1) A Community Labor News E-Zine
*DONT MOURN - ORGANIZE!*
Today 19 Nov 1915
Joe Hill, IWW Organizer, Poet, Song Writer
Was murdered by the State of Utah

2) MOBILIZATION ON SATURDAY, NOVEMBER 20TH
IN SUPPORT OF THE LOCAL 2
HOTEL WORKERS!
Saturday, Nov. 20, 11:00 a.m.
Union Square, San Francisco

3) Not in Our Name Bay Area
We need your hands, not your tongue!
Mass Mailing Party
Pizza and drinks to fuel processing of
national Not in Our Name fundraising letter
Monday, November 22
5:00 PM - 10:00 PM
Not in Our Name Office
3945 Opal Street, Oakland (map)
At 40th Street, near Broadway ­
a short walk from Macarthur BART.

4) ** Dahr Jamail's Iraq Dispatches **
As U.S. Forces Raided a Mosque
Dahr Jamail
BAGHDAD, Nov 19 (IPS)

5) +++++++++We need your help!+++++++++++
There is a DIRECT ACTION being organized around the
hotel lockout in San Francisco -- a community response
to a lockout of 4000 workers at 14 city hotels.

6) Statement by the National Youth & Student Peace Coalition
(NYSPC)
On the morning of Thursday, October 28th, more than a dozen
armed federal agents(representing the Federal Bureau of
Investigation, the Joint Terrorism Task Force, and the
Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives)
raided the West Philadelphia home of three organizers
involved with the Student Environmental Action Coalition
(SEAC) and the National Youth & Student Peace Coalition (NYSPC).

---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

1) A Community Labor News E-Zine
*DONT MOURN - ORGANIZE!*
Today 19 Nov 1915
Joe Hill, IWW Organizer, Poet, Song Writer
Was murdered by the State of Utah

My will is easy to decide
for there is nothing to divide
My kin don't need to fuss and moan
Moss doesn't cling to a rolling stone
My body?
Ahh if I could choose
I would to ashes it reduce
and let the merry breezes blow
my dust to where some flowers grow
Perhaps some fading flower then will spring to life
and bloom again
This is my last and final will
Good luck to all of you
Joe Hill

Written in his prison cell the night before his
execution

Don't Mourn ORGANIZE

Sent from UnionMail Service [http://mail.union.org.za]

Readers may email your article submissions
or your comments to ListAdmin@CLNews.org

You may Subscribe or Un-Subscribe through a
Confirmed Opt-In or Opt-out Automatic Process at
http://www.clnews.org/MailList/subscribtion.htm
"Freedom is always and exclusively
freedom for the one who thinks differently"
--Rosa Luxemburg

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2) MOBILIZATION ON SATURDAY, NOVEMBER 20TH
IN SUPPORT OF THE LOCAL 2
HOTEL WORKERS!
Saturday, Nov. 20, 11:00 a.m.
Union Square, San Francisco

Dear Sisters and Brothers:

Please join the Million Worker March Committee, the San Francisco
Labor Council, HERE-UNITE Local 2, and the Executive Board of ILWU
Local 10 in a solidarity mobilization with the locked-out hotel
workers.

The short solidarity rally will start at 11 a.m. sharp at Union
Square in San Francisco (Powell @ Geary). It will feature
presentations by the locked-out workers and rally sponsors. Following
the speakers, there will be a march to some of the main hotels that
have locked out their workers, with mass picketing and chants at each
site.

The Local 2 workers need our visible solidarity -- urgently. They
need the largest possible show of support to send a clear signal to
the hotel owners' association that San Francisco is -- and will
remain -- a strong union town.

A PDF version of an attractive Nov. 20 mobilization leaflet is
available upon request at . Also, thanks to a
kind donation from Inkworks Press, we have one thousand two-sided
color postcards urging participation in the Nov. 20 rally and letting
people know how people can help the Local 2 workers.

We need volunteers to distribute the Nov. 20 leaflets and postcards
at the various rallies and events tomorrow (Friday the 19th) --
including the rallies throughout the Bay Area in support of the UFCW
grocery workers. If you want to help distribute the postcards, please
pick up a stack at Inkworks in Berkeley (510-845-7111, ask for
Charlie Hinton) or at ILWU Local 10 in San Francisco (415-776-8100).
Please call beforehand to make sure that postcards are still
Available.

Thanks, in advance, for your support in building this mobilization
for the locked-out hotel workers. Their fight is our fight. As the
motto of the International Longshore and Warehouse Workers proclaims:
"An Injury to One Is An Injury to All."

In solidarity,

Ed Rosario and Alan Benjamin
OWC Continuations Committee
San Francisco Labor Council
Open World Conference in
Defense of Trade Union Independence & Democratic Rights, c/o S.F. Labor
Council, 1188 Franklin St., #203, San Francisco, CA 94109


ActionLA
Action for World Liberation Everyday!
Tel: (213)403-0131
URL: http://www.ActionLA.org
e-mail: Info@ActionLA.org

Please Donate to ActionLA!
Send check pay to:
ActionLA/SEE
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South Pasadena CA 91030
(All donations are tax deductible)

Please join our ActionLA Listserv
go to: http://lists.riseup.net/www/subscribe/actionla
or send e-mail to: actionla-subscribe@lists.riseup.net

[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

PEACE!

Bay_Area_Activist list info: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/bay_area_activist
Archives: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/bay_area_activist/messages
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WHEN SPIDERS UNITE, THEY CAN TIE DOWN A LION -- Ethiopian Proverb

NOTE: In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. section 107, this material is
distributed without profit or payment to those who have expressed a prior
interest in receiving this information for non-profit research
andeducational purposes only. For more information go to:
http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/107.shtml

---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

3) Not in Our Name Bay Area
We need your hands, not your tongue!
Mass Mailing Party
Pizza and drinks to fuel processing of
national Not in Our Name fundraising letter
Monday, November 22
5:00 PM - 10:00 PM
Not in Our Name Office
3945 Opal Street, Oakland (map)
At 40th Street, near Broadway ­
a short walk from Macarthur BART.

This is a huge project. Thousands of envelopes to stuff, seal and
stamp! You need your hands, but not your tongue-there is absolutely
no licking involved. This is a great way for anybody (yes, you!) to step
right up and make a contribution to the anti-war movement.

About the EID stamp

For the fouth year, the postal office is issuing this stamp to mark
Ramadan, the month-long observance of fasting and prayer observed
by Muslims all over the world. This year Ramadan began October 26
and ends November 25 marked by the celebration of Eid-ul-Fitr, one
of the two major Muslim holidays. The second major holiday is Eid-ul-
Adha which is celebrated the day after Hajj (the big pilgrimage in Mecca).
Eid is an Arabic word and literally means a recurring event. In Islam it
denotes the festivals of ISLAM. Hence the message of "Eid Greetings"
on the stamp applies to both Eid-ul-Fitr and Eid-ul-Adha.

Not in our Name has learned that there have been reactionary calls
to boycott the stamp. As a gesture of solidarity with our Muslim
sisters and brothers under attack, we are using thousands of these
stamps for our mailing and encourage you to buy and use the stamp
on all your mail.

The Not in Our Name Project
needs your support!

Donate online
donate.notinourname.net

Or send your tax-deductible contribution today to:

Not in Our Name
3945 Opal Street, Oakland CA 94609
www.notinourname.net

phone: 510-601-8000
email: bayarea@notinourname.net
local: bayarea.notinourname.net

---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

4) ** Dahr Jamail's Iraq Dispatches **
As U.S. Forces Raided a Mosque
Dahr Jamail
BAGHDAD, Nov 19 (IPS)

BAGHDAD, Nov 19 (IPS) - An eyewitness commentary to IPS through a U.S.
raid on a Baghdad mosque Friday gives a vivid picture of what a
'successful raid' can be like.

U.S. soldiers raided the Abu Hanifa mosque in Baghdad during Friday
prayers, killing at least four and wounding up to 20 worshippers.

At 12:30 pm local time, just after Imam Shaikh Muayid al-Adhami
concluded his talk, about 50 U.S. soldiers with 20 Iraqi National
Guardsmen (ING) entered the mosque, a witness reported.

"Everyone was there for Friday prayers, when five Humvees and several
trucks carrying INGs entered," Abu Talat told IPS on phone from within
the mosque while the raid was in progress. "Everyone starting yelling
'Allahu Akbar' (God is the greatest) because they were frightened. Then
the soldiers started shooting the people praying!"

Talat said he was among a crowd of worshippers being held back at
gunpoint by U.S. soldiers. Loud chanting of 'Allahu Akbar' could be
heard in the background during his call. Women and children were
sobbing, he said.

"They have just shot and killed at least four of the people praying," he
said in a panicked voice. "At least 10 other people are wounded now. We
are on our bellies and in a very bad situation."

Talat gave his account over short phone calls. He said he was witnessing
a horrific scene.

"We were here praying and now there are 50 here with their guns on us,"
he said. "They are holding our heads to the ground, and everyone is in
chaos. This is the worst situation possible. They cannot see me talking
to you. They are roughing up a blind man now." He evidently could talk
no further then.

The soldiers later released women and children along with men who were
related to them. Abu Talat was released because a boy told him to
pretend to be his father.

Other witnesses gave similar accounts outside the mosque. "People were
praying and the Americans invaded the mosque," Abdulla Ra'ad Aziz from
the al-Adhamiya district of Baghdad told IPS. He had been released along
with his wife and children. "Why are they killing people for praying?"
He said that after the forces entered "they went to the back doors and
we heard so many bullets of the guns -- it was a gun bigger than a
Kalashnikov. There were wounded and dead, I saw them myself."

Some of the people who had been at prayer were ordered by soldiers to
carry the dead and wounded out of the mosque, he said.

"One Iraqi National Guardsmen held his gun on people and yelled, 'I will
kill you if you don't shut up'," said Rana Aziz, a mother who had been
trapped in the mosque.. "So they made everyone lie down, then people got
quiet, and they took the women and children out."

She said someone asked the soldiers if they would be made hostages. A
soldier used foul language and asked everyone to shut up, she said.
Suddenly, she laughed amid her tears. "The Americans have learnt how to
say shut up in Arabic, 'Inchev'."

Soldiers denied Iraqi Red Crescent ambulances and medical teams access
to the mosque. As doctors negotiated with U.S. soldiers outside, more
gunfire was heard from inside.

About 30 men were led out with hoods over their heads and their hands
tied behind them. Soldiers loaded them into a military vehicle and took
them away around 3.15 pm.

A doctor with the Iraqi Red Crescent confirmed four dead and nine
wounded worshippers. Pieces of brain were splattered on one of the walls
inside the mosque while large blood stains covered carpets at several
places.

A U.S. military spokesperson in Baghdad did not respond to requests for
information on the raid.

You are subscribed to the Dahr Jamail's email Iraq Dispatches
because you requested a subscription at some point.

You can visit http://dahrjamailiraq.com/email_list/ to subscribe or
unsubscribe to the email list.

Or, you can unsubscribe by sending an email to
iraq_dispatches-request@dahrjamailiraq.com and write unsubscribe in the
subject
or the body of the email.

Iraq_Dispatches mailing list
Iraq_Dispatches@dahrjamailiraq.com
http://lists.dahrjamailiraq.com/mailman/listinfo/iraq_dispatches

---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

5) +++++++++We need your help!+++++++++++
There is a DIRECT ACTION being organized around the
hotel lockout in San Francisco -- a community response
to a lockout of 4000 workers at 14 city hotels.

The management group that represents these
hotels is trying to starve San Francisco hotel workers
into a brutal contract. This contract will increase workers'
health care premiums from 10 to 273 dollars per month.
This will effectively strip many workers of their healthcare
by making it completely unaffordable. To add insult to injury
management is offering a pathetic 5-20 cent per hour raise.
Also at stake is the length of the contract. Management
wants to lock workers into a 5 year contract that leaves
them weak and isolated; the union wants to renegotiate
in two years when contracts expire in other cities around
the country. If you don't already know the
details about this battle, you can, and should read more
about it at: http://www.unitehere2.org/ and
http://www.indybay.org/labor/.

This action is being initiated by several affinity groups
associated with Direct Action to Stop the War. Although
we cannot divulge specifics about the action target, time, or
date via email, we can tell you the following:

* This will be a simple, non-violent direct action. It involves
no damage to property. NUMBERS will make this action
what it needs to be.

* It will happen SOON so if you want to get involved
you need to move quickly.

* Ours is a community response to the lockout. It is meant
to demonstrate to hotel management that an attack on
their workers is an attack on our entire community. We are
opening our own front in the battle for healthcare benefits, and
employers everywhere should take notice that San Francisco is
a union town, and healthcare is a human right that our community
will defend. We are serving notice that these hotels picked the
wrong city to attack workers in.

* Our demands for this action:
1) an immediate end to the lockout
2) no increase in worker contributions to the health care plan
3) contract length of two years.

* The hotel workers are pursuing their own strategies in this
battle. We are not here to critique the union's strategies, set an
example or lead them. Likewise, we are going to produce one
of what will hopefully be many supportive and diverse community
responses. We do not want to be divisive or argue about what
some monolithic community response should be.

* Our response doesn't begin or end with this battle, and
our messaging is our own. Our messaging will be powerful in its
simplicity, and will not be divisive. We view healthcare as a right
and our sights are set on future actions, and significant
escalation of actions in support of workers wherever they are being
attacked.

+++++++++++What we need from you++++++++++++++++

* Your participation: Hopefully, you, and many of your friends
will wish to be involved. And if so, WE NEED YOUR CONTACT
INFORMATION (cell phone, email, group affiliations) so we can
get in touch with you with info on where to meet. We need to know
if you will participate as an individual or group or groups. If
there are groups we need to know who the point or contact person is
for those groups. You should begin thinking about whether you
and your friends can risk arrest (red team), or whether you are
willing to be present and do support for the action (yellow team)
or even if you have some of both.

* Help organize: Do you know other people or groups who we can or
should contact directly or in person? If you have tactical experience
with direct action and would like to take a more involved role, let us know.

* Spread the word: Please pass this info on! [Please do NOT hit
your forward button -- copy the text into a new email window.]

* Come to an organizing meeting. There are meetings coming up
Wednesday and Thursday nights, and representation from
participating groups is important. Send us a phone number to call
you at if you want to come.

* RSVP!!! Direct your responses to cissl@hush.com and someone
will get in touch with you in short order. We really would like to
stress the need for phone numbers, as it is hard to organize a near
term action if we cannot get in touch with people in short order.

---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

6) Statement by the National Youth & Student Peace Coalition
(NYSPC)
On the morning of Thursday, October 28th, more than a dozen
armed federal agents(representing the Federal Bureau of
Investigation, the Joint Terrorism Task Force, and the
Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives)
raided the West Philadelphia home of three organizers
involved with the Student Environmental Action Coalition
(SEAC) and the National Youth & Student Peace Coalition (NYSPC).

While the search warrant employed by the agents was
specifically directed towards the activities of Philadelphia-based animal
rights group “Hugs for Puppies” and any communications it has had with the
Stop
Huntingdon Animal Cruelty (SHAC) campaign, all residents of the house were
questioned by the agents and private property belonging to several residents
was seized.

Two of the seized items included the personal laptop and day-planner of
Jason
Fults, a SEAC/NYSPC organizer who is in no way involved with the groups
mentioned in the warrant. Fults’ computer contained copies of organizing
materials belonging to both NYSPC and SEAC.

We are deeply concerned about the ramifications of this unjust seizure, and
are
sending this communication out to our constituency for two reasons:

1) We believe that the individuals who have expressed an interest in working
with our coalition deserve to know that their right to privacy is being
endangered by the unjust (and potentially illegal) activities of the federal
government.

2) We are concerned that this raid is but one skirmish in an ongoing war on
civil liberties being waged by the U.S. government in the name of fighting
“terrorism.” While neither NYSPC nor SEAC is involved with the SHAC
campaign,
we join all activists in our strong opposition to the repression of dissent
and
the increasing efforts to coerce information and intimidate activists. In
May
of 2004, seven prominent SHAC activists were arrested and charged with
violations of the 1992 Title 18 “Animal Enterprise Protection Act,” which
contains subsection 43 on “animal enterprise terrorism.” The "SHAC 7" are
currently facing a combined 23 years in federal prison and over a million
dollars in fines for running a website which reports on direct action
against
the vivisection company Huntingdon Life Sciences and its business partners.
For more information about the SHAC 7 and this ongoing case, visit:
www.shac7.com. Regardless of where one stands on the issue of animal rights
and the employment of direct action as an activist tactic, this instance
demonstrates clearly that an attack on the civil liberties of anyone is an
injury to everyone.

The victims of the October 28th raid are currently being represented by the
law
firm of Kairys, Rudovsky, Epstein & Messing, who are making every effort to
expedite the return of the confiscated property and to assure that any
copies
of the contents of Fults’ computer are destroyed. Due to the lack of
responsiveness by the FBI thus far, our legal representation will begin
pursuing litigation early next week.

We deeply appreciate the support we have received from our allies thus far,
and
will keep you informed as the situation develops. For more information or
to
learn how you can support the victims of this raid, contact Jason Fults at
215-222-4711 or jason@seac.org.

--
National Youth & Student Peace Coalition (NYSPC)
PO Box 31909
Philadelphia, PA 19104
info@nyspc.net
www.nyspc.net
215-222-4711

_______________________________________________
Nyspc mailing list
Nyspc@seac.org
http://seac.org/mailman/listinfo/nyspc_seac.org

posted 4:23 PM  0 comments

---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

1) ** Dahr Jamail's Iraq Dispatches **
Media Repression in 'Liberated' Land
Dahr Jamail
BAGHDAD, Nov 18 (IPS)

2) The Streets of Baghdad
By Dahr Jamail
Nov. 18
http://dahrjamailiraq.com/weblog/archives/dispatches/000123.php#more

3) Lessons Of The November 2004 Elections
& Perspectives For The Future
Sunday December 12, 2004, 7:00 PM
522 Valencia St./16th St., San Francisco
Donation Requested $3.00

4) THE WORLD SAYS NO TO WAR:
Dear Friends,
Below is a proposed agenda for the Brazil Social Forum's
Anti-War Assembly. It is critical that we get nuclear
abolition on the agenda. Right now there are three items:
The Anti-War Assembly will be held in the WSF with the proposed
schedule:
No US Bases/Militarization Strategy Session--Jan 27, 9-12am
Global Anti-War Movement Strategy Session--Jan 27, 2-6pm
Global Anti-War Assembly--Jan 27, 7-9pm

5) Marine Officers See Risks in Reducing U.S. Troops in Falluja
MILITARY ASSESSMENT
By ERIC SCHMITT and ROBERT F. WORTH
WASHINGTON
November 18, 2004
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/11/18/international/middleeast/18troops.html?hp&
ex=1100840400&en=6b27992e86a60966&ei=5094&partner=homepage

6) Subject: Venceremos Brigade Faces Prosecution
To: Nicaragua Network Hotline
The Nicaragua Network has received this important
information which we thought you would want to know.
Venceremos Brigade Faces Charges for Constitutionally
Protected Activities
Tue, 16 Nov 2004
(PLEASE PASS THIS ON TO ANY MEDIA AND / OR INTERESTED
PERSONS. TR)

7) Survey: World Fears for Future
By Robert Evans
GENEVA (Reuters)
Thu Nov 18, 2004 08:42 AM ET
http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?type=topNews&storyID=6854546&src=eD
ialog/GetContent§ion=news

8) Dollar melts but Snow stays firm
We will not intervene, insists US treasury chief
Ashley Seager
The Guardian
Thursday, November 18, 2004
http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/story/0,,1353645,00.html

9) Massive new round of cuts in Detroit Public Schools
By Arnetta Eubanks
World Socialist Web Site
www.wsws.org
18 November 2004
http://www.wsws.org/articles/2004/nov2004/detr-n18.shtml#top

10) Margaret Hassan's Suspected Execution Will Be Seen As
'Proof' of Evil
By Robert Fisk
Thursday, November 18, 2004
http://www.commondreams.org/views04/1117-29.htm

11) World on Alert as Over 15,000 Species Face Extinction
By Sonny Inbaraj
BANGKOK
Wednesday, November 17, 2004 by InterPress Service
http://www.commondreams.org/headlines04/1117-23.htm

12) Statement in Response to the Intimidation of Columbia
University Professor Joseph Massad, Modern Arab Politics
and Intellectual History
614 Kent Hall
212-854-4722
jam25@columbia.edu
Joseph Massad
http://www.columbia.edu/cu/mealac/faculty/massad/

13) The American Friends Service Committee and the
Alternatives to War forum invite you to the following forum:
"THE OCCUPATION IS THE REASON"
Noam Bahat & Shimri Zamaret
TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 23, 2004, 7:00 PM
Quaker Meeting House
65 9th St., San Francisco, CA
(between Market and Mission Civic Center BART and MUNI stops)

14) Unions Resume Debate Over Merging and Power
By STEVEN GREENHOUSE
November 18, 2004
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/11/18/national/18labor.html?oref=login

15) Possible New Mad Cow Case Is Found in the U.S.
By DONALD G. McNEIL Jr.
November 18, 2004
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/11/18/national/19cowcnd.html?hp&ex=1100840400&en
=6dfbb1c3e752b246&ei=5094&partner=homepage

---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

1) ** Dahr Jamail's Iraq Dispatches **
Media Repression in 'Liberated' Land
Dahr Jamail
BAGHDAD, Nov 18 (IPS)


BAGHDAD, Nov 18 (IPS) - Journalists are increasingly being detained and
threatened by the U.S.-installed interim government in Iraq. Media have
been stopped particularly from covering recent horrific events in Fallujah.

The "100 Orders" penned by former U.S. administrator in Iraq L. Paul
Bremer include Order 65 passed March 20 to establish an Iraqi
communications and media commission. This commission has powers to
control the media because it has complete control over licensing and
regulating telecommunications, broadcasting, information services and
all other media establishments.

