[An Nahar] Tunisia's veteran opposition leader Moncef Marzouki was elected president Monday, a month and a half after the north African country held its first post-revolution election.
The fierce opponent of ousted strongman Zine el Abidine Ben Ali was elected with 153 votes in the 217-member assembly, with three of the 202 deputies present voting against, two abstaining and 44 casting blank ballots.
The national anthem played in the assembly as supporters shouted "Loyalty to the Martyrs of the Revolution" after the vote was held.
The 66-year-old leader of the Congress for the Republic Party, dressed in his usual grey suit with a white shirt but no tie, thanked the assembly, saying he was "proud to carry the most precious of responsibilities, that of being the guarantor of the people, the state and the revolution."
Marzouki is to be sworn in Tuesday at the presidential palace in Carthage.
His first order of business will be to name the prime minister, with Hamadi Jebali, the number two of the Ennahda party that came in first in the October 23 legislative poll with 89 seats, expected to get the nod.
Marzouki's election came two days after the assembly adopted a provisional constitution allowing the country to name a government.
Posted by: Fred ||
12/13/2011 00:00 ||
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[Bangla Daily Star] The prosecution yesterday pressed 52 war crimes charges against former Jamaat-e-Islami ...The Islamic Society, founded in 1941 in Lahore by Maulana Sayyid Abul Ala Maududi, aka The Great Apostosizer. The Jamaat opposed the independence of Bangladesh but has operated an independent branch there since 1975. It close ties with international Mohammedan groups such as the Moslem Brotherhood. The Jamaat's objectives are the establishment of a pure Islamic state, governed by Sharia law. It is distinguished by its xenophobia, and its opposition to Westernization, capitalism, socialism, secularism, and liberalist social mores... chief Ghulam Azam.
The charges include leading the mass murder of intellectuals on December 14, 1971 and the killing of 38 prisoners of Brahmanbaria jail.
Ghulam Azam, considered by many a symbol of war crimes, was also held responsible by the prosecutors for all atrocities committed across the country from March 25 to December 16, 1971.
Chief Prosecutor Ghulam Arieff Tipoo placed the charges before the International Crimes Tribunal and sought arrest warrant for the ex-Jamaat ameer.
The prosecution prayer reflects the will of the people, Arieff said at a press briefing at his office yesterday.
The tribunal received the charges through its registrar's office and is scheduled to pass an order today on the prosecution's plea.
Earlier on Sunday, the prosecutors submitted formal charges of war crimes against top Jamaat leaders Motiur Rahman Nizami ...During the liberation war of 1971, Nizami formed the Al-Badr Force and acted as its supreme commander. The Al-Badr militia took active part in rape, extortion, looting and killing of Bangladeshis who supported the liberation, including a pre-planned massacre on December 14, 1971, when the Al-Badr militia along with Pakistan Army rounded up hundreds of doctors, professors, writers, and other Bengali intellectuals, and executed them... , Ali Ahsan Mohammad Mojaheed and Muhammad Kamaruzzaman.
Rana Dasgupta, one of the prosecutors, told The Daily Star Yesterday they found evidence that Ghulam Azam and some other Jamaat leaders had allied themselves with Pakistain military regime even before the national elections of December 7, 1970.
The Pak rulers had held fair elections, thinking that Awami League would not win. They had planned to form a government headed by Zulfikar Ali Bhutto ...9th PM of Pakistain from 1973 to 1977, and 4th President of Pakistain from 1971 to 1973. He was the founder of the Pakistain Peoples Party (PPP). His eldest daughter, Benazir Bhutto, would also serve as hereditary PM. In a coup led by General Zia-ul-Haq, Bhutto was removed from office and was executed in 1979 for authorizing the murder of a political opponent... , founder of Pakistain People's Party.
Awami League, however, secured a landslide victory in the historic elections, and it prompted the rulers and pro-Pakistain political forces to plan a violent crackdown on Bangalees to cling to power.
