Thursday 26 June 2008

by: Ramit Plushnick-Masti, The Associated Press

Muslim physicist Moniem El-Ganayni, left, at a Pittsburgh press conference with his attorney, Vic Walczak. After El-Ganayni's security clearance was revoked, he lost the job at the Bettis Laboratory, where he'd worked for 18 years on nuclear projects. (Photo: Keith Srakocic / AP)

    Pittsburgh - An Islamic nuclear physicist on Thursday accused the U.S. Department of Energy of revoking his security clearance in retaliation for his criticism of the government's treatment of Muslims.

    Moniem El-Ganayni had worked at the Bettis Laboratory in the Pittsburgh suburb of West Mifflin for 18 years. He was fired in May after the department revoked his security clearance, according to a federal lawsuit filed on his behalf Thursday by the American Civil Liberties Union.

    The Department of Energy denied El-Ganayni the right to appeal the revocation by saying its reasons are classified and could violate national security if made public. El-Ganayni is demanding that he be allowed to contest it before a "nonpolitical, neutral arbiter as mandated by DOE regulations."

    "Everything I strived for all my life came to an end without a chance to defend myself," said El-Ganayni, 57, an Egyptian who moved to the United States in 1980.                                           More--------------------

Ex-Dutch prime minister and Israel critic Andreas Van Agt (Cnaan Liphshiz)

By Cnaan Liphshiz, Haaretz Correspondent

The emotion in Andreas Van Agt's voice as he lambastes Israel's behavior seems puzzling for a man of his status. It is especially intriguing when one is reminded that this blue-eyed professed idealist is an astute statesman who presided as the Dutch prime minister for five years, until 1982. "My involvement in the Middle East is certainly unusual," Van Agt confessed in an interview with Haaretz at his home in Nijmegen, where he discussed Israel, the Palestinians, European foreign policy, the Holocaust and anti-Semitism. Currently, Van Agt is writing a book about the Israeli-Arab conflict. In December he launched an info-site (www.driesvanagt.nl) about the subject, in which he accuses Israel of brutal treatment of the Palestinians, violating international law and implementing racist policies. Advertisement Among other illustrations, the site contains one snapshot of a graffiti slogan said to have been sprayed by Jewish settlers on a Hebron wall, reading: "Arabs to the gas chambers." Last year, Van Agt spoke as keynote speaker at a controversial solidarity rally with the Palestinian people in Rotterdam, where he lamented the Dutch boycott of Hamas, calling it wrong "and even stupid." He has also been outspoken in accusing the Israel Defense Forces of acting like a terrorist organization. "In my country, people are highly surprised by my demeanor. Some even say it should be ascribed to my advanced age; that I'm not fully in my right mind anymore," the 77-year-old says with a snicker while sitting under the outdated portrait of the Queen, which hangs on the wall of his modern-style, taupe-colored den.            More.....................

NEW YORK -- Soaring corn and soy prices on top of rising construction costs and tight credit markets have pushed about a dozen U.S. biofuel plants to file for bankruptcy protection, experts said.

Prices for corn, the feedstock for most U.S. ethanol plants, hit fresh records above $8 per bushel this week as floods this month in the Midwest have caused billions of dollars of crop damage.

"Corn prices are making the feasibility of ethanol plants every day more and more questionable," said Alex Moglia, president of Moglia Advisors in suburban Chicago, which helps biofuel companies restructure.

Meanwhile prices for soy oil, the feedstock for most biodiesel plants, have been been high on rising global demand for months, making life miserable for most producers. The miserable profit margins have pushed many makers of the alternative motor fuel to run plants at only about half of their capacity.

Moglia said about 12 small to midsize biodiesel and ethanol plants have declared bankruptcy in recent months. Renova Energy LLC, a company that owns a partially built 20 million-gallons-per year ethanol plant in Idaho, was the latest to declare bankruptcy last week. Kansas-based Ethanex Energy Inc declared bankruptcy in March.

