals." FSEA's standard is based on only a "reason to believe that (the food) is adulterated, misbranded or otherwise in violation or this act." In other words, suspicion alone without proof can prohibit food sales and put small producers out of business.

FSEA also greatly increases the FDA's recall powers. It currently can request a voluntary recall, administratively detain food, or file a court order to seize and prohibit its distribution. FSEA goes further by empowering the FDA to recall food based on "reason to believe that the use or consumption of, or exposure to, (it) may cause adverse health consequences to human or animals." No proof is needed, just the word of corporate officials running these agencies for the companies they represent and will return to in high-paying jobs.

Based on "credible evidence or information," FSEA empowers the FDA to quarantine a geographic area to prevent "adverse health consequences or death to humans or animals...." Without court order and solely by notifying an "appropriate official of the State affected," food distribution and sales can be halted even by producers unrelated to the problem's source.

Currently, anyone violating FFDCA provisions can be imprisoned for up to three years if there's proof of "intent to defraud or mislead." Under FSEA, it's 10 years and fines of up to $100,000 for individuals and $7.5 million for corporations for offenses like the following - failing to register a facility, "misbranding," or not conducting a "hazard analysis" or filling out required paperwork.

Further, each day a violation continues constitutes a separate offense so, in theory, perpetrators might get millions of dollars in fines and life sentences for failing to comply with burdensome regulations that never should be imposed in the first place. Currently, producers are only at risk if they've "introduced or delivered for introduction into interstate commerce adulterated food."

FTCLDF concludes the following:

"While higher penalties may....deter industrial food companies from repeated dangerous violations, the (FDA) has a track record of pursuing small farmers and producers; these penalties could be imposed to ruin people for actions that pose no threat to human health."

The FDA notoriously serves the interests of industries it represents and betrays the public's well-being. Jeopardizing safer alternative sources to industrialized food is a frightening prospect to consider.

In 1970, Henry Kissinger said: "Control oil and you control nations; control food and you control people." Concentrating control in the hands of a few Ag giants places everyone at risk. They plan world domination by patenting all life forms to force-feed GMO foods on everyone - even though eating them risks harm to human health. It's why FTCLDF supports small family farms, too vital to lose. It's why FSEA must be stopped. "Any food safety bill should target industrial food processors and imports while leaving (the nation's safe) local food system alone." Obama's plan does the opposite.

Stephen Lendman is a Research Associate of the Centre for Research on Globalization. He lives in Chicago and can be reached at lendmanstephen@sbcglobal.net.

Also visit his blog site at sjlendman.blogspot.com and listen to The Global Research News Hour on RepublicBroadcasting.org Monday - Friday at 10AM US Central time for cutting-edge discussions with distinguished guests on world and national issues. All programs are archived for easy listening.

http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=14148

Obama's Cap and Trade Carbon Emissions Bill - A Stealth Scheme to License Pollution and Fraud

Obama's Cap and Trade Carbon Emissions Bill - A Stealth Scheme to License Pollution and Fraud - by Stephen Lendman

On May 15, HR 2454: American Clean Energy and Security Act of 2009 (ACESA) was introduced in the House purportedly "To create clean energy jobs, achieve energy independence, reduce global warming pollution and transition to a clean energy economy."

In fact, it's to let corporate polluters reap huge windfall profits by charging consumers more for energy and fuel as well as create a new bubble through carbon trading derivatives speculation. It does nothing to address environmental issues, yet on June 26 the House narrowly passed (229 - 212) and sent it to the Senate to be debated and voted on. More on that below.

On March 31, Energy and Commerce Committee Chairman Henry Waxman and Energy and Environment Subcommittee Chairman Edward Markey released a "discussion draft" of the proposed legislation and falsely claimed:

-- it's "a comprehensive approach to America's energy policy that charts a new course towards a clean energy economy;" it will

-- create millions of clean energy jobs....that can't be shipped overseas;

-- put America on the path to energy independence;

-- reduce our dependence on foreign oil;

-- save money by the billions;

-- unleash energy investment by the trillions;

-- cut global warming pollution;

-- strengthen our economy;" and

-- make "America the world leader in new clean energy and energy efficiency technologies."

Strong-arm pressure, threats and bribes got the bill through the House. Forty-four Democrats opposed it. Eight Republicans backed it. Over 1200 pages long, few if any lawmakers read it.

After passage, Chairman Markey said:

"It's been an incredible six months to go from a point where no one believed we could pass this legislation to a point now where we can begin to say that we are going to send President Obama to Copenhagen in December as the leader of the world on climate change."

Speaker Pelosi praised the bill as "transformational legislation which takes us into the future" and added that after passage she took congratulatory calls from Obama, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid and Al Gore. The former vice-president has long-standing ties to Goldman Sachs (GS), and in 2004 he and David Blood, CEO of GS's asset management division until 2003, co-founded Generation Investment Management LLC, a firm likely to profit greatly from cap and trade schemes.

In a prepared June 25 statement ahead of the House vote, Obama said:

"Right now, the House of Representatives is moving toward a vote of historic proportions on a piece of legislation that will open the door to a new, clean energy economy."

After citing the same false claims as Waxman and Markey, he called the legislation "balanced and sensible" and "urge(d) every member of Congress - Democrats and Republicans - to come together and support" it.

Polluters love it. So does Wall Street and corporate-friendly environmental groups like the Environmental Defense Fund. The opposition, however, includes Greenpeace, Friends of the Earth and Public Citizen.

In a joint May 13 press release, they were "extremely troubled (about) compromises to the already flawed American Clean Energy & Security Act."

It contains enough loopholes to make its claimed performance standards worthless, one of which prohibits the EPA from using the Clean Air Act to regulate future greenhouse gas emissions. That alone means they'll proliferate beyond what new technology reduces on its own, and only then if it's profitable to do it.

On June 23, Friends of the Earth president Brent Blackwelder said:

"Corporate polluters including Shell and Duke Energy helped write this bill, and the result is that we're left with legislation that fails to come anywhere close to solving the climate crisis. Worse, the bill eliminates preexisting EPA authority to address global warming - that means it's actually a step backward."

A June 25 Greenpeace press release stated:

"As it comes to the floor, the Waxman-Markey bill sets emission reduction targets far lower than science demands, then undermines even those targets with massive offsets. The giveaways and preferences in the bill will actually spur a new generation of nuclear and coal-fired power plants to the detriment of real energy solutions."

On June 27, Public Citizen (PC) called the bill "a new legal right to pollute (that) gives away 85 percent of (its) credits to polluters. (It) will not solve our climate crisis but will enrich already powerful oil, coal and nuclear power companies." PC wants polluters to cut their emissions 80% below 1990 levels by 2050 and pay for credits, not get them free. It also cited the American Wind Energy Association saying that the renewable standard will deliver "effectively zero" new ones.

PC wants consumers protected, not charged a "carbon tax....The bill doesn't, but should, provide money to help homeowners pay for such things as weatherization or to receive rebates for rooftop solar." Its main "consumer protection provision distributes free pollution allowances to electric and natural gas utilities (on the assumption) that the 50 different state utility commissions will redirect all that money back to consumers." In fact, HR 2454 is a thinly-veiled scheme to let companies profit from polluted air, in part financed by a consumer "carbon tax."

Big Coal gets a waiver until 2025. Agribusiness is exempt altogether even though it's responsible for up to one-fourth of greenhouse gas emissions. The nuclear industry will benefit hugely from the free allowances provision. A leaked memo had Exelon, the nation's largest nuclear power company, bragging that it will reap a $1 - $1.5 billion annual windfall.

Overall, carbon trading is a scam, first promoted in the 1980s under Reagan. Clinton made it a key provision of the 1997 Kyoto Protocol. He signed it in 1998, but it was never ratified. As of February 2009, 183 nations did both, but independent scientists call it "miserable failure" needing to be scrapped and replaced by a meaningful alternative.

ACESA is about profits, not environmental remediation. Its emissions reduction targets are so weak, they effectively license pollution by creating a new profit center to do it.

The Next Bubble

Wall Street also will reap a huge bonanza through carbon trading derivatives speculation exploiting what Commodity Futures Trading commissioner Bart Chilton believes will be a $2 trillion market - "the biggest of any (commodities) derivatives product in the next five years." Others see a future annual market potential of up to $10 trillion based on these schemes:

-- government-issued cap and trading carbon allowance permits to let polluters emit a designated amount of greenhouse gases; those exceeding the limit can buy rights for more from companies below their limit;

-- carbon offsets that let companies emit excess greenhouse gases provided they invest in projects purportedly cutting them elsewhere, either domestically or abroad; they can also fulfill their obligation by stretching out investments for up to 40 years - far enough ahead to avoid them altogether; and

-- besides trading allowances and offsets, polluters and Wall Street can play the derivatives game, including with futures contracts for a designated number of allowances at an agreed on price for a specified date.

According to Robert Shapiro, former Undersecretary of Commerce in the Clinton administration: "We are on the verge of creating a new trillion dollar market (through) financial assets that will be securitized, derivatized, and speculated by Wall Street like the mortgage-backed securities market" and all others that inflated bubbles that burst. If cap and trade becomes law, this market will explode so Wall Street is pressuring senators to pass it.

According to the Center of Public Integrity (CPI), around "880 total businesses and groups....reported they were seeking to influence climate change policy" as addressed in HR 2454. Representing 770 of them are "an estimated 2340 lobbyists," a 300% increase in the past five years, or more than "four climate lobbyists for every member of Congress."

