Compilation, editing, re-reporting, brief comment by Carolyn Bennett
Western Press, Corporate Government conspire in Middle East/Africa Catastrophes
LIBYA
The invasion of Libya was planned before September 11, 2001, says a June 4 independent news agency article Ten reasons why the U.S. war in Libya is a CIA operation.
“In a 2007 filmed interview,” the article recalls, “4-star U.S. Army Gen. Wesley Clark discussed a Pentagon memo under [former U.S. Defense Secretary] Donald Rumsfeld describing “‘how we’re going to take out seven countries in five years — starting with Iraq and then Syria, Lebanon, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, and finishing off [with] Iran.’”
The U.S. Central Intelligence Agency “works for multinational corporations to tenaciously protect their world interests.” These “U.S. companies are invisible in Libya. Many U.S. corporations have been in Libya, are there now and will continue to do business there but are UNDER NO PRESSURE to leave or ‘give back’ their profits or alter their business activity with Col. Muammar al- Qaddafi’s so-called ‘murderous regime.’…”
Some of the “U.S. companies in Libya whose Libyan business arrangements have yet to be questioned are: Chevron Oil, ConocoPhillips, Hess Corporation, Marathon Oil Corporation, Occidental Petroleum, Sheraton Hotels, Exxon Mobil, Dow Chemical, Halliburton, Raytheon, Motorola, Four Seasons Hotels, Shell Oil, United Gulf Construction, Valmont, and White and Case, Marriott Hotels, and Intercontinental Hotels.”
Propaganda
False claims of rape used to wage war
After days of [alleged] gang rape by Col. Muammar al- Qaddafi’s soldiers, “a distraught English-speaking Arab woman fortuitously finds her way into the only hotel in Tripoli where foreign journalists are encamped (apparently dropped off by her tormentors). She reports her ordeal to gathered media who immediately, unquestioningly, broadcast the brutal crime to the world as proven fact. …” Hearing this woman’s claims brought to mind a similar incident in October of 1990.
“A sobbing 15-year-old Kuwaiti girl gave unsworn testimony in a Congressional hearing chaired by Zionist congressman Thomas Lantos in which she described what she saw in a Kuwaiti hospital with her own eyes: ‘While I was there, I saw the Iraqi soldiers come into the hospital with guns, and go into the room where … babies were in incubators. They took the babies out of the incubators, took the incubators, and left the babies on the cold floor to die.’
“This girl was actually the daughter of a Kuwaiti ambassador. She had been coached by the public relations firm Hill and Knowlton to give false testimony.
“Three months passed between the hearing and the start of the first Gulf War during which the fabricated incubator story was repeated over and over again by seven U.S. senators and ten times by George H.W. Bush.”
The false claim “was recited as fact in congressional testimony, on TV, in radio talk shows such as ‘Nightline.’” It was repeated “in the UN Security Council and cited as the single most persuasive reason that the American public backed the first Iraq War.
The Press
International “mainstream” press peddles war at the behest of government, both tied to corporations
A polluted press pushes aggression not for democracy but for plunder: overthrow, ethnic division and containment, capture and control of Middle East/Africa resources
“Journalists have a responsibility to tell the truth and report all newsworthy issues,” correspondent Mahdi Darius Nazemroaya writes in a late June article “Journalism as a Weapon of War in Libya.” He says some journalists take this responsibility to heart, “but their stories are either edited [redacted] or are never published or aired. Others say nothing [censor] and concoct stories” [make them up]. In the case of Libya, “Western journalists have quite deliberately distorted what is happening… They have upheld NATO as an instrument of peace and democratization. They have endorsed an illegal and criminal war.…”
At night, the sound of NATO jets flying over Tripoli can be heard in the Mediterranean coastal city, he reports. Tripoli has not been bombed for a few days but the sound of the flyovers have been numerous.
Psychological warfare
“The Atlantic Alliance deliberately picks the night as a means to disturb the sleep of residents in an attempt to spread fear. Small children in Libya have lost a lot of sleep during this war. This is part of the psychological war being waged. It is meant to break the spirit of Libya. All of this is in addition to the severe wound imposed on Libya through trickery and sedition.”
