contributions

Dr Ilan Pappe is one of Israel’s most prominent “new historians”. In May 2002, Pappe was threatened with expulsion from his university, the University of Haifa, for supporting a Jewish graduate student whose dissertation documented an massacre of Palestinians by Israeli soldiers. The expulsion proceedings were suspended due to a protest by international academics. Green Left Weekly’s Nick Everett spoke with Pappe during his recent visit to Australia.
What brought about the current intifada (…)

By: Greg Palast
I know you won’t believe this, but our President told a whopper in New York
An update of our report from last Labor Day.
MACON,GA.- In celebration of the working person’s holiday, Secretary of Labor Elaine Chao has announced the Bush Administration’s plan to end the 60-year-old law which requires employers to pay time-and-a-half for overtime.
I’m sure you already knew that — if you happened to have run across page 15,576 of last year’s Federal Register.
According to (…)

By JAMES RISEN and DAVID JOHNSTON WASHINGTON. It began like most national security investigations, with a squad of Federal Bureau of Investigation agents surreptitiously tailing two men, noting where they went and whom they met. What was different about this case was that the surveillance subjects were lobbyists for the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, and one of their contacts turned out to be a policy analyst at the Pentagon.
The ensuing criminal investigation into whether (…)

A massive car bomb exploded on the outskirts of Fallujah on Monday, killing seven U.S. Marines and wounding several others, a U.S. military official said. It was the deadliest day for U.S. forces in four months of fighting.
The strength of the blast sent the engine from the vehicle used in the bombing flying "a good distance" from the site, a military official said on condition of anonymity.
Witnesses said the attack took place 15 kilometers (9 miles) north of Fallujah and destroyed two (…)

An Annotated Version
by Rahul Mahajan
As columnist David Saransohn of the Oregonian points out, there is a curious gap in all the talk at the Republican National Convention:
At this convention, you don’t hear much about Iraq.
That is, Iraq the country.
You hear constantly about Iraq the symbol, the demonstration of American resolve, the place that will be a beacon of democracy throughout the Middle East and the Muslim world. Speakers repeatedly invoke Iraq as a stage set for (…)

Iraqi forces have surrounded an office of Shia leader Muqtada al-Sadr in Najaf in preparation to storm it while in the latest attack in Baghdad, one Iraqi was killed and several others injured.
Members of the Iraqi national guard have surrounded an al-Sadr office in Najaf in preparation to storm it on Monday, Aljazeera has learnt.
Al-Sadr office officials said Shia cleric Ayat Allah Ali al-Sistani must give his approval before Iraqi forces may enter the office.
A spokesman for the (…)

By Peter Wallsten and Matea Gold
Bush boasts of reforms without mentioning a record premium increase revealed Friday and seized on by Kerry.
BROADVIEW HEIGHTS, Ohio - Medicare emerged as a key point of contention Saturday in the race for the White House, as President Bush defended his efforts to improve it while Sen. John F. Kerry blasted the administration for promising fixes, only to approve the largest premium hike in the program’s 40-year history.
With new polls showing Bush (…)

by Robert Thompson
These comments are addressed above all to those among you who follow Judaism, Christianity or Islam, but it might be useful for others to ponder on the points raised.
At the end of June, when I wrote on the subject of the "Misappropriation of Christianity (or of any other religion)", I ended with the advice "Above all, pray for guidance to our loving, compassionate and merciful God, who cannot be served with evil actions".
This has since become even more urgent, and (…)

An influential cleric has lambasted US-led forces for conducting a damaging military raid that he says has harmed efforts to secure the release of two French journalists.
"The attack on Latifiya disrupted the process of their release," senior Iraqi cleric Shaikh Mahdi al-Sumaidi said on Sunday.
Experts have warned that increased military activity against resistance strongholds in the area could harm the chances of rescuing Radio France International’s Christian Chesnot and Georges (…)

by Graydon Carter
1 Number of Bush administration public statements on National security issued between 20 January 2001 and 10 September 2001 that mentioned al-Qa’ida.
104 Number of Bush administration public statements on National security and defense in the same period that mentioned Iraq or Saddam Hussein.
101 Number of Bush administration public statements on National security and defense in the same period that mentioned missile defense
65 Number of Bush administration public (…)