The United Arab Emirates' Civil Aviation Authority has rejected claims that a US-bound Emirates' flight from Dubai contained "suspicious" parcels from Yemen. Fighter jets were scrambled on Friday to accompany an Emirates plane into New York's JFK airport after a security alert, US media reported. Emirati authorities, however, said flight 201 carried no 'suspicious' cargo from Yemen as claimed by US-Canadian military agency NORAD. UAE officials rejected the claim and said the plane was not a source of threat.

Antiwar: Arrest in Yemen in bomb plot; more suspects sought
Antiwar: Obama Vows to ‘Destroy’ al-Qaeda in Yemen

McDonald’s sells itself as the ultimate happy place. But this election season, a local McDonald’s franchise in Canton, Ohio is telling employees how to keep the company happy: vote Republican.

Along with their recent paychecks, employees received a pamphlet from their employer on company letter head that stated “as the election season is here, we wanted you to know which candidates will help our business grow in the future.” While pointing out that the vote is the employee’s “personal decision,” the pamphlet explicitly states, “if the right people are elected we will be able to continue with raises and benefits at or above our present levels. If others are elected we will not”.

The "right people" are John Kasich, Rob Portman, and Jim Renacci for this franchisee.

In explicitly endorsing gubernatorial candidate John Kasich (R), Senate candidate Rob Portman (R), and House candidate Jim Renacci (R), the pamphlet — which was directly inside the envelope with the paycheck — appears to directly violate Ohio Revised Code regarding elections:

No employer or his agent or a corporation shall print or authorize to be printed upon any pay envelopes any statements intended or calculated to influence the political action of his or its employees; or post or exhibit in the establishment or anywhere in or about the establishment any posters, placards, or hand bills containing any threat, notice, or information that if any particular candidate is elected or defeated work in the establishment will cease in whole or in part, or other threats expressed or implied, intended to influence the political opinions or votes of his or its employees.

Iran has criticized the United States for allocating $100 billion to proliferation of its nuclear weapons, saying it contradicts Washington's claim of supporting a nuke-free world. Iran's Ambassador to the United Nations Mohammad Khazaei condemned the US nuclear double standards, saying Washington advocates a nuclear-free world on the one hand, while it continues to develop and modernize its nuclear arsenal on the other.

“The US plan to develop and modernize nuclear weapons … to which a budget of more than one hundred billion dollars is allocated, is in direct contradiction to the White House slogans on a nuke-free world,” Khazaei told the UN General Assembly's Disarmament Committee.

The Iranian envoy also referred to the US nuclear bombardment of the Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, saying the existence of thousands of nuclear warheads in the arsenals of nuclear countries continues to cast a “shadow of fear” over the world.

An Israeli commander has confessed to crimes committed by the Israeli army during the 22-day onslaught on the Gaza Strip, a report says. Colonel Ilan Malka, who headed the Givati Brigade during the December 2008-January 2009 war against Gaza, has admitted to the killing of civilians during the Israeli incursion into the coastal sliver, the Arabic-language Al-Alam television network reported on Saturday.

Malka had earlier told Israeli investigators that he did not know there were civilians in a building that came under attack on January 5, 2009 after he ordered the strike. Eyewitnesses, however, say Israeli military razed the building after the attack in order to obliterate traces of their crimes. The deadly attack, which was denounced by the United Nations as "one of the gravest" of the offensives of the war, claimed the lives of 22 members of the Samuni family, ten of whom were minors. Twenty-nine members of the family, who lived in Gaza City's Zaitun neighborhood, were killed, and 49 others were injured in the war.

Photo: Ivar Fjeld

The Israeli Tourist Ministry recently invited the rescued Chilean miners to visit the ‘Holy Land’….. if they accept the invite they might still be able to smell the smoke from today’s hate fire...

A hundred year old church was burned Friday by right-wing Israeli settlers, who broke a number of windows of the church and hurled Molotov cocktails inside. The damage to the church was substantial, with burn damage throughout the first floor of the building.

The church was built in Jerusalem in 1897, and housed the Palestinian Bible College until 1947, when parishioners were pushed out by Jewish armed gangs during the violence accompanying the creation of the state of Israel.

Christians make up 2% of the population of both Israel and the Palestinian Territories – the number used to be around 15%, but many Christians from the Holy Land have emigrated due to the harsh conditions of the Israeli occupation, and discrimination against them by the Israeli state.

