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http://www.juancole.com/2014/0...
The Hateful Likud Charter Calls for Destruction of Any Palestinian
State
Aug. 4, 2014
By Jonathan Weiler

Since virtually every comment on Hamas in American media includes the assertion that the group's Charter rejects Israel's right to exist, it's worth noting the following from the Likud Platform of 1999:

a. "The Jordan river will be the permanent eastern border of the State of Israel."

b. "Jerusalem is the eternal, united capital of the State of Israel and only of Israel. The government will flatly reject Palestinian proposals to divide Jerusalem"

c. "The Government of Israel flatly rejects the establishment of a Palestinian Arab state west of the Jordan river."

d. "The Jewish communities in Judea, Samaria and Gaza are the realization of Zionist values. Settlement of the land is a clear expression of the unassailable right of the Jewish people to the Land of Israel and constitutes an important asset in the defense of the vital interests of the State of Israel. The Likud will continue to strengthen and develop these communities and will prevent their uprooting.

There have been some updates to the platform more recently, reflecting Israel's withdrawal of settlements from Gaza in 2005. But the Likud Party has *never* in its statements of principles, accepted a Palestinian State. Its electoral partner, Yisrael Beitenu, has likewise categorically rejected the possibility of an independent Palestinian State, insisting that the idea is nothing more than a ploy to facilitate the destruction of Israel.

The Hamas charter, of course, does more than just reject Israel as a sovereign political entity. It's a vile document that echoes some of the worst anti-Semitic tropes of the modern era. But on the central question of one side denying the other's legitimacy - it's hard to ignore the symmetry between Likud - the party of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu - and Hamas.

Agree. How many people who commit acts of terrorism (mostly Christian, not Muslim, as the lame-stream media would have us believe. See: http://www.juancole.com/2015/1...) are not engineers and what explanation do they offer for them for committing acts of terrorism?

The part that caught my attention was, "migrant populations, where people with engineering backgrounds have difficulty in realizing their ambitions for good and socially valued jobs." How about marginalisation and injustice as strong contributing factors?

You're attributing the ENTIRE death toll of both World Wars to Christian terrorism?

That's really good stuff. Keep at it.

Agree. How many people who commit acts of terrorism (mostly Christian, not Muslim, as the lame-stream media would have us believe. See: http://www.juancole.com/2015/1...) are not engineers and what explanation do they offer for them for committing acts of terrorism?
 
The part that caught my attention was, "migrant populations, where people with engineering backgrounds have difficulty in realizing their ambitions for good and socially valued jobs." How about marginalisation and injustice as strong contributing factors?

You could not be more wrong about the Koch brothers!!! They, are the most malevolent influence in the US today... you must limit yourself to nothing but the incredibly biased dirt from Fox News, and Rupert Murdoch! It is nearly impossible to pay attention to any less biased news sources for a better view of the poison they spew. Just between the two of them, they are spending close to a billion dollars THIS ELECTION ALONE to drown out any other views, and put as many senators and congressmen in their pockets as possible! http://www.rollingstone.com/po... http://www.kochfaqs.com/ http://www.bloomberg.com/news/... http://m.dailykos.com/story/20... http://www.juancole.com/2013/0... There are tons of such reports from nearly every major news source (notably NOT from FOX or Murdoch!). The only way you can, say they are "pro freedom" is that they don't want any restrictions on what they spend on campaigns, or how they spend it. The Bush administrations loaded the Supreme Court with justices that have been very regressive, such as allowing "Citizens United" to not only out-spend anyone more moderate, but ruling that such news outlets as Fox can report total lies on their broadcasts and it's okay because it's "free press". The Kochs complain angrily about union spending on political campaigns, but they spend TEN TIMES MORE ON ELECTIONS THAN ALL UNIONS COMBINED! Read up on the tons of dirty deals they were involved with, and then tell me how innocent and wonderful they are. The Koch brothers are the most INSIDIOUS siblings on the planet.

Dear coward

He also leaked tons of information about the unquestionably legal foreign intelligence activities of the US. There's no argument about that. It's a slam-dunk case and any lawyer would advise him to plea bargain for all he can, because he has no chance of winning in court.

