Wednesday, July 09, 2014

[

Julian  Assange on Aiding Snowden, Tiff w/ The Intercept & Whether He’ll Ever Leave Embassy Refuge

excerpts:
...
Then the Afghanistan War Logs, now, these came at a very important moment in 2010, where Michael Hastings had just—the late Michael Hastings had just released a report on McChrystal, and these publications came not long after that.
AMY GOODMAN: This is the Rolling Stone journalist who died in a car crash.  [a "car crash"!!]
...
JULIAN ASSANGE: ... in December of that year [2010], we started the release of Cablegate, the more than 251,000 U.S. diplomatic cables from all around the world from 1966 to 2010. And that is the largest compendium of diplomacy that has ever been released. It’s about 3,000 volumes of material. As a sort of history of how the modern world behaves in practice, it’s extremely important, and it fed into the Tunisian revolution quite directly. In fact, Ben Ali’s propaganda minister, after the government fell, said that the WikiLeaks releases about Tunisia is what broke the back of the Ben Ali system.
AMY GOODMAN: Because?
JULIAN ASSANGE: Well, because it exposed the corruption that many Tunisians knew about, but in a much more flagrant form of what money had gone where and people keeping pet tigers and so on, but also that there was various kinds of debates about it, and within the United States and from others, and that when push came to shove the U.S. would probably back the military and not Ben Ali. And it was undeniable.
...
JULIAN ASSANGE: ...And those cables are really quite incredibly important. They have gone into literally dozens of court cases. They have released people from prison. People have been released from prison holding these cables above their head as the reason that they had been released from prison. The El-Masri case, where the CIA kidnapped a German citizen unlawfully, renditioned him and kept him in a CIA black site for four months
...
Similar cases in Spain, and an important precedent was set about the use of our materials in court cases generally, specifically cables. So, this relates to Chagos islands. So there’s an island group called Diego Garcia in the Indian Ocean. It’s owned by the British. It is very important strategically because it’s sort of on the way between things. Now, the British handed over, rent-free, one of these islands, Chagos, to the United States military.
https://libcom.org/files/images/blog/stealing-a-nation.jpgAMY GOODMAN: C-H-A-G-O-S.
JULIAN ASSANGE: Yeah, to the United States military. And it has been now turned into a base, and rendition flights go through there and so on. But there was original inhabitants. At the time it was handed over to the United States in the '60s, the original inhabitants were pushed off. And they were all pushed off to Mauritius and Madagascar, and they had been trying to fight a court case to come back. And some cables revealed that in fact the British government had told the U.S. it was setting up a secret plan to make it very difficult or impossible for them to come back. It was going to declare—you know, it was going to suck in the Liberal Left. And here's how it was going to do it. Create a marine park. It’s a coral atoll, the Chagos islands. Going to create a marine park. Well, what was the economy of the Chagos islands? It was fishing. So this is explicitly that they’re going to prevent the Chagos islanders having any meaningful economic return to the island by creating this marine park, which all the Liberals will love. And that way, you know, these islanders won’t be able to interfere or spy on the U.S. base.
Anyway, that provoked new litigation by the Chagos islanders in the British courts. And ultimately, the lower courts found that the cables were inadmissible, because they had come from embassies, and there’s a Vienna Convention, the same thing that is protecting me here that protects diplomatic correspondence. But in a higher court, it was appealed, and it was found that’s not true. Actually, diplomatic cables published by WikiLeaks are not protected by the Vienna Convention. They’re already public. It’s the first instance of getting them out that’s protected, not what happens to them subsequently. So that’s quite an important precedent within the common law world, because it means these cables can be used in many more court cases.

fyi: Stealing a Nation

'Stealing A Nation' (2004) is an extraordinary film about the plight of the Chagos Islands, whose indigenous population was secretly and brutally expelled by British Governments in the late 1960s and early 1970s to make way for an American military base. The tragedy, which falls within the remit of the International Criminal Court as "a crime against humanity", is told by Islanders who were dumped in the slums of Mauritius and by British officials who left behind a damning trail of Foreign Office documents.

