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MIDDLEEAST.ORG
GAZA MASSACRES
ARAB and U.N. IMPOTENCE
"If Egypt and Jordan would break, or at
least
suspend, their diplomatic
relations with Israel,
then at least the world
might take note of what
is happening. But
their own dependence on
the Americans to keep their
police-state regimes
in power has them hog-tied;
and they know it."
MER -
Mid-East Realities - MiddleEast.Org - Washington - 4
August: The United
Nations Security Council will meet in emergency session today about the
Israelis. In the end, largely due to American pressures and
threats, it will do nothing other than issue another worthless 'plea
for peace'. And thus things will be even worse after the Security
Council meets than before; and the Israelis will have even a greater
free hand to rampage and kill at will.
The Arab regimes, and their pathetically weak Arab League, have issued
a variety of statements and appeals. But truth be told once
again hardly anyone takes them very seriously any more, not even
themselves. The Arab League has been fractured, paralyzed,
co-opted, and discredited beyond all hope.
Now if Egypt and Jordan
-- the two Arab countries that have peace treaties with Israel signed
under totally different circumstances and promises -- would
break, or at least suspend, their
relations with today's rogue Jewish State, then at least the
world might take note of what is happening.
But their own near-total dependence on the Americans to
keep their police-state regimes in power has them
hog-tied; and they know it.
The realities are
bleak; the future ominous. Gaza is already the world's largest
prison camp and the United Nations and the world community, in addition
to the United States superpower, all bear considerable
responsibility. Just in the past week alone, per capita in
comparison to the population of the U.S., the Palestinians in Gaza have
suffered fully three times more deaths than the Americans did on 9/11;
and probably 10 times more badly injured.
When the Security Council meets
later today and does essentially nothing, it will be one more huge
stain on the integrity and decency of that international body, and of
the international community it claims to represent.
Arab League calls for
UN intervention
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The Arab League wants the UN to save the
Palestinians
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Aljazeera -
Monday 04 October 2004, 2:06 Makka Time, 23:06 GMT: The
Arab League has decided to appeal to the United Nations to halt
Israel's deadly military offensive in the northern Gaza Strip.
The
Palestinians are faced with "a serious humanitarian situation", Arab
League representatives said on Sunday and called for aid organisations
to provide emergency relief.
The five-day Israeli military onslaught
has claimed the lives of more than 65 Palestinians, including
dozens of civilians.
After talks at its Cairo headquarters, the
League
asked Arab representatives in New York "to make an urgent appeal to the
General Assembly and/or Security Council to halt Israel's continued war
of extermination against the Palestinian people".
They will also call for international
protection of
the Palestinians "in line with the Geneva accords [on people living
under occupation] and international laws".
Permanent representatives of the Arab League
also
urged the Middle East peace quartet - a grouping of the United Nations,
Washington, Moscow and the European Union - "to live up to its
responsibility and move rapidly to take a decisive stand to end the
Israeli aggression".
The Israeli army launched an operation in
northern
Gaza late on 29 September that escalated a day later after a
Palestinian rocket attack killed two children in the southern Israeli
town of Sderot.
From
Gaza:
GCMHP
Calls for Immediate Intervention to Stop the Israeli Military Incursion
in the Northern
Gaza Strip
Over 66 Palestinians,
including 19 children, have been killed and at least 246 injured since
the Israeli Occupying Forces (IOF) launched a renewed incursion into
the northern Gaza Strip in a large scale operation called "days of
penitence". It is the largest and deadliest offensive in
Gaza
in more than four years.
IOF, reinforced by over
200 tanks & armored personnel carriers and Apache helicopters,
opened fire on the densely heavily populated Jabalya refugee camp and
residential area in the village
of Bait
Lahiya.
In this military
operation, IOF have demolished over 75 homes, destroyed large areas of
agriculture land & civilian property, torn up roads, and converted
schools and a number of houses into military sites. They have cut off
the electricity and water supplies rendering about 15,000 people living
in the area of the raid without water and electricity for 7 days.
Shortage of milk supplies and food is also escalating.
Moreover, the Gaza Strip
remains partitioned into three parts after Israeli armored bulldozers
sealed off the main coastal road. For more than two weeks, the Gaza
Strip is still considered a military zone, where entry and exist is
prohibited.