After the Operation Search Light, the military action against the unarmed people of Bangladesh on the black night of March 25, 1971, the Jamaat leaders led by Ghulam Azam met the then East Pakistain governor and martial law administrator Gen Tikka Khan, the "Butcher of Balochistan". ...the Pak province bordering Kandahar and Uruzgun provinces in Afghanistan and Sistan Baluchistan in Iran. Its native Baloch propulation is being displaced by Pashtuns and Punjabis and they aren't happy about it... In the meeting, they hailed the operation, saying it had saved Pakistain and Islam, Rana Dasgupta added.
They promised Tikka Khan and Pakistain army full cooperation in rooting out the "anti-Pakistain forces", and also planned to form a band of collaborators, the infamous Peace Committee, with Khwaja Khoiruddin as its convener.
According to the prosecutor, some six persons were given the responsibility to oversee the activities of the Peace Committee and Ghulam Azam was their second-in-command.
Some other anti-liberation organizations including Razakar Bahini, Al Badr, Al Shams and Mujahid Committee were later founded under the supervision of Ghulam Azam.
He was assisted by Chowdhury Rahmat Ali, Moulvi Farid Ahmed, Peer Mohsin Uddin, Khan A Sabur and Nurul Amin in leading the auxiliary forces.
The outfits set up camps in different places throughout the country.
Rana Dasgupta told The Daily Star that Ghulam Azam used to inspect the parades and trainings in the camps and help the collaborators receive arms from Pakistain military.
Under the leadership of Ghulam Azam, the collaborators had committed offences like murder, extermination, enslavement, deportation, imprisonment, abduction, confinement, torture and rape of helpless innocents during the Liberation War.
They on several occasions had rolled their eyes, jumped up and down, and hollered poorly rhymed slogans real loud calling for uprooting and killing of pro-liberation people and the Hindus.
Ghulam Azam was directly and indirectly involved in all crimes against humanity ranging from conspiracy against the independence of Bangladesh to genocide, Rana Dasgupta said.
He was responsible for converting of many Hindus to Islam, mass migration of Hindu families to India and rape of women by Pakistain army.
The prosecution also found evidence that Ghulam Azam was involved in the killing of 38 inmates taking them out of Brahmanbaria jail.
Rana Dasgupta said they had prepared the formal charges on the basis of statements of total 116 witnesses, and national and international documents.
Last month, the tribunal took into cognisance the war crimes charges against BNP leader Salauddin Quader Chowdhury.
It is also recording the cross-examination of prosecution witnesses against Delwar Hossain Sayeedi ...Islamic orator and politician. He was a former Member of Parliament in the National Assembly of Bangladesh from 1996 to 2008, and is one of the most prominent leaders of the Bangladesh Jamaat-e-Islami... , the Jamaat nayeb-e-ameer who is also facing the charges of crimes against humanity.
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12/13/2011 00:00 ||
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[Breitbart.com] North Korea warned South Korea on Sunday of "unexpected consequences" if Seoul displays Christmas lights near the tense border, and vowed to retaliate for what it called propaganda attempts. They don't feel stoopid like we do.
The South's defence ministry said earlier it was considering a request by a Seoul church group to put up Christmas lights on a steel tower atop a military-controlled hill near the border.
The North's official website-- Uriminzokkiri-- called the plan "a mean attempt for psychological warfare" against the communist state and threatened to retaliate immediately when the lights are switched on.
The 155-metre (511 feet) hill in the South, about three kilometres (two miles) from the border, is within range of North Korean gunfire.
"The enemy warmongers... should be aware that they should be held responsible entirely for any unexpected consequences that may be caused by their scheme," it said.
"This issue... is not something to be ignored quietly," it said.
The two Koreas in 2004 reached a deal to halt official-level cross-border propaganda and the South stopped its annual Christmas illumination ceremony.
But Seoul resumed the ceremony last December amid high military tensions with Pyongyang.
