Palestinian Information Center

The four siblings killed in Beit Hanoun on Monday April 28, 2008 BEIT HANUN, (PIC)-- IOF troops on Monday killed seven Palestinians including a mother and her one-year-old baby while ten others were wounded when an IOF tank shell blasted their home in northern Gaza. Witnesses told PIC reporter that the IOF artillery shelled the house of Abu Muaitek family in Beit Hanun town completely destroying it and killing the mother and her four children Musab, 1, Hana, 3, Saleh, 4, and Rudaina, 6. They said that the shelling also killed the 17-year-old boy Ayub Attalla and Ibrahim Hajuj of the Quds Brigades, the armed wing of the Islamic Jihad Movement. Citizens appealed to all those having vehicles with petrol to head to the scene of the IOF crime in order to evacuate the victims due to the acute shortage of fuel supplies in the Strip, which were blocked by the Israeli occupation authority and which paralyzed all aspects of life. Representatives of Palestinian resistance factions head on Monday to Cairo to discuss calm with the IOA. For its part, the armed wing of Hamas, the Qassam Brigades, claimed responsibility for firing at four IOF soldiers during their incursion in Beit Hanun on Monday, adding that the "Zionist enemy" acknowledged the injury of two of its soldiers. The armed wing earlier Sunday claimed responsibility for firing two Qassam missiles at an IOF military base east of Deir Al-Balah in central Gaza and two RPGs and a number of mortar shells at IOF armored vehicles and a bulldozer that was advancing in Palestinian lands in the same area.

:: Article nr. 43489 sent on 28-apr-2008 16:03 ECT
www.uruknet.info?p=43489

Link: www.palestine-info.co.uk/en/default.aspx?xyz=U6Qq7k%2bcOd87MDI46m9rUxJEpMO%2bi1s
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Occupation forces broke into the sewing work shop of the Islamic Charitable Society in Hebron warning the workers to evacuate in one day

Twelfth Bough

April 28, 2008 I’m sure you haven’t heard on TV news that the IDF killed a Palestinian family of four small children and their mother, among others, as they were getting ready to eat breakfast. I mean, if an Israeli family was killed we’d be hearing about it non-stop; but this was just a Palestinian mother and her four little children. Just some collateral damage… Four Palestinian children, all members of one family, were killed Monday morning in an Israel Defense Forces strike in the northern Gaza Strip, Palestinian sources reported. According to the report, an IDF shell hit a house in the town of Beit Hanoun, killing five members of the Abu Meatak family. Palestinian medics identified the dead children as sisters Rudina and Hana Abu Meatak, aged 6 and 3; and their brothers 4-year-old Saleh and 15-month-old Mousad. Their mother, Miyasar, was in her late 30s. Her two older children were critically wounded in the strike, the officials said. A 15-year-old boy was also killed in the strike while making his way to school. Nine people were reportedly injured, three of them sustaining serious to critical wounds. A Palestinian source in the Strip said that a member of the al-Quds Brigades, the Islamic Jihad’s military wing, was also killed by IDF soldiers. The IDF reported that it had attacked a group of gunmen spotted near forces operating in Beit Hanoun. Soldier belonging to the Givati patrol brigade exchanged fire with Palestinian gunmen in the area. During the military activity, an IDF soldier was lightly injured in the leg and rushed to hospital. It sounds like there was some gunfire exchanged between IDF soldiers and Palestinian gunman, slightly wounding an IDF soldier, and then a shell hit the house killing all these innocent civilians. Source article http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3536673,00.html. The IDF is looking into the incident, but has yet to obtain a full picture of what happened. Military sources noted that a group of gunmen was spotted shortly after 8 am near Givati forces operating in the area. An aircraft fired at them and hit them, while tanks fired shells towards the area.                                      More...............