In 2003, Wall Street employed none on climate issues. CPI says it now has 130 representing the usual players like Goldman Sachs, JP Morgan Chase, Citigroup and others, and why so is simple - to create a huge new revenue stream to make up for ones lost with perhaps others in the wings, thus far not revealed. Waxman - Markey delivered splendidly, setting the stage for another bubble if HR 2454 becomes law with huge pressure now on senators to assure it.

Warning: Cap and Trade Bubble Ahead

On July 1, Catherine Austin Fitts' Solari.com blog headlined "The Next Really Scary Bubble" in stating:

"If you think the housing and credit bubble diminished your financial security and your community, or the bailouts, or the rising gas prices did as well, hold on to your hat" for what's coming. "Carbon trading is gearing up to make the housing and derivative bubbles look like target practice."

She quoted Rep. Geoff Davis calling it "a scam," Rep. Devin Nunes saying it's a "massive transfer of wealth" from the public to polluters and Wall Street, Rep. James Sensenbrenner stating "Carbon markets can and will be manipulated using the same Wall Street sleights of hand that brought us the financial crisis," and Dennis Kuchinich citing "The best description to date (to) be found in Matt Taibbi's....'The Great American Bubble Machine: From tech stocks to high gas prices, Goldman Sachs (GS) has engineered every major market manipulation since the Great Depression - and they are about to do it again.' "

Taibbi calls GS the "world's most powerful investment bank....a great vampire squid wrapped around the face of humanity, relentlessly jamming its blood funnel into anything that smells like money." It operates by positioning itself "in the middle of (every) speculative bubble, selling investments they know are crap."

They control Washington and profit by extracting "vast sums from the middle and lower floors of society with the aid of a crippled and corrupt state that (lets it) rewrite the rules in exchange for the relative pennies (it)throws (back as) political patronage."

When inflated bubbles burst "leaving millions of ordinary (people) broke and starving, they begin the entire process over again (inflating new bubbles and) lending us back our own money at interest...." They've been at this since the 1920s and are "preparing to do it again (with) what may be the biggest and most audacious bubble yet" - a new cap and trade derivatives scam written into HR 2454 with GS positioned to profit most from it. Taibbi calls its market edge a position of "supreme privilege (and) explicit advantage" ahead of all others on the Street.

Contributing $4,452,585 to Democrats in 2008 (around $1 million to Obama) was mere pocket change for what it can reap from scams like cap and trade disguised as an environmental plan. The scheme was devised. GS helped write it. The House passed it and sent it to the Senate. Unless stopped, it will transfer more of our wealth to corporate polluters and Wall Street on top of all they've stolen so far from derivatives fraud and the imploded housing and other bubbles. And Goldman will lead the way finding new ways to do it until there's nothing left to extract.

Stephen Lendman is a Research Associate of the Centre for Research on Globalization. He lives in Chicago and can be reached at lendmanstephen@sbcglobal.net.

Also visit his blog site at sjlendman.blogspot.com and listen to The Global Research News Hour on RepubicBroadcasting.org Monday - Friday at 10AM US Central time for cutting-edge discussions with distinguished guests on world and national issues. All programs are archived for easy listening.

http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=14148

Bioweapons, Dangerous Vaccines, and Threats of a Global Pandemic

Bioweapons, Dangerous Vaccines, and Threats of a Global Pandemic - by Stephen Lendman

Although international law prohibits the use of chemical and bacteriological weapons, America has had an active biological warfare program since at least the 1940s. In 1941, it began secret developmental efforts using controversial testing methods. During WW II, mustard gas was tested on about 4000 servicemen. Biological weapons research was also conducted. Human subjects were used as guinea pigs in various other experiments, and numerous illegal practices continued to the present, including secretly releasing toxic biological agents in US cities to test the effects of germ warfare.

The Hague Convention of 1907 banned chemical weapons usage, and the 1928 Geneval Protocol prohibited gas and bacteriological warfare. The 1972 Biological Weapons Convention (BWC) "Prohibit(ed) the Development, Production and Stockpiling of Bacteriological (Biological) and Toxin Weapons and Their Destruction." The 1989 Biological Weapons Anti-Terrorism Act "implement(ed the) Prohibition of the Development, Production, and Stockpiling of Bacteriological (Biological) and Toxin Weapons and Their Destruction...."

In 2001, the Bush administration rejected the 1972 BWC, took advantage of a loophole allowing "prophylactic, protective or other peaceful uses," continued a secret Clinton administration bioweapons initiative, and asserted its right to spend multi-billions illegally to develop, test and stockpile "first-strike" chemical and biological weapons that potentially can kill millions.

In his August 14, 2008 article titled, "The Pentagon's alarming project: Avian Flu Biowar Vaccine," F. William Engdahl cited:

"alarming evidence accumulated by serious scientific sources that the US Government is about to or already has 'weaponized' Avian Flu. If reports are accurate, this could unleash a new pandemic on the planet that could be more devastating than the 1918 Spanish Flu epidemic which killed an estimated 30 million people worldwide before it eventually died out. Pentagon and NIH experiments with remains in frozen state of the 1918 virus are the height of scientific folly" unless something more nefarious is afoot in collaboration with Big Pharma to produce weaponized viruses and/or dangerous mandatory vaccines that, at the least, can cause serious autoimmune diseases or, as some allege, a Swine Flu or other viral pandemic.

Alarming News about Baxter International

On February 27, 2009, various news agencies including Helen Branswell in the Canadian Press, reported:

Baxter International that "released contaminated flu virus material from a plant in Austria confirmed (today) that the experimental product contained live H5N1 avian flu viruses." The WHO said the incident occurred at the company's research facility in Orth-Donau, Austria, but claimed "that public health and occupational risk is minimal" thus far. What's not known, however, "are the circumstances" behind the incident that, according to some, raise suspicions while others call it a willful criminal act. More on that below.

The contaminated product, "a mix of H3N2 seasonal flu viruses and unlabelled H5N1 (Avian Flu) viruses, was supplied to an Austrian research company....Avir Green Hills Biotechnology." It then "sent portions of it to sub-contractors in the Czech Republic, Slovenia and Germany."

The problem was discovered when The Czech Republic company discovered that ferrets innoculated with the product died. "Ferrets shouldn't die from exposure to human H3N2 flu viruses." Public health authorities called it a "serious error" that showed "the H5N1 virus in the product was live." But Baxter "has been parsimonious about the amount of information it has released about the event." Christopher Bona, the company's global bioscience communications director, did confirm that the material was a "live....experimental virus" made at the Orth-Donau research laboratory.

Security experts expressed alarm that something this serious could happen, calling the co-mingling (or reassortment) of human H3N2 with H5N1 avian viruses a dangerous practice that should never occur because of the potentially devastating effects to human health. "If someone exposed to a mixture of the two had been simultaneously infected with both strains, he or she could have served as an incubator for a hybrid virus able to transmit easily to and among people," who, in turn, could transmit it to enough others to potentially cause a pandemic. So far, nothing this extreme has happened, but a future threat remains.

As Medical Director of the Natural Solutions Foundation, Dr. Rima Laibow warns about dangerous, toxic drugs and vaccines. On March 6, 2009, she posted a "Pandemic Flu Emergency Action eAlert on her healthfreedomusa.org web site stating:

"World media (outside America) are reporting that Baxter Pharmaceuticals has admitted that it 'accidently' contaminated various vaccine batches with Avian Flu viruses. These batches were shipped to 18 countries. Clearly, either 1. stupidity and incompetence (are to blame) or 2. intentional contamination of flu vaccine lots was at work."

Many Avian Flu vaccines compete with each other, yet they're "profitable ONLY if used in huge numbers." Although "Avian Flu has been slow to be become pandemic by 'jumping the species barrier' to humans in large numbers," might Baxter's "accident" be a way to do it? If so, Big Pharma will score "One of the biggest wins in history."

In fact, it already has after the Center for Infectious Disease Research & Policy (CIDRAP) reported that Congress (in mid-June) "approved $7.65 billion for battling pandemic influenza, more than three times what the House and Senate had earlier proposed." Unsurprisingly, it was part of "a $106 billion (Iraq and Afghanistan war) supplemental appropriation bill" to open a new front at home in the form of dangerous vaccines - perhaps to be mandated for everyone.

Laibow sees a "manipulated disaster of unprecedented magnitude precipitated by unprecedented avarice and greed," and adds that "Baxter International Inc. is no stranger to recalls and lethal contaminations." Its record includes producing faulty infusion and volumetric pumps, HIV-2 tainted Albumin Buminate 5 percent, faulty dialysis machine tubing and blood-cleaning filters, and various other products that should make everyone leery of its soon-to-be-released Swine Flu vaccine. Along with similar ones from other pharmaceutical companies, these drugs cause serious autoimmune diseases and absolutely should be avoided, even if mandated.

Laibow expresses great alarm in stating:

"Baxter mixed a virus which has a hard time infecting people (H5N1 Avian flu) with one that infects them easily ("Seasonal Flu") in a medium which can promote mutations of the H5N1 virus into a type which can infect us easily. What will be in the vaccine you are forced/coerced/threatened into allowing into your body? Who knows?"

What is known are our constitutional and Nuremberg Code rights. The Fifth Amendment protects against abusive government authority in stating that "No person shall....be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law...." The Eight Amendment prohibits "cruel and unusual punishments." Depriving someone of health is tantamount to the latter as well as life by harming and potentially shortening it.

