USA: 1984

Spiegel: Senioren in Handschellen

Die US-Bundespolizei FBI nimmt Kriegsgegner und Bush-Kritiker als potenzielle Terroristen ins Visier. Selbst harmlose Protestler laufen nun Gefahr, auf die FBI-Abschussliste zu geraten.

.....Als der Pensionär mit einem Protestplakat zu einem Auftritt von Präsident George W. Bush aufkreuzte, wurde er prompt in Handschellen gelegt. Erst nach Bushs Abreise ließ ihn die Polizei wieder frei und verzichtete auch nur auf Intervention der US-Buergerrechtsunion ACLU auf eine Anzeige.

.....Ein Muster, das sich nun erstmals als eine Strategie der Regierung zu offenbaren scheint, ihre Kritiker mundtot zu machen. Und zwar geht das aus einem internen Memo hervor, das die Bundespolizei FBI im Oktober als "Bulletin Nr. 89" an alle oertlichen Behoerden geschickt hat und das diese Woche, gegen den Willen des heimlichtuerischen FBI, bekannt wurde.

Darin gibt das Bundesbuero Instruktionen für den Umgang mit regierungskritischen Protestlern. Die oertlichen Polizeistellen, so die zweiseitige Anweisung, mögen fortan "alle potenziell illegalen Akte" bei Anti-Bush-Demos an eine der 66 lokalen Terror-Arbeitsgruppen des FBI melden - also auch das ordnungswidrige Herumtragen von Plakaten außerhalb der polizeilich abgeriegelten "Potestzonen", dessen sich der Rentner Neel schuldig gemacht hatte. Neels Plakat trug die wütende, doch harmlose Aufschrift: "Die Familie Bush lieben die Armen sicher - sie hat so viele von uns arm gemacht."

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ROGUE STATE USA: GUANTANAMO

Guardian: Powell: no quick deal on Guantanamo

US needs more time to decide if Britons held in Cuba are dangerous, he tells Guardian

The US military authorities at Guantanamo Bay have not finished interrogating seven of the nine British detainees and have yet to decide whether "they have done something wrong", Colin Powell, the US secretary of state, said yesterday, nearly two years after the prison camp was set up in Cuba.
Mr Powell's remarks, in an interview with the Guardian in his state department office, appear to dash hopes of a swift resolution to the fate of the British inmates. The US struck a deal with the Australian government this week, under which two Australian suspects would have lawyers from their own country if they faced military tribunals and might be able to serve their sentences in Australia.

The comments were greeted with outrage from human rights groups and the prisoners' lawyers. Relatives of all nine Britons, who were captured in Afghanistan, have denied they had links with terrorist groups.

Stephen Jakobi, the director of the pressure group Fair Trials Abroad and an adviser to the European parliament on the issue of Guantanamo Bay, said: "It is necessary under international law to bring people before a court promptly. I have yet to see a definition of 'promptly' that means two years. The idea that intelligence can't process people over two years in risible. What Powell has said makes no sense."

"Nach zwei Jahren, wissen die Amerikaner immer noch nicht ob ihre Gefangenen im Konzentrationslager Guantanamo sich überhaupt etwas haben zu Schulden kommen lassen. Sie wurden nach zwei Jahren noch nicht mal fertig verhoert."

IRAQ

Guardian: How British charity was silenced on Iraq

One of Britain's most high-profile charities was ordered to end criticism of military action in Iraq by its powerful US wing to avoid jeopardising financial support from Washington and corporate donors, a Guardian investigation has discovered.
Internal emails reveal how Save the Children UK came under enormous pressure after it accused coalition forces of breaching the Geneva convention by blocking humanitarian aid.

Senior figures at Save the Children US, based in Westport, Connecticut, demanded the withdrawal of the criticism and an effective veto on any future statements blaming the invasion for the plight of Iraqi civilians suffering malnourishment and shortages of medical supplies.

Uncovered documents expose tensions within an alliance that describes itself as "the world's largest independent global organisation for children" but which is heavily reliant on governments and big business for cash.

Accounts published by Save the Children US highlight its vulnerability to political pressure from a Republican White House with "government grants and contracts" generating some 60%, nearly £71m, of its £119m operating support and revenue. The proportion is also high in the UK, where £60.1m - 49% - of the organisation's income is "grants and gifts in kind from institutional donors", including the government.

IRAQ

Independent: Shia leader set to reject plans for new Iraq

The Bush administration's plans for formally ending the occupation of Iraq face further complications with signs of hardening opposition from the country's most influential Shia Muslim cleric.

Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani has criticised plans by Washington to transfer political responsibility to Iraqis next year as incomplete and believes they pay too little heed to Islam, a Shia politician said yesterday.

