Archive for March 5th, 2008
ISRAELIS START TO TALK OF MOVING GAZAN – 20-day-old infant girl was shot in the head
SRAELIS START TO TALK OF MOVING GAZAN CITIZENS
The first tentative talk of moving Gazan citizens has begun in Israeli government circles. Israeli Minister for Terrorism against the Palestinian People, Ehud Barak, has suggested that Gazans be cleared out of areas where Palestinian fighters are launching rockets and mortars.
In order to ensure that they then stay out of the area one of two things need to happen; one, the Gazans that are removed will need to moved out of the Gaza altogether, perhaps to the West Bank, or as many Zionists would prefer, to Jordan or the Sinai in Egypt, or two, the Israeli IDF occupies the area evacuated. The third option, of course, is that they do both.
Pushing the removed citizens just further in to Gaza will create huge problems for the already overcrowded and under-serviced Strip.
The Israelis must realise, however, that in pushing into the Gaza this way, all they are succeeding in doing is push back the war front.
The Palestinian fighters will simply move their weaponry back and aim them at the occupying IDF rather than into Israel.
The Israelis will then need to push even further into the Gaza shifting more people out. One doesn’t need to be a military genius to see where all this is going.
Let there be no mistake about what the long-term aims of the Israeli Zionists are; they want all Palestinians out of the Strip which they will then occupy militarily and then eventually colonise with settlers.
THIS WAS ALWAYS ARIEL SHARON’S ULTIMATE AIM.
He knew when he decided to evacuate the Israeli settlers from the Gaza in 2005 that they one day would return. A Gaza Strip separated and isolated from the West Bank was never going to be a viable proposition any more than a sovereign state of Palestine is likely to be in the eyes of the Zionist Israelis and their neocon supporters throughout the world.
Barak’s excuse for wanting to shift the Gazan civilians is ‘to give the Israel Defense Forces greater room to manoeuvre and target rocket crews without endangering civilians.’ The truth is, the Israeli Terrorist in Chief has never in the past cared about civilian losses and has never been bothered before when he was an active terrorist himself about who he had killed just because they happened to be in the way.
The world needs to ignore the propaganda and rhetoric of the Zionist Israeli and wake up to the geo-political reality of what’s really going on here.
http://lataan.blogspot.com/2008/03/israelis-start-to-talk-of-moving-gazan.html
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Israel troops murder infant girl, wound her mother in central Gaza
The IOF troops murdered a 20-day-old infant girl called Amira Abu Asr, wounded her mother and assassinated a leader affiliated with the Quds Brigades, the armed wing of the Islamic Jihad Movement, during their incursion into the Abu Al-Ajeen village to the east of Deir Al-Balah, central Gaza Strip.
Palestinian medical and local sources told the PIC reporter that the infant was shot in the head; whereas, her mother was seriously wounded and her father was kidnapped during their visit to the house of Yousef Al-Samiri, a prominent Islamic Jihad leader.
Eyewitnesses explained that Israeli special forces reinforced by a number of tanks and air cover invaded the villages of Al-Karara and Abu Al-Ajeen and stormed the Samiri’s house amid intensive gunfire, adding that the IOF troops also kidnapped Samiri’s elder son and wounded a Palestinian citizen.
Later, medical sources in the Aqsa martyrs hospital stated that they received the body of Samiri who was reportedly killed after escaping from his house.
For its part, the Qassam Brigades, the armed wing of Hamas, announced that its fighters fired a number of mortar shells at the invading IOF troops and an RPG shell at an Israeli military jeep in the villages, while its anti-aircraft units warded off the Israeli planes.
The Palestinian people in Gaza fear that these Israeli military operations would be a complement to the Israeli massacre committed east of the Jabaliya town, northern Gaza Strip, which resulted in the death of 124 Palestinians including 40 children and 14 women, and the destruction of the invaded areas’ infrastructure.
A look at the military strength of U.S.-backed Colombia compared to Ecuador and Venezuela
A look at the military strength of U.S.-backed Colombia
compared to Ecuador and Venezuela
Colombia has been battling left-wing insurgents for more than four decades and enjoys close U.S. logistical and intelligence support. Venezuela’s military lacks combat experience but its air force has superior technology. Ecuador fought a monthlong border war with Peru in 1995.
COLOMBIA (includes army, navy, air force)
Regular troops: 254,300
Reservists: 61,900
National Police: 136,000 (many combat-trained and equipped).
