During the reporting period, 5 Palestinian civilians were wounded by IOF in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip. A 6th civilian was also wounded by Israeli settlers in the West Bank. Additionally, a Palestinian civilian was stabbed by Israeli soldiers at Kfar Etzion checkpoint near Bethlehem. During the reporting period, IOF wounded 4 demonstrators, including two children and an international human rights defender, during the dispersion of peaceful demonstrations organized in protest to the construction of the annexation wall and settlement activities in the West Bank. ■ On 19 May 2012, a number of Israeli settlers from “Yits’har” settlement attacked Palestinian agricultural areas in the southeast of Southern ‘Assira village, south of Nablus, and set fire to some of them. A number of Palestinian civilians gathered to extinguish fire. Soon, Israeli settlers threw stones and empty bottles at houses in the village. When Palestinian civilians attempted to stop this attack, an Israeli settler fired at them. As a result, a Palestinian civilian was seriously wounded by a bullet that entered the right eye and exited the left ear. IOF were present in the area and did not intervene to stop the attack. Video clips from the area showed two Israeli soldiers standing near an Israeli settler while he was firing at Palestinian civilians, which indicates that IOF support Israeli settlers in their attacks on Palestinian civilians and their property. Additionally, 5 Palestinian civilians were injured by stones thrown by Israeli settlers. ■ On 20 May 2012, a Palestinian was seriously wounded near Etzion intersection, south of Bethlehem. IOF claimed that he attempted to stab an Israeli soldier using a sharp tool, and quarrel erupted between him the soldier, as a result of which he fell onto the ground and the sharp tool entered his abdomen. He was evacuated to an Israeli hospital and was put under detention. He told a lawyer who visited him that a number of Israeli soldiers attacked him with a knife and they stabbed him in the abdomen. ■ In the Gaza Strip, on 20 May 2012, a Palestinian civilian was wounded when IOF positioned at the border between the Gaza Strip and Israel opened fire at al-Qarara village, northeast of Khan Yunis. ■ During the reporting period, Israeli gunboats opened fire at Palestinian fishing boats in the northern and central Gaza Strip. No casualties were reported.

Quebec authorities have begun to make use of the sweeping repressive powers contained in Bill 78—the emergency legislation the provincial Liberal government rushed through the National Assembly late last week to suppress the province-wide student strike. - On Tuesday evening, just hours after 150,000 people had demonstrated in Montreal to mark the 100th day of the strike and denounce Bill 78, police invoked the new law to declare a nighttime student protest illegal. In addition to criminalizing the student strike, Bill 78 makes all demonstrations in Canada’s second most populous province—irrespective of their cause—illegal, unless organizers have submitted to police more than eight hours in advance the protest route and duration and undertaken to abide by any changes demanded by the police. [H/T]

Laurence Bherer and Pascale Dufour: Our Not-So-Friendly Northern Neighbor
Keith Jones: Quebec: Huge protest supports striking students, denounces Bill 78

Andrew Gavin Marshall: 10 Things You Should Know About the Quebec Student Movement - The student strikes in Quebec, which began in February and have lasted for three months, involving roughly 175,000 students in the mostly French-speaking Canadian province, have been subjected to a massive provincial and national media propaganda campaign to demonize and dismiss the students and their struggle. The following is a list of ten points that everyone should know about the student movement in Quebec to help place their struggle in its proper global context.

The decision for the US to bring drones, still relative newcomers as tools of overseas assassination, to a part of everyday life in Everytown, USA has come quickly, with large numbers of agencies nationwide getting approval for the deployment of domestic spy drones. - Civil liberties groups were just starting to rally against the new and growing threat to privacy, and officials are now doubling down, with reports that some police agencies are considering arming their spy drones to attack people. The Montgomery County, TX (which includes part of Houston) Sheriff’s Dept. is looking to be the first to arm their drones, and promised that they would only use them when “there is criminal activity afoot.”