Any "lawyer"? No hedging or dodging now. You're the one taking the moral high ground we're all looking to you to set the standards

This is the internet. Did it not occur to you that readers might use other parts of the internet to read opinion of lawyers that don't agree with that? Professor Jonanthan Turley (or is a leading expert in Military and Constitutional law good not enough?), Ben Wizner, Anatoly Kucherena, Robert Tibbo, Albert Ho, Jonathan Man, Baltasar Garzon. Which ones are not lawyers? ,No chance of a fair trial, and not a good idea to face one.

tl;dr You are wrong. You are so full of wrong if you're doing this for free you're a wrong-headed fool.

Bush, Cheney and Obama should man up – and turn themselves in – before Snowden.

[...] while Muslim faith prescribes terrorism.

That myth was debunked yet again this week by Juan Cole's Top Ten Ways Islamic Law forbids Terrorism. See: http://www.juancole.com/2015/0...

http://freethoughtblogs.com/ta...

I hope you can retreat to your imaginary world.

[...] while Muslim faith prescribes terrorism.

That myth was debunked yet again this week by Juan Cole's Top Ten Ways Islamic Law forbids Terrorism. See: http://www.juancole.com/2015/0...

Glenn Greenwald asks a more interesting and important question than /. encourages its readers to consider when Greenwald asks "What's Scarier: Terrorism, or Governments Blocking Websites in its Name?" and then he answers it, "More damage has been inflicted historically by censorship than by the "terrorism" used to justify it.". Considering how little of a threat terrorism is in the US relative to other known dangers ('Terrorism Still Less Deadly in US Than Lack of Health Insurance, Salmonella', 'Gun Murders vs. Terrorism by the Numbers') one has to wonder about other western countries such as France.

You are in more danger of being shot by a toddler, than a terrorist. .

It is important that people know who the 'hero of Vincennes' is. Way too many people are looking for an excuse to indulge their bigotry and attack muslims. Which is pretty much what the terrorists hope to make happen.

As long as the top level politicians are disciples of the cult of Politically Correctness the real problem, the problem with the Islamic barbarism will still remain.

That is true. Admitting that there is a problem with islam would be a very big step towards improvement. But since this is categorically denied, it is not possible to find a solution.

BTW, the vast majority of the victims of radical islam are themselves muslims. Maybe it is time for muslims to stand up and say, no, peeps, contrary to what political correctness suggest, we actually do have a problem in our religion, and here in the west it is actually possible to do something about it.

The point, rather obviously, is not to exterminate muslims, but to make the fringes of islam less barbaric.

But there's a problem also with assuming that there's a systemic problem with a whole belief system like that. Even if it were true (which I don't think it is, and doesn't seem to be from the muslims that I know) if you start saying there's a problem with this group you single them out for discrimination which is exactly the sort of response that the extreme fringes want you to do.

http://www.juancole.com/2015/0...

Just imagine - for five seconds what our response would be if, instead of illegals, Mexico decided to lob rockets at us.

I'll imagine, for five seconds, that this willfully ignorant talking point making the rounds wasn't debunked propaganda. Nope. can't do it.

They could have accepted (with negotiations) any of several peace offers, such as the Arab Peace Initiative

You mean a peace initiative heralded by a Massacre. The problem with the peace initiative is that those signing it have no control over Hamas. Do you really believe that Israel could have signed an Arab Peace treaty after the massacre and subsequent Intifada? The other issue with the Arab Peace initiative is that it requires return to the 1967 borders. The Arab League attacked in 1967 and several times after and now they want to call "no harm no foul"? The repatriation issue has the same problem.

The settlement Ariel is right in the middle of the narrowest part of the west bank, and cuts it in half.

If you mean the Arial on this map you are a bit off.

So when you let the settlers stay there, you're rewarding their illegal behavior and violence.

So by returning to 1967 borders and allowing people who left to clear the way for the destruction of Israel you are rewarding illegal behavior and violence. It strikes both ways.

http://www.juancole.com/2014/0...
http://www.politicususa.com/20...
http://www.rightwingwatch.org/...
http://jezebel.com/5923898/rep...