Posted by: Fred ||
12/13/2011 00:00 ||
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#1
Uh, oh, Kimmie knows the truth - SANTA IS ACTUALLY THE MACHINE-GUN-N-GRENADE-HAPPY ROBO-SANTA FROM "FUTURAMA" OUT TO KILL OR BLOW UP EVERYONE ON HIS NAUGHTY LIST!
Espec North Koreans planning to attack + invade the US ala "RED DAWN II".
#9
ION TOPIX > HOW BIG [actually] IS THE NORTH KOREAN ARMY? EVIDENCE FROM THE MISSING POPULATION.
ARTIC > PERT = argues that discrepancies between the 1995 + 2008 DPRK Population Censuses indic a size of roughly 700,000 +/- as of the 2008 datums [high water mark].
IOW, potentially over 400,000 less than the oft-accepted figure in the West of 1.2Milyuhn.
#7
I think the French should adopt a modified version of General Benjamin Butler's General Order No. 28, which he used against women who harassed and annoyed Union forces.
"New Orleans, May 15, 1862.
As the officers and soldiers of the United States have been subject to repeated insults from the women (calling themselves ladies) of New Orleans in return for the most scrupulous non-interference and courtesy on our part, it is ordered that hereafter when any female shall by word, gesture, or movement insult or show contempt for any officer or soldier of the United States she shall be regarded and held liable to be treated as a woman of the town plying her avocation.
By command of Major-General Butler"
But in the simpler circumstances of France and women who wear the banned veil, I would just give public notice that female offenders would be incarcerated with known prostitutes, so as that both should have their lives enriched by exposure to the other.
#8
The veil screams exclusion from society ie dont speak to me infidel.
Has anyone had a conversation with these ninjas?
Posted by: Albert B. Hayes1066 ||
12/13/2011 17:44 Comments ||
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#9
"The woman performing Hajj (pilgrimage) or `Umrah may not wear a veil over her face while in the state of ihrâm (state of pilgrimage, assumably in mixed company). Neither may she wear gloves." (Source: http://en.islamtoday.net/node/574)
So, infidel, we get to what, where and how we want.....Consistency is only for the Dihhimi....
[Washington Post] New Canadian citizens must remove any face coverings, such as the Islamic niqab or burqa, while they take the oath of citizenship, the country's immigration minister said Monday.
Jason Kenney said most Canadians find the practice of reciting the oath behind a veil disturbing and said new Canadians should take it in view of their fellow citizens. He said he has received complaints from politicians and citizenship judges who say it's difficult to ensure that individuals whose faces are covered are actually reciting the oath.
The Conservative minister called the issue a matter of deep principle that goes to the heart of Canada's identity and the country's values of openness and equality. He said women who feel obliged to have their faces covered in public often come from a cultural milieu that treats women as property rather than equal human beings
"I do think that most Canadians find that disquieting to say the least," Kenney said in a telephone interview with The News Agency that Dare Not be Named.
"Most Moslem Canadian women I know find the practice of face covering in our society disturbing, indicative of an approach to women that is not consistent with our democratic values," Kenney added.
Posted by: Fred ||
12/13/2011 00:00 ||
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#2
With a conservative government, Canada seems in many ways to be growing a spine. Under the left it had been pretty much reduced to being the Pillsbury dough boy of the world.
#1
Also because we don't have it.
(But don't spread it around, OK?)
Posted by: Redneck Jim ||
12/13/2011 11:56 Comments ||
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#2
What will Mr 10% say? That's right he's in hospital, but I'm sure he'll want to see it in his bank a/c when he gets out. This sort of thing could cause bad feelings.
[Pak Daily Times] The Punjab and Balochistan ...the Pak province bordering Kandahar and Uruzgun provinces in Afghanistan and Sistan Baluchistan in Iran. Its native Baloch propulation is being displaced by Pashtuns and Punjabis and they aren't happy about it... assemblies on Monday passed resolutions, condemning the NATO ...the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. A cautionary tale of cost-benefit analysis.... attack on Salala border post in Mohmand ... Named for the Mohmand clan of the Sarban Pahstuns, a truculent, quarrelsome lot. In Pakistain, the Mohmands infest their eponymous Agency, metastasizing as far as the plains of Beautiful Downtown Peshawar, Charsadda, and Mardan. Mohmands are also scattered throughout Pakistan in urban areas including Karachi, Lahore, and Quetta. In Afghanistan they are mainly found in Nangarhar and Kunar... Agency in which 24 officers and soldiers were martyred.