His comments, which come as America is struggling to contain a Sunni-led insurgency, will concern Washington's strategists, including Paul Bremer, the US pro-consul in Iraq.

They know Ayatollah Sistani holds great sway over thepoor urban Shias, who comprise 60 per cent of the 25 million population, and has influence over the 25-seat US-appointed Iraqi governing council. Although the Americans do not want their policy determined by a Shia religious leader, they know that many Shia Iraqis would be unlikely to accept proposals that were rejected by him.

IRAQ: THE IMPERATOR HAS LANDED

Independent: The turkey has landed: how Bush cooked up a secret mission to give thanks to his troops

George Bush delivered a dramatic Thanksgiving Day surprise last night by flying, under cover of darkness, into Iraq on board Air Force One.

Two hundred and ten days after declaring an end to major combat, President Bush slipped into the unstable and dangerous Middle Eastern country that his troops now occupy with the lights on his plane darkened and the windows blacked out.

The extraordinary mission ­ no American president has visited a war zone since Richard Nixon flew to Vietnam in 1969 ­ was clearly calculated to burnish Mr Bush's image as he prepares for a re-election campaign that will be overshadowed by violence in Iraq and the rising toll of American casualties. It was spent with 600 soldiers at a turkey and sweet potato dinner in a mess hall at Baghdad airport and lasted a mere two and a half hours.

EURO VS. DOLLAR

Bloomberg: Dollar Drops Further Against Euro

Bloomberg) -- The dollar had its biggest decline against the euro in a week on concern the U.S. won't attract enough capital to narrow its record current account deficit, even as the economy expands at the fastest pace since 1984.

The dollar failed to rally after government and industry reports showed durable goods orders in the U.S. rose, jobless claims fell and an index of Chicago-area factory activity rose to the highest in almost nine years. In contrast to the U.S., the euro region's current account surplus widened in September, the European Central Bank said today.

"Traders don't feel comfortable sleeping at night with a big long dollar position,'' said Shahab Jalinoos, a currency strategist at ABN Amro Holding NV in London.

In New York trading, the dollar fell to $1.1935 per euro at 1:52 p.m. from $1.l792 late yesterday. The dollar is down 14 percent versus the euro this year and today dropped against all but three of 16 major currencies tracked by Bloomberg News.

SUDAN

Allafrica: Oil companies complicit in massive Sudan crimes says report

International oil companies in Sudan share full responsibility with the
Sudanese government for the displacement of hundreds of thousands of
civilians from oil concession areas, as well as countless other human
rights abuses, according to the advocacy group Human Rights Watch. Oil
company executives had "turned a blind eye" to well-reported government
attacks on civilians and civilian targets, including aerial bombings of
hospitals, churches, relief operations and schools, it said in a new
report entitled Sudan, Oil and Human Rights.

MIAMI: FTAA

Miami Herald: He respected the badge, but `not in Miami'

Early on Thursday morning, Bentley Killmon boarded a chartered bus to take him from Fort Myers to Miami so he could protest the proposed Free Trade Area of the Americas. The 71-year-old, retired airline pilot said he was amazed by the heavy police presence in downtown Miami when he arrived.

Throughout the day, he said he watched police overreact to incidents. He saw a 53-year-old woman get shot in the chest with rubber bullets. He saw other peaceful protesters being gassed with pepper spray. He saw young people, who weren't doing anything illegal or improper, being pushed and harassed by cops.

''My father was in the Norfolk City Police Department for many years,'' he said. ``Until Thursday, I respected the badge. I respected the job the police had to do. But I no longer respect the badge. Not in Miami. Not after what I saw. Not after what happened to me and others.''

MEDIA WATCH

Guardian: BBC Director slams US media for war coverage

BBC director general Greg Dyke delivered a stinging criticism of US
news coverage of the war in Iraq as he collected a prestigious award for his
contribution to broadcasting at an international awards ceremony last
night.

Mr Dyke said it was the BBC's duty to stand up to the government as he
was presented with an international Emmy directorate award for his
outstanding achievement in TV broadcasting at the ceremony in New York.

"News organisations should be in the business of balancing their
coverage, not banging the drum for one side or the other. This is something which
seemed to get lost in American reporting of the war," said Mr Dyke

MIAMI: FTAA

commondreams: The War on Dissent by Naomi Klein
Heavy-handed Police and Propaganda Tactics Brought Baghdad to Miami

In December, 1990, U.S. President George Bush Sr. traveled through South America to sell the continent on a bold new dream: "a free-trade system that links all of the Americas." Addressing the Argentine congress, he said that the plan, later to be named the Free-Trade Area of the Americas would be "our hemisphere's new declaration of interdependence . . . the brilliant new dawn of a splendid new world."

