The United States has perpetually contaminated the world, particularly the Middle East, by using massive amounts of depleted uranium (DU) in its wars, an analyst tells Press TV. - Vietnamese-American writer and journalist Linh Dinh described the US use of depleted uranium as a “tremendous crime against humanity,” reiterating that it will affect innocent people and new-born infants “for generations to come and literally, for billions of years to come.” "Once depleted uranium gets into the environment, into the water, into the soil, into the air, it remains there for billions of years and it doesn't just stay in these (Middle Eastern) countries, although these populations are the ones who are most affected immediately, because once airborne it will spread all over across the globe," he said. The Philadelphia-based writer noted that the use of DU, the destructiveness of which the US denies, is 'frankly genocidal.'

PressTV: 'DU destroying Afghans' gene pool'
Abel Bult-Ito: Nothing depleted about 'depleted uranium'

A recent report has revealed that the Israeli regime has increased the number of its overseas covert operations in countries such as Sudan, Lebanon and Iran over the past year. - "Most of the details about the operations are classified, including the exact number, but according to foreign reports, the IDF has operated in places such as Sudan, Lebanon and Iran," the Israeli newspaper Jerusalem Post reported on Tuesday. The daily said that the Israeli military has “a number of units that specialize in covert operations.” Israeli Army Chief of Staff Lt.-Gen. Benny Gantz “decided in December to establish the 'Depth Corps' -- a new unit that will oversee operations deep in enemy territory,” the report added. The report comes as Iranian officials have many times pointed to the fact that Israel is behind terrorist attacks against Iranian scientists.

The Food and Drug Administration secretly monitored the personal e-mail of a group of its own scientists and doctors after they warned Congress that the agency was approving medical devices that they believed posed unacceptable risks to patients, government documents show. - The surveillance — detailed in e-mails and memos unearthed by six of the scientists and doctors, who filed a lawsuit against the FDA in U.S. District Court in Washington last week — took place over two years as the plaintiffs accessed their personal Gmail accounts from government computers. Information garnered this way eventually contributed to the harassment or dismissal of all six of the FDA employees, the suit alleges. All had worked in an office responsible for reviewing devices for cancer screening and other purposes.

President Barack Obama readily confirmed the drone war in northwest Pakistan in an interview Monday, breaking with the protocol which normally demands U.S. officials not speak publicly about the classified program.

“I want to make sure people understand actually drones have not caused a huge number of civilian casualties,” President Obama said in an hour long interview hosted by Google. “For the most part, they’ve been very precise, precision strikes against against al-Qaeda and their affiliates.” The claim mirrors previous attempts to downplay the civilian casualties of the drone war. John Brennan, President Obama’s counter-terrorism advisor, told the public back in June that zero civilian casualties have occurred as a result of U.S. drone strikes in Pakistan. This was an obvious lie, but the Bureau of Investigative Journalism helped prove it so in August by cataloguing their lengthy findings on civilian casualties in the drone war, counting hundreds of civilians by name who were killed in drone strikes, including at least 168 children. Investigative reporter Noor Behram, who had been on the ground in Pakistan tallying the dead, estimated that “for every 10 to 15 people killed, maybe they get one militant.” A Washington Post report [has] said that the drone war in Pakistan has resulted “in an estimated 1,350 to 2,250 deaths.” But the public simply doesn’t have a good idea of how many have been killed, because “the identities…remain classified, as does the existence of the drone program itself.” [Image: Associated Press]

BIJ: Drone War Exposed – the complete picture of CIA strikes in Pakistan

Two ships of the US Navy, the nuclear submarine USS Annapolis and the destroyer USS Momsen have passed through the Suez Canal into the Red Sea. Although their destination is confidential, they are now getting dangerously close to the Persian Gulf. - The ships’ passage was a major operation for the Suez administration as due to safety reasons they had to close off the canal to all other traffic and even shut down the bridge, disrupting the link between the banks for some four hours. The traffic on the roadways alongside the canal was also restricted, Interfax news agency reports. There are no reports regarding the destination of the vessels, but the news come amid the ongoing crisis in the relationship between the US and Iran. There is mounting speculation that the Annapolis and the Momsen are heading to the Persian Gulf to reinforce the US naval forces already present in the region. Currently the US has two aircraft carrier groups in the region headed by USS Abraham Lincoln and USS Carl Vinson. It is expected that another aircraft carrier, USS Enterprise, will join the strike force in March.

On January 13th the Atlanta Jewish Times featured a column by its owner-publisher suggesting that Israel might someday need to “order a hit” on the president of the United States. - In the column, publisher Andrew Adler describes a scenario in which Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu would need to “give the go-ahead for U.S. based Mossad agents to take out a president deemed unfriendly to Israel.” The purpose? So that the vice president could then take office and dictate U.S. policies that would help the Jewish state “obliterate its enemies.” On January 13th the Atlanta Jewish Times featured a column by its owner-publisher suggesting that Israel might someday need to “order a hit” on the president of the United States.