On June 28 when the United States handed over power to a 'sovereign'
Iraqi interim government, Bremer simply passed on the authority to Ayad
Allawi, the U.S.-installed interim prime minister who has had
longstanding ties with the British intelligence service MI6 and the CIA.

A glaring instance is the curbs placed on the Qatar-based TV channel
al-Jazeera.

Within days of the 'handover' of power to an interim Iraqi government
last summer, the Baghdad office of al-Jazeera was raided and closed by
security forces from the interim government. The network was accused of
inaccurate reporting and banned initially for one month from reporting
out of Iraq.

The ban was then extended "indefinitely." On Tuesday this week the
interim government announced that any al-Jazeera journalist found
reporting in Iraq would be detained.

The al-Jazeera office in Baghdad had been bombed by a U.S. warplane
during the invasion of March last year. The TV channel had given their
exact coordinates to the Pentagon to avoid such an occurrence. One of
their journalists was killed in the bombing.

Al-Jazeera now broadcasts a daily apology "because we cannot cover Iraq
news well since our offices have been closed for over three months by
orders from the interim government."

Other instances of political repression abound. The media commission
sent out an order recently asking news organisations to "stick to the
government line on the U.S.-led offensive in Fallujah or face legal
action." The warning was sent on the letterhead of Allawi.

The letter also asked media to "set aside space in your news coverage to
make the position of the Iraqi government, which expresses the
aspirations of most Iraqis, clear."

Last week a journalist for the al-Arabiya network was detained by U.S.
forces outside Fallujah when he attempted to enter the besieged city.

Citing another al-Arabiya correspondent as its source, the U.S.-based
Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) said the Arabic satellite station
had lost contact with Abdel Kader Saadi, a reporter and photographer
living and working in the Sunni Muslim city, on Nov. 11.

French freelance photographer Corentin Fleury was detained by the U.S.
military with his interpreter, 28 year-old Bahktiyar Abdulla Hadad when
they were leaving Fallujah just before the siege of the city began.

They had worked in the city for nine days leading up to the siege, and
were held for five days in a military detention facility outside the city.

"They were very nervous and they asked us what we saw, and looked over
all my photos, asking me questions about them," Fleury told IPS. "They
asked where the weapons were, what the neighborhoods were like, all of
this."

Fleury said he had photographed homes destroyed by U.S. warplanes, and
life in the city leading up to the siege.

"They wanted information from me regarding the situation in Fallujah,
but they have yet to release my translator," he said. "I made a silly
photo of him holding a sniper rifle, and I think this is why they are
holding him. I've been trying to get information for the last five days
on him, and the French embassy has been trying to get him out, different
journalists he's worked with are sending letters, but there has been no
luck so far."


You can visit http://dahrjamailiraq.com/email_list/
to subscribe or unsubscribe to the email list.

Or, you can unsubscribe by sending an email to
iraq_dispatches-request@dahrjamailiraq.com
and write unsubscribe in the subject or the body of the email.

Iraq_Dispatches mailing list
Iraq_Dispatches@dahrjamailiraq.com
http://lists.dahrjamailiraq.com/mailman/listinfo/iraq_dispatches

---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

2) The Streets of Baghdad
By Dahr Jamail
http://dahrjamailiraq.com/weblog/archives/dispatches/000123.php#more

We had our daily car bomb today when a suicide bomber drove his car
into a US patrol as it passed near the Yarmouk police station. Several
Iraqis were killed, with no report yet on US casualties. I felt the rumble
even though I was on a street far away from the blast-at least 5 miles
distant.

Walking and driving on the streets Baghdad I find myself in a sea of
chaos. Traffic is mayhem for many reasons. The current fuel crisis
being the lead cause. Lines at petrol stations stretch for miles at some
of the stations. A common scene at these lines is that of people pushing
their cars because they are already out of gas or to save what precious
little may be left in their tank.

The fuel lines that stretch in the busier parts of the city cause huge
snarls of traffic as it is squeezed into one of the remaining lanes left
open.

Another reason is military patrols and searches. Oftentimes when we are
caught in crawling traffic, we come upon several Humvees blocking one
of the lanes as they are searching a store or guarding troops who are
doing a small foot patrol.

Iraqi reaction to military vehicles in the city continues to be cold.
Actually,
more than cold-it has become notably hostile.

I was walking with my interpreter along one of the main streets of Baghdad
when a couple of different times patrols rolled by of two Humvees with
guns pointing out the windows at people and the machine gunners atop
them swinging their guns back and forth at the rooftops of buildings. Each
time men nearby said to nobody in particular, "Get off our streets with your
guns," "You aren't here to protect us you bastards," or as one man laughed
to his friend, "Can't you see we have no weapons of mass destruction?
Now go home!"

A little later a group of two white SUV's full of (I presume) CIA and/or
mercenaries followed by a GMC with several large antennae rolled down
the road with their guns pointing out the tinted windows at pedestrians.
As the GMC passed, the back was open because inside was literally a
machine gun bunker-a black metal shield covered the opening, with a
small rectangle on the top portion which had the barrel of a large caliber
machine gun hanging out of it.

I noted several Iraqis around me shaking their heads who watched this
entourage pass.

Several blocks away several large explosions are heard in the general
area from which they'd come.

Highways around Baghdad are filled with places where the guardrails
have been mashed down by tanks . Other places find destroyed
overpasses . The point is there is no reconstruction of the damage.

Later this evening a friend stopped by my room to visit. He is
a Christian man who had hoped that the attack on Fallujah would
have quieted the resistance.

But he is sickened by the US-installed interim government, and
their utter futility to fix anything in his war-torn occupied country.

He said, "The government only cares about themselves. They are
obviously not here to help Iraq. It is such a simple thing to fix
a hole in the street, you can just bring asphalt and fill it with
a shovel...and they cannot even do this. You can see the city
is rubbish...so how can they fix the big problems like the fighting?
Fallujah is now a disaster and the resistance is everywhere around
Iraq. They can do nothing because they are powerless. There is no
army or police here worth anything. This is worse than the war in
Lebanon. There is no solution."

Posted by Dahr_Jamail at November 18, 2004 03:50 PM

---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

3) Lessons Of The November 2004 Elections
& Perspectives For The Future
Sunday December 12, 2004, 7:00 PM
522 Valencia St./16th St., San Francisco
Donation Requested $3.00

What are the lessons of the election and how do we go forward today. These
are the issues that will be addressed at this discussion. The trade unions
which spent hundreds of millions of dollars to support Kerry are now left
with nothing to show for it and Bush is intent on pushing privatizaton,
more repression and expanding the wars in the Middle East.
What should working people do to challenge these policies and how can the
Million Worker March movement be used as a vehicle to build an independent
working class movement.

Join us in this important debate.

Sponsored by
Peace And Freedom Labor Committee
Steve Zeltzer For Supervisor Campaign Committee

Speakers:
Steve Zeltzer, Candidate For SF Board Of Supervisors District 9
Tom Lacey, North State Chair Peace & Freedom Party Central Committee

For further information contact
stevefor9@pacbell.net (415)695-1369
tlacey@uesf.org (415)647-3868

---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

4) THE WORLD SAYS NO TO WAR:
Dear Friends,
Below is a proposed agenda for the Brazil Social Forum's
Anti-War Assembly. It is critical that we get nuclear
abolition on the agenda. Right now there are three items:
The Anti-War Assembly will be held in the WSF with the proposed
schedule:
No US Bases/Militarization Strategy Session--Jan 27, 9-12am
Global Anti-War Movement Strategy Session--Jan 27, 2-6pm
Global Anti-War Assembly--Jan 27, 7-9pm

Please tell them about the Abolition Now Campaign during this 60th
anniversary year of the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki and how
we are working with the Mayors of those cities to enroll Mayors all
over the world in the Emergency Campaign to Ban Nuclear Weapons.
Tell them about the May 1st Disarmament march and rally in New York
prior to the start of the Non-Proliferation Treaty Review, where it was
promised that the nuclear weapons states would get rid of their
weapons. Instead, the US used nuclear weapons as an excuse to go
to war in Iraq, and is now threatening Iran and North Korea. And we
now see Putin following the bad example of the US, testing new
nuclear missiles. Ask them to feature this issue on the agenda.
We may be able to have Mayor Akiba from Hiroshima at the meeting.
Please do what you can to make Abolition Now a world wide campaign
with the widest possible support. See www.abolitionnow.org And
please work on your own Mayors and Heads of States to come to New
York for this important Conference. Many thanks. Alice Slater


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Date: Fri, 19 Nov 2004 00:28:47 +0700
From: Mary Lou Malig
To: jakarta peace ,
beirut list
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Subject: [global-peace-movement] WSF Anti-War Assembly * FSM Asamblea
Anti-Guerra
X-Virus-Scanned: by amavisd-new-20030616-p10 at riseup.net
*Apologies for cross-postings*
*Disculpen si reciben estos documentos varias veces*
(español mas abajo)
Dear Friends,
Greetings from Sao Paolo and Bangkok!
We are writing to invite you to send comments and proposals for the Anti-War
Assembly and related activities at the coming World Social Forum (WSF) in
Porto Alegre, Brasil this January 26-31, 2005.
Please find attached the proposal for the Anti-War Assembly and the letter
from the Alianza Social Continental/Hemispheric Social Alliance explaining
the new way that the WSF will be organized and how others can get involved.
Both documents are in English and Spanish.
We are requesting everyone to please send in their comments and proposals by
Monday, November 29.
We look forward to hearing from you.
In solidarity,
Gonzalo Berrón and Mary Lou Malig
Hemispheric Social Alliance
and Focus on the Global South
Gonzalo: secr.asc@cut.org.br
Mary Lou: marylou@focusweb.org
=================================
Amigos y Amigas
Saludos desde São Paulo y Bankok!
Les escribimos para invitarlos a enviar comentarios y propuestas para la
Asamblea Anti-Guerra y otras actividades vinculadas al tema a realizarse
durante el Foro Social Mundial en Porto Alegre, Brasil, los próximos 26 a
31 de enero de 2005.
Por favor, lean el archivo adjunto que contiene la propuesta para la
Asamblea Antiguerra y la carta que la Alianza Social Continental envió
explicando el nuevo formato organizativo del FSM y como involucrarse en él.
Ambos documentos están en inglés y español.
Les pedimos a todos y todas que por favor nos envien sus comentarios y
propuestas hasta el lunes 29 de noviembre
Nos despedimos a la espera de sus respuestas.
Saludos solidarios
Gonzalo Berrón y Mary Lou Malig
Alianza Social Continental
Focus on the Global South
Gonzalo: secr.asc@cut.org.br
Mary Lou: marylou@focusweb.org
--
Focus on the Global South (FOCUS)
c/o CUSRI, Chulalongkorn University
Bangkok 10330 THAILAND
Tel: 662 218 7363/7364/7365/7383
Fax: 662 255 9976
Email: marylou@focusweb.org
Website: www.focusweb.org


Everything about this list:
[conf->wwsympa_url]/info/[list->name]
To unsubscribe, send mail to:
[list->name]-unsubscribe@[list->host]

Alice Slater
Global Resource Action Center for the Environment (GRACE)
215 Lexington Ave., Room 1001
New York, NY 10016
tel: (212) 726-9161
fax: (212) 726-9160
email: aslater@gracelinks.org
http://www.gracelinks.org
GRACE is a member of Abolition 2000, a global network for the elimination of
nuclear weapons.
www.abolition2000.org
www.abolitionnow.org

---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

5) Marine Officers See Risks in Reducing U.S. Troops in Falluja
MILITARY ASSESSMENT
By ERIC SCHMITT and ROBERT F. WORTH
WASHINGTON
November 18, 2004
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/11/18/international/middleeast/18troops.html?hp&
ex=1100840400&en=6b27992e86a60966&ei=5094&partner=homepage

WASHINGTON, Nov. 17 - Senior Marine intelligence officers in Iraq
are warning that if American troop levels in the Falluja area are
significantly reduced during reconstruction there, as has been
planned, insurgents in the region will rebound from their defeat.
The rebels could thwart the retraining of Iraqi security forces,
intimidate the local population and derail elections set for
January, the officers say.

They have further advised that despite taking heavy casualties
in the weeklong battle, the insurgents will continue to grow in
number, wage guerrilla attacks and try to foment unrest among
Falluja's returning residents, emphasizing that expectations for
improved conditions have not been met.

The pessimistic analysis is contained in a seven-page classified
report prepared by intelligence officers in the First Marine
Expeditionary Force, or I MEF, last weekend as the offensive
in Falluja was winding down. The assessment was distributed
to senior Marine and Army officers in Iraq, where one officer
called it "brutally honest."

Marine commanders marshaled about 12,000 marines and
soldiers, and roughly 2,500 Iraqi forces for the Falluja campaign,
but they always expected to send thousands of American troops
back to other locations in Iraq eventually, after the major fighting
in Falluja. This intelligence assessment suggests that such
a move would be risky.

Some senior military officers in Iraq and Washington who have
read the report have cautioned that the assessment is a subjective
judgment by some Marine intelligence officers near the front
lines and does not reflect the views of all intelligence officials
and senior commanders in Iraq.

"The assessment of the enemy is a worst-case assessment," Brig.
Gen. John DeFreitas III of the Army, the senior military intelligence
officer in Iraq, said of the Marine report in a telephone interview
on Wednesday. "We have no intention of creating a vacuum and
walking away from Falluja."

The report offers a stark counterpoint to more upbeat assessments
voiced by military commanders in the wake of the Falluja operation,
which they say completed its goals well ahead of schedule and with
fewer American and Iraqi civilian casualties than expected.

Although the resistance crumbled in the face of the offensive, the
report warns that if American forces do not remain in sufficient
numbers for some time, "The enemy will be able to effectively
defeat I MEF's ability to accomplish its primary objectives of
developing an effective Iraqi security force and setting the
conditions for successful Iraqi elections.

The American military and Iraqi government are poised to pour
humanitarian aid and conduct reconstruction efforts in the battle-
scarred city, most of whose nearly 300,000 residents fled before
the fighting began last week.

"The view from the tactical level has been generally more
pessimistic," said one senior Marine officer in Washington,
referring to the view from the ground. "They may well be right,
but I would also say that tactical intel is almost always more dour
than that done at the strategic level."

Details of the report and some of its verbatim findings were
provided to The New York Times this week by four active-duty or
retired military officers in Iraq and Washington who have read the
report or heard descriptions of it.

The assessment draws on intelligence gathered in the Falluja
operation and 10 intelligence reports compiled in the last six
months in the Marines' area of responsibility in Iraq, principally
Al Anbar and Babil Provinces, officials said.

Senior officers said the intelligence report was meant to help top
Marine commanders in Iraq, including Lieut. Gen. John F. Sattler
and Maj. Gen. Richard F. Natonski, and their military superiors in
Baghdad, decide how many American forces to keep in the Falluja-
Ramadi area when the offensive is over and reconstruction efforts
are in full swing.

Senior officers have said that they would keep a sizable American
military presence in and around Falluja in the long reconstruction
phase that has just begun, until sufficiently trained and equipped
Iraqi forces could take the lead in providing security.

"It will take a security presence for a while until a well-trained Iraqi
security force can take over the presence in Falluja and maintain
security so that the insurgents don't come back, as they have tried
to do in every one of the cities that we have thrown them out of,"
Gen. George W. Casey Jr., the top American commander in Iraq,
said on Nov. 8.

American commanders have expressed disappointment in some
of the Iraqis they have been training, especially members of the
Iraqi police force. Other troops have performed well, the officers
have said.

The commanders are looking at a range of options on how many
troops to keep in the area, depending on the security situation
and how quickly Iraqi forces can take control. But if many American
troops and the better-trained specialized Iraqi forces, like the
commando and special police units, are committed to Falluja for
a long time, they will not be available to go elsewhere in Iraq,
possibly creating critical shortfalls.

Already, hundreds of American troops in a battalion of an Army
Stryker Brigade in the Falluja area have been returned to Mosul
in the north to help quell insurgent attacks there.

The Marine report paints a generally gloomy picture of the
insurgents' expected reaction if American forces are reduced
too much during the critical reconstruction.

"At current projected force levels, the enemy will be able to
maintain a sufficient level of intimidation of the Al Anbar and
Babil Province populations and infiltrate or otherwise further
degrade the capabilities" of the Iraqi security forces in western
and south-central Iraq, where the Marines operate, the report says.

The insurgency has shown "outstanding resilience" and the
militants' willingness to fight is bolstered by four main factors,
the report says. One, the tribal and insurgent leaders understand
the limitations of the United Nations, American elections and
internal Iraqi government politics, and try to exploit them. Two,
they are skilled at turning battlefield defeats into symbolic victories,
just as Saddam Hussein did after the 1991 Persian Gulf war.
Insurgents will make the battle of Falluja into an excellent
recruiting tool, the report says.

Three, the insurgents are dedicated propagandists who use
the Internet and other means to feed exaggerated and contrived
reporting from the battlefield to jihadists in Saudi Arabia and
elsewhere in the Middle East. Al Jazeera and Arab media then
pick it up, the report says.

Finally, the report says, the insurgents believe they are more
willing to suffer casualties than the American military and public,
and "will continue to find refuge among sympathetic tribes and
former regime members."

The report predicts that insurgents will try to disrupt voter
registration, which the officers say is already two weeks behind
in Al Anbar Province, and that elections in the region will be
cast into doubt.

Officers who have read the report played down its dire warnings
and pointed out several successes noted in the document. The
report, for instance, says that the Falluja operation achieved
its basic goal, to deny the insurgents their largest sanctuary
in Iraq, and has forced the network of Jordanian militant Abu
Musab al-Zarqawi to move to a new base of operations in the
country, probably Mosul.

The report also says that the number of attacks in Ramadi, the
capital of Al Anbar Province, has declined by 40 percent in the
last few weeks, after security was heightened in the region,
according to Maj. Douglas M. Powell, a Marine spokesman in
Washington.

Eric Schmitt reported from Washington for this article, and
Robert F. Worth from Falluja.

Copyright 2004 The New York Times

---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

6) Subject: Venceremos Brigade Faces Prosecution
To: Nicaragua Network Hotline
The Nicaragua Network has received this important
information which we thought you would want to know.
Venceremos Brigade Faces Charges for Constitutionally
Protected Activities
Tue, 16 Nov 2004
(PLEASE PASS THIS ON TO ANY MEDIA AND / OR INTERESTED
PERSONS. TR)

***

November 13, 2004
Press Advisory
For Immediate Release

For more information:
Venceremos Brigade
PO Box 5202
Englewood, NJ
07631
vbrigade@aol.com

Local contact: K. Karlson
kat2kat234@aol.com
917-969-0386

Tue, 16 Nov 2004
(PLEASE PASS THIS ON TO ANY MEDIA AND /
OR INTERESTED PERSONS. TR)

For more information:
Venceremos Brigade
PO Box 5202
Englewood, NJ
07631
vbrigade@aol.com

Local contact: K. Karlson
kat2kat234@aol.com
917-969-0386

Venceremos Brigade Faces Charges for Constitutionally Protected Activities:

Treasury Department takes first step in prosecuting groups who travel to
Cuba in opposition to U.S. policy.

New York, NY...In October, the Venceremos Brigade (VB) received a
Requirement to Furnish Information (RFI) from the US Treasury Department's
Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC). The RFI is phase one in the
enforcement of laws that restrict the constitutionally protected right to
travel to Cuba.

The OFAC letter calls the VB a "travel service provider." The VB is not a
travel service provider. The VB is an anti-imperialist education project
that works to develop friendship with the Cuban people. VB activities
include education and consciousness-raising
around issues related to Cuba such as democracy, social justice and the
role of US foreign policy. The VB affirms the right of the Cuban people to
determine their own history without outside interference. The VB travels to
Cuba without requesting a license,
pointing out that the restrictions on travel imposed by the US government
are a violation of the US Constitution and of international law.

OFAC's letter to the VB is an act of intimidation that is in line with the
Bush administration's escalated attacks on Cuba, and travel to Cuba. While
heralding a "war on terror", the Bush administration is increasing its
attacks on Cuba, a nation that has posed no threat to the United States.

Brigadista Bonnie Massey points out that "between 1990 and 2003 OFAC
investigated only 93 cases of international terrorism, compared to 10,683
investigations into unlicensed travel to Cuba." Questioning the intent of
the unconstitutional restrictions, Massey continues: "What is wrong with
finding out the truth about Cuba? Why is OFAC trying to prevent us from
going to see Cuba with our own
eyes?"

While in Cuba, VB participants work side by side with Cuban people,
obtaining first hand knowledge about life on the island. When they return
home, VB participants share their experiences, educating people in the US
about the Cuban people, their way of life,
and their social, political and economic system.

Brigadista Ed Felton states: "To the Cuban people, bringing the truth about
Cuba back to the U.S. is one of the most important parts of our effort. The
distorted picture of Cuba that's presented in the U.S outrages the Cuban
people. Cubans want U.S. citizens to travel to Cuba and see it for
themselves."

"The VB will continue to stand up for our constitutional right to do so,
until the restrictions are lifted. The overwhelming majority of
American people, including both Houses of Congress are opposed to the
travel restrictions."

In the face of prosecution, the VB stands firmly on the ground of their
civil rights convictions, citing Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., who said:
"...one has a moral responsibility to disobey unjust laws." As Brigadista
Tshaka Barrows says: "We are ready. No illegitimate letter or any other act
of intimidation by the government can undermine the strength of our unity."

---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

7) Survey: World Fears for Future
By Robert Evans
GENEVA (Reuters)
Thu Nov 18, 2004 08:42 AM ET
http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?type=topNews&storyID=6854546&src=eD
ialog/GetContent§ion=news

GENEVA (Reuters) - People around the globe largely mistrust
their political leaders and nearly half fear the world will be
less safe for their children, according to a survey issued on
Thursday.