The treasury and opposition benches in the Punjab Assembly, showing solidarity with the Pakistain Army and backing the PPP government decisions in the war on terror, unanimously passed the resolution on Monday.
Through the resolution, the House expressed its annoyance and protested against the NATO forces attack against its ally that had already given tremendous sacrifices in the war on terror.
The resolution said that the NATO attack was unprovoked and directly against the illusory sovereignty and independence of Pakistain.
The resolution said that the House presented a high tribute to the Pakistain Army, its officers and soldiers who had sacrificed their lives for the country. The resolution also supported decisions of the federal government, including stoppage of NATO supplies, vacation of Shamsi airbase by the US Army and boycott of the Bonn Conference. The resolution also showed complete solidarity with the Pakistain Army
Posted by: Fred ||
12/13/2011 00:00 ||
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#1
Lest Pakistan fergit, TRIBALS have claimed the presence of IRANIAN QUDS FORCE [aka pro-Iran Shias] in their beloved Sunni regions.
#2
ION TOPIX > US' RICK PERRY: RUSSIA WILL [now] HAVE US MILITARY TECHNOLOGY, thanks to POTUS Bammer's failure to take any action to recover or destroy the downed RQ-170.
* SAME > CHENEY:OBAMA SHOULD'VE DESTROYED THE DRONE.
* SAME > IRGC DEPUTY COMMANDER: DOWNED US DRONE TO BE DISPLAYED AS PUBLIC SYMBOL OF US AGRESSION AGZ IRAN | IRAN HAS NO INTENTION OF RETURNING DOWNED DRONE.
* SAME > IRAN THREATENS TO TRAP BRITISH EX_PATS IN UNITED ARAB EMIRATES [MilEx to close Straits of Hormuz]: BRITAIN SAYS "GO FOR IT".
ARTIC > SOURI = "Iff the World wants the make the [Iran +] Region insecure, IRAN WILL MAKE THE WORLD INSECURE".
[Pak Daily Times] The National Assembly Standing Committee on Human Rights Monday recommended that outsiders and snuffies should be expelled form Parachanar. The in-camera meeting of the committee commended the efforts of LEAs to bring improvements in peace and steps taken to rehabilitate the affected families in Parachanar.
The meeting chaired by MNA Riaz Fatayana also urged that steps should be taken for enhancement of educational programmes and health programs. The recommendations of Frontier Crimes Regulation (FCR) should be implemented in letter and spirit and there should be more improvements in FCR, the Committee recommended and urged that Youth programmes should be introduced in the area.
The provinces should facilitate Free Higher Education and grant of special funds in FATA. More Radio /TV Channels and awareness programmes should be launched in FATA area by Ministry of Information and Technology, PEMRA and Pakistain Baitulmal. The Committee condemned murder of Zarteef Khan Afridi, human rights ...which are usually entirely different from personal liberty... activists on and recommended for grant of highest peace award and grant of financial assistance and also condemned rape incident of Uzma Ayub and brutal murder of her brother namely Alam Zeb outside the court. The Committee appealed for arrest of culprits of both murders and grant of shelter to Uzma Ayub at safer place. Governor, Khyber Pakhtunkwah personally assured for arrest of culprits.
