Posts Tagged ‘Terrorism’
Friday, May 7th, 2010
George Bisharat; 7/5/10
Every May 15 since 1948, Palestinians across the globe have marked another anniversary of the Nakba (“catastrophe” in English), the term designating the destruction of Palestinian society attendant with the establishment of Israel. Beginning in late 1947, about 780,000 Palestinian Arabs were forced from their homes and homeland or fled in fear because of a deliberate campaign by Jewish troops of ethnic cleansing. The majority Arab population of Palestine was, by its physical presence and predominant ownership of land, a major obstacle to the foundation of a state with a Jewish majority. The expulsion of hundreds of thousands of Palestinians, therefore, was no accident of war. Indeed, close to half of the Palestinians forced or terrorised into exile had fled before Israel declared its independence, and thus before any Arab state intervened in the conflict. A notorious massacre by Jewish troops of Palestinian citizens occurred in Deir Yassin on April 9, 1948, five weeks before Israel was founded.
(more…)
Tags: Human Rights, Israel, Settlers, Terrorism, USA
Posted in Human Rights, Israel & Palestine, Terrorism, USA | No Comments »
Friday, May 7th, 2010
David Cloud, 7/5/10
The CIA received secret permission to attack a wider range of targets, including suspected militants whose names are not known, as part of a dramatic expansion of its campaign of drone strikes in Pakistan’s border region, current and former counter-terrorism officials say. The expanded authority, approved two years ago by the Bush administration and continued by Barack Obama, permits the agency to rely on what officials describe as ”pattern-of-life” analysis, using evidence collected by surveillance cameras on the unmanned aircraft and from other sources about individuals and locations. The information was used to target suspected militants, even when their full identities were not known, the officials said. Previously the CIA was restricted in most cases to killing only individuals whose names were on an approved list.
(more…)
Tags: Human Rights, Terrorism, USA
Posted in Human Rights, Terrorism, USA | No Comments »
Wednesday, May 5th, 2010
5/5/10;
Japan’s Prime Minister says moving all of a key US Marine base out of Okinawa is ”impossible”, breaking with past promises to move the base outside the southern island. It was the first time since Yukio Hatoyama became Prime Minister in September that he had officially acknowledged that at least part of Futenma Marine airfield would remain in Okinawa, which hosts more than half the 47,000 American troops based in Japan. Mr Hatoyama had frozen a 2006 agreement with Washington on moving Futenma to a less crowded part of the island, straining ties with the US. Yesterday he said ”it is impossible” to move all of the base out of its current location, saying that Okinawa must share some of the burden.
(more…)
Tags: Arms, Terrorism, USA
Posted in Arms, Human Rights, Terrorism, USA | No Comments »
Tuesday, May 4th, 2010
4/5/10; Matthew Clayfield; The Australian, No Internet Text; (2 Items)
Today marks the 40th anniversary of the infamous Kent State shootings in May1970 (photograph above by John Filo), when the US National Guard opened fire on unarmed students at Ohio’s Kent State University during an anti-Vietnam War protest. Four students were killed in the shooting and nine were wounded. To mark the anniversary of the tragedy — still known by some as the May 4 massacre — the University of Sydney’s University Art Gallery is presenting Kent State: Four Decades Later, a provocative exhibition opening next Thursday. The exhibition, curated by Ann Stephen and Luke Parker, features works from that time, including British pop artist Richard Hamilton’s 1970 screen print Kent State, as well as new works by artists from different generations. “The new work reveals how these contemporary artists are engaging new media and new audiences to reflect upon an art of social commitment, just as Hamilton’s historic work did for his generation,” Parker says.
(more…)
Tags: Terrorism, USA, Vietnam War
Posted in Terrorism, USA, Vietnam, War | No Comments »
Saturday, May 1st, 2010
Mark Dodd; 1/5/10
The UN should accept that conflicts today are not about gaining territory but protecting civilians. Angered by the rising civilian death toll in Afghanistan, Stanley McChrystal, the blunt-speaking US general in charge of the war, warned his commanders the conflict would not be won by the number of enemy combatants killed but by the number of Afghan civilians shielded from violence. Militaries, including Australia’s, disguise the killing of civilians with weasel word descriptions such as the odious “collateral damage”. Modern armies are increasingly aware that high civilian death tolls lose wars. In June last year, McChrystal said the problem was getting so serious that rules of engagement might have to be changed, including limits on the use of air strikes, too often a first response by jittery NATO troops under insurgent attack.