Amateur video of Israeli soldiers appearing to watch idly watching idly as settlers opened fire on Palestinians throwing stones has emphasized the growing power of "citizen journalism" in the occupied West Bank.

Shaky footage , captured on Saturday from two angles by residents of Aseera al-Qibliya village, shows bearded residents from the nearby settlement of Yitzhar aiming a hand gun and assault rifle at the crowd, followed by sounds of gunfire. A bloodied youth shot in the face was shown being carried away on the shoulders of fellow villagers. The video was soon posted on the Internet. Teacher Ibrahim Makhlouf, who filmed the incident, lives by the brush scorched in the clashes on the village's edge, beneath the gaze of the prefabricated suburbs of Yitzhar, which lie outside the official settlement boundary. "We want the whole world to see what Israel and the settlers do to us. They steal our land and they attack us, and the world said we were the terrorists and criminals," he said. "Now we can make it clear who's the aggressor and who's attacking whom. The truth contradicts their claims about our situation."

Germans have become markedly more critical of Israel over the past three years, with 59 percent describing it as aggressive, according to a survey for the weekly magazine Stern released on Wednesday. - The survey was conducted shortly before President Joachim Gauck visits Israel and the Palestinian territories May 28-31. A similar Stern survey in 2009 found 49 percent considered Israel aggressive. The survey, conducted by Forsa pollsters, found 70 percent of Germans agree with the statement that Israel pursues its interests without consideration for other nations. Three years ago, 59 percent agreed.

The National Security Agency is trying to expand U.S. cyber expertise needed for secret intelligence operations against adversaries on computer networks through a new cyber-ops program at selected universities. - The cyber-ops curriculum is geared to providing the basic education for jobs in intelligence, military and law enforcement that are so secret they will only be revealed to some students and faculty, who need to pass security clearance requirements, during special summer seminars offered by NSA. It is not easy to find the right people for cyber operations because the slice of the hacker community that would make a quality cyber operator inside the government is only a sliver. The "quality cyber operators" the NSA is looking for are few and far between, says Neal Ziring, technical director at the agency's Information Assurance Directorate. "We're trying to create more of these, and yes they have to know some of the things that hackers know, they have to know a lot of other things too, which is why you really want a good university to create these people for you," Ziring told Reuters in an interview at NSA's headquarters in Maryland.

Speaking in Beit Shemesh ahead of the Shavuot holiday, Rabbi Aharon Yehuda Leib Shteinman, one of the leaders of the Lithuanian branch of haredi Judaism discussed the importance of the torah and said that the world was created for the righteous that learn and follow its teachings. Yet he also issues some more controversial statements. The rabbi's speech which was published in full in the haredi newspaper Yated Ne'eman, included statements on non-Jews:

"There are eight billion people in the world. And what are they? Murderers, thieves, brainless people… But who is the essence of this world? Has God created the world for these murderers? For these evil-doers? "

The rabbi, who has replaced Rabbi Yosef Shalom Elyashiv as the Lithuanian branch of Judaism's spiritual leader, reiterated his statements and went on to say: "Non-Jews have no connection to torah. The nations have nothing, no confidence (=faith) and no good principles."

One person was killed when a car exploded in the eastern Sudanese city of Port Sudan on Tuesday in what the government said resembled a blast last year that it blamed on an Israeli missile strike. - An Israeli government spokesman declined to comment on the explosion in Sudan's east, which analysts say is used as an arms smuggling route to the Hamas-controlled Gaza Strip via neighbouring Egypt. Yigal Palmor, spokesman for Israel's Foreign Ministry, told Reuters: "I'm not going to respond to generic allegations." A local journalist in the Red Sea port said he saw two small but deep holes near a gutted car and another hole beneath it. Photographs from the scene showed blood splashed on the road. Sudan's Foreign Minister Ali Ahmed Karti, the highest level official yet to comment on the blast, stopped short of directly blaming Israel, but said the explosion looked similar to an April, 2011 attack Khartoum blamed on an Israeli missile strike.