"There will be more to follow," said Moglia. Some plants are restructuring their debt and taking steps to manage risks, but many others are not, he said.

U.S. ethanol plants are still opening but plans for the opening of plants through 2009 are being increasingly delayed or scrapped.

More..........................

By Naseer Ahmad Nawidy, Writer & Researcher — Islamabad

June 27, 2008 For the last two weeks, fighting has been intensifying in Afghanistan between the Taliban and the NATO forces, backed by Afghan forces, over the southern part of Kandahar province, which is strategically important to both sides for its special position in the south— bordering Pakistan— and being the starting point and birthplace of the Taliban. Taliban's control over this province, where the majority of population supports them, will deal a tough blow to the frail regime that is losing much of its credibility being unable to fight corruption and mismanagement in nearly every aspect of Afghanistan's daily life. The break of Taliban into Arghandab — a district about 20 km north west of the Kandahar city— was an unexpected event. On June 14, about 500 armed Taliban elements sneaked into the city from Khakriz and Zeray areas occupying 11 villages within three days. Hundreds of villagers were forced to flee the area after Taliban fighters blew up three bridges and laid mines along several roadways around Arghandab. But can we say Taliban is coming back so quickly? Taliban’s spokesman Yousuf Ahmadi told AFP by telephone from an undisclosed location that Taliban would use Arghandab for strategic attacks on Kandahar city. Responding to the Taliban offensive, 1,400 troops of Afghan National Army (ANA) along with 600 NATO soldiers, mostly Canadians, backed by gunship helicopters rolled into the battlefield. After massive air strikes on Taliban’s positions, the Afghan and NATO forces could cautiously enter to the combat area on June 18. After a short time, the government troops claimed killing of 20 Taliban militants while Taliban, on the other hand, claimed killing many Afghan and foreign troops and destroying their tanks and armored vehicles.                    More.............

Quarter of adult population face mandatory "anti-pedophile" test in sweeping expansion of "child protection" measures

Paul Joseph Watson Prison Planet Thursday, June 26, 2008 |

Sweeping new policies set to be introduced in the UK will mandate parents to get government permission to kiss their children or take them to the swimming pool in public, measures that are "poisoning" relationships between the generations, according to respected sociologist Professor Frank Furedi.

A quarter of the entire adult population of the United Kingdom will be mandated to pass a state check operated by a newly formed government agency to have any physical contact with children under the age of 16 in public - including their own kids.

"From next year the new Independent Safeguarding Authority will require any adult who come into contact with children or vulnerable adults either through their work or in voluntary groups to be vetted," according to a London Telegraph report.

by John Pilger

The British lawyer Gareth Pierce, celebrated for her defense of miscarriage of justice victims, wrote recently: "Over the years of the conflict, every lawless action on the part of the British state provoked a similar reaction: internment, ‘shoot to kill’, the use of torture, brutally obtained false confessions and fabricated evidence. This was registered by the community most affected, but the British public, in whose name the actions were taken, remained ignorant." Referring to the conflict in Northern Ireland, she was drawing a comparison with "our new suspect community," people of Muslim faith, against whom a vicious, sectarian and mostly unreported war is well under way.

As Pierce points out, "internment, discredited and abandoned in Northern Ireland" now allows, not 42 days, but "indefinite detention without trial of foreign nationals, the ‘evidence’ to be heard in secret with the detainee’s lawyer not permitted to see the evidence against him." Those snatched from their homes in Britain following 11 September, 2001 have all but vanished into an Anglo-American gulag, which in this country joins Belmarsh prison, where people are consigned to oblivion, with Broadmoor psychiatric prison, where they are sent as they go mad, and with Kafkaesque versions of "home" where others are interred under "control orders." One of these home prisoners, wrote Pierce, " a man without arms, was left alone and terrified, unable to leave the flat or to contact anyone without committing a criminal offense, subject to a curfew and allowed no visits unless approved in advance by the Home Office." Going into the garden, arranging a plumber, speaking to a child’s teacher all require permission. The families go mad, too.                          More.................