Last week, Mr. Bush's two sons joined forces to try to usher in that new world by holding the FTAA negotiations in friendly Florida. This is the state that Governor Jeb Bush vowed to "deliver" to his brother during the 2000 presidential elections, even if that meant keeping many African-Americans from exercising their right to vote. Now Jeb Bush was vowing to hand his brother the coveted trade deal, even if that meant keeping thousands from exercising their right to protest.

And yet, despite the Bush brothers' best efforts, the dream of a hemisphere united into a single free-market economy died last week. It was killed not by demonstrators in Miami, but by the populations of Brazil, Argentina, and Bolivia, which have let their politicians know that if they sign away any more power to foreign multinationals, they may as well not come home.

ALternet: Fragments of the Future: The FTAA in Miami

Editor's Note: In an introduction to Solnit's article, Tom Engelhardt,
editor of tomdispatch.com, comments on the growing militarization of
our
culture.

I used to think that, as with what Chalmers Johnson calls its "empire
of bases," the United States was developing a new form of militarism,
unlike every past example, in which you could walk the streets of our cities
forever without seeing anyone in a military uniform. That, of course,
began to change after 9/11. Now, from airports to subways, not to speak of
demonstrations, it's become quite normal to spot well-armed soldiers.
As Rebecca Solnit suggests in her vivid report below on the FTAA
demonstrations in Miami, in the face of protest there's a creeping
militarization of whole cityscapes.

US ARMY

Boston: Army Reserve battling an exodus

When will the Draft start?

WASHINGTON -- The US Army Reserve fell short of its reenlistment goals this fiscal year, underscoring Pentagon fears that the protracted conflict in Iraq could cause a crippling exodus from the armed services.

The Army Reserve has missed its retention goal by 6.7 percent, the second shortfall since fiscal 1997. It was largely the result of a larger than expected exodus of career reservists, a loss of valuable skills because such staff members are responsible for training junior officers and operating complex weapons systems.

"The Army has invested an enormous amount of money in training these people, and they're very hard to replace," said John Pike of globalsecurity.org, an independent research group in Washington.

GEORGIA

Globeandmail: Politics, pipelines converge in Georgia

The downfall of Shevardnadze had its roots in the rivalry between the United States and Russia, writes MARK MacKINNON

TBILISI -- It looked like a popular, bloodless revolution on the streets. Behind the scenes, it smells more like another victory for the United States over Russia in the post-Cold War international chess game.

Once, the game was played out on a truly global scale, in places such as Angola and Afghanistan, and was cloaked as a fight between capitalism and communism. These days, as Russian power and influence have shrunk, so has the playing field. The fight for influence goes on, but the battlefields have edged much closer to Moscow -- former colonies such as Kyrgyzstan and Uzbekistan in Central Asia, and Azerbaijan and Georgia in the Caucasus.

Eduard Shevardnadze used to be one of the chess masters. Yesterday, he was knocked aside like just another pawn.

The roots of Mr. Shevardnadze's downfall go much further back than Georgia's disputed parliamentary election, held on Nov. 2, which even his chief-of-staff has now acknowledged were rigged. They lie to the east, in the oil under the Caspian Sea, one of the world's few great remaining, relatively unexploited, sources of oil.

IRAQ WAR

information clearinghouse: Deadline Iraq - Uncensored Stories of the War

These are the stories that weren’t told by the media during the Iraq
war. CBC NEWS goes straight to the source, to journalists, camera operators
and photographers from news organizations around the world, who reveal the
lethal risks they faced, as well as the untold horrors they witnessed.

.....Given all this, we thought it would be fascinating and informative to zero in on the journalists who were there. Whether there were logistical impediments to getting their stories out, or editorial concerns, or military restrictions, there was much that they couldn't, or wouldn't say, during the war. Now they can. We interviewed nearly 50 journalists from around the world, representing the broadest range of media affiliations. You can read the entire interviews from 12 of them here on our website.


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ENVIRONMENT

Independent: Ozone layer 'sacrificed' to lift re-election prospects

President George Bush has brought the international treaty aimed at repairing the Earth's vital ozone layer close to breakdown, risking millions of cancers, to benefit strawberry and tomato growers in the electorally critical state of Florida, The Independent on Sunday can reveal.

His administration is insisting on a sharp increase in spraying of the most dangerous ozone-destroying chemical still in use, the pesticide methyl bromide, even though it is due to be phased out under the Montreal Protocol in little more than a year. And it has threatened that the United States could withdraw from the treaty's provisions altogether if its demand is not met.

IRAQ

NewYork Times: Look at Afghanistan ... and fear for Iraq by NICHOLAS D. KRISTOF

Here's a foreign affairs quiz.