(more…)
Tags: Australia, Terrorism, UN, USA
Posted in Australia, Terrorism, United Nations, USA | No Comments »
Saturday, May 1st, 2010
Mark Dodd; 1/5/10
The UN should accept that conflicts today are not about gaining territory but protecting civilians. Angered by the rising civilian death toll in Afghanistan, Stanley McChrystal, the blunt-speaking US general in charge of the war, warned his commanders the conflict would not be won by the number of enemy combatants killed but by the number of Afghan civilians shielded from violence. Militaries, including Australia’s, disguise the killing of civilians with weasel word descriptions such as the odious “collateral damage”. Modern armies are increasingly aware that high civilian death tolls lose wars. In June last year, McChrystal said the problem was getting so serious that rules of engagement might have to be changed, including limits on the use of air strikes, too often a first response by jittery NATO troops under insurgent attack.
(more…)
Tags: Australia, Terrorism, UN, USA
Posted in Australia, Human Rights, Terrorism, United Nations, USA | No Comments »
Saturday, May 1st, 2010
Jason Kotsoukis; 1/5/10
The Israeli human rights group B’Tselem has released video footage showing an unarmed Palestinian protester in Gaza being shot by an Israeli soldier on Wednesday. Ahmad Sliman Salem Dib, 19, later died from wounds at Gaza City’s Shifaa Hospital. In video footage filmed by B’Tselem’s Gaza field research officer Muhammad Sabah, a group of Palestinian and foreign protesters can be seen walking from the al-Shaj’iya neighbourhood, east of Gaza, towards the double wire fence that separates Gaza from Israel. Israeli security forces have declared a 300-metre ”no-go” zone inside the fence.
(more…)
Tags: Israel, Terrorism, USA
Posted in Human Rights, Israel & Palestine, Terrorism, USA | No Comments »
Thursday, April 29th, 2010
Brad Norington, 29/4/10
It has become a running joke in the Pentagon. So much so, that it makes the famous Knowledge Nation diagram advanced by Barry Jones for federal Labor’s education policy in 2001 look like child’s play. General Stanley McChrystal, the top US military commander in Afghanistan, had his own acerbic way of describing the complicated PowerPoint slide. “When we understand that slide, we’ll have won the war,” General McChrystal told a room of army chiefs when he first saw it in Kabul last year. He drew laughter when he made his remarks, not surprisingly, but the PowerPoint slide was meant to be a serious attempt by military analysts to explain the task for allied forces in confronting the Taliban and winning support among the local population.
(more…)
Tags: Afghanistan, Terrorism, USA
Posted in Human Rights, Terrorism, USA | No Comments »
Monday, April 26th, 2010
Matthew Campbell; 26/4/10
U.S. helicopter allegedly fires on unarmed reporters – A US soldier who took part in an attack in which 12 people, including a Reuters journalist, were killed and two children injured has written an emotional apology to the victims’ families in Iraq. Ethan McCord is seen carrying the children to safety in a Pentagon video of the attack in a Baghdad suburb three years ago. The film was released on the internet this month by WikiLeaks, the website dedicated to publishing secret documents. “The acts depicted in this video are everyday occurrences of this war,” writes Mr McCord in an apology, which is also signed by Josh Stieber, another former soldier from the same unit. “We humbly ask you what we can do to begin to repair the damage we caused.” The release of the 38-minute video embarrassed the Pentagon and prompted indignation at the spectacle of soldiers from Bravo Company killing with the seeming detachment of video gamers.
(more…)
Tags: Iraq, Terrorism, USA
Posted in Human Rights, Terrorism, USA | No Comments »
Thursday, April 22nd, 2010
22/4/10
Argentina’s last dictator has been convicted and sentenced to 25 years in jail for kidnappings and torture during the 1976-83 military regime. Reynaldo Bignone, 82, was convicted yesterday with five other former military officers in 56 cases involving torture, illegal detentions and other crimes in one of Argentina’s largest torture centres, Campo de Mayo. Human rights groups say that of the 4000 dissidents taken to the army base, about 50 emerged alive. The base also had a clandestine maternity centre where dissidents gave birth only to have officials take their babies away to be adopted by military families. Bignone was de facto president from 1982 to 1983, but the crimes he was convicted of were committed between 1976 and 1978, when he was a commander at the Campo de Mayo base. Five other retired officers received sentences ranging from 17 to 25 years.