The survey, carried out in 60 countries by the Gallup
International polling organization for the Swiss-based World
Economic Forum, also found that business leaders have a better
image than the politicians -- but not by a huge margin.

Worldwide, 63 percent of the 50,000 people questioned
believe politicians are dishonest while 43 percent think the
same term applies to business leaders, according to the survey,
titled "The Voice of the People."

Some 52 percent feel politicians behave unethically, and 39
percent believe the same of business chiefs. But while 39
percent think politicians are not capable or competent, only 22
percent viewed their business counterparts in the same way.

Least trusted by their peoples, the survey indicated, are
the political leaders of Latin America, West Asia and Africa
with dishonesty ratings of 87 percent for the first, 84 percent
for the second and 82 percent for the third.

Although in Western Europe as a whole 46 percent of the
survey sample described their politicians as dishonest, in
Germany 76 percent held that view, while 70 percent of Germans
thought business leaders were dishonest too.

By contrast, across the border in France, where cynicism
about political life has been long viewed from outside as rife,
only 36 percent saw their politicians as dishonest and only 27
percent described them as unethical.

IRAQ WAR EFFECT

In Britain, 72 percent feel that "politicians respond to
people more powerful than themselves" -- possibly reflecting
disapproval of Prime Minister Tony Blair's support for
President Bush over Iraq, survey compilers said.

The figure for Western Europe as a whole was 58 percent.

In North America, covering the United States and Canada, 50
percent of the sample felt political leaders are dishonest, and
47 percent believe business leaders behave unethically. The
survey as issued by the Forum gave no other details or
breakdown for the two countries.

It said Ecuador returned the highest dishonesty rating, 96
percent, followed by Mexico with 93 percent, Nigeria with 92
percent, Peru, Bolivia and India with 91 percent -- and new
European Union member Poland with 90 percent.

At the other end of the scale, only three percent of those
surveyed in Singapore saw their political leaders as dishonest,
12 percent in the Netherlands and 13 percent in Malaysia.

The survey found 45 percent of the sample around the globe
-- and 46 percent in the United States -- predicting a less
safe world for future generations, of whom nearly one third
thought life would be "a lot less safe" in years to come.

In Western Europe, this view was expressed by 55 percent of
the sample -- up to 63 percent in Germany.

But in Africa, scene of some of the worst natural disasters
and civil conflicts of the last decades, optimism was stronger
with 50 percent saying the world would be safer and only 30
percent expecting less security.

(c) Copyright Reuters 2004.

---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

8) Dollar melts but Snow stays firm
We will not intervene, insists US treasury chief
Ashley Seager
The Guardian
Thursday, November 18, 2004
http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/story/0,,1353645,00.html

The dollar plunged to an all-time low against the euro yesterday
as the Bush administration signaled it was not prepared to take any
action to prevent the slide.

The greenback has resumed its fall since George Bush was re-elected
and is down 40% against the euro over the past two years, reflecting
growing concerns in currency markets over the giant US budget and
current account deficits.

But US treasury secretary John Snow told the Royal Institute of
International Affairs that his country's current account deficit was
a problem for other nations as well and signaled his opposition
to any kind of intervention to put a floor under the currency.

"The issue of the current account deficit is a shared responsibility
not just one for the US," he said.

He added that the US intended to do its bit to eradicate the current
account deficit by reducing its budget deficit over the next few years.
Other countries, particularly in Europe, had to make a contribution
by boosting their economies and attracting investment capital which
is now flowing into the US and exacerbating its current account
problem. "We would be interested in seeing Europe grow faster ...
There is unbalanced growth which is contributing to this problem
of current account deficits," he said.

As he spoke, the dollar bust through the $1.30 to the euro level
to set a record low of $1.3047. It also set a nine-year low against
a basket of major currencies and a seven-month low of 104.1
against the yen. The pound rose to $1.8628.

But Mr Snow dismissed speculation that the major economic
powers may intervene in currency markets and buy dollars: "The
history of efforts to impose non-market values on currencies is
at best unrewarding ... we believe in open, free, competitive
currency markets."

But in spite of questioning he reiterated that Washington's
long-stated policy of wanting a strong dollar remained intact:
"The policy is the policy."

However, currency markets believe that Washington is happy to
see the dollar fall back and help reduce the current account deficit
by making imports more expensive and exports cheaper, so they
took his comments as a signal to sell the dollar. "He gave no
impression that dollar policy will change and that gave a green
light to dollar sales," said Tim Fox, currency strategist at National
Australia Bank in London.

Mr Snow said he was optimistic that China would soon free up the
renminbi, which Beijing pegs at an artificially low rate to the dollar
to boost its own exports. It runs a huge current account surplus
with the US and freeing up its currency is seen as a way to reducing
the US deficit.

Mr Snow said he was "very optimistic" that China would float its
currency in the next few years, but did not specify a date. "They
have agreed to do it but say they need a little more time. We are
saying 'let's get on with it'."

Chinese officials are likely to come under more pressure to revalue
the renminbi at a meeting of the Group of 20 leading industrialised
and developing countries this weekend.

Mr Snow said that with China and India becoming so much more
significant, dialogue about economic issues needed to be widened
beyond traditional meetings of the G7 industrialised nations.

---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

9) Massive new round of cuts in Detroit Public Schools
By Arnetta Eubanks
World Socialist Web Site
www.wsws.org
18 November 2004
http://www.wsws.org/articles/2004/nov2004/detr-n18.shtml#top

Detroit Public Schools has announced a massive new round of cuts,
including the elimination of 4,000 jobs and the closing of 25 to 40
schools. In a press conference on Tuesday, Detroit Public Schools
CEO Kenneth Bunley said the cuts were being made to comply with
a state law to balance the budget by the end of the fiscal year in
June 2005.

The 4,000 job cuts are in addition to the 2,100 jobs eliminated
since April of last year. The new school closings will add to the
21 schools that have shut their doors over the past five years.
Ninety teaching positions will be immediately terminated, with
another 50 to be cut next semester.

The announcement elicited a predictable response from Detroit
Federation of Teachers (DFT) President Janna Garrison who, in an
attempt to reassure teachers increasingly angry and disgusted
over the state of affairs, claimed that the jobs losses would be
absorbed through attrition-buyouts of high seniority employees
and retirements.

In reality, the new round of cuts places in jeopardy the continued
existence of a public school system in the one-time capital of the
world's automotive industry. The school closures will result in both
student and teacher dislocations. Students will have to travel on
an increasingly decrepit public transportation system to arrive at
school on time. Teachers will be shunted about, bumping those
with less seniority to different schools. Some schools and
classrooms will become more crowded. These hardships, as
well as the decision of some families to enroll their children in
charter schools, will further impact the dropout rate. And all
this may occur in the middle of the school year!

At Tuesday's press conference, Burnley announced the cuts in
a dry, matter-of-fact manner, as though this was a business
decision (which, in fact, it was), giving no specifics concerning
which schools would be closed and which jobs would be
eliminated. Feigning ignorance, he stated that none of the
experts predicted either the continued drop in enrollment or
the payment of $11 million to the state for the teachers'
retirement fund, an absurd admission given the fact that
a vast number of Detroit's teachers are approaching or have
already reached retirement age.

He then cited statistics that indicate enrollment has fallen by
more than 20 percent, from 175,988 in the 1996-1997
academic year to 147,000 today. The budget deficit, he claims,
includes a whopping $197 million for the year ending June 30,
2005, and a $48.7 million deficit from the 2003-2004 fiscal year.

Other plans to balance the budget include nonunion employees,
such as principals, paying 20 percent of their benefit premiums;
increasing the cost of co-payments on prescriptions; and the
issuance of deficit-reduction bonds. Burnley is also requesting
that the $15 million supplemental funding received from the
state takeover of the school system in 1999 be maintained.
But the state representatives of both parties, as well as the
current governor, Democrat Jennifer Granholm, have already
opposed any bailout for Detroit's schools, especially since
voters in the city overwhelmingly decided in the November
election to have the right to elect their own school board. As
one lawmaker put it: "They want control again. They're going
to have to live with the system that everyone else in the state
has." The legislators are afraid that other school districts which
face the same crisis as Detroit will also want to issue deficit-
reduction bonds.

The announced cuts are the latest in a series of political and
budgetary attacks on public education in Detroit that have
greatly weakened the school system over that past two decades.
Even when money was available for capital improvements that
resulted in the building of eight new elementary schools and
two new middle schools in the mid-1990s, the system was
plagued by a combination of incompetence, corruption and an
increasingly right-wing agenda aimed at dismantling public
education, in favor of for-profit charter schools, faith-based
institutions and vouchers.

The appointment of Burnley in 2000 by former Republican
governor John Engler, following the departure of then-schools
CEO David Adamany, marked an acceleration of a process
already well under way. During the intervening four years,
enrollment has steadily declined and thousands of teachers
and support staff jobs have been eliminated. One could argue
that the dismantling of the Detroit Public School system has
been "job one" since the first day of Burnley's appointment.

In a press release, Burnley stated, "Many urban public school
systems in our country are in a similar situation." His conclusion?-
"The district needs to get smaller, faster in order to bring our
expenditures in line with revenues and to be able to provide the
type of high-quality education that our students deserve. We
know what we have to do, and it must be done with precision
and urgency. We have the right team with the right experience
and right judgment to make the district stronger, leaner and
more effective. Smaller will be better." These are words of
a corporate executive, not those of someone who has any
concern about the current and future education of young people.

It may appear ironic, given the fact that the Bush administration's
"No Child Left Behind" Act was ostensibly designed to create
conditions to close the "performance gap" between inner-city
children and those in more affluent school districts. But a careful
examination of the situation confronting Detroit teachers,
administrators and students is in reality the product of the
same pro-big business model being imposed on public school
districts throughout the country faced with deficits.

It should be noted parenthetically that the role of the American
Federation of Teachers and its Detroit affiliate the DFT, has
been to serve in an advisory capacity, assisting Burnley and
the school board in administering the cutbacks and in
streamlining the budget.

Copyright 1998-2004
World Socialist Web Site
All rights reserved

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10) Margaret Hassan's Suspected Execution Will Be Seen As
'Proof' of Evil
By Robert Fisk
Thursday, November 18, 2004
http://www.commondreams.org/views04/1117-29.htm


After the grief, the astonishment, heartbreak, anger and fury
over the apparent murder of such a good and saintly woman,
that is the question her friends - and, quite possibly, the Iraqi
insurgents - will be asking.

This Anglo-Irish woman held an Iraqi passport. She had lived in
Iraq for 30 years, she had dedicated her life to the welfare of
Iraqis in need.

She hated the United Nations sanctions and opposed the Anglo-
American invasion.

So who killed Margaret Hassan?

Of course, those of us who knew her will reflect on the appalling
implications of the videotape (sent to Al Jazeera yesterday and
apparently showing her execution).

Her husband believes it is evidence of her death.

If Margaret Hassan can be kidnapped and murdered, how much
further can we fall into the Iraqi pit?

There are no barriers, no frontiers of immorality left. What price
is innocence now worth in the anarchy that we have brought to
Iraq? The answer is simple: nothing.

I remember Margaret arguing with doctors and truck drivers over
a lorry-load of medicines for Iraq's children's cancer wards in 1998.
She smiled, cajoled and pleaded to get these leukaemia drugs to
Basra and Mosul.

She would not have wished to be called an angel - Margaret didn't
like clichés. Even now I want to write "doesn't like clichés". Are we
really permitted to say that she is dead?

For the bureaucrats and the Western leaders who today will express
heir outrage and sorrow at her reported death, she had nothing but
scorn.

Yes, she knew the risks. Margaret Hassan was well aware that many
Iraqi women had been kidnapped, raped, ransomed or murdered by
the Baghdad mafia.

Because she is a Western woman - the first to be abducted and
apparently murdered - we forget how many Iraqi women have
already suffered this terrible fate; largely unreported in a world
which counts dead American soldiers but ignores the fatalities
among those with darker skins and browner eyes and a different
religion, whom we claimed to have liberated.

And now let's remember the other, earlier videos. Margaret Hassan
crying. Margaret Hassan fainting, Margaret Hassan having water
thrown over her face to revive her, Margaret Hassan crying again,
pleading for the withdrawal of the Black Watch regiment from the
Euphrates River.

In the background of these appalling pictures, there were none of
the usual Islamic banners. There were none of the usual armed and
hooded men. There were no Qur'anic recitations.

And when it percolated through to Fallujah and Ramadi that the
mere act of kidnapping Hassan was close to heresy, the combined
resistance groups of Fallujah - and the message genuinely came
from them - demanded her release.

So, incredibly, did Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the al-Qaeda man whom
the Americans falsely claimed was leading the Iraqi insurrection,
but who has definitely been involved in the kidnappings and
beheadings.

Other abducted women were freed when their captors recognised
their innocence.

But not Margaret Hassan, even though she spoke fluent Arabic and
could explain her work to her captors in their own language.

If anyone doubted the murderous nature of the insurgents, what
better way to prove their viciousness than to produce evidence of
Margaret Hassan's murder?

What more ruthless way could there be of demonstrating to the
world that the US and Interim Prime Minister Iyad Alawi's tinpot
army were fighting "evil" in Fallujah and the other Iraqi cities?

Even in the topsy-turvy world of Iraq, nobody is suggesting that
people associated with the government of Mr Allawi had a hand
in Margaret Hassan's death. Iraq, after all, is awash with up to 20
insurgent groups but also with rival gangs of criminals seeking to
extort money from hostage-taking.

But still the question has to be answered: who killed Margaret
Hassan?

'Our hearts are broken... her suffering has ended'

Statement released by Michael, Deirdre, Geraldine and Kathryn
Fitzsimons, brothers and sisters of Margaret Hassan, last night

"Our hearts are broken. We have kept hoping for as long as we
could, but we now have to accept that Margaret has probably
gone and at last her suffering has ended.

"Our prayers and thoughts are with our dear brother-in-law Tahseen.
Margaret was a friend of the Arab world, to people of all religions. Her
love of the Arab people started in the 1960s when she worked in Palestinian
camps, living with the poorest of the poor and supporting the refugees.

"For the past 30 years, Margaret worked tirelessly for the Iraqi people.

"Margaret had only goodwill towards everyone. She had no prejudice
against any creed. She dedicated her whole life to working for the poor
and vulnerable, helping those who had no one else.

"Those who are guilty of this atrocious act, and those who support
them, have no excuses.

"Nobody can justify this. Margaret was against sanctions and the war.

"To commit such a crime against anyone is unforgivable.

"But we cannot believe how anybody could do this to our kind,
compassionate sister.

"The gap she leaves will never be filled."

(c) 2004 The Star & Independent Online
(c) Copyrighted 1997-2004
www.commondreams.org

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11) World on Alert as Over 15,000 Species Face Extinction
By Sonny Inbaraj
BANGKOK
Wednesday, November 17, 2004 by InterPress Service
http://www.commondreams.org/headlines04/1117-23.htm


BANGKOK - Over 15,000 animal and plant species face extinction, reveals
the World Conservation Union or IUCN in its ' 2004 Red List of
Threatened Species '.

One in three amphibians and almost half of all freshwater turtles are
threatened, on top of the one in eight birds and one in four mammals
known to be jeopardy, said the IUCN at its 3rd World Conservation
Congress being held in the Thai capital from Nov. 17-25.

The global conference brings together 81 states, 114 government
agencies, 800 plus non-governmental organisations (NGOs) and some
10,000 scientists and experts from 181 countries and has been billed
as the one of biggest environmental meetings in history.

''This sends a very powerful message that conservation is not a marginal
issue in the year 2004,'' said Achim Steiner, director-general of the
Geneva-based IUCN. ''There has been a record level of interest.''

IUCN's 'Red List' is the most comprehensive scientific assessment of
species at risk of dying out, and includes concrete measures to slow
or reverse their extinction.

The 15,589 species threatened with extinction, although cover just over
one percent of the world's described species, includes 12 percent of all
bird species, 23 percent of all mammal species, 32 percent of all
amphibian species and 34 percent of all gymnosperms (mainly conifers
and cycads).

''This is a wake up call for the world,'' said Steiner.

''Environmentalists have a reputation for presenting doom and gloom
scenarios but it is pointless to try and deny what you will find in this
'Red List','' he added. ''The evidence presented should make people
worry about the future viability of the various ecosystems that we
depend on.''

There are nine categories in the 'Red List' system: extinct, extinct in
the wild, critically endangered, endangered, vulnerable, near threatened,
least concern, data deficient and not evaluated. In addition to the 'Red
List', the IUCN has also published its Global Species Assessment, which
it does every four years.

According to the 2004 assessment, countries with the most threatened
and threatened endemic species lie mainly in the continental tropics,
while those with the highest proportion of threatened endemics are
mainly tropical island nations.

''Australia, Brazil, China, Indonesia and Mexico have particularly large
numbers of threatened species,'' the report pointed out.

It also revealed that Colombia, India, Malaysia, Burma, New Caledonia,
Papua New Guinea, the Philippines, South Africa and the United States
have high number of threatened endemics for at least one taxonomic
group.

People, either directly or indirectly, are the main reason for most species'
declines. Habitat destruction and degradation are the leading threats but
other significant pressures include over-exploitation for food, pets,
and medicine, introduced species, pollution and disease. Climate
change, also, is increasingly recognised as a serious threat.

Among the key findings of the 2004 Global Species Assessment is that
future conflicts between the needs of threatened species and rapidly
increasing human populations are predicted to occur in Cameroon,
Colombia, Ecuador, India, Madagascar, Malaysia, Peru, Philippines,
Tanzania and Peru.

The report also named Brazil, Cameroon, China, Colombia, Ecuador,
India, Indonesia, Madagascar, Peru and the Philippines as countries
with a large number of threatened species and unable to financially
invest in conservation.

''The world's conservation community has been ignored for far too long
by those who are making fundamental economic and political decisions,''
said IUCN's Steiner. ''We are reaching the limits of exploitation and we
need to reverse that.''

But while most threats to biodiversity are human-driven, human actions
alone can prevent many species from becoming extinct, said David
Brackett, chair of IUCN's Species Survival Commission.

''There are many examples of species being brought back from the brink,
including the southern white rhinoceros,'' Brackett pointed out.

The southern white rhinoceros that had been fairly widespread
throughout Namibia, Bostwana, Zimbabwe, Mozambique and South
Africa early in the 19th century, had by the turn of the 20th century
been reduced to two relict populations on the Zimbabwe- Mozambique
border and the Umfolozi Game Reserve in KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa.

A conscientious decision had been made on their protection and
numbers soon increased over the years from 700 animals in 1960
to over 11,5000 free-ranging southern white rhinos in 2002.

The southern white rhinoceros is now listed as near threatened on
the IUCN 'Red List'.

But the IUCN's 'Red List' also demonstrates how little is known about
the world's biodiversity.

''Undoubtedly this is an underestimate as many species have not been
assessed. In fact only three percent of the world's species have been
assessed in this 'Red List','' said Brackett. ''Other habitats are also
under
threat but we do not know quite enough of them yet.''

''However, the fact that we have many gaps in our knowledge should not
be an excuse for inaction,'' added Brackett. ''The 15,589 threatened
species on the 'Red List' require urgent conservation attention if they
are not to slip further towards extinction.''