Cuba Flight 455 blown up, 78 people killed, Posada Carriles (who, BTW, was trained by the CIA at Fort Benning) escaped Venezuela to the US, and currently lives in Miami after the US refused Venezuelan extradition, on the grounds that he could be tortured if extradited. (Judges generally don't do irony.) He was tried, and acquitted, in the US for entering the country illegally, in the course of the trial his lawyers made the interesting statement that ""The Defendant's CIA relationship, stemming from his work against the Castro regime through his anti-communist activities in Venezuela and Central America, are relevant and admissible to his defense."

Although you will find barely a mention of the connection in the English language press, Juan Cole connects the dots.

which reminded me of an interesting parallel.

Iran has a nuclear program. Critics insist they're trying to build nuclear bombs. Iran insists it's for nuclear energy. But take their word on it because they won't let inspectors anywhere near it.

Interesting fact always left out of this storyline: the two nations raising the most hell over Iran's "nuclear weapons program", the U.S. and Israel, freely admit that Iran...has no nuclear weapons program.

The only way they see to "deny" what they are doing is shooting the messenger. "Independent" press has been attacking him since the start.

Watergate whistleblower Daniel Ellsberg:
“Richard Nixon, if he were alive today, might take bittersweet satisfaction to know that he was not the last smart president to prolong unjustifiably a senseless, unwinnable war, at great cost in human life. (And his aide Henry Kissinger was not the last American official to win an undeserved Nobel Peace Prize.)

He would probably also feel vindicated (and envious) that ALL the crimes he committed against me–which forced his resignation facing impeachment–are now legal.

That includes burglarizing my former psychoanalyst’s office (for material to blackmail me into silence), warrantless wiretapping, using the CIA against an American citizen in the US, and authorizing a White House hit squad to “incapacitate me totally” (on the steps of the Capitol on May 3, 1971). All the above were to prevent me from exposing guilty secrets of his own administration that went beyond the Pentagon Papers. But under George W. Bush and Barack Obama,with the PATRIOT Act, the FISA Amendment Act, and (for the hit squad) President Obama’s executive orders. they have all become legal.

http://www.juancole.com/2011/06/ellsberg-all-nixons-crimes-against-me-now-legal.html

http://www.juancole.com/2012/07/58-murders-a-year-by-firearms-in-britain-8775-in-us.html

http://www.juancole.com/2012/07/58-murders-a-year-by-firearms-in-britain-8775-in-us.html

at least a purpose was to replace an evil regime with a democracy.

A purpose was to replace the dictator Saddam Hussein with our hand-picked dictator, Ahmed Chalabi. Instead, we replaced the dictator with mob rule. Now Iraq has a hundred Saddam Husseins.

http://www.juancole.com/2007/02/3-month-record-for-us-troops-killed.html

Speaking of scams, Neoconservative Douglas Feith is teaching at Georgetown. So in the run up to the 2003 war, I’m told, Douglas Feith was challenged by a State Department official who knows the Middle East about what in the world the US would do in Iraq once it won the war.

State Dept. Official: “Doug, after the smoke clears, what is the plan?”

Feith: “Think of Iraq as being like a computer. And think of Saddam as like a processor. We just take out the old processor, and put in a new one–Chalabi.”

State Dept. Official: “Put in a new processor?”

Feith: “Yes! It will all be over in 6 weeks.”

State Dept. Official: “You mean six months.”

Feith: “No, six weeks. You’ll see.”

State Dept. Official: “Doug.”

Feith: “Yes?”

State Dept. Official: “You’re smoking crack, Doug.”

Feith: “Oh, so you’re disloyal to the President, are you?”

19,187 separate attacks? Can we get a citation for this? Or some methodology?

4.75 attacks per day in the world is a lot? Hardly.

You'll need to follow up on this yourself, but just to get you started.. . . .

If memory serves me, there are at least 20 countries experiencing either an Islamist insurgency and/or terrorism include: India, Iraq, Afghanistan, Thailand, Turkey, Algeria, Egypt, Somalia, Philippines, Saudi Arabia, Russia, Yemen, and others.