(more…)
Tags: Argentina, Human Rights, Terrorism, USA
Posted in Human Rights, Terrorism, USA | No Comments »
Wednesday, April 21st, 2010
John Lyons, 21/4/10
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has restated his government’s intention to build new Jewish homes in disputed East Jerusalem despite US opposition. His statement came as Defence Minister Ehud Barak said it would be impossible for Israel’s occupation of the West Bank to continue because of the views of the international community. Both men used Israel’s memorial and independence days to make the declarations yesterday. Mr Netanyahu dismissed a demand for Israel to stop building in East Jerusalem, saying construction had been going on since 1967.
(more…)
Tags: Human Rights, Israel, Settlers, Terrorism, USA
Posted in Human Rights, Israel & Palestine, Terrorism, USA | No Comments »
Wednesday, April 14th, 2010
14/4/10;
Israel will reject any moves by the US to set its own timeline and benchmarks for Palestinian peace talks, potentially establishing a new fault line between Washington and the Netanyahu government. Key Arab leaders, such as Jordan’s King Abdullah, have publicly called for US President Barack Obama to impose on Israel the parameters for negotiations, arguing that otherwise the process will stall interminably.
(more…)
Tags: Human Rights, Isarel, Terrorism, USA
Posted in Human Rights, Israel & Palestine, Terrorism, USA | No Comments »
Tuesday, April 13th, 2010
Isabel Kershner; 13/4/10
A recently amended military order that allows Israel to remove people from the occupied West Bank if it does not recognise their legal status could lead to the expulsion of thousands of Palestinians, Israeli human rights groups warn. The amendment – to a 1969 order on dealings with those judged to be West Bank infiltrators – was signed by military officials in October and is to take effect today. In the original document, issued two years after Israel captured the West Bank from Jordan in the 1967 war, ”infiltrator” was defined as a person who entered the area illegally from a neighbouring Arab country.
(more…)
Tags: Israel, Settlers, Terrorism, USA
Posted in Human Rights, Israel & Palestine, Terrorism, USA | No Comments »
Friday, April 9th, 2010
Tim Reid; 9/4/10
Gorge W. Bush, Dick Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld covered up that hundreds of innocent men were sent to the Guantánamo Bay prison camp because they feared that releasing them would harm the push for war in Iraq and the broader War on Terror, according to a new document obtained by The Times. The accusations were made by Lawrence Wilkerson, a top aide to Colin Powell, the former Republican US secretary of state, in a signed declaration to support a lawsuit filed by a Guantánamo detainee. It is the first time that such allegations have been made by a senior member of the Bush administration. Colonel Wilkerson, who was General Powell’s chief of staff when he ran the State Department, was most critical of Mr Cheney and Mr Rumsfeld. He claimed that the former vice-president and defence secretary knew that the majority of the initial 742 detainees sent to Guantánamo in 2002 were innocent but believed that it was “politically impossible to release them”.
(more…)
Tags: Guantanamo Bay, Terrorism, USA
Posted in Human Rights, Terrorism, USA | No Comments »
Wednesday, April 7th, 2010
Keith John; 7/4/10; (2 Items)
The Obama administration, facing questions about the legality of its drone program — a key part of US counter-terrorism efforts in Pakistan’s Afghan-border region — is pushing back with a legal defence of a program it only tacitly acknowledges.The UN and some legal scholars have questioned whether it is legal for the US to target and execute individuals in countries the US isn’t at war with. Mary Ellen O’Connell of the University of Notre Dame law school has called the drone program “unlawful killing”, and says it violates international law.
(more…)
Tags: Human Rights, Terrorism, USA
Posted in Arms, Human Rights, Terrorism, USA | No Comments »
Tuesday, April 6th, 2010
Jerome Starkey; 6/4/10
US soldiers dug bullets out of their victims’ bodies in the aftermath of a botched night raid, then washed the wounds with alcohol before lying to their superiors about what happened, Afghan investigators have claimed. Two pregnant women, a teenage girl, a police officer and his brother were shot on February 12 when US and Afghan special forces stormed their home in Khataba village, outside Gardez, in eastern Afghanistan. The precise composition of the force has never been made public. The claims were made as NATO admitted responsibility for all the deaths for the first time last night. It had initially claimed the women had been dead for several hours when the assault force discovered their bodies.
(more…)
Tags: Afghanistan, Terrorism, USA
Posted in Afghanistan, Human Rights, Terrorism, USA | No Comments »