GCMHP warns of the
worsening of the health and humanitarian conditions if the IOF continue
their operation for weeks as declared.
GCMHP denounces the
Israeli military operation in the northern Gaza Strip and the whole OPT
and appeals to the entire world to act immediately and rapidly to stop
the attacks and prevent further escalation and deterioration of the
humanitarian conditions.
GCMHP calls the
international human rights organizations, the EU, and the quartet to
intervene immediately, and pressure Israel
to stop its military actions and respect its obligations, as set by the
4th Geneva Convention, in protecting Palestinian civilians
in times of war. (Gaza
Community Mental Health Program)
No
reprieve in sight for besieged Gaza
 |
| Tens of victims of the Israeli raid have been
buried |
<>Aljazeera - Monday 04 October 2004
6:42 AM GMT:
<><> Eight Palestinians have been killed in the Gaza Strip on
the fifth day of a huge Israeli offensive with army commanders talking of
a weeks-long operation. <>
<>Among the dead on
Monday was a child and a
16-year old girl. The teenage girl, Asma Dwidar died after being hit by
a bullet in the chest in the eastern part of the Jabalya camp in Gaza.
The child was killed by Israeli gunfire during
another army incursion into a village near Khan Yunus in southern Gaza,
according to Palestinian medical and security sources.
The killings came after an Israeli military
chief warned that the troops were there to stay.
"Our forces are ready to operate not just for
days
but for weeks," Israeli army chief Lieutenant-General Moshe Yaalon told
military radio on Monday.
Fighters killed
Early on Monday, Israeli missiles killed four
Palestinians in the northern town of Bait Lahya. Among those killed was
a Hamas field commander in northern Gaza, Dharif Masri, 29.
The army said the men were detonating a bomb
and a missile was fired at them from a helicopter.
The death brought to 73 the number
of Palestinians
killed by Israeli forces since tanks and troops swarmed into the
densely populated Gaza Strip last Tuesday. Hundreds more have been
injured.
A few hours earlier, Israeli occupation forces
targeted a local Hamas commander in a Gaza City air strike, seriously
wounding him, another resistance fighter and a woman, witnesses and
hospital officials said. The military had no comment.
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Moshe
Yaalon: Troops are ready to
continue for weeks
|
The
onslaught in northern Gaza intensified again late on Sunday when
about
25 tanks moved into Bait Hanun, the town closest to the Israeli border
and the town of Sderot across the fence.
About 15,000 people living in the area of the
raid have been without water and electricity for days.
Land seized
Israeli forces have also seized a
9-km area in Gaza to use as a buffer zone to move its towns out of
range of the rockets.
Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon pledged to
expand the area under Israeli control to stop the rocket fire.
"The forces will have to remain there as long as this danger exists,"
Sharon told army radio.
Sharon is committed to smashing
Palestinian
resistance groups in advance of an announced withdrawal of
settlers and
troops from the Gaza Strip.
The onslaught, concentrated in the Jabalya
refugee camp, has been deadly.
Palestinians
say the Israeli occupation forces have destroyed homes, torn up roads
and left a school in ruins. Toys, colouring books, and posters of
Donald Duck and Mickey Mouse were scattered in the dust.
International reaction
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A school
has been reduced to
rubble in the Jabalya camp
|
Previous
Israeli military operations have halted suddenly when civilian
casualties soared, and there are signs that the international community
is losing its patience.
On Sunday, UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan
called on
Israel "to halt its military incursions into the Gaza Strip, which have
led to the deaths of scores of Palestinians, among them many civilians,
including children".
The statement from a UN spokesman added:
"The
secretary-general likewise calls on the Palestinian Authority to take
action to halt the firing of rockets against Israeli targets by
Palestinian militants."
Resistance reacts
Palestinian resistance groups met over the weekend to
discuss the situation.
 |
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Ismail
Haniya (2nd R): Israel to
be pressured, not Palestinians
|
"Factions have discussed
how to supply the Palestinians with force elements to face this
aggression and protect the resistance, as it is the only weapon through
which the Palestinians can defend themselves, defeat the occupation and
attain all their rights," Ismail Haniya, a member of Hamas's political
bureau told Aljazeera.
