Obama once again showing America is Israel's lapdog.

[RedfernMag 0]

Thatcher and Reagan were the siren call for the beginnings of neo-liberalism and infact it synchronised with the movement of the means of production abroad ie China etc...And the first signs that the postwar boom and the balance between capital and state started to be eroded. Capitalism was in a quandary in the West in that expectations had become really high amongst the masses and they knew it could never be fulfilled and go on in that way...Capital started clawing back stuff an reductive war against the state by both the left (quietly) and the right (openly).

 

http://www.salon.com/2013/03/09/the_world_according_to_milton_friedman_partner/

 

Capitalism indeed has no borders till we look at tariffs and legislation the oft used tools of the EU and the U.S. There has never been a free market. That's a myth.

 

It was when the early EU and Delors courted the unions that a very pro-EU Thatcher started to change her mind...And consequently got wiped out. Thatcher might have started the process but Blair and the EU will finish it.

 

The war is as much about identity as it is economic expansion. If you don't know who you are you it becomes harder to find your enemy. My contention is that after the post war boom the left has been in bed with Capital as much as any right wing Govt. As you said earlier in the thread there is no more left.

 

cheers for the link, i'll have a read in the morning (it's nearly 2am here and i have to go to work in a bit) :-)

[Park Life 70]

Not sure about this BBC bias angle either. Wor kid was making the same point the other day about a protest for Palestine in Central London that he said they hadn't been covered. I then read the same thing in the Guardian comments section to which someone replied with 4 separate links to stories on the BBC website covering the protest. It made me wonder why I heard this from 2 different sources when it was wrong and I concluded that both people were probably reading the same websites that claim the BBC are part of the global power networks conspiring to control us.

 

I also think the BBC covers health issues very comprehensively. I don't agree that the BBC are biased, their correspondents are very well informed. It's difficult to prove though, either way.

"A report on electronic intifada highlighted that in 2012, Raffi Berg, the new Middle East Editor of BBC, sent internal emails guiding his staff to write more favourably about Israel during its assault on Gaza in November 2012 which killed nearly 200 Palestinians. The report also accuses Berg of instructing writers to word stories in way that does not blame or “put undue emphasis” on Israel for attacks."

 

A 2003 study by Matt Viser published in the International Journal of Press Politics found that the New York Times personalised Israeli deaths, largely ignored Palestinian deaths, and relied heavily on Israeli sources."

 

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/hundreds-protest-against-bbc-proisrael-bias-of-gaza-coverage-in-cities-across-the-uk-9609016.html

 

The BBC has finally admitted that it breached its own impartiality guidelines when it presented a pro-Israel commentator as if he was neutral.

The finding published yesterday by the BBC Trust, the highest level of complaints adjudication at the broadcaster, relates to appearances made by a commentator called Jonathan Sacerdoti during Israel’s "Operation Pillar of Cloud" bombing of Gaza in November 2012."

Given that Sacerdoti appeared as a representative of the Zionist Federation on BBC Big Questions in November 2009, then on Sky News in June 2010 and, on the BBC again in September 2010, according to its own blog, it appears that he was in fact doing media work for the Zionist Federation for a period of at least 11 months.

Sacerdoti was emailed via the contact form on his website but did not respond to questions. However, he previously told The Jewish Chronicle newspaper that he felt his comments were 'in keeping with the requirements of due impartiality'.

While the ruling is centrally a damning indictment of journalistic standards in the BBC news room, Sacerdoti – who tried to remove evidence of his pro-Israel connections from the internet – does not come off well either."

[Park Life 70]

Oldskool

 

Edited August 3, 2014 by Park Life

[ChezGiven 0]

None of those examples show anything.

 

Berg wanted the BBC to be less biased towards Palestine.

 

Tw New York Times is not the BBC.

 

The third example is about the integrity of appearances and notably doesn't include any biased comments just a slight (possible mistake) in how opinion was presented. It certainly does not detail the comments made or which other views were covered at the time.

 

None of that even supports nevermind proves the idea that the BBC are pro-Israel.

[Park Life 70]

None of those examples show anything.

 

Berg wanted the BBC to be less biased towards Palestine.

 

Tw New York Times is not the BBC.