577 glorious pages of incidents at Iraq Body Count (The observant among you will notice that attacks against Iraqis haven't stopped despite the US pullout, so no, the war didn't end.

Taliban Attacks 100 Times per Day

Afghanistan: Update. Daily reporting from Afghanistan indicates the Taliban have sustained at least 100 attacks and security incidents per day since the start of the spring offensive. That is a high number for a group supposedly on the ropes.

From 2010 - Afghanistan: 57 Insurgent Attacks a Day (the insufferable)

Negotiations are certain to be part of the mix in any attempt to resolve the crisis. The military situation is getting worse. There were 400 attacks in the past week in Afghanistan, 60 percent of them by roadside bomb There were over 1,000 roadside bomb attacks in April 2010, twice as many as in April 2009.

This number of attacks per day, some 57, about 34 of them roadside bombs, is breathtaking. That level of violence is what characterized Iraq in March, 2005, before the Sunni-Shiite civil war. The year 2005 was a bloody year in Iraq, and nobody but then Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld doubted we were mired in a vicious guerrilla war.

That is only two countries out of the many marked by Islamist violence. What about Thailand?

Terrorism in South Thailand

Looking at the Thai news, one can notice that almost every day people are being killed or injured due to terrorist attacks in South Thailand. Federal Foreign Offices around the world warn tourists to visit these areas because of mortal danger

That doesn't include Iran's attempts to kill Israeli diplomats in Thailand, as they have in various other nations in the last several months.

Pity the Yezhidi.
The Vanishing Yezidi of Iraq

The worst incident occurred on August 14, 2007, when four coordinated truck bombs exploded in two Yezidi villages, killing at least 500 people and wounding more than 1,500. It was the second deadliest terrorist attack in world history after 9/11.

Of course there are plenty more mass casualty attacks. I'll leave that as an exercise for you. You could check out the Bali bombing, the 7/7 bombing, the Madrid bombing, plenty of markets being bombed in Iraq.

The US has been fortunate in that it has been able to foil many attempts by would-be Jihadis, but sadly not all, including the "workplace violence" of Major Hasan at Fort Hood (13 dead, 31 wounded). (May Justice be done upon him.)

Just a few recent reports from the US:
FBI’s Top Ten News Stories for the Week Ending January 27, 2012

Denver: Man Arrested for Providing Material Support to a Designated Foreign Terrorist Organization

You are confused.

You are spinning and rationalizing. And it's beneath you.

The US didn't ignore the ABM treaty, it withdrew from it as was allowed under the treaty.

Pedantry over "ignored" is noted, and met with...pretty much every treaty ever signed with any of the native tribes.

Bush and Obama aren't ignoring the Geneva conventions - Al Qaeda is not entitled to their protections due to fighting in an unlawful manner

The sheer, soulless, unmitigated arrogance in bombing weddings, rescuers trying to help the wounded and then finally bombing the funerals for the dead, and then having the gall to whine about "fighting in an unlawful manner"? Fuck that neocon bullshit. Either Al Queda operatives are soldiers and captured ones should be treated as P.O.W.s, or they are suspected criminals. Either classification carries rights.

There is NO third category that allows you to kidnap people and torture them, or simply assassinate them along with any poor bastards that happen to be standing nearby.

but captured Al Qaeda members are still being treated in a humane fashion at Guantanamo Bay prison camp

We've held people there for nearly 10 years, many of which we knew were innocent, some of which were even captured as minors. The president's of both parties have insisted they have no rights, with the current one even insisting he has 'post acquittal detention' powers. As in: Obama will keep them imprisoned, even if ordered released by a court of law.

A broad coalition of nations is dealing with Iran and its unacceptable behavior, but if it makes you happier - Iran has been threatening to attack the US, Europe, Israel, and various Arab nations for some time, not to mention making veiled threats of genocide, and engaging in an active campaign of terrorism and assassination around the world.

Every single word in those two sentences was a total lie. It's been 200 years since Iran attacked another nation - compared to dozens of first strikes and wars of choice for both Israel and the U.S. since WWII alone. Iran's "threats" have been retaliatory in nature, as in "we will strike back if we are attacked". Well, no shit, Sherlock. The "genocide" shit is another lie based on a willful mistranslation by the press. The 'torture and assassination around the world' shit is pure projection, as it's the U.S. doing that shit with CIA blacksites and drones.

