De Israelische Terreur 35

De New York Times bericht: 'Peres Says Ceasefire in Everyone's Interests.

Almaty - Israeli Vice Prime Minister Shimon Peres gave a cautious welcome to Hamas's proposed ceasefire and said on Friday he did not see a need for the United Nations to investigate the beach killings in Gaza last week.
Hamas, which formed the Palestinian government in March after winning elections, said on Thursday it was willing to ask Palestinian militants to stop firing rockets from Gaza into the Jewish state. But it said Israel had to first stop military activity in the Gaza Strip and West Bank.
"I think all parties are interested in lowering the flames because the flames are uncontrollable," Peres told reporters during a trip to Kazakhstan. "From the point of view of Israel there won't be shooting ... We are not initiating it."
Asked about an appeal by the Palestinians and their supporters to ask the United Nations to investigate the killing of seven Palestinians including several members of the same family on a beach in Gaza last week, Peres said there was little the United Nations could do.
"I'm not sure because the U.N. doesn't have any means to investigate. All the evidence is in our hands," he said.
Israel has denied responsibility for the blast which occurred on a day of heavy shelling of the Gaza Strip.' Lees verder:
http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/news/news-mideast-israel.html?_r=1&oref=slogin Of:
http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/061606G.shtml

Planet of Slums

De BBC bericht: 'Report Reveals Global Slum Crisis.

Slum-dwellers who make up a third of the world's urban population often live no better - if not worse - than rural people, a United Nations report says.

Anna Tibaijuka, head of the UN Habitat agency, urged governments and donors to take more seriously the problems of at least a billion people.
Worst hit is Sub-Saharan Africa where 72% of urban inhabitants live in slums rising to nearly 100% in some states.
If no action is taken, the world's slum population could rise to 1.4bn by 2020.
Habitat - the UN's human settlements programme - is hosting an Urban Forum in Vancouver next week on how to stem the crisis.
Its report is billed as a ground-breaking survey of urban growth, making a clear distinction between slum and non-slum development for the first time in UN history.
According to Dr Tibaijuka, speaking to reporters in London, slum-dwellers suffer a double disadvantage: they both live in misery and their plight often goes unreported given the traditional focus on the rural poor in the developing world.
"The average aid worker is not aware of the extent of the problem - this report is the proof," UN Habitat's executive director added.
Some states, the report notes, have already taken significant action to improve conditions, notably in Latin America where about 31% of urban people are classified as living in slums (figures for 2005) - down from 35% in 1990.
Such progress is welcomed as part of the UN's Millennium Development Goal of achieving a significant improvement in the lives of at least 100 million slum-dwellers by 2020.' Lees verder:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/in_depth/5078654.stm Of: http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/061606F.shtml


In zijn boek Planet of Slums schrijft de Amerikaanse onderzoeker Mike Davis: 'In 1950 there were 86 cities in the world with a population of more than one million; today there are 400, and by 2015 there will be at least 550. Cities, indeed, have absorbed nearly two-thirds of the global population explosion since 1950, and are currently growing by a million babies and migrants each week. The world's urban labor force has more than doubled since 1980, and the present urban population - 3.2 billion - is larger than the population of the world when John F. Kennedy was inaugurated.' Daar komt bij dat de kloof tussen arm en rijk de afgelopen 40 jaar verdubbeld is. Voor een ieder met een beetje gezond verstand is duidelijk dat deze ontwikkeling desastreus is en hierin werkelijk verandering moet komen. Allereerst door de westerse rijkdom eerlijk te verdelen.

De Israelische Terreur 34

Het Egyptische Al Ahram Weekly bericht: 'On 13 June Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert told a press conference in London that he had just signed a memorandum allowing the import through Egypt and Jordan of firearms and other weapons to bolster Abbas's position vis-à-vis Hamas.
Olmert's words can be interpreted in only one way; that Israel is actively promoting a Palestinian civil war.

Days of fire
Israeli massacres have yet to overshadow Palestinian differences, reports Khaled Amayreh from Ramallah
Hamas and Fatah leaders joined ranks in condemning the 9 June murder by the Israeli army of a Palestinian family, save one girl, picnicking on a Gaza beach. The annihilation of the Ghalia family was followed by the massacre of seven more civilians, including three members of the same family, in eastern Gaza on Tuesday.
Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas, not known for his rhetorical excess, described the killings as "horrible massacres".
"There is only one term to describe what is happening and it is state terror," said Abbas, adding that "these massacres will not deter us from pursuing our legitimate rights."
Hamas, for its part, called the unrelenting wave of killings "war crimes resembling what the Nazis did in Europe more than 60 years ago."
"When Zionist Jews think, behave and act like Nazis, they become Nazis," said a close aide to Palestinian Prime Minister Ismael Haniya.
The latest wave of killings, which have claimed the lives of over 40 Palestinians, the bulk of them civilians, have not, however, re-unified the Palestinians.' Lees verder:
http://weekly.ahram.org.eg/2006/799/fr1.htm

