[Peace] News notes 041219

[C. G. Estabrook]

	========================================================
	Notes from last week's "global war on terrorism" [GWOT],
	for the AWARE meeting, Sunday, December 19, 2004.
	(Sources provided on request; a paragraph followed by a
	bracketed source is substantially verbatim.)
	========================================================

[1. IRAQ] Suicide car bombers struck Iraq's two main Shi'ite holy cities
of Najaf and Kerbala on Sunday, killing at least 62 people and wounding
nearly 130, bloodiest attack since last month's U.S. assault on the Sunni
city of Falluja. The blasts were not far from important Shi'ite shrines --
the Imam Ali mosque in Najaf and Imam Hussein mosque in Kerbala.  Shi'ite
leaders called on their people not to reply in kind.  Saddam appealed to
Iraqis from his prison cell to unite against what he called U.S. efforts
to sow sectarian divisions, his lawyers said in Amman on Sunday. Ziad
Khasawneh, spokesman for the defense team, told reporters: "President
Saddam Hussein urged the unity of his Iraqi people, regardless of their
religious and ethnic creed, to confront U.S. plans to divide their country
on sectarian grounds." [REUTERS]
	Air Force Lt. Gen. Lance Smith has admitted the Iraqi resistance
is "becoming more effective" in its attacks on US forces and Iraqi troops
backed by the interim government. [DN]
	Fighting has resumed in and around Fallujah. Last Sunday US forces
dropped 10 precision-guided bombs on parts of the city and seven Marines
died in the region making it the deadliest day for US troops since
October. Nearly 1,300 US troops have now died in Iraq. The US also bombed
parts of Mosul last weekend. In the city of Hit, Iraqi fighters ambushed
members of the Iraqi National Guard killing 7. In separate attacks in
Baghdad and Kirkuk, three high-ranking Iraqi police forces were killed.
[DN]
	CNN is reporting the State Department is planning to soon take the
unusual step of designating a television station as a terrorist
organization. The station, Al-Manar, is run by the Lebanese group
Hezbollah. The station is currently available in this country on satellite
TV. Earlier this week the French government also banned the station. [DN]

[2. MILITARY] The Pentagon plans to broaden its intelligence capabilities
by increasing the military's involvement in the kinds of clandestine
operations and human spy activities usually handled by the CIA, including
missions aimed at terrorist groups and those involved in weapons
proliferation.  It's an effort by the Pentagon to expand its role in
intelligence gathering at a time when legislation signed by President Bush
on Friday creates a national intelligence director. One part of the
Pentagon proposal is being drafted by a team led by Lt. Gen. William G.
Boykin, deputy under secretary of defense. Among the ideas cited by
Defense Department officials is the idea of "fighting for intelligence,"
or commencing combat operations chiefly to obtain intelligence. The
general reports to Stephen A. Cambone, who since 2003 has used his newly
created post as under secretary of intelligence to run clandsetine
operations for Rumsfeld. The idea of transferring paramilitary authority
from the intelligence agency to the military's Special Operations Forces
was among several prominent recommendations made by the Sept. 11
commission.
	This comes as the White House moves to rein in Pentagon spending
while the US faces rising budget deficits and growing costs for the Iraq
war, currently about $4.4 billion a month. The Pentagon budget cuts will
not affect spending on the war in Iraq and operations in Afghanistan,
which are paid through separate emergency allocations. The Pentagon is
preparing a supplemental war budget for 2005 that officials said could
total $80 billion, up from $66 billion the previous year. If the
Pentagon's emergency supplemental budget for 2005 is approved, Congress
could end up authorizing nearly $500 billion for the Department of Defense
for the fiscal year.
	Now as the Bush adminsitration prepares to submit its 2006 budget
to Congress, the military services are said to be trying to find areas
that can be cut. The Air Force and Navy could each be losing $4 billion to
$5 billion in 2006, officials said. The Navy also controls the budget of
the Marine Corps. The White House's Office of Management and Budget wants
a cut of $60 billion over the next six years.
	The NYT also fronts an investigation of the culture of suspicion
and paranoia among U.S. personnel at Guantanamo Bay that spawned several
false prosecutions by the Army of its own people. In the two cases
detailed in the article, the men charged were Muslims -- one a chaplain
and the other an interpreter -- whose work involved frequent contact with
detainees. Fellow servicemen began to perceive them as sympathizers, then
as conspirators, and finally as spies. The article describes the series of
events by which the men were brought to trial on flimsy evidence and
inflated charges (e.g., aiding the enemy by distributing baklava
pastries). [SLATE]

