On June 13th, a fifty-four-year-old former government employee named Thomas Drake is scheduled to appear in a courtroom in Baltimore, where he will face some of the gravest charges that can be brought against an American citizen. A former senior executive at the National Security Agency, the government’s electronic-espionage service, he is accused, in essence, of being an enemy of the state. According to a ten-count indictment delivered against him in April, 2010, Drake violated the Espionage Act. In 2007, the indictment says, Drake willfully retained top-secret defense documents that he had sworn an oath to protect, sneaking them out of the intelligence agency’s headquarters, at Fort Meade, Maryland, and taking them home, for the purpose of “unauthorized disclosure.” The aim of this scheme, the indictment says, was to leak government secrets to an unnamed newspaper reporter, who is identifiable as Siobhan Gorman, of the Baltimore Sun. Gorman wrote a prize-winning series of articles for the Sun about financial waste, bureaucratic dysfunction, and dubious legal practices in N.S.A. counterterrorism programs.

Glenn Greenwald: Jane Mayer on the Obama war on whistleblowers - In a just released, lengthy New Yorker article, Jane Mayer -- with the diligence and thoroughness she used to expose the Bush torture regime -- examines a topic I've written about many times here: the Obama administration's unprecedented war on whistleblowers generally, and its persecution of NSA whistleblower Thomas Drake in particular (Drake exposed massive waste, excess and perhaps illegality in numerous NSA programs). Mayer's article is what I'd describe as the must-read magazine article of the month, and I encourage everyone to read it in its entirety.

Down With Tyranny: Glenn Greenwald: "The vast majority" of gov't secrecy is about avoiding embarrassment and accountability, not about nat'l security

At least two Pakistani soldiers have been wounded when NATO helicopters targeted a security checkpoint in Pakistan's northwestern tribal region.

The Western alliance choppers violated Pakistani air space early on Tuesday and shelled a military post in Datta Khel district of North Waziristan Agency, local authorities told Press TV. The motive behind the attack remains unknown. On Monday, unauthorized US drone strikes killed at least 12 people in the same region in Pakistan. The US has carried out numerous attacks on Pakistan's tribal areas. The aerial raids, initiated by former US President George W. Bush, have been escalated under President Barack Obama.

Photograph from a Nato aircraft bombing Libya. Libyan
officials say three security guards were killed in today's
bombing of the Sarir oifield. (Reuters/chnarmy.com)

NATO military intervention in Libya is becoming a full scale war as predicted by various anti-war organizations and security analysts around the world.

After just two months into the conflict, the western alliance has gone from enforcing a “no-fly zone” on Libya to a “no-drive zone” and ultimately to “let's assassinate Qaddafi”. The head of the UK armed forces, General Sir David Richards has urged the NATO to destroy Libya's infrastructure in accordance with what the Libyan despot is doing to his own people and his own country. The western military invasion of Libya has run into a stalemate with more than 2,000 bombing raids by the US, Britain and their allies, and the western powers are facing another disaster in the third Muslim country they have attacked in the last decade. General Richards has made it clear included in the aims of the escalation he is proposing would be the killing of Colonel Qaddafi. This is yet another evidence that a war for regime change -- which is illegal under international law - has been disguised as a humanitarian intervention to "protect" the Libyan people.

Congress ready to vote on worldwide war bill; it is a provision buried inside the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) that would enable the US to use military force anywhere in the world (including within the US) in search of "terrorists".

As we blogged last week, a hugely important provision for Congress to authorize a new worldwide war has been tucked away inside the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA). The bill was marked up by members of the House Armed Services Committee (HASC) last Wednesday that poured into Thursday morning (2:45 a.m. to be exact). A couple of minutes past midnight, Rep. John Garamendi (D-Calif.) offered an amendment to strike Sec. 1034 — the new authorization for worldwide war provision — from the NDAA. Visibly angry that such a large sweeping provision had not yet had any public hearing whatsoever, he vigorously characterized it as a very broad declaration of war. Rep. Garamendi was very concerned by the limitless geographic boundaries of the provision. Essentially, it would enable the U.S. to use military force anywhere in the world (including within the U.S.) in search of terrorists.