There's no gentle way to put it: People who give in to racism and prejudice may simply be dumb, according to a new study that is bound to stir public controversy. - The research finds that children with low intelligence are more likely to hold prejudiced attitudes as adults. These findings point to a vicious cycle, according to lead researcher Gordon Hodson, a psychologist at Brock University in Ontario. Low-intelligence adults tend to gravitate toward socially conservative ideologies, the study found. Those ideologies, in turn, stress hierarchy and resistance to change, attitudes that can contribute to prejudice, Hodson wrote in an email to LiveScience.

More and more US schools have police patrolling the corridors. Pupils are being arrested for throwing paper planes and failing to pick up crumbs from the canteen floor. Why is the state criminalising normal childhood behaviour? - Each day, hundreds of schoolchildren appear before courts in Texas charged with offences such as swearing, misbehaving on the school bus or getting in to a punch-up in the playground. Children have been arrested for possessing cigarettes, wearing "inappropriate" clothes and being late for school. "It's very much tied in with some of the hyperbole around the rise in juvenile crime rate that took place back in the early 90s," said Deborah Fowler, deputy director of Texas Appleseed, an Austin legal rights group, and principal author of a 200-page study of the consequences of policing in Texas schools. "They ushered in tough, punitive policies. It was all part of the tough-on-crime movement." Part of that included the passing of laws that made the US the only developed country to lock up children as young as 13 for life without the possibility of parole, often as accomplices to murders committed by an adult.

Justice Center: Breaking Schools’ Rules: A Statewide Study on How School Discipline Relates to Students’ Success and Juvenile Justice Involvement

Not even a month after President Barack Obama signed his name to the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2012, the US government is already using the legislation to justify its ongoing detainment of a prisoner at Guantanamo Bay. - Musa'ab al-Madhwani had barely entered adulthood when he first arrived at the military prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba in 2002. But in the months between his capture in Pakistan and transfer to Gitmo, the Yemeni national experienced more than most would see in a lifetime. Before he turned 23, he says he was beaten and kicked, threatened with death and suspended by his hands in an underground torture chamber. Now for the prisoner, about to celebrate the 10-year-anniversary of his arrival at Gimo, the rest of that lifetime looks to be spent behind bars thanks to the NDAA.

The ACLU [has] set up a special page allowing people to compare multiple versions of documents with just a simple mouseover. This came out a few months ago, but I didn't get a chance to write it up until now. It's pretty enlightening to see just what makes the censor's cut, and (not surprisingly) raises significant questions about the government's temptation to simply excise stuff they don't like, rather than information that there are valid reasons to keep hidden.

Greece's financial crisis has made some families so desperate they are giving up the most precious thing of all - their children. - One morning a few weeks before Christmas a kindergarten teacher in Athens found a note about one of her four-year-old pupils. "I will not be coming to pick up Anna today because I cannot afford to look after her," it read. "Please take good care of her. Sorry. Her mother." In the last two months Father Antonios, a young Orthodox priest who runs a youth centre for the city's poor, has found four children on his doorstep - including a baby just days old. [...] One of the children cared for by Father Antonios is Natasha, a bright two-year-old brought to his centre by her mother a few weeks ago. The woman said she was unemployed and homeless and needed help - but before staff could offer her support she had vanished, leaving her daughter behind. "Over the last year we have hundreds of cases of parents who want to leave their children with us - they know us and trust us," Father Antonios says. "They say they do not have any money or shelter or food for their kids, so they hope we might be able to provide them with what they need." Requests of this kind were not unknown before the crisis - but Father Antonios has never until now come across children being simply abandoned. His organisation, Kivotos, tries to prevent children being separated from their parents. They currently have 30 apartments they use to house families in need.

Across southern Florida, rabbits, raccoons, bobcats and foxes have been disappearing at dramatic rates over the past decade, and invasive Burmese pythons are to blame, a US study said Monday.

The United States formally banned the import of Burmese pythons earlier this month, but the study suggests they have already caused enormous damage to the ecosystem in the Florida Everglades with unknown implications for the future.

The research was based on data from surveys in which dead and live animals are counted along roadways. From 1993-1999, before the invasive snakes had established a population in south Florida, raccoons, opossums and rabbits were the most frequent roadkill. But from 2003-2011, surveys spotted a 99.3 percent decrease in racoons, 98.9 percent fewer opossums and no rabbits or foxes, said the article authored by Michael Dorcasa at Davidson College in North Carolina and colleagues at the Department of Fish and Wildlife Conservation and the National Park Service. Surveys also saw 94.1 percent fewer white-tailed deer and 87.5 percent fewer bobcats. These “severe apparent declines in mammal populations… coincide temporally and spatially with the proliferation of pythons in Everglades National Park,” said the study. During that period, annual removals of Burmese pythons have risen from less than 50 per year to 300-400 annually.

Libyan judicial police have started taking control of makeshift prisons in the country after human rights organizations complained of rampant torture of inmates, the country's deputy justice minister said on Sunday. - The deputy minister, Khalifa Ashour, said uniformed police have been dispatched to some prisons where former rebels have been holding people accused of being loyalists of deposed ruler Moammar Gadhafi. During last year's civil war, former rebels trying to protect their neighborhoods held anyone deemed suspicious of being a Gadhafi loyalist or mercenary, locking them up in makeshift prisons in schools, homes and empty government buildings. According to the U.N., various former rebel groups are holding as many as 8,000 prisoners in 60 detention centers around the country.

