The administration of US President Barack Obama is trying to “legalize” its assassination drone attacks in six Muslim countries, as the targeted killing program draws global condemnations. - Citing two unnamed US officials, the New York Times reported that the US government has been drawing up a formal rulebook to justify the targeted killings by its assassination drones in Pakistan, Afghanistan, Yemen, Somalia, Iraq and Libya. The “explicit rules” would give the new US administration “clear standards and procedures” to continue its targeted killing program. The report added that the US administration had accelerated the plan in the weeks before the presidential election on November 6, as the likelihood of Obama’s reelection was deemed low. The US administration “is still pushing to make the rules formal and resolve internal uncertainty and disagreement about exactly when lethal action is justified,” the daily wrote.

Patrick Martin: Obama administration pushes ahead with drone killings

In a dramatic press conference, the Defense Minister, who has seen a recent spike in popularity following Operation Pillar of Defense, announces he will not run in the upcoming Israeli elections; Netanyahu says he respects Barak's decision. Defense Minister Ehud Barak announced Monday that he will retire from political life and will not run in the upcoming Israeli elections.

Globes: Ehud Barak announces retirement from politics
Ynet News: Erdan: Barak misread Mideast politics
Ynet News: Likud: We did not ask Barak to resign
Haaretz: Ehud Barak is the only leader who can take on Netanyahu

Israel has reportedly vowed to destroy rockets and other weapons being sent to Gaza by Iran. Tel Aviv issued this threat despite a recent ceasefire following eight days of bitter conflict between Gaza and Israel.

Israeli spy satellites spotted a cargo vessel in the Iranian port of Bandar Abbas that was allegedly Gaza-bound and carrying arms, [Murdoch's] Sunday Times reported. “Regardless of the ceasefire agreement, we will attack and destroy any shipment of arms to Gaza once we have spotted it,” an Israeli defense official told the newspaper. The vessel reportedly began its voyage last week just as Israel and Hamas agreed to a ceasefire ending eight days of violence in Gaza, in which over 150 Palestinians died. The cargo is believed to include Fajr-5 rockets, similar to those used by Hamas in the conflict, and Shahab-3 ballistic missiles. The ship is set to travel through the Red Sea, Sudan and Egypt, according to the Sunday Times report. The newspaper also cited Israeli officials speculating that Iran could be moving longer-range ballistic missiles into Sudan, which could be aimed at Israel from the African country. The Sunday Times’ report comes a day after the Hamas leadership announced they aren’t ready to stop arming themselves, despite the recently-agreed truce and ceasefire.

Stephen Lendman: Netanyahu Plans More War - Anti-Hamas accusations [have begun again]. It didn't take long. Haaretz headlined the following: "Report: Israeli spy satellites spot Iranian ship being loaded with rockets for Gaza." Rupert Murdoch's The Sunday Times was cited. Satellites can identify much on the ground. While still in port, they don't know cargo ship destinations. They may not determine contents accurately. Haaretz's headline is irresponsible. Consider the source. Murdoch is a longtime pro-Israeli stalwart. Jewish organizations gave him numerous awards. He got them for decades of supporting Israel's worst crimes.

Israeli forces have shot and wounded a Palestinian in the southern Gaza Strip despite a cease-fire has been in place between the two sides since Wednesday, medical sources say. - According to Palestinian sources, the incident occurred east of Khan Yunis on Sunday, four days after Hamas resistance movement and Tel Aviv agreed to an Egyptian-brokered truce which ended an eight-day conflict. Sunday's shooting is Israeli's second violation of the truce. On Friday, Israeli soldiers opened fire on residents of Khouzaa, near Khan Yunis, killing one Palestinian and wounding many others.

PressTV: Gazan dies of injuries sustained in recent Israeli attacks

Members of the so-called Free Syrian Army (FSA) have blown up a mosque in Aleppo.