Ten days ago, my friend Riad, founder and director of the Palestine
Children's Welfare Fund and a middle school teacher, was found dead in
Lady Bird Lake in Austin, TX. Riad had been under investigation by the
FBI for sending food, medicine, and other basic amenities to needy
Palestinian families. It seems the FBI suspected him of terrorism, but
I knew him to be a gentle and selfless man who did all he could to
facilitate the survival of Palestinian children with pride and
dignity. He explained to me when we first met that PCWF is a
for-profit organization, providing families with living wages at fair
prices rather than forcing them to work for little. Riad was
interested in human dignity more than aid, and hundreds of families
depended on his crucial work.

The last time we met was in Austin, where he hosted my father and me
for a luxurious dinner. It struck me, since I knew how frugal he was
with himself — sleeping in a car rather than paying for a hotel that
would detract from the money he could send to Palestinians — but he
was always generous with others. He sent me away with a full belly and
1000 bumper stickers that he'd bought himself to support my work. Soon
thereafter he sent me dozens of purses embroidered by Palestinian
refugees. Each purse bore the name of a destroyed village. These
weren't your typical "Free Palestine" messages; Riad was encouraging
the embroiderers to celebrate their history and connection to their
villages — a kind of nonviolent resistance to Israel's policies of
ongoing ethnic cleansing and denial of the inalienable Right of Return.

Riad struggled tirelessly for justice in Palestine, south of his
native country of Lebanon. Towards the end of his life, the FBI had
posted surveillance signs on his front lawn and harassed the family
constantly, including Riad's children and partner. Riad's legal fees
eventually became more than he could afford, and in our last
correspondence Riad acknowledged (after some nudging) that he could no
longer support himself, yet he was still committed to the cause. He
wrote on March 18, 2008:

"I spent EVERY penny that I own in Palestine and do not even have
money to pay my bills. I will be sending money to Palestine soon after
I pay the shipping costs on the credit cards along with the laptops
that we bought and shipped to Palestine in the last few months. Let me
know if you have any questions and SHUKRAN again for your generosity,
work, and support.
Salamat,
Riad Hamad
www.pcwf.org, www.marhabafrompalestine.com; Palestine Children's
Welfare Fund; 201 W. Stassney # 201; Austin, TX 78745. Support the
children of Palestine by buying Palestinian arts and crafts. Sustain
the Palestinian economy and provide jobs for the men, women and
farmers in Palestine to live with pride and dignity TILL WE RETURN."

There is much controversy surrounding the circumstances of Riad's
death: he had been gagged with duct tape and his arms were bound, but
local police said the placement of the tape was consistent with
suicide and they ruled out murder. I can only speculate whether it was
suicide or not, but how important is such a distinction? Interrogation
by the FBI had traumatized his family and paralyzed his own work. If
death was the only escape from the ongoing harassment, can we really
call that "voluntary"? No matter what led Riad to the lake, our
comrade was martyred by the cruelty of a system that denies the right
to provide a lifeline to human beings struggling to survive. He was a
devoted activist and one of the kindest human beings I've ever met.

View an interview with Riad about harassment from the FBI:
hwww.freespeech.org/fscm2/contentviewer.php?content_id=344

For a picture of Riad in front of his FBI-monitored home:
www.geocities.com/riadutep/dhlsecurity2.html?1050349975040

Send condolences to pcwfaustin@yahoo.com and iristulip@gmail.com

Honor Riad's memory with a contribution: www.pcwf.org/

May you finally find the peace you harvested for so long, Riad.

Anna

The arrest of a New Jersey engineer on charges of conspiracy to pass U.S. military secrets to Israel Tuesday shows a consistent, continued pattern of Israeli spying on its major benefactor, the United States, according to espionage experts.

"The Israelis have always been active intelligence collectors in the U.S. It's just a matter of time in terms of when we have sufficient evidence to bring one of the cases," said John Martin, retired senior U.S. Department of Justice executive who oversaw the investigation and prosecution of espionage cases in the U.S. for more than 30 years, including that of convicted spy Jonathan Pollard. Pollard is currently serving his 23rd year of a life sentence in federal prison in North Carolina for passing highly classified information to Israel.