Media war
“In the same context, the media war against Libya has continued too. The Rixos Hotel in the Libyan capital of Tripoli, where the majority of the international press is located, is a nest of lies and warped narratives where foreign reporters are twisting realities, spinning events, and misreporting to justify the NATO war against Libya.
“Every report and news wire being sent out of Libya by international reporters has to carefully be cross-checked and analyzed.
“Foreign journalists have put words in the mouths of Libyans and are willfully blind: they ignore civilian deaths in Libya, the clear war crimes being perpetrated against the Libyan people, and the damage to civilian infrastructure — from hotels to docks and hospitals.…
“In the Libyan hospitals, the foreign reporters try not to take pictures of the wounded and dying. They go into the hospitals to paint the image of impartiality but report essentially about nothing and ignore almost everything newsworthy. They refuse to tell the other side of the story. Shamelessly, in front of seriously injured civilians, the type of questions many foreign reporters ask doctors, nurses, and hospital staff is whether they have been treating military and security personnel.…
“It is now the responsibility of the public,” Nazemroaya concludes, “to look with a grain of salt on reports, coming from all sides, out of Libya. Diversity of news is just one starter.”
Persia resists
“‘The era has passed in which hegemonic powers determined the fate of other nations with their military presence.’”
The Ayatollah Seyyed Ali Khamenei, leader of the Islamic Revolution, was speaking today in an address to naval officers during a visit to the southern Iranian port city of Bandar Abbas. Khamenei said, “The presence of U.S. and European warships in the Persian Gulf is ‘harmful and odious.’”
The Ayatollah pointed to the growing vigilance of regional nations as a result of which they consider “‘foreign military presence in the region as a cause for instability.’”
However, despite rising costs and rising criticism, U.S. officials and their corporate allies continue ordering war against foreign countries and against the best interests of the people of the United States.
U.S.-led
WAR DEAD
Casualty sites reporting July 23, 2011
(Accurate totals unknown)
Anti-war dot com Casualties in Iraq since March 19, 2003
[U.S. war dead since the Obama inauguration January 20,
2009: 246] Information out of date
•
Wounded 33,105-100,000
U.S. veterans with brain injuries 320,000
Suicides estimated: 18 a day
Latest update on this site: July 19, 2011
http://www.antiwar.com/casualties/
•
Iraq Body Count
The worldwide update on civilians killed in the Iraq war and occupation
Documented civilian deaths from violence
101, 906 – 111, 371
Full analysis of the WikiLeaks’ Iraq War Logs may add 15,000 civilian deaths. http://www.iraqbodycount.org/
•
ICasualties figures:
AFGHANISTAN:
1, 680 United States
2, 607 Coalition
IRAQ: 4,474 United States
4,792 Coalition
http://icasualties.org/
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| Britannica map |
War’s waste
Press TV is reporting today “a draft report by a bipartisan congressional panel shows that the United States has wasted or misspent $34 billion on contracting for services in Iraq and Afghanistan…”
In addition, “Senate investigators found last year that forces serving in private security agencies in Afghanistan often have ties to criminals, insurgents and local warlords.”
PERSIAN GULF
U.S.-allied Kingdom of Saudi Arabia deploys more forces in U.S.-allied Bahrain in an attempt to further repress demonstrators and assist King Hamad bin Isa Al Khalifa’s hold on power.
The Bahrain Center for Human Rights, a non-governmental organization, reports more than 1,000 political detainees inside the country. The United Nations Human Rights office and Amnesty International are criticizing the Al Khalifa regime “for its violations of international law by brutally cracking down on peaceful protesters and activists.”
IRAQ
The U.S. chances of getting approval from Iraq’s parliament to extend its military presence in that country are slim so the United States, according to Antiwar.com news editor Jason Ditz, is “seeking to fill the gap through private security contractors.”
The approximate number of U.S. troops currently in Iraq is 46,000 and the U.S. under agreement is to leave that country by December 31, 2011. Notwithstanding that agreement, “The U.S. is laying the groundwork for what amounts to a mercenary army of unprecedented size in Iraq.”
HORN OF AFRICA
Eastern Africa is battling its worst drought in 60 years and
it too is under U.S. aggression
it too is under U.S. aggression
SOMALIA
Strategically located in the Horn of Africa, Somalia remains one of the countries generating the highest number of refugees and internally displaced persons (IDP) in the world.