The Nuremberg Code requires voluntary consent of human subjects without coercion, fraud, deceit, and with full disclosure of known risks. It also affirms that experiments should avoid "all unnecessary physical and mental suffering and injury," and should never be conducted if there's "an a priori reason to believe death or disabling injury will occur" or harm to human health.

The FDA as an Industry Front Group

As stated on its web site, the FDA is mandated to protect human health and well-being.

As an agency in the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), "The FDA is responsible for protecting the public health by assuring the safety, efficacy, and security of human and veterinary drugs, biological products, medical devices, our nation's food supply, cosmetics, and products that emit radiation."

Run by officials of the industries it "regulates," it fails on all counts. Byron J. Richards is a clinical nutritionist and founder of Wellness Resources. In his book "Fight for Your Health: Exposing the FDA's Betrayal of America," he discusses FDA complicity with Big Pharma, dangerous drugs worth billions of dollars to the industry, and the serious risks to people who use them. He states:

"The FDA has put into mothballs its federal mandate to protect the public. In order to foster drug sales, the FDA hides important medical data from the public and from doctors, including the risks of heart attacks, suicide, seizures, and serious mental-health debility. Even worse, the FDA has changed sides. They are actively undermining the rights of citizens to claim damages if injured by drugs. And they are seeking to remove safety barriers to drug testing. They are planning to expose many individuals to unproven drugs, a new form of human experiment" that may rise to a higher level if HHS mandates dangerous Swine Flu vaccines for all Americans despite no forensic evidence of an outbreak or even a single proved death attributable to H1N1.

Yet, in advance of what looks to be coming, on June 11, the WHO declared that "The world is now at the start of the 2009 influenza pandemic (in) decid(ing) to raise (its) influenza pandemic alert from phase 5 to (its highest) phase 6" level.

Dr. Laibow advises that everyone has a "right to say "NO!" to vaccinations and other treatments that (they) do not want. The Police Power of the State ENDS at my skin and yours!" If a pandemic erupts, as a longtime natural health practitioner, she advises what she'll use herself - Nano Silver as well as vitamins, minerals, and herbs like echinacea that boost the immune system, unlike dangerous vaccines that destroy it. For more information, she directs individuals to the web site: www.nutronix.com/naturalsolutions.

WHO, CDC, and Canada's Public Health Agency (PHAC) Fearmongering Misinformation

Besides declaring its highest Level 6 influenza pandemic alert on June 11, the BBC reported on July 3 that WHO's Director-General, Dr. Margaret Chan, warned that the spread of swine flu is "unstoppable" while admitting that most cases are mild and many people recover unaided.

On June 25, Daniel DeNoon in WebMD Health News reported that CDC's influenza surveillance chief, Dr. Lyn Finelli, said: "Right now, we are estimating over 1 million (Swine Flu) cases in the US" in 2009 affecting about 6% of households in major cities. She, too, admitted that the vast majority of cases have been mild but avoided the fundamental issue - that no forensic evidence attributes a single death globally to Swine Flu and all or most known instances may be ordinary viral influenza or common colds, bad enough to cause fever (at times high) and discomfort, last several days and then pass for most people.

With no proof, Finelli cited 3065 Swine Flu hospitalizations and 127 deaths. In a June 26 telebriefing, Dr. Anne Schachat, CDC's National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases director, cited no verifiable forensic documentation in saying:

"The novel H1N1 (Swine Flu) influenza is continuing to spread here in the United States and around the globe. The key point is that this new infectious disease is not going away. In the US, we're still experiencing a steady increase in the number of reported cases (and they're just) the tip of the iceberg." She added that vaccines are being hurriedly produced. No decisions have been made about "which populations" will need them, but "it's very important for states and communities to begin intensifying their efforts on planning to administer a vaccine should such be necessary in the fall," especially for "young people including school children, pregnant women, babies, and adults, particularly younger adults with those underlying conditions...." That said, it "doesn't mean we've finalized any vaccine recommendations."

On June 21, Canada's National Post published Sharon Kirkey's Canwest News Service report headlined, "Vaccinate Canadians under 40 and (aboriginal) natives first: experts." She added that "Under Canada's official pandemic plan, the entire population would ultimately be immunized against H1N1 swine flu," but not at once as vaccines will only be available in batches.

Canada's Public Health Agency (PHAC) "is working on a priority list," effective for all provinces and territories. Gymnasiums will be used for mass vaccinations of school children, but no final decisions have been made.

In a June 26 news release, PHAC reported that "The Government of Canada today launched a three-year public education campaign to encourage parents to have their children immunized against certain diseases before the age of two. The Honorable Leona Aglukkaq, Minister of Health, made the announcement at the annual meeting of the Canadian Paediatric Society" saying that "Immunization is one of the best tools we have to protect the health of our children."

In fact, all vaccines are dangerous and should be avoided. They contain squalene-based adjuvants that cause a menu of autoimmune diseases in test subjects. In humans they include chronic fatigue, various type rashes, chronic headaches, anemia, aphthous ulcers, seizures, weakness, neuropsychiatric problems, ALS, Raynaud's phenomenon, and multiple sclerosis, among other illnesses and diseases, some causing death.

It's why Dr. Laibow says "No insurance company in the world will insure against" their risks. In America, a special fund "has paid out over 2 billion dollars to parents of children killed or maimed by vaccinations." However, the vast majority of those harmed are never compensated, and US law 'immunizes' drug companies from lawsuits.

Laibow adds:

"In fact, vaccines are explicitly acknowledged NOT to protect against diseases they supposedly are designed to prevent (read the Package Inserts for vaccines, available on line and in your doctors' offices if you doubt that) and often" cause them.

Yet they continue in use because they're so "immensely, enormously and hideously profitable," and Big Pharma has enough clout to proliferate products that "in a rational society (should) be banned forever."

Bioterrorism Criminal Charges Filed

On June 10, Austrian journalist Jane Burgermeister filed sweeping criminal charges with the FBI in addition to earlier ones on April 8 with the Vienna State Prosecutor's Office against Baxter AG, Baxter International and Avir Green Hill Biotechnology AG, "for manufacturing, disseminating, and releasing a biological weapon of mass destruction on Austrian soil between December 2008 and February 2009 with the intention of causing a global bird flu pandemic virus and of intending to profit from that same pandemic in an act that violates laws on international organised crime and genocide."

Baxter operates Biosafety Level 3 (BLS-3) labs that take strict precautions to assure no possibility of accidental H3N2 and H5N1 co-mingling contamination unless something more nefarious is afoot.

BLS-3 personnel are trained in handling pathogenic and potentially lethal agents and are supervised by competent scientists with extensive experience with them. In addition, these labs have specially engineered design features for added safety.

On its web site, CDC lists four biosafety levels:

-- BLS-1 labs are "suitable for work involving well-characterized agents not known to consistently cause disease in healthy adult humans, and (pose) minimal potential hazard to laboratory personnel and the environment."

-- BLS-2 labs are "similar to Biosafety Level 1 and (are) suitable for work involving agents of moderate potential hazard to personnel and the environment. It differs from BLS-1 in that (lab personnel) have specific training in handling pathogenic agents," and are "directed by competent scientists." In addition, access to the labs are limited, and "extreme precautions are taken with contaminated sharp items...."

-- BLS-3 labs work with "indigenous or exotic agents which may cause serious or potentially lethal disease as a result of exposure by the inhalation route. Laboratory personnel have specific training in handling pathogenic and potentially lethal agents, and are supervised by competent scientists who are experienced in working with these agents." Labs also have "special engineering and design features," and follow strict procedures. In addition, protective clothing, equipment, and other extreme precautions are taken.

-- BLS-4 labs are for the most highly toxic and dangerous agents - ones "that pose a high individual risk of aerosol-transmitted laboratory infections and life-threatening disease." As a result, the strictest possible procedures and precautions are always taken.

By combining human influenza H3N2 with bird flu H5N1 virus in its BLS-3 lab, "Baxter produced a highly dangerous biological weapon with a 63 per cent mortality rate. The H5N1 virus is restricted in its human-to-human transmissibility, especially because it is less airborne."

"However when....combined with seasonal flu viruses (easily transmitted by air), a new flu virus is created which is unknown to the human immune system and which will have a severe impact on an unprotected population. A deadly virus of this kind could spread around the world in a short time and (potentially) infect millions and even billions of people."

Baxter (via Avir) "distributed (72 kilos of) contaminated (live bird flu) vaccines using false concealment and a false labels to 16 laboratories in Austria and....other countries at the end of January/beginning of February, potentially infecting at least 36-37 laboratory staff, who (were) treated preventively for bird flu and ordinary flu." On the same day, 18 Avir employees were as well at Vienna's Otto Wagner Hospital.

Burgermeister cited a Baxter-Avir 2006 contract with Austria's Health Ministry for 16 million vaccine doses in case a bird flu pandemic was declared. She maintains that this "laboratory incident shows that national and international authorities are not able to fulfill their obligations to ensure the safety of the Austrian people" and claims that authorities were engaged in a cover-up.

"If a pharmaceutical company can breach laws - and almost trigger a bird flu pandemic, which (potentially could spread worldwide) - without being made accountable for it....then there is, de facto, no rule of law on Austrian territory."

She also contends that Baxter's production system, "namely, the use of 1200 liter bioreactors and vero cell technology," meets "the technical criteria to be classified as a secret dual purpose large-scale bioweapon production facility (able to produce) a huge amount of contaminated vaccine material....rapidly."

