Israel’s existence is an “insult to all humanity,” Iran’s president said Friday in one of his sharpest attacks yet against the Jewish state, as Israel openly debates whether to attack Iran over its nuclear program. - Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said confronting Israel is an effort to “protect the dignity of all human beings.” “The existence of the Zionist regime is an insult to all humanity,” Ahmadinejad said. He was addressing worshippers at Tehran University after nationwide pro-Palestinian rallies, an annual event marking Quds (Jerusalem) Day on the last Friday of the holy month of Ramadan. Israel [says it] considers Iran an existential threat because of its nuclear and missile programs, support for radical anti-Israel groups on its borders and repeated references by Iranian leaders to Israel’s destruction. Ahmadinejad himself has repeatedly made such calls, as has Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. Iran has denied allegations that it is seeking to build nuclear weapons, saying its nuclear program is peaceful and aimed at producing electricity and radioisotopes used to treat cancer patients.

Fars News Agency: Ahmadinejad: Zionists Trying to Control Region by Israeli Regime

The Coming War of Gog and Magog (גּוֹג וּמָגוֹג‎):
It doesn't matter which of them is Gog; both of
them are from Magog and neither belong in the
Middle East. They should go back to where they
came from and certainly not start another war.

In response to a flurry of protests and civilian statements opposing an Israeli war on Iran, Defense Minister Ehud Barak struck back, dismissing the protests as irrelevant and declaring it the government’s business alone. Apparently trying to showcase his appreciation for democracy, Barak said

“The prime minister, defense minister and foreign minister have the authority…and the decision will be made as necessary by the government of Israel. That’s how it is and how it needs to be — not a group of civilians [sic] or even newspaper editorials.”

Barak then conceded that a unilateral military attack on Iran has its dangers and complications. But, he warned, war with a nuclear-armed Iran would be “incomparably” more dangerous than a preemptive campaign now. This is of course a false choice which presumes the two major lies about Iran. First, that it is developing nuclear weapons, which it isn’t. And second, that some future nuclear-armed Iran would go to war with Israel, which almost certainly wouldn’t happen since countries get nuclear weapons to deter wars, not to fight them – especially not with other nuclear-armed countries like Israel.

Stephen Lendman: Israelis Against War on Iran
John Glaser: ‘Ya Know Who’s Messianic? Netanyahu.’
PressTV: Israel can’t attack Iran alone: Peres

The Army experienced a record 38 suicides in July, the highest monthly total since the service began releasing monthly figures in 2009. - According to an Army report, 26 active-duty soldiers and 12 Army National Guard or Army Reserve members were suspected of or confirmed to have died by suicide. The soldiers included a 21-year-old air traffic controller who shot himself in his Fort Wainright, Alaska, barracks; a 26-year-old captain who died at an indoor firing range in Virginia, and a 29-year-old sergeant who had deployed four times to Iraq and Afghanistan. Three soldiers died at their own hands on deployment, and 13 had deployed at least once. But nine had never seen combat, according to the Army. All were men, and three-fourths were in paygrades E-3 through E-5. The deaths bring the total number of suspected suicides by soldiers to 187 for the year: 116 on active duty and 71 nonmobilized Guard or Reserve members. The previous record for a single month was 33 in July 2011.

CBS News: Army suicides doubled last month from June's total
Jason Ditz: Soaring Army Suicide Rates Hit Another New Record in July

The 'heirs' of Warlords like Dostum Abdul Rashin, Atta Muhammad, Gul Agha Sherzai, Ismail Khan and Harji Bashar are now the controllers of the business in which government figures are included as well as foreign specialists who act as security guards and NATO military. - A little more than 10 years after the invasion of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), Afghanistan is still the main generator of opium with calculations estimated just over 90 percent of world production. This element, translated into the inner realities of the invaded country, implies a figure close to $ 500 million in the gross domestic product (GDP) a year and that obviously Hamid Karzai's regime does not take into account. These details, supported by the United Nations Organization (UN) and its specialized agencies, also provide that in 14 Afghan provinces had increased its cultivation, especially in Helmand. According to data from the UN Office of Drugs and Crime the income per hectare of opium exceeds the $ 3, 500 USD compared to 1, 100 from one of wheat.

Peter Dale Scott/VoltaireNet.org: Afghanistan: Opium, the CIA and the Karzai Administration
Natural News: US military admits to guarding, assisting lucrative opium trade in Afghanistan

In an extraordinary interview a member of the Free Syrian Army has cheerfully admitted to summarily executing a gravely injured man, accused without trial of being a Shabiha militia sniper loyal to Bashar al-Assad.

Yaman Hamoud - an assistant in a Dubai GAP clothing store before his return home to Aleppo to take up arms against the Syrian government - recounts how his squad arrested an injured man "disguised as a woman", who had approached their checkpoint after mistaking it for a government-held post. According to Hamoud, he and his cohorts asked their commander if they could immediately kill the man, but were told to instead take him to hospital for treatment. Doctors at the hospital said that the man would die of his wounds within a couple of days - but when he didn't, Hamoud's squad commander agreed to the injured man's execution. Hamoud disturbingly recalls how

"We took him to the graveyard, where there was a hole in the ground,” he said, laughing. His confession was entirely unprompted. “We shot him. He fell."

