Archive for March 8th, 2015

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08/03/2015

Netanyahu Govt. More 'Frightening' than All Israel Enemies, ex-Mossad Chief Tells Crowds

Human Wrongs Watch

8 March 2015 (RT)* — Israel is suffering the “worst crisis since its creation” under Netanyahu’s leadership, a former Mossad director told a crowd of up to 50,000 in Tel Aviv. The anti-government rally was orchestrated and funded from abroad, said the ruling Likud party.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel addresses the General Assembly. UN Photo/J Carrier

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel addresses the General Assembly. UN Photo/J Carrier

Delivering his keynote speech, Meir Dagan, the former Mossad director spoke of the government’s lack of vision and inability to properly direct the country surrounded by enemies.

“I am frightened by our leadership. I am afraid because of the lack of vision and a loss of direction. I am frightened by the hesitation and the stagnation [of Israel’s government]. And I am frightened, above all else, from a crisis in leadership. It is the worst crisis that Israel has seen to this day,” Maj. Gen Dagan told a receptive crowd in Rabin Square in Tel Aviv, held under the banner of ‘Israel wants change.’

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08/03/2015

The Speech

Human Wrongs Watch

By Uri Avnery*

7 March 2015

Uri Avnery

Uri Avnery

SUDDENLY IT reminded me of something.

I was watching The Speech by Binyamin Netanyahu before the Congress of the United States. Row upon row of men in suits (and the occasional woman), jumping up and down, up and down, applauding wildly, shouting approval.

It was the shouting that did it. Where had I heard that before?

And then it came back to me. It was another parliament in the mid-1930s. The Leader was speaking. Rows upon rows of Reichstag members were listening raptly. Every few minutes they jumped up and shouted their approval.

Of course, the Congress of the United States of America is no Reichstag. Members wear dark suits, not brown shirts. They do not shout “Heil” but something unintelligible. Yet the sound of the shouting had the same effect. Rather shocking.

But then I returned to the present. The sight was not frightening, but ridiculous. Here were the members of the most powerful parliament in the world behaving like a bunch of nincompoops.

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Posted in Market Lords, Middle East, Others-USA-Europe-etc., The Peoples | Leave a Comment »

08/03/2015

Afghanistan’s U.S.-Funded Torturers and Murderers

Human Wrongs Watch 

By John Sifton*

6 March 2015, Human Rights Watch — The United States continues to fund and support a network of abusive Afghan strongmen in the name of security. It’s time to stop.

**Central photo: A US soldier and an Afghan interpreter in Zabul, 2009. | DoD photo by Staff Sgt. Adam Mancini, U.S. Army - Mountain Ridge Security | Wikimedia Xommons

**Photo: Central photo: A US soldier and an Afghan interpreter in Zabul, 2009. | DoD photo by Staff Sgt. Adam Mancini, U.S. Army – Mountain Ridge Security | Wikimedia Commons

In October 2013, police in Kandahar — the Afghan province that is the birthplace of the Taliban and home to some of the fiercest fighting in the war — picked up “Tariq” for alleged ties to the insurgents. Whether those allegations were true will remain unknown.

Tariq, whose name has been changed for security purposes, died in custody days later from wounds inflicted on his skull with an electrical drill. His case is not unique.

Over the past two years, dozens of Kandahari residents have been tortured to death by the province’s police — one of a range of forces in Afghanistan that the United States supports and equips.

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08/03/2015

Women's Day: Former Kinshasa Cabbie Earns a Crust Feeding Refugees, Aid Workers

Human Wrongs Watch

By Andy Needham*

SHERKOLE CAMP, Ethiopia, 6 March 2015 (UNHCR)* – Every morning, just before 4am, Masika Basemé-Jeanne reaches for the snooze button on her mobile phone alarm. She’d love to continue dreaming of her former life with her husband and driving her taxi around Kinshasa, but she knows there are 1,500 loaves of bread to be baked.

© UNHCR Photo Unit | Congolese refugee Masika tends to a bubbling stew in her restaurant in Ethiopia's Sherkole camp.

© UNHCR Photo Unit | Congolese refugee Masika tends to a bubbling stew in her restaurant in Ethiopia’s Sherkole camp.

The 47-year-old Congolese lives in Sherkole refugee camp, western Ethiopia, arriving a little over two years ago. Uprooted from a happy life in Kinshasa, capital of the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), she and her family had ended up in the North Kivu province town of Butembo in 2012.

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Posted in Africa, Asia, Latin America & Caribbean, Market Lords, Others-USA-Europe-etc., The Peoples | Leave a Comment »

08/03/2015

On the Other Side of the Lake – Alhaji’s Story

By Baptiste de Cazenove*

When the fighting in north-eastern Nigeria came to Baga town, thousands of survivors fled across Lake Chad, searching for safety.

(03032015)_Featured_ontheothersideofthelake

UNHCR/Olivier Laban-Mattei | Survivors of the attack on Baga move to a safer location in Chad.

6 March 2015 – A long canoe slips through the reeds on the calm waters of Lake Chad. The faces on board are tense, including that of 16-year-old Alhaji Haoudou, who is eager to jump onto the sandy shores of Baga Sola, Chad. One of more than 80 passengers, he fled Nigeria weeks earlier, throwing himself into an overloaded vessel following a massacre back home on 3 January.

That day, fighters burned down a dozen villages as well as the port town of Baga, on the western shore of Africa’s fourth largest lake. Several dozen people – and perhaps several hundred, according to some accounts – perished in a few days. Others drowned while crossing the lake.

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Posted in Africa, Others-USA-Europe-etc., The Peoples, War Lords | Leave a Comment »

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