Full English Voice-over of the speech of the secretary general of Hizbullah, Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah(HA) delivered on May 9, 2013 on the 25th Anniversary of the al-Nour Radio Station.

Syria is to supply Hizbullah with game-changing weapons despite Israel's air strikes reportedly aimed at cutting off the flow of arms, Hizbullah chief Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah said on Thursday, vowing to back "the Syrian popular resistance in the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights. You Israelis say your objective is to stop the capability of the resistance from growing ... but Syria will provide (Hizbullah) with game-changing weapons it has not had before, Nasrallah said in a televised speech on the 25th anniversary of the establishment of Hizbullah's al-Nour radio station. We declare that we are ready to receive any game-changing weapons and we're competent to possess and protect such type of weapons and we will use them to defend our people, he added. Nasrallah said the shipments of new types of weapons would serve as the Syrian reaction to Israel's airstrikes. Syria has long been a conduit for Iranian weapons bound for Hizbullah. Israeli officials say the Lebanese group has tens of thousands of rockets, but that most of them are unguided. Israeli officials said the shipments targeted twice last week included precision-guided missiles. [More here]

The prison is a deeply un-American disgrace. It needs to be closed rapidly. - The authorities at Guantánamo Bay say that prisoners have a choice. They can eat or, if they refuse to, they will have a greased tube stuffed up their noses, down their throats and into their stomachs, through which they will be fed. This can cause gagging and bleeding in a compliant patient, and is a lot nastier when done against his will. It takes up to two hours, during which time an unco-operative prisoner must be restrained to stop him pulling out the tube. Lawyers for the 23 or so men who are being subjected to this treatment report that it is deliberately being done roughly, with unsterilised tubes that are too large: those claims are denied. But even if they are false, the business clearly violates an individual’s rights; according to the president of the American Medical Association, it also breaches the “core ethical values of the medical profession”.

A Detroit-area lawyer has been fighting for almost a decade to win compensation for four men who spent time in Iraq's notorious Abu Ghraib prison. - CACI Premier Technology, a Virginia company that handled interrogations at Abu Ghraib, has asked a federal judge to dismiss Shereef Akeel's lawsuit, the Detroit Free Press reported Thursday. A hearing is scheduled Friday in Arlington, Va. Akeel first became involved with Abu Ghraib in 2004 when a man named Saleh visited his law office in Troy, Mich., and described beatings and torture at a prison in Iraq. After seeing the man's story confirmed by a report on "60 Minutes," Akeel traveled to Iraq to interview detainees. The lawsuit has faced a number of hurdles. Three of Akeel's clients have been barred from flying to the United States to give depositions. CACI has said they are on the "no-fly" list as known or suspected terrorists.

An international protest planned for later this month against biotechnology company Monsanto is slated to span six continents and include demonstrations in dozens of countries around the globe.

Amid growing concerns over St. Louis, Missouri-based Monsanto and the impact the company is having on agriculture, activists have planned rallies for later this month in 36 countries. Monsanto, a titan of the emerging biotech industry, has come under attack from environmentalists, agriculturalists and average consumers over the company’s conduct in the realm of genetically-modified organisms and genetically-engineered foods. Despite research on the effects of GMO crops being largely considered inconclusive, Monsanto has lobbied hard in Washington and around the globe to be able to continue manufacturing lab-made foods without the oversight that many have demanded. In March, Congress passed a biotech rider dubbed the “Monsanto Protection Act” by its critics that essentially allows that company and others that use GMOs to plant and sell genetically-altered products without gaining federal permission.

Two months ago, the Supreme Court refused to hear a challenge to the Foreign Intelligence and Surveillance Act (FISA), a Bush-era law that allows the NSA to wiretap American citizens without a warrant. Now, the full scope of the US government's warrantless surveillance schemes is becoming known. Leaked documents from the IRS, the FBI, and the Department of Justice have now shown that none of those agencies believe that warrants are required for monitoring the online communication—think emails, not just public Twitter posts—of American citizens. At the same time, the Obama administration is reportedly planning on backing an FBI plan that would force internet providers, email hosts, social media platforms, and others to install backdoors to their system to allow the FBI easier access.

Russia Today: ‘Like 1984, only worse’: UK may resurrect ‘snooper’s charter’ -

Amal Saad-Ghorayeb: There is no greater distortion of reality than to portray the war in Syria as one fought between two warring sides. There are no two sides inside Syria; there is simply Syria and the enemies of Syria. As such, when we call for a dialogue between “the two sides” we are not referring to the two sides of Syria, or two camps within Syria, as though there were some political or moral parity between them, but to the side that represents the Syrian Arab Republic and the side that represents those who want to destroy it. The fact that some of Syria’s enemies happen to be Syrian does not make them any more representative of one side of Syria than their Arab and American masters. - Yes, the war is taking place on Syrian soil and it does possess characteristics of a civil war, but it remains a war ON Syria and not one between two sides of Syria. To state otherwise is to confer popular legitimacy and sovereignty on those that pursue the destruction of the Syrian state.