1. In the two years since the war in Afghanistan, opium production has:

a) Virtually been eliminated by Hamid Karzai's government and American forces.

b) Declined 30 per cent, but eradication is not expected until 2008.

c) Soared 19-fold and become the major source of the world's heroin.

2. In Paktika and Zabul, two religiously conservative parts of Afghanistan, the number of children going to school:

a) Has quintupled, with most girls finishing at least Grade 3.

b) Has risen 40 per cent, although few girls go to school.

c) Has plummeted as poor security has closed nearly all schools there.

CHECK IT

USA: 1984

defensenews: Persistent ISR Would Allow U.S. Military to Function as Strike Force

The U.S. military must cast an intelligence, surveillance and
reconnaissance net over the world to keep a watchful eye on the current
threat — a smart and patient enemy with access to commercial
technology, a senior Army official said Nov. 17.

“We have to put a globe, if you will, a sphere, over the world from an
intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance capability standpoint,”
said Edward Bair, Army program executive officer for intelligence,
electronic warfare and sensors. “We must be able to see, be able to
hear, be able to smell, be able to feel what’s going on anytime, anyplace in the world.”

Maintaining persistent ISR around the globe would allow the military to
continue to function as a “strategically relevant, continental United
States-based projection force,” Bair said during the Defense News Media
Group conference, ISR Integration 2003: The Net-Centric Vision, in
Arlington, Va.

MEDIA: IRAQI DEMOCRACY?

ZMAG: Iraq's Press, by Robert Fisk

Under US Control, Press Freedom Falls Short in Iraq by Freedom of the
press is beginning to smell a little rotten in the new Iraq. A couple of
weeks ago, the Arabic Al-Jazeera television channel received a phone call
from one of U.S. Proconsul Paul Bremer's flunkies at the presidential palace
compound. The station had to answer a series of questions in 24 hours,
its reporters were told.

"They insisted that if we didn't go to them, they'd come for us," one
of Al-Jazeera's reporters told The Independent. And come they did - to
drive the station's employees to the palace, where they were handed a sheet
of paper asking if they had been given advance notice of "terrorist
attacks" or had paid "terrorists" for information.

Al-Jazeera - along with its rival channel, Al-Arabiya - had already
been denounced by the U.S.-appointed Governing Council, currently led by the
convicted fraudster Ahmed Chalabi, and punished for allegedly
provocative programs by being banned from the council's press conferences for two
weeks.

Then the same council - obviously on Bremer's instructions - listed a
series of "do's" and "don'ts" for all the media, ranging from a
prohibition on inciting violence all the way to a ban on reporting on the rebirth
of the Baath Party or speeches by Saddam. As columnist Hassan Fattah
remarked about the council's punishment of the two Arab channels, "the council
and the interim council will be silent for two weeks, throughout much of
the Arab world, including Iraq itself. The resistance and the terrorists,
meanwhile, will still be able to say what they want. What a perfect
opportunity to pour their footage onto the airwaves and capture the
hearts and minds of Iraqis desperate for stability and some leadership."

"Wie will Amerika im Irak eine Demokratie errichten wenn sie nicht mal den Mut haben eine freie Presse zuzulassen? Moeglicherweise weil das ganze Demokratie gelaber nur Propaganda ist und die USA mit einer wirklichen Demokratie im Irak nicht leben k?nnen, weil diese Anti-Amerikanisch, Anti-Israelisch und Muslimisch waere."

MEDIA: IRAQI DEMOCRACY?

Santafee: Iraq's U.S.-Appointed Government Shuts Arab TV News Bureau for 'Inciting Murder'

BAGHDAD, Iraq - One of the biggest Arab television news networks agreed Monday to halt reports from Iraq after the U.S.-appointed government raided its offices, banned its broadcasts and threatened to imprison journalists. Media groups said the action called into question the future of a free press in Iraq.

The Iraqi Governing Council banned Al-Arabiya from working in Iraq for "a certain time" for broadcasting an audiotape a week ago of a voice it said belonged to Saddam Hussein.

"We have issued a warning to Al-Arabiya and we will sue," said Jalal Talabani, the current council president. "Al-Arabiya incites murder because it's calling for killings through the voice of Saddam Hussein."

Shortly after Talabani finished his news conference, about 20 Iraqi police officers raided Al-Arabiya's offices in Baghdad's Mansour neighborhood, making lists of equipment to be seized if it continued to report from Baghdad, said station correspondent Ali al-Khatib, reporting live from the Iraqi capital

"Kann man FOX News auch schliessen weil dort George W. Bush zum morden aufruft?"