Hardware: 115 combat-capable aircraft, including 22 ground-attack fighters, among them Mirages and Kfirs. Four surface combat ships
Defense budget in 2007: $5.1 billion
ECUADOR (includes army, navy, air force)
Regular troops: 57,100
Reservists: 118,000.
Hardware: 57 combat-capable aircraft including 31 fighters, among them Mirages and Kfirs. Eight surface combat ships.
Defense budget in 2007: $918 million
VENEZUELA (includes army, navy, air force, national huard):
Regular troops: 115,000
Reservists: 280,000 (estimated, fighting capability unknown)
Hardware: 94 combat-capable aircraft including 68 fighter jets including Sukhois, F-16s and Mirages. Recent military purchases include 53 helicopters, two dozen SU-30 Sukhoi fighter jets and 100,000 Kalashnikov assault rifles. Six surface combat ships.
Defense budget in 2007: $2.56 billion
Source: International Institute for Strategic Studies, AP
Vermont towns vote to arrest Bush and Cheney
Vermont towns vote to arrest Bush and Cheney
WASHINGTON (Reuters) -
Voters in two Vermont towns on Tuesday approved a measure that would instruct police to arrest President George W. Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney for “crimes against our Constitution,” local media reported.
The nonbinding, symbolic measure, passed in Brattleboro and Marlboro in a state known for taking liberal positions on national issues, instructs town police to “extradite them to other authorities that may reasonably contend to prosecute them.”
Vermont, home to maple syrup and picture-postcard views, is known for its liberal politics.
State lawmakers have passed nonbinding resolutions to end the war in Iraq and impeach Bush and Cheney, and several towns have also passed resolutions of impeachment. None of them have caught on in Washington.
Bush has never visited the state as president, though he has spent vacations at his family compound in nearby Maine.
Roughly 12,000 people live in Brattleboro, located on the Connecticut River in the state’s southeastern corner. Nearby Marlboro has a population of roughly 1,000.
(Writing by Andy Sullivan, editing by David Wiessler)
www.reuters.com/article/topNews/idUSN0454699420080305
The Big Question: Why has Colombia invaded Ecuador, and why is Venezuela joining the fight?
The Big Question:
Why has Colombia invaded Ecuador, and why is Venezuela joining the fight?
At the weekend the Colombian army crossed the border into Ecuador to kill a Colombian rebel leader, and 16 other guerrillas, who were sheltering there. The move outraged the government in Ecuador, which broke off diplomatic relations with its neighbour and helicoptered 3,000 of its own troops to the border area.
Colombia’s other neighbour, Venezuela, also reacted. It also expelled Colombia’s diplomats and ordered thousands of troops, tanks and fighter jets to the border. Venezuela’s fiery president, Hugo Chavez, also warned that war could break out if Colombia crossed into Venezuelan soil. It is the worst diplomatic crisis in Latin America for many years.
So what really happened?
The Colombians say they first bombed a rebel camp on their own side of the border. They claim that rebels hiding across the border in Ecuador fired on them, so they crossed the border to fight back.
The Ecuadorean president, Rafael Correa, called that account an outright lie: “It was a massacre,” he said. The Colombian troops were backed by military planes, suggesting the raid was pre-ordained. When Ecuadorean troops reached the rebel camp they found the rebels were killed in their sleep “in their pyjamas”. The rebels were “bombed and massacred as they slept, using precision technology.” Colombian military sources seemed to corroborate this by revealing that US intelligence helped target the rebels by disclosing that the rebel’s deputy leader, Raul Reyes, was sporadically using a satellite telephone, whose signal could be pinpointed.
What’s at the heart of the dispute?
In Colombia a left-wing group of rebels called the Farc – the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia – has been fighting the government for more than four decades. Their declared aim is a fairer wealth distribution in the country, which has a huge divide between rich and poor. But they finance their armed struggle by trading in cocaine and political kidnapping. Their base is in the remote rural regions of the country but they also take shelter in Ecuador and Venezuela which each have a porous border over a thousand miles long with Colombia. The Colombians accused their neighbours of turning a blind eye to the rebels’ presence – something Ecuador and Venezuela deny.
What’s the position of the three leaders?