The Secretary of Defense has clearly stated that Iran has no nuclear weapons program. But even if they did, they have every reason to want such weapons as a deterrent to Israel and their arsenal of 200+ nuclear warheads. The United States has stated that it will treat 'cyberattacks' as an act of war - guess what Stuxnet under U.S. rules? And of course it's actually the United States in violation of the U.N. charter with it's multiple belligerent threats towards Israel.

So, you want to walk back that hairball of propaganda and tell us just who is threatening who here?

In Iraq NATO got the regime changed, put in place a democracy, built up the military to defend the fledgeling regime from terrorists (sponsored from neighboring countries) and then left. There new regime is still shaky, but not really in danger of falling a part despite the Americans leaving Baghdad almost a year ago.

You have a pretty low bar for democracy. In Iraq we killed somewhere between 150,000 and 600,000 people, most of them civilians, and drove millions out of their homes and outside the country. There were entire neighborhoods in which Shiites massacred Sunni or vice versa, leaving segregated neighborhoods like the (Christian) Northern Ireland. The entire professional class left. Doctors were regularly being kidnapped for ransom and killed anyway. (Iraq had the best health care systems in the Arab mideast, and it was basically destroyed.) Political opponents are regularly assassinated. A lot of Iraqis are now saying that they wanted Saddam to leave, but things are now so bad that they wish he was back.

They don't have democratic votes as the founders of our country defined the term. People just vote for candidates of their religion or tribe (which is why the Sunnis are doing so badly). Millionaires and warlords run the country (OK, I admit millionaires run the US too).

George W. Bush was basically the dictator of Iraq. He could set up any kind of government he wanted. He thought he would be an FDR or Truman. He failed spectacularly.

GWB thought that it was easy. All you have to do is unleash the free market. “Think of Iraq as being like a computer. And think of Saddam as like a processor. We just take out the old processor, and put in a new one–Chalabi.” http://www.juancole.com/2007/02/3-month-record-for-us-troops-killed.html

You better hope the Republicans never get a chance to install their free-market solutions here.

Are they trying to catch real-world terrorists or Lex Luthor?

They are trying to catch you, the citizen, organizing to reform the financial elites that have ruined our economy and control our/their politicians.

These liberal blogs that I am following have been very critical of Obama:

http://www.salon.com/writer/glenn_greenwald/
http://www.americablog.com/
http://agonist.org/
http://crooksandliars.com/
http://www.juancole.com/

Dailykos mission is too elect Democrats. They are more partisan than the progressive blogoshpere at large.

Every ME country doesn't want Israel to have nukes either, but Israel says they don't friggin care what you think. Israel is one of the single-digit holdouts that refused to sign the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, even Iran signed it (which is why the IAEA routinely inspects Iran).

Why are so many people surprised the Iranian people want nukes? Their democracy was overthrown in a coup that the CIA freely admits orchestrating, they lost over a million people in the Iran-Iraq war, where among other things Saddam Hussein gassed their capital. Israel keeps threatening to nuke Israel and Hebrew-language editorial pages keep agitating for it. The US has put soldiers on both the East and West borders of their country, and Bush and the new GOP candidates are running on an anti-Iran platform.

From Iran's point of view, possessing a nuclear weapon keeps you safe. Look at how Bush treated Iraq and North Korea very differently as a result. Even so, Ayatollahs Khomeini and Khaminei have both said that nuclear weapons are a sin (so if they were caught making one it would undermine their power completely), the IAEA has said that none of the Uraniam has been diverted from power-production to weapons production, and many scholars think Iran's moves over the last few years are a "nuclear latency" tactic.

The Left was so used to condemning the Iraq war that they failed to see the important differences.
Top 10 Myths about the Libya war

I don't know what the British motivation is.

  I submit the Lockerbie bombing

Finally there is an opening to get back at Gaddafi.