Charles Sullivan  - June 25, 2008

Palestinian Information Center

June 19, 2008 BRUSSELS, (PIC)-- A report issued by the European campaign to lift the siege stated that the number of the siege victims has risen to 116 Palestinian patients including children since the beginning of 2008 which indicates the Gaza Strip is witnessing a notable rise in the death toll of patients. According to the report, the total number of the siege victims since the Israeli siege imposed about a year ago, thus, has reached 192 patients. The campaign had warned that the specter of death is threatening a long list of patients who suffer chronic and serious diseases due to the lack of medicines and the Israeli restrictions imposed on travel for medical treatment outside the besieged Gaza Strip. The campaign underlined that the statute of the international criminal court defines "genocide" in article no. six as any action that would deliberately inflict on a group of people conditions of life calculated to bring about physical destruction in whole or in part.

:: Article nr. 45004 sent on 19-jun-2008 17:52 ECT
www.uruknet.info?p=45004

By Joseph Abrams -

Critics are calling for the resignation of a U.N. official who publicly supports investigating theories that the Sept. 11 attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon were an "inside job."

Richard Falk, the special rapporteur on human rights in the Palestinian territories, investigates alleged Israeli violations of human rights law for the U.N.'s Human Rights Council.

But the former Princeton professor would also like to investigate whether "some sort of controlled explosion from within" destroyed the Twin Towers, he told FOXNews.com.

"I do think there are questions that haven't been answered, questions about the way the buildings collapsed and the failure to heed a variety of signals that there was danger coming," Falk said.

"I think [his beliefs are] fruitcake city, but among many delegations to the U.N. it's probably the conventional wisdom," said John Bolton, a former U.S. ambassador to the U.N. known for his straight talk on U.N. hypocrisy.

But Hillel Neuer, executive director of U.N. Watch, a non-governmental organization that monitors the U.N., wants Falk removed from his job.

"He should resign," said Neuer, who raised concerns about Falk's ability to be an objective observer. Neuer has also criticized Falk for being biased against Israel.                                      More....................

d4

 أمية جحا - جريدة الراية - قطر

Omayya Joha - Alraya newspaper - Qater

John Goetz and Bob Drogin, Special to Los Angeles Times

Der Spiegel The Iraqi refugee and German intelligence source code-named Curveball, left, meets with reporter John Goetz somewhere in Germany. His tall tales of Saddam Hussein's mobile germ weapons labs helped the White House justify the invasion of Iraq. Rafid Ahmed Alwan talks publicly for the first time. Charges that he fabricated intelligence that helped lead to war in Iraq are themselves fiction, he insists. But there are fresh doubts about his ho June 18, 2008 Nuremberg, Germany Rafid Ahmed Alwan hoped for an easier life when he came here from Iraq nine years ago. He also hoped for a reward for his cooperation with German intelligence officers. "For what I've done, I should be treated like a king," he said outside a cramped, low-rent apartment he shares with his family. Instead, the Iraqi informant code-named Curveball has flipped burgers at McDonald's and Burger King, washed dishes in a Chinese restaurant and baked pretzels in an all-night bakery. He also has faced withering international scorn for peddling discredited intelligence that helped spur an invasion of his native country. Now, in his first public comments, the 41-year-old engineer from Baghdad complains that the CIA and other spy agencies are blaming him for their mistakes. "I'm not guilty," Alwan said, insisting that he made no false claims. "Believe me, I'm not guilty." It was intelligence attributed to Alwan -- as Curveball -- that the White House used in making its case that Saddam Hussein possessed weapons of mass destruction. He described what turned out to be fictional mobile germ factories. The CIA belatedly branded him a liar. After Curveball's role in the pre-invasion intelligence fiasco was disclosed by the Los Angeles Times four years ago, the con man behind the code name remained in the shadows. His security was protected and his identity concealed by the BND, Germany's Federal Intelligence Service.                    More.................