USA: REPRESSION

ZMAG: Anarchy And The FBI by Michey Z

"What a waste of thumbs that are opposable/To make machines that are disposable And sell them to seagulls flying in circles/Around one big right wing Yes, the left wing was broken long ago/By the slingshot of COINTELPRO And now it's so hard to have faith in anything/Especially your next bold move" --"Your Next Bold Move," Ani DiFranco

In a November 23, 2003 piece entitled, "F.B.I. Scrutinizes Antiwar Rallies," New York Times reporter Eric Lichtblau broke the rather unsurprising news with this lead: "The Federal Bureau of Investigation has collected extensive information on the tactics, training and organization of antiwar demonstrators and has advised local law enforcement officials to report any suspicious activity at protests to its counterterrorism squads, according to interviews and a confidential bureau memorandum."

Representing the land of the free, F.B.I. officials told Lichtblau the comforting news that the "intelligence-gathering effort was aimed at identifying anarchists and 'extremist elements' plotting violence, not at monitoring the political speech of law-abiding protesters."

If there was ever a fail-safe, catch-all band of villains, it's the anarchists. Evoke the term "anarchist" and everyday citizens look the other way when law enforcement (sic) agencies bend the rules. Whether it's the Palmer raids of 1918-21, the deportation of Emma Goldman and Alexander Berkman, the devastating impact of the FBI Counterintelligence Program (COINTELPRO), it's nothing new. In fact, AK Press just re-issued Berkman's "What is Anarchism?" and this 70-plus year-old book could've been written yesterday.

"You have heard that Anarchists throw bombs, that they believe in violence, and that Anarchy means disorder and chaos," Berkman writes. "It is not surprising that you should think so. The press, the pulpit, and everyone in authority constantly din it into your ears." But he adds, "Most of them know better" and "have a reason for not telling you the truth."

MIAMI: FTAA

ZMAG: The Miami Model
Paramilitaries, Embedded Journalists and Illegal Protests. Think This is Iraq? It's Your Country

MIAMI--We were loading our video equipment into the trunk of our car when a fleet of bicycle cops sped up and formed a semi-circle around us. The lead cop was none other than Miami Police Chief John Timoney. The former Police Commissioner of Philadelphia Timoney has a reputation for brutality and hatred of protesters of any kind. He calls them "punks," "knuckleheads" and a whole slew of expletives. He coordinated the brutal police response to the mass-protests at the Republican National Convention in Philadelphia in 2000. After a brief stint in the private sector, Timoney took the post of Miami police chief as part of Mayor Manny Diaz's efforts to "clean up the department."

As Timoney was talking with his men, one of the guys on the bikes approached us with a notepad. "Can I have your names?" he asked.

I thought he was a police officer preparing a report. He had on a Miami police polo shirt, just like Timoney's. He had a Miami police bike helmet, just like Timoney's. He had a bike, just like Timoney's. In fact there was only one small detail that separated him from Timoney-a small badge around his neck identifying him as a reporter with the Miami Herald. He was embedded with Chief Timoney

Watching the embedded journalists on Miami TV was quite entertaining. They spoke of venturing into Protesterland as though they were entering a secret al Qaeda headquarters in the mountains of Afghanistan. Interviews with protest leaders were sort of like the secret bin Laden tapes. There was something risqué, even sexy about having the courage to venture over to the convergence space (the epicenter of protest organizing at the FTAA) and the Independent Media Center. Several reporters told of brushes they had with "the protesters." One reporter was quite shaken after a group of "anarchists" slashed her news van's tires and wrote the word "propaganda" across the side door. She feared for the life of her cameraman, she somberly told the anchor back in the studio. The anchor warned her to be careful out there

IRAQI RESISTANCE

Reuters: Blasts hit Baghdad

BAGHDAD (Reuters) - Loud blasts have echoed across Baghdad after dark and loudspeakers at the headquarters of the U.S.-led administration ordered personnel to take cover as an attack was under way.

"Attack. Take cover. This is not a test," the loudspeaker announcements said, as sirens wailed at the coalition compound in one of Saddam Hussein's former palace complexes on the west bank of the Tigris river in central Baghdad.

The compound has come under mortar and rocket fire several times this month, prompting intensified U.S. military operations against guerrilla targets in Baghdad.

Residents of a central Baghdad neighbourhood near the compound said at least two rockets had landed nearby. A large crater had been blown in the middle of one road, but there were no signs anybody had been wounded.

AGRICULTURE

Fromthewilderness: China's rising grain prices could signal global food crisis

China's rising grain prices could signal global food crisis - It's Happening Faster Than We Expected. The Agence France-Presse Is reporting that a major famine may be looming for China and that their purchases of US grain could multiply. The AFP Story does not address the serious Peak Oil and Gas issues raised by Dale Allen Pfeiffer in Eating Fossil Fuels or acknowledge that US grain harvests are falling. It does add the new wrinkle of how Global Warming (caused by burning oil and gas) continually reduces crop yields. On top of a recent CNN report announcing that soon the US will not be able to export any grain at all, it is clear that the effects of Peak Oil and Gas have begun to hit sooner than anyone expected.