Before the Americans came, more than 2,000 people lived on the islands in the Indian Ocean, many with roots back to the late 18th century. There were thriving villages, a school, a hospital, a church, a railway and an undisturbed way of life."
[fwiw: UPandOUT showed "Stealing a Nation" on March 15, 2012; a must see film for all americans]

Julian Assange on Aiding Snowden, Tiff w/ The Intercept & Whether He’ll Ever Leave Embassy Refuge

excerpts:
...
Then the Afghanistan War Logs, now, these came at a very important moment in 2010, where Michael Hastings had just—the late Michael Hastings had just released a report on McChrystal, and these publications came not long after that.
AMY GOODMAN: This is the Rolling Stone journalist who died in a car crash.  [a "car crash"!!]
...
JULIAN ASSANGE: ... in December of that year [2010], we started the release of Cablegate, the more than 251,000 U.S. diplomatic cables from all around the world from 1966 to 2010. And that is the largest compendium of diplomacy that has ever been released. It’s about 3,000 volumes of material. As a sort of history of how the modern world behaves in practice, it’s extremely important, and it fed into the Tunisian revolution quite directly. In fact, Ben Ali’s propaganda minister, after the government fell, said that the WikiLeaks releases about Tunisia is what broke the back of the Ben Ali system.
AMY GOODMAN: Because?
JULIAN ASSANGE: Well, because it exposed the corruption that many Tunisians knew about, but in a much more flagrant form of what money had gone where and people keeping pet tigers and so on, but also that there was various kinds of debates about it, and within the United States and from others, and that when push came to shove the U.S. would probably back the military and not Ben Ali. And it was undeniable.
...
JULIAN ASSANGE: ...And those cables are really quite incredibly important. They have gone into literally dozens of court cases. They have released people from prison. People have been released from prison holding these cables above their head as the reason that they had been released from prison. The El-Masri case, where the CIA kidnapped a German citizen unlawfully, renditioned him and kept him in a CIA black site for four months
...
Similar cases in Spain, and an important precedent was set about the use of our materials in court cases generally, specifically cables. So, this relates to Chagos islands. So there’s an island group called Diego Garcia in the Indian Ocean. It’s owned by the British. It is very important strategically because it’s sort of on the way between things. Now, the British handed over, rent-free, one of these islands, Chagos, to the United States military.
https://libcom.org/files/images/blog/stealing-a-nation.jpgAMY GOODMAN: C-H-A-G-O-S.
JULIAN ASSANGE: Yeah, to the United States military. And it has been now turned into a base, and rendition flights go through there and so on. But there was original inhabitants. At the time it was handed over to the United States in the '60s, the original inhabitants were pushed off. And they were all pushed off to Mauritius and Madagascar, and they had been trying to fight a court case to come back. And some cables revealed that in fact the British government had told the U.S. it was setting up a secret plan to make it very difficult or impossible for them to come back. It was going to declare—you know, it was going to suck in the Liberal Left. And here's how it was going to do it. Create a marine park. It’s a coral atoll, the Chagos islands. Going to create a marine park. Well, what was the economy of the Chagos islands? It was fishing. So this is explicitly that they’re going to prevent the Chagos islanders having any meaningful economic return to the island by creating this marine park, which all the Liberals will love. And that way, you know, these islanders won’t be able to interfere or spy on the U.S. base.
Anyway, that provoked new litigation by the Chagos islanders in the British courts. And ultimately, the lower courts found that the cables were inadmissible, because they had come from embassies, and there’s a Vienna Convention, the same thing that is protecting me here that protects diplomatic correspondence. But in a higher court, it was appealed, and it was found that’s not true. Actually, diplomatic cables published by WikiLeaks are not protected by the Vienna Convention. They’re already public. It’s the first instance of getting them out that’s protected, not what happens to them subsequently. So that’s quite an important precedent within the common law world, because it means these cables can be used in many more court cases.

