gaza

that's Isaiah's The World Today Just Nuts "Who Could Have Guessed" and timothy geithner was confirmed as the secretary of the treasury late today. i was planning a post on a lighter topic for tonight but thta flew out the window due to a number of things regarding the attacks on the palestinians. elaine passed over 'Adam Shapiro on the Situation in Gaza "Scenes of complete utter devastation"' (revolution):

Revolution: Why don't you start out by sharing what you know about the situation in Gaza.
Shapiro: So as we're talking now a ceasefire seems to be in place. It's not a ceasefire in terms of an agreement but there seems to be both sides have agreed to actually not fire weapons at each other at the moment. And we have, I think, five volunteers with the International Solidarity Movement who are on the ground in Gaza and who have been there during the entire onslaught. What I'm hearing from them, now that they're able to start moving around a bit, and also what I'm hearing from other Gazans is just scenes of complete utter devastation.
In Gaza City itself, yes there were air strikes and tank firing in certain parts of the city particularly in the refugee camp, in Jabalia Camp there was intense fighting. But when you go out from Gaza City to the south and to the north, in the south to places like Rafah and Khan Younis and even smaller villages, I guess we can almost call them, although they're not necessarily properly organized as such. Just complete and utter—buildings completely demolished for miles around. I mean, nothing left standing. Families coming back are just sifting through the rubble to see if they can find anything of their property, of their memories, of anything that they had had and also finding bodies. This is the story now that people, my colleagues, are reporting, is that dozens and dozens of bodies are being found in the rubble of people who were trapped in the homes when they were hit by bombs or tank shells or whatever. And so the death count is certainly rising in Gaza.
It's not clear, some of these people may have been killed instantly, some may have been just injured and bled to death because no medical assistance was coming. I did hear from a friend who has family in Gaza that just two days ago his father and two brothers were driving in a car trying to escape an area where there was heavy bombing, and their car was targeted and hit. The one brother died instantly. The other brother was bleeding and ultimately after 14 hours bled to death. The father was injured and required surgeries but in the end will hopefully be OK. This story we were able to get attention to, in the sense that we were calling to Israeli journalists and to other people in Israel with the exact location of where the car was, to try to get the Army to allow medical personnel to come to save the brother who was bleeding to death. And nothing would happen. There was no permission for any kind of ambulance to come, and so ultimately my friend's brother succumbed. This is similar to the case of the Palestinian doctor which has made some news coverage, who lost his three daughters in an air strike, I'm sorry, in a tank shell bombing.
People in Gaza are, I think, by all accounts from my colleagues there from talking to people are, I think shell-shocked is the term. But I don't even think that captures it, because you are talking about a population that was already severely traumatized not just from 18 months of siege and blockade, but from—what are we talking about, basically for over a decade, since 2000—intense campaigns waged by the Israeli military to terrorize the population, to intimidate them. Even on days when bombs weren't falling the Israeli planes would consistently break the sound barrier giving off the impression of bombs going off.
It's been widely reported—at least by Palestinian health agencies and international children’s advocacy and health groups—the effects that this is having in terms of traumatizing the population. So how do you measure the additional amount of trauma that people have been experiencing for these last three weeks? And how do you figure out at what point were they already traumatized, and then how much additional can a human being take?
I was just remarking with a friend and I have often said this before: Israelis should be sending thank you notes to Palestinians that there aren’t millions of people strapped with suicide bombs ready to blow themselves up at this point, for what Israel has done—of course, I am not advocating Palestinians take such action. There is often this line that Israelis or pro Israeli folks use of saying, “Look at what the Palestinians have made us do. They made us… Look at what they have made us become.” Israeli leaders use these terms all the time, “We don’t want to do this, but look what they’ve made us do….” If they can get away with saying that, then the Palestinians certainly are justified to suggest that and to show that what they’ve become as a people and as individuals—in terms of how they might feel towards Israelis, and towards their overall situation including as supporters of Israel—they are more than justified in feeling whatever they feel.
I think it’s remarkable that you can still hold a conversation with a Palestinian anywhere, but especially those who live in Gaza, and not feel hatred coming from their side. It is a remarkable measure of the humanity of the people of Gaza that you can actually have a conversation and they are just not full of hate completely. That’s what I’m hearing from my colleagues in Gaza. It is not surprising, because if you spend any time among the Palestinians it won’t surprise you. But still it is almost a wake-up, a reawakening in a sense, to realize that people who have experienced all of this, they still have hope in a way. I mean not hope in their leaders. I’m not sure where their hope is directed towards. But there is hope, and that is I think something is utterly, utterly remarkable.