(c) 2004 IPS
(c) Copyrighted 1997-2004
www.commondreams.org

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12) Statement in Response to the Intimidation of Columbia
University Professor Joseph Massad, Modern Arab Politics
and Intellectual History
614 Kent Hall
212-854-4722
jam25@columbia.edu
Joseph Massad
http://www.columbia.edu/cu/mealac/faculty/massad/


The recent controversy elicited by the propaganda film "Columbia
Unbecoming," a film funded and produced by a Boston-based pro-
Israel organization, is the latest salvo in a campaign of intimidation
of Jewish and non-Jewish professors who criticize Israel. This witch-
hunt aims to stifle pluralism, academic freedom, and the freedom of
expression on university campuses in order to ensure that only one
opinion is permitted, that of uncritical support for the State of Israel.
Columbia University, the Department of Middle East and Asian
Languages and Cultures, and I personally, have been the target
of this intensified campaign for over three years. Pro-Israel groups
are pressuring the university to abandon proper academic procedure
in evaluating scholarship, and want to force the university to silence
all critical opinions. Such silencing, the university has refused to do
so far, despite mounting intimidation tactics by these anti-democratic
and anti-academic forces.
The major strategy that these pro-Israel groups use is one that
equates criticism of Israel with anti-Semitism. But the claim that
criticism of Israel is an expression of anti-Semitism presupposes
that Israeli actions are "Jewish" actions and that all Jews, whether
Israelis or non-Israelis (and the majority of world Jews are not Israelis),
are responsible for all Israeli actions and that they all have the same
opinion of Israel. But this is utter anti-Semitic nonsense. Jews,
whether in America, Europe, Israel, Russia, or Argentina, are, like
all other groups, not uniform in their political or social opinions.
There are many Israeli Jews who are critical of Israel just as there
are American Jews who criticize Israeli policy. I have always made
a distinction between Jews, Israelis, and Zionists in my writings
and my lectures. It is those who want to claim that Jews, Israelis,
and Zionists are one group (and that they think exactly alike) who
are the anti-Semites. Israel in fact has no legal, moral, or political
basis to represent world Jews (ten million strong) who never elected
it to that position and who refuse to move to that country. Unlike
the pro-Israel groups, I do not think that Israeli actions are "Jewish"
actions or that they reflect the will of the Jewish people worldwide!
All those pro-Israeli propagandists who want to reduce the Jewish
people to the State of Israel are the anti-Semites who want to
eliminate the existing pluralism among Jews. The majority of
Israel's supporters in the United States are, in fact, not Jews but
Christian fundamentalist anti-Semites who seek to convert Jews.
They constitute a quarter of the American electorate and are the
most powerful anti-Semitic group worldwide. The reason why the
pro-Israel groups do not fight them is because these anti-Semites
are pro-Israel. Therefore, it is not anti-Semitism that offends pro-
Israel groups; what offends them is anti-Israel criticism. In fact,
Israel and the US groups supporting it have long received financial
and political support from numerous anti-Semites.
This is not to say that some anti-Zionists may not also be
anti-Semitic. Some are, and I have denounced them in my writings
and lectures (see
http://web.mit.edu/cis/www/mitejmes/issues/200105/br_massad.htm ). But the
test of their anti-Semitism is not whether
they like or hate Israel. The test of anti-Semitism is anti-Jewish hatred,
not anti-Israel criticism. In my forthcoming book, The Persistence of
the Palestinian Question, I link the Jewish Question to the Palestinian
Question and conclude that both questions persist because anti-
Semitism persists. To resolve the Palestinian and the Jewish Questions,
our task is to fight anti-Semitism in any guise, whether in its pro-Israel
or anti-Israel guise, and not to defend the reprehensible policies of the
racist Israeli government.
I am now being targeted because of my public writings and
statements through the charge that I am allegedly intolerant in the
classroom, a charge based on statements made by people who were
never my students, except in one case, which I will address momentarily.
Let me first state that I have intimidated no one. In fact, Tomy
Schoenfeld, the Israeli soldier who appears in the film and is cited
by the New York Sun, has never been my student and has never taken
a class with me, as he himself informed The Jewish Week (
http://www.thejewishweek.com/news/newscontent.php3?artid=10049 ).
I have never met him. As for Noah Liben, who appears in the film
according to newspaper accounts (I have not seen the film), he was
indeed a student in my Palestinian and Israeli Politics and Societies
course in the spring of 2001. Noah seems to have forgotten the
incident he cites. During a lecture about Israeli state racism against
Asian and African Jews, Noah defended these practices on the basis
that Asian and African Jews were underdeveloped and lacked Jewish
culture, which the Ashkenazi State operatives were teaching them.
When I explained to him that, as the assigned readings clarified,
these were racist policies, he insisted that these Jews needed to
be modernized and the Ashkenazim were helping them by civilizing
them. Many students gasped. He asked me if I understood his point.
I informed him that I did not. Noah seems not to have done his
reading during the week on gender and Zionism. One of the
assigned readings by Israeli scholar and feminist Simona Sharoni
spoke of how in Hebrew the word "zayin" means both penis and
weapon in a discussion of Israeli militarized masculinity. Noah,
seemingly not having read the assigned material, mistook the
pronunciation of "zayin" as "Zion," pronounced in Hebrew "tziyon."
As for his spurious claim that I said that "Jews in Nazi Germany
were not physically abused or harassed until Kristallnacht in
November 1938," Noah must not have been listening carefully.
During the discussion of Nazi Germany, we addressed the racist
ideology of Nazism, the Nuremberg Laws enacted in 1934, and
the institutionalized racism and violence against all facets of Jewish
life, all of which preceded the extermination of European Jews. This
information was also available to Noah in his readings, had he
chosen to consult them. Moreover, the lie that the film propagates
claiming that I would equate Israel with Nazi Germany is abhorrent.
I have never made such a reprehensible equation.
I remember having a friendly rapport with Noah (as I do with all
my students). He would drop off newspaper articles in my mailbox,
come to my office hours, and greet me on the street often. He never
informed me or acted in a way that showed intimidation. Indeed, he
would write me E-mails, even after he stopped being my student, to
argue with me about Israel. I have kept our correspondence. On
March 10, 2002, a year after he took a class with me, Noah wrote
me an E-mail chastising me for having invited an Israeli speaker
to class the year before when he was in attendance. It turned out
that Noah's memory failed him again, as he mistook the speaker
I had invited for another Israeli scholar. After a long diatribe,
Noah excoriated me: "How can you bring such a phony to speak
to your class??" I am not sure if his misplaced reproach was
indicative of an intimidated student or one who felt comfortable
enough to rebuke his professor!
I am dedicated to all my students, many of whom are Jewish.
Neither Columbia University nor I have ever received a complaint
from any student claiming intimidation or any such nonsense.
Students at Columbia have many venues of lodging complaints,
whether with the student deans and assistant deans, school
deans and assistant deans, department chairmen, departmental
directors of undergraduate studies, the ombudsman's office, the
provost, the president, and the professors themselves. No such
complaint was ever filed. Many of my Jewish and non-Jewish
students (including my Arab students) differ with me in all sorts
of ways, whether on politics or on philosophy or theory. This is
exactly what teaching and learning are about, how to articulate
differences and understand other perspectives while acquiring
knowledge, how to analyze one's own perspective and those of
others, how to interrogate the basis of an opinion.
Columbia University is home to the most prestigious Center
for Israel and Jewish Studies in the country. Columbia has six
endowed chairs in Jewish Studies (ranging from religion to Yiddish
to Hebrew literature, among others). In addition, a seventh chair
in Israel Studies is now being established after pro-Israel groups
launched a vicious campaign against the only chair in modern
Arab Studies that Columbia established two years ago, demanding
"balance"! Columbia does not have a Center for Arab Studies, let
alone a Center for Palestine studies. The Department of Middle
East and Asian Languages and Cultures encompasses the study
of over one billion South Asians, over 300 million Arabs, tens of
millions of Turks, of Iranians, of Kurds, of Armenians, and of six
million Israelis, five million of whom are Jewish. To study these
varied populations and cultures, MEALAC has three full time
professors who cover Israel and Hebrew, four full time professors
to cover the Arab World, and two full-time professors who cover
South Asia. One need not do complicated mathematics to see
who is overrepresented and who is not, if the question is indeed
a demographic one.
Moreover, the class that this propaganda machine is targeting,
my Palestinian and Israeli Politics and Societies course, is one of
a number of courses offered at Columbia that cover the Palestinian
/Israeli conflict. All the others have an Israel-friendly perspective,
including Naomi Weinberger's "Conflict Resolution in the Middle
East," Michael Stanislawski's "History of the State of Israel, 1948-
Present" and a course offered in my own department by my colleague
Dan Miron, "Zionism: A Cultural Perspective." My course, which is
critical of Zionism and Palestinian nationalism, is in fact an elective
course which no student is forced to take.
Let us briefly review these claims of intimidation. Not only have
the students (all but Noah have not even taken my courses) not used
a single university venue to articulate their alleged grievances, they
are now sponsored by a private political organization with huge funds
that produced and funded a film about them, screened it to the major
US media and to the top brass of the Columbia administration. Last
Wednesday, the film was screened in Israel to a government minister
and to participants at a conference on anti-Semitism. The film has still
not been released to the public here and is used as a sort of secret
evidence in a military trial. The film has also been used to trump up
a national campaign with the aid of a New York Congressman to get
me fired. All this power of intimidation is being exercised not by
a professor against students, but by political organizations who use
students against a junior non-tenured faculty member. A senior
departmental colleague of mine, Dan Miron, who votes on my
promotion and tenure, has recently expressed open support for
this campaign of intimidation based on hearsay. Indeed with this
campaign against me going into its fourth year, I chose under the
duress of coercion and intimidation not to teach my course this
year. It is my academic freedom that has been circumscribed. But
not only mine. The Columbia courses that remain are all taught
from an Israel-friendly angle.
The aim of the David Project propaganda film is to undermine
our academic freedom, our freedom of speech, and Columbia's
tradition of openness and pluralism. It is in reaction to this witch-
hunt that 718 international scholars and students signed a letter
defending me against intimidation and sent it to President Bollinger,
with hundreds more sending separate letters, while over 1400 people
from all walks of life are signing an online petition supporting me
and academic freedom. Academics and students from around the
world recognize that the message of this propaganda film is to
suppress pluralism at Columbia and at all American universities so
that one and only one opinion be allowed on campuses, the opinion
of defending Israel uncritically. I need not remind anyone that this
is a slippery slope, for the same pressures could be applied to
faculty who have been critical of U.S. foreign policy, in Iraq for
example, on the grounds that such critiques are unpatriotic.
Surely we all agree that while the University can hardly defend
any one political position on any current question, it must
defend the need for debate and critical consideration of all
such questions, whether in public fora or in the classroom.
Anything less would be the beginning of the death of academic
freedom.

Friends,

Please take a minute to sign a petition in support of Dr. Joseph
Massad. Dr Massad, a Palestinian by birth, is a professor of
Modern Arab Politics and Intellectual History at Colombia
University. He is being targeted by the Boston-based "David
Project" with the accusation that he displayed anti-semitism
in his classroom.

The David Project, founded by Dr. Charles Jacobs, is a Zionist
organization connected to the "Committee for Accuracy in
Middle East Reporting" (CAMERA) and the American Anti-
Slavery Group.

The accusations against Professor Massad have no merit and
are part of a wider campaign of pro-Israel attacks on professors
of Arabic studies at university campuses across the US.

The petition can be signed by going to:

http://www.petitiononline.com/mod_perl/signed.cgi?jmassad&1

Professor Massad's statement can be read at:
http://www.columbia.edu/cu/mealac/faculty/massad/

If you are in the Boston area, Professor Massad is speaking in at
Harvard University this Thursday, November 18. To attend, see
details below:

Thank you,

Richard Hugus
New England Committee to Defend Palestine

"WCFIA/CMES

MIDDLE EAST SEMINAR

Lenore G. Martin, Sara Roy, and
Herbert C. Kelman, Co-Chairs

presents

JOSEPH MASSAD

Assistant Professor of Modern Arab Politics and Intellectual History,
Columbia University

The Jewish Question, the Palestinian Question: Resolution
or Displacement?

Thursday

November 18, 2004

4-6pm
Weatherhead Center for International Affairs
1033 Massachusetts Avenue
Mezzanine Seminar Room (M-11)

The Weatherhead Center for International Affairs is located at 1033
Massachusetts Avenue, 2nd Floor, Cambridge, MA 02138.
For more information
concerning these events, please call 617-495-3816, or e-mail
lkahn@wcfia.harvard.edu

Visit our web site: http://www.wcfia.harvard.edu/seminars/middleeast/
This event is free and open to the public"

Announce mailing list
Announce@onepalestine.org
http://mail.onepalestine.org/mailman/listinfo/announce_onepalestine.org

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13) The American Friends Service Committee and the
Alternatives to War forum invite you to the following forum:
"THE OCCUPATION IS THE REASON"
Noam Bahat & Shimri Zamaret
TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 23, 2004, 7:00 PM
Quaker Meeting House
65 9th St., San Francisco, CA
(between Market and Mission Civic Center BART and MUNI stops)

In September, 2004, 5 Israeli Jewish high school refusniks --prisoners
of conscience-- were released from Israeli prison. Noam Bahat after
serving 645 days in prison and Shimri Zamaret after 643 days in prison.
Noam and Shimri will speak about the Israeli Occupation of Palestinian
lands, the reasons for their refusal to be conscripted into the Israel
Defense Forces, and their experience in prison.



"As a man of conscience I could not take part in the army of oppression.
Noam Bahat(from his testimony)

"I refuse to take part in this moral corruption. Serving the army will
be a treachery upon my future and a treachery upon my children's
future." Shimri Zamaret (from his testimony)



All contributions will support the work of the Refuser Solidarity
Network. This will be their last appearance before returning to Israel.



"When the elected government tramples over democratic values
and the chances for a just peace in the region, we have no choice
but to obey our conscience and refuse to take part in the attack on
the Palestinian people. As youth about to be called to serve in the
military, we pledge to do all that we see fit so as not to serve the
occupation."

(From public letter sent to Prime Minister Sharon, signed by
300 draft-age students, Sept. 2002)

Sponsors: Refuser Solidarity Network; American Friends Service
Committee, Resource Center for Nonviolence.



For more information please call AFSC 415-565-0201 x 26 or 24

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14) Unions Resume Debate Over Merging and Power
By STEVEN GREENHOUSE
November 18, 2004
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/11/18/national/18labor.html?oref=login


Linda Canny, a nurse with Group Health, a health maintenance
organization in Seattle, applauded her union when it dug in against
her employer's proposal to take away a much-coveted benefit: she
does not have to pay any health insurance premiums.

But Ms. Canny, a member of S.E.I.U. District 1199 Northwest, was
flabbergasted when another union representing Group Health
employees ignored her union's pleas and agreed to have many of
its workers pay $520 a year in premiums.

"We really felt the rug was pulled out from under us when that union
agreed to health care premiums,'' Ms. Canny said, referring to a local
of the United Food and Commercial Workers. "We felt that was
a major step backward. Unfortunately, Group Health has really
used that against us."

Angered by such cases, the president of Ms. Canny's union,
Andrew L. Stern, has ignited a debate throughout the labor
movement by arguing that labor needs a sweeping overhaul,
including the merger of many unions and a vast increase in
organizing, to reverse its long decline.

Last week, Mr. Stern, president of the Service Employees
International Union, called on the A.F.L.-C.I.O. to adopt
a 10-point plan, and the debate he began could lead to
the most far-reaching changes in the labor movement
in a half-century

Mr. Stern complained that unions were doing far too little
to help American workers because they were organizing too
few workers and were often undercutting one another in
negotiations. He also complained that many unions were too
small to contend with giant companies, noting that 40 of the
60 unions in the A.F.L.-C.I.O. had fewer than 100,000 members.

Mr. Stern, who heads the largest and fastest-growing union in the
A.F.L.-C.I.O., called for merging the 60 unions into fewer than 20,
so that each would be large enough to square off against big
corporations.

Alarmed that labor's ranks are shrinking, he also proposed that
the A.F.L.-C.I.O., whose unions represent 13 million workers, be
authorized to set ambitious goals on how much money each union
should spend on organizing.

"I'm totally focused on winning the fight on how to build a labor
movement that works for workers," said Mr. Stern, who has
a reputation as a maverick and strategic thinker. "It's hard to
get the job done the way things are organized right now."

He made his call for change a week after President Bush won
re-election, notwithstanding labor's all-out efforts to defeat him.
Many union leaders agree that labor badly needs to take steps
to reverse its decline, but they favor far less sweeping and painful
change than Mr. Stern advocates.

He has warned that unless the A.F.L.-C.I.O. embraces bold
changes, his union, with more than 1.6 million members,
may leave the federation.

The director of the U.C.L.A. Labor Center, Kent Wong, said
labor's weakened state has had important repercussions.

"Unions put together a very impressive campaign to unseat
George Bush,'' Professor Wong said. "But the reality is when
they represent just 13 percent of the work force, even with
their huge effort, they were unable to prevail."

He suggested that if unions represented more of the work
force, like the 22 percent level it did three decades ago, the
Democrats might have won the election.

Mr. Stern's proposals have set off a fierce debate. Some labor
leaders have accused him of arrogantly seeking to dictate to
others. Many accuse him of favoring a top-down approach in
which the A.F.L.-C.I.O. would tell long-autonomous unions
what to do.

Mr. Stern's plan would, for example, force unions to recruit
members only in their core industries, barring them from raiding
those where other unions dominate.

Some labor leaders say Mr. Stern wants service unions to dominate
the A.F.L-C.I.O. at the expense of fast-shrinking manufacturing
unions. The president of the machinists' union, R. Thomas
Buffenbarger, has even threatened to quit the federation if
Mr. Stern gets his way.

Some labor leaders complain that Mr. Stern's proposals to merge
unions would allow the big fish to swallow the little fish. His
defenders say the heads of some small unions, despite their
puny bargaining power, oppose mergers because they desperately
want to cling to their positions, power and salaries.

"Stern is absolutely right that the status quo isn't acceptable, that
it's a recipe for oblivion," Paul F. Clark, a professor of labor relations
at Penn State University, said. "But I don't see how the consolidations
he's calling for will get done. You'll find resistance because a lot of
union leaders don't want to give any of their power to the A.F.L.-C.I.O."

John W. Wilhelm, the longtime president of the Hotel Employees
and Restaurant Employees International Union, which merged last
summer with Unite, the textile workers' union, urged leaders of
other small unions to follow his example.

"The fundamental problem is that too many unions don't have the
resources to meet the challenges," Mr. Wilhelm said. "We're dealing
with global corporations in virtually every industry. I was very proud
of our union. We had 265,000 members. We were doing great stuff.
But we didn't have the size, strength and resources that we needed."

How far Mr. Stern goes with his push for change will depend on his
one-time mentor, John J. Sweeney, president of the A.F.L.-C.I.O.

If Mr. Sweeney, Mr. Stern's predecessor as head of the service
employees, pushes hard to sell the proposals to other unions,
the federation's executive council might adopt many of the them
at its meeting in February.

Last week, Mr. Sweeney said a new committee he heads would
take a hard look at proposals by Mr. Stern and others and would
make far-reaching recommendations.

"It will be a very serious effort," he said. "The labor movement
has through the years tried to change with changing times."

He said there might be resistance.

"We have to recognize and acknowledge the fact that individual
unions are autonomous," Mr. Sweeney said. "There may be some
differences of opinion about the degree of change."

Larry Cohen, executive vice president of the Communications
Workers of America, who is widely expected to win its presidency
next year, has his own proposals, which focus on expanding the

right to bargain collectively. He complained that many companies
break the law in fighting unionizing and that public employees in
many states do not have the right to form unions. "What we should
focus on is strengthening bargaining power," he said.

In Mr. Stern's view, one factor undercutting bargaining power is
that in some industries 10 or more unions are active and often
trip over, and undercut, one another. He has proposed giving the
A.F.L.-C.I.O. the power to designate two or three unions in each
industry to take the lead in bargaining and organizing.

To show how well this strategy can work, S.E.I.U. officials point to
a contract approved recently by many workers at the Valley
Medical Center in Renton, Wash. Four unions represent workers
at the hospital, and they agreed that the service employees, which
represents the registered nurses and some other employees and
is the largest union at the hospital, should lead the talks.

The service employees obtained an agreement that its members
would not have to pay health insurance premiums, paving the way
for similar provisions in contracts for the other unions, many of
whose members had previously paid about $1,000 a year for
family coverage.

"This shows that if you have a dominant union that's willing to
fight and sets a standard, management usually has to bring
everybody up," said Diane Sosne, president of District 1199
Northwest.

Shannon Halme, an official with a union for Valley Medical
office and clerical workers, said: "I don't think we could have
gotten this by ourselves. We flew on the coattails of what the
nurses got."

Copyright 2004 The New York Times

---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

15) Possible New Mad Cow Case Is Found in the U.S.
By DONALD G. McNEIL Jr.
November 18, 2004
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/11/18/national/19cowcnd.html?hp&ex=1100840400&en
=6dfbb1c3e752b246&ei=5094&partner=homepage

Another possible case of mad cow disease has been found in the
United States, the Agriculture Department said today.

The brain of a cow tested positive three times on a rapid test for
the presence of prions, the misfolded proteins that cause the
disease, a spokeswoman for the department said.

But the department officially refers to positive results on the rapid
tests as "inconclusives."

Confirmation of a positive case can only be made by a more complex
test performed by the department's National Veterinary Services
Laboratory in Ames, Iowa.

The animal's brain must be sent to the lab, where several sections
will be sliced thin, stained and inspected through a microscope,
a process that will take four to seven days, the department said.

The department declined to give the age, location or any other
information about the animal, but Andrea Morgan, associate deputy
administrator of the department's animal and plant health
inspection service, emphasized that it "did not enter the food
or feed chain."

Last Dec. 23, the department announced that an animal slaughtered
on Dec. 9 had tested positive on the slower test done at the Iowa lab.
But by the time the announcement was made, the cow had been
ground into hamburger and much of the meat was sold. A recall
was issued for that meat, but it is unclear how much of the meat,
which was mixed with uncontaminated meat, was consumed.

Since then, the department has adopted the rapid tests used in
Europe and Japan that give results in a few hours.

Since slaughterhouses normally cool animals for 24 hours after
killing them to firm up the meat for cutting, the rapid test makes
it possible to tag and remove the carcass.

However, the department did not say whether the animal was
tested at a slaughterhouse, at a farm or dairy, or at a rendering
plant where it was to be turned into pet food or animal byproducts.

Copyright 2004 The New York Times

posted 2:55 PM  0 comments

** Dahr Jamail's Iraq Dispatches **

November 17, 2004


Slash and Burn


See the photos


She lays dazed in the crowded hospital room, languidly waving her
bruised arm at the flies. Her shins, shattered by bullets from US
soldiers when they fired through the front door of her house, are both
covered by casts. Small plastic drainage backs filled with red fluid sit
upon her abdomen, where she took shrapnel from another bullet.

Fatima Harouz, 12 years old, lives in Latifiya, a city just south of
Baghdad. Just three days ago soldiers attacked her home. Her mother,
standing with us says, ³They attacked our home and there weren¹t even
any resistance fighters in our area.² Her brother was shot and killed,
and his wife was wounded as their home was ransacked by soldiers.
³Before they left, they killed all of our chickens,² added Fatima¹s
mother, her eyes a mixture of fear, shock and rage.

A doctor standing with us, after listening to Fatima¹s mother tell their
story, looks at me and sternly asks, ³This is the freedomŠin their
Disney Land are there kids just like this?²

Another young woman, Rana Obeidy, was walking home with her brother two
nights ago. She assumes the soldiers shot her and her brother because he
was carrying a bottle of soda. This happened in Baghdad. She has a chest
wound where a bullet grazed her, unlike her little brother who is dead.

Laying in a bed near Rana is Hanna, 14 years old. She has a gash on her
right leg from the bullet of a US soldier. Her family was in a taxi in
Baghdad this morning which was driving near a US patrol when a soldier
opened fire on the car.

Her father¹s shirt is spotted with blood from his head which was wounded
when the taxi crashed.

In another room a small boy from Fallujah lays on his stomach. Shrapnel
from a grenade thrown into their home by a US soldier entered his body
through his back, and implanted near his kidney.