OCCUPIED TERRITORIES

Counterpunch: 'We Didn't Know' Will Be No Excuse - The Wall

Israel's occupation of the Palestinian Territories passed through a profound transformation during the last several months. Through a series of policy changes and military orders, the West Bank "security fence" has gradually revealed itself to be the backbone of a comprehensive new system of land theft, imprisonment, collective punishment...and worse. The question is not whether it is a "political fence" or a "security fence", but whether it is an engine of ethnic cleansing.

In the past ninety days Israel has established a clear pattern of using its "security fence" to deny Palestinian farmers access to their own lands. Much of the olive harvest in the northern West Bank hangs dead on the trees because farmers have been 'caged' for weeks at a time. Entire villages have been issued permits to farm that give them as little as two days outside the barrier - for the entire year. Even if you have a permit, you must hope the soldiers open the gate for a few minutes on your appointed day, and open it again when you return from your labors.

In the past sixty days, Israel revealed its willingness to use deadly force to protect its "fence". It relaxed its rules of engagement, and shot an unarmed Palestinian dead for disobeying orders; he touched the wall.

Download B'Tselem's New Map of the West Bank: Settlements CHECK IT

Karte der Seperations Mauer: Map of the Separation Barrier

More than a quarter of a million Palestinians will be trapped in enclaves to the east and west of the main barrier.
The barrier will separate approximately 200,000 Palestinians who live in East Jerusalem from the rest of the West Bank.
Over 100 Palestinian communities will be separated from their agricultural land.
16% of the West Bank will be surrounded by barriers.

USA: LAND OF THE FREE

Wired: Congress Expands FBI Spying Power

Congress approved a bill on Friday that expands the reach of the Patriot Act, reduces oversight of the FBI and intelligence agencies and, according to critics, shifts the balance of power away from the legislature and the courts.

A provision of an intelligence spending bill will expand the power of the FBI to subpoena business documents and transactions from a broader range of businesses -- everything from libraries to travel agencies to eBay -- without first seeking approval from a judge.

Under the Patriot Act, the FBI can acquire bank records and Internet or phone logs simply by issuing itself a so-called national security letter saying the records are relevant to an investigation into terrorism. The FBI doesn't need to show probable cause or consult a judge. What's more, the target institution is issued a gag order and kept from revealing the subpoena's existence to anyone, including the subject of the investigation.

ISRAEL

The Scotsman: Israel Threatens Strikes On Iranian Nuclear Targets

Israel has warned that it is prepared to take unilateral military action against Iran if the international community fails to stop any development of nuclear weapons at the country's atomic energy facilities.

As the International Atomic Energy Agency prepares to meet again this week to discuss the situation in Iran, Israel has told Washington it is prepared to act alone and launch a strike similar to its attack on Iraq in 1981 when its air force bombed a nuclear reactor near Baghdad.

In an apparent attempt to increase pressure on the IAEA and United Nations to limit the development of Iran's nuclear facilities, Israel's defence minister Shaul Mofaz has made what sources have described as a warning of "unprecedented severity".

check: Russia Ready to Vaporize the Jewish State

USA

Newsmax: Franks - A WMD Attack On US Will End The Constitution

Gen. Tommy Franks says that if the United States is hit with a weapon of mass destruction that inflicts large casualties, the Constitution will likely be discarded in favor of a military form of government. Franks, who successfully led the U.S. military operation to liberate Iraq, expressed his worries in an extensive interview he gave to the men's lifestyle magazine Cigar Aficionado.

In the magazine's December edition, the former commander of the military's Central Command warned that if terrorists succeeded in using a weapon of mass destruction (WMD) against the U.S. or one of our allies, it would likely have catastrophic consequences for our cherished republican form of government.

Discussing the hypothetical dangers posed to the U.S. in the wake of Sept. 11, Franks said that "the worst thing that could happen" is if terrorists acquire and then use a biological, chemical or nuclear weapon that inflicts heavy casualties.

If that happens, Franks said, "... the Western world, the free world, loses what it cherishes most, and that is freedom and liberty we've seen for a couple of hundred years in this grand experiment that we call democracy."

"Es verheisst nichts gutes, wenn Leute wie Tommy Franks solche Dinge in der Oeffentlichkeit verlauten lassen um Reaktionen zu testen. Prepare for the Attack..vor den Praesidentschaftswahlen 2004"

ISRAEL

Spiegel: Scharon wirft Europäern kollektiven Antisemitismus vor

Israels Ministerpräsident Ariel Scharon hat schwere Vorwürfe gegen Europa erhoben. Den Menschen dort wohne der Antisemitismus inne, und die Regierungschefs der EU machten sich einer "voreingenommenen Nahostpolitik" schuldig. Auch warnte Scharon vor einer wachsenden Zahl von Muslimen in der EU.