now media lens has an alert but there site is down currently. you can also find it at dissident voice:


THE BBC REFUSES TO BROADCAST GAZA CHARITY APPEAL
Numerous members of the public have written to us expressing their bewilderment at the violence of Israel's 22-day attack on Gaza killing upwards of 1,300 people and wounding 4,200. To many witnessing the onslaught on their TV screens (especially Al Jazeera) this appeared to be an act of state sadism. Israeli forces repeatedly bombed schools (including UN schools), medical centres, hospitals, ambulances, UN buildings, power plants, sewage plants, roads, bridges and civilian homes.
On January 15, Helpdoctors.org reported that Al Quds hospital had been "again the target of bombing". Some 50 patients, 30 in wheelchairs, fled as the burning hospital was "totally destroyed". (http://translate.google.com/translate?u=http%3A%2F%2F www.helpdoctors.org%2F&langpair=fr%7Cen&h l=fr&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&prev=%2Flanguage_tools)
The hospital's medical director said, "My heart is crying," as he described how intensive care patients and premature babies in incubators were wheeled onto the street in the middle of the night. (http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/7833919.stm)
On January 19, UN official John Ging said half a million people in Gaza had been without water since the conflict began - huge numbers were without power. Four thousand homes have been ruined and tens of thousands of people are homeless. (http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/7836869.stm) It is now known that the Israeli army (the IDF) used white phosphorus incendiary weapons - designed to burst over a wide area and burn to the bone - against civilian targets, including hospitals and UN buildings. The use of these weapons against civilians is a war crime.
[...]
Despite this carnage, despite the fact that 89% of Gaza's 1.5 million residents have received no humanitarian aid since Israel began its assault (http://www.maannews.net/en/ index.php?opr=ShowDetails&ID=35162), the Guardian notes that the BBC has refused to broadcast a national humanitarian appeal for Gaza, "leaving aid agencies with a potential shortfall of millions of pounds in donations." (Jenny Percival, 'Broadcasters refuse to air Gaza charity appeal,' The Guardian, January 23, 2008;http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/ 2009/jan/22/gaza-charity-appeal)

yes, that's the bbc that so many rave over, refusing to air a charity appeal because that's apparently what indepenent outlets do. and there is blowback over the decision. this is emily pykett (the scotsman):

ACTORS and directors have warned the BBC they will not work for the corporation again if it does not broadcast the Gaza charity appeal.
In a letter written to Mark Thompson, the BBC's director-general, the actors Tam Dean Burn and Pauline Goldsmith, and the directors Peter Mullan and Alison Peebles, said they were "appalled" by the refusal to show the Disasters Emergency Committee (DEC) appeal.Their ultimatum came as the satellite broadcaster Sky also decided yesterday it would not screen the DEC film. Like the BBC, it said it wanted to protect the impartiality of its news reports.Gaza is in the grip of a humanitarian crisis, with its 1.5 million population urgently needing food, water, medicine and shelter, after Israel's three-week assault.

meanwhile international law expert francis a. boyle has a piece at dissident voice and i'm excerpting the six things he believes need to happen in the next round of discussions (presumint there is a next round):

