Stephen Lendman

Make no mistake. America is directly or indirectly responsible for most world conflicts. Across North Africa, the Middle East, and Central Asia, it plays the lead role.

Afghanistan has been occupied for nearly 11 years. US air and ground attacks murder civilians daily. Pre-2003 Iraq no longer exists. America destroyed the cradle of civilization. It's complicit in daily Israeli state terror against Palestinian civilians. It ravaged and murdered tens of thousands of Libyans. It's using death squad invaders against Syrians. Civilian men, women and children are prime targets. Everyone supporting peace and stability is vulnerable.

It's not enough. Plans call for full-scale war. Washington fights dirty. Scorched earth belligerence is policy. Target states aren't just attacked. They're willfully, maliciously, and lawlessly destroyed. People are massacred in cold blood. Propagandists call it humanitarian intervention. War is peace. Orwell warned us long ago. Only imperial dominance matters. Hegemons accept nothing less. Human lives are of no consequence. It's been that way since America's beginning. It's ongoing today with WMD ease.

Plans were readied months ago for ground and air attacks on Syria. Proxy war is prelude to full-scale conflict. Libya 2.0 looms. Media propaganda plays the lead role. Public opinion is being massaged, softened, and manipulated to accept more bloodshed. It never ends. One war segues to another. After Syria comes Iran. How many more millions will die? How much more human suffering is enough? How much are media scoundrels paid to support what they should condemn?

People have a right to know. They pay for it multiple ways. Their tax dollars go for killing and mass destruction, not vital domestic services. They're increasingly on their own to fund America's war machine. Police state harshness targets dissenters. Bipartisan complicity threw them under the bus long ago. Imagine what's coming post-election. Both parties are committed to endless wars without mercy. Revolutionary resistance is the only way to stop them. Hardly a sign of it exists.

Drumbeat warmongering drowns out activists needing much greater support to matter. Western media managed news misreports on nations Washington targets. Their hands are as blood drenched as imperial planners. They're virtual subcontractors. They're complicit in mass murder and destruction. They risk letting the entire Middle East explode. They ignore fundamental international law principles. They support foreign wars and ones at home against freedom. They're for wealth and power interests only. Destroying Syria and Iran get top billing.

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Gulf Center for Human Rights

The BCHR and GCHR condemn in the strongest terms the sentence passed today against the detained human rights defender Nabeel Rajab by the Bahraini government on charges related to protesting. Rajab was sentenced to a total of three years imprisonment in three cases, to be immediately carried out.

Nabeel Rajab is the president of the BCHR, the director of the Gulf Center for Human rights, the vice president of FIDH, and on the advisory board for the MENA section in Human Rights Watch. He is a renowned human rights defender, and in 2011 he was awarded with the Ion Ratiu Democracy Award because he "has worked tirelessly and at considerable personal peril to advance the cause of democratic freedoms and the civil rights of Bahraini citizens". The GCHR and BCHR believe that the only reason for targeting Rajab is to prevent him from continuing his legitimate and peaceful human rights work.

He is already serving a 3 months imprisonment sentence on charges of “libeling the citizens of the town of Muharraq over twitter”, another case of an ongoing campaign of judicial harassment against Rajab. He is in prison since 9 July 2012 for this charge. (See GCHR and BCHR appeal dated 9 July 2012 for further information: "Bahrain: Leading human rights defender Nabeel Rajab imprisoned for three months over twitter".

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Bill Van Auken

The body of CIA torture victim, Manadel al-Jamadi. At Abu Ghraib
prison, CIA officers took al-Jamadi to a shower stall. They put a sand-
bag over his head, cuffed his hands behind his back and chained his
arms to a barred window.(Credits: docudharma.com/examiner.com)

On Thursday US Attorney General Eric Holder shut down a more than three-year investigation into CIA torture and murder of detainees, with no charges being brought against anyone.

This final ignominious chapter in the Obama administration’s protection of those responsible for the crimes carried out under the Bush administration concerned the CIA’s torturing to death of two detainees, one in Afghanistan in 2002 and another in Iraq in 2003.

In a statement announcing that no one would be prosecuted, Attorney General Holder claimed, “admissible evidence would not be sufficient to obtain and sustain a conviction,” adding that this conclusion had been reached following a review of “substantive criminal statutes as well as the statutes of limitations and jurisdictional provisions.”

He did not say what charges had been contemplated and provided no concrete explanation of why they could not be brought. He included in his statement an obsequious tribute to those responsible for the torture and murders carried out under the Bush administration: “I also appreciate and respect the work of and sacrifices made by the men and women in our intelligence community on behalf of this country. They perform an incredibly important service to our nation, and they often do so under difficult and dangerous circumstances. They deserve our respect and gratitude for the work they do.”

Incredibly, Holder also praised the Justice Department’s investigation: “I continue to believe that our Nation will be better for it,” adding that the probe “was not intended to, and does not resolve, broader questions regarding the propriety of the examined conduct.”

In other words, after three years of investigation, the Obama administration has not only granted full impunity to those involved in the crimes of rendition, torture and murder carried out under Bush. It has failed to even issue a ruling on the “propriety” of torturing detainees to death. The clear implication is that the US government and legal system sanction such practices, and they will continue.

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Stephen Lendman

Washington and Israel wage dirty covert wars. Iran's been targeted for years. Imperial aims are prioritized. Rule of law principles don't matter. Israel wants sole regional dominance. America wants it globally. Lawless tactics continue. They include cyber attacks, other sabotage, targeted assassinations, deadly explosions, sophisticated satellite, drone, and other spying, bogus accusations, a virtual blockade, hostile saber rattling, multiple rounds of sanctions, and attempts to cripple its central bank and oil industry. In addition, relentless anti-Iranian propaganda substitutes malicious misinformation and bald-faced lies for accuracy and truth.

At issue is Iranian independence. The Islamic Republic threatens no one. Its nuclear program is peaceful. It seeks cooperative international relations. It wants its sovereign rights respected. However, belligerence is America's option of choice. Regime change is planned. It wants pro-Western governments replacing independent ones. Peace and stability are sabotaged. Pretexts are created. One war follows another. After Syria comes Iran.

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