An operation successfully removed the shrapnel. His father was killed by
what his mother called, ³the haphazard shooting of the Americans.² The
boy, Amin, lies in his bed vacillating between crying with pain and
playing with is toy car.

It¹s one case after another of people from Baghdad, Fallujah, Latifiya,
Balad, Ramadi, Samarra, BaqubaŠfrom all over Iraq, who have been injured
by the heavy-handed tactics of American soldiers fighting a no-win
guerilla war spawned from an illegal invasion based on lies. Their
barbaric acts of retaliation have become the daily reality for Iraqis,
who continue to take the brunt of the frustration and rage of the soldiers.

Out in front of the hospital three Humvees pull up as soldiers alert the
hospital staff that some of the wounded from outside of Fallujah will be
brought there. One of the staff begins to yell at the soldier who is
doing the talking, while a soldier manning a machine gun atop a Humvee
with his face completely covered by an olive balaclava and goggles looks on.

³We don¹t need you here! Get the fuck out of here! Bring back Saddam!
Even he was better than you animals! We don¹t want to die by your hands,
so get out of here! We can take care of our own people!²

The translator with the soldiers does not translate this. Instead he
watches with a face of stone.

The survivors of those killed and wounded by the US military in Iraq, as
well as those who care for them, are left with feelings of bitter
anguish, grief, rage and vengeance.

This afternoon at a small, but busy supply center set up in Baghdad to
distribute goods to refugees from Fallujah, the stories the haggard
survivors are telling are nearly unimaginable.

³They kicked all the journalists out of Fallujah so they could do
whatever they want,² says Kassem Mohammed Ahmed, who just escaped from
Fallujah three days ago, ³The first thing they did is they bombed the
hospitals because that is where the wounded have to go. Now we see that
wounded people are in the street and the soldiers are rolling over them
with tanks. This happened so many times. What you see on the TV is
nothing-that is just one camera. What you cannot see is so much.²

While Kassem speaks of the television footage, there are also stories of
soldiers not discriminating between civilians and resistance fighters.

Another man, Abdul Razaq Ismail arrived from Fallujah last week.

While distributing supplies to other refugees he says, ³There are dead
bodies on the ground and nobody can bury them. The Americans are
dropping some of the bodies into the Euphrates River near Fallujah. They
are pulling the bodies with tanks and leaving them at the soccer stadium.²

Nearby is another man in tears as he listens, nodding his head. He can¹t
stop crying, but after a little while says he wants to talk to us.

³They bombed my neighborhood and we used car jacks to raise the blocks
of concrete to get dead children out from under them.²

Another refugee, Abu Sabah, an older man wearing a torn shirt and dusty
pants tells of how he escaped with his family while soldiers shot
bullets over their heads, but killed his cousin.

³They used these weird bombs that put up smoke like a mushroom cloud,²
he said, having just arrived yesterday, ³Then small pieces fell from the
air with long tails of smoke behind them. These exploded on the ground
with large fires that burnt for half an hour. They used these near the
train tracks. You could hear these dropped from a large airplane and the
bombs were the size of a tank. When anyone touched those fires, their
body burned for hours.²

The comparison of Iraq to Vietnam is becoming more valid by the day here.

You can visit http://dahrjamailiraq.com/email_list/ to subscribe
or unsubscribe to the
email list.

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posted 12:45 PM  0 comments

---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

1) San Francisco Voters Say:
"Bring Our Troops Home Now!"
63% to 37%
November 9, 2004
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Contact: 415/861-0318
http://www.yesonn.net
From: "Howard Wallace"


2) The Horrible Truth in Pictures: Falluja
http://fallujapictures.blogspot.com/

3) U.S. Troops Move to Drive Out
Rebels in North of Iraq
INSURGENCY
By EDWARD WONG
BAGHDAD, Iraq
November 17, 2004
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/11/17/international/middleeast/17iraq.html?hp&ex
=1100754000&en=766b3b2f2b60eff6&ei=5094&partner=homepage

4) U.S. Pounds Falluja Diehards, Violence in North
By Michael Georgy and Fadel al-Badrani
FALLUJA, Iraq (Reuters)
Wed Nov 17, 2004 08:48 AM ET
http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?type=topNews&storyID=6840990&src=eD
ialog/GetContent§ion=news

5) Former G.I.'s, Ordered to War, Fight Not to Go
By MONICA DAVEY
New York Times
Article published Nov 16, 2004
http://www.heraldtribune.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20041116/ZNYT02/4111
60663

6) Come together for Palestine!
West Coast Regional Right to Return Conference
Empowering the Palestine Right to Return Movement on
the West Coast of North America
Saturday November 20, 2004

7) Attica to Abu Ghraib: Human Rights, Torture,
and Resistance" Conference
Convenors: International Human Rights Initiative (IHRI)
Friday, February 25th - Saturday, February 26th, 2005
Oakland, CA - Laney Community College

8) New Bill in Congress
Targets Teachers
Who Dare To Question US Support For Israel
By Michael Collins Piper
American Free Press
11-15-4
http://rense.com/general59/NEWBILL.HTM

9) Judge Questions Long Sentence in Drug Case
(55 years for selling sack of weed to a police informant)
By NICK MADIGAN
SALT LAKE CITY
November 17, 2004
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/11/17/national/17sentencing.html

10) Fallujah: Blood Does Not Drown People’s Resistance,
But Nurtures It!

11) Consumer Prices See Biggest Gain Since May
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
WASHINGTON (AP)
November 17, 2004
Filed at 11:54 a.m. ET
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/business/AP-Economy.html?oref=login


---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

1) San Francisco Voters Say:
"Bring Our Troops Home Now!"
63% to 37%
November 9, 2004
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Contact: 415/861-0318
http://www.yesonn.net
From: "Howard Wallace"



By a hefty 26 percent margin, San Francisco voters have called upon
the federal government to "take immediate steps to end the U.S.
occupation of Iraq and bring our troops safely home now." The
ballot measure, Proposition N, gained the support of more than
50 community organizations, including senior groups, high school
students, environmentalists, the entire labor movement and scores
of neighborhood groups. Two African-American weekly newspapers
and two lesbian and gay weeklies endorse Prop N.

The only significant organized opposition came from the San
Francisco Chronicle , the San Francisco Republican Party and the
San Francisco Examiner . The latest vote tally (with all but provisional
votes counted) is 187,105 yes against 109,391 no.

"This was far ahead of a similar local measure which won by a slim
margin well into the latter stages of the Viet Nam war," said Howard
Wallace, who coordinated both campaigns. "It is a dramatic statement
from one of the world's most popular cities," he added.

City Supervisor Chris Daly, one of four colleagues who placed N on
the ballot, predicted that other cities in the U.S. will follow suit with
anti-war measures of their own. "A majority of Americans still believe
this illegal war is not worth the continued tragic loss of Iraqi or American
lives. In the wake of the sleazy propaganda barrage of this national
election, there should be a great urge of voters in other cities to speak
their minds," he said.

Prop N organizers vowed to aid that process and cited their web site:
http://www.yesonn.net, which includes suggestions to other cities
on how to go about organizing such a campaign.

# # #

---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

2) The Horrible Truth in Pictures: Falluja
http://fallujapictures.blogspot.com/

---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

3) U.S. Troops Move to Drive Out
Rebels in North of Iraq
INSURGENCY
By EDWARD WONG
BAGHDAD, Iraq
November 17, 2004
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/11/17/international/middleeast/17iraq.html?hp&ex
=1100754000&en=766b3b2f2b60eff6&ei=5094&partner=homepage

BAGHDAD, Iraq, Nov. 16 - The American military raced Tuesday to
contain a spreading insurgency, sending hundreds of soldiers and
armored vehicles into the streets of Mosul to root out bands of rebels
who commandeered parts of the city last week as the Americans were
battling their way through Falluja.

The struggle to retake Mosul came as the family of a kidnapped
British-Iraqi aid worker, Margaret Hassan, said they believed that she
was the woman shown being executed in a videotape released by
insurgents. Ms. Hassan was abducted in Baghdad last month as she
drove to work. She would be the first foreign female hostage in Iraq
to be executed.

In a televised interview shown on the BBC, her husband, an Iraqi,
pleaded with her captors to confirm her fate, saying, "I beg those
people who have kidnapped Margaret to tell me what they have done
with her."

The American military on Tuesday was investigating the videotaped
fatal shooting of an apparently wounded and unresisting Iraqi prisoner
by a marine in a Falluja mosque. After the videotape was broadcast
Monday evening by NBC News, commanders removed the marine from
the battlefield, and American officials braced for a wave of outrage
in the Middle East as news of the videotape spread around the world.

Though a weeklong American offensive smashed the insurgents'
haven of Falluja, snipers continued Tuesday to shoot at American
troops roaming the debris-covered streets. Residents began to
warily step out of their homes, emerging into a wasteland devastated
by American bombs and bullets.

The American action in Mosul, 225 miles north of Baghdad and Iraq's
third largest city, answers a burst of violence that erupted there during
the offensive in Falluja.

American and Iraqi troops sealed off the five bridges spanning the
Tigris River and began blocking off western neighborhoods largely
inhabited by Sunni Arabs, who ruled the country in the era of Saddam
Hussein. The provincial government imposed a curfew, and the main
avenues appeared deserted for much of the day, witnesses said. The
loudest noises came from mortar shells exploding near the American
forces and helicopters buzzing above rooftops and rows of palm trees.

"It's ongoing offensive operations to eliminate all the pockets of
resistance that are out there," said Lt. Col. Paul Hastings, a spokesman
for Task Force Olympia, the American units charged with controlling
northern Iraq. "Now we're trying to catch a wider swath of targeted areas."

The colonel said that American forces had met little resistance and
that groups of insurgents appeared to melt away at the approach of
the light-armored vehicles of the Stryker Brigade. But they continued
carrying out attacks throughout the city, firing at Iraqi police stations,
lobbing mortars at American bases and aiming suicide car bombs
at American troops.

Thousands of Kurdish militiamen have entered Mosul at the request
of the provincial governor, a move that could increase ethnic tensions
in the diverse city, which has large numbers of Kurds, Christians and
Sunni Arabs. The governor has also called in Iraqi soldiers to help
establish order where the police have failed.

As the American offensive got under way in Mosul, the rebels continued
their wave of assaults, with ambushes on American troops across the
Sunni Triangle in Baquba and Ramadi and bombings of oil pipelines
near Kirkuk.

An American soldier was killed and another wounded by a roadside
bomb north of the capital, the American military said.

Iraqi officials claimed success in flushing out some insurgent leaders,
saying they had captured several leaders of the Army of Muhammad,
believed to be responsible for several beheadings of Iraqis and
foreigners.

Al Jazeera, the Arab satellite news channel, reported Tuesday evening
that it had received a videotape showing a gunman shooting to death
a woman who was likely to be Ms. Hassan, the aid worker. It did not
televise the videotape.

Ms. Hassan's family and British officials said they had seen a video
that led them to believe she was dead.

"Our hearts are broken," Ms. Hassan's four brothers and sisters said
in a statement released by the British Foreign Office. "We have kept
hoping for as long as we could, but we now have to accept that
Margaret Hassan has probably gone and at last her suffering has
ended."

Ms. Hassan was the director of Iraq operations for the aid group
CARE International and had lived in this country for more than
30 years. She was born in Dublin and received citizenship here after
marrying an Iraqi man, Tahseen Ali Hassan.

A group of armed men snatched her last month as she was driving
to work. She was held by an unknown group that released four videos
of her. The last one, released Nov. 2, showed Ms. Hassan fainting and
a gunman threatening to turn her over to the Jordanian militant
Abu Musab al-Zarqawi if Britain did not withdraw its forces within
48 hours.

"She dedicated her whole life to working for the poor and vulnerable,
helping those who had no one else," her family said. "Those who are
guilty of this atrocious act, and those who support them, have no
excuses."

Ms. Hassan's kidnapping and that of a British engineer, Kenneth
Bigley, who was beheaded by Mr. Zarqawi's group in early October,
have increased the political pressure on the British prime minister,
Tony Blair. The war has been hugely unpopular in Britain, and the
two kidnappings have led to widespread condemnation of British
participation.

With Iraq's first democratic elections scheduled to take place in
January, the American military is under enormous pressure to pacify
Sunni-dominated parts of Iraq, where the guerrilla uprising has grown
stronger and more lethal.

Last Thursday in Mosul, up to 500 insurgents working in large groups
overran a half-dozen police stations and sent hundreds of policemen
fleeing. The Iraqi government is now struggling to rebuild the devastated
police force.

In Baquba, 35 miles northeast of Baghdad, insurgents kept up attacks
on American and Iraqi forces on Tuesday, a day after laying siege to
police stations. The guerrillas fired rockets, mortar rounds and bullets
at a center used by Iraqi security forces and American troops, wounding
at least four Iraqi national guardsmen, said Capt. Bill Coppernoll,
a spokesman for the First Infantry Division, charged with controlling
the area. In the southern suburb of Buhritz, an insurgent stronghold,
fighters ambushed an American patrol and wounded two soldiers.

Guerrillas in Ramadi, 30 miles west of Falluja, attacked American
troops with small-arms fire and rocket-propelled grenades. The fighters
later tried a suicide car bomb assault but failed. American commanders
said troops killed an enemy sniper there.

Insurgents also continued attacking the country's oil infrastructure,
bombing a section of the northern export pipeline carrying crude oil
from the Kirkuk fields to the Turkish port in Ceyhan. Fires raged at the
site of the sabotage, west of Kirkuk. The pipeline has been under
constant attack since Mr. Hussein was ousted.

The sabotage of the pipeline came a day after guerrillas set fire to four
oil wells near Kirkuk and attacked an oil storage tank by the section
of the pipeline near Mosul. In an audio recording posted on the Internet
on Monday, Mr. Zarqawi urged fighters to keep up attacks on the
pipelines and remain steadfast in the broader war against the Americans.

The Iraqi interior minister, Falah al-Naqib, said Tuesday at a news
conference in Baghdad that Moayed Ahmed Yassin, the leader of the
Army of Muhammad, and five aides were arrested recently in the capital.
Mr. Yassin was a member of Mr. Hussein's Republican Guard,
Mr. Naqib said.

American and Iraqi officials have said the group was formed by
Mr. Hussein in the final days of his rule to fight for the return of
the Baath Party. Since the start of the insurgency, Mr. Yassin has
traveled to Syria to meet with close associates of Mr. Hussein,
Mr. Naqib said.

In Baghdad, Nasir Ayaef, a member of the interim National Assembly
and an official in the influential Iraqi Islamic Party, was arrested, said
Ayad al-Samarrai, a senior party official. Mr. Samarrai said on Al Jazeera
that Mr. Ayaef had not been engaged in any criminal activity and that
he had been detained because of the party's stand against American
policies. Last week, the Sunni-dominated party said it was withdrawing
from the interim Iraqi government to protest the invasion of Falluja.

If the party decides not to take part in the January elections, it would
come as a big blow to the Americans, who are hoping for strong
Sunni participation to ensure the legitimacy of the outcome.

In Mosul on Tuesday, American and Iraqi troops hoped to clamp
down on the Sunni-led insurgency with their sweep of the city's
troubled western half. A suicide car bomb exploded near a patrol,
wounding one American soldier, said Colonel Hastings, the Army
spokesman. Insurgents also lobbed mortar rounds at an American
base near the airfield and at the headquarters of Task Force Olympia.

Mr. Zarqawi, the most wanted man in Iraq, may have moved his
base from Falluja to Mosul, according to a new military intelligence
report. Some evidence of that appeared in his latest audio recording.
He praised most of the insurgents across the Sunni Triangle by calling
them "lion cubs." But the fighters of Mosul, he said, were "lions."

Reporting for this article was contributed by an Iraqi employee of
The New York Times from Mosul, Robert F. Worth from Falluja,
Richard Oppel Jr. from Habbaniya and Sarah Lyall from London.

Copyright 2004 The New York Times

---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

4) U.S. Pounds Falluja Diehards, Violence in North
By Michael Georgy and Fadel al-Badrani
FALLUJA, Iraq (Reuters)
Wed Nov 17, 2004 08:48 AM ET
http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?type=topNews&storyID=6840990&src=eD
ialog/GetContent§ion=news


FALLUJA, Iraq (Reuters) - American mortars pummelled parts
of Falluja on Wednesday as troops hunted for guerrillas still
fighting in the Iraqi city after nine days of bombardment.

U.S. officers said Marines were "cleaning up" fragments of
an insurgent force of Iraqi and foreign Islamists and Saddam
Hussein loyalists that Iraq's interim government says has left
some 1,600 rebels dead in the rubble of the urban battlefield.

But elsewhere in the northern heartlands of the formerly
dominant Sunni Muslim minority, trouble flared again as it has
done repeatedly since U.S. and Iraqi troops launched a major
offensive more than a week ago in Falluja, west of Baghdad.

Five Iraqis were killed when a car bomb went off close to a
U.S. patrol in the northern oil refining town of Baiji. But
Mosul, Iraq's third biggest city, was relatively quiet after a
week of clashes between guerrillas and U.S. and Iraqi allies.

Two Turkish truck drivers were killed and their vehicles
destroyed in a rocket attack on a civilian convoy near Samarra.

Washington, fighting to crush insurgents before Iraq tries
to hold an election in late January, has acknowledged senior
militants, including Jordanian al Qaeda ally Abu Musab
al-Zarqawi, probably escaped before the attack on Falluja.

It is not clear how widely coordinated insurgent activity
is, however, and so hard to assess whether violence in other
Sunni towns has been led by figures formerly based in Falluja
or simply a reaction to events there by sympathizers.

More widely, the bloodshed in Falluja, including the
alleged shooting dead of an unarmed and wounded guerrilla in a
mosque by a U.S. Marine has provoked dismay among many in Iraq
and the Arab world, where President Bush has hoped the
overthrow of Saddam Hussein would foster stability.

One of the most prominent critics of last year's U.S.-led
invasion returned to the verbal offensive on Wednesday:

"I'm not at all sure that one can say the world is safer,"
said French President Jacques Chirac on the eve of a visit to
Bush's closest ally, British Prime Minister Tony Blair.

"There is no doubt there has been an increase in terrorism
... To a certain extent Saddam Hussein's departure was a
positive thing but it also provoked reaction such as the
mobilization in a number of countries of men and women of Islam
which has made the world more dangerous."

BODY SOUGHT

The family of a kidnapped British aid worker, who said on
Tuesday she was probably dead, were still seeking the return of
her body after a video, apparently made some days ago, seemed
to show her being shot in the head by a hooded gunman.

It has never been clear who seized Margaret Hassan in
Baghdad a month ago nor where she was being held. The timing of
the video, ruled "probably genuine" by the British government,
suggested she may have been killed last week.

"I want to know where she is so I can bury her in peace,"
her Iraqi husband, Tahsin Hassan, told Reuters on Tuesday,
urging his wife's killers to get in touch to clarify her fate.

Dublin-born Hassan, the Iraq country director for the
charity Care International, had lived in Baghdad for more than
30 years, earning acclaim for her work with the poor and sick.

In Falluja, Marines began firing mortars overnight and
intensified the attacks to ease what they called "clean-up
operations" to clear the city of weapons and insurgents.

U.S. officials say more than 1,000 insurgents have been
killed and at least 1,000 suspected fighters have been
detained.

The United States and Iraqi interim government have been at
pains to try to ensure the assault on Falluja does not inspire
a backlash among Sunni Arabs, who have long controlled Iraq,
including under Saddam. Many Sunnis fear majority Shi'ite
domination after January's election.

The government has denied aid agency reports of widespread
civilian suffering in Falluja, much of whose 300,000 residents
have fled the city before the U.S. offensive.

However, U.S. television images of a U.S. Marine shooting
dead a wounded and unarmed man in a mosque have provoked anger
across the Arab world. The Marine has been taken out of combat
and the incident is being investigated.

"I am not a jihadist, I am just a normal Muslim but such
scenes are pushing me to Jihad," said one engineer in the
tranquil Gulf emirate of Dubai, who gave his name as Abdallah.

"We don't expect this from the representative of democracy
in the world."

Anger at America might, however, was tempered with fury
that the guerrillas were using mosques to wage war.

(Additional reporting by Lin Noueihed in Baghdad and Sabah
al-Bazee in Baiji)

(c) Copyright Reuters 2004.

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5) Former G.I.'s, Ordered to War, Fight Not to Go
By MONICA DAVEY
New York Times
Article published Nov 16, 2004
http://www.heraldtribune.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20041116/ZNYT02/4111
60663

The Army has encountered resistance from more than 2,000 former
soldiers it has ordered back to military work, complicating its efforts
to fill gaps in the regular troops.

Many of these former soldiers - some of whom say they have not
trained, held a gun, worn a uniform or even gone for a jog in years
- object to being sent to Iraq and Afghanistan now, after they
thought they were through with life on active duty.

They are seeking exemptions, filing court cases or simply failing
to report for duty, moves that will be watched closely by
approximately 110,000 other members of the Individual Ready
Reserve, a corps of soldiers who are no longer on active duty
but still are eligible for call-up.

In the last few months, the Army has sent notices to more than
4,000 former soldiers informing them that they must return to
active duty, but more than 1,800 of them have already requested
exemptions or delays, many of which are still being considered.

And, of about 2,500 who were due to arrive on military bases
for refresher training by Nov. 7, 733 had not shown up.

Army officials say the call-up is proceeding at rates they
anticipated, and they are trying to fill needed jobs with former
soldiers as they did in the Persian Gulf war of 1991.

Still, the resistance puts further strain on a military that has
summoned reserve troops in numbers not seen since World
War II and forced thousands of soldiers in Iraq to postpone
their departures when their enlistment obligations ended.

Tensions are flaring between the Army and some of its veterans,
who say they are surprised and confused about their obligations
and unsure where to turn.