First, we must immediately move for the de facto suspension of Israel throughout the entirety of the United Nations System, including the General Assembly and all U.N. subsidiary organs and bodies. We must do to Israel what the U.N. General Assembly has done to the genocidal rump Yugoslavia and to the criminal apartheid regime in South Africa! Here the legal basis for the de facto suspension of Israel at the U.N. is quite simple:
As a condition for its admission to the United Nations Organization, Israel formally agreed to accept General Assembly Resolution 181 (II) (1947) (partition/Jerusalem trusteeship) and General Assembly Resolution 194 (III) (1948) (Palestinian right of return), inter alia. Nevertheless, the government of Israel has expressly repudiated both Resolution 181 (II) and Resolution 194 (III). Therefore, Israel has violated its conditions for admission to U.N. membership and thus must be suspended on a de facto basis from any participation throughout the entire United Nations System.
Second, any further negotiations with Israel must be conducted on the basis of Resolution 181 (II) and its borders; Resolution 194 (III); subsequent General Assembly resolutions and Security Council resolutions; the Third and Fourth Geneva Conventions of 1949; the 1907 Hague Regulations; and other relevant principles of public international law.
Third, we must abandon the fiction and the fraud that the United States government is an “honest broker.” The United States government has never been an honest broker from well before the very outset of these negotiations in 1991. Rather, the United States has invariably sided with Israel against the Palestinians. We need to establish some type of international framework to sponsor these negotiations where the Palestinian negotiators will not be subjected to the continual bullying, threats, harassment, intimidation and outright lies perpetrated by the United States government.
Fourth, we must move to have the U.N. General Assembly impose economic, diplomatic, and travel sanctions upon Israel pursuant to the terms of the Uniting for Peace Resolution (1950), whose Emergency Special Session on Palestine is now in recess.
Fifth, the Provisional Government of the State of Palestine must sue Israel before the International Court of Justice in The Hague for inflicting acts of genocide against the Palestinian People in violation of the 1948 Genocide Convention!
Sixth, An International Criminal Tribunal for Israel (ICTI) can be established by the UN General Assembly as a “subsidiary organ” under article 22 of the UN Charter. Article 22 of the UN Charter states the UN General Assembly may establish such subsidiary organs as it deems necessary for the performance of its functions. The purpose of the ICTI would be to investigate and Prosecute suspected Israeli war criminals for offences against the Palestinian people.

i didn't think that my topic tonight would be gaza again. i have no problem with covering it but i do know that people sometimes need a break. the latest attack was extreme* and shocking. that alone requires absorbing for some people. last week, we went over things that should be done and that also requires time to settle. i am not at all offended to have young readers. i love that i do. and i know that for some of you this was your 1st time witnessing the slaughter.

there's no apologies necessary and i've tried to reply to all of those e-mails. if you didn't know about the situation before this go-round, there's no reason to apologize. i say that to the high schoolers who e-mailed but i mean for any 1 who was new to the topic regardless of age.

i also know that when you're absorbing a new topic, you do need breaks. so barring anything big tomorrow, i'll write about something else.

but charlie and meg both e-mailed with a question and i will grab that today. it's actually the '*' above: 'the latest attack was extreme.' charlie and meg wanted to know where this ranked with previous attacks?

i e-mailed them back and, with their permission, am noting their question and my reply.

i don't rank it.

1st, the assault goes on forever. it goes on now as the blockades continue.

it flares up in such a way that the international press has to cover it as they did this go-round.

but i hate to rank the attacks because i fear that we can get to a point where we start going, 'oh, well it's not that bad. i remember back in ...' all the attacks - and the continued daily attacks - are outrageous and illegal.

i just worry that ranking them allows people to say (at some point in the future), 'it's really not that bad, why, if you'd seen what happened in the summer of ...'


let's close with c.i.'s 'Iraq snapshot:'

Monday, January 26, 2009. Chaos and violence continues, the US military announces multiple deaths, provincial elections loom, Nouri al-Maliki makes laughable statements (redundant or just expected?), and more.