 

The third example is about the integrity of appearances and notably doesn't include any biased comments just a slight (possible mistake) in how opinion was presented. It certainly does not detail the comments made or which other views were covered at the time.

 

None of that even supports nevermind proves the idea that the BBC are pro-Israel.

The BBC are pro-Israeli always have been. There are hundreds of examples even from ex-employees..

 

The fact there has been a decades long debate about it should tell you something. Pro-Israeli pressure groups and money slap any top tier media outlet down if there is even a hint of a properly contextualised criticism of Israel. The Guardian fiasco was the last one that comes to mind...CH4 got into hot water a few years back. They are all running scared of the Israeli lobby notwithstanding a lot of our politicians get money from the Israel lobby.

 

On average 10 pro-Israel people get on the BBC compared to 2 giving the other view. There is data all over the place about this.

 

ps It comes as no surprise that Javier Bardem and Cruz have started recanting their original stance in that letter. How long did they hold out?

Two days?

 

http://www.theguardian.com/film/2014/aug/01/javier-bardem-israel-palestine-gaza-penelope-cruz

 

 

 

Edited August 3, 2014 by Park Life

[Dr Gloom 19770]

http://www.dw.de/oz-lose-lose-situation-for-israel/a-17822511

 

Interesting interview with Amos Oz on why the Gaza offensive is a "lose-lose" situation for Israel.

[Dr Gloom 19770]

The BBC are pro-Israeli always have been. There are hundreds of examples even from ex-employees..

 

The fact there has been a decades long debate about it should tell you something. Pro-Israeli pressure groups and money slap any top tier media outlet down if there is even a hint of a properly contextualised criticism of Israel. The Guardian fiasco was the last one that comes to mind...CH4 got into hot water a few years back. They are all running scared of the Israeli lobby notwithstanding a lot of our politicians get money from the Israel lobby.

 

On average 10 pro-Israel people get on the BBC compared to 2 giving the other view. There is data all over the place about this.

 

ps It comes as no surprise that Javier Bardem and Cruz have started recanting their original stance in that letter. How long did they hold out?

Two days?

 

http://www.theguardian.com/film/2014/aug/01/javier-bardem-israel-palestine-gaza-penelope-cruz

I wouldn't describe Jeremy Bowen as being particularly pro-Israel in his reporting from the Middle East.

[Park Life 70]

http://www.dw.de/oz-lose-lose-situation-for-israel/a-17822511

 

Interesting interview with Amos Oz on why the Gaza offensive is a "lose-lose" situation for Israel.

Agree with nearly all of that.

[Park Life 70]

I wouldn't describe Jeremy Bowen as being particularly pro-Israel in his reporting from the Middle East.

Bowen has done some good stuff. He's got various nefarious types after him for this.

[Park Life 70]

Classsic BBC bollocks...

 

[Dr Gloom 19770]

Agree with nearly all of that.

Me too. Shame the Israelis in power don't listen to the likes of Oz - he speaks for more of the population than those stats reveal, I'd wager.

Edited August 3, 2014 by Dr Gloom

[Dr Gloom 19770]

Feminism from day one was a total invention of the rulers. They noticed women weren't paying tax.

 

Once the breeding phase after the wars was over they started with getting women out the house, spinning slyly against family values and so on...They also noticed that women were frugal in the family setting and actually protected the family budget...There was a big switch from selling to men (the magpie in the nest attracted to shiny stuff) to selling to women (This continues unabated).

An interesting theory, you nutter

[Dr Gloom 19770]

Russell Brand's takedown of Hannity continues

 

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=-v5WlY8Uf5U

[aimaad22 3442]

Mark Steel at it again

 

 

In recent years most of humanity has become more tolerant of groups who once seemed to be on the margins of society. But until now it’s still been acceptable to be offensive about one minority: the child murdering community.

At last it seems the mood is changing, and finally we’re beginning to hear the child murderers’ point of view.

For example one brave soul, prepared to speak out, is spokesman Uri Dromi, who explained on Radio 4 yesterday that although the Israeli government bombed a school that several children died in, the deaths are clearly the fault of the people who live in the areas being bombed.

What a refreshing change from that tired old thinking that always blames murder on the murderer. Mister Drome, once a spokesman for the Israeli government, said the Israelis were “lured into a trap, now Hamas sheds crocodile tears about the dead”.

