Early in the morning of Friday, April 9, 1948, commandos of the Irgun, headed by Menachem Begin, and the Stern Gang attacked Deir Yassin, a village with about 750 Palestinian residents. It was several weeks before the end of the British Mandate. The village lay outside of the area that the United Nations recommended be included in a future Jewish State. Deir Yassin had a peaceful reputation and was even said by a Jewish newspaper to have driven out some Arab militants. But it was located on high ground in the corridor between Tel Aviv and Jerusalem and one plan, kept secret until years afterwards, called for it to be destroyed and the residents evacuated to make way for a small airfield that would supply the beleaguered Jewish residents of Jerusalem.

By noon over 100 people, half of them women and children, had been systematically murdered. Four commandos died at the hands of resisting Palestinians using old Mausers and muskets. Twenty-five male villagers were loaded into trucks, paraded through the Zakhron Yosef quarter in Jerusalem, and then taken to a stone quarry along the road between Givat Shaul and Deir Yassin and shot to death. The remaining residents were driven to Arab East Jerusalem.

In the wake of Monday’s explosion at the Upper Big Branch mine in southern West Virginia, a mass of evidence has emerged of wanton and pervasive safety violations by coal giant Massey Energy, the owner of the mine. The facts show as well that federal regulators, well aware of the deadly conditions in the mine, did nothing to force the company to comply with safety laws and protect the miners from the inevitable consequences of the company’s willful disregard for elementary safety standards. As of this writing, 25 miners are known to have died in the massive explosion that ripped through the mine Monday afternoon, and hope for four others who remain trapped underground is dwindling. The disaster at the Montcoal, West Virginia mine is already the most deadly US mine accident in more than 25 years, and seems likely to become the deadliest in four decades. Raw Story: Four missing US miners found dead. NZ Herald: Missing men found dead in coal mine. WSWS: West Virginia miners speak on unsafe conditions.

FROM THE MADHOUSE: Westboro Baptist Church Blames Homosexuality for Coal Mine Disaster:

On Thursday, April 8, the Westboro Baptist Church showed up in Charleston, West Virginia to protest. They said the Upper Big Branch Coal Mine accident happened because God is punishing America for homosexuality. One flier said, "God hates WV! The dead miners are in Hell!" Signs proclaimed: "America Is Doomed," "Thank God for Dead Miners," "God Hates Your Tears," "God Hates West Virginia" and "God Hates You."

Conservative media spent much of Friday attacking Rep. Alan Grayson (D-Fla.) for breaking up a GOP meeting Thursday evening in his Orlando district. Rush Limbaugh talked about the confrontation for good chunks of his show and Fox News hit the story several times, as did Michelle Malkin. Though the media outlets didn't make it clear, Grayson had a specific objective in attending the meeting. Grayson had obtained an email from Ron Janssen, the District One Republican Chairman, telling fellow Republicans that at the next meeting there would be a guest speaker who had "snuck behind enemy lines into an Organizing For America Meeting." He wanted to know if the Orange County Republicans approved of the tactic. Raw Story: Grayson crashes GOP meeting, says Republicans spying on Obama group. MyFoXOrlando: Is Rep. Alan Grayson a party crasher?

[Editor's Comment:] In spite of their occasional animosity on a personal level, we should not be misled: the Republicans and the Democrats are nothing but the two wings of the same corporate party. -The US is a one party state.

Following a series of pedophilia scandals, a new document has come to light showing that Pope Benedict XVI resisted defrocking a US pedophile priest in 1985. Former Cardinal Joseph Radzinger had signed a letter which defied calls to defrock California priest Stephen Kiesle over children abuse charges, letters released by the victims' attorney Jeff Anderson showed Friday.

Sophrosyne Radical: “The Dark Ages”: Frat Boys, Prostitutes & Christian Morality:

During The Great Schism three legally elected popes (i.e., Benedict XIII, Gregory XII and Alexander V) pilfered and debauched Europe for four years. This forced/inspired leading laymen of the Church and a few dissident prelates to convince Emperor Sigismund to convene a Church General Council. Beginning in 1414, it dragged on for four years and was basically one long frat party. “[The] incontinence practised by the churchmen demoralised the city” (The Variations of Popery). 1,500 prostitutes – known as “vagrant strumpets” (Ibid.) – were recruited to pleasure the priests. As might be expected, favourites were given lavish sums of money for their troubles and the impoverished locals became increasingly disagreeable.

The head of Kyrgyzstan's new interim government yesterday revealed that her country was broke and said that the former president who was overthrown in a street-led revolution this week had left only $80m in the budget. In an interview with the Guardian, Roza Otunbayeva appealed for urgent international aid so that the impoverished Central Asian nation could meet its immediate bills. "Tomorrow we should pay pensions. This is a really serious problem," she said. PressTV: US suspends Kyrgyzstan troop flights at Manas.

A German cartoon mocking the Catholic Church has sparked holy outrage among believers here who say it incites hatred against the Pope and the Catholic faith. The caricature, published in the Good Friday edition of satire magazine Titanic, shows a priest apparently having oral sex with a crucifix of Jesus on the cross.

"I don't tell my children where I get the food, I'm too ashamed," said Iris Aegisdottir, an Icelander who has been going to a food bank every week for a year to feed her three children. The crisis that brought down Iceland's economy in late 2008 threw thousands of formerly well-off families into poverty, forcing people like Iris to turn to charity to survive. Each week, up to 550 families queue up at a small white brick warehouse in Reykjavik to receive free food from the Icelandic Aid to Families organisation, three times more than before the crisis.

A plane carrying Lech Kaczynski, the Polish president, has crashed near Smolensk airport in western Russia, killing all on board, Russian officials have reported. Polish officials said on Saturday that Kaczynski was supposed to be on board the flight with his wife, as well as Slawomir Skrzypek, the head of Poland's central bank, Andrzej Kremer, the deputy foreign minister and the army chief of staff. No officials have yet confirmed the Polish president's death. The Tupolev Tu-154 plane crashed about 1.5km from Smolensk airport in foggy conditions. Sergei Antufiev, the governor of the Smolensk region told official media there were no survivors from the crash. Google: Polish president's plane crashes in Russia; 87 die.

Italian prosecutors have recommended the indictment of Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi for tax fraud and embezzlement in his Mediaset TV station. Prosecutors have requested that the case against Berlusconi and 11 other people, including his son Pier Silvio, be sent for trial, court sources said on Friday. If indicted, Berlusconi is unlikely to stand trial, because his lawyers can invoke a new law that shields the premier from criminal prosecution for up to 18 months.

Carson Show- Dick Nixon,Martin Luther King and Robert Kennedy