CIA's asset, Dr.Shakil Afridi

The US has said it will press for the release of a Pakistani doctor who has been jailed for 33 years for running a fake CIA vaccination programme as part of the hunt for Osama bin Laden.

But even as senior American politicians denounced the sentence as "outrageous", the Obama administration shied away from strong comment on the trial itself as officials said that the legal process is not at an end. Officials are hoping that the sentence can be shortened or overturned on appeal. Two US senators, John McCain and Carl Levin, denounced Afridi's conviction and demanded his immediate release. The sentence was announced just days after Barack Obama snubbed the Pakistani president, Asif Ali Zardari, by refusing to hold a formal meeting with him at the Nato conference in Chicago. US intelligence officials say the clandestine operation by Afridi did not succeed in determining whether Bin Laden was in the house and the raid went ahead without any certainty that the Navy Seal team would find its target. However, Pakistani security officials recently told the Guardian that although the nurses working for Afridi were not allowed inside the house to vaccinate any of the children, they did succeed in getting a mobile phone number for someone in the house. The Pakistani sources say that phone call allowed the CIA to make a voice match to Bin Laden's private courier, a man known as Abu Ahmed al-Kuwaiti.

The Guardian: CIA's fake vaccination programme criticised by Médecins Sans Frontières
KPLU 88.5: Did CIA undermine global health by faking vaccines in hunt for Bin Laden?
The CIA's fake vaccination program in Pakistan reveals the moral bankruptcy of American spooks

The death toll of the U.S. drone strike launched early Thursday morning in Pakistan's northwest tribal area of North Waziristan has risen to 10, reported local Urdu TV channel Dunya. - The target hit by the U.S. drones is a mosque instead of a house, said the report quoting local residents. Two missiles were fired at the mosque when people were leaving after early morning prayers, it said, adding that many of the killed and injured were civilians. The report also said that it was the first time that the U.S. drones targeted a mosque and the mosque was destroyed in the attack. Rescue work was delayed due to fear of more strikes as five U.S. drones were seen hovering over the area following the strike, said the report. This is the second U.S. drone strike over the last two days.

Jason Ditz: Tensions Rise as US Drone Strike Kills 10 in Northwest Pakistan

An airstrike carried out by US assassination drones has killed five people and injured several others in Pakistan’s North Waziristan tribal area, which borders Afghanistan. - Early on Wednesday, five US drones were flying over Miranshah, the capital of the North Waziristan, before firing two missiles at a house in the city, Xinhua reported. Wednesday’s airstrike was the first US drone attack since the 25th NATO summit, during which US President Barack Obama reportedly noted that the US and Pakistan were making “diligent progress” on reopening the border crossings used to transfer NATO supplies to landlocked Afghanistan.

Following in the rich history of fake endings to wars during the Obama Administration’s first term, the US and other NATO member nations are loudly hyping their endorsement of a transition pact, which is being presented as an “irreversible pullout” of occupation forces. - “We are now unified to responsibly wind down the war in Afghanistan,” insisted President Obama. The pact pledges to see a transition to Afghanistan taking a “leading role” by summer of 2013. This is a great way to brand the war, since polls show massive majorities of voters in virtually every NATO notion overwhelmingly opposed to the conflict. But despite the hype, the pact is materially no different from the one that came out of the Lisbon summit, which seeks to declare the war “over” at the end of 2014 but keep large but unspecified numbers of NATO troops occupying the nation in the nation long beyond that “end.”

Pursuant to the deal reached by Kabul and Washington for drawing down the war in Afghanistan, U.S. soldiers are now statutorily required to obtain a warrant before entering Afghan homes. - The Obama administration, desperate to come to an agreement and extricate itself from the failed war, reluctantly agreed to Karzai’s demand to have greater Afghan control and a judge’s permission over night raids, a central military policy throughout the war. But earlier indications suggested this development in policy was not was it sounded like. Pentagon spokesman Capt. John Kirby told reporters in April that ““It’s not about the U.S. ceding responsibilities to the Afghans.” Kirby said, contrary to reports, that Afghan President Hamid Karzai will not hold “a veto” over future night raids and although U.S. forces will need a warrant going forward, “In practical terms, not much has changed.”