"I consider myself a civilian," said Rick Howell, a major from
Tuscaloosa, Ala., who said he thought he had left the Army
behind in 1997 after more than a decade flying helicopters.
"I've done my time. I've got a brand new baby and a wife, and
I haven't touched the controls of an aircraft in seven years. I'm
47 years old. How could they be calling me? How could they
even want me?"

Some former soldiers acknowledge that the Army has every
right to call them back, but argue that their personal circumstances
- illness, single parenthood, financial woes - make going overseas
impossible now.

Others say they do not believe they are eligible to be returned
to active duty because, they contend, they already finished the
obligations they signed up for when they joined the military.
A handful of such former soldiers, scattered across the country,
have filed lawsuits making that claim in federal courts.

These former soldiers are not among the part-time soldiers
- reservists and National Guard members - who receive paychecks
and train on weekends, and who have been called up in large
numbers over the last three years.

Instead, these are members of the Individual Ready Reserve, a pool
of former soldiers seldom ordered back to work. Ordinarily, these
former soldiers do not get military pay, nor do they train. They
receive points toward a military retirement and an address form
to update once a year.

When soldiers enlist, they typically agree to an eight-year commitment
to the Army but often are allowed to end active duty sooner. Some
of them join the Reserves or National Guard to complete their
commitment; others finish their time in the Individual Ready Reserve.

For officers, the commitment does not expire unless they formally
resign their commissions in writing, a detail some insist they did
not know and were not told when they signed their contracts,
although Army officials strongly dispute that.

Lt. Col. Pamela Hart, a spokeswoman for the Army, said people
in the service are well aware of the provision. "We all know about
it," Colonel Hart said.

She said problems with the call-ups of former soldiers have involved
a relatively small number of people, are being worked out, and are
hardly unique to this conflict. In the first gulf war, she said, more than
20,000 former soldiers were called up. With medical problems and
no-shows, only about 14,400 were actually deployed, she said.

Most of the deployments in the first gulf war lasted 120 days, the
Army said. The current call-ups are more likely to last a year.

Of those seeking exemptions now, the Army is studying each
person's case individually, Colonel Hart said, and has no set rule
on what allows a person to avoid deployment. Army officials are still
weighing more than half of the requests. So far, only 3 percent of
requests for exemptions have been turned down, while 45 percent
have been approved.

As for the former soldiers who failed to appear at bases by their
assigned dates, the Army is trying to reach them, one by one, to
discuss their circumstances, Colonel Hart said. In late September,
some Army officials suggested that they would pursue harsher
punishments - declaring people AWOL and possibly pursuing military
charges - but the Army has since taken a quieter, more conciliatory
approach.

"These are challenging times in their lives," Colonel Hart said, adding
that some former soldiers who failed to report might have moved and
not received the Army's notice. "We're contacting them as best as possible."
For the rest, though, some questions linger over who really qualifies
for the callback.

Colette Parrish said she burst into tears the evening that her husband,
Todd, walked into their house in Cary, N.C., with a letter from the
Army calling him back to service. "We had no idea this could happen,"
she said. "We hadn't been preparing for any of it because we thought
it wasn't possible."

At first, Mr. Parrish, 31, said he was convinced that the letter was
just an administrative error because he believed that his time in the
Individual Ready Reserve had ended.

He had gone to college on an R.O.T.C. scholarship, then served four
years as a field artillery officer. He said he resigned his commission
after that, became an engineer, and still owed the Army four years
in the Individual Ready Reserve to complete his total obligation.

To Mr. Parrish, who has filed a lawsuit against the Army in federal
court in North Carolina, that obligation ended on Dec. 19, 2003.
But the Army apparently does not agree, and says that it never
accepted Mr. Parrish's resignation as an officer.

As the court fight has continued, Mr. Parrish's date to report to Fort
Sill, Okla., has been pushed back, again and again, one month at
a time. Instead of thinking about long-term plans, for his wife and
their future family, he is living in 30-day increments.

He said he always looked back on his service years fondly, and with
a deep sense of patriotism.

"I guess I feel disillusioned now," he said. "This isn't about being
for or against the war. It's not about Democrats or Republicans. It's
just a contract, and I don't think this is right. If they need more
people, shouldn't they get them the right way? How many more like
me are there?"

Mark Waple, Mr. Parrish's lawyer, said he had received calls from
30 other former soldiers in recent months, all of whom had heard
of Mr. Parrish's case and had similar stories.

At least two other former soldiers have filed suit over the question.
In Hawaii, David Miyasato, a former enlisted soldier who served in the
first gulf war, said he would never go AWOL; he would have gone to
Iraq, he said, if need be.

But Mr. Miyasato also said that his eight-year commitment ended
nearly a decade ago. After he received his letter calling him back
to service, he said, he called the Army repeatedly to argue that he
was not eligible. Finally, he said, with his date to report to a base
in South Carolina just days away, he contacted a lawyer and filed
suit on Nov. 5.

"This was actually my last resort," said Mr. Miyasato, a former truck
driver and fuel hauler who said that, at 34, he led an entirely different
life, with an 8-month-old daughter and a window-tinting company to
run. "I had been calling around everywhere for help."

On Nov. 10, Mr. Miyasato said, he learned that the Army had rescinded
his orders.

In New York, Jay Ferriola, a former captain in the Army, filed a suit
saying he had resigned his officer's commission in June and no longer
qualified for call-up in the Individual Ready Reserve. On Nov. 5, the
Army rescinded his orders and honorably discharged him.

"This shows that the system works," Colonel Hart said. "If the soldiers
bring their situations to our attention, we're going to do what's right."

Barry Slotnick, Mr. Ferriola's lawyer, said he wondered how many other
soldiers might be in similar positions, but without the money, the
contacts or the certainty to sue. Mr. Slotnick said he had received
numerous calls from others since he filed Mr. Ferriola's case in late
October.

"We might as well add another phone bank," Mr. Slotnick said. "What
I can see is that there are many, many cases of people being called up
that shouldn't have been. This is a backdoor draft. I also have to wonder
how many are already in Iraq who shouldn't be there, who just didn't
think to question it."

The Army's current plan is to fill 4,400 jobs through March from among
5,600 former soldiers ordered to duty. But an Army official said last
month that more former soldiers, perhaps in similar numbers, might
be called on later next year, as well.

For now, those being sent to Iraq and Afghanistan are being asked to
handle a variety of support positions, including truck drivers and fuel
and food suppliers.

Months ago, the Army said some of the former soldiers would be needed
to play the French horn, the clarinet, the euphonium, the saxophone
and the electric bass as part of the military's bands, but the notion
drew criticism from members of Congress who questioned the need
to order people to give up their civilian lives to play instruments.
Colonel Hart said the Army has since filled the musician jobs with
volunteers.

Before going to Iraq, former soldiers are receiving as many days of
training as they need, an Army spokesman said. Some of the soldiers
said they were worried, though, about the prospect and safety of trying
to get up to speed in a few months.

"These guys like me are basically untrained civilians now," said Mr.
Howell, the former helicopter test pilot. Mr. Howell said he left the
Army years ago with an injured back, knee and elbow, leaving him
wondering about his own physical condition.

"I don't even have a uniform anymore," he said. "But they don't have
any more reserves left, so we're it. All they want is some bodies to
go to Iraq, just someone to be there, to sit on the ground."

When he left the military in 1997 as part of a reduction in forces,
Mr. Howell said, he saw a note in the "little print" in his annuity
agreement about a future commitment. But he said he was told that
his obligation to the Individual Ready Reserve would be brief and
meant little anyway. "They said it was just a way of having me on
the books," he said.

After that, Mr. Howell said, he jumped into the civilian world. He
got married. He and his new wife began building a house. They
struggled to have children.

In September, his first child, Clayton, was born. Just before that,
his orders arrived.

"It does rip my heart out that these young men and women are
over there, and there is part of me that wants to be with them,"
he said recently. "But I have responsibilities here now."

Mr. Howell said he had applied to the Army for an exemption but
was recently turned down. If he loses his appeal, he will be given
a new reporting date. His best hope, he said, is that his appeal is
buried somewhere at the very bottom of a big stack of them.

---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

6) Come together for Palestine!
West Coast Regional Right to Return Conference
Empowering the Palestine Right to Return Movement on
the West Coast of North America
Saturday November 20, 2004

*panel discussions
*informative presentations
*cultural performance
*informal social dinner

Al-Awda San Diego in conjunction with Students for Justice at The
University
of California at San Diego will be hosting an important and timely one-day
West Coast regional conference for the Right to Return Movement for
Palestinian refugees. The conference will take place on 20 November 2004 at
The University of California San Diego, La Jolla. Now more than ever we
must
come together to defend the rights of Palestinian refugees.

Confirmed speakers include Dr. Jess Ghannam (Al-Awda SF), Richard Becker
(ANSWER Coalition), Alison Weir (founder, If Americans Knew), John Parker
(IAC West Coast Coordinator), Musa Al-Hindi (Al-Awda Exec. Committee),
Lamis
Deek (Al-Awda NY), Ban Al-Wardi (ADC-LA/OC), Muna Coobtee (Free Palestine
Alliance), Samera Sood (Palestinian American Women's Association), Mark
Gonzales (Hip Hop artist), student activists from a number of California
campuses, and many more!

Join us for this important event. For more information on the West
Coast regional conference, visit the following pages:

Purpose: http://al-awdacal.org/west_conf/back.html
Program: http://al-awdacal.org/west_conf/prog.html
Speakers: http://al-awdacal.org/west_conf/speakers.html
Registration: http://al-awdacal.org/west_conf/register.html
Dinner: http://al-awdacal.org/west_conf/dinner.html
Accommodation: http://al-awdacal.org/west_conf/hotel.html
Directions & Transportation:
http://al-awdacal.org/west_conf/maps.html
Organizations wishing to table, contact us at: info@al-awdacal.org

You can register online at:
http://al-awdacal.org/west_conf/register.html

Registration also available at the door. All are welcome.

Al-Awda California
The Palestine Right to Return Coalition
PO Box 131352
Carlsbad, CA 92013, USA
E-mail: info@al-awdacal.org
WWW: http://al-awdacal.org
Fax: 1-360-933-3568

Los Angeles Website: http://www.Al-AwdaLA.org/
California Website- http://www.al-awdacal.org/
Al-Awda National Website: http://www.al-awda.org/
Unless indicated otherwise, all statements posted represent the views of
their authors and not necessarily those of Al-Awda, The Palestine Right to
Return Coalition.

http://al-awda.org

---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

7) Attica to Abu Ghraib: Human Rights, Torture,
and Resistance" Conference
Convenors: International Human Rights Initiative (IHRI)
Friday, February 25th - Saturday, February 26th, 2005
Oakland, CA - Laney Community College

Contact Info:

Lead Organizer:

Email: info@attica2abughraibKali Akuno Website:
www.attica2abughraib.com (under construction) (510)
593-3956 Phone Number: (510) 433-0115

kaliaw@sbcglobal.net Conference Brief


Torture, illegal detention and other human rights abuses have always been
weapons used by the US government to crush resistance. Today we see a
terrifying escalation in that repression, whether against Iraqis and
Afghans half a world away-or immigrants, prisoners and political
activists here at home. Our strength lies in building on the experiences
of those who resist-here in the US, in Latin America, Palestine, the
Philippines, the Caribbean, and in countless communities throughout the
world.

Faced with the globalization of repression, how can we globalize our
resistance? Help plan a conference to:

· Declare an International Day of Solidarity to draw attention to,
support, protect and demand freedom for all Political Prisoners; ·
Urge, propose and support litigation and/or other forms of redress in
domestic and international forum against the U.S. government and its
agents for committing systematic violations of human rights, domestic
law and international law;
· Develop and implement coordinated access
to and use of institutions of civil society, i.e. schools, media,
grassroot organizations, to condemn violations of human rights and
international law by the U.S. government and its agents. We want to
involve as many organizations and voices as possible in the planning
process.
For more information, contact us at www.attica2abughraib.com or
info@attica2abughraib.com.

Goals and Objectives

The overall aim of the Attica to Abu Ghraib International Conference is
to develop strategies for and coordinate resistance to U.S. government
policies that violate human rights and international law. A structure
will be established to create a network to coordinate solidarity work
among domestic and international groups to achieve the following
objectives:

· Initiate an international campaign to stop the systematic use of
torture, illegal detentions, grand jury abuses, secret probes,
immigration raids, registrations and other violations of domestic and
international by the U.S. or its agents;
· Increase domestic and international support for Political Detainees,
Political Prisoners and Prisoners of War who were detained before and after
9/11 within and out side the U.S. borders;
· Pursue litigation and redress in domestic
and international forums against the U.S. government and its agents for
systematic human rights abuses and violations of domestic and
international law. Practically support this undertaking by compiling
relevant evidentiary documentation of these violations and abuses.
General Strategy Points

1. We see the conference organizing process as a vehicle for
building an international campaign to challenge the human rights
record of the United States, and to ignite an international campaign
to challenge these ongoing abuses. 2. We are eliciting
international support and presence at the conference to build the
international campaign. We are aiming specifically for
representation from South Africa, Cuba, and Venezuela. Our aim is to
have one or more of these nations represent our case to the UN and
various international legislative and/or judicial bodies (like the
International Court of Justice/ICJ). We are also aiming for
representation from various international bodies of the UN, like the
International Labor Organization (ILO), and from various
international NGO's that focus on defending human rights.

Focus Areas


To meet the goals of the campaign we have divided the conference program
into three broad areas of focus and analysis. Each area is a key
component of the workings of U.S. empire domestically and
internationally, and provides a focus for linking movements within and
outside the U.S. to more effectively resist imperial strategies of
repression, criminalization, and assaults on the sovereignty of the
worlds peoples and nations. Our aim is to formulate strategies and
concrete plans from the analysis of these focus areas to unite domestic
and international organizations in the pursuit of successful
anti-imperialist campaigns.
1. Methods of Repression:
1. The systematic use of racial profiling, mass incarceration,
domestic militarization, torture and sensory deprivation to
criminalize oppressed peoples and peoples' struggles, and as
instruments of repression. 2. The training and promotion of
torture and terrorism, including the production of instructional
courses and manuals in how to use torture as part of
counterinsurgency operations, provided by the US to its allies and
proxies (such as the Taliban in Afghanistan and the Salvadorean
Army). 3. The systematic use of grand juries, secret detentions,
secret evidence and deportations to repress dissent and to avoid
civil and international law. 4. The international promotion of
legislation and policies modeled on COINTELPRO and the Patriot Act.




1. Criminalization and Detention:
1. The privatization of war and security operations,
specifically the increasing use of "contractors" to conduct wars and
run prisons. 2. The systematic refusal by the US government to
apply the Geneva Conventions to domestic and international political
prisoners and prisoners of war. 3. The policy of criminalizing
and/or falsely labeling resisters as "terrorists" and the equation
of all forms of resistance with criminal activity or acts of
terrorism.




1. Assaults on Sovereignty


a. The support and defense of dictatorial regimes (e.g. Israel,
Chile, Argentina, the Philippines, Zaire) that have systematically
violated the human rights of people within their borders and/or occupied
territories. b. Undermining the sovereignty and self-determination
ofnations, including the illegal overthrow of legitimate governments
through coups and invasions (e.g. Chile, Afghanistan, Nicaragua, Haiti)
as well as the ongoing subjugation of oppressed people inside US
borders.c. Providing sanctuary convicted war criminals, human rights
abusers, and terrorists, including exiled Cuban-American mercenaries and
death squad
leaders from Guatemala, El Salvador, Mozambique, Nicaragua, Chile,
Angola, the Philippines and Haiti.

Partial List of Sponsors and Endorsers


€ Al-Awda, The Palestine Right to Return Coalition
€ American Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee (ADC)
€ American Friends Service Committee (AFSC) Africa Initiative -
SF € Amnesty International - Western Region € Arabs
Building Community € Black Radical Congress (BRC) - SF Bay Area
€ California Prison Focus
€ Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR)
€ Center for Justice and Accountability (CJA)
€ Challenging White Supremacy Workshops
€ Critical Resistance (CR)
€ Ella Baker Center for Human Rights (EBC)
€ GABRIELA Network
€ Global Exchange
€ Haiti Action Committee
€ Jericho Movement
€ Justice in Palestine Coalition
€ LAGAI - Queer Insurrection
€ Legal Services for Prisoners with Children (LSPC)
€ Malcolm X Grassroots Movement (MXGM)
€ National Committee to Free the Cuban Five
€ National Lawyers Guild (NLG) - San Francisco
€ Out of Control
€ Prison Activist Resource Center (PARC)
€ Queers Undermining Israeli Terrorism (QUIT!)
€ San Francisco Women in Black
€ School of the Americas Watch (SOA Watch)
€ SUSTAIN-Bay Area Chapter -Stop U.S. Tax Aid to Israel Now €
Trans Africa Forum

Since 1923 the War Resisters League has affirmed that war is a crime
against humanity. We therefore are determined not to support any kind
of war, international or civil, and to strive nonviolently for the
removal of all the causes of war.

---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

8) New Bill in Congress
Targets Teachers
Who Dare To Question US Support For Israel
By Michael Collins Piper
American Free Press
11-15-4
http://rense.com/general59/NEWBILL.HTM

The Israeli lobby has launched an all-out drive to ensure
congressional passage of a bill, approved by the House and now before a
Senate committee that would set up a federal tribunal to investigate and
monitor criticism of Israel on American college campuses.

Ten months ago the New York-based Jewish Week newspaper
claimed that the report by American Free Press that Republican members
of the Senate were planning to crack down on college and university
professors who were critical of Israel was "a dangerous urban legend at
best,
deliberate disinformation at worst." They were claiming that AFP lied.

However, on Sept. 17, 2003, the House Subcommittee on
Select Education unanimously approved H.R. 3077, the International Studies
in Higher Education Act, which was then passed by the full House on Oct.
21. The chief sponsor of the legislation was Rep. Peter Hoekstra, a
conservative Republican from Michigan.

DANGEROUS LEGISLATION


DANGEROUS LEGISLATION

Critics charge that the bill is dangerous-a direct affront
to the First Amendment and the product of intrigue by a small clique of
individuals and organizations which combines the forces of the powerful
Israeli lobby in official Washington.

Leading the push for Senate approval of the bill are
the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) of B'nai B'rith, run by Abe Foxman, the
American Jewish Congress and the American Jewish Committee.

Also lending its support is Empower America, the neo-conservative
front group established by William Kristol, editor and publisher of
billionaire Rupert Murdoch's Weekly Standard, which is said to be the
"intellectual"
journal that governs the train of foreign policy thinking in the Bush
administration.

One other group has lent its support: the U.S. India
Political Action Committee, an Indian-American group that has been working
closely with the Israeli lobby now that Israel and India are geopolitically
allied.

H.R. 3077 is bureaucratic in its tone, decipherable only
to those with the capacity to wade through legislative linguistics. It
would set up a seven-member advisory board that would have the power to
recommend cutting federal funding for colleges and universities that are
viewed as harboring academic critics of Israel.

Two members of the board would be appointed by the Senate,
two by the House, and three by the secretary of education, two of whom
are required to be from U.S. federal security agencies. The various
appointees would be selected from what The Christian Science Monitor
described on
March 11 as "politicians, representatives of cultural and educational
organizations, and private citizens."

FEARS ECHOED

Gilbert Merk, vice provost for international affairs
and development and director of the Center for International Studies at
Duke University, has echoed the fears of many when he charged that this
advisory board "could easily be hijacked by those who have a political
axe to grind and become a vehicle for an inquisition."

The primary individuals promoting this effort to control
intellectual debate on the college campuses are prominent and outspoken
supporters of Israel and harsh critics of the Arab and Muslim worlds. They
are:

* Martin Kramer, a professor of Arab studies at the Moshe
Dayan Center at Tel Aviv University in Israel;

* Stanley Kurtz, a contributor of ex-CIA man William
F. Buckley Jr.'s bitterly anti-Arab National Review Online and a research
fellow at the staunchly pro-Israel Hoover Institution; and

* Daniel Pipes, founder of the pro-Israel Middle East
Forum and its affiliate, Campus Watch, an ADL-style organization that keeps
tabs on college professors and students who are-or are suspected of
being-critics of Israel.

These three, along with the Israeli lobby, are claiming
that they are fighting "anti-Americanism" as it is being taught
on the college campuses.

Republicans in Congress have joined this chorus, preferring
to allow their constituents to think that this is an "America First"
measure.

Juan Cole of the History News Network responds to this
extraordinary twist on reality saying that the claim of "anti-Americanism"
is intellectually dishonest.

"What they mean . . . if you pin them down is ambivalence
about the Iraq war, or dislike of Israeli colonization of the West Bank,
or recognition that the U.S. government has sometimes in the past been
in bed with present enemies like al Qaeda or Saddam. None of these positions
is 'anti-American,' and any attempt by a congressionally appointed body
to tell university professors they cannot say these things-or that if they
say them they must hire someone else who will say the opposite-is
a contravention of the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution."

The promoters are also suggesting that this legislation
would, according to the American Jewish Committee, "enhance intellectual
freedom on campus by enabling diverse viewpoints to be heard." Of
course, the legislation would do precisely the opposite, say critics.

Lisa Anderson of the Columbia University School of International
and Public Affairs said in response that "this plan . . . is not about
diversity, or even about the truth."

Ms. Anderson does not cite the role of the Israeli lobby,
but instead targets conservative Republicans who are acting as the Israeli
lobby's surrogates and says that this plan is "about the conviction
of conservative political activists that the American university community
is insufficiently patriotic, or perhaps simply insufficiently conservative."

What she should be saying is that these Republicans who
are carrying water for Israel are concerned that universities are
"insufficiently pro-Israel."

The Republican House members who originally joined Hoekstra
in co-sponsoring this legislation should be named for the record. They
are: John A. Boehner (Ohio), John R. Carter (Texas), Tom Cole (Oklahoma),
James Greenwood (Penn.), Howard (Buck) McKeon (Calif.), Patrick J. Tiberi
(Ohio) and Joe Wilson (South Carolina).

