Stephen Lendman

On June 9, McClatchy and other publications revealed some of what's rarely, if ever, acknowledged in the press - that Israel's blockade of Gaza is "economic warfare," not for security as most commonly reported, based on an Israeli document the Gisha Legal Center for Freedom of Movement's lawsuit obtained.

Gisha's director, Sari Bashi, said the document shows the siege is collective punishment, in violation of Fourth Geneva's Article 33 stating:

"No protected person may be punished for an offence he or she has not personally committed. Collective penalties and likewise all measures of intimidation or of terrorism are prohibited."

For over 43 years of occupation, Israel has willfully and maliciously violated this and virtually all other Fourth Geneva and other humanitarian rights law provisions.

In the wake of the Flotilla massacre, a Gisha June 9 press release headlined, "The Pyrrhic Victory of Jam and Halva," saying:

Israel agreed to let these items, razors, coriander, cardamon, and cookies enter Gaza, after banning them for three years. However, it "continues to prevent the transfer of purely civilian goods, such as fabrics, fishing rods, and food wrappers, as part of what it calls "economic warfare" aimed at crippling Gaza's economy, (and by doing so) denies 1.5 million human beings the right to engage in productive, dignified work," let alone rebuild and survive under unending harshness.

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Craig Murray

[Former Soviet republic Kyrgyzstan (Kyrgyz: Кыргызстан; Russian: Кыргызстан, officially the Kyrgyz Republic, is a country in Central Asia. Landlocked and mountainous, it is bordered by Kazakhstan to the north, Uzbekistan to the west, Tajikistan to the southwest and People's Republic of China to the east. Its capital and largest city is Bishkek. WP ]

The sad fact is that any posting about Central Asia sees my visitor figures plummet. I can please myself and don't make money from this webiste. But I can see why commercial media ignore Central Asia. And the harsh truth is that, even when a dramatic crisis is occuring and this blog is one of the few sources of informed comment, only a dribble of people bother to google.

A disclaimer - I know Uzbek and Kirghiz people who don't really understand what is happening. The only journalists who might have a clue are Michael Andersen and Monica Whitlock, and the latter self-censors a lot on Central Asia for family reasons. Disgracefully Britain does not even have an Embassy in Bishkek and "covers it" in the most desultory way imaginable from Astana, more than a thousand kilometers away.

Academic analyses concentrate on "clan systems" which mean nothing to most Kirghiz, who are unaware they belong to separate "clans" according to Western universities.

Even spellings are difficult becase you are transliterating non-Russian names, which had been rendered into Russian Cyrillic, into the latin alphabet. There is therefore no dispute on the Cyrillic spelling of Kyrgyzstan, but I always spelt it Kirghizstan in latin. Similarly the country's interim leader I always spelt as Rosa Otubaeva, but now she is suddenly in tiny articles in the middle broadsheet pages as Roza Otunbayeva.

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Kourosh Ziabari

The Iranian nation is not unfamiliar with the double standards of the superpowers anymore. The history of Iran's relations with the western and eastern superpowers is filled with deceitfulness, dishonesty and fraudulence. The recent U.S.-proposed, Russia-backed United Nations Security Council resolution against Iran over its nuclear program is simply one example out of hundreds of instances which demonstrate that the big powers have not ever been honest and sincere with Iran.

While the international community is witness to the flagrant, ceaseless and unrelenting felonies of the illegitimate regime of Israel in the occupied territories of Gaza and West Bank, United Nations Security Council blindly voted in favor of an unfair, unilateral and unjustifiable round of sanctions against the most pacifist and peace-lover country in the region simply because it wants to progress its civilian nuclear program domestically and without foreign intervention.

The new round of sanctions against Iran comes in the wake of Israel's continued blockade of the Gaza strip in violation of the UNSC resolution 1860 which demanded Tel Aviv last year to end the siege and allow the humanitarian aids to be transferred to the beleaguered enclave. More interestingly, the UNSC resolution against Iran was adopted while the international community was expecting a decisive and clear-cut reaction to Israel's assault on the convoy of humanitarian aid heading from Turkey towards the Gaza strip.

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Nahida Izzat

Imagine for one moment the corridors of power and influence, from presidential palaces to military command centres, being populated by the likes of Ku Klux Klan, white supremacists etc, who utter such racist nonsense that one race had been responsible for most of humanity's great achievements, that they are more apt at ruling the world's affairs!

Imagine for an instant that such dangerous extremists were offered glamorous receptions and confidential meetings with Presidents, Queens, MPs, Generals! Imagine their influence so overt, that in front of US's White House for example, the traditional Christmas Tree would be replaced by a GIGANTIC symbol of this racist ideology...!

Imagine EVERY single one of the 50 Governors of the USA submissive enough to make proclamations reflecting recognition and admiration of these racist supremacists, calling them even the "world's most influential..."

Can you imagine such folly ???

Well, the REALITY is far worse

Not only does this folly exist, but the racists in question in fact consider their own “race” as unique, superior morally, intellectually and spiritually, and totally distinct from the rest of humanity.

They even believe to be “gifted” with additional “divine” souls whereby the rest of humans only have animal souls

They pretend that God created them for a special mission and gave them the central role of leadership of humanity.

Whilst the political fringe, such as KKK or white supremacists etc, are insignificant and loathed, exposed and opposed by all parties whether mainstream or progressives, the extremists who have REALLY infiltrated all corridors of power are celebrated and promoted, and their destructive racist ideology is covered-up, muted, taboo.

This group with its sectarian ideology and predatory methods, has become a radical, and perhaps pivotal component of the very forces which have transformed our era into a tragic calamity; characterized by the collapse of economies, by corrupt and inept governments, by endless wars of destruction, by social regression, by colossal pauperization, etc etc, setting our planet ablaze.

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