Editor’s comments

Nuclear scientists are not terrorists

by News Sources 01.12.2012

In an op-ed for the New Scientist, Debora MacKenzie writes: Attempts to derail a country’s nuclear programme by killing its scientists “are products of desperation”, says [William] Tobey [of the Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs at Harvard University] – citing a US effort to kill legendary physicist Werner Heisenberg during the second world [...]

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Torture doesn’t reduce crime

by News Sources 01.08.2012

The proponents of a harsh penal system argue that being tough on criminals is the most effective way of tackling crime. A comparison between Virginia and the Netherlands makes it clear that this is a baseless argument. The Netherlands has twice the population of Virgina, twice the population density, lower per capita income, and yet [...]

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Iranians fear war, deprived of life-saving medicines — Washington satisfied

by News Sources 01.06.2012

The Obama administration’s definition of diplomacy with Iran is that it does not talk about “regime change.” Instead it talks about “tightening the noose.” As the rial collapses and Iranians die because they can’t afford life-saving medicines, no doubt they feel deeply grateful for America’s kind attention. The Washington Post reports: At a time when [...]

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Ron Paul, Pat Buchanan and the non-interventionists

by News Sources 01.06.2012

Noting the fact that Ron Paul and Pat Buchanan both share the ‘virtue’ of being non-interventionists, Fred Clark starts drilling into the question of whether there really is such a principle as non-interventionism. I want to look one further step back from this discussion and question the assumption here that “non-interventionism” is a Good Thing. [...]

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In Syria, another Friday, another Damascus bomb

by News Sources 01.06.2012

The Daily Telegraph reports: At least 25 people were reportedly killed or wounded after a suicide bomber blew himself up in central Damascus on Friday, the second such attack on the Syrian capital in a fortnight. The bomb was detonated at a set of traffic lights in the historic district of al-Midan, just south of [...]

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Forging ties with democratic Egyptian government is like reaching out to the Soviet Union?

by Paul Woodward 01.04.2012

The New York Times reports: With the Muslim Brotherhood pulling within reach of an outright majority in Egypt’s new Parliament, the Obama administration has begun to reverse decades of mistrust and hostility as it seeks to forge closer ties with an organization once viewed as irreconcilably opposed to United States interests. The administration’s overtures — [...]

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U.S. no longer able to disregard Pakistan’s sovereignty

by News Sources 12.25.2011

The New York Times reports: With the United States facing the reality that its broad security partnership with Pakistan is over, American officials are seeking to salvage a more limited counterterrorism alliance that they acknowledge will complicate their ability to launch attacks against extremists and move supplies into Afghanistan. The United States will be forced [...]

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Why anti-government Americans should be pro-Palestinian

by News Sources 12.24.2011

On the right in the U.S., nothing garners political support as easily as preaching the evils of Big Government. But if someone wants to observe big government in one of its most tyrannical expressions, there’s probably no place better to go than the West Bank where Palestinians live under Israeli military rule. Haaretz reports on [...]

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Did Israel knowlingly supply Iran with internet monitoring equipment?

by News Sources 12.23.2011

Bloomberg reports: The clandestine arrangement worked smoothly for years. The Israeli company shipped its Internet- monitoring equipment to a distributor in Denmark. Once there, workers stripped away the packaging and removed the labels. Then they sent it to a man named “Hossein” in Iran, an amiable technology distributor known to them only by his first [...]

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‘It’s time to stop the bully’: Adbusters editor Kalle Lasn on Occupy Wall Street, the Israel lobby and the New York Times

by Paul Woodward 11.28.2011

Mondoweiss interviews the founder of Adbusters: When the Occupy Wall Street protests began to attract attention in the fall, everyone wanted to know where the idea to set up a permanent protest at the heart of Manhattan’s financial district came from. The answer was the mind of Kalle Lasn, the co-editor (along with Micah White) [...]

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Israel behind deadly explosion at Iran missile base?

by News Sources 11.14.2011

Whether it was the result of an Israeli covert operation, or, as Iran claims, an accident, the latest deadly incident once again highlights the willingness of the United States and Israel to engage in acts of violence that were they instigated by Iran or any other state or non-state actor would simply be called acts [...]