WAR ON TERROR

Guardian: A war that can never be won

Terrorism is a technique, not an enemy state that can be defeated

The bombast has increased with the bombs. We saw two disturbing escalations this week. The explosions that devastated the British consulate and the HSBC bank in Istanbul mark a significant widening in the choice of targets by those Islamist radicals who use terror to express their hatred of British and US policy in Iraq and the Middle East. The Blair/Bush response reached an equally alarming new level of ferocity.
At their swaggering joint press conference on Thursday, the two men repeatedly made the risible claim that they could win their war on terror. The prime minister was the worse. While Bush gave himself a global carte blanche to intervene anywhere, by speaking of his "determination to fight and defeat this evil, wherever it is found", Blair put the issue in terms of a finite goal. He talked of defeating terrorism "utterly" and "ridding our world of this evil once and for all".

"CHECK IT"

OCCUPIED TERRITORIES

Guardian: Israel admits it lied over missile raid on camp

The Israeli military has admitted that it lied about a rocket attack on a Gaza refugee camp, which according to the army led to no casualties, but which the Palestinians have claimed killed 14 civilians.
A leftwing member of the Israeli parliament, Yossi Sarid, forced the confession from the air force chief after he threatened to release evidence that the military had used a weapon more destructive and indiscriminate than it had publicly claimed.

A month ago, the air force launched an assassination strike against a Hamas activist who was driving through Nuseirat refugee camp. The Palestinians claimed that the attack caused a large number of civilian casualties, but the air force commander, Major General Dan Halutz, produced video footage of the car being hit by two missiles that showed no one standing near the wrecked vehicle as the rockets struck.

The military said that Hellfire missiles were used, producing a concentrated explosion over a small area. Gen Halutz likened the effect of the missiles to "two grenades". The video footage was widely shown on Israeli television.

But the army now admits that it lied in briefings to the Israeli and foreign press, because the second rocket was not a Hellfire missile.

The military refuses to identify the weapon used, on the grounds of "operational security". But the speculation is that it was an American-made Flechette, which is illegal under international law because it fires thousands of tiny darts over hundreds of metres, causing horrific injuries. Israel has used similar weapons in Gaza in the past.

EU POLL

EU-President apologizes to World Jewry for poll-result
At the meeting both sides agreed that a seminar should be organized in
Brussels in order to find out why European citizens (59% surveyed) put
Israel ahead of countries such as Iran and North Korea as a threat to
world
peace...
http://www.fpp.co.uk/online/03/11/EuroPoll061103.html
David Irving comments:

YES, this appears to have been a case of democracy at its very worst:
people being asked their private opinions, and despite all that the
media can do, coming up with this truly appalling result. The outcome is
clearly way off the map. There must have been something wrong with the
pollsters, or their pencils, or their pads, or their attitude that day.

Everybody knows that the fragrant little nation slandered in this poll
is the most peace-loving on earth, and always has been, and that in
consequence its people are the most widely loved -- nay, they are loved
with a lasting and abiding sense of global affection, by everybody,
wherever they may be -- whether beneath the tracks of a Caterpillar
bulldozer, or crushed in the ruins of a home at Jenin, or stunned by
the blast of a salvo of missiles fired into a main street in Gaza by an
American-built Apache helicopter gunship, or intimated by a
German-built tank.

If anybody does not love these truly affection-inspiring people, then
he is manifestly a sick man indeed, and Europe must conjure forth seminars,
with educational kits and all the other paraphernalia of mind-bending and
brainwashing with which the world has been familiar since the end of
the Holocaust.

UK

Guardian: The very secret service

David Kelly referred obliquely to Operation Rockingham. What role did this mysterious cell play in justifying the Iraq war?

David Kelly, giving evidence to the prime minister's intelligence and security committee in closed session on July 16 - the day before his suicide - made a comment the significance of which has so far been missed. He said: "Within the defence intelligence services I liaise with the Rockingham cell." Unfortunately nobody on the committee followed up this lead, which is a pity because the Rockingham reference may turn out to be very important indeed.
What is the role of the Rockingham cell? The evidence comes from a former chief weapons inspector in Iraq, Scott Ritter, who had been a US military intelligence officer for eight years and served on the staff of General Schwarzkopf, the US commander of allied forces in the first Gulf war. He has described himself as a card-carrying Republican who voted for Bush, but he distinguished himself in insisting before the Iraq war, and was almost alone in doing so, that almost all of Iraq's WMD had been destroyed as a result of inspections, and the rest either used or destroyed in the first Gulf war. In terms, therefore, of proven accuracy of judgment and weight of experience of the workings of western military intelligence, he is a highly reliable source.