"It is obvious that
there is a strategic Israeli plan being carried out to end
the
intifada, eliminate the resistance and break the will of the
Palestinians."
Pressure
But
Palestinian legislators, following an emergency meeting on
Sunday, issued a statement implying that resistance fighters
should
stop firing rockets at Israel.
"The Palestinian Legislative
Council,
while asserting our people's right to resist Israel's ugly occupation,
calls on all factions to put this resistance in a strategic frame that
is consistent with the Palestinian higher interests," the lawmakers
said.
However, Haniya said: "All
international and regional
establishments, including the Legislative Council, should not impose
any pressure upon the resistance and Palestinians.
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Up to 200
Israeli tanks have been
deployed in and around Gaza
|
"The pressure should be imposed on the Israeli
occupier as it is the one carrying out mass killings in Jabalya refugee
camp, Bait Hanun and Bait Lahya, in accordance with the United States."
Monstrous attack
On Sunday, Palestinian President
Yasir
Arafat referred to Israel's campaign as a "monstrous, criminal,
inhumane attack on our people".
He called on "the entire world
to act immediately and rapidly to stop the criminal and racist" attack.
On Friday, US state department spokesman Adam
Ereli
said Israel had the right to defend itself, but added: "We urge Israel
to avoid civilian casualties and minimise humanitarian
consequences." http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/336E5DCF-9936-407B-85BD-12FFFCEF6EA2.htm
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October 2004
Iran Next - Part 1
(October 31, 2004)
In a few days the American election itself will be history. The likelihood is the Bush/Cheney/neocon regime will remain in power; hard as that still is for so many to imagine and understand. Should the Democrats win the White House Middle East policies will be largely in the hands of the neoliberals and the super money-men like Haim Saban who when it comes to the Middle East and Israel have far more in common with the neocons than has yet been realized by many who will vote for them. Whatever happens on Tuesday next the build-up to attacking and if at all possible regime changing Iran is well underway and the showdown increasingly imminent.
Osama, Bush, Kerry - Past, Present, Future
(October 30, 2004)
Few Middle East realities have been heard during this long grueling American election campaign. Most of the rhetoric has been extraordinarily self-righteous and self-serving, disingenuous and dishonest. Sad and tragic as it is to have to say, for many in the Middle East and around the world beyond American shores, tactics aside, the words of Osama Bin Laden ring more true to their experience and perspective regarding U.S. foreign policy than those of either George Bush or John Kerry.
Fahrenheit 9/11 - Watch It On Your Computer This Weekend
(October 30, 2004)
Who would have imagined on 9/11 more than three years ago now that the top front-page story in the Washington Post Saturday before the 2004 election would be a picture of Osama Bin Laden addressing the American people! Reality keeps trumping fiction time after time in our era!
Escalating War Against the World after November 2nd?
(October 29, 2004)
Whether the Americans are lead by Bush and the neocons, or by Kerry and the neoliberals, the reality is that both of the great American political parties are today dominated by their super-hawkish Israeli-connected elements and that both are heavily mortgaged to major, however competing, segments of the Israeli-Jewish lobby in Washington.
ARAFAT - Pathetic Symbolism for the 'Grand Old Man' of the Palestinians
(October 29, 2004)
There is often such pathetic symbolism surrounding Yasser Arafat even as many of his people cling to his legacy as the 'symbol of Palestinian nationalism' -- itself nearly as tattered and frail as the Grand Old Man has himself become.
Bush Uncensored; Cheney Unauthorized
(October 28, 2004)
MAKE SURE TO WATCH THESE TWO VIDEOS
ABOUT GEORGE BUSH and DICK CHENEY
Gaza Scam + Dem Party Emails American Jews
(October 27, 2004)
The price for the past political trickery has already been very high. The poison of the Israeli-Arab conflict has spread continually for decades now and played a substantial role in bringing about today's 'Clash of Civilizations' whose end is yet in sight. The eventual future price for what is happening these days threatens to be higher yet, potentially catastrophic.
IRAN Attack Imminent?