De Israelische Terreur 33

Electronic Intifada bericht: 'As the daily death toll of Palestinian men, women and children at the hands of Israelis clearly indicates, Israel's policy towards the Palestinians is driven solely by violence and aggression. No other avenues (the non-violent kind) are open.Because of this, Israel is now escalating its practice of keeping internationals out of the West Bank and Gaza, the idea being that the presence of internationals puts a crimp in Israeli operations. When Palestinians protest on their own, the Israeli forces can and do use live ammunition against them. The presence of internationals is a deterrent to such violence. Or you can believe the Israeli version: "The situation on the ground in the West Bank between Fateh and Hamas provides a reason for much stiffer entry "regulations."'The bottom line is that for Americans and other nationals working for humanitarian organizations, it is getting near impossible to enter or stay in the West Bank. This Israeli policy is not in writing anywhere; it has recently manifested itself in "actions at border crossings, ports of entry and Ben Gurion by the Israeli Ministry of Interior." As tourism in the Holy Land is not exactly flourishing these days, internationals who enter the West Bank and Gaza come either as activists to help organize peaceful protests against the occupation in its various terrible permutations, or they provide much-needed skills to NGOs or governmental institutions. A bigger problem is that a sizeable number are Palestinian expatriate nationals (Palestinians forced by circumstances to acquire a nationality somewhere in the world or else be left with no national identity at all). At borders, the Israelis catch onto this group quickly, not only because of their names and the way they look, but also because they are asked to provide the names of their fathers and grandfathers and where they were born on their visa forms. These people come with their children to connect with families, or to reside with spouses who are holders of Palestinian IDs, or to lend their skills to various development enterprises, to buy homes and to start businesses. If they could, they would be holders of dual citizenships, just like the thousands of American Jews who are also Israeli nationals, but there is no such option for them.' Lees verder: http://electronicintifada.net/v2/article4813.shtml

Klimaatverandering 40

LiveScience bericht: 'Carbon that has been locked away for thousands of years could escape into the atmosphere if global warming thaws large patches of frozen ground in Alaska and Siberia as expected, a new study warns.

Called permafrost, the frozen ground contains large amounts of carbon-rich grass and animal bones. The new study looked at the effects of global warming on permafrost in Siberia, called "yedoma."

Scientists calculate that about 500 gigatons (Gt) of carbon is locked away in yedoma permafrost. One gigaton is equal to one billion tons.

The researchers estimate that if global warming continues at its current pace, about 90 percent of the carbon in yedoma permafrost could be released. Most of it would go into the atmosphere as either carbon dioxide or methane, the researchers say.

The study, led by Sergey Zimov from the Russian Academy of Sciences, is detailed in the July 15 issue of the journal Science.

The study notes that about another 500 Gt of carbon is locked away in other permafrost areas around the world, and that global warming could have similar effects on these areas as well.

Scientists estimate that permafrost makes up some 24 percent of land in the Northern Hemisphere.' Zie:
http://www.livescience.com/environment/060615_permafrost_carbon.html

De Commerciele Massamedia 11

Via Information Clearing House kunt u naar deze documentaire kijken: 'Operation Saddam - America's Propaganda War (2003) Documentary focusing on the tactics used by the U.S and it's allies in the build up to,and during, the Iraq War, featuring Ray Mcgovern and Seymour Hersh amongst others. Originally broadcast on SBS (Australian T.V) Language is English, 50 mins' Zie: http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article11054.htm

Kurt Vonnegut

Information Clearing House: 'Custodians of chaos In this extract from his forthcoming memoirs, Kurt Vonnegut is horrified by the hypocrisy in contemporary US politics

"Do unto others what you would have them do unto you." A lot of people think Jesus said that, because it is so much the sort of thing Jesus liked to say. But it was actually said by Confucius, a Chinese philosopher, five hundred years before there was that greatest and most humane of human beings, named Jesus Christ.The Chinese also gave us, via Marco Polo, pasta and the formula for gunpowder. The Chinese were so dumb they only used gunpowder for fireworks. And everybody was so dumb back then that nobody in either hemisphere even knew that there was another one.We've sure come a long way since then. Sometimes I wish we hadn't. I hate H-bombs and the Jerry Springer ShowBut back to people like Confucius and Jesus and my son the doctor, Mark, each of whom have said in their own way how we could behave more humanely and maybe make the world a less painful place. One of my favourite humans is Eugene Debs, from Terre Haute in my native state of Indiana.Get a load of this. Eugene Debs, who died back in 1926, when I was not yet four, ran five times as the Socialist party candidate for president, winning 900,000 votes, almost 6 percent of the popular vote, in 1912, if you can imagine such a ballot. He had this to say while campaigning:"As long as there is a lower class, I am in it."As long as there is a criminal element, I am of it."As long as there is a soul in prison, I am not free."Doesn't anything socialistic make you want to throw up? Like great public schools, or health insurance for all?When you get out of bed each morning, with the roosters crowing, wouldn't you like to say. "As long as there is a lower class, I am in it. As long as there is a criminal element, I am of it. As long as there is a soul in prison, I am not free."How about Jesus' Sermon on the Mount, the Beatitudes?Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the Earth.Blessed are the merciful, for they shall obtain mercy.Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called the children of God.And so on.Not exactly planks in a Republican platform. Not exactly George W Bush, Dick Cheney, or Donald Rumsfeld stuff.For some reason, the most vocal Christians among us never mention the Beatitudes. But, often with tears in their eyes, they demand that the Ten Commandments be posted in public buildings. And of course that's Moses, not Jesus. I haven't heard one of them demand that the Sermon on the Mount, the Beatitudes, be posted anywhere.' Lees verder:
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article13659.htm