Raw Story: ACLU: National Defense Authorization Act permits ‘worldwide war without end’

The US reached the statutory debt limit as it ran into its USD 14.29 trillion ceiling on borrowings, Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner has warned.

Geithner said in a letter to US Senate leader Harry Reid on Monday that the country was initiating a "debt issuance suspension period" to keep from going over it, AFP reported. The US Treasury secretary urged Congress to raise the ceiling "in order to protect the full faith and credit of the United States and avoid catastrophic consequences for citizens." He said to avoid topping the ceiling, the government would halt the automatic cycling of civil service pension funds into US Treasury debt, the way they are traditionally stored. The move will give the Treasury about USD 224 billion of headroom as it meets an estimated USD 120 billion a month in net new borrowing needs to cover the government's mounting budget deficit.

The Turkish government wants users to install filters before accessing the Internet.

Thousands of Turks protested Sunday both online and on the streets against new Internet controls proposed by the Turkish government. The controls will require users to choose one of four filters before accessing the Internet, according to media reports. The family, children, domestic or standard filters will result in different levels of filtering. The list of websites that will be blocked by each filter is classified, said Reporters Without Borders. The new rules from Turkey’s Information and Communication Technologies Authority, which is commonly known as BTK, come into effect from August 22.

"This measure is a complete violation of both the European Convention on Human Right and Turkey’s own constitution," Reporters Without Borders said earlier this month. "Everyone should be guaranteed unrestricted access to the Internet."

The Turkish government earlier abandoned a plan in April to filter content based on 138 keywords, Reporters Without Borders said.

Undercover agents tracked a Syrian official carrying nuclear secrets to London where they broke into his hotel room and stole the plans as part of a daring operation on foreign soil by Mossad, the Israeli secret service, it has been claimed.

The original plan was apparently to assassinate the official and Israel only averted what would have been a huge diplomatic rift with Britain, when they decided the target was more valuable alive than dead. The operation involved at least 10 undercover agents on the streets of Britain and led directly to a controversial bombing raid into Syrian territory that destroyed a nuclear reactor that was under construction. It closely mirrored the assassination of Mahmoud al-Mabhouh, a senior Hamas arms trader, who was killed in his hotel room in Dubai last year using agents disguised as tennis players. The operation began when Israeli intelligence picked up an online booking for a senior Syrian nuclear official at a hotel in Kensington, west London, in late 2006, according to the Israeli authors of the book Israel vs Iran: the Shadow War.

Arnon Degani, who served in the Golani brigade, describes the distress of a young woman who tearfully pleaded to be allowed to pass through a Jenin checkpoint in order to sit an important exam. He gradually came to understand, he says, that the Israeli army's intention was "to enforce tyranny on people who you know are regular civilians" and to "make it clear who's in control here".

Some of the former soldiers describe the "neighbour procedure", a term for the use of Palestinian civilians, often children, as human shields to protect soldiers from suspected booby traps or attacks by militants. The procedure was ruled illegal by Israel's high court in 2005. Others speak of routine harassment of civilians at checkpoints, arbitrary intimidation and collective punishment.

"Part of the silence of Israeli society is to believe these are isolated and exceptional incidents. But these are the most routine, day-to-day, banal stories," said Yehuda Shaul, of Breaking the Silence.

Official website (English)

Palestinian Prime Minister Ismail Haneyya said that Palestinian and Arab blood that was spilt during Nakba marches suggests that Nakba is being marked with a new spirit, and that the Palestinians have begun to ”bury the Nakba” for good.