This is not the first time that Israeli right-wingers have destroyed churches and church property – a number of Chrisitan churches were destroyed during the second initfada (uprising) that began in 2000, and many more were destroyed by Israeli forces during the 1948 and 67 wars.

Haaretz: J'lem church officials suspect extremist Jews behind arson
Maan News: Church officials say arson behind Jerusalem fire

'Terror Threat' a Big Political Win for Obama, Dems. Though the administration has declined to raise the terror alert level, the very public nature of the Yemen bomb plot is seen as giving President Obama and incumbent Congressional Democrats a much-needed political shot in the arm, conveniently enough just days before the midterm elections. The plot gave an opportunity for President Obama to look “presidential,” experts say, as he gave a high profile speech vowing “any steps necessary” to see al-Qaeda’s Yemeni affiliate destroyed.

The fact that by all accounts no explosives appear to have actually gotten to the United States also likely plays to the administration’s advantage, and indeed the advantage of all incumbents, who can claim that the “system worked” in this regard even as they promise major new foreign policy ventures in retaliation.

Mohammed al-Shaibah, Air Cargo Director for Yemenia Airways said to Yemen Post, "No UPS cargo plane left Yemeni lands over the land 48 hours. These accusations are false and baseless." He added, "No UPS or DHL cargo packages heading to Chicago through Yemen took place in the last 48 hours as well." "All packages are checked very carefully in Yemen, and there is no evidence to prove that this package came through Yemen." CNN reported the suspicious package, which contained a "manipulated" toner cartridge, tested negative for explosive material, the source said, but it led to heightened inspection of arriving cargo flights in Newark, New Jersey, and Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, and a UPS truck in New York.

Antiwar: Yemen Officials: Packages Didn’t Come From Yemen -Officials Insist No Cargo Planes Even Left Yemen in Last 48 Hours
Yemen Post: No U.S. Commercial or Private Plane left Yemen to the U.S. over last 48 hours; Yemeni Official
The Guardian: [RE: Pakistan] Barack Obama accused of exaggerating terror threat for political gain (Pakistani diplomat launches scathing attack on White House)
Truth is Contagious: Obama Issues Fake Terror Alert On Eve Of Elections

Lots of people have weighed in to condemn the planned execution of Tariq Aziz, the former Iraqi official who was condemned to death this week, including the Vatican, Russia, and Amnesty International. Let me add my voice to theirs.

The hanging judge in this particular kangaroo court is a former aide to Prime Minister Maliki, who ran for election on Maliki’s misnamed State of Law coalition. It’s clear that Maliki wants to use the execution of Tariq Aziz, a Roman Catholic, to build support for his party among the most extreme Shiite partisans. Like Maliki’s support for the pre-election shenanigans in January, when Iran and Ahmed Chalabi maneuvered to exclude hundreds of legitimate candidates from running over charges of connections to the old Baath Party, Maliki wants to wave the bloody shirt of Tariq Aziz to rally his supporters. The fact that he’s not a Muslim makes that even more popular among Shiite radicals.

Bill Van Auken: Tariq Aziz faces judicial murder in Iraq.

'Undesirables' are swept from the streets before being detained without trial, say human rights groups. UN funding is being used to run a brutal internment camp for the destitute in Cambodia where detainees are held for months without trial, raped and beaten, sometimes to death, former inmates have told the Guardian.

The Prey Speu facility, 12 miles from Phnom Penh, the Cambodian capital, is officially described as a "social affairs centre" offering education and healthcare to vulnerable people. But human rights groups and former inmates say the centre is an illegal, clandestine prison, where people deemed "undesirable" by the government – usually drug users, sex workers and the homeless – are held for months without charge. Men, women and children are housed together in a single building and are regularly beaten with planks, whipped with wires or threatened with weapons, according to witnesses.

A Chinese scientific research center has built the fastest supercomputer ever made, replacing the United States as maker of the swiftest machine, and giving China bragging rights as a technology superpower. The computer, known as Tianhe-1A, has 1.4 times the horsepower of the current top computer, which is at a national laboratory in Tennessee, as measured by the standard test used to gauge how well the systems handle mathematical calculations, said Jack Dongarra, a University of Tennessee computer scientist who maintains the official supercomputer rankings. Although the official list of the top 500 fastest machines, which comes out every six months, is not due to be completed by Mr. Dongarra until next week, he said the Chinese computer “blows away the existing No. 1 machine.”