This morning the US military announced: "TIKRIT, Iraq -- Four Coalition Soldiers died Jan. 26, when their aircraft crashed in Northern Iraq. The cause is unclear at this time and does not appear to be by enemy action. An investigation is ongoing. The names of the deceased are being withheld pending notification of next of kin and release by the Department of Defense." The announcement brings the total number of US service members killed in Iraq since the start of the illegal war to 4236 with 15 for the month thus far. Ned Parker and Caesar Ahmed (Los Angeles Times) cited an unnamed Iraqi police source who states the aircraft was a helicopter and they note, "Initial reports from the U.S. military said two aircraft were involved, but later reports said it was only one aircaft that went down in the incident, which occured around 2:15 a.m." In a later update (1:23 p.m. EST), they note that it was two helicopters. Anthony Shadid (Washington Post) reminds, "The crash was the first since Nov. 15, when an OH-58 Kiowa Warrior helicopter landed with difficulty after hitting wires in the northern city of Mosul. Two US pilots were killed. The worst crash of the conflict was in January 2005, when a U.S. Marine CH53E Super Stallion helicopter went down in western Iraq, killing 30 Marines and a Navy sailor." Sam Dagher (New York Times) adds, "At least 70 American helicopters have gone down since the war started in March 2003, according to military figures. Of those, 36 were confirmed to have been shot down." Jordan's Al Bawaba notes the US military refuses to say where the crash took place but it appears to have been outside Kirkuk based on unnamed sources: "One observer indicated that the crash report was very unusual, because if two Blackhawk helicopters were involved as the U.S. Military claims then they would have carried at the least eight crewmembers in both machines, but only four were reported . He suggested several possible explanations, including that the aircraft involved were actually attack helicopters, which carry only two crew each, that only one helicopter had crashed (which makes the claim of a mid-air collision highly unlikely), or that there was a far higher casualty list from the incident, which the Americans were deliberately hiding." Deborah Haynes (Times of London) locates the crash similiary, "An Iraqi police general responsible for Salahuddin province said two small helicopters had collided near the city of Kirkuk, 155 miles north of Baghdad."

Today's announcement follows two over the weekend. Saturday, the US military announced: " A Multi-National Division -- Center Soldier died of non-combat related causes in southern Iraq today." And [PDF format warning] they announced, "A 3rd Sustainment Command (Expeditionary) Soldier died as a result of non-combat related injuries Jan. 24." The Seattle Times identified the second death ["A 3rd Sustainment Command (Expeditionary) Soldier] as "24-year-old Sgt. Kyle J. Harrington" and notes he is survived by Faith, his wife, and by Joshua (their five-year-old son) and Kaylee (their two-year-old daughter).

On Sunday news of other Saturday violence emerged. Timothy Williams (New York Times) reported on a Saturday raid by US forces in Hawija in which a husband and wife were killed by US forces and their young daughter was wounded. The house raid, Williams explained, required helicopters and was done at two in the morning. For the killing of the wife (Fathiya Ali Ahmed), the official story is she reached for something and, later, a gun was allegedly found under a mattress. After he saw his wife slaughtered, the husband (Dhiya Hussein) went after the US soldiers and was killed. Ahlam Dhia, the eight-year-old daughter, was shot by US soldiers for no official reason cited and she is quoted stating, "They killed my mother and father right in front of me. I was under the blanket. I heard my mom screaming, and I started to cry." Based on descriptions, Williams hypothesized the soldiers were American Special Ops. It is interesting that when Iraq supposedly has control over their country, US forces -- not Iraqi forces or, for that matter, US forces and Iraqi forces -- are conducting house raids. Ned Parker and Saif Hameed (Los Angeles Times) reported, "The chairman of the Hawija Council said the woman's husband, Dhia Hussein, had not been linked to Al Qaeda in Iraq, as the U.S. military claimed" and quote Hussein Ali Salih (the chair) stating, "I personally know Col. Dhia Hussein; he is one of the former army officers and he was trying to return to the new Iraqi army. He has no affiliations with any armed groups." NPR's Lourdes Garcia-Navarro (All Things Considered -- link has video and text) reports:The U.S. military said the operation was conducted with and approved by Iraq's security forces, as stipulated by a security agreement that went into effect at the beginning of the year. But a senior Iraqi government spokesman said there were no Iraqi forces present and is calling for an investigation of the deaths."The Americans were on foot," said Hussein Ali, the father of the man who was killed. "They threw percussion hand grenades at the door, then they started shooting. When I got inside the house, the Americans were gone. I found [my son and daughter-in-law] in the bedroom, dead beside each other. They shot my son at close range. His blood was all over the wall."McClatchy's Leila Fadel (and possible the Institute for War and Peace Reporting?) felt the above information could wait until paragraph eight and spent the first seven pagraphs repeating the US military's version in what can only be characterized as Blind Faith Typing. Were Judith Miller still working for the New York Times and had she filed the exact same report Fadel did, she'd be called out non-stop on through next month for that one report. Instead, the anger only emerges in Iraq. Anthony Shadid and Qais Mizher (Washington Post) explained, "In the angry aftermath, 40 cars carrying hundreds of people converged on the family's funeral later in the day, said Fadhil Najm, a neighbor. He said the mourners shouted, 'Death to America! Death to killers of women!' as they buried the bodies." The two also point out that the head of the province's police force, General Jamal Tahir Bakir, states "U.S. forces acted on their own in the raid." China's Xinhau cites an unnamed police source, "The source also said that local security forces were not informed about the raid and that the reasons behind the killings are unclear yet."