fyi: Stealing a Nation

'Stealing A Nation' (2004) is an extraordinary film about the plight of the Chagos Islands, whose indigenous population was secretly and brutally expelled by British Governments in the late 1960s and early 1970s to make way for an American military base. The tragedy, which falls within the remit of the International Criminal Court as "a crime against humanity", is told by Islanders who were dumped in the slums of Mauritius and by British officials who left behind a damning trail of Foreign Office documents.

Before the Americans came, more than 2,000 people lived on the islands in the Indian Ocean, many with roots back to the late 18th century. There were thriving villages, a school, a hospital, a church, a railway and an undisturbed way of life."









Posted by at No comments:
Standing with Chelsea, PRIDE 2014 photos
Is this email not displaying correctly?
View it in your browser.
Chelsea Manning Support Network

Taking PRIDE in Chelsea Manning

On June 28th & 29th, Chelsea Manning supporters marched in PRIDE parades around the country and world, raising awareness and support for Chelsea Manning and her upcoming legal appeals. In San Francisco, former US Army intel analyst PFC Manning was the official Honorary Grand Marshal! Supporters across the country organized street theater performances, dances, banners, and a motorized cable car. All this public support for Chelsea sent a clear message: Manning is a heroic whistle-blower, and enough is enough – we will not rest until she is free!
SF Pride
In San Francisco, the contingent (photo above) featured supporters riding in a trolley car, the Brass Liberation Orchestra marching band, and a synchronized dance group doing a routine to Michael Jackson’s ‘They don’t care about us’. Former military strategist Daniel Ellsberg, who in 1971 leaked the Pentagon Papers to The New York Times marched alongside supporters while sporting a pink boa.
Pride NYC
In New York City, supporters (photo above) marched with Free Chelsea t-shirts, posters, and a banner stating "Pride means freedom for all political prisoners.
In Seattle, the Veterans for Peace organized a Chelsea Manning contingent featuring buttons, stickers, and t-shirts.
In London, Queer + Friends of Chelsea Manning organized a contingent consisting of a banner, thousands of flyers, stickers and badges, posters,
Pride 2014
In Dublin, Ireland, supporters marched in a Chelsea Manning contingent featuring a Free Chelsea banner
And in the Twin Cities, supporters handed out flyers and sticker’s at Saturday’s pride festival as well as marching with a Chelsea Manning banner in the Parade on Sunday.

Click here to check out more photos!



Posted by at No comments:

Taking PRIDE in Chelsea Manning


Cable Car
A cable car featured in the SF contingent
July 8th, 2014 by the Chelsea Manning Support Network
On June 28th & 29th, Chelsea Manning supporters marched in PRIDE parades around the country and world, raising awareness and support for Chelsea Manning and her upcoming legal appeals. Supporters organized street theatre performances, banners, and in SF a motorized cable car with Free Chelsea Manning banners highlighted the contingent!
All this public support for Chelsea has sent a clear message: Chelsea Manning is a heroic whistleblower, and enough is enough – she must be set free!
In the SF Pride parade, Chelsea Manning was honored as an Honorary Grand Marshal!  The contingent featured supporters riding in a trolley car, the Brass Liberation Orchestra marching band, and a synchronized dance group doing a routine to Michael Jackson’s ‘They Don’t Care About Us’. Former military strategist Daniel Ellsberg, who in 1971 leaked the Pentagon Papers to the New York Times, marched alongside supporters while sporting a pink boa.
We Stand With Chelsea Banner
San Francisco Chelsea Manning contingent
In New York City, supporters marched with Free Chelsea t-shirts, posters, and a banner stating “Pride Means Freedom for all Political Prisoners”.
New York
New York
 In London, England, Queer + Friends of Chelsea Manning organized a contingent with banners, flyers, stickers, badges, and posters.
London
London
In Dublin, Ireland, supporters marched in a Chelsea Manning contingent featuring a hand-painted “Free Chelsea Manning” banner.
Dublin
Dublin
Seattle
Seattle
In Seattle, WA, the Veterans for Peace organized a Chelsea Manning contingent featuring buttons, stickers, and t-shirts.
And in the Twin Cities, supporters handed out flyers and stickers at Saturday’s pride festival as well as marching with a Chelsea Manning banner in the Parade on Sunday.