"If (this) material were added to the 1200 liter bioreactors, it would replicate and infect the entire batch of vaccine material in (it). Contaminated material could (then) be distributed among sections of the population using false labels and secretly marked batches (able to) infect millions of people."

Burgermeister accused high-level Austrian Health and other Ministry officials of knowledge and support of this practice. Otherwise, controls would have been in place to prevent it. In June, she named drug producers Baxter, Novartis and Sanofi Aventis, world agencies, including the WHO, UN, and CDC, and high-level officials in Austria, other European countries, and America.

Whether or not there's enough evidence to substantiate her charges, her case is vital to alert people globally to the potential health threat they face because inadequate controls are in place if the worst occurs.

It highlights the importance of being alert to this and other potential health hazards given lax government regulations and public complicity with powerful corporate interests, that in alliance show a disturbing indifference to public safety and well-being - worse still because dominant print and broadcast media stoke fear by reporting misinformation to convince people to use dangerous drugs and vaccines they should avoid.

As they say, forewarned is forearmed. Better be safe than sorry. Something nefarious may or may not be afoot, but it's vital to learn the truth, know the risks, and assert your legal right to refuse all dangerous vaccines and other medications, even if mandated.

Stephen Lendman is a Research Associate of the Centre of Research on Globalization. He lives in Chicago and can be reached at lendmanstephen@sbcglobal.net.

Also visit his blog site at sjlendman.blogspot.com and listen to The Global Research News Hour on RepublicBroadcasting.org Monday - Friday at 10AM US Central time for cutting-edge discussions with distinguished guests on world and national issues. All programs are archived for easy listing.

http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=14148

Reviewing Marjorie Cohn and Kathleen Gilberd's "Rules of Disengagement"

Reviewing Marjorie Cohn and Kathleen Gilberd's "Rules of Disengagement: The Politics and Honor of Military Dissent" - by Stephen Lendman

Marjorie Cohn is a Distinguished Law Professor at Thomas Jefferson School of Law in San Diego where she's taught since 1991 and is the current President of the National Lawyers Guild. She's also been a criminal defense attorney at the trial and appellate levels, is an author, and writes many articles for professional journals, other publications, and numerous popular web sites.

Her record of achievements, distinctions, and awards are many and varied - for her teaching, writing, and her work as a lawyer and activist for peace, social and economic justice, and respect for the rule of law. Cohn's previous books include "Cameras in the Courtroom: Television and the Pursuit of Justice" and "Cowboy Republic: Six Ways the Bush Gang Has Defied the Law."

Her newest book just out, co-authored with Kathleen Gilberd (a recognized expert on military administrative law), is titled "Rules of Disengagement: The Politics and Honor of Military Dissent." It explores why US military personnel disobey orders and refuse to participate in two illegal wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. It also explains that US and international law obligate them to do so.

Cohn and Gilberd write:

"Rules of Engagement limit forms of combat, levels of force, and legitimate enemy targets, defining what is legal in warfare and what is not. (They're also) defined by an established body of international (and US) law" that leave no ambiguity.

Nonetheless, in past and current US wars, virtually no "Rules" whatever are followed. Soldiers are trained to fire at "anything that moves," place no value on enemy lives, and often treat civilians no differently from combatants. It results in massive civilian casualties, dismissively called "collateral damage." It also gets growing numbers in the ranks to resist - to challenge so-called "Rules" they believe are illegal and immoral.

"Rules of Disengagement" "discuss(es) the laws and regulations governing military dissent and resistance - the legal rules of disengagement (and offers) practical guidelines (that include) political protest to requesting discharge from the service."

Today, growing Iraq and Afghanistan casualty counts are enormous as well as the disturbing toll on the GIs involved - including long and repeated deployments, often leaving permanent debilitating effects, physical and/or psychological.

US soldiers have a right and duty to dissent and resist, and today it's easier than ever through all the modern ways of communicating, including blogging, sharing stories, photos, videos, and "developing new ways to speak out to fellow soldiers and civilians online and in the media."

"Rules of Disengagement" goes into courtrooms where military personnel "have spoken out, arguing that (today's) wars are illegal (and immoral) under international (and US) law." It's a "practical guide" providing "specific discussion(s) of applicable regulations and laws" for readers "to form their own conclusions and consider their own options." Above all, it's a way for honorable young men and women to dissent, resist, and disengage from two illegal, immoral wars, in hopes many others will follow their example.

Resisting Illegal Wars

Every US war since WW II has been illegal. Article 51 of the UN Charter only permits the "right of individual or collective self-defense if an armed attack occurs against a Member....until the Security Council has taken measures to maintain international peace and security."

In addition, Article I, Section 8, Clause 11 (the war powers clause) authorizes only both houses of Congress, not the president, to declare war. Nonetheless, that process was followed only five times in our history and last used on December 8, 1941 after Japan attacked Pearl Harbor.

Yet many judges won't apply "the law to the wars, and then to service members' refusal to take part" in them. They say it's "not their role, not a matter under their jurisdiction, or not 'relevant.' " In case studies the authors use, court-martial judges, juries, and the public increasingly accept these arguments but also recognize that "men and women of conscience have put their futures on the line for their opinions and actions against illegal wars (and) orders."

It hasn't shown up in court-martial decisions except in more lenient sentences, indicating growing respect for those brave enough to resist on matters of conscience and their opinions regarding the law. Pablo Paredes for one.

The Navy petty officer third class and weapons-control technician refused duty on the USS Bonhomme Richard as it deployed to the Persian Gulf on December 6, 2004 to take part in Operation Iraqi Freedom. He was charged with unauthorized absence and willfully missing his ship's deployment. On May 10, 2005, Paredes avoided jail and a dishonorable or bad conduct discharge when the court-martial judge dismissed the former charge, convicted him on the latter one, sentenced him to two months restriction, three months of hard labor without confinement, and reduction in rank from E-4 to E-1.

Lt. Cdr. Robert Klant denied expert testimony on the war's illegality, but let Cohn testify as an expert witness, at the sentencing hearing. At its conclusion, Klant astonished attending spectators by saying:

"I believe the government has successfully demonstrated a reasonable belief for every service member to decide that the wars in Yugoslavia, Afghanistan and Iraq were illegal to fight in." Paredes benefitted from that view. Others have as well, but not often or easily.

Modern Conscientious Objectors (COs)

They're persons who refuse to perform military service, and request noncombatant status or discharge on grounds of religious, moral, ethical, or philosophical beliefs with regard to wars and killing. Objecting on the basis of conscience is 'a long and honorable" tradition going back to the beginning of the republic. It was used frequently during the Vietnam war.

Objectors help others by expanding the right to resist and dissent. Under DOD regulations, "the military must grant CO status to any service member who (consciously opposes all) war(s) in any form, whose opposition is founded on religious training and beliefs, and whose position is sincere and deeply held." This position "must have developed or become central to the CO's beliefs after entry into the military," and applicants must provide "clear and convincing evidence that he or she is a CO."

US Army Reserve Staff Sergeant Camilo Mejia was the first Iraq War veteran to refuse further involvement on matters of conscience after serving in it earlier from April - October 2003. Following leave, he failed to rejoin his National Guard unit and filed for discharge as a CO on grounds that the invasion and occupation were illegal and immoral. The Army then charged him with desertion to send a strong message to others who resist.

His May 2004 court-martial was a kangaroo-court show trial, widely broadcast to all military personnel worldwide on internal Pentagon television, radio and newspaper outlets. At trial, the military judge disallowed prepared defense testimony under Army Field Manual 27-10, the Constitution, and established international law.

Mejia was found guilty of desertion with intent to avoid hazardous duty. He was sentenced to a year in prison, reduction in rank to E-1, one year's forfeiture of pay, and a bad conduct discharge after which Amnesty International declared him a prisoner of conscience, its highest honor.

After the verdict, international law expert Francis Boyle was allowed to testify during the sentencing phase - but under strict limitations imposed by the judge. He cited relevant domestic, international, and military law, reviewed crimes of war and against humanity under them, and explained the culpability of commanders and government officials to the highest levels for abusing and torturing prisoners.

Mejia served nine months in prison and in August 2007 was elected chairman of the board of Iraq Veterans Against the War. Hundreds of others have filed for CO status while many more go AWOL or refuse deployment to combat zones. The military never makes it easy, yet the illegitimacy of two illegal wars and the immense hardships on young GIs and their families makes growing numbers resist and dissent. Still many others aren't aware that they qualify for CO status.

Current CO stereotypes stem from the Vietnam era when they were viewed as subversives and cowards. Other myths are that wars must be ongoing for those in the military to apply, the process is lengthy, discharges, if granted, won't be honorable, and federal benefits will be lost as well as eligibility for government jobs. "Needless to say, these myths are not true," but exist to discourage applicants and impede the process.

Various civilian organizations provide good information on CO rights, regulations on them, and procedures on how to apply. Also, the "CO process is one of the most legally protected of discharge proceedings - COs have greater rights than those who seek discharge for family hardship or similar reasons." Yet command hostility exists and rights are often denied. "Success rates vary among the services." Some COs are discharged for other reasons. Many applications are rejected. Some go AWOL as a result, and others do or don't succeed through court intervention. Imperial America doesn't make it easy, so applicants have to persist all the harder.