"لو كنت مكان قائد حزب الله اللبناني حسن نصر الله، لما وجدت أفضل من الداعية الإسلامي السني "فتحي يكن"، مروجاً للمشروع الصفوي المنبثق من طهران إلى كافة أرجاء العالم الإسلامي".

هذا ما دار بخلدي وأنا أتابع الحلقة الثالثة من برنامج مراجعات على قناة الحوار مع الداعية الإسلامية فتحي يكن، ومع علمي السابق بانفصال الأستاذ فتحي يكن عن الجماعة الإسلامية بلبنان، ووجود نوع تحالف بين تنظيم فتحي يكن الجديد "جبهة العمل الإسلامي" وحزب الله اللبناني، إلا أني لم أتصور ذوبان شخصية فكرية بهذا الحجم في محيط التيار الصفوي، حتى إن الرجل لم يقدم جواباً عن سؤال سأله إياه الكاتب "عزام التميمي" عن مستقبل الجبهة الإسلامية السنية؟

وأخذ ينشد مقطوعة من الثناء على ما أسماه "جبهة الممانعة"، مثنياً على النظام الإيراني، والنظام السوري، وحزب الله، مما يدل دلالة ضمنية أن الرجل لم يعد يراهن على أهله من أهل السنة في الوقت المنظور على الأقل، وقد وقع الأستاذ فتحي يكن في إشكالات منهجية في معرض دفاعه عما يعتبره "جبهة الممانعة" ألخصها فيما يلي:

June 14, 2008 at 11:20 am

For more information, kindly visit:

BBC

IMEMC

The Muslim News

Source

Saed Bannoura - IMEMC News

June 12, 2008   After an Israeli human rights group handed out small video cameras to Palestinians in the West bank, those cameras have been used to capture a number of attacks that would otherwise have gone unreported. In the latest example, an attack by a group of Israeli settlers on a Palestinian farming family Sunday was filmed, and the video released on the internet. Attacks by extremist Israeli Jewish settlers against the indigenous Palestinian population of the West Bank are common, and the incidents have increased as Israeli settlements have expanded on Palestinian land over the last 15 years. In Sunday's attack, an elderly woman, Thamam al-Nawaja, was herding her family's sheep when four masked and armed Israeli settlers came running toward her from the settlement of Susia. When her son and husband saw what was happening, they came over, and the settlers beat the whole family with baseball bats. Al-Nawaja, who suffered the brunt of the beating, spent three days in the hospital after the attack. Her face was beaten badly, and one cheekbone was shattered. But when approached by reporters upon leaving the hospital, she stated, "They don't want us to stay on our land. But we won't leave. We'll die here. It's ours." Israeli police claim they are investigating the incident, but no one has been arrested. It is extremely rare for Israeli settlers to be charged with attacks against Palestinians, as it is the mandate of the Israeli police to protect the settlers from attacks by Palestinians, and the police claim they have no jurisdiction to charge settlers who attack Palestinians. The British Broadcasting Corporation, or BBC, obtained the rights to the video, which can be viewed at the link below. Related Link(s): http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/7451691.stm