 

 

Posted by at No comments:
As The 225th Anniversary Approaches-Poet's Corner- William Wordsworth's Ode To The French Revolution



A YouTube film clip about William Wordsworth.

Markin Comment:

Here is William Wordsworth's famous ode to the beginning of the French revolution full of all the youthful enthusiasm such a world historic event can elicit. That he, like many another former 'friend' of revolutions over the ages, went over to the other side when things got too hot does not take away from his efforts here.

The French Revolution as it appeared to Enthusiasts

. Oh! pleasant exercise of hope and joy!

For mighty were the auxiliars which then stood

Upon our side, we who were strong in love!

Bliss was it in that dawn to be alive,

But to be young was very heaven!—

Oh! times, In which the meagre, stale, forbidding ways

Of custom, law, and statute, took at once

The attraction of a country in romance!

When Reason seemed the most to assert her rights,

When most intent on making of herself

A prime Enchantress--to assist the work

Which then was going forward in her name!

Not favoured spots alone, but the whole earth,

The beauty wore of promise, that which sets

(As at some moment might not be unfelt

Among the bowers of paradise itself )

The budding rose above the rose full blown.

What temper at the prospect did not wake

To happiness unthought of? The inert

Were roused, and lively natures rapt away!

They who had fed their childhood upon dreams,

The playfellows of fancy, who had made

All powers of swiftness, subtilty, and strength

Their ministers,--who in lordly wise had stirred

Among the grandest objects of the sense,

And dealt with whatsoever they found there

As if they had within some lurking right

To wield it;--they, too, who, of gentle mood,

Had watched all gentle motions, and to these

Had fitted their own thoughts, schemers more wild,

And in the region of their peaceful selves;--

Now was it that both found, the meek and lofty

Did both find, helpers to their heart's desire,

And stuff at hand, plastic as they could wish;

Were called upon to exercise their skill,

Not in Utopia, subterranean fields,

Or some secreted island, Heaven knows where!

But in the very world, which is the world

Of all of us,--the place where in the end

We find our happiness, or not at all!

William Wordsworth
Posted by at No comments:




It has been about a year since we released a new documentary. I am currently working on a three-part series entitled "Plutocracy" (Political Repression in the USA), as well as the "Anarkos" project.


 Plutocracy will engage in a far-reaching analysis of political warfare in the United States from the late 19th Century to the present.

Many excellent documentaries have been made about specific movements in American history, and a small number on political repression; with "Plutocracy" I hope to offer Americans (and activists in general) a truly comprehensive picture of these movements and attempts by authorities to undermine them. The final section of the film will offer concrete advice to activists and explore positive modern movements for change.

I have completed about 70% of the interviews, however I will require additional funds if I am to finish the project. To that end I have set up a fundraiser, which will last about 2 weeks:

http://metanoia-films.org/plutocracy/

Major topics will include: private detective agencies during the gilded age; the birth of modern policing; the assault on the IWW; the red scare; union militancy under Roosevelt; the mob, intelligence agencies and labor unions; COINTELPRO and the war against the new left; a critical history of the FBI; 60's utopian movements; the Reagan/neo-liberal counter-revolution; the militarization of the police; the war against radical environmentalists; and the post-911 assault against civil liberties.