[3. BUREAUCRACY] The WP fronts a look at the FDA's lack of permanent
leadership under Bush, a state of affairs now being blamed for the recent
foul-ups there. The agency has had temporary chiefs for nearly two-thirds
of Bush's tenure. The article suggests that because the Senate must
approve permanent appointees, the White House prefers to bypass the
confirmation process by installing temporary, less-powerful leaders who
are sympathetic to the administration's more relaxed regulatory stance.
[SLATE]
	Congressman Billy Tauzin (R-LA) is retiring to take a $2 million
post to head the country's largest pharmaceutical lobbying firm. The
watchdog group Public Citizen said the hiring indicated Washington's
revolving door between Capitol Hill and the lobbying world has spun out of
control. Meanwhile Center for Responsive Politics reports the
pharmaceutical industry donated more than $200,000 to Tauzin's campaigns
over the past 15 years. [DN]
	The LAT claims that Democrats are uniting against the
adminsitrtion's plans for Social Security reform. They argue that Bush is
trying to create a political crisis where none exists: that the system is
not at all in dire straits (by current projections, it won't become
insolvent for 38 years), and that besides failing to cure the system's
financial problems, the president's plan to reroute funds to private
accounts could entail unnecessary risk for beneficiaries.

[4. MISSILES] A small example of one method by which propaganda works:
through journalists' use of the "objective voice" to describe the very
motives which they should be questioning. This from the Washington Post:
	"The Bush administration's effort to build a system for defending
the country against ballistic missile attack suffered an embarrassing
setback yesterday when an interceptor missile failed to launch during the
first flight test of the system in two years."
	Certainly, there is more to be said on why "missile defense" is a
first strike weapon. And, certainly, there is more to be considered in
terms of the role of corporate profiteering in such project. But note how
the above graph cuts the discussion: the Bush administration's effort to
build a system for defending the country. Once that framework is presented
and accepted, all criticisms look silly. What's a few billion in an effort
to defend the country? So a few tests fail. So a few well-connected
corporations make a buck. It's an effort to defend the country. A piece
that starts like that mainly reinforces the propaganda system, no matter
how critical the rest of the contents. [underthesamesun.org]
	Canadian Prime Minister Paul Martin said Tuesday he does not
believe the U.S. ballistic missile shield will succeed in shooting down
incoming rockets, as he threw up new roadblocks to counter President
George W. Bush's strong appeal for Canada to join his continental defence
plan. Canada will not put any money into building the missile shield and
it will not allow Washington to station rockets on Canadian soil as the
price of participation in the multibillion-dollar program, Martin told
Global National in a year-end interview. In another issue that could cause
friction with Bush, Martin said Canada was prepared to accept U.S.
citizens who do not want to serve in the war in Iraq. "In terms of
immigration, we are a country of immigrants and we will take immigrants
from around the world. I'm not going to discriminate," said Martin, when
reminded that former prime minister Pierre Trudeau opened Canada's doors
to draft dodgers and deserters during the Vietnam War. [Windsor Star]

[5. POODLE] The Guardian of London reports Britain is facing a near
constitutional crisis following Thursday's high court ruling condemning
the government's anti-terror laws. The court ruled the British government
can not indefinitely detain foreign terrorism suspects without trying them
in court. The decision came less than 24 hours after the main architect of
the law, Home Secretary David Blunkett, resigned over a personal scandal.
In court, one judge declared the anti-terror laws posed a threat to the
British people. He said, "The real threat to the life of the nation...
comes not from terrorism but from laws such as these." Another judge said
the legislation reminded him of "Soviet Russia in the Stalinist era."
	New questions have emerged over whether a top British government
scientist was murdered last year. The scientist, David Kelly, was found
dead shortly it was revealed that he was the source of a BBC report that
questioned the veracity of the government's report on Iraq's weapons of
mass destruction. Officials at the time said he had committed suicide by
slashing his wrists. But now the two paramedics who treated Kelly at the
scene have come forward to tell the Observer newspaper that Kelly could
not have died from the wound they saw on his wrist.