Stephen Lendman: Torture and Abuse in Libya
Stephen Lendman: Violence Rages in Libya

Hundreds of police clad in riot gear and wielding a variety of weapons attacked a procession of protestors in Oakland, California, on Saturday. It was the largest altercation between police and protestors in Oakland since the October 25 confrontation that left several wounded, including Iraq War veteran Scott Olsen. - In order to contain the crowd of between 1,000 and 2,000 protestors, the City of Oakland mobilized police and sheriff departments across the San Francisco Bay Area. More than 400 protestors were arrested over the course of the evening, with marches continuing late into the night. Police used rubber bullets, flash bangs, smoke grenades, bean bag guns, batons, and tear gas to suppress the demonstration. Images of children wearing tear-gas masks surfaced in the wake of the demonstrations, and one women was reportedly shot in the back from point-blank range by a police officer. (Video here).

Russia Today: Stun gun vs Occupy DC: Cops tase protester in pyjamas (VIDEO)
Russia Today: Oakland: Cops bend law in brutal arrest wave
PressTV: 500 protesters nabbed in Oakland
Washington Post: One protester tased, arrested at Occupy D.C.
CNN: Park service to crack down on Occupy DC camps
Keeping track of the apprehensions: Occupyarrests.com

The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) has dispatched a team of inspectors to Iran this weekend, and they began an intensive three-day inspection visit today under growing threats of an Israeli attack against Iran’s civilian nuclear sites. - The visit was being loudly welcomed by top Iranian officials, with their nuclear chief saying that the inspection would finally end international allegations that the program was anything but a legal, civilian program. Foreign Minister Ali-Akbar Salehi added that the IAEA inspectors would be given free and full access to any nuclear sites they requested. The inspection team includes weapons experts, with the expectation that they will grill Iran over the alleged military ambitions of their program. Previous inspections have failed to uncover any solid evidence that there is any military program at all, which has only fueled further accusations from Western nations that Iran is hiding them. The IAEA’s current chief Amano Yukiya, has mostly gone along with these allegations, issuing a report warning that they couldn’t prove Iran didn’t secretly have a weapons program.

America’s frenzy over “diabolic” Iran has its roots not on the Potomac riverside, but rather on the banks of Tel Aviv’s Yarkon River: appeasing the US Jewish community has become an inevitable idiosyncrasy of the US presidential campaign. - When America beats the drums of war over Iran, it may not always be driven by the Islamic state's alleged nuclear intentions. Would-be US presidential candidates aren't shy when it comes to voicing their anti-Iran rhetoric in front of America's influential Jewish community. And America almost never misses an opportunity to praise its best ally. “Our iron-clad commitment, and I mean iron-clad, to Israel’s security has meant the closest military cooperation between our two countries, in history,” announced US President Barack Obama from a rostrum in Washington. And the American President did not forget to point a proverbial punch at Israel’s greatest adversary. “Let there be no doubt: America is determined to prevent Iran from getting a nuclear weapon, and I will take no options off the table to achieve that goal,” Barack Obama insisted. However, for many American Jews and Israeli supporters, Obama’s war of words against Tehran doesn't go far enough.

A prominent British journalist says the West is selling the possibility of confrontation with Iran by exaggerating the threat of Tehran's nuclear program through media manipulation. - “Manipulation of the media and public opinion through systematic threat exaggeration through which the growing confrontation with Iran is being sold by the US, Israel and West European leaders is deeply dishonest,” wrote Patrick Cockburn in an article published in The Independent on Sunday. Cockburn added that “the supposed aim of imposing sanctions on Iran's oil exports and central bank is to force Iran to abandon its nuclear program before it reaches the point where it could theoretically build a nuclear bomb.” The United States and the European Union have recently slapped unilateral sanctions against Iran's oil and banking sectors based on the allegation that Tehran's nuclear program may consist of a covert military aspect. Iran has repeatedly refuted the allegations, arguing that as a signatory to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty and a member of the International Atomic Energy Agency, Tehran has a right to use nuclear technology for peaceful use.

Patrick Cockburn: Sanctions can only deepen the Iran crisis
Stephen Lendman: Selling War

The Federal Bureau of Investigation is looking for a better way to spy on Facebook and Twitter users. The Bureau is asking companies to build software that can effectively scan social media online for significant words, phrases and behavior so that agents can respond.A paper posted on the FBI website asks for companies to build programs that will map sentiment and wrongdoing. [...] Although the police, including in Britain, already use Facebook routinely to ascertain the whereabouts of criminals, automatically filtering out irrelevant information remains challenging. The new FBI application will be able to automatically highlight the most relevant information. The FBI is seeking responses by 10 February.