This war effort makes for some strange allies because Gaddafi managed to sorely piss off so many factions. Interesting find at Juan Cole's blog:

A note: The resolution was co-sponsored by the Lebanese government, in which the Shiite party Hizbullah (Hezbollah) is a leading element. In part, Lebanon was representing the Arab League, which in some ways was the major political force (along with Britain and France) pushing for world action. But in other ways something more personal was going on.

When I was working for a newspaper in Beirut in 1978, I translated wire service reports on the disappearance of the great Shiite leader Mousa al-Sadr while on a trip to Libya. He was likely murdered by Qaddafi and put in a grave somewhere there. I once attended a lecture by Sadr in Beirut. He was a great man, charismatic and a force for uplift in his community and for outreach to other communities. He probably went to Libya in an attempt to convince Qaddafi not to send any more weapons to the factions there (such arms shipments and factionalization contributed to the long Lebanese Civil War). Lebanese Shiites, including Hizbullah, still lionize Mousa al-Sadr and despise Qaddafi.

Payback is a bitch.

Have you ever heard of any other military intervention where the US was aligned with Hezbollah?

See my previous comment, he did not threaten to erase Israel off the map. Sure he doesn't like Israel and hopes it will one day go away, but he did not say he would do it.

I can' t decide whether you're being willfully obtuse or not. To quote the New York Times, "Iran's conservative new president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, said Wednesday that Israel must be 'wiped off the map.'"

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/10/26/world/africa/26iht-iran.html

For a history of Ahmadenijad's almost countless threats again Israel, including calls for "Zionist exermination," see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mahmoud_Ahmadinejad_and_Israel.

He has denied it and the IAEA has said there isn't proof that Iran is doing anything more than building nuclear power plants, which is legal under the NNPT. I think Iran is pursing a policy of nuclear latency, rather than an actual policy of weapons-building.

Demonstrably false. UN Security Council resolution 1929 passed in June 2010 bans Iran from involvement in "uranium mining and production or use of nuclear materials and technology."

http://www.un.org/News/Press/docs/2010/sc9948.doc.htm

You don't get one of those slapped on you for complying with the NNPT. You get on for repeatedly not complying with the NNPT in a serious way over an extended period; and there's no reason for Iran *not* to comply with the NNPT if they really are just trying to build nuclear power plants. So, right now, Iran's behavior suggests they're trying to develop nuclear weapons capability and so the UNSC--including Russia and China--has declared Iran's nuclear program de facto illegal.

See my previous comment, he did not threaten to erase Israel off the map. Sure he doesn't like Israel and hopes it will one day go away, but he did not say he would do it.

Second, he is not actively pursuing nuclear weapons. He has denied it and the IAEA has said there isn't proof that Iran is doing anything more than building nuclear power plants, which is legal under the NNPT. I think Iran is pursing a policy of nuclear latency, rather than an actual policy of weapons-building.

Pesky internets with no facts at all; http://www.juancole.com/2010/03/israel-humiliates-biden-announces.html

No, his refusal to click on it shows that he knows about the claim that Seigenthaler killed Kennedy, which stood for months; the guy named Essjay who was put into powerful positions on Wikipedia after claiming he was a religious scholar even though he was a kid who was frankly a waste of carbon, and who was defended by Wiki-overlord Jimbo Wales even after it was clear what had happened; the man who was detained at Canadian customs because of false information in his Wikipedia entry; or any of the other billions of things that show that Wikipedia is a complete disaster and that human knowledge is made less, not more, by its existence.

Wikipedia has actual negative impacts on real people and is run by people like Essjay who really aren't fit to be sweeping streets, and attempting to defend it makes you look like a fool.

Do we really need to be scientific when questioning the credibility of a result we don't like and which (if it isn't the result of manipulation) reflects the views of the under-educated rural religiouly conservative masses?

Juan Cole politely tells you that you're full of shit here. He knows more about this than you do. Go read him.

There's a serious omission in that op-ed that misrepresents that 2:1 ratio.

Namely, that Ahmadinejad only had the vote of 34% of the those polled while Mousavi had 14%. So yes, technically that's 2:1 where the the sum total of both figures is less than 50%. Read the actual report linked to in the article, they highlight this rather important qualifying information by the big red text on page 3.

