Readers periodically ask me some variation on this question: “Why does the press follow every jot and tittle of Iran’s nuclear program, but we never see any stories about Israel’s nuclear weapons capability?” It’s a fair question. - Israel refuses to acknowledge publicly that it has nuclear weapons. The U.S. government also officially does not acknowledge the existence of such a program. Israel’s official position, as reiterated by Aaron Sagui, spokesman for the Israeli Embassy here, is that “Israel will not be the first country to introduce nuclear weapons into the Middle East. Israel supports a Middle East free of all weapons of mass destruction following the attainment of peace.” The “introduce” language is purposefully vague, but experts say it means that Israel will not openly test a weapon or declare publicly that it has one. [...] President John Kennedy vigorously tried to prevent Israel from obtaining the bomb; President Lyndon Johnson did so to a much lesser extent. But once it was a done deal, Nixon and every president since has not pressed Israel to officially disclose its capabilities or to sign the Non-Proliferation Treaty. In return, Israel agrees to keep its nuclear weapons unacknowledged and low-profile. Because Israel has not signed the treaty, it is under no legal obligation to submit its major nuclear facility at Dimona to International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) inspections. [...] Among the less benign reasons U.S. sources don’t leak is that it can hurt your career. Said Perkovich: “It’s like all things having to do with Israel and the United States. If you want to get ahead, you don’t talk about it; you don’t criticize Israel, you protect Israel. You don’t talk about illegal settlements on the West Bank even though everyone knows they are there.”

PressTV: Netanyahu has lost his wits over Iran: Mofaz

"I have sent solidarity regards to Julian Assange from the left in Germany and the online community in Germany," said Ms Dagdelen in a statement issued after the visit. "We, as peace- and freedom-loving people in Germany and around the world, are greatly indebted to Mr Assange. "He helped to uncover the war crimes in Iraq and in Afghanistan. He showed us how dirty and bloody these wars were and are, and how much we have been fooled by our governments."

Ms Dagdelen, a member of the party Die Linke who sits on the foreign affairs committee in the lower house, wants to help find a solution to the diplomatic standoff around Mr Assange's asylum request.

Ankara was tight-lipped concerning a reported unannounced visit to Istanbul by U.S. Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) Director David Petraeus, while U.S. officials were little different than their Turkish counterparts in response to questions. - Petraeus arrived in Istanbul's Atatürk Airport with his private plane, according to an exclusive report by Turkish daily newspaper Akşam. The daily said the agenda of Petraeus’s talks with Turkish officials would be the Syria crisis and the anti-terror fight. The visit was be the second unannounced visit by the CIA chief to Turkey in last six months. In March, the United States’s top spy paid an unannounced two-day visit to Ankara to discuss the deepening instability in Syria, the joint fight against terrorism, and closer cooperation on pressing regional issues “in the coming months.” On that visit, Petraeus held separate talks with Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan and his Turkish counterpart, MİT chief Hakan Fidan.

Bolivia President Evo Morales accused the US military of commanding Colombia's armed forces and of having a military base in the South American country, in a televised speech Sunday. - Morales was responding angrily to recent US figures that indicate Bolivia and Peru have surpassed Colombia as the world's biggest cocaine producers. "Sure, Colombia is being downplayed as a country that has a drug problem -- because there is a US military base, there are Americans commanding the Armed Forces of Colombia," the president said in a speech to coca growers unions in Lauca N, about 650 kilometers (400 miles) from La Paz. Washington "wants to praise the country where they have accepted US military bases," he said. In fact, there is no longer a US base in Colombia, but US military involvement is massive.

There is some long-settled wisdom among Washington politicos: When you have bad news and want to avoid attention, you release it just before a holiday weekend. And when you can hold off long enough to ensure that it is totally buried, you release it at the most moribund point in the entire news calendar: just before the Labor Day weekend, when no one who counts in American politics is likely to be paying any attention. So what news story was official Washington most eager to bury this year? We have our answer. The New York Times reports:

Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr. announced Thursday that no one would be prosecuted for the deaths of a prisoner in Afghanistan in 2002 and another in Iraq in 2003, eliminating the last possibility that any criminal charges will be brought as a result of the brutal interrogations carried out by the C.I.A. Mr. Holder had already ruled out any charges related to the use of waterboarding and other methods that most human rights experts consider to be torture. His announcement closes a contentious three-year investigation by the Justice Department and brings to an end years of dispute over whether line intelligence or military personnel or their superiors would be held accountable for the abuse of prisoners in the aftermath of the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001. The closing of the two cases means that the Obama administration’s limited effort to scrutinize the counterterrorism programs carried out under President George W. Bush has come to an end.

Scott Horton: The Guantánamo “Suicides”: A Camp Delta sergeant blows the whistle
Bill Van Auken: US Justice Department closes CIA probe with no charges in torture, murder of detainees

Some 1,000 British soldiers are still facing possible war crimes charges related to their role in the 2003 US invasion of Iraq and the subsequent occupation of the nation, according to officials familiar with the situation. - Most of the charges are related to detainee abuse, and are based on testimony from the detainees themselves. Lawyers defending the soldiers say the evidence to support their allegations is “weak” in many of the cases. Britain has by and large shrugged off war crimes allegations in Iraq, though a public inquiry into the practice after British soldiers tortured hotel receptionist Baha Mousa to death found that there were “systemic” problems related to the treatment of detainees.

BBC: William Hague says UK must shed 'guilt' over empire
PressTV: Bush, Blair must stand trial for war crimes: Tutu
The Guardian: Tony Blair should face trial over Iraq war, says Desmond Tutu

The leader of the Israeli opposition party Kadima has blasted Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for his war rhetoric against Iran, saying the hawkish premier has “lost his wits”. - Netanyahu seemed “confused, stressed out and unfocused” over the issue of Iran, Mofaz said.

“He seems to have lost his wits, and rather than making thought-out, responsible decisions, he is creating the sense of an impending war.” “The prime minister has lost the faith of the security chiefs, United States President [Barack] Obama, and [Israeli] President Shimon Peres,” said Mofaz. “This is a bankrupt leadership.”

He added that there is a direct relation between Tel Aviv’s bellicose rhetoric against Iran and the economic woes in Israel.

PressTV: Israelis protest potential war on Iran outside Barak's house
Russia Today: Netanyahu urges international community to set nuclear 'red line' for Iran