Winter Soldier

Iraq and Afghan veterans willing to come forward provide the most compelling evidence of "war crimes beyond imagination." Yet those familiar with Vietnam, WW II, and other US wars have heard it before. John Dower's powerful WW II book, "War Without Mercy," documented how both sides in the Pacific war depersonalized the opposition, abandoned the rules of war, and fought with equal savagery.

Later examples include:

-- Winter Soldier 1971 - the Vietnam My Lai massacre killing around 500 civilians was a mere skirmish compared to death squad campaigns like Operation Phoenix that contributed to an estimated 80,000 deaths from around 1968 - 1971. Numerous other stories documented mass murder, torture, rape and other atrocities - the same kinds committed earlier and today;

-- Winter Soldier 2008 - "traumatized" veterans today tell similar horrors stories to ones from past wars, including Vietnam, Korea, and WW II; Iraq Veterans Against the War (IVAW) offer testimonies as ammunition for their three unifying principles:

(1) immediately ending the Iraq and Afghan wars and occupations and withdrawing all troops;

(2) paying reparations to Iraqis; and

(3) providing proper medical care for all US war veterans.

Short of these, all imaginable atrocities will continue, including mass killings, torture, rape, destruction, and much more. Wars are ugly business, and laws or no laws, the worst of abuses happen routinely by a military command teaching rank and file soldiers to commit them with impunity. And they're besides the harm done to GIs, many of whom are never the same from the experience - if they survive. Vietnam destroyed an entire generation of American youths, and today's wars are doing it again.

The rules of engagement are stipulated in various laws of war - the Constitution, Hague and Geneva Conventions; UN Charter; Nuremberg Charter, Judgment and Principles; Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide; Universal Declaration of Human Rights; Supreme and lower Court decisions; US Army Field Manual 27-10; and the Law of Land Warfare (1956). They state that nations must abide by the laws of war. No exceptions are ever allowed, and failure comply constitutes a crime of war and/or against humanity.

At the Nuremberg Tribunal, chief US prosecutor Robert Jackson cited wars of aggression as the "supreme international crime against peace differing only from other war crimes in that it contains within itself the accumulated evil of the whole." Yet this standard indicts America on all its wars since WW II.

And young GIs are affected. Winter Soldiers 2008 say "they were subject to amorphous and contradictory rules of engagement - often free-fire zones where they could shoot at anything that moved (including noncombatants). These rules, or lack thereof, led to the commission of atrocities and war crimes," not occasionally but often.

Aside from the 2001 Afghanistan bombings and March 2003 "shock and awe" attack, the worst of them took place in April and November 2004. In retaliation for the killing and mutilation of four Blackwater mercenaries, the first and second Fallujah Battles waged some of the fiercest urban combat since the 1968 Battle of Hue in Vietnam. Several thousand or more were killed, mostly civilians. Major war crimes were committed. Illegal weapons were used. Vast destruction was inflicted. The city was held under siege. Free-fire zone rules applied. A "shoot-to-kill" curfew was imposed, and according to Adam Kokesh: "we changed our rules of engagement more often than we changed our underwear."

Winter Soldiers 2008 speak out publicly over what they saw and did in their tours, including in testimonies to Congress. "So far (none of them) have been prosecuted for their testimony, though some active duty witnesses were harassed by superiors."

Dissent and Disengagement

Resistance includes refusing illegal orders, objecting on the basis of conscience, requesting a discharge, demonstrating, picketing, dissenting as the Constitution allows, attending rallies, petitioning Congress, going underground, taking refuge abroad, speaking out publicly, and through the media. It's acting according to one's principles and morality and not backing down when the going gets tough.

Lt. Ehren Watada's case is instructive. In June 2006, he refused to deploy to Iraq and publicly said why - that "as an officer of honor and integrity, (he could not participate in a war that was) manifestly illegal....morally wrong (and) a horrible breach of American law." He became the first US military officer to face court-martial for his action and was charged with:

-- one specification under UCMJ article 87 - missing movement;

-- two specifications under article 99 - contempt toward officials (for making public comments about George Bush); and

-- three specifications under article 133 for conduct unbecoming an officer.

If convicted on all charges, he faced possible dishonorable discharge, forfeiture of all pay and allowances, and seven years in prison. A military equivalent of a grand jury convened on August 17, 2006 to review the charges and rule on their justification. Watada called three expert witnesses in his defense:

-- former UN Iraq Humanitarian Coordinator (1997 - 1998) Denis Halliday who resigned under protest because he was "instructed to implement a policy that satisfies the definition of genocide (and already) killed well over one million individuals, children and adults;"

-- US Army Colonel Ann Wright who resigned her commission as a State Department foreign service officer in March 2003 to protest a "war of aggression (in) violat(ion) of international law;" and

-- Professor Francis Boyle, international law and human rights expert, activist, and author of numerous books, papers, and articles on these topics.

On August 22, the Army reported on the proceeding and recommended all charges be referred to a general court-martial. It began in February 2007 under very constricted rules - denying a First Amendment defense, disallowing one's questioning the legality of the war, and refusing to allow expert testimony, including from Cohn.

However, legal issues couldn't be excluded as they directly related to charges brought, so the prosecution introduced them at trial. In addition, Watada firmly stated before testifying that he refused to deploy because of the war's illegality.

Unable to stop him from saying this, judge John Head declared a mistrial. He'd lost control of the proceeding, knew Watada was on solid ground, and had to prevent his evidence from being introduced to avoid the embarrassing possibility of an acquittal on one or all charges. If it happened, the war's illegality would be exposed and its continuation jeopardized.

Under the Fifth Amendment's "double jeopardy" clause, Watada can't be retried on the same charges. It states no person shall be "subject for the same offense to be twice put in jeopardy of life or limb." Watada's triumph by mistrial was a powerful tribute to his convictions and spirit. It's also an inspiration to civil resisters and all members of the military to follow in his footsteps.

On October 22, 2008, US District Court Judge Benjamin Settle agreed with Watada's double jeopardy claim and dismissed three of the five counts against him. In mid-May, beyond the timeline of Cohn and Gilberd's book, the Department of Justice dropped plans to retry him on two remaining counts, but his legal problems continue as the Army is still weighing further action. Fort Lewis spokesman Joe Piek said the base's leadership is considering "a full range of judicial and administrative options that are available, and those range from court-martial on those two remaining specifications, to nonjudicial punishment, to administrative separation from the Army."

If they can't win one way, they may keep harassing Watada and make him pay by attrition. Millions of war resisting Americans may have other ideas, and organizations like Project Safe Haven, Courage to Resist, Veterans for Peace, and Iraq Veterans Against the War are united with others in demanding an end to Watada's persecution as well as two illegal wars and occupations.

They also support "high-visilbility demonstrations, protests and street theater," along with the right to resist and dissent. The law supports them "to speak out on a broad range of issues" using all means of technology to do it. Military regulations also "can be powerful weapons for service members who choose to dissent."

DOD Directive 1325.6 Guidelines for Handling Dissent and Protest Activities among Members of the Armed Forces describes basic rights for "dissident and protest activities" with guidelines pertaining to:

-- possession and distribution of printed materials;

-- off-base locations allowed;

-- publishing underground newspapers and materials;

-- off-base demonstrations and protests; and

-- rules for military personnel participation.

Resisters have the law and regulations on their side if they conform to their provisions therein - "consistent with good order and discipline and the national security." But going up against the Pentagon and Department of Justice is never easy, and even winning exacts a great toll.

But fundamentally, "GIs do in fact have the right to express their opposition to the wars verbally and in writing, share that position with the media, state it on the Internet, distribute it to other GIs in newspapers or leaflets, say it from the microphone at national antiwar rallies, and show it by marching in off-base antiwar demonstrations and picket lines" - as long as they're off-duty, off-base, and out of uniform.

Imperfect as it is and getting worse, it's still America, and growing numbers of GIs, their families and friends are resisting two illegal wars and occupations, demanding they end, and the nation returned peace. Those goals are worth everyone's time to fight for, and it's high time more among us did it..

Challenging Racism

For many decades, young recruits are taught to kill by portraying enemies as subhuman. So the Japanese were called "Japs" and portrayed in cartoons as apes or savage gorillas; North Koreans, North Vietnamese and Viet Cong were called "gooks;" and Arabs are called "rag-heads," "camel jockeys" and "sand niggers." As a result, extreme racism is a pervasive problem in the military. But it's a proved effective way to motivate soldiers to fight and kill by viewing Westerners as superior to nonwhite enemies globally.

Many Winter Soldiers (2008) "discussed the pervasiveness of racist behavior," admitted using racial epithets, and "engag(ing) in brutality that dehumanized Iraqis and Afghanis." However Vietnam-era history "shows that organizing and protests by African American, Latino, and other minority GIs (with support from other service members)" offer the best chance of achieving real change. But success depends on ending the Pentagon's proven way to teach young recruits to kill, so getting the top brass to abandon it won't be easy.

Sexual Harassment and Sexual Assault in the Military

Teaching recruits "sexism and sexual imagery" works the same way as indoctrinating racism. Soldiers are taught to equate "strength and discipline in combat (to) sexual prowess," military violence to the sexual kind, and "disobedience, nonconformity, or weakness as feminine."

Today, sexism is so embedded in military culture that female soldiers pay the price. They're discriminated against in training, assignments, promotion, much else, and are frequent victims of harassment and sexual assault - the former through "unwelcome sexual advances, requests for sexual favors," and other similar behavior; the latter includes "rape and other forcible or unwanted sexual contact...."