In an interview in the Scottish Sunday Herald in June, Ritter said: "Operation Rockingham [a unit set up by defence intelligence staff within the MoD in 1991] cherry-picked intelligence. It received hard data, but had a preordained outcome in mind. It only put forward a small percentage of the facts when most were ambiguous or noted no WMD... It became part of an effort to maintain a public mindset that Iraq was not in compliance with the inspections. They had to sustain the allegation that Iraq had WMD [when] Unscom was showing the opposite."

ENOMOMY: MIAMI FTAA

Alternet: Miami Vice

Editor's Note: Tom Hayden, reporting for AlterNet from the Free Trade
Area of the Americas conference in Miami, filed this update Thursday
evening. The original story follows the update.

UPDATE. MIAMI. 10:30 EST, Thursday An ugly and bloodier ending to the
Miami FTAA meeting was averted by a sudden decision tonight to end the closed
official events one day early. FTAA co-chairs from the US and Brazil
both described the summit as a step forward though it was widely understood
that the agreement was far less than the American business community and the
White House originally hoped for.

At 5:30 pm, besieged protestors at the convergence center, threatened
by the spectre of mass arrests, put out a televised appeal for public
solidarity. At virtually the same moment, word came from within the
FTAA meeting that an agreement had been reached. At 6:45, the agreement was
announced at a press conference of all the trade ministers, and shortly
afterwards the police encirclement of the convergence center seemed to
be lifted.

"They finished early because there was nothing to be gained from
another day of bad publicity from the streets, and there was nothing to
negotiate beyond an agreement to keep negotiating in the future," said
Washington-based trade expert Mark Weisbrot. A perplexed Wall Street
Journal reporter asked FTAA officials whether "after nine years you've
agreed to keep moving forward but with lesser goals than before."
Brazilian foreign minister Celso Amorim, carefully choosing a word in English
said only that the agreement was "enabling."

Tallahasse IMC: Thanks for the Pepper Spray, Pigs (FTAA Nov. 20)

An eyewitness account of protest activity from a member of the FSU contingent in Miami.
Hey Everyone,

This is what I saw happened, and what happened to me at the FTAA protest in Miami.

After the march, a lot of people headed inside for the rally. After 1/2 an hour (?), my friend and I looked outside and saw a large group of people moving through the AFL-CIO marshall lines towards the fence and the riot cops. We went outside to join, and on the way, met up with several other FSU folks. We moved to the front, maybe 2 or 3 rows back from the cops. We were all loudly chanting "Shut It Down!" The cops were speaking over a bullhorn, but we couldn't hear them over the chanting.

Then the police came into the lines a-swingin', spraying pepper spray, and apparently shooting rubber bullets (I was told that later, I didn't realize it was happening at the time, but I'd seen the snipers up in their cranes). We were all falling back. We all began yelling to hold the lines and we linked arms. Then the police were suddenly on my line and they sprayed me directly in the eyes with pepper spray.

I turned and moved back, got some water to squirt in my eyes. Everyone around me asked me if I was fine, and I thought I would be okay, but then I started to feel dizzy and began going blind. I saw another FSU person and asked him to get me to a safe place. He grabbed my hand and led me away and then began squirting my eyes some more. He got shot with a rubber bullet, and then there was tear gas coming so we had to fall back more. I turned and saw a girl hit the ground about 10 feet behind me, blood coming out of her head. I ran back and helped someone else pick her up and move her away, shouting for a medic. Soon more people came to help her, she was bleeding bad, and we kept shouting for a medic. As soon as one came, I approached a group of three people and asked for water. They gave me a squirt bottle and some water, and then someone I'd met at the protest came up and squirted my eyes out.

QUOTE OF THE DAY

"What difference does it make to the dead, the orphans and the
homeless, whether the mad destruction is wrought under the name of
totalitarianism or the holy name of liberty or democracy?" -- Mahatma Gandhi,

GEORGIA: VIVA LA REVOLUTION

Independent: Georgia returns to normal after bloodless revolution
Georgian opposition leader Nino Burdzhanadze pledged today to hold elections in 45 days and called on police and security services to restore order after a wave of protest swept President Eduard Shevardnadze from office.

"Order must be restored immediately not only in Tbilisi but also in all the regions of the country," Ms Burdzhanadze said in a nationally televised speech. She has assumed the powers of temporary president.

Life in Tbilisi appeared to be returning to normal today after a night of street parties, and only a few dozen stragglers stood outside the parliament building, the epicentre of the protests. Traffic flowed freely along Tbilisi's main Rustaveli avenue for the first time in days, with the bustle of a normal work week getting under way.