The United Nations refugee agency reported in April that the number of Somali refugees arriving in neighboring countries during the first quarter of 2011 has more than doubled in comparison to the same period in 2010.
As a severe drought assails more than 10 million people in the Horn of Africa, the UN this week declared famine in two parts of southern Somalia.
Resistance. Related news from the country is that Somalia’s Al-Shabab group says organizations “previously banned are not allowed back onto the Somali soil.” Al-Shaabab had initially banned groups with “‘ulterior political motives.’” A Press TV correspondent reported today that Al-Shaabab also accused the UN of exaggerating the humanitarian conditions in Somalia for political purposes.
One of the organizations banned by Al-Shabab is the World Food Program (WFP).
The president of Venezuela, Hugo Chavez, announced plans today that he will send $5 million worth food aid to Somalia. Chavez has reportedly contacted his ministers to take urgent action to help the government of Somalia with a $5 million pledge. The Venezuelan leader is in Cuba receiving cancer treatment.
European governments, however, are reported to have failed to live up to their promises of aid for the drought-stricken Horn of Africa, a failure, which is “not unprecedented.”
Western countries, especially, and the international community in general “has a record of pledging publicly that they are going to help and then they don’t help.” African affairs analyst Nii Akuetteh was speaking in interview with Press TV.
On Wednesday, the British charity Oxfam “accused several European governments of ‘willful neglect’ and vehemently criticized them for their ‘sluggish’ response to Africans’ urgent needs.” Oxfam revealed that, “only a fifth of the estimated $1 billion needed to stave off a humanitarian catastrophe in the Horn of Africa had been received.”
South/Central Asia
AFGHANISTAN
Civilian deaths continue rising
“US-led soldiers on Friday killed three more Afghan civilians. Among the dead are a female doctor and her son. The soldiers reportedly “opened fire on a civilian vehicle in Afghanistan’s eastern province of Wardak.”
In addition, “on Thursday night, foreign soldiers killed three civilians.” They were a father and his two sons. US-led troops had attacked these people’s home in the same area as on Friday.
In the Friday incident, Afghan people “had clashed with foreign forces in Parvan province” as they were trying to stop a nightly operation. “The confrontation happened as foreign soldiers were launching an attack on the residents’ homes.”
PAKISTAN
In what has been termed “fresh ethnic and political violence,” 11 people have died and at least 15 suffered wounds Friday in the southern Pakistani port city of Karachi.
The killings are reportedly “some of the worst seen so far this year in Karachi — a city of 18 million people and a hotbed of crime and violence.”
Resistance
Pakistan’s former president, Pervez Musharraf, is warning the U.S. officials that “an attempt to go after al-Qaeda leader Ayman al-Zawahiri on Pakistani territory would be ‘irresponsible.’” This statement comes amid deteriorating relations between Islamabad and Washington following the “U.S. attack in the Pakistani town of Abbottabad that allegedly killed al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden on May 2.”
Ayman al-Zawahiri was working as a doctor “in Afghanistan during the Soviet occupation of the 1970s and 1980s … when the United States was providing several hundred million dollars a year in aid to Afghan Mujahedeen militants fighting the Soviet Army.”
Resistance
Also in news from Pakistan, the country’s “security forces have barred at least 10 American diplomats from entering the troubled northwestern city of Peshawar.” On Tuesday, security forces banned entry to four diplomats; on Wednesday, they banned six others and sent them back to Islamabad.
Pakistani officials said, “The diplomats were refused entry for not having No-Objection Certificates (NOCs), the legal permission foreigners need to have to enter Peshawar.”
INDIA
U.S.-allied India against Kashmir
Top separatist leader Syed Ali Shah Geelani has strongly condemned Indian forces’ violence against women in the disputed Himalayan region.
Today a general strike reportedly paralyzes Indian-administered Kashmir “in a second day of protests against the sexual assault of a woman by army personnel.” The strike has shut most shops, schools and offices in Srinagar and other major towns. On Friday, protesters torched a government vehicle and clashed with police.
This resistance follows a young woman’s report of being “abducted and raped by two army officers.”