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Sarkozy tells truth about Netanyahu but press decide it’s too sensitive to report

by Paul Woodward 11.08.2011

“Who the fuck does he think he is? Who’s the fucking superpower here?” Bill Clinton said in exasperation about Benjamin Netanyahu after one of the Israeli prime minister’s characteristic displays of arrogance in 1996. Now we learn that last Thursday at the G20 summit in Cannes, France’s President Nicolas Sarkozy privately described Netanyahu as a [...]

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Tony Blair views Arab desire for democracy as a threat to Mideast peace

by News Sources 10.23.2011

Forever the slick salesman, Tony Blair says evolution is better than revolution — which sounds like saying change is good so long as there isn’t too much of it and it doesn’t come too fast. That’s the kind of change he can believe in. Just like a peace process which in the eyes of most [...]

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U.S. backs probe into circumstances of Gaddafi death

by News Sources 10.23.2011

Reuters reports: Secretary of State Hillary Clinton on Sunday backed a possible U.N. investigation into the death of deposed Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi and called for the convicted Lockerbie bomber to be jailed again. There is growing international disquiet about the chaotic scenes surrounding Gaddafi’s apparent summary execution following the fall of his hometown of [...]

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A presidency rotten at its core

by Paul Woodward 10.20.2011

What’s the good of calling yourself a Democrat if you don’t practice democracy? President Obama’s first allegiance has proved not to be the upholding of democracy, but instead the preservation and expansion of secrecy. It is revealing that a man who in so many other domains often appears like a pushover, unable to find any [...]

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American teenager killed in drone strike

by Paul Woodward 10.16.2011

An American teenager gets blown up in a US drone strike and the only explanation provided for why he was killed is that his father was alleged to be a terrorist. And given the small amount of reporting on yesterday’s killings it appears that having covered the Obama-kills-an-American story last month, Obama-kills-another-American is a story [...]

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American and Israeli exceptionalism

by Paul Woodward 10.11.2011

Foreign Policy‘s latest issue looks at American exceptionalism and Stephen Walt writes: Over the last two centuries, prominent Americans have described the United States as an “empire of liberty,” a “shining city on a hill,” the “last best hope of Earth,” the “leader of the free world,” and the “indispensable nation.” These enduring tropes explain [...]

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White House clarifies when it’s OK for Obama to kill Americans

by Paul Woodward 10.09.2011

A week after the assassination of Anwar al-Awlaki — “a great day for America,” as one senior Obama administration official put it — and then a flurry of headlines about Obama killing US citizens, the White House clearly sees the need to change the narrative. Although it had already been stated that the president was [...]

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The muted impact of the Arab Awakening on Israel

by Paul Woodward 08.26.2011

Daniel Levy writes: After decades of near-hegemonic Israeli strategic supremacy in the Middle East, the ground is shifting. For Israel’s leaders, the Arab Awakening and the removal of Mubarak represents the collapse of a key support structure in the edifice that maintains Israel’s regional posture. That edifice had been fraying for some time. Yet with [...]

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On Norway’s emotional maturity

by News Sources 07.31.2011

As Norway has demonstrated this week, anger is often nothing more than the inability to experience grief and acknowledge loss. Knut Olav Amas writes: Exactly a week has passed since the twin terror attacks on Norway. As of this writing, the death toll stands at seventy-seven, and more than thirty people, mostly young, are still [...]

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Norway believes democracy is the best way of challenging terrorism

by Paul Woodward 07.27.2011

Just imagine if these words had come out of George Bush’s mouth after 9/11: “The American response to violence is more democracy, more openness and greater political participation.” The Guardian reports: The Norwegian prime minister, Jens Stoltenberg, says his country will “not be intimidated or threatened” by Friday’s terror attacks, which left 76 people dead. [...]

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News updates

by Paul Woodward 07.14.2011

I’ll be off-line for the next few days and so there won’t be regular news updates until late Friday. But in the meantime I have scheduled a lot of interesting feature articles which will appear here over this period. — PW Share

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News updates

by Paul Woodward 07.13.2011

I’ll be off-line for the next few days and so there won’t be regular news updates until late Friday. But in the meantime I have scheduled a lot of interesting feature articles which will appear here over this period. — PW Share

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