If only more of us understood bombed schools in this way. We always rush to judge some poor kid in an American town who mows down his classmates, without even pausing to consider the dead kids probably tricked him into it, and now to make it worse their parents are all pretending to cry.

Even more imaginative was Michael Oren, ex-Israeli ambassador to the US, on Channel 4 News. He explained that Hamas was to blame for all this death, because “toasters and refrigerators have been booby-trapped”.

It goes to show you should never make up your mind too quickly. Many of us see pictures of buildings reduced to rubble with a bomb sticking out, and hastily conclude the bomb had something to do with the explosion. But look carefully and it becomes obvious it was caused by the silly sods blowing themselves up with a toaster.

I bet if we went back to Hiroshima and checked what happened more thoroughly, we’d discover the blast was nothing to do with an atom bomb, and was caused by a booby-trapped kettle. I hope consumer programmes in Gaza cover this issue, to warn people of the dangers. The Gaza edition of Watchdog this week should start: “We’ve received several complaints from those of you who bought one of these toasters from Hamas, and were surprised when it caused your entire street to explode.”

Benjamin Netanyahu spoke out for child murderers’ civil rights by informing us the Palestinians deliberately arrange the “telegenically dead” to be filmed, to attract sympathy. So it seems Hamas stroll round bomb sites, placing the prettiest corpses on view for film crews, otherwise we’d all think “it doesn’t matter that the Israelis killed that kid, he was an ugly little bastard anyway”.

Other spokesmen have repeated this line, and maybe soon they’ll take it to the next stage, claiming that the Palestinians we see howling with anguish about their dead children have been trained at a special Hamas acting school. Directors yell, “One more rehearsal everyone, now as soon as we’ve blown up our toaster we want all the cast kneeling and sobbing, give it everything loves, everything, then we’ll go for a take.”

As the bombing continues I expect we’ll hear more reasons why the Palestinians are to blame for being bombed. An Israeli minister will say, “These people in Gaza are always complaining that they live in a densely populated area, so we’re trying to help them out by reducing the population as much as we can to give them more space. But they’re still not happy. Some people are never satisfied.”

The Israelis insist they give warnings before bombing somewhere, and in general we all forgive someone bombing a school as long as they let you know they’re doing it five minutes in advance. Given how crowded the area is, and the scale of the bombing, any warning might seem fairly useless unless it gives you instructions on how to fly or escape into another dimension like Doctor Who, but at least the intention is there.

Now they’re calling up another 16,000 reservists, but if they don’t think they’re managing to do enough damage already, a better strategy might be to scrap their F16 bombers that clearly aren’t up to the job, and replace them with some booby-trapped toasters as apparently they’re more effective.

In less enlightened times, those responsible for such murder would be snarled at in the street and their pictures displayed on newspapers under inflammatory headlines. But thankfully we’re growing more liberal, and can only regret that more thought wasn’t given to treating murderers kindly in the past.

Poor Fred West, for example, instead of barely being given a chance to make his case, could have sat in televison studios saying, “Of course I regret the deaths of civilians. But you have to understand these people I murdered could be a bloody nuisance. I was lured into killing them, and I’m not even sure I did kill them until I’ve carried out my own investigation. Some of them kill themselves to get sympathy by booby-trapping their ironing boards, you know.”

As times change, maybe Netanyahu and his spokesmen will become more forthright, and organise “Child Murderer Pride” in which child murderers can get together for a procession and carnival, where they can at last feel safe, and no longer feel looked down on for carrying out their basic human right to bomb a school to bits.

 

http://www.independent.co.uk/voices/comment/how-silly-of-me-to-assume-it-was-israeli-bombs-causing-all-the-damage-in-gaza-9640905.html

Edited August 3, 2014 by aimaad22

[Happy Face 29]

And Glenn Greenwald...

 

The U.S. government has long lavished overwhelming aid on Israel, providing cash, weapons and surveillance technology that play a crucial role in Israel’s attacks on its neighbors. But top secret documents provided by NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden shed substantial new light on how the U.S. and its partners directly enable Israel’s military assaults – such as the one on Gaza.