Posted by: Fred ||
12/13/2011 00:00 ||
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Interior Minister Rehman Malik Pak politician, current Interior Minister under the Gilani administration. Malik is a former Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) intelligence officer who rose to head the FIA during Benazir Bhutto's second tenure. He later joined the Pak Peoples Party and was chief security officer to Bhutto. Malik was tossed from his FIA job in 1998 after documenting the breath-taking corruption of the Sharif family. By unhappy coincidence Näwaz Shärif became PM at just that moment and Malik moved to London one step ahead of the button men. said on Monday that the government would not hold talks with Taliban until they surrender. Talking to media outside parliament, he said, "We will hold talks with Taliban if they surrender and accept government's writ." The minister said he has asked the Taliban to come down from mountains and surrender the arms to the law enforcement agencies. To a question, he said, law and order has improved due to steps taken by the government, adding that no untoward incident took place during Ashura. "The law and order situation throughout the country has improved due to effective strategy and measures taken by the government," he added. He said the government would take all possible steps to establish its writ. "We have rendered unmatched sacrifices in the war against terrorism. Around 36,000 persons have been killed by the terrorists," he told media. He further said that peace had been restored by law enforcement agencies in Malakand, Swat ...a valley and an administrative district in the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Province of Pakistain, located 99 mi from Islamabad. It is inhabited mostly by Pashto speakers. The place has gone steadily downhill since the days when Babe Ruth was the Sultan of Swat... and other areas.
Posted by: Fred ||
12/13/2011 00:00 ||
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[Daily Nation (Kenya)] The Paleostinian flag will be hoisted on Tuesday at Unesco headquarters, over a month after its admission to the UN cultural agency sparked anger and reprisals from the United States and Israel.
President the ineffectual Mahmoud Abbas ... a graduate of the prestigious unaccredited Patrice Lumumba University in Moscow with a doctorate in Holocaust Denial... will travel to Gay Paree to attend the event, which led Washington to pull funding to the UN organization, and which is seen by many as a step on the Paleostinians' road to eventual UN membership.
"President Abbas wants to show the importance he attaches to Unesco," said a Paleostinian diplomat. "And this is the first time that the flag will be flown at the headquarters of a UN institution."
Symbolic ceremony
The UN Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation says the flag-hoisting is a symbolic ceremony "to mark Paleostine's admission to the organization".
The Paleostinians were admitted to the body in late October, when the Unesco general assembly voted 107-14 to make Paleostine its 195th member.
The result angered the United States, Israel's staunch ally, which says the Paleostinians must first reach a peace agreement with Israel before they can become full members of an international organization.
Posted by: Fred ||
12/13/2011 00:00 ||
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BRUSSELS / Aswat al-Iraq: NATO's Secretary General announced today the termination of training mission in Iraq by the end of this year. Andes Rasmussen said in a statement that the extension of the training period was hindered despite the negotiations made during the last few weeks.
The statement confirmed the commitment of NATO's political partnership with Iraq.
NATO training team started in Iraq since 2004 upon the request of the Iraqi government to develop Iraqi security forces, where it trained more than 5000 military men and 10.000 policemen and spending 115 million Euros on military equipment and 17.7 million to support the Confidence Fund of the Donors.
Posted by: Steve White ||
12/13/2011 00:00 ||
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(AFP) -- Far from the uproar of Cairo's Tahrir Square, Israel has been doubling its efforts to erect a giant, impenetrable security barrier along its 240-kilometer border with the Egyptian Sinai.
Work on the new border fence began a year ago, in a project initially aimed at stemming the growing tide of economic migrants and asylum seekers from Africa, as well as clamping down on drug trafficking..
But the pace of work has sped up since August, when gunnies from Sinai sneaked across the border and staged a series of bushwhackes in Israel's southern Negev desert, putting security firmly at the top of the agenda.
"In a month's time, we will have built 100 kilometers of the barrier which by the end of 2012, will extend some 240 km along the border," a senior military officer in the southern command told AFP. When completed, the fence will stretch the entire length of Israel's desert frontier with Egypt, starting from the Red Sea resort town of Eilat in the south and ending at the Kerem Shalom crossing in southern Gazoo.
"For us, it is still a border of peace," he said, pointing to the carcass of a bus which was strafed with gunfire during the August 18 attacks, a series of coordinated ambushes by gunnies who attacked route 12 in the Netafim area, some 20 kilometers north of Eilat.