[6. CLIENT] Mossad, the Israeli spy agencey, is accused of attempting to
kill a senior Palestinian militant in a car-bombing in the Syrian capital,
Damascus. Two people were wounded in the blast. Witnesses say the bomb was
planted under the driver's seat of the car and exploded just moments after
the Hamas member and his daughter got out of the vehicle. [ABC]
	The Israeli soldier on trial for killing 22-year-old British peace
activist Tom Hurndall in the Gaza Strip has admitted he was lying when he
said his victim was carrying a gun. This according to the Guardian of
London. Hurndall was killed in April 2003 as he tried to shelter children
from Israeli gunfire. On the witness stand Israeli Sergeant Idier Wahid
Taysir said he was under orders to open fire even on unarmed people. [DN]
	In Gaza, five Israeli soldiers were killed by a bomb buried
beneath their outpost; the worst Palestinian attack in months.  [SLATE]

[7. NON-VIOLENCE] A new audio tape purportedly recorded by Osama bin Laden
has appeared on the Internet. On the tape, the man identified as Bin
Laden, praises last month's months attack on the US consulate in Saudi
Arabia and criticized the Saudi regime as being controlled by the United
States. [DN] He tells Saudis to try non-violent protest. "Matters have
exceeded all bounds," he said, "and when the people move to ask for their
rights, security agencies cannot stop them." [SLATE]

[8. TORTURE] A Briton released from the U.S. prison camp at Guantanamo
Bay, Cuba, told Europe's top human rights body Friday he was beaten,
shackled, kept in a cramped cage and fed rotten food as part of
"systematic abuse" in custody. Jamal al-Harith's testimony before a
Council of Europe panel came as part of an inquiry by the body into human
rights abuses at the U.S. prison camp to be made public in a report due
out early next year. Reading from a 10-page statement, al-Harith described
his two-year detention at Guantanamo Bay as a period of continual
mistreatment that ranged from humiliation and 15-hour interrogations to
physical abuse he said left scars. [AP]
	Within the heavily guarded perimeters of the Defense Department's
much-discussed Guantanamo Bay prison in Cuba, the CIA has maintained a
detention facility for valuable al Qaeda captives that has never been
mentioned in public, according to the Washington Post. Most international
terrorism suspects in U.S. custody are held not by the CIA but by the
Defense Department at the Guantanamo Bay prison. They are guaranteed
access to the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) and, as a
result of a U.S. Supreme Court ruling this year, have the right to
challenge their imprisonment in federal courts. CIA detainees, by
contrast, are held under separate rules and far greater secrecy. Under a
presidential directive and authorities approved by administration lawyers,
the CIA is allowed to capture and hold certain classes of suspects without
accounting for them in any public way and without revealing the rules for
their treatment. The roster of CIA prisoners is not public, but current
and former U.S. intelligence officials say the agency holds the most
valuable al Qaeda leaders and many mid-level members with knowledge of the
group's logistics, financing and regional operations ... The CIA is
believed to be holding about three dozen al Qaeda leaders in undisclosed
locations ... CIA detention facilities have been located on an off-limits
corner of the Bagram air base in Afghanistan, on ships at sea and on
Britain's Diego Garcia island in the Indian Ocean ... Army officials
investigating the Abu Ghraib prison scandal concluded that the CIA had
held "ghost detainees" at the prison, inmates who were not registered or
officially acknowledged, a violation of military rules.
	More evidence has emerged that US troops in Iraq carried out
extensive torture inside Iraqi jails. Newly released military documents
show Marines carried out mock executions, used electric shocks and burned
prisoners. The documents obtained through the Freedom of Information Act
has revealed that at least 13 Marines were court martialed for taking part
in the abuse. Some were jailed. The names of the Marines were blacked out
of the documents. None of there cases had been previously reported. In one
case, three marines were convicted after they "ordered four juvenile Iraqi
looters to kneel beside two shallow fighting holes and a pistol was
discharged to conduct a mock execution". The American Civil Liberties
Union, which obtained the documents, has accused the Pentagon of
withholding more information on torture in Iraq. Meanwhile the Pentagon
has admitted that at least eight detainees have died in US custody in
Afghanistan. The admission came following a critical report by Human
Rights Watch that assailed the military's "culture of impunity" on
prisoner abuse. [DN]
	The WSJournal notices inside that six months after the White House
disavowed a Justice Department memo that essentially justified torture,
the administration has not gotten around to giving intel agencies and the
military a new set of legal guidelines for interrogations. Apparently,
some in the administration don't think it's worth the potential trouble.
[SLATE]