State Dept. Drones Cover All of Iraq to 'Protect Embassy'. - Another irksome aspect of the lingering American presence beyond its military withdrawal, the US State Department has fielded a whole fleet of surveillance drones to fly over Iraq. They say the flights are meant to protect the city-sized US Embassy on the outskirts of Baghdad. For the Iraqi government, however, the unwelcome overflights amount to a violation of Iraq’s sovereignty, and they have a point. It is hard to imagine the US would give unfettered access to the whole of its airspace to any other nation’s surveillance drones, no matter how big its embassy was. The State Department’s Diplomatic Security branch hasn’t exactly been keeping the drones a secret, but it hasn’t broadcast them very loudly either. Their mention is a single paragraph buried near the back of its recent annual report.

The Israeli military says a drone that can fly as far as Iran has crashed in central Israel on a routine experimental flight.

The military says there were no injuries in Sunday’s crash, and it was investigating the incident. The Heron TP drone is also known locally as the Eitan. It has a wingspan of 86 feet (26 meters), making it the size of a Boeing 737 passenger jet. It is the largest unmanned aircraft in Israel’s military arsenal.

The drone figures to be featured prominently in any potential Israeli operation against Iran and its expanding nuclear program. Heron TP could provide surveillance, jam enemy communications and connect ground control and manned air force planes. It’s unclear if is could carry a deployable payload in a potential strike.

PressTV: Israeli drone crashes during test flight

The Palestine New and Info Agency, WAFA, reported that a Jewish settler illegally took over Palestinian land near the northern West Bank city of Jenin by enclosing the land in a fence and uprooting it, claiming that it belongs to him. - The land in question is located near Nazlat Zeid village, and is located behind the Israeli Annexation Wall. WAFA said that, last week, the settler, Known as Eli, fenced off a land that belongs to Abdul-Raouf Barry and some of his relatives, and claimed that he “rented the land from the Israeli government." The land is privately owned by the Barry family. Abdul-Raouf added that the family always planted the land, but was prevented from reaching it after Israel built the Annexation Wall, as the land became isolated behind it. It is worth mentioning that settlers of the Shikda and Hananit illegal settlements are conducting ongoing attacks against Palestinian orchards that belong to several residents of Nazlet Zeid village, Al-Arqa village, and Ya’bod town. Approximately 120 Dunams of lands became totally isolated behind the Wall in that area.

Stephen Lendman: Profile of a Rogue State

BEIRUT - In dozens of tanks and armored vehicles, Syrian troops stormed rebellious areas near the capital Sunday, shelling neighborhoods that have fallen under the control of army dissidents and clashing with fighters. At least 62 people were killed in violence nationwide, activists and residents said. - The widescale offensive near the capital suggested the regime is worried that military defectors could close in on Damascus, which has remained relatively quiet while most other Syrian cities descended into chaos after the uprising began in March. The rising bloodshed added urgency to Arab and Western diplomatic efforts to end the 10-month conflict. The violence has gradually approached the capital. In the past two weeks, army dissidents have become more visible, seizing several suburbs on the eastern edge of Damascus and setting up checkpoints where masked men wearing military attire and wielding assault rifles stop motorists and protect anti-regime protests.

Greek Prime Minister Lucas Papademos has warned that his country faces 'the specter of bankruptcy and all the dire consequences that it entails.' - Lucas Papademos said on Sunday that Greece would default on its debts and might not be able to pay off its loans, and thus forced out of the eurozone unless the country's international creditors agreed to a new bailout. The warning comes as Greece's international lenders say the country needs EUR145 billion of public money from the eurozone for its second bailout to escape economic failure. The figure is more than the planned EUR130 billion because of the deteriorating economic situation in Greece. The European Union (EU) and the International Monetary Fund (IMF) have presented Greece with two rescue packages so far in return for specific austerity measures, which include cutting public sector salaries and pensions, increasing taxes and overhauling the pension system.

Stefan Steinberg: Berlin calls for EU-run bankers’ dictatorship over Greek economy

The Roots of Christian Zionism: How Scofield Sowed Seeds of Apostasy from WHTT on Vimeo.

Ever wonder why so many Christians support America’s many wars, especially in the Middle East? A new Christianity has emerged from the Twentieth Century called Christian Zionism or what could be called, "Angry Evangelicalism," or "Dispensationalism on Steroids." What motivates a nationally known, evangelical preacher like John Hagee to call for a preemptive strike against Iran when it is contrary to what Jesus taught and commanded his followers to do? This “Roots of Zionism” presentation may be the first of its kind with a factual explanation of how Christianity’s latest apostate epidemic was launched with the publishing of C. I. Scofield's reference Bible in 1909, and the influence of the notes in it. While purposefully reaching and helping many under Christian Zionist influence by featuring its identification and cure, this 2nd edition offers hope to all people, regardless of faith, who may also wish to leave it’s grasp. Film clips include action inside Gaza Strip and a moving interview with Shareen, a young Palestinian woman living in Gaza. Check out our website: whtt.org for the latest news on Christian Zionism and the "Angry" evangelicals. Or listen to our free podcasts at whtt.podbean.com.

An Iranian lawmaker says the Majlis (parliament) Energy Committee has finalized a draft bill to stop the country's oil exports to EU member states in reaction to the bloc's recent decision to ban oil imports from Iran. - Nasser Soudani, deputy chairman of the committee, said on Saturday that the double-urgency bill for halting Iran oil exports to Europe had been finalized in four clauses. “According to one of the main clauses, the Islamic Republic of Iran will halt all oil exports to European countries as long as they continue to ban oil imports from Iran,” he added. The lawmaker said the bill may undergo further modifications as some Iranian parliamentarians believe that oil exports to EU should be stopped for five years.