"[The Israelis] got caught again, and they'll get caught again after this," said Martin, referring to Tuesday's indictment by the U.S. government of Ben-Ami Kadish, a former U.S. military engineer who allegedly helped give restricted nuclear weapons data, classified jet fighter weapons system data and key information on the Patriot missile system to Israel between 1979 and 1985.             More............

Hmmm...."sleeper cells"...and they ain't Arab!

Now, where have I heard something like that before???

Pollard prosecutor: Spy arrest shows Israel lied to US

Pollard prosecutor Joseph E. DiGenova slams Israel, says Kadish arrest shows 'this was much larger espionage operation with sleeper cells in the United States than we understood or could have known at the time'

Submitted by a reader ... Thanks, Lee.

"Can you imagine this shit? Whats next?

I think its time to reel in the double spooks and take 'em out to the field.

One way or another.

Where in the US constitution [does it] say 'we the ppl will lie to the ppl for another set of ppl to make sure those ppl are in better shape the Americans?'

NO where. -- Lee"

The arrest of Ben-Ami Kadish, accused of passing US military secrets to the same handler as convicted spy Jonathan Pollard , confirms that the espionage ring was larger than previously believed and that the Israelis lied about it, a former US prosecutor says.

 

"The similarities are quite eerie," said Joseph E. DiGenova, the US attorney who oversaw the 1980s-era Pentagon spy scandal that ensnared Pollard. "This was a much larger espionage operation with sleeper cells in the United States than we understood or could have known at the time," DiGenova said.

Citing court papers, DiGenova said Pollard's handler, Yosef Yagur, used the same methods with Kadish that he did with Pollard, finding a US Citizen with security clearance to take classified materials from the workplace and letting him copy them.

DiGenova said he and other investigators in the 1980s were convinced there were other Americans involved in the espionage. "It was obvious they had other people supplying the information so they could target the finds," he said. "You want to protect your ultimate source."

25 years later

Charles S. Leeper, a former assistant US attorney who was the lead trial attorney in the Pollard case, called the Kadish case fascinating. "I am not aware of any other case where the government has brought espionage charges more than 25 years after the conduct in question," he said.

DiGenova said the charges can be brought so long after the fact because the case can be viewed as a continuing conspiracy based on communications between Yagur and Kadish. "He was an agent in place then, and he's an agent in place now," he said.

 

Earlier, IsraeliForeign Ministry spokesman Aryeh Mekel said the events in question dated back to the early 1980s, and that since then there has been much care taken to observe the directives of the prime ministers not to engage in any activities of this type in the US.

Kadish, a US Army veteran, was arrested Tuesday and charged with conspiracy. He was released on $300,000 bail, but could face a possible death sentence on the charge.

Good! - it's about time one of those israel-firsters swung for their crimes against the American people!http://www.wakeupfromyourslumber.com/node/6565

By Jeff Stein, CQ National Security Editor

The elderly New Jersey man arrested last week on charges of spying for Israel years ago was probably still working for the Jewish state’s espionage service in tandem with another, as yet unidentified spy, former American intelligence officials say.

Ben-Ami Kadish, now 84, was employed as a mechanical engineer at a U.S. Army weapons center in New Jersey when he allegedly supplied his Israeli handler with classified military documents, according to charges filed last week.

The handler was named only as “CC-1,” or co-conspirator 1, in the criminal complaint. But its description of him as the same man who was handling the notorious Israeli mole Jonathan Pollard all but identified him as Yosef Yagur, formerly the consul for scientific affairs at the Israeli consulate in New York.

Pollard, who gave Yagur thousands of highly classified documents while working as a navy intelligence analyst in the 1980s, is in the 21st year of a life sentence for espionage.

Kadish, who worked at the U.S. Army’s Picatinny Arsenal in Dover, N.J., from 1963 to 1990, could also spend the waning years of his life in jail if he is convicted.

A former senior CIA counterintelligence operative believes the case “will never go to trial, because of all the ugly stuff that would come out” about Israeli activities in the United States.