We don't usually start articles with warnings, but some of the pictures in the gallery are incredibly distressing. We omitted some on the grounds that they were just too upsetting, but the ones that we do run, we do so with full permission, and because we feel that this is an important story. - You might remember Karlos Zurutuza from his photos of Baloch insurgents, his guide to warzone hotels or maybe, if you like reading news and knowing what’s going on in the world, you will have seen his work elsewhere. During recent trips to Iraq, Karlos waded into a story that even in the quagmire of depressing awfulness that is Iraqi news, stands out as brutally distressing. We had a chat with him about the medical fallout of the Iraq War and specifically its effects on children in Fallujah. [Article]

Why this is important: Building 7 of the World Trade Center, a 47 story building, contained offices of the CIA, the Secret Service, the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) several financial institutions and then-Mayor Giuliani's Office of Emergency Management. Despite never being hit by an airplane, Building 7 was reduced to a pile of rubble in about 7 seconds at 5:20 p.m. on September 11, 2001. After 9/11 this fact has been widely covered up by the U.S. mass media and was even omitted from the 9/11 Commission Report. NIST, the National Institute for Standards and Technology (a U.S. government agency) was authorized by Congress to determine “why and how WTC 7 collapsed.” NIST produced a preliminary draft of their final report in August, 2008 omitting the fact that Building 7 fell at free fall acceleration for part of its descent. After a physicist challenged NIST on this point the final report, in November 2008 admitted free fall acceleration for 105' or 2.5 seconds. However NIST claimed that this was consistent with their own fire based collapse theory which alleged that the entire collapse began because column 79 became laterally unsupported and buckled due to heat. NIST has refused to disclose their entire computer model and this column 79 theory was not based on any hard evidence. [...] NIST has already admitted the scientific fact of free fall acceleration in Building 7. This is remarkable! Now we ask that NIST tell what this means: that the entire building structure below for at least eight floors was removed just as Building 7 began to fall. Does this not imply use of explosives? We petition for a response.

Stephen Lendman: Consensus 9/11: Seeking Truth, Dispelling Lies

In November, 2008, media reports strongly suggested that President Obama intended to name John Brennan as CIA Director. But controversy over Brennan’s recent history — he was a Bush-era CIA official who expressly advocated “enhanced interrogation techniques” and rendition — forced him to “withdraw” from consideration, as he publicly issued a letter citing “strong criticism in some quarters” of his CIA advocacy. Undeterred by any of that unpleasantness, President Obama instead named Brennan to be his chief counter-Terrorism adviser, a position with arguably more influence that he would have had as CIA chief. Since then, Brennan has been caught peddling serious falsehoods in highly consequential cases, including falsely telling the world that Osama bin Laden “engaged in a firefight” with U.S. forces entering his house and “used his wife as a human shield,” and then outright lying when he claimed about the prior year of drone attacks in Pakistan: “there hasn’t been a single collateral death.”

On 25th visit [???] to Israel, former secretary of state recalls the first panicked moments of 9/11. - The world changed in the wake of the 9/11 attacks, former US secretary of state Condoleezza Rice told an audience in Israel Sunday, and so did the relationship between the United States and Israel. While Jerusalem and Washington were always good friends, after the attacks they became allies “with a common cause in the fight against people who would seek political gain by attacking civilians, parents and children,” she said. Rice also described the first panicked minutes for the US administration on 9/11, including the moment she raised her voice to president George W. Bush.