PressTV: '70 EU refineries to shut for Iran oil ban'

Such public displays have been incredibly common in recent years, but US Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman General Martin Dempsey’s emergency visit to Israel last week may well have had a sense of genuine urgency not often seen. - That’s because increasingly, the long-standing Israeli threats to attack Iran are being taken as a distinct and imminent possibility. Sanctions and announcements related to impending embargoes by the international community seem aimed more at placating Israel and convincing them to hold off on the attack.

Pepe Escobar: Iran Not Isolated - Audio
Jim Lobe: Growing Elite Opposition to Military Option Against Iran

Ministry of Defence says 1st Battalion The Yorkshire Regiment soldier was shot during a foot patrol in Helmand province. - Officials have not yet released the identity of the soldier but said his family has been notified. Britain has about 9,500 troops in Afghanistan, most based in the southern province. The death brings to 397 the number of British personnel who have died in Afghanistan since "operations" [the occupation] began in 2001.

For Republican candidates seeking Jewish vote in the 2012 US presidential election, it is an open season to launch scathing attacks on the Palestinians and to show the Zionist side of their faces. - These candidates have been competing with one another in a cannibalistic way for months to take the most hard line position against the occupied people of Palestine. In a TV talk show on Thursday, one of these candidates Mitt Romney, the most likely to represent his party in the election, said US president Barack Obama sacrificed Israel by his policies, while his party's mate Newt Gingrich reiterated his racist slurs against the Palestinians and labeled them as an invented people. Romney claimed that the presence of Hamas (a resistance movement founded in 1987 during the first intifada) and its supporters among the Palestinian leaders was the reason behind the absence of peace between the Palestinian and Israelis. During a debate aired by US TV channels, Romney also said the [occupied] Palestinians teach their school children how to kill Jews, while the Hamas-Fatah speeches deny the Jewish people their right to statehood and call for destroying Israel. He added that the Israelis would be happy to have a two-state solution, but the Palestinians reject this solution and want to eliminate the state of Israel.

In a speech Thursday to the Davos World Economic Forum, Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper pledged that his Conservative government will pursue a “transformative” big business agenda—austerity and tax cuts, radical regressive changes to public health care and pensions, and deregulation. In short, a social policy counter-revolution. With a significant cross-section of the world’s financial elite in the audience, Harper touted Canada as a haven for investors, where businesses already enjoy the lowest taxes on new investment of any G-7 country. But, he vowed, “We will do more, much more.”

Head-Smashed-In Buffalo Jump: A World Heritage Site

Located 18 km north & west of Fort Macleod, Alberta, Canada at a location where the foothills of the Rocky Mountains meet the great plains, one of the world's oldest, largest, and best preserved buffalo jumps can be found. Head-Smashed-In - a Unesco World Heritage Site - has been used continuously by aboriginal peoples of the plains for more than 5,500 years.

Head-Smashed-In Buffalo Jump is an archaeological site known around the world as a remarkable testimony of prehistoric life. The Jump bears witness to a custom practiced by native people of the North American plains for nearly 6,000 years. Due to their excellent understanding of topography and bison behavior, native people killed bison by chasing them over a precipice. They then carved up the carcasses in the camp set up below the cliffs.

In 1981, the United Nations Educational Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) designated the Jump as a World Heritage Site placing it among other world attractions such as the Egyptian pyramids, Stonehenge and the Galapagos Islands. For more information on UNESCO, go to www.unesco.org

No trial, no doctor, no judge: A man who spent two years in solitary confinement after getting arrested for DWI was awarded $22 million for suffering inhumane treatment in New Mexico's Dona Ana County Jail. - Stephen Slevin was arrested in August of 2005 for driving while intoxicated, according to NBC station KOB.com. He said he never got a trial and spent the entire time languishing in solitary, even pulling his own tooth when he was denied dental care. "'[Prison officials were] walking by me every day, watching me deteriorate," he said. "Day after day after day, they did nothing, nothing at all, to get me any help." Slevin said he made countless requests to see a doctor to get medication for his depression, but wasn't allowed to see one until only a few weeks before his release. He also never got to see a judge. The $22 million settlement, awarded by a federal jury on Tuesday, is one of the largest prisoner civil rights settlements in U.S. history, according to KOB.com. Slevin's attorney, Matt Coyte, told KOB.com, "I have never been with or seen a braver man who stood up to these guys for what they did to him ... [This case] It affects everybody and it's not good for this country. It's not good for Mr. Slevin for sure and it's not good for this country. It has to stop."

India has reportedly agreed to pay Tehran in gold for the oil it buys, in a move aimed at protecting Delhi from US-sanctions targeting countries who trade with Iran. China, another buyer of Iranian oil, may follow Delhi’s lead.

The report, by the Israeli-based news website DEBKAfile, states that Iran and India are negotiating backup alternatives with China and Russia, should the US and EU find a way to block the gold payment mechanism.

