Seeking education under occupation: Palestinian children ride obstacle course to school-video

by Al Jazeera Unco-operative donkeys and checkpoints manned by armed soldiers are not obstacles most students have to face on their way to school. But for some Palestinian bedouin children living in the occupied West Bank, they are everyday challenges on their journey to get an education, as Al Jazeera’s Clayton Swisher finds in the [...]

The Lying Game

By John Pilger September 30, 2009 “Information Clearing House” – In 2001, the Observer in London published a series of reports that claimed an “Iraqi connection” to al-Qaeda, even describing the base in Iraq where the training of terrorists took place and a facility where anthrax was being manufactured as a weapon of mass destruction. [...]

Lebanon’s cluster bomb lessons

By Andrew Wander in southern Lebanon, Al Jazeera September 30, 2009 “He was picking grapes when he died,” says Khalil Kassem Terkiya, glancing at his wife as he recalls the day their son was killed by a cluster bomb in southern Lebanon. Greying and slight, Terkiya looks older than his 46 years: “A cluster bomb [...]

Israeli Arabs to launch strike against discriminatory policies

By Jean Shaoul WSWS – 30 September 2009 Israel’s 1.4 million Arab citizens are to stage a one-day general strike on October 1 to oppose the openly racist and discriminatory policies of Prime Minister Benyamin Netanyahu’s government. Jafar Farah, director of the Mossawa Center, the Advocacy Center for Arab Citizens in Israel, cited “ongoing police [...]

IAEA letter thanks Iran over notification

Wed, 30 Sep 2009, Press TV The UN nuclear watchdog, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), has thanked Iran for providing the agency with information about the construction of its new pilot enrichment plant. “With reference to the letter of 21 September 2009… from HE Ambassador Soltanieh to the Director General of the Agency Dr [...]

Is the Middle East heading towards the eighth war?

by Salim Nazzal, Palestinian think tank The result which the American envoy George Mitchell in the Middle East has come with was not unexpected by most Arab observers. In the view of the Arab thinker Klofis Maksoud the real aim of Netanyahu is to freeze peace and not settlements. The Israeli rejecting of a temporary [...]

Our Intelligence, and Theirs: Iran, nukes, and geography

by Justin Raimondo, September 30, 2009, source Ron Rosenbaum, journalist (the New York Observer, Slate.com), author, and one of the few liberals to sign on to the ill-fated Pajamas Media fiasco, is damned mad: “Will all the pundits who relied on the discredited 2007 NIE on Iran now admit that they were wrong? That they [...]

The Pathology of Evil

by Gilad Atzmon, source Israeli PM Netanyahu’s speech at the UN is a major insight into the Israeli’s mentality, psyche and logic. In his speech Netanyahu, a prolific and charismatic speaker, gives air to his genocidal inclinations, he brings to light the Israeli supremacy but he also allows us to detect some shaky and vulnerable [...]

“Israel”, Lebanon’s worst enemy: Poll

Wed, 30 Sep 2009, Press TV Results of a recent survey show that the Lebanese people deem Qatar as their country’s closest ally while Israel is considered as their foremost enemy. An opinion poll conducted on August 11-15 among people from different religious communities in Lebanon shows more than 86 percent of Lebanese favor Qatar. [...]

Night raids in Bilin target activists

 by Jody McIntyre, EI September 29, 2009 For the last three months, residents of the West Bank village of Bilin have been subjected to constant night raids by the Israeli military. The raids are in retaliation for their five-year campaign of nonviolent resistance against Israel’s wall, which is being constructed on the village’s land. The [...]

The Means of Power: Arabs in the International Balance

By BOUTHAINA SHAABAN, counter punch The battle the Egyptian Minister of Culture Farouq Husni fought for the position of UNESCO Director General was not a personal battle by any standard. Many powers had concerted their efforts so that this important position would not be occupied by an Arab, regardless of nationality and qualifications, whether the [...]

Another War in the Works

by Paul Craig Roberts, September 29, 2009, source Does anyone remember all the lies that they were told by then-president Bush and the “mainstream media” about the grave threat to America from weapons of mass destruction in Iraq? These lies were repeated endlessly in the print and TV media despite the reports from the weapons [...]

Hezbollah had Better Intel, Strategy, Tactical Command & Motivation than “Israel”

Al Manar 29/09/2009 “Hezbollah had better intelligence information than Israel and better control of its forces during the Second Lebanon War,” according to an official Israeli military scorecard compiled recently by a top navy officer. The article – which was given an award by Chief of General Staff Lt.-Gen. Gabi Ashkenazi – was written by [...]

False promise of integration for Palestinian soldiers in “Israel”

by Jonathan Cook, The Electronic Intifada, 28 September 2009 Demands from Israel’s chief commander this month that all Israeli citizens should be required to perform national service has turned the spotlight on a rarely discussed group of soldiers: members of Israel’s Palestinian minority. Though no official statistics are available, an estimated 3,000 of Israel’s 1.3 [...]

Gaza peace protester is imprisoned in own home

by Jonathan Cook, Foreign Correspondent – September 27, 2009, source NAZARETH // Nine months after he helped to organise protests against Israel’s attack on Gaza, Samih Jabareen is a prisoner in his home in Jaffa, near Tel Aviv, an electronic bracelet around his ankle to alert the police should he step outside his front door. [...]