Indeed, Justice Department attorneys have fought to keep “ugly stuff” from emerging in the trial of two officials of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, or AIPAC, charged with accepting classified documents from Pentagon official Larry Franklin.                         More............

BBC Anchor Who Reported on WTC7 Collapse Early Agrees There May Be a 'Conspiracy'
We Are Change UK Question former BBC Report Phil Hayton-- who is 'amazed' that such a 'significant' event has no official explanation

Aaron Dykes
Prison Planet
Friday, April 25, 2008

Members of We Are Change UK questioned ex-BBC reporter Phil Hayton about the early reporting of WTC 7's collapse during a speaking appearance.

Hayton failed to recollect even being in the studio on the day of 9/11-- at first-- but then recalls the situation when it is described in detail, including the actions of Jane Standley, who reported the collapse some 26 minutes in advance with WTC Building 7 still visible in the background.

"A lot of eyebrows were raised," We Are Change reporters point out in summary, because many saw it as a clear controlled demolition, including a number of engineers.

Hayton responded, pointing out that he was not aware of the situation with WTC 7. "This sounds so significant-- I'm just amazed I didn't know about this... This is completely news to me."                                           More............

Countering Palestine Solidarity Work in Canada

Over the past several months of 2008, Israel advocacy organizations have entered a period of ongoing mobilization in an effort to decisively counter what they see as the growing influence and impact

of the Palestine solidarity movement.

After spending years trying to find its footing in the aftermath of the Oslo Accords, the Palestine solidarity movement has found a new strategic focus with the emergence of the campaign for boycott, divestment and sanctions (BDS), which has effectively shifted theterms of the Israel-Palestine debate and presented a clear analysis of

the apartheid reality facing Palestinians.

These shifts have thrown the mainstream Zionist movement into a state of crisis as it finds itself unable to effectively counter the charge of apartheid. In addition, Zionist organizations find themselves increasingly isolated (with the exception of right-wing, conservative and Christian evangelical circles) as the solidarity movement

continues to gain traction amongst an ever larger spectrum of audiences and organizations.

It is against this backdrop that a divided Zionist movement is seeking ways to reverse their organizational and ideological disarray. Most significantly, the emergence of this repressive trend directed at Palestine solidarity work is converging with a broader targeting of students who are active in other struggles.

Shifting Solidarity: The Development of a New Politics in the Aftermath of Oslo

The onset of the second Intifada in September 2000 opened the eyes of many who had up until then still harboured illusions as to the nature of the Oslo process. Far from leading to the establishment of an independent Palestinian state, the "process" merely served to distract from the ongoing colonization of the West Bank and Gaza Strip. Instead

of a winding down of the occupation, the matrix of Israeli control intensified. Land continued to be expropriated, Palestinian population centers were increasingly isolated and surrounded by expanding settlements, and life remained regimented by hundreds of Israeli checkpoints.                      More............

Posted 4 hours 30 minutes ago

Amnesty International has accused Ethiopian soldiers of killing 21 people, including an imam and several Islamic scholars, at a Mogadishu mosque, and said seven of the victims had their throats slit.

The rights group said the soldiers had also captured dozens of children during the raid on the Al Hidaaya mosque in the north of the Somali capital earlier this week during operations against Islamist insurgents.

Ethiopia has thousands of soldiers in neighbouring Somalia to bolster a Western-backed government against rebels fighting an Iraq-style insurgency in the Horn of Africa nation.

The Ethiopian and Somali governments have not responded publicly to accusations of atrocities at the mosque.

But they have frequently denied abusing human rights in the fight against groups they call Al Qaeda-backed terrorists.

Amnesty said those killed at the mosque included imam Sheikh Saiid Yaha and several scholars of the moderate Tabligh group that operated there.

"Eye-witnesses report that those killed inside the mosque were unarmed civilians taking no active part in hostilities," Amnesty said.