Delhi’s move is seen as surprising, as earlier India and Iran said they would switch to yen and rupees. China, another major importer of Iranian oil, may follow Delhi’s lead, the report adds. India and China need to switch from the dollar in bilateral trade, since the US and EU have issued unilateral sanctions against the Iranian oil industry and financial institutions. The sanctions would ban any bank involved in oil trade with Iran from dealing with American and European counterparts. Both India and China, two major buyers of Iranian oil accounting for 22 and 13 percent of its total export respectively, have refused to join such sanctions. This means they have to establish a reliable way of paying for crude, independently of the parts of the global financial system controlled by New York and London.

Delhi’s current plan is to effect payments through two state-owned banks, India’s UCO Bank and Turkey’s Halk Bankasi, Turkey being another country refusing to join the sanction spree.

PressTV: Algeria defies EU oil embargo on Iran

'No One Can Go Out' Insists Steinitz. - In an interview today with Bloomberg Businessweek, Israeli Finance Minister Yuval Steinitz rejected the European Union’s ban on importation of Iranian crude oil, insisting it doesn’t go nearly far enough. Instead, Steinitz called for the international community to impose a full naval and aerial blockade across all of Iran so that “no one can even go out [sic].” This is the only option with any chance of success, he said. Steinitz said a good model for his plan was the Cuban blockade by the United States in 1962, an effort which nearly ended with the annihilation of all life on earth in the Cuban Missile Crisis.

Peter Symonds: Israel prepares for war against Iran - Washington’s allies in Europe are getting ready for war as well. French and British warships accompanied the aircraft carrier, the USS Abraham Lincoln, into the Gulf last Sunday. British Defence Secretary Philip Hammond declared on Monday: “The UK has a contingent capability to reinforce its presence in the region should at any time it be considered necessary to do so.” [...] Claims that Iran is on the point of constructing a nuclear weapon are not supported by facts. The latest International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) report—a political document designed to justify the latest US and European sanctions against Iran’s oil exports—provided limited evidence of Iranian research related to aspects of building a nuclear bomb. Much of the “evidence” came from US, European and Israeli intelligence sources. Most of the research projects were discontinued after 2003. Iran continues to deny any plans to build nuclear weapons.

The United States has been brought to the humble state of acting as an attack dog for the Zionist entity, an American political analyst tells Press TV.

The United States is no longer a super power that 'can make decisions that are in her own best interest,' but the country is like an 'unleashed dog' that is simply kowtowing to the Israelis, said Mark Glenn, of the Crescent and Cross solidarity movement in a Wednesday interview. The Idaho-based analyst referred to US President Barack Obama's Tuesday night State of the Union address as 'just one more proof in that direction [US obedience to Israel]'. Obama highlighted the US loyalty to Israel in his speech which was delivered to a joint session of Congress, saying "Our ironclad commitment -- and I mean ironclad -- to Israel's security has meant the closest military cooperation between our two countries in history." The US president's speech is actually a speech "that was written by Israel's foreign policy planners and that means the United States is fighting Israel's wars for her, wherever they may be, if it's Iraq, if it's Afghanistan, if it is Libya, if it is Iran," Glenn said.

Canada and the U.S. have finalized one agreement and renewed another to better co-ordinate civilian and military forces against "threats". - Defence Minister Peter MacKay, speaking Tuesday night to a group of defence officials, diplomats and civil servants, said the two countries were expected Wednesday to renew the Civil Assistance Plan and sign off on the Combined Defence Plan. His office confirmed Wednesday they had been signed. The civil assistance agreement lets military personnel and equipment deploy rapidly to humanitarian events, MacKay said in notes prepared for his speech to the Permanent Joint Board on Defence. The defence agreement sets out the authority and means for the two countries to approve homeland military operations against "threats", as well as the process for sharing information.

The anti-corporatism Occupy movement has reportedly had more than 6,000 of its protesters arrested across the United States since the campaign's evolution in September 2011. - Occupyarrests.com, a website, which keeps track of the apprehensions, says the US police have so far laid at least 6020 Occupy protesters under arrest. The figure includes 37 people, who were arrested in New York City on Thursday, while demonstrating among others against an auction of foreclosed homes at Brooklyn Supreme Court. The protesters had begun chanting when the bidding started. At least three Occupy Minneapolis protesters were also arrested at the headquarters of the US Bank in the city on Tuesday. The protesters were demanding talks between bank officials and two people whose homes were being subjected to foreclosure. The Occupy movement emerged after a group of demonstrators gathered in New York's financial district of Wall Street on September 17, 2011 to protest against the excessive influence of big corporations on the US policies and the high-level corruption in the country. Despite police crackdown and mass arrests, the Occupy movement has now spread to many major US cities as well as to Australia, Britain, Germany, Italy, Spain, Ireland, Portugal as well as other countries.

Reporters Without Borders: 2011-2012 World Press Freedom Index
AWIP: After OWS, U.S. Drops in Press Freedom Rankings

Tens of thousands of demonstrators have poured into the streets of several cities in eastern Spain to protest against the government's austerity measures.