Colombia is ruled by a right-wing populist, Alvaro Uribe, a Harvard-educated lawyer who is a staunch ally of the Bush administration. Since coming to power in Colombia in 2002 he has maintained a hardline policy against the Farc rebels, who killed his father during a kidnap attempt. Washington has poured billions of dollars in American aid to support the Colombian military. The president in Ecuador is a young left-wing economist, Raphael Correa. He has not minced his words in the current crisis. Colombia, he said, has “a foul and lying government that doesn’t want peace.” In Venezuela the charismatic leftist president Hugo Chavez, backed by his country’s vast oil reserves, is attempting direct the continent away from the influence of Washington. He called Colombia “a terrorist state” and described President Uribe as “a criminal,” acting for “the United States empire”. By contrast he called Raul Reyes a “good revolutionary”.
What were the rebels doing?
The Colombians claim they have captured the computer of Raul Reyes, who was the rebels’ main interlocutor with foreign governments. It reveals, they claim, growing ties between rebels and Venezuela and Ecuador. One document, it was said, showed that President Chavez had provided $300m to the FARC. In another letter the rebels offered military assistance to Venezuela in the event of a US attack. A third, it was claimed, showed that the rebels were in negotiations for 50 kilos of uranium to build a dirty bomb. Venezuela and Ecuador poured scorn on the Colombian claims. Journalists were not given copies of the alleged documents.
Why is the US involved?
As much as 90 per cent of all cocaine on American streets comes from Colombia, the centre of the world cocaine trade. Since 2000, the US has spent more than $4bn giving Colombian forces training, equipment and intelligence to hunt down drug-traffickers and eradicate coca crops. Since 2002 the Bush administration has conceded that some aid is now being spent to tackle the insurgency, even though there is evidence that all sides in Colombia are involved in drug-trafficking. Venezuelan officials insist they have information about links between drug traffickers and top Colombian officials.
The Colombian government has also played into American paranoia about the “war on terror”, characterising FARC not as an armed struggle to bring political change in a highly segregated society – split between rich families of Spanish descent and the vast majority of poor Colombians, many of whom are of mixed race – but as an arm of international terrorism.
What do other countries in theregion think?
They are worried. The big regional heavyweight, Brazil, which has mainly cordial relations with the three presidents involved, has demanded Colombia apologise to Ecuador. Brazil fears the conflict is beginning to destabilize regional relations. The president of Argentina is due to visit Venezuela tomorrow. Peru has urged restraint. Mexico and Chile have offered to mediate.
Could there befull-scale war?
Certainly the rhetoric is supercharged. Hugo Chavez has called Colombia’s President Alvaro Uribe a “mob boss” and a liar. “If it occurs to you to do this in Venezuela, President Uribe, I’ll send some Sukhois” – the 24 warplanes he recently bought from Russia. The President of Ecuador has said: “This is not a bilateral problem, it’s a regional problem… Should this set a precedent, Latin America will become another Middle East.”
But there is little appetite for armed conflict. The economic costs would be too high. Trade between Colombia and Ven-ezuela is worth $5bn a year, with food imports vital to Venezuelans suffering milk and meat shortages. Ecuador depends on some $1.8bn in trade with Colombia. Militarily Colombia is a formidable foe, thanks to $5bn in aid from Washington and US military advisers sprinkled throughout the Colombian army. The signs are of a climb-down. Colombia has indicated that it will not send more troops to its borders. And Washington, while backing Colombia’s right to defend itself, has urged dialogue.
Was Colombia justified in crossing into Ecuador to kill rebels?
Yes…
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The FARC rebels are the chief drug traffickers in a country which produces most of the world’s cocaine
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Rebels were being given covert support by both Ecuador and neighbouring Venezuela
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The rebels are major movers in international terrorism with plans to build a dirty radioactive ‘dirty’ bomb
No…
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It was a clear violation of the sovereignty of a neighbouring nation, and was bound to cause regional instability
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The rebels are not international terrorists, as Colombia claims, but leftists who want a fairer distribution of resources in the country.
Egypt leaks information about an American military action against Syria
Egypt leaks information about an American military action against Syria
By: roadstoiraq.com
on: 05.03.2008
Jordanian newspaper Al-Arab Al-Youm reported today, through sources that an American message leaked by Egypt to Syria shows that the United States is ready to launch a broad military operation against Syria if it insists on its position on the Lebanese crisis and this is the real reason behind the deployment of “USS Cole” in front of the Syrian – Lebanese waters
The source said that the official announced reason of Condoleezza Rice’s visit to Egypt is to push the Palestinian – Israeli peace process forward but the real reason is to explain the American military actions and the presence of the American ships to the Egyptian leadership.
Update
This is reported today “US waived congressional restriction on Egypt aid” … which says it all.
