Glenn Greenwald: US No Different From Israel

Glenn Greenwald:

“One can express all sorts of outrage over the Obama administration’s depressingly predictable defense of the Israelis, even at the cost of isolating ourselves from the rest of the world, but ultimately, on some level, wouldn’t it have been even more indefensible — or at least oozingly hypocritical — if the U.S. had condemned Israel?  After all, what did Israel do in this case that the U.S. hasn’t routinely done and continues to do? Continue reading

Spilling The Wrong Blood

From Lynda Brayer, a human rights lawyer living in Haifa, Palestine, who is an active participant in the One State in Palestine movement and supports the Return of Palestinian Refugees to Palestine.

“Furthermore, what exacerbates the image problem for the Israeli government is that it is no longer Arab blood that has been spilt, but nice “white” or “European” blood that, in the West, is different from Arab or Muslim blood. The international reverberations and the trial against Israeli officials in the case of Rachel Corrie, who was deliberately murdered by an Israeli bulldozer driver for attempting to stop the demolition of a Palestinian home, should have provided sufficient warning to the Israeli regime of what is now about to unfold. Having chosen to confront the flotilla, it has now fallen into the proverbial biblical pit of its own making! Continue reading

Strategies Of Tension

The Daily Bell on the tensions between Israel and the world as an elite manipulation:

“The creation of the tiny theocratic state of Israel was not something that came about because of an upsurge in sentiment that such a state was needed. Even Dr. John Coleman, who has written a recent (fairly vituperative) history of the Rothschilds, explains that the Jewish state was an invention of the elites – especially the Rothschilds – not a movement that bubbled up from Jewish populations around the world. The book, written in 2007, certainly makes a case for the Rothschilds as the driving force in the political developments and wars of the 19th and 20th century, especially. The motivating idea – the goal – is one-world government, though Dr. Coleman does not spell out the linkage between the state of Israel itself and the larger issue of global governance. Continue reading

Gaza Flotilla Like Jewish Refugees In Exodus Says Former Mossad Agent

Victor Ostrovsky in SpyTalk at The Washington Post:

“The Israeli commando attack on a civilian flotilla was “so stupid it is stupefying,” says former Mossad agent Victor Ostrovsky. Ostrovsky spent six years in the Israeli navy, rising to the rank of lieutenant commander before Mossad recruited him in 1982. He quit after four years and in the 1990s he wrote two highly critical, first-person books about the intelligence service. Continue reading

Rudolf Steiner On Why Plutocrats Love Democracy

“It is interesting that the excellent statement was made in 1910 [by Francis Delaisi, La Démocratie et les Financiers, 1910]: ‘… that big capital has succeeded in creating out of democracy the most wonderful, the most effective, the most flexible instrument for the exploitation of the population as a whole. Continue reading

Powell Suggests Military Take Over Of Gulf Oil Disaster

We were waiting breathlessly for this:

The Guardian:

“Former US secretary of state Colin Powell joined calls for the military to take command of the operation from BP. Powell said the problem was beyond the capacity of BP to solve and the government should bring in “decisive force”. He said: “The military brings organisation, it brings control, it brings assets.”

War has become nation-building and peacetime operations have become warlike…

Everything is a crisis, everything is a war. Everything is about ceding more power to the state, while allowing the “private” sector to dump its costs on the government.

Read the rest of the article here.

Israeli Historians, Politicians: Israel Was Never In Danger Of Extinction

I’m indebted to Jeremy Hammond (author of the excellent piece, “The Simplicity of the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict”) for the compilation of these quotes:

“I know how at least 80 percent of all of the incidents there started. In my opinion, more than 80 percent, but let’s speak about 80 percent. It would go like this: we would send a tractor to plowin the demilitarized area, and we would know ahead of time that the Syrians would start shooting. Continue reading

Bypass The US Media, Says Black Novelist

Thoughtful and impassioned advice from Ishmael Reed, interviewed on his recent book, “The Return of the Nigger Breakers”.

Reed notes the one-sided treatment of pathologies in the black community, versus the treatment of  pathologies in other communities:

“The Gates line is picked up by white critics like Nicholas Kristof urging white rule to return to Africa.  I wrote Kristof a letter about his constant hammering of black male behavior toward women without challenging the wide-spread abuse of women by white men. Continue reading

The Daily Bell Gets It….

The Daily Bell on why the show trial of Goldman (albeit a worthy target, in my opinion) is most likely to be just another ruse of the powers that be:

“The progressive press, in our estimation, tries to blame individuals or certain corporations (Enron comes to mind, and now Goldman) to distract from the larger issue, which is the corruption of civil society itself by this horrid, pernicious mercantilism. Continue reading

Barrick Gold Threatens Vancouver Publisher

CBC News in Canada reports that bankster-associated gold miner Barrick Gold is shutting down critical writing on the Canadian mining industry.  (Thanks to Chris Cook).

An excerpt:

“The threat of legal action from mining giant Barrick Gold has forced Vancouver-based Talonbooks to postpone publication of a book about the Canadian mining industry.

Publisher Karl Siegler calls it a clear case of “libel chill” by one of Canada’s largest mining companies.

The book, Imperial Canada Inc.: Legal Haven of Choice for the World’s Mining Industries, was to be published in spring 2010, but in February, the publisher and everyone else involved with the book got a threatening letter from Barrick lawyers. Continue reading