If you click on "clips" you can watch a handful of original interview segments that will give you an better idea of the subject matter. These include:

Christian Parenti -- The origins of American policing
Howard Zinn - The Haymarket Affair
Noam Chomsky -- The Red Scare
Sharon Smith -- Roosevelt and the Flint Strike
Paul Wolf -- COINTELPRO
Glen Ford -- Martin and Malcolm
Larry Pinkney -- The Black Panthers
John trudell -- The Framing of Leonard Peltier

Thank you for your time and support. Even very small donations are greatly appreciated.
Scott Noble

P.S. For those interested, I recently did a print interview with Dissident Voice concerning my previous effort, Counter-Intelligence.

Part 1:   http://dissidentvoice.org/2014/07/counter-intelligence-spying-deters-democracy/

Part 2:   http://dissidentvoice.org/2014/07/counter-intelligence-beyond-the-deep-state/

Our mailing address is:
Metanoia Films
7-529 Johnstone Rd.
Parksville, Bc v9p2k1
Canada

Add us to your address book

Copyright (C) 2014 Metanoia Films All rights reserved.





Posted by at No comments:

 

Israel Steps Up Offensive with Deadly Gaza Bombings

By ISABEL KERSHNER and FARES AKRAMJULY 8, 2014
    Photo
    Israel launched an airstrike on Rafah, in southern Gaza, on Tuesday.CreditIbraheem Abu Mustafa/Reuters
    Continue reading the main storyShare This Page
    Continue reading the main storyContinue reading the main story

    ​ Top Stories

    This article and others like it are part of our new subscription.
    Learn More »
    JERUSALEM — Israel and its Palestinian adversaries in Gaza sharply escalated the latest resurgence of hostilities on Tuesday, with the Israeli military conducting a deadly aerial bombardment that targeted at least 160 Gazan sites, including homes, and militants in the enclave responding with missile volleys aimed at Israeli population centers, including Tel Aviv and Jerusalem.
    The Israeli military said Gaza militants fired more than 150 rockets and that Israel’s missile defense system had thwarted at least 29 of them. More than 100 landed in Israel, the military said, but it was unclear whether they had caused any casualties or serious damage.
    Continue reading the main story

    RELATED COVERAGE

    Hamas, the militant group that controls Gaza, took responsibility late Tuesday for having fired up to 40 long-range rockets, some of them intercepted over Tel Aviv and Jerusalem, where sirens sounded around 10 p.m. The Israeli military confirmed that one rocket hit Hadera, a city about 72 miles north of Gaza, the farthest range yet of the Gaza-based weapons.
    Photo
    Palestinians removed the body of a man from a vehicle destroyed during an Israeli airstrike on Gaza City. CreditMohammed Abed/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images
    Palestinian witnesses and health officials said at least 23 people had been killed in the Israeli attacks. They included seven in a house that was bombed after its occupants had been warned in a cellphone call to leave, and six in another house that members of Islamic Jihad, another militant group, said had belonged to one of its commanders.
    It was the deadliest day so far in the latest escalation of the long-running Israeli-Palestinian conflict, fed partly by the raw rage over the kidnapping and killing of three Israeli teenagers in the occupied West Bank last month, a massive security crackdown by Israel there, and the grisly kidnapping and killing of a Palestinian teenager from East Jerusalem last week.
    In an ominous indication of further escalation, the Israeli government approved the call-up of 1,500 reservists, mainly Home Front Command and aerial defense units, and said later Tuesday that it had authorized the military to mobilize as many as 40,000 additional reservists if necessary for a possible ground invasion.
    The Israeli military also reported Tuesday evening, with little detail, that it had defeated an effort to attack an army base in southern Israel by “several gunmen armed with grenades” who had approached from the sea. The army said it had killed four of the gunmen and was searching for others.
    The Israeli aerial barrage followed the firing of about 80 rockets out of Gaza on Monday that reached deep into southern Israel.
    Continue reading the main storyVideo
    PLAY VIDEO|0:42