The protesters marched in the region's three largest cities of Alicante, Castellon and Valencia on Thursday chanting slogans and carrying large banners which read "No to cuts to public services." The rallies were organized by Spain's main labor unions. Union officials said around 200,000 people took part in the protests in the three cities. Unions' leaders called for the protests after the regional government of Valencia, Spain's most indebted region, announced deep spending cuts to health and education sectors. According to the Spanish daily El Pais, the regional government's debt to the area's roughly 400 schools is around 33 million Euros. Some of school teachers are buying chalk for blackboards and students are required to bring their own paper for exams. Hit by the global financial downturn, the Spanish economy collapsed into recession in the second half of 2008, destroying millions of jobs.

Bloomberg: Unemployment in Spain Rises to 22.9%
Mike Jobson: Striking truckers, fishermen clash with Italian government

Twitter has announced it will begin restricting tweets in certain countries, marking a policy shift for the social media platform that helped propel the popular uprisings recently sweeping across the Middle East. - "As we continue to grow internationally, we will enter countries that have different ideas about the contours of freedom of expression," Twitter wrote in a blog post. It said even with the possibility of such restrictions, Twitter would not be able to coexist with some countries. "Some differ so much from our ideas that we will not be able to exist there," it said. Twitter gave as examples of restrictions it might cooperate with "certain types of content, such as France or Germany, which ban pro-Nazi content". A Twitter spokeswoman declined to elaborate on the blog.

BBC: FBI plans social network map alert mash-up application

Police have rescued Australian Prime Minister Julia Gillard from angry Aboriginal protesters who were demonstrating on Australia Day against European settlers' “centuries-long persecution of the Aborigines.” - Scores of police escorted Gillard and the leader of the opposition Tony Abbott from the capital Canberra's Lobby restaurant after it was surrounded by around two hundred Aboriginal protesters. Gillard appeared distressed as she was pulled away from the encirclement of protesters but escaped unhurt.

Sydney Morning Herald: Aboriginal protesters torch Australian flag outside Parliament
AWIP: Australian Prime Minsiter Julia Gillard escorted by riot police amid angry Australia day protests in Canberra - Video

The Pentagon detailed the Defense Department cuts on Thursday that US President Barack Obama hinted at earlier in the month. - While the agenda for the DoD isn’t full of surprises, it exemplifies a trend that the military has seen more and more as of late: droves of drones replacing real-life soldiers. Under the Pentagon’s new budget plan, America’s war-time arsenal will see a drastic decrease in the number of servicemen, with the DoD instead spending money on robotic unmanned vehicles. Drone aircraft, drone submarines and drone helicopters will be added by the dozens while the US military eliminates around 100,000 positions. The Defense Department asks Congress for $525 billion, a smaller number than the $553 billion it wanted in 2011. Cuts will come in all divisions of the Armed Forces, with the Army losing 80,000 soldiers and the Marine Corps around 20,000. The Air Force will miss nearly 100 cargo planes and the Navy will retire an arsenal of cruisers earlier than it had planned. But as the Pentagon brings down its numbers and will save a few thousand men and women from the eventual onslaught of PTSD, it will focus its development not on bettering things for the human beings fighting America’s wars, but on a futuristic fleet of space-age weaponry. Come 2015, military pay raises will begin to stagger and, barring any unforeseen foreign involvements, the tally of troops will continue to shrink.

This is fascinating, a nuclear explosion from the Tumbler-Snapper tests performed in Nevada during 1952. It looks different from all nuclear explosions you've seen because it's what it looks like one millisecond after detonation. It looks like a skull by Tim Burton.

The face of atomic death just one second away from unleashing its absolute destruction. Only one millisecond after the bomb explodes, this 65.6-foot (20 meters) ball of fire appears in midair, with spikes that look like rotten teeth or stalactites of fire (called the rope trick effect). The explosion was captured by a Rapid Action Electronic camera—a high speed device designed to photograph nuclear explosions just milliseconds after ignition.

What's a Rapid Action Electronic camera? - The rapatronic camera, as it is called, was created by Harold Edgerton in the 1940s using two polarizing filters and Kerr cell instead of a shutter, which is too slow for this job. A Kerr cell is a panel that changes its polarization depending on the voltage applied. This acts as a very high speed shutter, which allows the perfect exposition to capture this moment.

A team of salvage divers has discovered an unexplained object resting at the bottom of the Baltic Sea near Sweden. - "This thing turned up. My first reaction was to tell the guys that we have a UFO here on the bottom," said Peter Lindberg, the leader of the amateur treasure hunters. Sonar readings show that the mysterious object is about 60 meters across, or, about the size of a jumbo jet. And it's not alone. Nearby on the sea floor is another, smaller object with a similar shape. Even more fascinating, both objects have "drag marks" behind them on the sea floor, stretching back more than 400 feet.

A prominent member of the Saudi royal family has called for a nuclear weapons-free zone in the Middle East, warning of the potential for a nuclear arms race in the region. - An Iranian nuclear weapons program would certainly be a concern to Saudi Arabia, who competes with Iran for regional influence, but the opinion of the U.S. intelligence community, the Obama administration, and the latest IAEA report is that Iran’s enrichment is so far civilian in nature. In May 2010, all 189 signatories to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty – including Iran – tacitly agreed to a nuclear weapons-free zone in the Middle East and called for a conference in 2012. Finland will be hosting that event this year. But Israel has refused to support a nuclear weapons-free zone for the region, reluctant to give up its own. Israel also is not a signatory to the NPT. These facts have arguably destabilized the region, leaving open the possibility of a nuclear arms race in the region, as Turki warned.