[9. DOMESTIC] The Washington Post reports two police officers recently
visited the home of a Virginia 11-year-old and questioned his parents for
three hours about anti-American comments their son made in school. The
student had refused to participate in a Veterans Day exercise and
criticized the Marines. The school claimed he had said, "I wish all
Americans were dead and that American soldiers should die." The Police
questioned his parents about their views on Sept. 11, the military and if
they knew any foreigners who criticized US policy. They also inquired
whether the parents might be teaching "anti-American values" at home. [DN]

[10. BUYING] The Associated Press is reporting the Bush administration
spent more than $65 million over the past two years in the lead-up to last
month's election in Ukraine. Russian president Vladimir Putin has charged
Washington with interfering with Ukraine's internal affairs. Some of the
money was spent to bring opposition leader Viktor Yushchenko to Washington
to meet US leaders as well as to underwrite the exit polls that indicated
he won the disputed election.
	Meanwhile, USA Today's Tuesday lead says U.S. programs to help
Russia secure and destroy its nuclear and chemical weapons stockpile are
years behind schedule. The paper mostly blames growing Russian resistance
to giving the U.S. access and says the pact governing the programs, which
expires in June 2006, may not get renewed ... last year USAT said the
administration was opposed to renewing the pact. [SLATE]

[11. WARMING] As the first signs of winter push into the Northeast,
researchers have some good news for fair weather fans - spring is coming
earlier than it used to. The lilacs say so. In one of the most
comprehensive studies that plants in the Northeast are responding to the
global warming trend, Cornell scientists and their colleagues at the
University of Wisconsin found lilacs are blooming about four days earlier
than they did in 1965 ... Earlier this year, Harvard University scientists
also reported finding evidence of earlier flowering in specimens at the
Arnold Arboretum in Boston, while botanists at the Smithsonian Institution
in Washington, D.C. found the city's Japanese cherry trees are blooming
about a week earlier than they were 30 years ago ... Cornell researchers
analyzed data from 72 locations throughout the Northeast where genetically
identical lilacs were planted during the 1960s and 1970s as part of a
joint U.S. Department of Agriculture-funded project involving Cornell and
the University of Vermont. The lilacs were planted to help farmers predict
planting and harvest dates, but have now provided scientists with a
historical record of bloom dates. [AP]
	Inuit plan to file claims that the U.S. is threatening their
existence by contributing to and effectively ignoring global warming. The
case will be filed to the Organization of American States, which doesn't
have enforcement powers. [SLATE]
	The Geneva-based World Meteorological Organization has announced
that 2004 is on track to being the fourth-hottest year since
record-keeping began in 1861. The years ahead of it are 1998, 2002, and
2003.