A video, which was released on the Internet on Sunday, shows the Syrian insurgents cheering after the explosion. Some media sources have accused the Syrian government of the bombing. Earlier in the day, two other videos were released online, one showing members of the FSA, equipped with US-made weapons. Syria has been experiencing unrest since March 2011. Damascus says the turmoil, which has killed many people, including large numbers of security forces, is being orchestrated from outside the country. There are reports that a very large number of the insurgents are foreign nationals. Damascus has repeatedly criticized the United States and its regional allies, including Saudi Arabia, Qatar, and Turkey, over funding and arming insurgents fighting the government forces.

Universal health care much loved among Canadians, monarchy less important: poll. - Canadians, it seems, love their universal health care. The monarchy? Not so much. A new national poll commissioned by the Montreal-based Association for Canadian Studies examined the pride Canadians place in a list of more than a dozen symbols, achievements and attributes. The online survey of 2,207 respondents by Leger Marketing found universal health care was almost universally loved, with 94 per cent calling it an important source of collective pride – including 74 per cent who called it “very important.”

At schools in Pinellas County, Fla., students aren't paying for lunch with cash or a card, but with a wave of their hand over a palm scanner. - "It's so quick that a child could be standing in line, call mom and say, 'I forgot my lunch money today.' She's by her computer, runs her card, and by the time the child is at the front of the line, it's already recorded," says Art Dunham, director of food services for Pinellas County Schools. Students take about four seconds to swipe and pay for lunch, Dunham says, and they're doing it with 99% accuracy. "We just love it,[the sheeple said]. No one wants to go back." Palm-scanning technology is popping up nationwide as a bona fide biometric tracker of identities, and it appears poised to make the jump from schools and hospitals to other sectors of the economy including ATM usage and retail. It also has applications as a secure identifier for cloud computing.

It is a nation racked by poverty, where 13 million people survive on less than £1 a day, and two million have no access to a toilet. Yet as his people struggle in squalor, South African president Jacob Zuma has sparked outrage by spending £17.5 million to upgrade his rural family home. Lavish works – which include the construction of 31 new houses, an underground bunker accessed by lifts and a helipad – will cost almost as much as the £19 million British taxpayers send to South Africa in annual aid. The costly upgrade to Zuma’s once-humble home in the village of Nkandla includes Astroturf sports fields and tennis courts, a gymnasium and state-of-the art security systems, including fingerprint-controlled access pads. And nearby roads have benefited from a further £40 million of improvements. When African journalists revealed the astronomical cost of the work, Zuma’s ministers turned on the whistle-blowers, saying that revealing the details of ‘top secret’ documents was illegal. Originally the cost of the project, which began two years ago, was put at £500,000 – but it has since skyrocketed. South African taxpayers are footing most of the bill, although Zuma, a polygamist with four wives and at least 20 children, is said to be contributing £700,000 of his own money – a stretch on his annual £185,000 salary. However, he also receives a controversial £1.2million in ‘spousal support’ for his wives – despite recently calling on fellow politicians to tighten their belts – and pays only a peppercorn rent of £560 on the tribally owned plot in the Zululand hills where his mansion sits. Zuma has named his residence a ‘national key point’ – a status invented by the previous paranoid apartheid government – which means it is entitled to security measures ‘in the interests of the nation’.

If their requests are approved by outgoing president Felipe Calderón, Monsanto Co. and DuPont will be planting 2,500,000 hectares (more than 6 million acres) of transgenic or GM maize in the heartland of Mexico. (Updated.) According to ETC Group, the consequences will be devastating for the heart of the center of origin and diversity for maize, and also globally. Mexico is considered to be the global repository of maize genetic diversity, as scientists have identified thousands of peasant varieties of maize. Should Monsanto's applications be approved, this would mark the world's first commercial-scale planting of GM varieties of a major food group, in it's center of origin. Basically this would wipe out all biodiversity, and all the various local varieties of maize, developed over around 7,000 years.

Natural Society: Scientist: Many Pro-GMO Corporate Biologists Own GMO Patents, in Bed with Monsanto