In a male-dominated military, this behavior is embedded, ritualized, and symbolic of male power. The highly-publicized September 1991 Tailhook incident is a prominent example but a rare one that made headlines. It involved a group of Naval aviators sexually assaulting 26 women at one of their annual gatherings. They cornered and surrounded them, passed them down a gauntlet, jeered, taunted, grabbed, fondled, and tried to strip them.

Similar incidents are all too common, and for years top brass knew of and tolerated them. They have documented evidence that half or more of women in all branches have been victims of sexual harassment or assault. It shows a profound contempt many military men (including top brass) have for women in the ranks, at the enlisted and officer levels.

Complaints, studies, hearings and regulations do little to halt these practices. Reports surface often about harassment, assaults, rape and other demeaning behavior in basic training, the service academies, duty assignments of all kinds, and in combat. The military today is no safer for women than it ever was. It never will be unless the Pentagon changes its ideology, how it trains GIs, and if it's willing to impose stiff penalties to offenders.

The Medical Side of War

The state of the military's health care system is deplorable. Pressed to fund and fill the ranks for two illegal and unpopular wars, Congress and the Pentagon pay scant attention to the injured, sick, and psychologically damaged. It's further testimony to a nation defiling its principles - ones observed only rhetorically, hardly ever in practice, and not at all once the usefulness of combatants is over.

The Iraq and Afghan wars have produced an epidemic of psychological wounds that for many end up permanent. Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) is frighteningly common, yet care delivered is minimal, inadequate, and dismissive of a major problem afflicting many tens of thousands of returning vets.

Others from the Vietnam era retained their scars, and it's happening again today. Many couldn't find work then or now, abused their spouses, and too often ended up homeless or committed suicide (before or after coming home). An uncaring nation didn't notice nor does it today. The real crime is that the Pentagon and Congress are well versed on these problems, yet do little to address them. Only unbridled militarism, advancing imperialism, filling the ranks, funding numerous weapons systems and munitions, and enriching war-profiteers matter.

The result for hundreds of thousands returning from past and current wars is untreated medical needs, an uncertain future, and the knowledge that the nation they fought for doesn't care when they're no longer needed. Vietnam vets know it, and so do ones today from Iraq and Afghanistan.

Without a draft, the military needs volunteers to fill the ranks. The result is the stop-loss practice of involuntarily extending enlistment terms and frequent redeployments, even for those with serious physical or psychological injuries.

The Pentagon denied the affects of Agent Orange in Vietnam and the existence of Gulf War Syndrome from the first Iraq war. In 1990 - 91 and now, its likely cause was the widespread use of depleted uranium (DU), the proliferation of other toxic substances, and the illegal use of dangerous vaccines in violation of the Nuremberg Code on medical experimentation. No rules apply in our war fighting, nor does the health and welfare of our recruited men and women matter - enlisted to be used, then discarded when their service ends. It's especially evident in the "medical side of war" when those most in need are largely ignored and forgotten.

How the US Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) handles disability claims highlights a problem reaching epidemic levels. In early May 2009, the Veterans Benefits Administration and Board of Veterans Appeals at VA had a backlog of 915,000 claims, and their rate is growing so fast it may now be approaching or past one million and climbing.

Things are so bad for returning vets that most face an average six month wait for benefits and up to four years to have their appeals heard when they're denied - which is often. It's in addition to the shameful treatment GIs get for their health needs - many serious and requiring extensive, expensive treatment, often not gotten from an uncaring nation.

Discharges

Many GIs become disillusioned when they learn promises made are hollow. Some seek early discharges that can be gotten honorably but not easily most often with the nation at war on two fronts and needing all the troops it can get. Still numerous reasons qualify for an Expiration of Active Obligated Service (EAOS), including CO status, disability and illness.

Others include:

-- family hardship or dependency factors;

-- parenthood for single parents or in cases where husbands and wives are in the military;

-- pregnancy or childbirth;

-- inadequate performance or conduct during the first six months of training;

-- qualification under the "don't ask, don't tell" for gays and lesbians;

-- specific personality disorders;

-- other physical or psychological factors that don't qualify for medical discharges;

-- erroneous enlistments, including contract violations and recruiter fraud;

-- alien status; especially relevant at a time undocumented Latinos (mainly Mexicans) are recruited with promises (then broken) of a green card for them and their family as well as free education, medical care, and post-service employment;

-- being a sole surviving family member;

-- unsatisfactorily performing duties;

-- "separation from the Delayed Entry Program (DEP)" that entraps "youths still in school or the Delayed Training Program (DTP)" for enlistment in the reserves; and

-- less than honorable discharges for misconduct, drug abuse, court-martial, and other undesirable factors.

Other administrative discharges are also available, all honorable, including "general" ones under honorable conditions. But recruits get little information during training. Those requesting them are told discharges are impossible, so to get the facts civilian sources must be consulted. It takes time, and following proper procedures is essential. But the payoff is worth the trouble for those willing to do it and counseling is available to help.

A GI Rights Network has a toll-free hotline, and there are other organizations as well. They're in it "for the long haul" to instruct today's military how to exit honorably from two illegal wars and avoid the risk of death or disabling injuries.

The Families

America's wars harm families as well as GIs. They must cope with the same problems of long, repeated deployments, possible death or permanent impairment, and the lasting affects of war-related trauma that afflict even those visibly or otherwise unscathed.

Some families go public against the Iraq and Afghan wars, recruiter lies and misconduct that entrap their loved ones, and as civilians they're free to speak publicly with no restrictions on what they may say.

Gold star mothers spoke out against the Vietnam War, and today Cindy Sheehan (whose son Casey was killed in Iraq five days after he arrived) and other parents who lost sons and daughters founded Gold Star Families for Peace. They say honor our lost loved ones by ending these illegal wars and occupations, stop invading other countries, and return the nation to peace.

Military Families Speak Out (MFSO) is the largest organization of its kind against the Iraq war with chapters in 29 states. They support their loved ones, demonstrate, speak out publicly, and lobby Congress the way some of their members did earlier against the Vietnam war. "These courageous families....endure unspeakable suffering....join together to support one another....work to end the war....(and represent) the power of collection action."

They're "a powerful force in the effort to end these wars. They can tell the truth to counter recruiters' deceptions." They can effectively represent their loved ones and help others through a common effort to free us all from the scourge of war.

Conclusion

America's Iraq and Afghan wars are illegal and immoral. Every service member is obligated by law to disengage, resist, and refuse any longer to participate. US and international laws support them, and as Ehren Watada stated in his defense: "An order to take part in an illegal war is unlawful in itself. So my obligation is not to follow the order to go to Iraq."

Increasing numbers of others are deployed as part of America's permanent war and occupation agenda - continuing no differently under Obama than George Bush. To know what's planned for Iraq, Afghanistan and future US targets, think Korea. US forces arrived in 1950 and never left. Think Japan as well. They've been there as well since WW II, on the mainland and choicest real estate of the country's southern-most and poorest prefecture - Okinawa.

Further, since the Japanese surrendered in August 1945, America has had no enemies anywhere - except those invented to advance a global imperial agenda at the expense of our nation's youths and their families, other loved ones, and friends at home. Wars guarantee new ones and a permanent cycle of violence, death and destruction, the only winners being profiteers who benefit hugely.

As a result, growing numbers of GIs, veterans, families, and the general public are opting to "disengage" and resist. Together they represent power enough to impact "whether or not the United States is able to carry out these and future wars of aggression."

Most Americans oppose the Iraq war and its continued toll on GIs and their families. It's just a matter of time until opposition to Afghanistan is as great and with luck whatever new conflicts the administration plans. Those sent to fight them and their families end up losers. Their choice is clear and unequivocal - absolutely refuse any longer to participate and with enough sharing that view, they'll end. With overwhelming homeland needs unmet at a time of grave economic crisis, honor and necessity must dictate our future course. It's up to mass public activism to demand it.

Stephen Lendman is a Research Associate of the Centre for Research on Globalization. He lives in Chicago and can be reached at lendmanstephen@sbcglobal.net.

Also visit his blog site at sjlendman.blogspot.com and listen to The Global Research News Hour on RepublicBroadcasting.org Monday - Friday at 10AM US Central time for cutting-edge discussions with distinguished guests on world and national issues. All programs are archived for easy listening.

http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=14148

Michael Hudson's "Super Imperialism:" The Economic Strategy of Imperial America

Michael Hudson's "Super Imperialism: The Economic Strategy of Imperial America" - by Stephen Lendman

First written in 1972, it was updated in a 2003 edition that's every bit as relevant now - thus this review focusing on Hudson's new preface, introduction, and detailed account of the book's theme.

He revisited it in his 2008-09 Project Censored award- winning article titled: "Economic Meltdown - The 'Dollar Glut' is What Finances America's Global Military Build-up" in which he explains the following - the "inter-related dynamics" of:

-- "surplus (US) dollars pouring into the rest of the world for yet further financial speculation and corporate takeovers;"

-- global central banks "recyl(ing) these dollar inflows (into) US Treasury bonds to finance the federal US budget deficit; and most important (but most suppressed in the US media),"

-- "the military character of the US payments deficit and the domestic federal budget deficit."

In other words, the global "dollar glut" finances US corporate takeovers, speculative excesses creating bubbles and global economic crises, America's reckless spending, foreign wars, hundreds of bases worldwide, "military build-up," and culture of militarism and belligerence overall at the expense of democratic freedoms, beneficial social change, and human and civil rights.

