(source: Tony Karon Blog - Rootless Cosmopolitan)

 America’s march to a disastrous war in Iraq began in the media, where an unprovoked U.S. invasion of an Arab country was introduced as a legitimate policy option, then debated as a prudent and necessary one. Now, a similarly flawed media conversation on Iran is gaining momentum.

Last month, TIME’s Joe Klein warned that Obama administration sources had told him bombing Iran’s nuclear facilities was “back on the table.” In an interview with CNN, former CIA director Admiral Mike Hayden next spoke of an “inexorable” dynamic toward confrontation, claiming that bombing was a more viable option for the Obama administration than it had been for George W. Bush. The pièce de résistance in the most recent drum roll of bomb-Iran alerts, however, came from Jeffrey Goldberg in the Atlantic Monthly. A journalist influential in U.S. pro-Israeli circles, he also has access to Israel’s corridors of power. Because sanctions were unlikely to force Iran to back down on its uranium enrichment project, Goldberg invited readers to believe that there was a more than even chance Israel would launch a military strike on the country by next summer.

By Iqbal Jassat

September 2010 will usher in the ANC’s National General Council and all expectations are that the Zuma presidency will regard it as a defining moment of make or break.

Amidst a wave of countrywide protests and huge outcries for better wages and more jobs, it seems impossible to imagine that only weeks ago the country was caught up in passionate euphoria over the soccer world cup.

National pride was in a state of ecstasy then. Unbelievable levels of efficiency and tight security measures characterized South Africa’s international showcase. Whether FIFA or its enigmatic Sepp Blatter was effectively at the helm of this country did not matter. What mattered was that every conceivable state function seemed to work in harmony.

News reports dominating headlines today seem to have backtracked so swiftly to the pre-WC2010 era, that many would find it unworthy of the soccer festival themed country.

Yet the harsh reality is that there cannot be any permanent escape to few fleeting moments of bliss when we as a country do indeed face tough challenges. While these may be described as socio-economic by some commentators, a fundamental challenge is that of governance.

By Phyllis Bennis

(source: Just News)

A growing grassroots movement is using the techniques of the anti-apartheid movement to challenge U.S. support for Israel’s occupation of Palestinian territories.

Document Actions

When Israeli commandos launched their assault on the unarmed flotilla of ships carrying hundreds of humanitarian aid workers and 10,000 tons of supplies for the besieged Gaza Strip, killing at least nine activists and injuring scores more, part of the operation was “Made in the USA.”

Decades of uncritical U.S. financial, military, and diplomatic support has ensured that Israel’s military power—nuclear and conventional—remains unchallengeable. A U.S. pattern of using UN Security Council vetoes to protect Israel from accountability has ensured that Israel can essentially do whatever it likes with those U.S.-provided weapons, regardless of what U.S. or international laws may be broken.

Israel has long relied on the numerous U.S.-made and U.S.-financed Apache and Blackhawk war helicopters in its arsenal—it’s a good bet those were in use in the May 31st assault in international waters. Use of U.S.-provided weapons is severely limited by our own laws: The Arms Export Control Act (AECA) prohibits any recipient from using U.S. weapons except for security within its own borders, or for direct self-defense. And no amount of Israeli spin can make us believe that an attack by heavily-armed commandos jumping onto the decks of an unarmed civilian ship in international waters has anything to do with self-defense.

So yes—our tax dollars and our politicians’ decisions play a huge part in enabling not only the flotilla attack but Israel’s violations of human rights overall. But increasingly, across the country, people and organizations are standing up to say no to U.S. support for those policies of occupation and apartheid.

(source: Ma'an News Agency)

Hamas leader in exile Khaled Mash'al said a return to direct negotiations with Israel was "nationally illegitimate, carried out by force and American summons," on Tuesday.

Mash'al, speaking at an iftar dinner held for journalists in Damascus, said the PLO Executive Committee's decision to endorse the talks was "an echo of Washington's orders," adding that consensus was not reached among Palestinian factions, with most of the 11 parties making up the PLO opposing a return to talks with Israel.

"The success of talks will be according to Israeli measures and conditions, which means eliminating the Palestinian cause, including the right of return, Jerusalem, 1967 borders. This is a success for Israeli interests," Mash'al said.

The Hamas leader said those who backed talks "sought their popularity from abroad ... and have given up on their conditions and demands, subduing themselves to the US, just as they did when the US objected to [Palestinian] conciliation."  He further accused the Palestinian Authority of being "responsible for many disasters," including the recognition of Israel as a Jewish state. "This would not have happened if the PA leadership were not weak," he added.

(source: the guardian)

One of the most shocking stories of the anti-apartheid era may have been uncovered by a British correspondent. It is the disclosure that former prime ministers, Hendrik Verwoed and John Vorster, and the former head of the security police, General Hendrik van den Berg, were co-conspirators in a crime which led to another man being sent to the gallows.

The man who was hanged was John Harris, the so-called “mad bomber” executed for bombing Johannesburg’s Park station in 1964. Harris was the only white man hanged for a political offence during National Party rule.

It now appears that the three most powerful political figures in South Africa at the time – Verwoerd, Vorster and Van den Bergh – knew that the bomb had been planted and had plenty of time to stop it, but chose not do so. The reason was that they anticipated – and were proven right – that the bomb would deliver a hammer blow to the anti-apartheid movement. Harris was the chairman of Sanroc (the South African Non-racial Olympic Committee) which was leading the campaign against apartheid through sports boycotts. The bomb, which went off at 4.33 pm on Friday 24, 1964, also destroyed the Liberal Party.