[12. THUGGERY] The White House is in search of a new homeland security
director following Friday's surprise announcement from former New York
Police Commissioner Bernard Kerik that he was withdrawing his name ...
there has been wide speculation that the nanny issue was just the tip of
the iceberg. Hours before his announcement, Newsweek had uncovered that an
arrest warrant was issued for Kerik in 1988 over a dispute involving
unpaid bills. The Daily News has since reported that Kerik had illegally
accepted thousands of dollars in cash and gifts while a public official.
The Wall Street Journal raised questions about his connection to the stun
gun manufacturer Taser and how he made millions in a recent stock sale.
Questions were also raised about his failure in Iraq to train a new Iraqi
police force as well as his misuse of police power while the head of the
New York police department. Despite Kerik's past, his announcement Friday
still came as a surprise in part because no top Democrat had opposed his
nomination. New York Senators Hillary Clinton and Charles Schumer had both
repeatedly praised his qualifications. Kerik reportedly will now return to
working for Rudolph Giuliani's firm Giuliani Partners. [DN]
	The New York Times weighs in on Kerik's web of relationships "with
officials of a New Jersey construction company long suspected ... of
connections to organized crime," and the New York Daily News reports that
Kerik "conducted two extramarital affairs simultaneously." ... Joyce
Purnick writes that in allowing Bush to nominate him, "Kerik was acting as
a graduate of the willful Giuliani administration," where he was
"accustomed to working in a climate that celebrated audacity and protected
insiders." [CURSOR]
	Skeletons Pour From Kerik's Closet.  Bernard Kerik took another
skewering in New York City newspapers on Wednesday. The former nominee to
become the nation's Homeland Security chief came under attack on three
fronts:
	# Newsday reported that Kerik has been married three times, and
appears to have concealed the existence of his first marriage. The
newspaper said that even Kerik's friends were unaware of the first union,
and that Kerik had made no mention of the marriage in his autobiography.
	# WCBS-TV reported that a Manhattan apartment Kerik reportedly
used to conduct extramarital affairs with two women overlooked Ground Zero
and was supposed to be for the use of exhausted 9/11 workers.
	# The New York Daily News raised fresh questions about Kerik's
personal finances. The newspaper said Kerik had been able to carry out a
lavish renovation of two apartments in 1999 despite the fact that he
appeared to have a cash shortage...
	Other press reports claim that around the time of the reported
affairs, Kerik accepted unreported gifts of thousands of dollars in cash
and other items from associates at a New Jersey construction company while
serving under Giuliani. Authorities suspect the company, Interstate
Industrial Corp., has ties to organized crime. [CBS/AP]

[13. CENSORSHIP] Muslim scholar Tariq Ramadan, a Swiss citizen, resigned
his appointment to the University of Notre Dame on Tuesday, four months
after the Bush administration revoked the scholar's work visa before he
could take up his teaching position ... Many who have rallied in support
of Ramadan believe the scholar's sharp criticism of Israel, the war in
Iraq and U.S. policy in the Mideast was the reason for the revocation. At
the time, the Department of Homeland Security said the decision was based
on "public safety or national security interests" and pointed to federal
law applying to aliens who have used a "position of prominence ... to
endorse or espouse terrorist activity." State Department spokesman Richard
Boucher said the case had been under review, but that Ramadan's
resignation would end the review process. [AP]
	Artwork in an exhibition that drew thousands to the Chelsea Market
for its opening last week was abruptly taken down over the weekend after
the market's managers complained about a portrait of President Bush
fashioned from tiny images of chimpanzees ... Bucky Turco, who organized
the show, said that a market director had expressed reservations about the
Bush portrait, a small colorful painting by Christopher Savido that from
afar appears to be a likeness of the president but viewed up close reveals
chimps swimming in a marshy landscape. [NYT]

[14. HUMANITARIANISM] The head of the British Red Cross has warned that
the Bush administration's "war on terror" has threatened the capacity of
the Red Cross and Red Crescent to operate in areas of conflict. While
visiting Iraq Sir Nicholas Young said "I had a very strong sense that we
were regarded as the occupying powers. And this was something I hadn't
felt before." Young said the Red Cross's mission was severely jeopardized
when Secretary of State Colin Powell called humanitarian aid "an important
part of our combat force" in Iraq. Young also told the Guardian of London
that the US-led coalition has been in defiance of international law in
Iraq. [DN]

[15. CARIBBEAN] In news from Cuba, the country's armed forces are
conducting its biggest military exercise in almost 20 years. Hundreds of
thousands of troops and millions of civilians are expected to participate.
The exercise is meant to be a warning to Washington that Cuba defend
itself against a US attack. Meanwhile Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez has
traveled to Havana to meet with Cuban President Fidel Castro. They
announced the formation of a new trade bloc to challenge the Free Trade
Area of the Americas. [DN]