And if you look at the actual tallies for that question on page 52, question 27, you will see it's 34% for Ahmadinejad, 14% for Mousavi, 27% (!) don't know and 15% (!!) who refused to answer. Both of those are non-trivial percentages that can swing either candidate for a landslide win. This undermines the implication that there is strong support for Ahmadinejad, by a ratio of 2:1 to his closest rival. Seriously, that's an incredulous omission to make, nevermind the fact that the poll itself was conducted a month ago. It is in these past two weeks that voter's opinion would better reflect their voting preferences, you know, after the actual presidential debates.

Fivethirtyeight.com has a good write up of these points, explaining why the opinion expressed in the editorial is not supported by the report it cites. Juan Cole has another good explanation as well.

(The most interesting question on the survey for me BTW, was the question that asked about developing nuclear energy. A full 83% responded with 'strongly favour' while 11% said 'somewhat favour'. That's 94% combined.)

Refuted, yes, but Mr. Silver also states that rigging stats would be very simple so it's not a big deal that this is wrong. He gives a great link to Juan Cole who has some good questions and irregularities.

http://www.juancole.com/2009/06/stealing-iranian-election.html

Y'know, I've earned a lot of Slashdot Karma up to now, and I'm ready to spend it all for this. I can always earn more. Maybe that's what slashdot Karma is really for.

Fark isn't where I get my news any more than slashdot is - they are two of many aggregators I use to ensure I get the widest exposure, and then I filter using neurons.

Here's Informed Comment's spin. Here is a nice pic. YouTube has a lot of videos.

Another cool pic

At least nobody says that the CIA stole this one.

Y'know, I've earned a lot of Slashdot Karma up to now, and I'm ready to spend it all for this. I can always earn more. Maybe that's what slashdot Karma is really for.

Fark isn't where I get my news any more than slashdot is - they are two of many aggregators I use to ensure I get the widest exposure, and then I filter using neurons.

Here's Informed Comment's spin. Here is a nice pic. YouTube has a lot of videos.

Another cool pic

The type of genocide that the U.S.-Israel just love to carry out against muslims is the main factor behind the "linking" of islamic terrorists. http://www.juancole.com/2009/01/al-fakhoura-school-bombed-42-killed.html

What other explanation makes sense for going to war against Iraq? Hint there were no WMDs even Bush will admit that now and critics like former weapons inspector Scott Ritter were telling us that in 2002. Further 17 of the 19 911 hijackers were from Saudi Arabia, and none were from Iraq. Further as a secular dictatorship Saddam had no use for Al Queda, it's only AFTER the U.S. invasion that Al Queda appeared in Iraq.

Thus any idea that the war on Iraq is tied to U.S. interests or the war on (some) terror is sheer fantasy. If we really wanted to go after terrorism and it supporters we would have invaded Saudi Arabia and it's nest of wahabi Al Queda supporters, but we couldn't do that because they have the biggest oil reserves in the world and are friendly to U.S. corporate interests, right?

The two possibilities left for the Iraq war then are to steal the oil (or keep it being traded in Euros or some other oil variant) or defending Israel.

I seriously hope it's the former for I tremble for the fate of the poor long suffering Jewish people if it comes out we invaded Iraq on behalf of the Likud/AIPAC minority faction of Israel which is certainly NOT in our national interest.

So I stand by what I said, as bad and totally unacceptable as a few smashed windows are, they pale in comparison to 500 billion wasted dollars, 4000+ wasted American soldiers lives, and a million dead Iraqis all for a lie.

Impeach, convict and hang Bush for war crimes IMO. Bush in bombing domestic populations and for example being commander and chief when FORTY percent of the civilian buildings were destroyed in Fallujah is guilty of blatant crimes against humanity under the Geneva conventions which forbids bombing civilian populations:

http://images.google.com/images?q=fallujah&ie=UTF-8&oe=utf-8&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official&client=firefox-a&um=1&sa=X&oi=image_result_group&resnum=1&ct=title

(Warning disturbing graphic images of U.S. war crimes)

http://www.juancole.com/2005/03/fallujah-tent-city-awaits-compensation.html

War of aggression is what the Nazis were hung for at Nuremberg, justice demands equal application to all war criminals foreign or domestic.