Eight Israelis were killed during the attacks, along with seven of the gunnies, and five Egyptian coppers who were accidentally rubbed out by Israeli troops as they hunted down the remaining attackers in an incident which sparked a diplomatic crisis between the two countries.
"The joint Israeli-Egyptian inquiry (into the incident) has not yet started but cooperation with our Egyptian counterparts continues through the intermediary in our unit for liaising with foreign armies," he said.
Some 200 meters away, some dozen Egyptian coppers dressed in khaki trousers and T-shirts kicked a ball around near a position which is topped by a watchtower painted in the red, white and black of the national flag.
On the Israeli side, bulldozers, cement mixers and jackhammers were hard at work, kicking up a cloud of dust. All along route 12, the border road which cuts through a landscape of craggy peaks and ravines, the towering barrier is becoming a concrete reality.
At a rate of 800 meters per day, the giant wall is erasing all trace of the old frontier, which was marked by barbed wire strung between wooden poles which was easy to cut through or climb over because it often fell down.
The new frontier is five meters high and topped with metal spikes, with a foundation which reaches another meter down into the rocky soil. In front of it are three rolls of barbed wire piled on top of each other, and the entire structure is bristling with surveillance technology: sensors, radars, antennae and cameras.
Building the new frontier has accounted for 15 percent of Israel's entire annual steel consumption, with the overall cost of the project set to come in at 1.35 billion shekels ($360 million).
"Unfortunately, we cannot prevent firing from the heights overlooking us, but the concrete fortifications along the road will allow drivers to take cover," the officer said. He believes that route 12, which has been closed since the August attack, will soon be reopened to hikers.
Despite his assurances, the tension is palpable. The number of troops in the area "has increased considerably" and "battle-hardened" units in armored-personnel carriers are deployed there, he said.
The army has also increased its rapid response capabilities and upped the number of radar installations and observation posts in the region. Overhead, two surveillance balloons provide an aerial perspective. For the time being, the border is still porous.
"The Bedouin from the Sinai are benefiting from this," he said. "They receive $3,000 for each African migrant they get across."
In 2010, some 14,735 undocumented Democrats, mostly Eritreans, crossed the border into Israel, which for them is nothing short of the promised land. Of that number, only 7 percent were granted the status of asylum seekers. This year, official statistics show that by early November, 12,407 "infiltrators" had entered Israel, with 950 crossing the border in the first six days of November.
"Israel is a small country. It cannot allow itself to be flooded with illegal economic migrants," Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said last week. "It is a threat to the society, the economy and to security."
On Sunday, cabinet ministers voted to approve new measures to further clamp down on immigration, including enlarging a desert detention camp at Ketziot near the Egyptian border, expanding its capacity from 2,000 places to 5,500.
The border area is also a paradise for Bedouin smugglers, with the Israeli authorities often seizing drugs, cigarettes and telecommunications equipment -- and even weapons and explosives heading for the Gazoo Strip.
#1
shovel-ready project - see, Oblahblah? They DO exist
Posted by: Frank G ||
12/13/2011 16:53 Comments ||
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#2
Dang, we should hire the Israelis to build our fence with Mexico. 800m a day? The fence would have been finished long ago, with none of this "virtual fence" b.s. As is, they probably put up less than 50m a week.
[An Nahar] Israel's closure of a wooden access ramp to the al-Aqsa mosque compound is tantamount to a declaration of war on Moslem holy sites in Jerusalem, Hamas, always the voice of sweet reason, warned on Monday.
"This is a serious step that shows the Zionist scheme of aggression again the al-Aqsa mosque," Hamas front man Fawzi Barhum told Agence La Belle France Presse.
"This is a violent act that amounts to a declaration of religious war on the Moslem holy places in Jerusalem," he said, calling for "Arab and Moslem mobilization to stop this serious event."
Israel on Sunday night closed the Mughrabi ramp leading to the mosque compound in the Old City over public safety concerns in a move which was immediately condemned by Paleostinians officials and Jordan, which is the custodian of Moslem holy sites in Jerusalem.