:: Article nr. 44843 sent on 13-jun-2008 17:25 ECT
www.uruknet.info?p=44843

	Ma'an news
	June 12, 2008 Gaza – Ma'an – The number of Palestinians killed in the explosion on Thursday at a Beit Lahiya home in the northern Gaza Strip increased to seven, after three members of the Hamas-affiliated Al-Qassam Brigades died from their injuries. The announcement of the deaths of Al-Qassam fighters Muhammed Hamdan Maqdad, Muhammed Sabri Abu Naja, and Ahmad Munir Subeih in the explosion brought the death toll on Thursday in Gaza to 11, with dozens injured. Medical sources had earlier announced that the body of Al-Qassam fighter Ashraf Na'im Mashtahi was also retrieved from the rubble of the two-storey Hamoudeh family home in Beit Lahiya, which was destroyed by a massive explosion on Thursday afternoon. More than 40 people were reported wounded in the explosion, at least six of them seriously. Four-month-old Nour Majdi Hamoudeh, 22-year-old Mahmoud 'Ataya Hamoudeh, and 27-year-old Omar Abdel Ra'ouf Abu Shaqfeh were also killed in the explosion. Earlier on Thursday afternoon, Dr Mo'awiya Hassanein, Head of Ambulance and Emergency Services in the Ministry of Health, said that at least three corpses and 35 injured citizens arrived at Gazan hospitals after an explosion destroyed the Hamoudeh family home in Beit Lahiya. He said he expected the number of casualties to increase because of the serious nature of the injuries. Eyewitnesses reported that the house was completely destroyed over its residents, and that emergency services evacuated the dead and wounded from the rubble. Contradictory reports were received regarding the explosion at the house owned by Khaled Hamoudeh. Hamas affirmed that the explosion was caused by Israeli F-16 aircraft bombing the house of an Al-Qassam Brigades leader. However, the Israeli military denied bombing the house. Hamas and the de facto Palestinian government in Gaza accused Israel of responsibility for the "massacre" and called on the international community to "assume its responsibilities and move urgently to protect the Palestinian people under occupation and the Israeli killing machine." In a separate incident, a Palestinian was killed and two others were injured in an Israeli air strike on the Khuza'a area, east of Khan Younis, on Thursday afternoon. Earlier on Thursday morning, three Palestinian resistance fighters were killed by Israeli fire on Thursday in two separate operations in the northern Gaza Strip. Two members of the Al-Aqsa Brigades and the National Resistance Brigades, the military wings of the Fatah and DFLP movements respectively, were killed in a joint operation on Thursday morning after infiltrating inside the Green Line near the evacuated settlement of Dugit, north of Beit Lahiya, and clashing with Israeli forces in the area. Armed with a machine gun and hand grenades, they fought Israeli forces for more than half an hour. Two fighters were killed in the operation: 20-year-old Mohammad Dawla from the Al-Aqsa Brigades and 21-year-old Khaled Zaki Zohd from the National Resistance Brigades. Meanwhile, the Israeli army announced early on Thursday that Israeli forces killed an armed Palestinian near the electric fence in the northern Gaza Strip, stating that soldiers opened fire at a Palestinian fighter approaching the fence and killed him. No Palestinian faction or brigade has claimed responsibility for this operation yet, and Israeli forces have still not returned his corpse to Palestinian authorities. In related developments, several Israeli communities and towns in the western Negev and the Erez crossing were attacked with homemade projectiles and mortar shells launched by Palestinian fighters. An Israeli woman in Yad Mordechai was lightly injured, and a fire broke out from the shelling near Kibbutz Beiri in the Negev. www.uruknet.info?p=44838

By MUHAMMAD IDREES AHMAD

It is with some alarm and dismay that I watched Amy Goodman’s “Democracy Now” provide platform to right-wing Paksitani journalist Ahmad Rashid, long an apologist for Bush's war-on-terror, to recycle propaganda from British tabloid press and other discredited sources. His tale about al-Qa'ida recruiting white converts for terrorist acts in Europe originated with the British security services as part of their fearmongering campaign to build support for the 42-day detention without charge plan. No shred of evidence was ever offered.

Equally bogus are his claims of organized al-Qa'ida 'training camps', where recruits are offered foreign language training etc. Once again, these claims are the products of the vivid imaginations of the terrorologists proliferating in the war on terror fear factory. I suggest Goodman ask Rashid to substantiate claims, or issue a retraction. (When he claims 'Iraq is an Arab problem' and that it would be resolved when its neighbours 'stop interfering', I would have liked Goodman  to at least ask if he was aware the country is under U.S. occupation.)

More................