Americans will not be able to find out how their representatives
voted on the bill. Hoekstra asked for a suspension of the House rules,
which was approved, making it possible for the controversial measure to
be passed with an unrecorded "voice vote." There is no record
of how individual House members voted or if they even voted at all.

FIRST MEASURE

The measure passed by the House is the same type of proposed
"ideological diversity" legislation that AFP detailed in its
Oct. 20, 2003, issue. At the time, the measure was being kicked around
for possible introduction in the Senate by two prominent Republicans, Rick
Santorum (Penn.) and Sam Brownback (Kan.).

AFP's initial report on the legislation garnered so much
attention from American college and university professors and on the
Internet, even so far as the Arab world, that the resulting negative
publicity forced
Santorum and Brownback to back off.

Many major American education organizations, including
the teacher's union, the National Education Association, have raised their
concerns about this campaign to muzzle the free speech of teachers,
professors and instructors. The American Civil Liberties Union has also
protested
this measure.

Critics say this is a new form of what has been known
in the past as "McCarthyism," and no matter what you may think
about the late Sen. Joseph McCarthy, whose name, rightly or wrongly,
inspired
that terminology, the truth is that this legislation is "McCarthyism"
by virtue of the popular definition.

The only chance to destroy this legislation and stop
it dead in its tracks is for enough grassroots citizens to rise up and
demand that H.R. 3077 be put to rest.

And believe it or not, the one senator who may be able
to stop it is Edward M. (Ted) Kennedy of Massachusetts.


http://www.americanfreepress.net/03_19_04/New_Bill_/new_bill_.html


MainPage
http://www.rense.com

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9) Judge Questions Long Sentence in Drug Case
(55 years for selling a sack of weed to a police informant)
By NICK MADIGAN
SALT LAKE CITY
November 17, 2004
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/11/17/national/17sentencing.html

SALT LAKE CITY, Nov. 16 - In a case that has spurred intense soul-searching
in legal circles, a 25-year-old convicted drug dealer, who was arrested two
years ago for selling small bags of marijuana to a police informant, was
sentenced on Tuesday to 55 years in prison.

The judge who sentenced him, Paul G. Cassell of the United States District
Court here, said that he pronounced the sentence "reluctantly" but that his
hands were tied by a mandatory-minimum law that required the
imposition of 55 years on Weldon H. Angelos because he had a gun
during at least two of the drug transactions.

"I have no choice," Judge Cassell said to Mr. Angelos, who seemed
frozen in place as the extent of the sentence became apparent.

The judge then urged Mr. Angelos's lawyer, Jerome H. Mooney, not only
to appeal his decision but to ask President Bush for clemency once all
appeals were exhausted. He also urged Congress to set aside the law
that made the sentence mandatory.

Judge Cassell said that sentencing Mr. Angelos to prison until he is
70 years old was "unjust, cruel and even irrational," but that the law
that forced him to do so had not proved to be unconstitutional and thus
had to stand. The sentence was all the more ironic, he said, because only
two hours earlier he had been legally able to impose a sentence of
22 years on a man convicted of aggravated second-degree murder for
beating an elderly woman to death with a log. That crime, he argued,
was far more serious.

Mr. Angelos's wife, Zandrah, who sat in court with the couple's two boys,
aged 5 and 7, began crying. "He might as well have killed someone,"
she said bitterly, wiping her eyes, referring to her husband. "He should
have done worse than he did if he was going to get 55 years."

The question of Mr. Angelos's sentence was at the center of a debate
as to whether it was fair to send a minor drug dealer to prison for
55 years when a murderer, rapist or terrorist, according to the same
sentencing directives, would ordinarily receive no more than about
25 years.

During a court hearing in September, Judge Cassell posed a question
to the opposing legal teams in the case: "Is there a rational basis," he
asked, "for giving Mr. Angelos more time than the hijacker, the
murderer, the rapist?"

The sentence against Mr. Angelos, the founder of the rap music label
Extravagant Records, stemmed from his conviction on three counts
of possession of a firearm while engaged in drug trafficking. The
first count carried a mandatory five-year sentence, with each
subsequent count calling for 25 years.

According to trial testimony, Mr. Angelos was carrying a pistol in
an ankle holster while selling marijuana. He was not accused of
brandishing the weapon or threatening anyone with it.

But in court on Tuesday, Robert Lund, an assistant United States
attorney who prosecuted the case, called Mr. Angelos a "purveyor
of poison," and said he had been dealing drugs for more than four
years before his arrest. Carrying a gun in the commission of such
crimes, he said, meant that Mr. Angelos was prepared "to kill other
human beings."

Copyright 2004 The New York Times

---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

10) Fallujah: Blood Does Not Drown People’s Resistance,
But Nurtures It!

One of the most savage assaults on the Iraqi people since the
US-UK imperialists invaded their country began on Fallujah on
8 November. The Butchers of Fallujah, Bush and Blair, are ruthlessly
pursuing the US war program particularly the war on the people,
which is in reality an ongoing and unlimited war for greater US
empire that has absolutely nothing to do with liberating anyone.
Now the people of Fallujah are experiencing the horrors of the US
program.

Before the Nazi style full-scale attack on Fallujah 200,000 people
due to aerial and artillery bombardments were forced to leave the city.
But 100,000 remained including many families huddling in their homes
banding together for survival. Then US troops who had already sealed
off roads, cut off water, electricity, food and medical supplies, occupied
the only hospital and started killing people everywhere mainly through
systematic destruction of whole neighbourhoods with tanks and
artillery firing indiscriminately and the warplanes dropping 500,
1000, 2000 pound bombs. This is nothing less than a massive new
war crime, which could lead to the deaths of thousands of Iraqis and
destruction of much of the city. Now, who are the real terrorists,
US-UK imperialists or resistance fighters who have had the support
of the most of the city’s people, many millions across Iraq and tens
of millions around the world?

In Iraq there has been mass outrage, distrust and a growing armed
opposition to the US-UK invaders. And Fallujah has been one stronghold
of a growing Iraqi people’s resistance to the occupation. This resistance
has created enormous problems for the US and UK imperialists not only
in Iraq but across the Middle East and globally. It has thrown a very big
spanner into their plans of making Iraqi people to submit and turn Iraq
to a platform for strengthening the US grip on the entire region. Iraqi
people’s resistance threatens to disrupt the US war on the world which
is aimed at restructuring global political, economic and military
relations to expand the US Empire.

We should value and support the Iraqi people’s resistance against
imperialism and help to strengthen it. If the US succeeds in Iraq, under
the pretext of “war on terrorism” it will be free to attack elsewhere
across the globe. If US tanks have not been rolling across other borders;
if US Cruise missiles, warplanes, helicopters and artillery have not been
blowing up neighborhoods and homes; and if US ground forces have
not been murdering, torturing and humiliating people in other countries,
one major factor holding them back so far is that they ran into a lot more
resistance in Iraq than they expected.

Fallujah has become a symbol of resistance in Iraq and across the
Middle East, a symbol of the Iraqi people’s refusal to bow down to
imperialism. Today the anti-occupation insurgency has spread across
Iraq and has gain momentum and the Iraqi resistance fighters are in the
front lines of resistance to US imperialism in the world. All this
underlines the importance of how the resistance in Iraq is fought
and how we can support and strengthen it. For the Iraqi people and
the people of the world it will make a big difference.

World People's Resistance Movement website- www.wprm.org********
For further information please E-mail us:
wprm_britain@yahoo.co.uk or please write to:-
BM Box 7970, London WC1N 3XX

---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

11) Consumer Prices See Biggest Gain Since May
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
WASHINGTON (AP)
November 17, 2004
Filed at 11:54 a.m. ET
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/business/AP-Economy.html?oref=login

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Consumer prices -- stoked by more expensive
gasoline as well as pricier fruits and vegetables -- heated up in October,
rising by 0.6 percent, the biggest gain in five months.

The newest snapshot of the inflation climate, released by the Labor
Department Wednesday, bolstered the chances that the Federal
Reserve would push up interest rates for a fifth time this year on
Dec. 14.

The sizable increase in the Consumer Price Index, the government's
most closely watched inflation barometer, came after prices rose by
0.2 percent in September.

Sharp increases in energy and food prices were the main culprits
behind the acceleration in consumer prices for October.

Excluding energy and food prices, which can swing widely from
month to month, ``core'' prices increased by a more modest 0.2
percent in October, following a 0.3 percent rise the previous month.

The pricing picture in October showed bigger increases than
economists were forecasting. Some were expecting a 0.4 percent
advance in overall consumer prices and a 0.1 percent rise in the
core figure.

In a bid to prevent inflation from becoming a threat to the economy,
Fed Chairman Alan Greenspan and his colleagues embarked in June
on a campaign to raise short-term interest rates. Economists said it
is crucial for the Fed to move rates back to more normal levels after
they were kept extraordinarily low to rescue the economy from the
jolts of the 2001 recession and terrorist attacks.

Thus far, the Fed has ordered four quarter-point rate increases. The
most recent one, last week, left the federal funds rate -- the Fed's
main tool for influencing economic activity -- at 2 percent.

``The chances have clearly risen this month that the Fed will not
take a holiday in December but rather continue on its program of
quarter-point increases,'' said Carl Tannenbaum, chief economist
at LaSalle Bank.

Other economic news also added to the case for another rate increase:

-- Industrial production shot up by 0.7 percent in October, up from
a 0.1 percent increase in September. The Federal Reserve report
suggested the industrial sector is gaining momentum.

-- Housing construction jumped by 6.4 percent in October to a
seasonally adjusted annual rate of 2.03 million, the Commerce
Department said.

From an economic point of view, inflation -- while certainly a concern
-- isn't currently a major danger to the economy's expansion, analysts
said.

Fed policy-makers, in a statement released after their meeting last
week, said ``inflation and longer-term inflation expectations remain
well contained.'' They also said the economy appears to be growing
``at a moderate pace despite the rise in energy prices.''

The consumer price report comes one day after the government
released data showing the wholesale costs soared in October by
1.7 percent, the biggest increase in more than 14 years.

The economy's soft patch in the spring and early summer had
helped to keep prices relatively subdued, economists said. Now
that the economy is picking up, inflation probably will be on the
rise as well. A weaker U.S. dollar also is putting pressure on prices
of imported goods, which gives U.S. producers more room to raise
their prices.

Still, Tannenbaum and other economists said that they expect both
wholesale and consumer prices for November to look a lot better,
citing a moderation in crude oil costs and a settling down of some
food costs that were pushed up as hurricanes hurt supplies.

In the CPI report, energy prices jumped by 4.2 percent in October,
compared with a 0.4 percent drop in September. Gasoline prices
last month surged by 8.6 percent and fuel oil costs went up by 9.4
percent. Both increases were the largest since February 2003.
Natural gas prices went up 0.6 percent.

Oil prices, which hit a record high of just over $55 a barrel late
last month, have moderated recently. Oil prices closed on Tuesday
at more than $46 a barrel.

Food prices climbed by 0.6 percent in October, after being flat in
September. Last month's increase reflected a 6.3 percent rise in the
prices of fresh fruits, the largest since June 1984, and a 8.8 percent
jump in vegetable prices, the biggest since February 1997. Supply
disruptions related to hurricanes that tore through the Southeast were
blamed for those big advances. Prices for beef and veal, pork, poultry
and dairy products all dropped.

Elsewhere in the report: clothing prices rose 0.2 percent in October
as more expensive fall and winter wear hit the racks. Airline fares
went up by 1.4 percent, as fuel costs become more expensive. Medical
care costs increased 0.4 percent.

In the first 10 months of 2004, consumer prices rose at an annual
rate of 3.9 percent, compared with a 1.9 percent increase for all of
2003. That pickup has been led by soaring energy costs. Excluding
energy and food costs, ``core'' inflation increased at an annual rate
of 2.4 percent. That's also faster than the 1.1 percent increase
registered for 2003.

Copyright 2004 The Associated Press

posted 12:37 PM  0 comments

---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

1) Lynne Stewart Frame-Up Unravels

2) For those in the Chicago Area or coming to the
USLAW National Leadership Assembly there ---
Challenging the militarization of our schools:
A forum on the fight to save Senn High School
Friday December 3
6:00 pm
UNITE HERE union hall
333 S. Ashland
Chicago
The Chicago School Board and the U.S. Navy want to turn the
North Side's Senn High School into a naval academy.

3) Please come out this November 19-21 to Columbus, GA to
close the School of the Americas.
SOA Watch Updates and Actions
Converge on Ft. Benning, GA: November 19-21!
Together We Will Shut Down the School of Assassins!

4) 'This one's faking he's dead'
'He's dead now'
Fallujah: Video shows US soldier killing wounded insurgent
in cold blood
By Andrew Buncombe in Washington
16 November 2004
http://news.independent.co.uk/world/middle_east/story.jsp?story=583322

5) U.S. Marines Rally Round Iraq Probe Comrade
By Michael Georgy
FALLUJA, Iraq (Reuters)
Tue Nov 16, 2004 09:29 AM ET
http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?type=topNews&storyID=6828512&src=eD
ialog/GetContent§ion=news

6) U.S. Forces Launch Assault on Iraqi Rebels in Mosul
By Maher al-Thanoon
MOSUL, Iraq (Reuters)
Tue Nov 16, 2004 09:37 AM ET
http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?type=topNews&storyID=6828657&src=eD
ialog/GetContent§ion=news

7) CKUT Radio: U.S. Military War Crimes in Fallujah

8) 800 Civilians Feared Dead in Fallujah
Inter Press Service
By: Dahr Jamail
{http://www.dahrjamailiraq.com/hard_news/archives/hard_news/000121.php#more}

9) A short history of trade unionism in the Iraqi oil industry
August 24, 2004
http://www.iraqitradeunions.org/archives/000071.html

10) A City Lies in Ruins, Along with the Lives of the
Wretched Survivors
By Michael Georgy in Fallujah and Kim Sengupta
Published on Monday, November 15, 2004 by the lndependent/UK
http://news.independent.co.uk/world/middle_east/story.jsp?story=582915
http://www.commondreams.org/headlines04/1115-01.htm

11) THE CIVILIAN DEATH TOLL
By Harvey McGavin
http://news.independent.co.uk/world/middle_east/story.jsp?story=582915
http://www.commondreams.org/headlines04/1115-01.htm

12) GI SPECIAL 2#C22
thomasfbarton@earthlink.net
11.16.04
Huge Increase In Badly Wounded Floods U.S. Military Hospital;
419 Since Attack On Falluja Started

13) 'Twas a Famous Rollover, Continued
By Fred Feldman

14) CONSPIRING TO COMMIT MURDER FOR PROFIT!
In a message dated 11/16/04 9:22:58 AM, Jibasmil writes:
Following is a pre-written message which I am lazy enough
to use. The fact that this "study" has been delayed is, I think,
due the use of the internet -- word of it got around very quickly
and the EPA felt the heat. We need to keep that heat up so the
#$%@&#* EPA kills it. -judy

15) United for Peace and Justice
Development Coordinator
Job Announcement

16) Why I fear for the dream of my life
Commentary
Abdul Bariatwan
The Observer
Sunday November 14, 2004
http://observer.guardian.co.uk/comment/story/0,6903,1350959,00.html

17) Producer Prices Jump on Higher Energy Costs
By TERENCE NEILAN
November 16, 2004
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/11/16/business/16cnd-prices.html?hp&ex=11006676
00&en=3a278a97f6a5790e&ei=5094&partner=homepage


18) Presbyterian Church receives arson threat over Middle
East policies
From: "Justice Freedom"
Date: Mon, 15 Nov 2004 21:08:17 -0800
[From Wendy Campbell]
http://www.lex18.com/global/story.asp?s=2561665&ClientType=Printable

19) S0CIALIST CUBA--THE HOPE OF THE PLANET
To: ufpj-disc@yahoogroups.com
By Dave Silver
Tue, 16 Nov 2004 16:55:02 -0500

---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

1) Lynne Stewart Frame-Up Unravels

Dear Friends,

Here's an important article on the Lynne Stewart case. Please help
distribute it widely.

In solidarity,

Jeff Mackler

Lynne Stewart Frame-Up Unravels
by Jeff Mackler

Almost 17 weeks after some dozen federal government prosecutors had begun
their marathon presentation charging progressive New York attorney Lynne
Stewart with aiding and abetting terrorism, Stewart finally took the
witness stand in her own defense.

On Oct. 25, before a packed courtroom of her supporters and a myriad of
attorneys who were similarly outraged at Stewart's persecution-ordered by
U.S. Attorney General John Ashcroft-her defense counsel, Michael Tigar,
methodically queried Stewart to expose the fraud of the "evidence" against
her. In four days, shortened by technical and procedural delays, Stewart
effectively tore apart and reduced to ridicule every aspect of the
government's frame-up.

The multi-racial jury panel of eight women and four men seemed transfixed,
paying close attention as Stewart's responses to each key government
exhibit demonstrated the innocence of her actions.
There is no doubt this was to be a show trial designed to buttress the
government's contention that Americans face real terrorist threats, not the
least of which come from life-long radicals like Stewart, who has been a
partisan in the struggle for social justice since her youth.

Stewart is being tried in the very room in the Manhattan Federal District
Court House where Julius and Ethel Rosenberg were railroaded to the
electric chair in 1953 during the witch-hunt era of Joseph McCarthy and his
governmental and judicial associates. Much as the McCarthyites made a
mockery of the U.S. Constitution by executing the Rosenbergs, so their
modern-day incarnations seek Stewart's life. If convicted of the "aiding
and abetting terrorism" charges against her, Stewart, 65, faces 45 years in
prison.

Prosecutors spent more than four months presenting thousands of pages of
Middle Eastern and U.S. press clippings, wiretapped phone calls,
intercepted e-mails, and secret government video/audio recordings of
Stewart's confidential jailhouse meetings with her 1995 client, Sheik Abdel
Omar Rahman. Rahman was convicted on frame-up charges of conspiracy to blow
up historic landmarks in New York City.

The government's aim in the present trial is to postulate an intricate
scenario in which Stewart and her co-defendants-professional Arabic
translator, Mohamed Yousry and post office employee/paralegal, Ahmed Abdel
Sattar-had been involved in a vast terrorist conspiracy.
Press clippings refuted as evidence

A central part of the prosecution's case consisted in presenting a
seemingly never-ending series of Arabic and English-language press
clippings on terrorist activities in several countries. The clippings had
been confiscated from Stewart's office as well as from the home of Yousry.
This was designed to demonstrate that Yousry's home and Stewart's law
office were repositories of vast tombs of material that could only be of
interest to terrorists.

The procedural rules of law exclude the use of such press clippings. They
are legally considered hearsay since the views expressed or the facts
presented in them represent only those of the author and cannot be taken by
the jury as fact.

Early in the trial, however, at the government's request, presiding Judge
John Koeltl approved an exception to the hearsay rule allowing introduction
of the clippings, accompanied with instructions to the jury that the
material was to be considered not in regard to factual accuracy but only to
demonstrate "the state of mind" of the defendants. And what could be the
"state of mind," the government implied, of persons who collect press
clippings on terrorism, other than committing terrorist acts?

With this ruling, the jury was subjected to prosecution attorneys' reading,
line by line, countless press articles on terrorist activities into the
official record. The fact that none of these connected any of the
defendants to any of these activities, or any other terrorist acts, was
deemed irrelevant.
The government's verbal presentation of each article was accompanied by its
simultaneous visual presentation on a huge courtroom movie-size screen and
further elucidated with the aid of individual monitors placed in the jury
box itself.

In 16 weeks, with the exception of the testimony of a government bureaucrat
who attested to his drafting government documents mailed to Stewart, not a
single witness was produced to prove the government's charges.

When defense attorney Tigar opened his questioning, holding up one of the
government's press clippings, he blithely asked Stewart if this clipping
actually came from her office. "Yes," Stewart responded.
"And where did you get this press clipping?" Tigar continued. "From the
U.S. government," Steward answered. Stewart explained that many of the
press clippings in her alleged terrorist file box had been sent to her
office by government prosecutors.

This was a routine procedure employed as part of the 1995 trial
proceedings, in which Stewart served as the chief counsel for Sheik Rahman,
whom the U.S. government tried and convicted as a terrorist conspirator.
Stewart explained that press clippings that the government intended to
introduce as evidence were, in effect, required to be sent to her office.

Additionally, Stewart and her staff made it a practice, in the course of
the defense of their client, to collect such press clippings, as was her
longstanding practice when handling such cases. Thus, in the course of a
minute's testimony, the government's case began to unravel.

What about the collection of press clippings and other material directly
related to the Egyptian "Islamic Group" (which the U.S. government had
designated a terrorist organization) that were found in the home of
co-defendant Yousry?

Yousry told this writer and will testify in early November that in addition
to his professional work as a translator, he was a Ph.D candidate at a New
York City university preparing his doctoral dissertation on the very same
Islamic Group. At the suggestion of his doctoral adviser, who is also
expected to testify on Yousry's behalf along with a dozen other defense
witnesses, Yousry had long ago begun work on this subject. But his innocent
collection of material for his thesis was turned by the government into
"proof" of his engagement in criminal acts.
"To fight zealously for our clients"

The government seeks to associate the fact that Stewart represented Sheik
Rahman as legal counsel with her having agreement with Rahman's ideas.
Stewart, a radical political activist, supporter of Mumia Abu-Jamal, and
opponent of the U.S. war in Iraq, has been legal counsel to a host of
clients from left-wing socialists to members of the Mafia. She told the
jury in response to Tigar's inquiry about her view of Rahman's ideas, "I'm
not in the habit of fundamentalism."