 

Over the last decade, the NSA has significantly increased the surveillance assistance it provides to its Israeli counterpart, the Israeli SIGINT National Unit (ISNU; also known as Unit 8200), including data used to monitor and target Palestinians. In many cases, the NSA and ISNU work cooperatively with the British and Canadian spy agencies, the GCHQ and CSEC.

 

The relationship has, on at least one occasion, entailed the covert payment of a large amount of cash to Israeli operatives. Beyond their own surveillance programs, the American and British surveillance agencies rely on U.S.-supported Arab regimes, including the Jordanian monarchy and even the Palestinian Authority Security Forces, to provide vital spying services regarding Palestinian targets.

 

The new documents underscore the indispensable, direct involvement of the U.S. government and its key allies in Israeli aggression against its neighbors. That covert support is squarely at odds with the posture of helpless detachment typically adopted by Obama officials and their supporters.

 

President Obama, in his press conference on Friday, said ”it is heartbreaking to see what’s happening there,” referring to the weeks of civilian deaths in Gaza – “as if he’s just a bystander, watching it all unfold,” observed Brooklyn College Professor Corey Robin. Robin added: ”Obama talks about Gaza as if it were a natural disaster, an uncontrollable biological event.”

 

Each time Israel attacks Gaza and massacres its trapped civilian population – at the end of 2008, in the fall of 2012, and now again this past month – the same process repeats itself in both U.S. media and government circles: the U.S. government feeds Israel the weapons it uses and steadfastly defends its aggression both publicly and at the U.N.; the U.S. Congress unanimously enacts one resolution after the next to support and enable Israel; and then American media figures pretend that the Israeli attack has nothing to do with their country, that it’s just some sort of unfortunately intractable, distant conflict between two equally intransigent foreign parties in response to which all decent Americans helplessly throw up their hands as though they bear no responsibility.

 

“The United States has been trying to broker peace in the Middle East for the past 20 years,” wrote the liberal commentator Kevin Drum in Mother Jones, last Tuesday. The following day, CNN reported that the Obama administration ”agreed to Israel’s request to resupply it with several types of ammunition … Among the items being bought are 120mm mortar rounds and 40mm ammunition for grenade launchers.”

 

The new Snowden documents illustrate a crucial fact: Israeli aggression would be impossible without the constant, lavish support and protection of the U.S. government, which is anything but a neutral, peace-brokering party in these attacks. And the relationship between the NSA and its partners on the one hand, and the Israeli spying agency on the other, is at the center of that enabling.

 

Tally of UN Vote on July 22, 2014 to investigate violations of international law in West Bank and Gaza (Credit: Ken Roth, Human Rights Watch)

 

Last September, the Guardian revealed that the NSA “routinely shares raw intelligence data with Israel without first sifting it to remove information about US citizens.” The paper published the full top secret Memoranadum of Understanding between the two agencies governing that sharing. But the NSA/ISNU relationship extends far beyond that.

 

One newly disclosed top secret NSA document, dated April 13, 2013 and published today by the Intercept, recounts that the “NSA maintains a far-reaching technical and analytic relationship with the Israeli SIGINT National Unit (ISNU) sharing information on access, intercept, targeting, language, analysis and reporting.”

 

Specifically, “this SIGINT relationship has increasingly been the catalyst for a broader intelligence relationship between the United States and Israel.”

Moreover, “NSA’s cyber partnerships expanded beyond ISNU to include Israeli Defense Intelligence’s [special Operation Division] SOD and Mossad.”

 

Under this expanded cooperation, the Americans and Israelis work together to gain access to “geographic targets [that] include the countries of North Africa, the Middle East, the Persian Gulf, South Asia, and the Islamic republics of the former Soviet Union.” It also includes “a dedicated communications line between NSA and ISNU [that] supports the exchange of raw material, as well as daily analytic and technical correspondence.”

 

The relationship has provided Israel with ample support for both intelligence and surveillance: “The Israeli side enjoys the benefits of expanded geographic access to world-class NSA cryptanalytic and SIGINT engineering expertise, and also gains controlled access to advanced U.S. technology and equipment via accommodation buys and foreign military sales.” Among Israel’s priorities for the cooperation are what the NSA calls “Palestinian terrorism.”