(October 24, 2004)
Though few in the world may fully realize it, international society is now at a historic moment and the future, even a potential World War III, is in the balance. Hence the leaks coming from Washington from those trying to warn, and to prevent, what the top neocons and Israeli operatives are pushing hard to bring about. Hence last month's extremely unusual 'Israeli Spy Scandal' which had officials in the FBI charging people working on the Iranian attack in coordination with the Israeli-Jewish lobby with espionage for Israel. Hence, as this article by a former National Security Council operative suggests: "Intelligence circles report that both intelligence agencies (CIA and Pentagon) are in open revolt against the Bush White House." It appears to have been quickly written and then quickly internet published using LebanonWire in the Middle East.
Cheney Uncovered - An Unauthorized Documentary by the CBC
(October 23, 2004)
Reporter Jean Heller presented Soviet satellite photos which did not show Iraqi troops amassed on the Saudi border to the Pentagon.
"It's what it (the photos) didn't show that's more important. What you expected to see were tanks on the border. There was none that we could see.
I said, look, if you can prove to me that our story isn't true, we won't run it. And they just ignored it.
They have never shown those (U.S. satellite images) photos. Not then and not since."
New CIA 'Shocking' Cover-Up
(October 22, 2004)
Completed in June, mandated by Congress nearly
two years ago, the CIA Report that names names
is being suppressed until after the election.
"What all the other reports on 9/11 did not do is point the finger at individuals, and give the how and what of their responsibility. This report does that," said the intelligence official. "The report found very senior-level officials responsible."
Talk about American Imperialism and Chutzpah!
(October 22, 2004)
The reaction in many quarters must be 'Oh My God'. Bill, Hillary, and Tenet all seek higher office! Talk about American Imperialism and Chutzpah!
The WARLORDS of AMERICA
(October 21, 2004)
Regardless of what happens on 2 November in the U.S. election, one group or another of "the Warlords of America" will be in power in Washington. And the years now immediately ahead, regardless if the President is named Kerry or Bush, are quickly shaping up as likely to be the most dangerous in modern history.
America on the Edge
(October 20, 2004)
The amazing thing about this American election is that in view of what has happened in the U.S. and in the world the Democrats should be running away with it -- and yet they are struggling everywhere and likely to go down to defeat.
Israel on Road to being Pariah State
(October 15, 2004)
Indeed Israeli policies and attitudes have for some time now seriously poisoned political relations throughout the Middle East, substantially helped bring about the era of the 'Clash of Civilizations', and through the powerful Israeli/Jewish lobby in Washington pushed the United States into the invasion of Iraq and other militarist isolated policies whose dangerous and destructive ramifications will be felt for many years to come
The Next Generation of Palestinians
(October 13, 2004)
If what has happened in Gaza in recent years would have happened in the USA (adjusted for population size) more than 100,000 Americans would have been killed and more than a quarter million homes destroyed by a foreign occupying army using battle tanks and attack helicopters against small resistance groups in cities and towns.
AMERICAN SECRET GULAG EXPANDING
(October 14, 2004)
THE CIA has greatly expanded its activities throughout the Middle East including in Jordan and Egypt as well as Iraq, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia and other countries throughout the region. Of course the CIA and the Mossad are working more closely together than ever to control the region and enforce what is now essentially the militarily imposed 'new world order' first announced during the current President father's days in the White House. Before President Bush I became President he was in fact the Director of the CIA, whose main headquarters is now named after him.
AOL Censors MER
(October 20, 2004)
AOL -- one of the largest internet service providers -- is blocking and censoring MER. Persons who subscribe to MER using an AOL email address can not receive MER -- it is being secretly censored from their mailboxes by AOL without notice of any kind. It is believed persons working for AOL may be censoring MER in coordination with Jewish Zionist groups. It may be that AOL has a special relationship with Jewish.com and other Israeli-connected groups in some way. It is all being done in secret with no notice of any kind to either AOL users or MER.
A few of the messages we have received from AOL subscribers to MER follow:
Major Iraq Attacks on Hold Until After U.S. Vote
(October 11, 2004)
The Pentagon chief Donald Rumsfeld made an unannounced visit to Iraq in recent days. And soon after the American election the superpower military will be much more fully unleashed throughout the country preparing to push the U.S.-appointed strong-man Iyad Allawai forward in the carefully staged 'election' that will proceed if 'conditions are right'. In other words, just as Hamid Karzai was U.S. -installed and then essentially U.S.-elected in Afghanistan, the same template is now planned for Iraq.