Oh you're stuffed full of hyperbole. MILLIONS riot in the streets? Show me proof of that, or just concede you're exaggerating.

I'm aware of Turkey's woes. I get the feeling that if they just let people have the freedom to wear headscarves or pray without being bothered, they'd be fine. Dubai works that way, and you could wear a bikini or a niqab without problems.

In a recent opinion poll measuring what people in Turkey perceive as the country's biggest threat, the United States was first and Iraqi Kurds were second. Leyla Tausanoglu, a political columnist for the independent Cumhuriyet newspaper, says many Turks are skeptical of American plans because of the Iraq war, and are now suspicious of U.S. ties with Iraqi Kurdish leaders.'

Many Turks reason that the US is the military power in Iraq, and if 5,000 PKK guerrillas have safe harbor in Iraqi Kurdistan, it must mean that the US supports the PKK. (In fact, it is on the State Department list of terrorist organizations).

Before W. got into the White House and ruined the world, 56% of Turks had a favorable view of the United States and the country was a firm NATO ally. Last I knew, the favorability rating had fallen to 12%, largely because Turks are afraid Bush's misadventure in Iraq will blow back on them. Now they think the US is a greater threat to them than the major terrorist organization that has menaced them for the past 30 years! It would be like the English public saying the US is a greater threat than the Irish Republican Army, or the French public saying the US is a greater threat than the Algerian Armed Islamic Group (Groupe Islamique Armé). (analysis shamelessly stolen from Prof. Cole)

You have a mistranslated source there. The arabic term is 'wali" which does not translate as friend. A mideast professor agrees with me here. The actual translation here would be "O believers, take not Jews and Christians as tribal protectors over you; they are tribal protectors of each other. Those of you who make them his tribal protector is one of them." - 5:54

As for the second, your source is completely mistranslated. Here's what mine says when I look up 9:123
"123. O ye who believe! fight the unbelievers who gird you about, and let them find firmness in you: and know that Allah is with those who fear Him." It's referring to the polytheist Meccans who had laid siege to the city of Medina, not a blanket statement here. Murder is a clear sin according to the Quran.

The fact of the matter is, you could yank many of these things out of context or improperly interpret them through the language barrier. People have been doing it to Christianity and Judaism for years.

Date: Sun, 23 Apr 2006 15:34:18 -0400 From: "Cole, Juan"

The speech in Persian is here:

Sorry that I misremembered the exact phrase Ahmadinejad had used. He made an analogy to Khomeini's determination and success in getting rid of the Shah's government, which Khomeini had said "must go" (az bain bayad berad). Then Ahmadinejad defined Zionism not as an Arabi-Israeli national struggle but as a Western plot to divide the world of Islam with Israel as the pivot of this plan.

The phrase he then used as I read it is "The Imam said that this regime occupying Jerusalem (een rezhim-e ishghalgar-e qods) must [vanish from] from the page of time (bayad az safheh-ye ruzgar mahv shavad)."

Ahmadinejad was not making a threat, he was quoting a saying of Khomeini and urging that pro-Palestinian activists in Iran not give up hope-- that the occupation of Jerusalem was no more a continued inevitability than had been the hegemony of the Shah's government.

Whatever this quotation from a decades-old speech of Khomeini may have meant, Ahmadinejad did not say that "Israel must be wiped off the map" with the implication that phrase has of Nazi-style extermination of a people. He said that the occupation regime over Jerusalem must be erased from the page of time.

Again, Ariel Sharon erased the occupation regime over Gaza from the page of time.

d) Although the execution was botched, while Democrats and liberals bemoan dictatorships around the world, George Bush put 200,000 boots on the ground to try and bring about democracy in a severely troubled part of the world.

???
Are you serious? Iraq was a democracy. But we intervened, by sponsoring the Baath party (of all the groups to pick, we chose the most ruthless and coldblooded), just so we could have a friendly (?) face in power. All in the name of 'stopping the spread of communism'.