 

The cooperation between the NSA and ISNU began decades ago. A top secret agreement between the two agencies from July 1999 recounts that the first formal intelligence-sharing agreement was entered into in 1968 between U.S. President Lyndon Johnson and Israeli Prime Minister Levi Eshkol, and informally began in the 1950s. But the relationship has grown rapidly in the last decade.

 

In 2003 and 2004, the Israelis were pressuring the NSA to agree to a massively expanded intelligence-sharing relationship called “Gladiator.” As part of that process, Israel wanted the Americans to pay hundreds of millions of dollars to fund Israeli activities. The specific proposed “Gladiator” agreement appears never to have been consummated, derailed by Israeli demands that the U.S. bear the full cost, but documents in the Snowden archive pertaining to those negotiations contain what appear to be two receipts for one or more payments of $500,000 in cash to Israeli officials for unspecified purposes:

 

 

 

The surveillance-sharing relationship with Israel has expanded to include the NSA’s British and Canadian counterparts, GCHQ and CSEC, both of which actively participate in feeding the Israelis selected communications data they have collected. Several documents from early 2009, at the height of the Israeli attack on Gaza called “Cast Lead” that left more than 1,000 people dead, detail some of this cooperation.

 

One top secret 2009 GCHQ project named “YESTERNIGHT” involved “Ruffle,” the British agency’s code name for ISNU. According to the document, the project involved a “trilateral (GCHQ, NSA and Third Party RUFFLE) targeting exchange agreement covering respective COMSAT accesses.” One of the “specific intelligence topics” shared between the parties was “Palestinians”, although the GCHQ document states that “due to the sensitivities” of Israeli involvement, that particular program does not include direct targeting of Palestinians and Israelis themselves. Another GCHQ document from February, 2009, describes “a quadrilateral meeting for RUFFLE, NSA, CSEC and GCHQ.”

 

The British agency noted in early 2009 that it had been spying on emails and telephone numbers specifically requested by ISNU, “and they have thanked us many times over.”

 

The NSA and GCHQ receive intelligence about the Palestinians from many sources. The agencies have even succeeded in inducing the U.S.-supported Palestinian Authority Security Forces (PASF) to provide them with surveillance and intelligence about other Arab groups in the region. One July 2008 GCHQ document states:

 

 

Jordan also feeds surveillance data about the Palestinians to the NSA. One classified NSA document from 2013 describes how “NSA’s partnership with EWD [the Jordanian Electronic Warfare Directorate] is a well established, long-standing and trusted relationship dating back to the early 1980’s.” Specifically, the two agencies “cooperate on high-priority SIGINT targets of mutual interest” that includes the Palestinian Security Forces.

 

The document continues: “EWD provides high-interest, unique collection on targets of mutual interest, such as the Palestinian Security Forces; EWD is the sole contributor to a large body of NSA’s reporting on this target.”

 

 

But even as the NSA and its partners are directed by political branches to feed the Israelis surveillance data and technology, they constantly characterize Israel as a threat – both to their own national security and more generally to regional peace. In stark contrast to the public statements about Israel made by American and British officials, the Snowden archive is replete with discussions of the Israelis as a menace rather than an ally.

 

NSA documents previously published by the Guardian stated that “one of NSA’s biggest threats is actually from friendly intelligence services, like Israel.” Another notes that the National Intelligence Estimate ranked Israel as “the third most aggressive intelligence service against the U.S.”

 

British officials have a similar view of the Israelis, describing them as a “very real threat to regional stability.” One top secret GCHQ planning document from 2008 notes that “policy makers remain deeply concerned over the potential threat that Israel poses to a peaceful resolution of the Iran problem, and to some of Israel’s less desirable activities in the region.” Moreover, “Israel’s thinking on the long-term threat offered by Iran to its fundamental foreign policy strategy of armed deterrence may create very real threats to regional stability in 2009.”

 

 

The NSA’s 2007 Strategic Mission List, identifying priorities for surveillance targeting, repeatedly identifies Israel as one of the leading threats in a diverse range of areas, including: “Combating the threat of development of weapons of mass destruction” and “delivery methods (particularly ballistic and nuclear-capable cruise missiles).” The “focus area” for that concern is “WMD and missile proliferation activities,” and one of the leading threats is listed as “Israel (cruise missiles).”