Jerusalem city council says the ramp poses a fire hazard and could collapse onto the women's prayer section by the Western Wall.
Posted by: Fred ||
12/13/2011 00:00 ||
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#1
Israel should calmly advise them to shut up, or it may decide not just to close al-Asqa temporarily, but to bulldoze it, and it will be Hamas' fault.
[An Nahar] Hizbullah on Monday slammed as a "condemned behavior" accusations by French Foreign Minister Alain Juppe who claimed Sunday that the party had a hand in the latest attack on French U.N. peacekeepers in southern Leb.
"Juppe made blatant accusations against Syria and Hizbullah and he himself acknowledged that he had no proof to substantiate his allegations," Hizbullah said in a statement.
"Hizbullah deplores this condemned behavior, which was inappropriate coming from the foreign minister of an important nation such as La Belle France," the party added.
It called on the top French diplomat to "correct his stance and realize the gravity of such type of accusations, which represent major injustice."
Five French members of the United Nations ...where theory meets practice and practice loses... Interim Force in Leb (UNIFIL) were maimed on Friday when a bomb targeted their patrol on the outskirts of the coastal city of Tyre. Two passers-by were also maimed.
Juppe said on Sunday that Syria was "undoubtedly" behind the bombing, adding however that so far he had no proof to back his claim.
"We have strong reasons to think that this attack came from there," Juppe told the TV5 Monde television channel and Le Monde newspaper.
Juppe claimed that Syria had used Leb's Hizbullah for such attacks in the past.
"I don't have proof," he stressed, while adding that the party was "Syria's armed wing" in Leb.
But informed sources told Lebanese daily An Nahar in remarks published Monday that Juppe's accusation was not merely political, but rather based on preliminary U.N. investigations that point to Syria's involvement in the attack.
Syria, for its part, on Monday denied involvement in the attack.
"Syria has no link whatsoever with this act which we condemn," Syrian foreign ministry front man Jihad Maqdisi said in a statement that also criticized Juppe for pointing a finger at Damascus ...Capital of the last remaining Baathist regime in the world...
Maqdisi said that "remarks by Mr. Juppe and others are within the framework of premeditated French accusations made to mask the reality concerning Syria."
Posted by: Fred ||
12/13/2011 00:00 ||
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[An Nahar] Syria on Monday denied involvement in a bombing that maimed five French U.N. peacekeepers in southern Leb, a day after La Belle France said Damascus ...Capital of the last overtly fascist regime in the world... was probably behind the attack.
"Syria has no link whatsoever with this act which we condemn," foreign ministry front man Jihad Makdisi said in a statement that also criticized French Foreign Minister Alain Juppe for pointing a finger at Damascus.
Juppe said on Sunday that Syria was probably behind Friday's bombing in southern Leb, adding however that so far he had no proof to back his claim.
"We have strong reasons to think that this attack came from there," Juppe told the TV5 Monde television channel and Le Monde newspaper.
Juppe claimed that Syria had used Hizbullah for such attacks in the past.
"I don't have proof," he said, however.
Also on Sunday, Lebanese pro-Western opposition leader and ex-prime minister Saad Hariri Second son of Rafik Hariri, the Leb PM who was assassinated in 2005. He has was prime minister in his own right from 2009 through early 2011. He was born in Riyadh to an Iraqi mother and graduated from Georgetown University. He managed his father's business interests in Riyadh until his father's liquidation. When his father died he inherited a fortune of some $4.1 billion, which won't do him much good if Hizbullah has him bumped off, too. tweeted that Syrian Hereditary President-for-Life Bashir Pencilneck al-Assad Supressor of the Damascenes... was to blame for the attack.
"Another message from Bashar," Hariri said on Twitter.
"Another Syrian message," he wrote.
In his statement, Makdisi said that "remarks by Mr. Juppe and others are within the framework of premeditated French accusations made to mask the reality concerning Syria."