Turning to some of today's reported violence . . .

Bombings?

Hussein Kadhim (McClatchy Newspapers) reports a Baghdad roadside bombing that left six injured, a Baquba bicyle bombing that left five people injured (and the bicyclist shot dead by the police), a Mosul car bombing that left six injured and a Mosul roadside bombing that left three wounded.

Corpses?

Hussein Kadhim (McClatchy Newspapers) reports 1 corpse discovered in Mosul.

Iraq Body Count lists 12 dead on Saturday and 14 on Friday. They don't have a number for Sunday or today yet. They are an undercount but they're also one of the few still covering Iraq. For example, Just Foreign Policy's counter estimates the number of Iraqis killed since the start of the illegal war to be 1,307,319. That's the number they offered last Sunday, and the Sunday before that. In other words, JFP wants you to believe that no Iraqs have died since January 4th. Or maybe it's just that counting the Iraqis killed only matters when a Republican is in the White House?

KUNA repots that the Interior Ministry has announced that "5000 servicewomen" have finished training "to work in female inspection posts in state ministires and bodies."

Meanwhile Alissa J. Rubin (New York Times) examines the puppet of the occupation Nouri al-Maliki, noting the two attempts by Parliament to oust him: "The anger at Mr. Maliki from the political class is strong enough that he has twice narrowly missed being voted out of office, in December and in late 2007." Those are not the only attempts to get rid of him, just FYI. Rubin goes on to explain that al-Maliki is popular with some Iraqis and, even later, goes on to explain why: Doling out pennies. Hmmm. It's a shame no one ever noticed that al-Maliki was sitting on all that money. It's a shame no one has thought to call for an audit of it.al-Maliki's creation of his private guards, so similar to Saddam Hussein's actions, are noted as well. The US government backed Saddam and they've backed al-Maliki. Should the Iraqi people not have their way, it will be important to remember who created the puppet in forty years. His private guards are the Baghdad Brigade and the Counterterrorism Task Force which bypass everyone else and report only to him and have no supervision or transparency. A Kurdish MP, Mahmoud Othman, is quoted observing, "The country is being militarized. People think he has overreached."And for those who can't grasp why the US should have already left (should have never gone but is continuing to do damage), note this section:American military commanders privately defend Mr. Maliki, saying that he has had to exert control over security forces and that having forces loyal to him reduces the influence of Shiite and Kurdish militias that function within the security ministries. For those not aware, the US military -- or any military -- is not the person to judge what's best for democracy or democracy building. Democracy building is not a task a military should ever take on because it is beyond its scope and ability. The judgments being made by the US commanders? You damn well better believe they impact orders on down the chain and it's putting the US military into the position Joe Biden warned against in April, choosing sides in a civil war. He also declared, in that Senate hearing, "Just understand my frustration, we want to normalize a government that really doesn't exist."That paragraph in Rubin's article should alarm but it will just sail over most heads because there is so little interest in Iraq and there is such a meager knowledge base on what a military can and can't do and what democracy actually is.Biden warned that the US military was being put in the