The leader who authorised the execution is believed to be working for Hajji Mari, the military commander leading the rebels in Aleppo. His men were responsible for recently executing four Shabiha leaders whose brutal killings were filmed and posted on the internet. Mari claimed that the men had been tried by a panel of six judges and found guilty of murder, though the likelihood of a kangaroo court is clearly very high. It does not appear that the man executed by Yaman Hamoud experienced even the pretence of a kangaroo court. That Syrian rebels are apparently killing seriously injured men without any kind of due process is unsurprising, however, considering the widely acknowledged fact that many of them are actually allied to [the CIA's] Al Qaeda.

A Former CIA man on the UK threat to go into the Ecuador embassy and arrest Assange: "This was unheard of even during ... the Cold War. If someone sought refuge in the US Embassy in Moscow or the Soviet Embassy in the United States ... international law was always honored. This is unprecedented."

Robert Stevens: UK threatens to storm Ecuadorean embassy to seize Assange - The threat by the UK’s Conservative-Liberal Democrat government to storm the Ecuadorean embassy to arrest WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange shows contempt for international law and a colonial-style disregard for Ecuadorean sovereignty. It marks a new stage in the British ruling class’ descent into criminality, aiming to silence a man who has helped expose many of its innumerable crimes and those of the United States and other imperialist powers.

Craig Murray: America’s Vassal Acts Decisively and Illegally
Russia Today: 'Not even in Cold War’s darkest days': International law scrapped in anti-Assange crusade

RT.com is under DDoS attack, hosting provider confirms. More details as we get it

UPDATE: Attack over

Russia Today: Anti-WikiLeaks hackers claim responsibility for DDoS attack on RT website - The RT.com website went down for more than three hours on Friday morning in a worldwide outage after a massive DDoS attack, and is still experiencing tech difficulties. The hacker group calling itself AntiLeaks claimed responsibility for the attacks which are still continuing. “Yes. We are behind the DDoS attack on #RT_com,” AntiLeaks wrote on Twitter.

■ ALBA, UNASUR y OEA convocan reuniones para analizar el asunto y la amenaza británica
■ La Asamblea Nacional de Ecuador pide una reunión del Consejo de Seguridad de la ONU
■ Venezuela critica "la arrogancia y la prepotencia” del Gobierno británico

Ecuador va ganando aliados en su pulso con Reino Unido después de que este jueves el Gobierno de Quito concediera el “asilo diplomático” a Julian Assange, que está refugiado en la embajada de Ecuador en Londres. Desde Santo Domingo, donde asiste a la toma de posesión del presidente dominicano, el canciller venezolano, Nicolás Maduro, ha rechazado la “arrogancia y la prepotencia” que a su entender ha mostrado el Gobierno británico al advertir de que no dejará salir de el país al fundador de Wikileaks. Además, organizaciones de naciones latinoamericanas como ALBA y UNASUR han anunciado reuniones de sus ministros de exteriores este fin de semana para tratar el asunto, mientras que la OEA lo decidirá este viernes. En un comunicado, ALBA ya ha mostrado su apoyo a Ecuador y su rechazo a la "aberrante" posición británica.

Russia Today: Ecuador may file appeal to ICC if UK refuses Assange safe passage

A SWEDISH minister has called besieged WikiLeaks' founder Julian Assange a "coward", a "pitiful wretch" and a "scumbag". Swedish media reports the Minister of Social Affairs Goran Hagglund has fired off a furious Twitter message: "Sick. A coward who does not dare to have his case tried by the court. If the accusations against him are true, he is a scumbag."

Massive reaction to dramatic Reuters video footage. - President Jacob Zuma expressed his shock and dismay at the massacre at Lonmin’s Marikana mine and instructed the police to bring the situation under control. Zuma released a statement only hours after Reuters released video footage showing police officers shooting wildly with automatic weapons at a group of protesters running towards them. The official death toll now stands at more than 40 after police minister Nathi Mthethwa confirmed on Friday morning in an interview with John Robbie on 702 that at least 30 people were killed in Thursday’s shooting. Ten other people, including two police officers, were killed in the preceding 6 days of violence. Just as a matter of comparison, a total of 69 people died in the 1960 Sharpville massacre.

El País: La policía sudafricana mata a tiros a 30 mineros en una protesta - VIDEO
Fin24.com: Lonmin bloodshed has global implications
Bill Van Auken: South African police massacre striking miners

The released Iranian national, Shahrzad Mir-Qolikhan, who was in a United States prison for five years over unfounded allegations, tells Press TV that she had “the most horrifying experience” there as a political hostage. - “It was the most horrifying experience that anybody could have in life,” Mir-Qolikhan said in a Thursday interview. Referring to the ordeal of her five-year incarceration, she said, “It was politically motivated. I was a political hostage.” “The whole trial, the whole prosecution was all false. It’s like when you are in a spider web and you are hunted there and there is no way out and you cannot do anything,” she pointed out. Mir-Qolikhan was reportedly kidnapped by US agents in December 2007. She was detained and sentenced to five years in prison by a Florida federal court. She has consistently denied any wrongdoing.