In softer form, it's what former US diplomat, advisor, father of Soviet containment, and dove compared to others at that time George Kennan believed should be America's post-WW II foreign policy. In his February 1948 "Memo PPS23, he stated:

"....we have 50% of the world's wealth but only 6.3% of its population. (It makes us) the object of envy and resentment. Our real task in the coming period is to devise a pattern of relationships (to let us) maintain this position of disparity without positive detriment to our national society. To do so we will have to dispense with all sentimentality and daydreaming; and our attention will have to be concentrated everywhere on our immediate national objectives. We need not deceive ourselves that we can afford today the luxury of altruism and world benefaction....

We should dispense with the aspiration to 'be liked' or to be regarded as the repository of a high-minded international altruism....We should (stop talking about) unreal objectives such as human rights, the raising of the living standards, and democratization. The day is not far off when we are going to have to deal in straight power concepts. The less we are hampered by idealistic slogans (ideas and practices), the better."

Yet Kennan advocated diplomacy over force in contrast to Paul Nitze, Dean Atcheson and other Truman and succeeding administration officials favoring hardline militarism, future wars, and National Security Council Report 68 (NSC-68) policies to contain the Soviet Union. In 1962, nuclear disaster nearly resulted. The threat remains, more menacingly than ever by "forc(ing) foreign central banks to bear the costs of America's expanding military empire" through recycling their dollars into US Treasuries - something the mass media call "showing their faith in US economic strength."

Hudson refers to a "sinister dynamic," not involving consumers or private investors, but central banks putting "their money" in US Treasuries, but "it is not 'their money' at all. They are sending back the dollars that foreign exporters and other recipients turn over to their central banks for domestic currency."

"When the US payment deficit pumps dollars into foreign economies, these banks (have) little option except to buy US Treasury bills and bonds which the Treasury spends on financing an enormous, hostile military build-up to encircle (today's) major dollar-recyclers China, Japan and Arab OPEC oil producers" - essentially a process by which they finance their own endangerment.

Up to now it's continued, but, given the reckless dollar glut in recent months, with less enthusiasm by bigger buyers and hints of a possible end game or at least less buying than previously - mostly among BRIC (Brazil, Russia, India and China) and OPEC countries but other emerging economies as well getting more interdependent on themselves than on America.

In his 2002 preface, Hudson noted that "the US Treasury (pursued the same balance-of-payment) 'benign neglect' (strategy as) it did thirty years" earlier. In 1971, it "caused a global crisis when its $10 billion (level) led to a 10 per cent dollar devaluation." Now it's hundreds of billions annually and still high during the current economic crisis when exports and imports are lower.

Earlier and especially now, if Europe and Asia let the dollar deflate, their exporters will be disadvantaged at a time they can least afford it. So they're forced to "support the dollar's exchange rate by recycling their surplus dollars back to the United States" by buying US Treasuries.

Sooner or later, it's a losing proposition, especially in today's climate with the Federal Reserve sacrificing dollar strength to bail out Wall Street and trying to keep long rates low to contain borrowing costs. Yet the greater the dollar erosion, the more losses foreign investors will incur and less likely they'll tolerate more by buying bad assets.

So far, however, they're still recycling their dollar inflows to fund America's budget deficit and global militarism - something Hudson calls a "Free Lunch in the form of compulsory foreign loans to finance US Government policy."

Even so, they have no say over US policies, yet America and international lending agencies, like the IMF and World Bank, "use their dollar claims" on indebted nations to enforce Washington Consensus diktats. Independent-minded states face sanctions, isolation, coups or wars if they refuse.

Until Nixon closed the gold window in August 1971, America couldn't run unlimited balance-of-payments deficits. However without gold convertibility, it's continued for nearly 40 years along with protectionist policies through generous subsidies to US exporters - most notably to agribusiness. As a result, Hudson sees international tensions growing for the next generation, perhaps even greater now given America's reckless monetarism and perpetual wars.

His book "provid(es) the background for US - European and US - Asian financial relations by explaining how (post-1971) the US Treasury-bill standard came to provide America with a Free Lunch." Also how the IMF promoted debtor nations' capital flight and the World Bank supported "foreign trade dependency on US farm exports...."

The early 1970s dollar crisis and balance-of-payments deficits seem small compared to today. Yet the "Treasury-bill standard (frees) the US economy from (doing) what American diplomats (force on) other debtor nations (with) payments deficits: impose austerity to restore balance in its international payments. The United States alone has been free to pursue domestic expansion and foreign diplomacy with hardly a worry about the balance-of-payment consequences." No other nation has that luxury.

Post-WW II, Washington made other countries dependent on America, something it eschewed after WW I, staying isolationist instead to pursue internal development.

In the 1970s, emerging nations proposed a New International Economic Order (NIEO) through the UN Conference on Trade and Development to promote their own trade and other concerns. It "originated as a response to America's aggressive world economic diplomacy, and how US strategy has provided other nations with a learning curve that they may follow in pressing their own national and regional interests."

The more reckless and belligerent America becomes, the more incentive they have to try - and in greater alliance, with BRIC country partners, may have a greater chance for success.

Introduction

Post-WW II, on the pretext of national security, America pursued "world power....and economic advantage as perceived by American strategists quite apart from the profit motive of private investors."

After WW I, it achieved world creditor status from its "unprecedented terms (in extending) armaments and reconstruction loans to its wartime allies." In 1917, it entered the war late when it felt staying out would "entail at least an interim economic collapse (the result of) American bankers and exporters (getting) stuck with uncollectible loans to Britain and allies." So it joined the Triple Entente as an associate, not a full partner, to protect its $12 billion investment.

Post-war, America was the world's major creditor - but one "to foreign governments with which it felt little brotherhood" and no obligation to stabilize world finance and trade. Unlike its post-WW II policy, it didn't extend loans to foreign countries so they could finance their US-owed debt. Nor did it open its markets to foreign imports. It wanted Europe's empires dissolved, their military spending cut, their wealth "to flow out and their prices to fall" - the idea being in this way to re-establish world payments equilibrium, a very unrealistic notion, but many leading Europeans embraced it. It didn't work and made repayment of foreign debts impossible.

The "world economy emerged from World War I shackled with debts far beyond its ability to pay," except by "borrow(ing) funds from private lenders in the creditor nation to pay the creditor-nation government."

A more enlightened policy would have turned "other countries into (US) economic satellites." But America eschewed European imports, and US investors preferred its own outperforming stock market. On trade and finance, US policies "impelled European countries to withdraw from the world economy and turn within."

America's isolationism prevented it from collecting its foreign debts. "Its status as world creditor proved ultimately worthless as the world broke into nationalist units," and sought independence from foreign trade and payments.

Washington pursued isolationism, thus prompting other nations to seek self-sufficiency. A bankrupt Britain convened the 1932 Ottawa Conference "to establish a system of Commonwealth tariff preferences." By the mid-1930s, Germany began preparing for war. At the same time, the Depression affected one country after another as private capital dried up while at the same time Britain and other nations had mounting debt problems. It begs the question as to why they let them get so onerous in the first place.

American Plans for a Post-WW II "Free-Trade Imperialism"

Early in the war, US officials and economists knew America would prevail and emerge as the world's dominant power. However, transitioning from war to peace needed large export volumes to stimulate economic growth and full employment. "This in turn required that foreign countries be able to earn or borrow dollars to pay" for what they got. So America supplied them through government loans and private investment.

In return, it "name(d) the terms on which" they were provided and structured the IMF and World Bank so countries could "pursue laissez faire policies by insuring adequate resources to finance the international payments imbalances," the result of opening their markets to US imports. It was thought that free trade and investment would result in "balanced international trade and payments....under US leadership."

Post-war, America was the only dominant nation intact, so it alone had enough foreign exchange to invest substantially abroad. Its commercial strength turned other economies into US satellites and assured America achieved maximum world power by:

-- having European nations let US investors buy extractive industries in their former colonies, especially Middle East oil;

-- less developed nations would supply America with raw materials rather than develop their own competitive manufacturing infrastructure;

-- they'd also buy US products and services; and

-- the resulting trade surplus would provide enough foreign exchange for US investors to buy the world's most productive resources and make America even stronger.

The goal was short-lived as:

-- America had tariffs on commodities that other nations could produce more cheaply;

-- the International Trade Organization, in place to subject all economies to the same rules, was scuttled; and

-- private US investment abroad was never enough to finance sufficient foreign purchases of US exports; IMF and World Bank loans also fell short.

America accumulated a payments surplus. It, in turn, weakened its export potential. The lesson learned was that "Beyond a point, a creditor and payment-surplus status can be decidedly uncomfortable."

At first, the enlightened solution wasn't taken - extended foreign aid for rebalancing as Congress put internal interests ahead of foreign policy.

The Cold War Pushes America's Balance-of-Payments into Deficit

Cold War strategy gave Congress an anti-communist reason to "bribe foreign governments" to fight the red menace as well as open their markets to US exporters. It got the Marshall Plan and other aid agreed on to "keep its fellow capitalist countries solvent" and not tempted to turn left. The possibility continued foreign aid for several decades.

At the same time, America's balance-of-payments reached never before attained levels and needed rebalancing "to promote foreign export markets and world currency stability." To buy US products and services, other countries needed resources to pay for them, something only Washington could arrange at a time when they weren't creditworthy.