NEIGHBORS and KIN
Iran, Iraq and Syria reportedly have reached a general agreement to sign the Middle East’s biggest natural gas deal. The contract paves the way “for the transit of Iran’s South Pars Gas field in the Persian Gulf to Lebanon and the Mediterranean Sea and then to Europe.
“The final contract is to be signed by the end of this year and executed in 3 to 5 years.” The deal constitutes “Iran’s second natural gas pipeline to Europe, the first passing through Turkey, after it is completed.” In two years, it “will extend to the Iran-Turkey border.”
Sources and notes
LIBYA
“Ten reasons why the U.S. war in Libya is a CIA operation,” June 4, 2011, From: Mathaba,
By the Historical Research Group of the Nation of Islam, Published April 28 in Final Call, http://www.mathaba.net/news/?x=627018
Founded in 1999, MATHABA, which means “a meeting place, platform, sanctuary,” is a leading independent global news agency and online news network. MATHABA is “the first stateless news organization in history [and] broadcasts news and information that serves the public interest. It has more than 50 different news categories, news feeds and distribution across multiple platforms for almost any type of news and information,” thus allowing readers a choice of platform.
“Journalism as a Weapon of War in Libya” (Mahdi Darius Nazemroaya), June 29, 2011, Global Research, http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=25441
Mahdi Darius Nazemroaya is a Research Associate for the Centre for Research on Globalization (CRG) and a frequent contributor to Global Research. He is currently in Libya as an international observer and member of an international group of journalists and writers from Europe, North America and the Middle East.
Pacifica’s Flashpoints on KPFA interviewed Mahdi Darius Nazemroaya this week. Posted by Flashpoints Friday, July 22 2011ly 22, 2011 with host Kevin Pina, Guest: Mahdi Nazemroya-Flashpoints correspondent on the ground in Libya, Dr. Mousa Ibrahim, and Dr. Kenneth Himma
“‘Foreign navies disrupt PG [Persian Gulf] stability,’” July 23, 2011, http://www.presstv.ir/detail/190364.html
WASTE
“U.S. wasting billions on military contracts,” July 23, 2011, http://www.presstv.ir/detail/190415.html
PERSIAN GULF
“KSA deploys more troops in Bahrain,” July 23, 2011, http://www.presstv.ir/detail/190421.html
“‘US sending mercs in Iraq to bypass Iraqi parliament,’” July 23, 2011, http://www.presstv.ir/usdetail/190453.html
HORN OF AFRICA
“UN declares famine in south Somalia,” July 20, 2011, http://www.presstv.ir/detail/189948.html
“Al-Shabab insists on aid groups’ ban,” July 23, 2011, http://www.presstv.ir/detail/190367.html
Venezuela to send $5mn aid to Somalia, July 23, 2011, http://www.presstv.ir/detail/190387.html
“‘West aid pledge renege a routine,’” July 20, 2011, http://www.presstv.ir/detail/189985.html
http://www.presstv.ir/detail/190456.html
South Central Asia
AFGHANISTAN
“U.S.-led soldiers kill 3 more Afghans, July 23, 2011, http://www.presstv.ir/detail/190365.html
PAKISTAN
“Violence claims 11 lives in Pakistan,” July 22, 2011, http://www.presstv.ir/section/351020401.html
“U.S. warned against new operation in Pakistan,” July 22, 2011, http://www.presstv.ir/detail/190189.html
“U.S. diplomats denied Peshawar entry,” July 21, 2011, http://www.presstv.ir/detail/190150.html
INDIA
“Kashmir on strike amid protests,” July 23, 2011, http://www.presstv.ir/detail/190391.html
http://www.presstv.ir/detail/190150.html
NEIGHBORS and KIN
“Iran, Iraq and Syria have agreed to sign the biggest natural gas deal in [Middle East],” July 23, 2011, http://www.presstv.ir/detail/190465.html
Maps from Britannica
Today July 23 in history
Egyptian monarchy toppled by coup. “On this day in 1952, the Free Officers, a nationalistic military group led by Colonel Gamal Abdel Nasser, engineered a coup that overthrew King Farouk I of Egypt, ending the monarchy and bringing Nasser to power.” Britannica note
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