    Israeli President on Increased Attacks

    Israeli President on Increased Attacks

    President Shimon Peres of Israel said his country won’t tolerate missile strikes on its cities as it intensifies an aerial offensive against Hamas in Gaza.
     Publish DateJuly 8, 2014. Image CreditJack Guez/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images
    Witnesses and Health Ministry officials in Gaza said the first of at least five deadly Israeli airstrikes on Tuesday destroyed a car in Gaza City, killing three unidentified occupants. The second was an Israeli bomb or rocket that witnesses said had been fired by an F-16 warplane on a house in Khan Younis, a town in the southeast part of Gaza, where seven occupants were found dead in the wreckage.
    A telephoned warning was made to the owner of the targeted home in Khan Younis five minutes before the bombing, apparently part of the Israeli military’s stated effort to minimize unintended civilian casualties. Salah Kaware, 25, who lived in the house, said that a call came to the cellphone of his brother’s wife, and that the caller urged them to leave.
    An unidentified member of Hamas was reportedly killed in a third airstrike, in an open space in central Gaza. Health officials in Gaza said at least four residents had been killed in Israeli strikes elsewhere, including Gaza City and the northern part of Gaza. Ashraf al-Qedra, a Health Ministry spokesman, said more than 90 people had been wounded since the Israeli air assaults had begun.
    The Israeli military said that its targets had included what it called a “terror command center embedded within civilian infrastructure” utilized by a militant in the southern Gaza town of Rafah.
    The air campaign comes after three weeks of escalating confrontation, with rocket attacks from Gaza against southern Israel and Israeli airstrikes on targets it has described as concealed rocket launchers, training sites and weapons manufacturing facilities associated with Hamas and other militant groups. Fury on both sides over the teenage victims of Israel-Palestinian enmity have fed the momentum.
    Continue reading the main story

    Cities Attacked in Israel and Gaza

    Locations hit or
    targeted since
    Sunday by ...
    Tel Aviv
    Rishon Letzion
    Palestinian rockets
    Israeli airstrikes
    Gedera
    Jerusalem
    Ashod
    Mediterranean Sea
    ISRAEL
    Beit Lahiya
    Beit Hanoun
    Sderot
    Gaza City
    WEST
    BANK
    GAZA
    Netivot
    Khan Yunis
    Rafah
    Beersheba
    10 MILES
    The New York Times
    Sources: Palestinian Center for Human Rights, Israeli Defense Forces
    Al Aksa radio, run by Hamas, reported that residents received warnings a few minutes before homes were bombed. Hamas’s military wing said in an emailed statement that the bombing of the houses was “a serious escalation” that “will oblige us to enlarge our attacks deeper into Israel.”
    Early on Tuesday, the Israel Defense Forcesannounced on Twitter that it had “commenced Operation Protective Edge in Gaza against Hamas in order to stop the terror Israel’s citizens face on a daily basis.”
    In a statement from his office, the Israeli defense minister, Moshe Yaalon, said, “Hamas is leading this current confrontation to a place in which it aspires to exact a heavy price from our home front.”
    “In the last few hours we have attacked with force and struck dozens of Hamas’s assets,” Mr. Yaalon added, saying that the military was “continuing its offensive effort in a manner that will exact a very heavy price from Hamas.” He said the campaign was likely to last more than a few days.
    In a conference call with reporters, Lt. Col. Peter Lerner, a spokesman for the Israeli military, said there would be “a gradual increase in the pressure we are putting on Hamas.”
    Continue reading the main storyVideo
    PLAY VIDEO|0:37

    Hamas Vows Vengeance for Israeli Strike

    Hamas Vows Vengeance for Israeli Strike

    Hundreds of mourners gathered in Gaza on Monday for the funeral of two of the militants killed in an Israeli airstrike earlier the same day, and a Hamas spokesman pledged to avenge their deaths.
     Publish DateJuly 7, 2014. Image CreditMohammed Salem/Reuters
    Colonel Lerner said that Israel was “watching to see what the reaction is with Hamas, to see how they respond to our steps.” His comments echoed those of other officials and experts, who have suggested that the initial blitz was meant as a warning, with the hope that Hamas would rein in its fire to avoid a ground invasion. Referring to such a development, Colonel Lerner said, “I don’t see that happening immediately.”
    Continue reading the main story