"Seven of the 21 were reported to have died after their throats were cut, a form of extra-judicial execution practiced by Ethiopian forces in Somalia."

Some moderate Islamist leaders have reacted to the mosque incident, and a recent upsurge of fighting in Mogadishu, by postponing plans to join UN-sponsored peace talks.

More than 100 people have been killed since the weekend in clashes in the coastal capital, and the takeover of several small towns by the Islamists' militant al Shabaab wing.

Washington last month put al Shabaab on its terrorism list.

- Reuters

Ahmad Jaradat, Alternative Information Center (AIC)

Approximately 2,000 pastoralist herders and farmers live in caves carved out of the hillside south of Hebron. Their way of life is unique in Palestine, as they have survived by farming the rocky hillsides and tending their flocks for at least 170 years. Tuesday, 22 April 2008 In the south hills of Hebron, ever since Jewish settlers arrived to colonize the region, we witness a comprehensive and ongoing policy of mass deportation of Palestinians from the area in order to create space for the expansion of surrounding Israeli settlements. The main settlements surrounding the area—Susya, Karmel, Maon and Yatir—are known to be inhabited by some of the most militant and violent settlers in the occupied Palestinian territories. The area was originally inhabited by a small Palestinian population of approximately 2,000 pastoralist herders and farmers living in caves carved out of the hillside, hence, their designation as "cave dwellers." Their way of life is unique in Palestine, as they have survived by farming the rocky hillsides and tending their flocks for at least 170 years. Before this, they were poor Palestinian families living in villages in the southern Hebron region, who bought land 20 kilometers away. About two centuries ago, they started to live in caves spread out across the area, gaining their livelihood from the mountains and surrounding fields. Some generations later they succeed in developing a culture and a way of living based on sheep herding, agriculture and cave dwelling. However, since the occupation of the region by Israel in 1967, the Israeli authorities have been confiscating their land, first using military justifications and then for the purpose of building and expanding settlements.                         More.................

Nigel Morris, Independent

April 22, 2008 An American expert in torture techniques has denounced his government for allowing "waterboarding" to be practised against terror suspects, just as a graphic advertisement showing the brutal reality of the technique is unveiled to British cinema-goers. Malcolm Nance, who trained hundreds of US servicemen and women to resist interrogation by putting them through "waterboarding" exercises, demanded an immediate end to the practice by all US personnel. He said: "They seem to think it is worth throwing the honour of 220 years of American decency in war out of the window. Waterboarding is out-and-out torture, and I'm deeply ashamed President Bush has authorised its use and dragged the US's reputation into the mud." Mr Bush faced criticism recently when he vetoed a Bill that would have outlawed such methods of "enhanced interrogation" – the White House refuses to describe it as torture. Mr Nance said: "You have a purpose-built table with straps in a pattern so that people can be strapped and unstrapped quickly. The head is strapped down in such a way so they cannot resist the water. The head is elevated so the water goes down the oesophagus. Amnesty International's new anti-waterboarding advert   "The water is poured very carefully over the nose – you keep a constant pour. You are drowning in water but you don't have the ability to hold your breath. You feel the water going in, you understand that water is filling your lungs." Mr Nance, who is now an independent consultant, said the technique was also futile, as well as barbaric, as the prisoner would say anything to survive – regardless of its truth. Amnesty International is leading the campaign to persuade the US to abandon the practice – a form of torture used as long ago as the Spanish Inquisition – and is stepping up its efforts with the release of a graphic and disturbing advertisement. The broadcast begins with images of glistening clear liquid, suggesting it could be promoting a new brand of vodka or gin. But the camera pulls back to show water is being poured over the face of a desperate man strapped to a table. Kate Allen, the UK director of Amnesty International, said: "Our film shows you what the CIA doesn't want you to see – the disgusting reality of half-drowning a person. "For a few seconds, our film-makers did it for real. Even for those few seconds, it's horrifying to watch. The reality – in a secret prison with no one to stop it – is much, much worse." The advertisement can be seen at www.unsubscribe-me.org from today and at 50 cinemas from next month onwards.