position of propping up one set of thugs. For those who doubt that's taking place, from Rubin's article:Other parties accuse these military forces [al-Maliki's two private guards] of detaining their members for political reasons. Ammar Wajih, a member of the Iraqi Islamic Party's political leadership, said the senior Sunni member of the provincial council in Diyala, Hussain al-Zubaidi, had been detained since November.Provincial elections are scheduled to be held in fourteen of Iraq's eighteen provinces on January 31st, five days from now. Rubin's reporting on how al-Maliki's tossing the pennies around in various areas in the hopes of increase support for his political party, Dawa. Over the weekend, Anthony Shadid (Washington Post) examined Al Anbar Province where various tribal leaders claim democracy has taken hold and where Dr. Sabah al-Ani replies, "If you believe in a stone, you can says it's God. We wanted technocrats and we were left with the tribes." Kimi Yoshino (Los Angeles Times) writes of a non-scientific poll the paper did (with a sample size of a little more than tweny) where the responses indicated "security takes a back seat to basic services, the economy and culture". She notes 14,8 million Iraqis have registered to vote. Monte Morin (LAT's Babylon & Beyond) explains that the weight of all the eleciton kits is 607 tons, while the ballots are 559 tons and the polling screens are 180 tons. The paper's Tina Susman examined some of the campaign materials and noted "In a country where few candidates have the means to produce glossy election literature, most simply splash letters across white sheets or poster paper and drape the signs between trees or signposts . . . Others use photographs or potraits of themselves . . ." Susman offers photos of various candidates including Nouri al-Maliki who actually is not running for a provincial council seat but is, as Rubin and others have noted, attempting to make this week's elections all about himself. AFP reports that Sunday found Nouri and KRG president Massoud Barzani trading swipes: "The two have been at odds over Maliki's plans to ammend the constitution to clear the way for a stronger central government in Baghdad at the expense of the powers of Barzani's administration based in the northern city of Erbil." Waleed Ibrahim and Michael Christie (Reuters) report that puppet of the occupation, Nouri al-Maliki, declared that US [combat only] forces will be pulled quickly. They report he made this announcement to "a crowd of supporters in the southern Iraqi city of Babel during a campaign rally ahead of Jan. 31 provincial elecitons" -- translation, a campaign promise by al-Maliki -- eager to pump up the number of seats held by his Dawa Party. And of course, if Barack had decided on that, he would let Nouri break the news, right? No need to inform the Pentagon or Joint Chiefs first. Just tell Nouri and let him tell the world.

Friday on PBS' Washington Week, Iraq was briefly discussed. As Ava and I noted, "ABC News Martha Raddatz explained to Gwen ('I didn't know') Ifill how Barack claimed he would 'meet with the Joint Chiefs and I think they were a little confused at the White House that that's not really who he would meet with right away, the Joint Chiefs, to talk about military advice. . . . That's not who he would meet with. He would meet with the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. He'd meet with his NSC advisor'." Radditz also noted she'd just returned from another trip to the Middle East but this time it did not include Iraq. (Remember ABC News has entered into an agreement with the BBC to air the BBC's Iraq reports.) This exchange was the key moment on Iraq:

Martha Raddatz: They laid out plans or started to lay out plans for the sixteen-month withdrawal, which President Obama says he wants, or the three-year withdrawal which is the Status Of Forces Agreement that the US has gone into with the Iraqis. And they talked about the risks with each of those. Ray Odierno, who is the general in charge of Iraqi forces, said, 'If you run out in sixteen months -- if you get out in sixteen months, there are risks. The security gains could go down the tube. If you wait three years, there are other risks because you can't get forces into Afghanistan as quickly.' So President Obama made no decisions. Again, he's going to meet with Joint Chiefs next week and probably will make a military decision. But also a key there is how many troops he leaves behind. That's something we're not talking about so much, he's not talking about so much. This residual force that could be 50, 60, 70,000 troops even if he withdraws -- Gwen Ifill: That's not exactly getting out of Iraq. Martha Raddatz: Not exactly getting out completely. That was the show's finest movement and, alone, made up for so much of the gas baggery Gwen usually dumbs down America with. More like that and you might have a show that actually informs. Pete Williams also deserves notice for telling the reality about Barack 'closing' of Guantanamo. It should be noted that Professor Patti objected to Barack's plan for Guantanamo as well, she and Bill Moyers just didn't feel they owed it to PBS viewers to explain what Barack was proposing. Gordon Lubold (Christian Science Monitor) reports the US "military has already been quietly moving materiel out of Iraq over the past 18 to 24 months, said a military official who requested anonymity" but it's the same Lubold who can't grasp the so-called SOFA so factor that in. He also wrongly estimates that as many as US troops could remain in Iraq after 'withdrawal.' (70,000 is the number the administration tosses around.) Barack's 'withdrawal' is a lot like his 'closing' Guantanamo. As Heart (Women's Space) observes, "Beacuse that's the sense I get reading what Obama has said -- that he wants to clean up our reputation quick, hoping everyone forgets the atrocities of the Bush Administration, so we can continue to fight a Democratic Administration version of the 'war on terror,' which seems to bear a striking resemblance to the one the Bush administration has been engaged in, to our national shame, for the last eight years." Mickey Z weighs in (at Dissident Voice):

So, the Pope of Hope announced his (purported) objective of closing the military detention center at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba ("Gitmo") within one year and we're expected to herald this announcement as a drastic break from the past. But -- as some of the regulars on my blog instantly declared -- if President Obama were serious about hope and change, he'd close the prison tomorrow, apologize to the detainees, and offer them financial reparations. That could be promptly followed up with the immediate indictment of all government officials (including those in Obama's administration) responsible for supporting torture, secret prisons, extraordinary rendition, extrajudicial punishment, etc. And why not toss in the immediate closing of the US military base at Guantánamo Bay and the return of that land to Cuba? That, I submit, would be a minuscule first step upon which we could build.
Waiting a year to close a single prison is nothing to celebrate. Transferring those illegally detained humans is not change anyone can believe in. Public promises about not torturing have been heard before and even if we could trust such dubious assurances, why are we so goddamned appreciative when a US president merely declares his theoretical intention to think about adhering to fundamental international law?

Also calling the nonsense out is Tom Eley (WSWS):

On Thursday, President Barack Obama issued executive orders mandating the closure of the Guantanamo Bay prison camp in a year's time, requiring that Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) and military personnel follow the Army Field Manual's prohibitions on torture, and closing secret CIA prisons overseas. While the media is portraying these orders as a repudiation of the detention and interrogation policies of the Bush administration, they actually change little. They essentially represent a public relations effort to refurbish the image of the United States abroad after years of torture and extralegal detentions and shield high-ranking American officials from potential criminal prosecution. In cowardly fashion, Obama staged his signing of the orders in a manner aimed at placating the political right and defenders of Guantanamo and torture and underscoring his intention to continue the Bush administration's "war on terror." He was flanked by 16 retired generals and admirals who have pushed for the closure of the prison camp in Cuba on the grounds that it impedes the prosecution of the global "war" and reiterated in his own remarks his determination to continue the basic political framework of the Bush administration's foreign policy.The continuation of the ideological pretext for wars of aggression and attacks on democratic rights ensures that the police state infrastructure erected under the Bush administration will remain intact. This is further reinforced by Obama's assurances that his administration will not investigate or prosecute those officials -- including Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld, Alberto Gonzales and others -- who were responsible for the policies of torture and illegal detention.


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alissa j. rubinmartha raddatzpbswashington week
caesar ahmed
kimi yoshinomonte morintina susmantom eley
mickey z.
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