However, what worked early on became destabilizing as America began "sink(ing) into the mire that had bankrupted every European power that experimented with colonialism." Unlike foreign investors that cut their losses when necessary, national security interests (and industries profiting from them) trump other considerations even when counterproductive. Once begun, military spending takes on a life of its own - something very apparent given its current out-of-control level and growing.

New Characteristics of America's Financial Imperialism

A growing US balance-of-payments surplus was "incompatible with continued growth in world liquidity and trade." So America had to buy more foreign products, services and capital assets than it supplied to foreign buyers. At the same time, it shifted more dollars abroad through a payments deficit, easily handled in the 1950s and 1960s as long as Washington could redeem them with gold. But that game had a limited life span as "Attempts by governments to repay their debts beyond a point extinguish(es) their monetary base."

...."international money (is also) a debt of the key-currency nation." Providing other countries with assets involves going into debt, and repaying it "extinguish(es) an international monetary asset."

By the early 1960s, America approached "the point at which its debts to foreign central banks soon would exceed the value of the Treasury's gold stock." It happened in 1964 the result of Vietnam War spending at an early stage in the conflict. Just as two world wars bankrupted Europe, Vietnam threatened the same fate for America, but it didn't curtail spending and still doesn't.

Earlier, the result was a run on gold with foreign central banks "cash(ing) in their dollar surpluses for American gold almost on a monthly basis." By March 1968, the US Treasury suspended its sales, and informally world central banks agreed to stop converting dollars into the metal. The result - the dollar gold price link was broken, and in August 1971, Nixon closed its window with an official embargo.

Henceforth, in place of gold, the US Treasury-bill (dollar-debt) standard began. No longer able to buy US gold, substituting Treasuries became the only option and "to a much lesser extent, US corporate stocks and bonds."

From then to now, foreign central banks have recycled their dollars to the US government. "Running a dollar surplus in their balance of payments became synonymous with lending (it) to the US Treasury." For its part, America borrows from other central banks and runs trade deficits. The larger they get, the greater the amount available to be loaned back, so today the volume is enormous.

For both sides, the problem is that Washington's guns and butter economy (including trillions to Wall Street) creates greater deficits and inflated spending. America's dominance is maintained, and foreign economies are obliged to finance it. Failure to support the dollar will inflate their own currencies, give US exporters a competitive edge, and ultimately let the world monetary system break down.

The "unique ability of the US Government to borrow from foreign central banks rather than from its own citizens (through taxes) is one of the economic miracles of modern times. Without it, the war-induced American prosperity of the 1960s and early 1970s would have ended quickly...."

How America's Payment Deficit Became a Source of Strength, not Weakness

It let America achieve what no earlier empires did - "a flexible form of global exploitation that controlled debtor countries by imposing Washington Consensus (diktats)." It's used the IMF, World Bank and other international lending agencies for its purposes, while the Treasury-bill standard "obliged the payments-surplus nations of Europe and East Asia to extend forced loans to the US Government." If they don't, world economies face monetary crisis.

Implications for the Theory of Imperialism

Hudson calls it a "new form of imperialism" under which America exploits other nations "via the central banks (and international lending agencies) rather than via the activities of private corporations seeking profits."

A "Super Imperialism" model "pressed foreign governments to regulate their nations' trade and investment to serve US national objectives...Washington Consensus (diktats) made aid borrowers more dependent on their creditors, worsened their terms of trade by promoting raw materials exports and grain dependency, and forestalled needed social modernization such as land reform and progressive income and property taxation."

US companies thus achieved a competitive advantage, not in the marketplace, but by Washington Consensus rules and the Bretton Woods institutions it controls - the IMF, World Bank, etc. What's good for US business benefits America overall and its Super Imperial ambitions.

Today's Source of Financial Instability Compared to the 1920s

The earlier period had a shortage of liquidity. By the early 1970s, it was in surplus, the result of the enormous volume of dollar inflows in world economies. The Korean War began shifting America's balance-of-payments from surplus to deficit. In 1971, Vietnam forced it off gold and "induced a US debtor-oriented international financial policy (with) the rest of the world" - something other nations have been trapped by ever since.

US deficits have disrupted world economies, but its character has changed. Not only does it finance US militarism, but it also "sustain(s) America's stock market and real estate bubble" while at the same time industrial America erodes. In addition, pressure is applied to privatize public enterprises to let this sector pass "into the hands of global finance capital....controlled and shaped by the Washington Consensus."

Under a "new state-capitalist form of imperialism," central banks, not industry, "are the vehicle for balance-of-payments exploitation" with the dollar as the world's reserve currency. It's Super Imperialism because one nation alone gets a Free Lunch right to benefit by getting others to finance its deficits and reckless spending.

The system's unique feature is that other countries may extract their citizens' wealth, but only America extracts theirs through the sale of its Treasury securities.

The World's Need for Financial Autonomy from Dollarization

In its relationship with client countries, America's dollarization policy imposes dependency, not self-sufficiency. It drains "the financial resources of its Dollar Bloc allies (and retards) the development of indebted third world raw-materials exporters...." But its gain isn't put to productive use. It's used instead for militarism and financialization at the expense of its former industrial strength.

It's an unsustainable system, but for other countries to break away, they'll have to renounce Chicago School alchemy, the austerity programs it imposes, and advantages it gives America in trade and other relations. It drains other nations' resources by trapping emerging economies in chronic debt and developed ones into forced buying of US Treasuries.

In return, America gets a Free Lunch. It rules as world debtor, forces other countries into creditor bondage, and threatens to bring down the global monetary system if enough of them balk. So far it's worked because Europe and Asia lack the political will to devise a "New International Economic Order" so nations producing economic gains can keep them and not let America use them to reinforce its "new kind of centralized global planning" - one based on financialization and a US Treasury securities standard, not industrial mechanisms. In WTO terms, it transfers foreign trade gains from other economies to the US, drains their resources overall, promotes dependency, not self-sufficiency, and backs it with hardline militarism and threats of systemic monetary collapse.

Eventually, exploited countries won't tolerate more "taxation without representation," a "quid without quo," a Free Lunch from "the world's payments-surplus nations." The longer America demands it by glutting world economies with dollars, the more likely disadvantaged nations will object. Hudson put it this way in his Project Censored award-winning article:

Today, "the only way a nation can block capital movements is to withdraw from the IMF, the World Bank and the World Trade Organization (WTO). For the first time since the 1950s, this looks like a real possibility, thanks to the worldwide awareness" of America's dirty game and how it harms them.

"De-Dollarization and the Ending of America's Financial-Military Empire"

In his June 14, 2009 article, Hudson explained that "Chinese President Hu Jintao, Russian President Dmitry Medvedev and other top officials of the six-nation Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO)" had a two-day June 15 - 16 meeting in Yekaterinburg, Russia, with Brazil attending on the 16th. SCO countries include Russia, China, Kazakhstan, Tajikistan, Kyrghyzstan, Uzbekistan with Iran, India, Pakistan and Mongolia having observer status.

The meeting's stated purpose was "to discuss mutual aid," not challenge America's financial and military empire. Yet it potentially may be pivotal by doing just that.

On June 5, Medvedev told the St. Petersburg International Economic Forum that Russia, China and India have an opportunity to "build an increasingly multipolar world order" away from America's "artificially maintained unipolar system (based on) one big centre of consumption, financed by a growing deficit, and thus growing debts, one formerly strong reserve currency, and one dominant system of assessing assets and risks."

In other words, America "makes too little and spends too much," especially with regard to its military. It also gluts the world with dollars that end up in foreign central banks. Either they recycle them into US Treasuries or "let the 'free market' force up their currency relative to the dollar - thereby pricing their exports out of world markets, creating domestic unemployment and business insolvency."

Given a choice up to now, they've had to choose the least bad alternative. "Now they want out" as Medvedev explained in St. Petersburg saying: "what we need are financial institutions of a completely new type, where particular political issues and motives, and particular countries will not dominate." How so is the question, and can it work?

"For starters, the six SCO (and other BRIC) countries intend to trade in their own currencies" to benefit by what America "until now has monopolized for itself." China's central bank governor Zhou Xiaochuan wants a new reserve currency "that is disconnected from individual nations." It was discussed in Yekaterinburg.

These and other countries see America as "a lawless nation, not only financially but also militarily." It forces its rules on others but won't abide by them itself - a practice now intolerable, and there's more.

So much of America's budget is for militarism that the Pentagon faces overstretch while the nation is so indebted it's effectively a deadbeat with amounts impossible to repay. For countries like China, the problem is especially acute given its $2 trillion holdings "denominated in yuan."

A "return to the kind of dual exchange rates common between World Wars I and II" may be the solution - "one exchange rate for commodity trade, another for capital movements and investments."

With or without these controls, "foreign nations are taking steps to avoid being the unwilling recipients of yet more dollars" that face lower valuations the more of them America prints. If SCO countries and Brazil have their way, America "no longer (will) live off the savings of others....nor have the money for unlimited military expenditures and adventures." For these nations and many others, it can't come a moment too soon.

Stephen Lendman is a Research Associate of the Centre for Research on Globalization. He lives in Chicago and can be reached at lendmanstephen@sbcglobal.net.

Also visit his blog site at sjlendman.blogspot.com and listen to The Global Research News Hour on RepublicBroadcasting.org Monday - Friday at 10AM US Central time for cutting-edge discussions with distinguished guests on world and national issues. All programs are archived for easy listening.

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