Clear intent for CIA to commit terrorism in Yemen

Just think about the ramifications of this first paragraph in a Washington Post story: The CIA is seeking authority to expand its covert drone campaign in Yemen by launching strikes against terrorism suspects even when it does not know the identities of those who could be killed, U.S. officials said.

The kindly Washington gift to dysfunctional Pakistan

Today’s Pakistan is a nation with various sources of power but the intelligence services, ISI, are who truly controls the place. Dilip Hiro writes in TomDispatch about who has been largely funding this degradation since 9/11: It is common knowledge that Pakistani judges, fearing for their lives, generally refrain from convicting high-profile jihadists with political…

Zionist Diaspora perpetuates mass Israeli paranoia

Ilan Pappe writes in the Electronic Intifada about irrational hysteria that envelops today’s Israel: Being part visitor and part inmate in the ward [Israel] I found solace in three books, each one of which tells us how best to keep our wits even when the most armed and aggressive state in the region has replaced…

First Julian Assange TV interview is with Hizbollah leader

A brave first call. Julian Assange speaks to Hassan Nasrallah and doesn’t take the position, as so much of the corporate media, that he’s one of the world’s greatest terrorists (which he clearly is not). They discuss Syria, Assad, Israel, Palestine, religion, God, technology, Wikileaks and the US. Assange could be more forceful with his…

This is not what courage looks like over Israel/Palestine

There really isn’t much to be added to this short but incisive post by Phil Weiss on Mondoweiss except to agree with his sentiments; the lack of guts by so many mainstream American intellectuals to comment on Zionism and the Israeli occupation of Palestine, as it’s seen as negatively affecting the career. Grow a pair,…

Private militias polluting Pakistan

My following investigation is the lead story on Lebanon’s Al-Akhbar English: The past decade has seen a significant increase in foreign investments in the private security market around the Middle East. Pakistan is one of the countries that attracted the most attention in this global mercenary business. The American killing of Osama bin Laden last…

American wars killing soldiers in the thousands

Shocking (via the New York Times): An American soldier dies every day and a half, on average, in Iraq or Afghanistan. Veterans kill themselves at… a rate of one every 80 minutes. More than 6,500 veteran suicides are logged every year — more than the total number of soldiers killed in Afghanistan and Iraq combined since…

Pakistan: private security is a state within a state

My following investigation appears in Australian publication Crikey today: The Pakistani city of Peshawar is situated an hour from Afghanistan. Driving there from Islamabad, the landscape was mostly lush green fields, poor villages and mud houses. After being stopped at five checkpoints along the way, an attempt to intercept foreigners and militants entering the sensitive…

Text and images ©2024 Antony Loewenstein. All rights reserved.

Site by Common