[16. HOMELESSNESS] And the number of hungry and homeless in the country
has increased for the 20th year in a row. Requests for emergency food
increased by 14 percent and the requests for shelter increased by six
percent. The figures were released in a report issued Tuesday by the U.S.
Conference of Mayors. [DN]

[17. IRAN] The Pakistani newspaper The Daily Times is reporting US forces
have begun building a new military base in Afghanistan near the border of
Iran. Some military commentators have said the development could be linked
to rising tensions between the United States and Iran, but the US military
and the Afghan government say the base is being built for the Afghan
National Army. Meanwhile the Atlantic Monthly has revealed that Pentagon
planners recently carried out simulated attacks on Iran to determine the
effectiveness of a military strike on Iranian bases and nuclear
facilities. The war games reportedly also considered a ground invasion.
[DN]

[18. GUARD] USA Today leads Monday with its own analysis showing that Army
National Guard troops in Iraq are one-third more likely to be killed than
their active-duty counterparts. Despite the SecDef's comments to the
contrary, reports from the field suggest that National Guard often do have
worse equipment and training than active duty troops. [SLATE]

[19. SPYING] The Bush administration has begun spying on the head of the
United Nation's International Atomic Energy Agency in an attempt to
uncover information that could lead to his ouster. This according to the
Washington Post. The US reportedly has tapped Mohammad ElBaradei's phones
and intercepted dozens of calls. The Bush administration has been at odds
with ElBaradei since he rightly stated there were no weapons of mass
destruction in Iraq. This is the third report over the past two years of
the Bush administration or its allies spying on officials at the United
Nations. In March 2003, the Observer newspaper revealed that the National
Security Agency had ordered increased eavesdropping on UN diplomats ahead
of the Security Council vote on Iraq. Earlier this year former British
cabinet minister Clare Short revealed British spies had eavesdropped on
U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan.
	The Department of Homeland Security has begun experimenting with a
massive privately-run computer database that allows investigators to match
financial transactions against a financial watch list of some 250,000
people and firms. The New York Times reports the watch lists reportedly
contains people with suspected ties to terrorist financing, drug
trafficking, money laundering and other financial crimes. The program is
being developed by a British company called World-Check that gathers data
from 140,000 public sources. Marc Rotenberg, executive director of the
Electronic Privacy Information Center said the government likely
outsourced the project to a private firm in order to circumvent US privacy
laws. Rotenberg said "There's a real risk in a situation like this because
there's really no accountability. People can find themselves on a watch
list incorrectly, and the consequences can be very serious."

[20. SECRECY] Want to see the federal government's regulation authorizing
airport security personnel to pat you down before boarding a plane? You
can't. It's a secret rule.
	Would you like to read the government regulation that says all
passengers must present identification before being allowed on an
aircraft, or what sort of identification meets the government requirement?
Sorry, you're out of luck. That's a secret law, too.
	They're just two of several secret regulations issued after the
Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks. The intelligence bill that Congress
sent to President Bush this week establishes a new "privacy council"
that's responsible for reviewing government activities and ensuring that
privacy rights of Americans are protected.
	The secret laws are affecting ordinary Americans, from no-fly
lists to requirements imposed since 9/11 that Americans declare their
identities before they fly. . .
	The secret rules are an outgrowth of a 1974 law that allowed the
Federal Aviation Administration to withhold from public disclosure any
information "detrimental to the safety of persons traveling in air
transportation." After 9/11, Congress transferred airport security to the
newly created TSA in the Department of Homeland Security and broadened the
FAA rule to cover anything that might be "detrimental to the security of
transportation."
	The government is now declaring all forms of interstate
transportation -- including airplanes, buses, trains and boats -- covered
by the cloak of "sensitive security information" and moving to keep
information from public scrutiny, said Todd Tatelman, an attorney with the
Congressional Research Service.
	Even the wording of regulations authorizing government employees
to carry out the procedures is kept secret. TSA spokesman Darrin Kayser
said the regulations aren't available for public reading because that
might provide terrorists with information on airport operations. [Lance
Gay, Scripps Howard News Service]

	
	Merry Christmas.  --CGE