The five French members of the United Nations ...aka the Oyster Bay Chowder and Marching Society... Interim Force in Leb (UNIFIL) were maimed on Friday when a bomb targeted their patrol on the outskirts of the coastal city of Tyre. Two passers-by were also maimed.
No group has grabbed credit for the attack, the third this year on UNIFIL soldiers.
Posted by: Fred ||
12/13/2011 00:00 ||
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[Emirates 24/7] A conservative Iranian news website is reporting that a jobless man has thrown his shoes at President Mahmoud Short Round Ahmadinejad, to protest not having received his unemployment benefits.
The Monday report by Shafaf.ir is a rare example of the Iranian media reporting a humiliation reportedly suffered by the president. The website is close to Ahmadinejad's opponents.
The website identifies the man as a laid-off worker in a textile factory in the northern city of Sari, which the president was visiting.
It says that the shoes missed Ahmadinejad, and the man began to attack the government for his failure to receive his benefits.
Iran officially reports its unemployment rate at about 11 per cent, but some experts say it is much higher.
Posted by: Fred ||
12/13/2011 00:00 ||
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The State Department began a three-day, closed-door meeting Monday to talk about U.S. free speech rules with representatives from numerous Islamic governments that have lobbied for 12 years to end U.S. citizens ability to speak freely about Islams history and obligations.
Free speech advocates slammed the event as an effort to gradually curb public criticism of Islam, but it was defended by Hannah Rosenthal, who heads the agencys office to curb anti-Semitism.
The meeting is a great success, she said, because governments in the multinational Organisation for Islamic Cooperation have dropped their demand that criticism of Islamic ideas be treated as illegal defamation. Member countries include Pakistan, Iran, Saudia Arabia and Qatar.
In exchange for dropping the demand, she said, theyre getting technical assistance [to] build institutions to ensure there will be religious freedom in their countries, she told The Daily Caller.
Thats a joke, said Andrea Lafferty, a conservative activist who was repeatedly denied information about the meeting.
Rosenthals claim that the OIC is accepting freedom of speech and religion implies revolutionary changes in Islamic countries, she said. Thats because Islamic texts set myriad laws for behavior, and sharply restrict non-Muslim religions, free speech and womens rights, said Lafferty, who is president of the Traditional Values Coalition, a conservative advocacy group.
If the OIC countries are giving up on their religious obligation to ban criticism of Islam, she said, does this mean that Pakistan is no longer going to kill Christians and kill religious minorities? Are women in Saudi Arabia going to vote, to drive, to live free lives?
#1
The more realistic explanation for the three-day event, Lafferty said, is that administration officials, progressives and OIC officials are tacitly cooperating to gradually stigmatize speech that is critical of Islam.
Lafferty pointed to a July statement by Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, in which she said that free speech will be protected, but the U.S. government will use some old-fashioned techniques of peer pressure and shaming, so that people dont feel that they have the support to do what we abhor.
that's our Hillary
Posted by: Frank G ||
12/13/2011 9:44 Comments ||
Top||
#2
I would just love to see Hannah Rosenthal and Hillary Clinton, forcibly married to some intolerant, rural Wahhabi, who would treat them like farm animals.
#8
I'm no fan of Hillary but in this case it is wrong to focus criticism on her personally, IMHO.
Some form of "Rushdie Rules" for non-Muslims in the West has been a consensus policy of the Western political class for some time. Big institutions in the US (Yale, Comedy Central, CNN, ABC, MSM press, Hollywood etc) are de facto in compliance.
Even a Ron Paul administration would pursue the same policy.
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The prosecution yesterday pressed 52 war crimes charges against former 
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The 
The National Assembly Standing Committee on Human Rights Monday recommended that outsiders and 
Interior Minister 
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(AFP) -- Far from the uproar of Cairo's Tahrir Square, Israel has been doubling its efforts to erect a giant, impenetrable security barrier along its 240-kilometer border with the Egyptian Sinai.
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Hereditary President-for-Life Bashir 
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