:: Article nr. 43304 sent on 22-apr-2008 21:14 ECT
www.uruknet.info?p=43304

By Curt Maynard

Well guess what reader, the United States government has done it again, they’ve hidden another Jewish spy from the American public, but this time the cats out of the bag, someone leaked the details and now we find that another Jewish American, this time a Navy Petty Officer by the name of Ariel J. Weinmann has been arrested for passing along Top Secret information related to National Security to the Israeli government.

In Weinmann’s case, one can bet the information he stole was of a highly classified nature, you see Weinmann was stationed on an American nuclear submarine, the USS Albuquerque. Despite this, Kate Wiltrout, of theVirginian-Pilot reports:

The Navy originally refused to release basic information about the Weinmann case - including the dates of his Article 32, or preliminary hearing - but reversed course after The Virginian-Pilot revealed Weinmann's confinement, and the secrecy with which it was being handled.[1]

ـ خلفية تاريخية:

أسست الحركة الإسلامية في القرن الإفريقي عام 1976على يد نخبة من العلماء وخريجي الجامعات العربية، على أمل أن يخدموا دينهم ومجتمعهم بما يتوافق والمنهج الإخواني. وانصب جل اهتمام الحركة على مجالي التعليم والإغاثة، حيث كان للحركة باع طويل في مجال التعليم خلال فترة غياب الحكومة الصومالية، وخاصة في محيط العاصمة.

ـ ضياع البوصلة:

لقد حدث وأن سيطرت على الحركة مجموعة عشائرية بتخطيط أسطوري، وكانت تهدف إلى خدمة عشيرتها عن طريق السيطرة على الحركة. وكانت هذه المجموعة القبلية تنحدر من حركة صوفية، تتمسك بالطريقة القادرية، المعروفة بمسايرتها الشديدة للاستعمار، كما اشتهرت بعمالة مؤسس هذا الفرع من القادرية (عبد الله القطبي) لكل من بريطانيا وإيطاليا، ومناوءته الشديدة للجهاد الإسلامي، بقيادة السيد محمد عبد الله حسن (1899-1921م).

ومادام أن عشيرة واحدة سيطرت على الحركة، والتي لها مفاهيم دينية وأهداف مصلحية مغايرة تماما لما أسست الحركة من أجله، فإن من البديهي أن تنحرف الحركة، ومن الطبيعي أن يتساءل أعضاؤها: "ماذا حدث، وإلى أين نتجه؟"

ومن هنا قطعت المجموعة المذكورة عزمها على أن تفصل نهائيا عن الحركة كل من يفكر بأن يقدم انتقادا إلى هذه القيادة غير الرشيدة، فضلا عن الذي يفكر في التصحيح. ومن هنا حدثت موجات الفصل والانفصال ومنها:

1- انفصال مجموعة كبيرة من أعضاء الحركة مع الشيخ/ محمد معلم علي، شيخ المفسرين في الصومال. وهم يتمركزون في جنوب الصومال، وهم الذين أصبحوا فيما بعد من مؤسسي حركة المحاكم الإسلامية.

2- انفصال الشباب الذين ينحدرون من الصوماليين في كينيا، بعد أن يئسوا من الحركة من أن تعير أي اهتمام إلى المنطقة الصومالية في كينيا.

3- الانفصال الذي حدث من قبل شباب الصومال الغربي، بعد ما تيقنوا أن الحركة لا تهتم أصلا بهذه المنطقة المحتلة.

4- علما بأن معظم قيادات التيار السلفي في القرن الإفريقي، كانوا يوما ما من حركة الإخوان المسلمين، ولكنهم تركوها لأسباب ما زالت قائمة إلى يومنا هذا، أو فُصلوا عنها من غير مبرر مقنع!!!