“Please be kind enough to let us know the number of plainclothes officers who will infiltrate our event so we can order the appropriate catering.” – Gatineau Chamber of Commerce on Bill 78. - The letter is a notice to the Gatineau police force, pursuant to the Special Law that the Quebec Government has quickly passed to block student protests. The law, in part, requires that all gatherings of ten or more people that will take place in a public venue must provide written notice at least eight hours in advance to the police of the location, route, date, time, number of attendees, and must comply with any changes ordered by the police. This law is likely unconstitutional in its broad application. - The letter is a notice to the Gatineau police force, pursuant to the Special Law that the Quebec Government has quickly passed to block student protests. The law, in part, requires that all gatherings of ten or more people that will take place in a public venue must provide written notice at least eight hours in advance to the police of the location, route, date, time, number of attendees, and must comply with any changes ordered by the police. This law is likely unconstitutional in its broad application. [H/T]

CJAD 800am: National Assembly passes Bill 78
The Star: Giant protest in Montreal puts emergency law to test
Keith Jones: Quebec: Huge protest supports striking students, denounces Bill 78

Canada's proposed Internet surveillance was back in the news last week after speculation grew that government intends to keep the bill in legislative limbo until it dies on the order paper. Public Safety Minister Vic Toews denied the reports, maintaining that Bill C-30 will still be sent to committee for further study. - Canada's telecom companies worked actively with government officials to identify key issues and to develop a secret Industry - Government Collaborative Forum on Lawful Access. The secret working group includes virtually all the major telecom and cable companies, whose representatives have been granted Government of Canada Secret level security clearance and signed non-disclosure agreements. The group is led by Bell Canada on the industry side and Public Safety for the government. The secret working group is designed to create an open channel for discussion between telecom providers and government. As the uproar over Bill C-30 was generating front-page news across the country, Bell reached out to government to indicate that "it was working its way through C-30 with great interest" and expressed desire for a meeting to discuss disclosure of subscriber information. A few weeks later, it sent another request seeking details on equipment obligations to assist in its costing exercises.

A Swedish documentary about the economic crisis in Greece. The documentary was made from Alexandra Pascalidou on behalf of SVT Swedish television.

Across Italy police are cracking down on Ferrari and Lamborghini drivers, but not because they are driving too fast. Italy, like so much of southern Europe, is drowning in debt, so police are pursuing drivers to make sure they are declaring – and therefore paying taxes on – earnings that would allow them to afford cars worth as much as half a million dollars. The targeting is part of an ongoing war on tax cheats, an attempt to shore up $2.5 trillion of the country's public debt and change a culture that has often prided itself on avoiding taxes. Tax authorities have long carried out much-publicized checks on owners of luxury cars, yachts, even nightclubs that don't issue proper receipts. But since the unelected, technocratic government took power in November, it has made enforcing tax collections a priority.

Chilean courts have decided to reexamine the death of the poet, whom some suspect was killed by the Pinochet regime. - Neruda, a member of Chile's Communist Party who won the Nobel Prize in 1971, is among the most widely read Spanish-language poets. Millions of people the world over have been wooed by "Twenty Love Songs and a Song of Despair". When he died just two weeks after the September 11, 1973, coup that overthrew Chilean President Salvador Allende, most people assumed it was from a broken heart that had accelerated the prostate cancer with which he had been diagnosed the previous year. Neruda was a close friend of Allende, and the military had raided his famous seaside home in Isla Negra, in those days about a two-hour drive from the capital Santiago. It was at Isla Negra that he completed his memoirs, which end with a bitter damnation of the coup and of General Augusto Pinochet.

A New York City Police Department sergeant has been caught on video threatening several Brooklyn men with his gun and with sexual assault. - Cell phone video obtained by the New York Post shows Sgt. Lesly Charles launching into a profane tirade while talking to several men who are suspected of criminal behavior. “I have a long dick, you don’t,” Charles says. “Listen to me. When you see me, you look the other way. Tell your boys, I don’t fuck around. I’ll take my gun and put it up your ass and then I’ll call your mother afterwards. OK? And I’ll put your own shit in your mouth. Alright?” (Raw Story)