    RECENT COMMENTS

    TLC

     24 minutes ago
    I've watched this wretched struggle my entire life. It's vile, whatever justification one makes... and it makes me sick.

    common sense

     1 hour ago
    Inevitably, on ANY Israel-related article, there are commenters who blame everything and anything on the "occupation". Or the "settlements"....

    Guido

     1 hour ago
    War is a terrible thing, never solved anything.As Churchill used to say:"Yaw, yaw is better then war, war".
    • SEE ALL COMMENTS
      •  
    • WRITE A COMMENT
    The hostilities erased an Egyptian-brokered cease-fire that ended eight days of fierce cross-border fighting in November 2012. That came after a devastating, three-week military offensive waged by Israel with air and ground forces against militant groups in the winter of 2008-09.
    Israeli experts often describe Israel’s periodic campaigns in Gaza in terms of “mowing the grass,” a kind of routine maintenance with the limited goals of curbing rocket fire and restoring deterrence. Critics contend such an analogy is part of what they call Israel’s policy of dehumanizing the Palestinians and their aspirations.
    “This sort of maintenance needs to be carried out from time to time, perhaps even more often,” Yoav Galant, a former commander of Israel’s southern district, including the area around Gaza, told Army Radio.
    In Sderot, an Israeli town about a mile from the border with Gaza that was first hit by rockets 13 years ago, residents in an open-air market ran with their shopping bags to find shelter behind a truck or by a wall when an incoming rocket alert sounded, then went back to buying groceries.
    Photo
    A Palestinian woman in her house, which was damaged by an Israeli airstrike on Tuesday in Gaza City. CreditMohammed Salem/Reuters
    Limor Porin, 42, a mother of two, said she had come to shop alone after leaving her children at home close to a fortified room. “The family needs to eat,” she said, as the loud booms from Gaza shook the town. “Life is stronger than fear.”
    Away from the market, the streets were empty as most people opted to stay indoors.
    At first, radical Islamic groups that are not necessarily under Hamas’s control increased the rocket fire against Israel. By Monday, however, Hamas was taking responsibility for the attacks, which have put tens of thousands of Israelis on alert and sent them rushing into safe rooms and bomb shelters.
    Asked about the repercussions of carrying out airstrikes in Gaza during the Muslim holy month of Ramadan, Colonel Lerner said Hamas had created “an unacceptable, unbearable reality” for one million Israelis in the range of the rockets fired Monday. Gaza residents should understand, he said, that “this is the type of Ramadan Hamas has brought on them.”
    Ismail Haniya, the Gaza-based deputy chief of the Hamas movement, called early Tuesday for the Palestinians to strengthen internal unity to confront the Israeli military offensive.
    Hamas recently entered into a reconciliation pact with the more moderate Palestinian Authority leadership based in the West Bank, which has been urging calm. Intended to heal a seven-year split between Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza, the pact has resulted in a new government, but little else so far.
    Isabel Kershner reported from Jerusalem, and Fares Akram from Gaza. Reporting was contributed by Steven Erlanger from Jerusalem, Gabby Sobelman from Tel Aviv, Rina Castelnuovo from Sderot, Israel, and Jodi Rudoren and Rick Gladstone from New York.

    --
    You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "CODEPINK Middle East Alumni" group.
    To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to middle_east_alumni+unsubscribe@googlegroups.com.
    To post to this group, send email to middle_east_alumni@googlegroups.com.
    Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/middle_east_alumni.
    For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.

    --

    ---
    You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Code
    Posted by at No comments:
    Subscribe to: Posts (Atom)