U.S. Forces IMF into secret Iraqi debt 'forgiveness' scheme
(October 11, 2004)
But maybe most of all in the longer run, and unspoken now for all of these reasons by the powers that be, once Iraq's prior debt to other countries is 'off the books', the new U.S.-installed and CIA-controlled government in Baghdad is free to sign agreements with the Americans -- secret or otherwise -- that will essentially mortgage Iraq's future oil revenues to the U.S.A. and those it approves.
Chomsky on American Force and Pre-emption
(October 10, 2004)
"Bush planners know as well as others that the
resort to force increases the threat of terror,
and that their militaristic and aggressive posture
and actions provoke reactions that increase
the risk of catastrophe."
IRAN - Targeted by U.S. and Israel
(October 9, 2004)
You would think after the Iraq debacle that the ability of the U.S. to blackball, sanction, and then attack, occupy and regime-change another country would be considerable reduced. Not so however as this article in Z Magazine helps explain with regard to Iran. Indeed, soon after the American election the situation will quickly escalate.
The Debates - Fixed and Controlled
(October 8, 2004)
The moderators -- both from the Public Broadcasting System (PBS) -- could have, and should have, asked hard, probing, unexpected questions like this:
Israeli AIPAC Spy Scandal - Update
(October 7, 2004)
It was just a month ago that the latest Washington spy scandal involving the very heart of the Israeli-Jewish Lobby had everyone buzzing. Then it faded from view as the corporate media moved on, as CBS News which originally broke the story found itself under assault, and as the election campaign and debates took center stage. Interesting, not one question from the PBS moderators about Israeli spying, nor even about the U.S. veto of the Security Council resolution condemning Israel, nor the International Court of Justice decision doing the same. Here's an update -- however inadequate -- from yesterday's L.A.Times. Though the real heart of the story should be AIPAC and the influence, tactics, and status of the Israeli-Jewish lobby; instead they focus on just the individual and not as they should on the large group of support persons and organizations. This should especially include, of course, the current cabal of largely Jewish neocons in top positions...including the one who hired Larry Franklin (Douglas Feith), and the ones who hired him (Paul Wolfowitz and Richard Perle).
AOL Blocks and Censors MER Articles
(October 6, 2004)
AOL is blocking and censoring MER articles because of pressures originating with Jewish and Israeli groups.
Emergency U.N. Security Council Meeting on Israel
(October 4, 2004)
The Springsteen 'Vote For Change' Concerts
(October 5, 2004)
"The press has let the country down. It's taken a very amoral stand, in that essential issues are often portrayed as simply one side says this and the other side says that. I think that Fox News and the Republican right have intimidated the press into an incredible self-consciousness
about appearing objective and backed them into a corner of sorts where they have ceded some of their responsibility and righteous power." - Bruce Springsteen
Israel's Peacenik - Uri Avneri: Realities
(October 5, 2004)
"Uri Avneri, along with many Israelis and Jews, rightly fears that at some point Israel will be the direct target of blame for it's major contribution to having brought about such terrorism in the world and pushing the U.S.
into invading Iraq. It is an understandable fear;
for it is to a significant degree true."
Iraq is a "disaster...that will haunt the U.S. for decades" - Wall Street Journal Reporter
(October 2, 2004)
Iraq is a "disaster" that has deteriorated "into a
raging barbaric guerilla war" that will haunt the
United States for decades.
The Passion of the Bush
(October 2, 2004)
As the modern-day American-Israeli led Christian-Jewish crusade to remake the Middle East in the name of 'democracy and freedom' proceeds, this new documentary is telling indeed. It was first shown at the Republican Convention in New York a few weeks ago; and now, as a kind of Bush-loving counter to Fahrenhite 9/11, the DVD is being rushed out in advance of the upcoming election.
U.S. and Israel Prepare for Iran +
(October 1, 2004)
Even as the two branches of the American political establishment semi-debated last night who would fight the new wars better than the other, even as U.S. and Israeli battle tanks and attack aircraft bombed and killed in Iraq and Palestine worse than ever, preparations to either force compliance or attack Iran, Syria, Hezbollah (Lebanon), Hamas (Palestine), and North Korea soon after the American election are fast proceeding at the Pentagon and the CIA.
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