 

The NSA internal discussion from that document regarding “Mastering Cyberspace and Preventing an Attack on U.S. Critical Information Systems” includes a subheading on “FIS [financial/banking system] threats.” The nations identified as the leading FIS threats include India, North Korea, Cuba and Israel. Similarly, Israel appears on the list of countries believed by the NSA to be “Enabling EW (producers/proliferators).”

 

Another section of the threat assessment document is entitled “Foreign Intelligence, Conterintelligence; Denial & Deception Activities: Countering Foreign Intelligence Threats.” It is defined as “Espionage/intelligence collection operations and manipulation/influence operations conducted by foreign intelligence services directed against U.S. government, military, science & technology and Intelligence Community.” The countries posing the greatest threat: “China, Russia, Cuba, Israel, Iran, Pakistan, North Korea, France, Venezuela, and South Korea.”

 

Asked about its cooperative relationship with Israel, an NSA spokesperson told the Intercept: “We are not going to comment on specific intelligence activities and relationships. The fact that intelligence services sometimes cooperate in a lawful and appropriate manner mutually strengthens the security of both nations. Whenever NSA shares intelligence information or technology, we comply with all applicable laws and rules.” A GCHQ official refused to comment on the record beyond the agency’s standard boilerplate claiming its activities are legal and subject to “rigorous oversight.”

 

Legal or not, the NSA’s extensive, multi-level cooperation with Israeli military and intelligence agencies is part of a broader American policy that actively supports and enables Israeli aggression and militarism. Every Israeli action in Gaza has U.S. fingerprints all over it. Many Americans may wish that the Israeli attack on Gaza were a matter of no special relevance or concern to them, but it is their own government that centrally enables this violence.

 

 

https://firstlook.org/theintercept/2014/08/04/cash-weapons-surveillance/

 

Few American politicians can survive if they express the truth of Israel's belligerence which is reflected in the secret documents of their spy agency (and few British with any stock in the 'partnership'). This in turn informs the scope of discussion across the media where the furthest anyone outside of Democracy Now, The Guardian or Ch 4 will go is to say both sides are as bad as each other.

 

It's a lie.

[Holden McGroin 4833]

That Hannity clip is an absolute farce. He who shouts the loudest is normally wrong.

Edited August 4, 2014 by Holden McGroin

[aimaad22 3442]

[tweet]

[/tweet]

 

[Kid Dynamite 5899]

it says a lot about Milliband that the Tories are in this much of a state and he's still not nailed on to win the next election

[Alex 30330]

it says a lot about Milliband that the Tories are in this much of a state and he's still not nailed on to win the next election

This is quite interesting if you're interested in that sort of thing:

http://www.electoralcalculus.co.uk/homepage.html

I think they pretty much nailed it at the last election re: projected seats.

[The Fish 8973]

Gives Warsi more time to concentrate on her media career I suppose.

[Dr Gloom 19770]

i can see another hung parliament myself. clegg to be the kingmaker again, unbelievably

[Kid Dynamite 5899]

This is quite interesting if you're interested in that sort of thing:

http://www.electoralcalculus.co.uk/homepage.html

I think they pretty much nailed it at the last election re: projected seats.

Fingers crossed

[PaddockLad 14568]

Israel May soon have to open a "northern front".....in some ways Gaza is the least of their worries if Isis encroach further into Lebanon

 

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/middle-east/isis-brings-its-war-to-lebanon--and-it-could-be-a-key-part-of-a-masterplan-9648009.html

[TobamorisRevenge 0]

quality publicity stunt.....he never stops!

 

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/george-galloway-declares-bradford-an-israelfree-zone-9653894.html

 

isis vs israel, gonna happen at some point!

 

hate to say this, but its kinda fascinating watching it all play out.....its like some gigantic game of risk.

 

Isis even manage to make hamas look less evil! latest reports say they been going around beheading children

[Dr Gloom 19770]

Isis are pretty scary. While all the talk has been of gaza lately the hundreds of thousands of people being killed across the Arab world has barely been mentioned. Latest from Iraq is another humanitarian crisis as the Yazidi ethnic minority flee to Iraqi highlands to escape Isis fighters, who view them as heretics, where there is no food or water so those unlucky enough not to make it to the refugee camps are starving to death while the UN struggle to get food to them.