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Joyce and Kevin Lucey, parents of Jeffrey Lucey, who committed suicide after returning, describe the last months of his life and his unsuccessful efforts to get help from the Veterans Administration.
Jeffrey was a Marine convoy driver stationed in Iraq for five months at the start of the war.
After he came back, he told his girlfriend he had done immoral things. “I’ve seen and done enough horrible things to last a lifetime,” he said to her.
Jeffrey told his sister he was a murderer. He wore the dog tags of two Iraqi soldiers for whose death he felt responsible. He wore the tags to honor the two.
Shortly before he killed himself, Jeffrey asked his father to take him in his lap and rock him, and his father did.
After he died, his parents found a note that read, “I am truly embarrassed of the man I became and I hope you can try to remember me only as a child when I was happy, proud, and enjoyed life.” He was 23.

Eugene Martin is a staffer for the American Federation of Government Employees, which represents many Veterans Administration employees. He says the uncertainty of funding undermines the efforts of VA staff to help veterans. Each year, he says, Congress fails to appropriate money on time, and instead passes continuing resolutions with funds for a month or two, which makes planning and filling vacancies very hard. What’s more, funds intended for medical treatment are sometimes diverted to other uses.                     More...............

by Cheryl Abraham

I must confess, my brain, my heart, and my conscience are on ‘overload.’ Every day I am bombarded with the latest outrage, the latest sad and sick news, the latest abomination created, controlled, manufactured, and contributed for and by the Bush regime. My levels of anger, frustration, anxiety, fear and worry are at an all time high. My sense of injustice is so raw at this point that the daily trip into this zone is a painful adrenaline ride. Many days I feel as if I am in a battle zone, the Bush regime’s war on terror is also waging a war on my sanity and on my life, but then I see the pictures and read the stories of the suffering of the Iraqi people at the hands of the U.S. military and their own people and this sobers me up from that self absorbed thought, so do the stories of the vets from Winter Soldier testimonies, as if I have anything to complain about, as if almost anything in my life I am experiencing could quantify as terror.

It is not as if I am a hapless victim of this overwhelming amount of ‘terrifying’ information. I choose to listen daily to AirAmerica radio, I choose to rent and watch documentaries sure to make my blood pressure rise, and I choose to go to my computer as much as I can throughout the day, read vast amounts of articles and commentaries, and then double check the information when I have time, and even when I don’t have the time, (which tends to create conflicts in other facets of my life). No one is forcing me to do these things. I do them all under the power of my own free will. I frequently and daily pass on the information that I think worthy, often to the annoyance of those on my email lists. I also watch mainstream media just to see what it misses instead of what it informs me of. I get my cynical rocks off watching the inane, redundant, stupefying junk that the news media passes off as ‘information’. It is fully within my own personal power to ‘turn off’ and turn away from the reality we all face.                                              

April 21, 2008 at 5:36 am

Born to Demolish

By: Jeff Halper

---

Nick Juliano - Published: Monday April 21, 2008
The Army doubled the number of waivers it issued to allow convicted felons to enlist between 2006 and 2007, while felony waivers issued to Marine recruits increased by nearly 70 percent, according to newly released numbers from the Pentagon.

The House Oversight Committee released the Department of Defense statistics Monday, and requested more explanation for the increase in criminals who have been allowed into the military's ranks. The Army issued 511 waivers in 2007, compared to 249 in 2006. The Marine Corps issued 350 waivers last year compared to 208 the year before.

According to the new data, the Army and Marines have allowed recruits who have been convicted of assault with a dangerous weapn, burglary, drug abuse, sexual assault; in a few instances recruits were cleared to join after convinctions on terrorism or bomb-threat related charges.

"I understand that there can be valid reasons for personnel waivers and recognize the importance of providing opportunities to individuals who have served their sentences and rehabilitated themselves," Rep. Henry Waxman (D-CA), the Oversight Committee's chairman, wrote in a letter (.pdf) to an undersecretary of defense. "At the same time, concerns have been raised that the significant increase in the recruitment of persons with criminal records is a result of the strain put on the military by the Iraq war and may be undermining military readiness."                                                                       More...................