Friday, September 9, 2011

Tearing Down another Wall of Shame

When Israel murdered 5 Egyptian police officers inside Egypt, its citizens demanded the expulsion of Israel's ambassador. Egypt's rulers were hesitant and did not act. Instead, Egypt's military council built a prefab concrete wall designed to protect Israel's embassy. This further enraged Egyptians who see the wall as a symbol of apartheid, a reminder of the separation wall on Palestine's West Bank which remains an emblem of injustice. It also invokes the humiliating peace treaty between Israel and Egypt, a degrading piece of legacy of rewarding the aggressor and the unjust.

So, they, the demonstrators took it upon themselves to force the ambassador and its staff to flee. This is people's power, the very source of authority that makes extraordinary things happen. Israel fears another intifada, it got hurt in Lebanon twice over and it failed to break the people of Gaza. The Arab Spring may well turn out to be its worst nightmare. What dark and dirty secrets lie in those Cairo embassy papers? 



The US is scrambling clutching at citing the Vienna Conventions to protect Israel's interests in Cairo. How hypocritical can one get to flaunt the Geneva Conventions when it was convenient to do so to prolong the torture and torment of Guantanamo, rendition and "black sites" detainees. Israel is now a pariah state and the world would want no part or company with it except for US-Old Europe lobbyists and political expediency.

Sunday, September 4, 2011

Libya: Treachery, Made in USA and UK



The Central Intelligence Agency and Gaddafi's Libyan intelligence services developed such a tight relationship during the George W. Bush administration that the U.S. shipped terror suspects (extraordinary rendition) to Libya for torture and interrogation, and suggested the questions they should be asked, according to documents found in Libya's External Security agency headquarters.

The relationship was close enough that the CIA moved to establish "a permanent presence" in Libya in 2004, according to a note from Stephen Kappes, at the time the No. 2 in the CIA's clandestine service, to Libya's then-intelligence chief, Moussa Koussa.

It has been also revealed that Britain's MI6 'worked with the Gaddafi regime'. Evidence has emerged of close cooperation between British intelligence and the regime of Colonel Gaddafi.

Documents found at the abandoned office of Libya’s former spymaster appear to provide new details of the close relations the Central Intelligence Agency shared with the Libyan intelligence service — most notably suggesting that the Americans sent terrorism suspects at least eight times for questioning in Libya despite that country’s reputation for torture.

The documents claim that MI6 supplied its counterparts in Libya with details on exiled opponents living in the UK, and chart how the CIA abducted several suspected militants before handing them over to Tripoli.

They also contain communications between British and Libyan security officials ahead of Tony Blair's visit in 2004, and show that British officials helped write a draft speech for Gaddafi when he was being encouraged to give up his weapons programme. The speech that appears to have been drafted for Colonel Qaddafi was found in the C.I.A. folder and appears to have been sent just before Christmas in 2003. The one-page speech seems intended to depict the Libyan dictator in a positive light.

No wonder Gaddafi kept or stashed his billions of dollars in the US, UK and Europe when it was cosy and convenient, losing it to their sanctions imposition when they decided to ditch him. The new transitional council's leadership (NTC) ought to be wary in dealing with those who brought them to victory, for they might end up like their former Brother Leader Gaddafi.