”Palestine will see a peaceful flood of people that will eliminate [Israel's] arrogance,” Haneyya said speaking at a ceremony after several Gaza fishermen received new boats. “Gaza has been under siege for the past four years, but on Nakba Day, [Israel] has been besieged from all sides.”

Haneyya lauded the role played by Palestinian youth in commemorating Nakba Day as they were unified under the Palestinian flag. He said that the situation marked the “first application” of the reconciliation practiced on the ground, as differences were set aside for the greater national interest. The Palestinian premier said that Gaza was “living the last moments of the siege collapsing”. He added that, at the same time, Israel was living the collapse of its occupation on the Palestinian territories, due to the Arab revolutions and the peaceful tide striking tyrannical Arab regimes and Israeli occupation government.

The Obama administration’s reaction to Israel’s massacre Sunday of unarmed Palestinian protesters on its borders underscores the hypocrisy of those ascribing “humanitarian” motives to Washington’s predatory policy in the region.

Israeli troops opened fire with live ammunition and, in one case, tank fire on Palestinians who demonstrated on Israel’s borders with Syria, Lebanon, the West Bank and Gaza. Tens of thousands joined in the protests, which were called to commemorate the 63rd anniversary of the Nakba (Arabic for catastrophe), the term used by the Palestinians for Israel’s declaration of independence and the wholesale ethnic cleansing that drove three-quarters of a million Palestinians from their homes in 1948. In the intervening years, the population of Palestinian refugees and internally displaced persons has grown to 7.1 million people living without rights or citizenship in neighboring Arab countries, under Israeli occupation in Gaza and the West Bank, or as worse than second-class citizens in Israel itself. The demonstrators were directly asserting the “right of return” to their homes and lands.

MPs have voted overwhelmingly in favour of new laws allowing for the construction of nuclear plants on Polish soil.

Today's votes in the Sejm (lower house) follow on from the selection of Zarnowiec, northern Poland, as the site of Poland's first nuclear facility, as chosen by the Ministry of Economy in March 2010. Today's votes concerned two amendments. The first allows the operator to have greater flexibility in determining the amounts ear-marked for the fund that deals with waste management. The second removes the requirement for investors to prove that they have the entire funds at their disposal from the outset, allowing for projects to be fulfilled in stages. In the first case, some 404 MPs voted in favour, with just two against and one abstention. Regarding the second amendment, one was against and five MPs abstained. An international tender will be announced in July, searching for a company that can provide technical expertise in the construction of the plant at Zarnowiec. U.S. concern Westinghouse has been reported as being amongst those keen to secure the commission.

German chancellor Angela Merkel came to power determined to extend the lives of the country's nuclear power stations, but after the catastrophe in Japan she has bowed to public opinion and abandoned nuclear power.

Germany is to accelerate the closure of its nuclear power stations under an energy strategy agreed at a summit last month between chancellor Angela Merkel and the prime ministers of Germany's 16 federal states. All 17 German nuclear reactors now look set to close by 2022 at the latest. The initiative was taken because of mounting public opposition to nuclear power following the crisis at Japan's Fukushima plant. Such is the changed political climate for nuclear power that Merkel is prepared to ditch the September 2010 coalition deal that would have extended the operating lives of Germany's reactors into the mid-2030s. Instead, expansion of gas and coal capacity is back on the agenda, together with yet faster wind power growth - both part of a six-point plan to make up any power shortfall arising from this nuclear shift. Lighter regulation of new renewable plant and major grid investments to prepare for a renewables-led future are further elements in the package.

OMAEZAKI, Japan — The nuclear power plant, lawyers argued, could not withstand the kind of major earthquake that new seismic research now suggested was likely.

If such a quake struck, electrical power could fail, along with backup generators, crippling the cooling system, the lawyers predicted. The reactors would then suffer a meltdown and start spewing radiation into the air and sea. Tens of thousands in the area would be forced to flee.

AIPAC 101 — What Every American Should Know from Anthony Lawson on Vimeo.