Brazil has renewed its permanent support for finding a peaceful solution to the crisis in Syria. - "Brazil is ready to contribute and support efforts in this direction, " Xinhua news agency quoted Brazilian Foreign Minister Antonio Patriota as saying in a press statement on Thursday. He added that Brazil welcomes Russian-US rapprochement regarding Syria and the proposal of holding an international conference on this issue. Brazil's President Dilma Rousseff, in a joint press conference with Egyptian President Mohamed Mursi in Brasilia yesterday, expressed her country's support for a political solution to the crisis in Syria by the Syrians and supported by the international community.

Bloomberg: Assad Opponents Rebuff U.S.-Russia Call for Syria Talks
YaLibnan: U.S. reassures Syria rebels about its stance on Assad

The Taliban militant group has said that the United States seeks permanent occupation of Afghanistan following its announcement to keep nine military bases in the war-torn country. - Taliban spokesman Zabiullah Mujahed said in an e-mailed statement that the group would not allow the US and its allies to have a permanent presence in Afghanistan, despite an announcement by Afghan President Hamid Karzai on Thursday that Washington had demanded to keep nine military bases across the country. Karzai’s remarks showed that both Kabul and Washington are trying to deprive the Afghan nation of political independence, the spokesman said, adding, “Afghans want an independent Afghanistan. We will never make any deal on our independence.” The Taliban spokesman said that the presence of foreign troops had sustained the ongoing war in Afghanistan and the “longer the occupiers are here, the longer it will take to find peace.”

PressTV: US wants to keep nine military bases in Afghanistan: Karzai
Matthew J. Nasuti: The CIA’s “Ghost Army" is De-Stabilizing Afghanistan

The Politburo of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) held a special session on April 25 to discuss the economy, amid mounting concern about the stability of the country’s financial system and the latest GDP figures showing an unexpected slowdown to 7.7 percent in the first quarter. A Politburo statement expressed particular concern about “potential risks in financial sectors”. A promise to establish a standardised local government financing mechanism underscores fears that local governments have accumulated huge levels of bad debt as a result of speculative activity, especially in real estate ventures. The Politburo special session followed the April announcement by global crediting rating agency, Fitch, that it was downgrading China’s sovereign credit rating from AA minus to A plus. The rating cut was China’s first since 1999, when the Asian financial crisis forced Beijing to vastly accelerate the privatisation of state enterprises. Tens of millions of workers were made redundant. Fitch warned that “risks over China’s financial stability have grown” as the domestic credit supply has ballooned from 125 percent of GDP in 2008 to 198 percent at the end of 2012, as a result of the government’s huge stimulus package following the 2008 global financial meltdown. Both corporate and local government debt in China has grown exponentially, much of it in the loosely-regulated underground banking markets.

The grandson of the late African-American human rights activist Malcolm X has been killed in Mexico, a report says. - The Amsterdamnews.com reported that Muslim civil activist Malcolm Shabazz was killed early Thursday due to injuries, but the exact circumstances of his death are still unconfirmed. Reports say that he suffered the fatal wounds after he was thrown off a building or shot as he was being robbed in the city of Tijuana. Terrie M. Williams, a close friend of the Shabazz family, stated in a message posted on Twitter, “I’m confirming, per US Embassy, on behalf of family, the tragic death of Malcolm Shabazz, grandson of Malcolm X. Statement from family to come.”

AWIP: FBI arrests Malcolm X grandson en route to Iran [02/04/13]

Stephen Hawking has been subject to vile abuse targeting his disability after it was announced he is planning to boycott a conference in Israel, hosted by the country's president Shimon Peres. Some of the ugliest responses to the boycott came on social media, with several accusing Hawking's singling out of Israel for boycott as "anti-Semitism" and making distasteful comments about his disability. The celebrated physicist withdrew from the conference, approving a statement in his name distributed by the British Committee for the Universities in Palestine, confirming his withdrawal was for political reasons, and not for health reasons.

Stephen Lendman: Hawking Boycotts Israel

Vandals believed to be Jewish extremists have uprooted dozens of olive trees and scrawled graffiti near a Palestinian village in the southern West Bank, police and witnesses said on Friday.

Palestinian witnesses told AFP that approximately 80 olive trees were uprooted in the village of Al-Tiwana east of Yatta. Israeli police spokeswoman Luba Samri confirmed that "police received a report about the damaging of some 62 Palestinian-owned olive trees" in the area. She also noted that "slogans such as 'price tag' and 'mutual guarantee' were scrawled nearby." "Price tag" is a euphemism for hate crimes, primarily committed against Palestinians by Israeli extremists. The attacks began in response to Israeli government moves to dismantle unauthorised settler outposts or in retaliation to Palestinians after attacks against settlers, but over the past 18 months have also targeted Christian institutions and even the Israeli military. The perpetrators of such crimes are rarely caught.