This is What Democracy Looks Like...

The nation drops 27 places in annual index thanks to the harsh treatment of reporters covering the protests.

The United States tumbled 27 places in the latest edition of the annual Press Freedom Index, thanks in large part to the rough treatment of journalists covering the Occupy Wall Street protests that took place around the country this past year. Last year, the United States came in 20th, sandwiched between the United Kingdom and Canada at 19th and 21st place, respectively. After 2011, however, the United States finds itself tied for 47th place with Romania and Argentina on the list, which is compiled by Reporters Without Borders, a not-for-profit advocating for press freedom around the globe. "The crackdown on protest movements and the accompanying excesses took their toll on journalists," the group explains in the annual report. "In the space of two months in the United States, more than 25 were subjected to arrests and beatings at the hands of police who were quick to issue indictments for inappropriate behaviour, public nuisance or even lack of accreditation." The drop is not unprecedented, however. In 2005, the United States ranked 53rd on the list as a result of the imprisonment of journalists and what the group called the "deteriorated" relationship between the press and the George W. Bush administration.

In a meeting on Monday between U.S. State Department and Israeli officials, the U.S. officials promised to extend loan guarantees to Israel for the next three years. The $3.8 billion in loan backing is in addition to the $3 billion a year in aid given to Israel by the U.S. government. - Israel is the only recipient of U.S. foreign aid and loans that is not considered a ‘developing’ nation, with an annual GDP of $235 billion ($29,800 per capita). In contrast, the next biggest recipient of U.S. aid, Egypt, receives less than half of the amount given to Israel and has a GDP of $6,200 per capita. Every other recipient of US aid has a GDP that is below that of Egypt. The U.S. Congress recently approved a guaranteed $30 billion in aid to Israel over the next 10 years. This aid, unlike assistance provided by the U.S. government to other countries, has no requirements, and is provided without stipulation as to how it should be used.

OCCUPIED JERUSALEM, (PIC)-- The Aqsa foundation for endowment and heritage (AFEH) has accused Jewish fanatics of destroying many headstones in the Islamic cemetery in Bisan. - AFEH said in a statement on Wednesday that it visits the deserted cemetery all yearlong and spray chemicals to combat weeds, adding that a delegation of the foundation visited the graveyard on Tuesday and discovered the destruction. It said that it maintains the graveyard within its annual maintenance program of sites of religious significance, adding that it rebuilt many graves over the past years that were the target of similar attacks.

In a move that has triggered outrage, Google has announced plans to bring all data collected from users’ separate accounts on its sites into a combined profile. Besides raising dubious questions about privacy, this offer is one you… cannot refuse. - The changes will take effect on March 1. Before that date, Google will notify its hundreds of millions of users about the new rules of the game. In preparation, the company is boosting its privacy policy and terms of service. Users will have to decide whether to agree with the new terms – or lose access to some of their favorite sites. There is no way of opting out of the changes. Some say Google’s privacy announcement is frustrating and a little frightening."Even if the company believes that tracking users across all platforms improves their services, consumers should still have the option to opt out,” said Common Sense Media chief executive James Steyer, as cited by the Washington Post.

After days of protests and hacker attacks, Poland has signed the controversial ACTA copyright protection treaty. Opponents call it an assault on online freedom, since it demands that internet service providers police user activity.

Warsaw’s Ambasador to Tokyo Jadwiga Rodowicz-Czechowska signed the Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement in Japan on Tuesday. The treaty aims to harmonize international copyright protection standards in a number of industries from pharmaceutics to fashion. The agreement now has to be ratified by the parliament, which is unlikely to oppose it, reports RT’s Aleksey Yaroshevsky. The news came amid mass protests in Poland, where tens of thousands of people took to the streets, while many more joined online action against ACTA. Some 15,000 activists marched in Krakow, 5,000 in Wroclaw, and several thousand in other Polish cities. A number of websites, including that of Prime Minister Donald Tusk were attacked by hackers demanding that the country boycott the treaty. This however didn’t stop the authorities from proceeding with their plan. The agreement, which has already been signed by the US, Australia, Canada, Japan, Morocco, New Zealand, Singapore and South Korea, has been criticized by human rights groups for the secrecy, in which it has been developed, and the potential for abuse it poses. The deal has been compared to the SOPA/PIPA bills, which drew worldwide opposition and an internet strike, once the danger the posed became widely publicized. It the case of ACTA, the public remained mostly unaware of its nature, before the hacktivist group Anonymous spread the message.

On December 9th a group of internet hackers who go by the name Anonymous shut down biotech giant Monsanto’s public relations firm. Anonymous, who have temporarily shut down FBI and Justice Department websites are now targeting the GMO giant itself by attacking Monsanto.com. This group of hackers, seemingly working in the shadows, focus their efforts on corrupt organizations in all forms.