"We are bound to accept the cases of even those who are hated by the
public," Stewart asserted. "We are abjured by the ethical system to fight
as hard and as vigorously and as zealously as we possibly can for our
clients." Stewart originally became involved in the Rahman case at the
behest of former U.S. Attorney General Ramsey Clark and Abdeen Jabarra,
former head of the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee. In the
course of her testimony Stewart maintained that despite the government's
attainment of a "guilty" verdict in the 1995 Rahman "terrorist conspiracy"
trial, she still believed in her client's innocence.

Defense attorney Tigar, turning the tables on the government's use of
hearsay material, introduced into evidence a Wall Street Journal article
authored by a prominent staffwriter who had observed Rahman's trial. The
article held in essence that the government's prosecution of Rahman was
without foundation. It concluded that Rahman was likely innocent of the
charges against him.
Stewart's defense was bolstered by an honest representation of her work as
an attorney who provided her legal services to a blind Egyptian cleric with
fundamentalist ideas opposing the U.S.-backed Egyptian dictatorship.

Stewart's attention then turned to a critical government charge that she
consciously violated a government Special Administrative Measure (SAM) that
prohibited her from relaying messages or otherwise allowing her client to
communicate with terrorist groups. The government asserts that Stewart's
violation of this order took the form of her releasing to Reuters News
Service a press statement from Rahman that announced his withdrawal of
support to a cease-fire or "peace initiative" that had been in effect in
Egypt for several years. The peace initiative was declared by the Islamic
Group in the hope of reaching a rapprochement with the government of
President Hosni Mubarak.

The Mubarak regime is renowned for murder and incarceration of its
political opponents.
In the course of her defense Stewart introduced a key document, a decision
of a U.S. immigration judge who had rejected a government effort to deport
one of Rahman's associates to Egypt. The judge's decision was based on his
conclusion that, despite the Egyptian defendant's illegal entry into the
U.S., he would be granted political asylum based on the Egyptian
government's lack of any democratic structures. In short, the judge ruled,
Rahman would be punished, if not murdered, for his political opposition to
the Mubarak regime.

Stewart's 1995 client, Abdel Omar Rahman, is a leading Islamic
fundamentalist scholar and Ph.D, who was perhaps the leading critic of the
Egyptian government. The indictment and charges against Stewart focused on
the assertion that her release of Rahman's statement resulted in a series
of terrorist acts that took the lives of scores of innocent Egyptians. But
Stewart's testimony proved these charges were totally without foundation.

Stewart said that Rahman's 2000 press statement, when Stewart continued to
represent him, did not result in a single act of terror. To the contrary,
she told the jury, the Islamic Group virtually ignored Rahman's statement
and formally decided to maintain the cease fire or "peace initiative."

Stewart insisted that she had never violated any government SAM. Rather,
her interpretation of the SAM was that it was not designed to prevent her
from fully representing her client in accord with her sworn oath as an
attorney. This, she said, required her to make public Rahman's views.

Attorney Tigar proceeded to demonstrate that the government's response to
the press release was merely to state its disagreement with Stewart's
action and to bar her from further visits to Sheik Rahman until such time
as she agreed to sign an amended SAM. After months of negotiations with
government officials, a new SAM was indeed drafted by the government, and,
after being amended following negotiations with Stewart's attorney whom she
had hired as an advisor on this matter, signed by Stewart.

There were no government reprisals until years later, when the new U.S.
attorney general, John Ashcroft, appearing on the David Letterman
television talk show, announced his intention to prosecute Lynne Stewart as
a terrorist.

Stewart concluded her Oct. 28 testimony by responding to a question posed
by her attorney. "Ms. Stewart, looking back at the events of May and June
and July and August of 2000, if you had to do it over again, would you do
it the same way?"

"Sitting here today, Mr. Tigar," Stewart responded, with uncontrolled tears
coming to her eyes, "it's a very difficult question. I am diminished by the
loss of my clientele. My family has suffered tremendously. I don't know if
I would do it again."

Stewart was interrupted by an objection from the prosecution that was
overruled by Judge Koeltl. This was followed by another question from
attorney Tigar, "As you sit there today, Ms. Stewart, do you believe that
you violated any legal duty that you owed to the United States of America?"
Regaining her composure, Stewart first responded to Tigar's initial
question, "I'd like to think I would do it again because it was a duty owed
to a client. I do not believe I ever violated anything, any command, any
restriction by the United States of America."

Stewart is expected to complete her testimony by early November. This will
be followed by an expected period of three to four weeks when her
co-defendants will present their cases. Following closing remarks by both
sides, the case will go to the jury. A verdict is expected in late
December. I'm betting on Lynne Stewart.

Originally published in Socialist Action newspaper, November 2004
www.socialistaction.org

---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

2) For those in the Chicago Area or coming to the
USLAW National Leadership Assembly there ---
Challenging the militarization of our schools:
A forum on the fight to save Senn High School
Friday December 3
6:00 pm
UNITE HERE union hall
333 S. Ashland
Chicago
The Chicago School Board and the U.S. Navy want to turn the
North Side's Senn High School into a naval academy.

SPEAKERS
JESSE SHARKEY, Chicago Teachers Union delegate, Senn High School

Students from Senn High School

STACEY PAETH, mother of a soldier wounded in Iraq,
Military Families Speak Out

BILL DAVIS, national coordinator, Vietnam Veterans Against the War;
president, International Association of Machinists Local 701*

CHUCK HUTCHCRAFT, Chicago area coordinator, American
Friends Service Committee

*organization for identification only

The Chicago School Board and the U.S. Navy want to turn the
North Side's Senn High School into a naval academy.

This proposal has met strong resistance from the Senn student
body-one of the most ethnically diverse in the city-as well
as the surrounding Rogers Park community.

The Navy's attempted takeover of Senn highlights the growing
militarization of our schools. For example, the federal No Child
Left Behind act has required high school enrollment lists to be
handed over to U.S. military recruiters.

Come to this important meeting to find out how teachers, union
members, community activists and antiwar activists are fighting back.

To endorse or for more information, send a message to
Chicago Labor Against the War
chi_labor_antiwar@yahoo.com
U.S. Labor Against War (USLAW)
www.uslaboragainstwar.org
info@uslaboragainstwar.org
PMB 153
1718 "M" Street, NW
Washington, D.C. 20036
Gene Bruskin and Bob Muehlenkamp, Co-convenors Amy Newell,
National Organizer Michael Eisenscher, Organizer & Web
Coordinator Adrienne Nicosia, Administrative Staff

---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

3) Please come out this November 19-21 to Columbus, GA to
close the School of the Americas.
SOA Watch Updates and Actions
Converge on Ft. Benning, GA: November 19-21!
Together We Will Shut Down the School of Assassins!


On November 20th and 21st, join Susan Sarandon, Martin Sheen;
Carlos Mauricio and Neris Gonzales, torture survivors and plaintiffs
in the successful lawsuit against Salvadoran generals now living in
the US; Betita Martinez, long time Chicana activist and historian;
Ruby Sales, prominent civil rights activist and native of Columbus,
Georgia; Bob King, vice president of the United Auto Workers; Bishop
Gabino Zavala, Bishop President of Pax Christi USA, Kathy Kelly,
Nobel Peace Prize nominee and founder of Voices in the Wilderness;
Sr. Helen Prejean, author of Dead Man Walking, grassroots activists
from Mexico, labor leaders from Colombia and many more dynamic
speakers gathered on stage in front of the main gates of
Fort Benning, Georgia.

Join, also, rousing musicians from around the country, including
many of the long-time musicians that have been an essential part
of our November presence: Amy Ray of the Indigo Girls, Charlie
King and Karen Brandow, Pat Humphries and Sandy Opatow,
Francisco Herrera, Jon Fromer, David Rovics, Dave Lippman and
Llajtasuyo. Newcomers to the stage this year include Kim and
Reggie Harris, Utah Phillips and Chicago-based ska/reggae band
Los Vicios de Papá.

SOA Watch Victory Against Metal Detectors and Illegal Searches:
The Eleventh Circuit Court Upholds the Constitution!

On Friday, October 15, the Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals
issued a groundbreaking ruling upholding the constitutional
rights of free speech, freedom of assembly and freedom from
unlawful search and seizure.

In a unanimous decision, the court ruled that the search policy
instituted by the Columbus City Police before the November 2002
vigil violates the First and Fourth Amendments to the Constitution
and that protesters may not be required to pass through metal
detectors to enter the rally site this November.

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4) 'This one's faking he's dead'
'He's dead now'
Fallujah: Video shows US soldier killing wounded insurgent
in cold blood
By Andrew Buncombe in Washington
16 November 2004
http://news.independent.co.uk/world/middle_east/story.jsp?story=583322

The US Marine Corps launched an investigation into possible war
crimes last night after video footage taken inside a mosque in
Fallujah apparently showed a Marine shooting dead an unarmed
Iraqi insurgent who had been taken prisoner.

The footage showed several Marines with a group of prisoners who
were either lying on the floor or propped against a wall of the bombed
-out building. One Marine can be heard declaring that one of the
prisoners was faking his injuries.

"He's fucking faking he's dead. He faking he's fucking dead," says
the Marine. At that point a clatter of gunfire can be heard as one of
the Marines shoots the prisoner. Another voice can then be heard
saying: "He's dead now."

The footage was obtained by a team from the American NBC network
that was embedded with the Marine Corps during last week's
seven-day battle to capture the city of Fallujah, west of Baghdad,
which military commanders say has been a focus of Iraqi resistance.
The film was then pooled and made available to other media.

On the footage that was broadcast last night, NBC correspondent
Kevin Sites said that the five wounded Iraqi fighters had been left
in the mosque after Marines had fought their way into that part of
the city on Friday and Saturday. Ten other Iraqis had been killed in
the battle for the mosque. Instead of being passed to the rear lines
for treatment the wounded Iraqis were left in the mosque until
a second group of Marines entered the building on Saturday, following
reports that the building may have been reoccupied. Sites said that
at this point one of the five Iraqis was dead and that three of the
others appeared to be close to death.

In his report accompanying the images, Sites said that one of the
Marines noticed that one of the wounded men was still breathing
before shouting that he was "faking it".

"The Marine then raises his rifle and fires into the man's head. The
pictures are too graphic for us to broadcast," said Sites. He added:
"The prisoner did not appear to be armed or threatening in any way".
Major Doug Powell, a spokesman for the Marine Corps in Washington,
told The Independent : "It's being investigated - I can't say much more
than that. It's being investigated for possible law of war violations.
A naval criminal investigation team is looking into it."

The footage - some of the first to show the situation inside Fallujah
and the bloody nature of the street-by-street battle that has taken
place there - is the latest to emerge from Iraq to contain possible
evidence of war crimes perpetrated by the US military.

Other footage has shown troops shooting wounded fighters lying
in open ground as well as attacks on Iraqis - some said to be
civilians - by US aircraft and helicopters. This latest footage is
among the most shocking given that it apparently shows without
obstruction the Marine shooting the prisoner in the head at close
range.

Kathy Kelly, a spokeswoman for the peace group Voices in the
Wilderness, said last night that such images would "recruit more
terrorists faster than they are being killed".

"I don't think the US is paying much attention to the Geneva
Conventions any more - that is the problem. This must be
investigated," she said.

NBC said in its report that the Marine who had shot the insurgent
had apparently been shot in the face the day before and that one
of his comrades had been killed the previous day by a booby-trap
bomb that had been placed on the body of a dead insurgent. He
has been withdrawn from the field and his unit removed from the
front lines, officials said.

Military experts said last night that rules of engagement prevented
US troops from shooting an enemy where there was no threat
being posed.

Yesterday, the Marines said they had taken more than 1,000 prisoners
in the battle for Fallujah. Colonel Michael Regner, operations officer
for the 1st Marine Expeditionary Force at Fallujah, said at least 1,052
prisoners had been captured in the battle. No more than about two
dozen of them were "foreign fighters", he said.

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5) U.S. Marines Rally Round Iraq Probe Comrade
By Michael Georgy
FALLUJA, Iraq (Reuters)
Tue Nov 16, 2004 09:29 AM ET
http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?type=topNews&storyID=6828512&src=eD
ialog/GetContent§ion=news

FALLUJA, Iraq (Reuters) - U.S. Marines rallied round a comrade
under investigation for killing a wounded Iraqi during the offensive
in Falluja, saying he was probably under combat stress in unpredictable,
hair-trigger circumstances.

Marines interviewed on Tuesday said they didn't see the shooting as
a scandal, rather the act of a comrade who faced intense pressure
during the effort to quell the insurgency in the city.

"I can see why he would do it. He was probably running around
being shot at for days on end in Falluja. There should be an
investigation but they should look into the circumstances," said
Lance Corporal Christopher Hanson.

"I would have shot the insurgent too. Two shots to the head," said
Sergeant Nicholas Graham, 24, of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. "You
can't trust these people. He should not be investigated. He did
nothing wrong."

The military command launched an investigation after video
footage showed a U.S. Marine shooting a wounded and unarmed man
in a mosque in the city on Saturday. The man was one of five
wounded and left in the mosque after Marines fought their way
through the area.

A pool report by NBC correspondent Kevin Sites said the
mosque had been used by insurgents to attack U.S. forces, who
stormed it, killing 10 militants and wounding the five. Sites
said the wounded had been left for others to pick up.

A second group of Marines entered the mosque on Saturday
after reports it had been reoccupied. Footage from the embedded
television crew showed the five still in the mosque, although
several appeared to be close to death, Sites said.

He said a Marine noticed one prisoner was still breathing.

A Marine can be heard saying on the pool footage provided
to Reuters Television: "He's fucking faking he's dead."

"The Marine then raises his rifle and fires into the man's
head," Sites said.

NBC said the Marine, who had reportedly been shot in the
face himself the previous day, said immediately after the
shooting: "Well, he's dead now."

THOROUGH PROBE PROMISED

The Marine commander in Falluja, Lieutenant General John
Sattler, said his men followed the law of conflict and held
themselves to a high standard of accountability.

"The facts of this case will be thoroughly pursued to make
an informed decision and to protect the rights of all persons
involved," he said.

Marines have repeatedly described the rebels they fought
against in Falluja as ruthless fighters who didn't play by the
rules. They say the investigation is politically motivated.

"It's all political. This Marine has been under attack for
days. It has nothing to do with what he did," said Corporal
Keith Hoy, 23.

Rights group Amnesty International said on Monday both
sides in the Falluja fighting had broken the rules of war
governing the protection of civilians and wounded combatants.

Gunnery Sergeant Christopher Garza, 30, favored an
investigation but like other Marines said the Pentagon should
weigh its decision carefully.

"He should have captured him. Maybe the insurgent had some
valuable information. There may have been mitigating
circumstances. Maybe his two buddies died in Falluja," he said.

Sites said: "I have witnessed the Marines behaving as a
disciplined and professional force throughout this offensive.
In this particular case, it certainly was a confusing situation
to say the least."

The U.S. military has been embarrassed by scandals in Iraq,
most prominently the Abu Ghraib affair in which at least eight
U.S. soldiers have been tried or face courts-martial over the
abuse of prisoners at the jail outside Baghdad.

There have also been several cases in which soldiers have
been charged with wrongfully killing Iraqis during operations.

(c) Copyright Reuters 2004

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6) U.S. Forces Launch Assault on Iraqi Rebels in Mosul
By Maher al-Thanoon
MOSUL, Iraq (Reuters)
Tue Nov 16, 2004 09:37 AM ET
http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?type=topNews&storyID=6828657&src=eD
ialog/GetContent§ion=news

MOSUL, Iraq (Reuters) - U.S. and Iraqi forces launched an
offensive in Mosul on Tuesday to retake control of rebel-held
areas after a week of anarchy with insurgents rampaging through
Iraq's third largest city.

"Offensive operations have begun on the western side of the
river to clear out final pockets of insurgent fighting," said
Captain Angela Bowman, spokeswoman for U.S. forces in the
north.

"It's a significant operation to secure police stations in
the area and make sure they can be put to use again."

Violence in Mosul was part of a surge in unrest in Sunni
areas of Iraq that coincided with a major U.S. assault on the
rebel bastion of Falluja. The U.S. military says it has taken
control of Falluja, but scattered resistance remains.

On Tuesday morning a Marine was killed in a suicide car
bomb attack in the south of Falluja, a Marine officer told
Reuters. At least 39 U.S. troops have been killed since the
start of the Falluja offensive eight days ago.

U.S. and Iraqi forces had met little rebel resistance in
the early stages of the Mosul operation but said a 4 p.m. to 6
a.m. (8 a.m.- 10 p.m. EST) curfew would remain in place and
that the five bridges over the Tigris in the city were closed,
Bowman said.

Last week scores of guerrillas seized control of parts of
the city, attacking police stations, looting them of weapons
and flak jackets and setting them ablaze. Nine of 33 police
stations were overrun, and some were briefly held by
insurgents.

A few hundred U.S. troops, backed by Iraqi national guards
and a unit of police special commandos were involved in
Tuesday's operation, which would continue until all police
stations were secure and insurgents defeated, Bowman said.

A U.S. brigade, around 5,000 soldiers, and a brigade of Iraqi
national guards had been assigned to the operation, but
only a fraction of those assets were being used, she said.

CONTROVERSY OVER KILLING

Iraq's government has insisted that civilian casualties in
Falluja have been minimal, and says reports of a humanitarian
crisis in the city have been exaggerated.

But controversy over the Falluja offensive has been fueled
by video footage showing a U.S. Marine shooting a wounded and
unarmed Iraqi in a mosque in the city on Saturday.

The U.S. military says it is investigating the killing.

"This investigation commenced immediately when allegations
were brought forward and is continuing," the 1st Marine
Division said in a statement on Tuesday.

"The purpose of this investigation is to determine whether
the Marine acted in self-defense, violated military law or
failed to comply with the Law of Armed Conflict."

The Iraqi was one of five wounded left in the mosque after
Marines fought their way through the area on Friday and
Saturday. A pool report by NBC correspondent Kevin Sites said
the mosque had been used by insurgents to attack U.S. forces,
who stormed it, killing 10 militants and wounding the five.

A second group of Marines entered the mosque on Saturday
after reports it had been reoccupied. Footage from the embedded
television crew showed the five still in the mosque, although
several appeared to be already close to death, Sites said.

He said a Marine noticed one prisoner was still breathing.
"The Marine then raises his rifle and fires into the man's
head. The pictures are too graphic for us to broadcast," Sites
said.

Rights group Amnesty International said on Monday that both
sides in the Falluja fighting had broken the rules governing
the rules of war protecting civilians and wounded combatants.

NO FALLUJA CRISIS, GOVERNMENT SAYS

Iraq's government has dismissed reports that civilians in
Falluja are desperately short of supplies and lacked adequate
medical care. Most civilians were reported to have fled the
city ahead of the start of the offensive last week.

"The Iraqi government strongly rejects suggestions from
some sources that there are shortages of supplies in Falluja,"
a statement from Prime Minister Iyad Allawi's office said.

A Health Ministry team had visited the city and Falluja
hospital, seized by U.S. and Iraqi forces just before the
assault began eight days ago, and found no shortages, the
statement said, adding:

"They have confirmed that they found no citizens in need of
food or water. It is now clear there are very few citizens in
Falluja. Most have already fled from the terrorists."

The Falluja offensive sparked a surge in unrest in other
rebel strongholds. In Baquba, northeast of Baghdad, five
policemen and 26 guerrillas were killed in fighting on Monday.

U.S. troops were also fighting guerrillas on Tuesday in the
oil refining town of Baiji, witnesses said. They said
guerrillas had taken to the streets and were fighting gun
battles with American and Iraqi forces.

Insurgents killed a Turkish truck driver in the town in a
rocket attack on his truck, police said. Dozens of drivers have
been killed on the perilous roads in the area over the last few
months, with insurgents repeatedly targeting convoys.

(Additional reporting by Lin Noueihed and Luke Baker in
Baghdad and Haider Hamza in Falluja)

(c) Copyright Reuters 2004

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7) CKUT Radio: U.S. Military War Crimes in Fallujah

Listen to a live report on the current military siege of Fallujah, from
Dahr Jamail an independent journalist, currently based in Baghdad Iraq.
According to a Red Cross official in Iraq, at least 800 civilians have
been killed during the U.S. military siege of Fallujah, which has
destroyed large areas of the city and inflicted a humanitarian disaster.

This live report provides insight and context into the current siege of
Fallujah, while questions the distinction between "insurgents" and
"civilians" killed in Fallujah, created by official U.S. military
statements and widely reported on major North American media networks.

To listen / download the report visit:
http://radio.indymedia.org/news/2004/11/2909.php

To read Dahr Jamail's reports from Iraq visit:
http://www.dahrjamailiraq.com

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8) 800 Civilians Feared Dead in Fallujah
Inter Press Service
By: Dahr Jamail
{http://www.dahrjamailiraq.com/hard_news/archives/hard_news/000121.php#more}

BAGHDAD, Nov 16 (IPS) - At least 800 civilians have been killed during the
U.S. military siege of Fallujah, a Red Cross official estimates.

Speaking on condition of anonymity for fear of U.S. military reprisal, a
high-ranking official with the Red Cross in Baghdad told IPS that "at
least 800 civilians" have been killed in Fallujah so far.

His estimate is based on reports from Red Crescent aid workers stationed
around the embattled city, from residents within the city and from
refugees, he said.

"Several of our Red Cross workers have just returned from Fallujah since
the Americans won't let them into the city," he said. "And they said the
people they are tending to in the refugee camps set up in the desert
outside the city are telling horrible stories of suffering and death
inside Fallujah."

The official said that both Red Cross and Iraqi Red Crescent relief teams
had asked the U.S. military in Fallujah to take in medical supplies to
people trapped in the city, but their repeated requests had been turned
down.

A convoy of relief supplies from both relief organisations continues to
wait on the outskirts of the city for military permission to enter. They
have appealed to the United Nations to intervene on their behalf.

"The Americans close their ears, and that is it," the Red Cross official
said. "They won't even let us take supplies into Fallujah General
Hospital."

The official estimated that at least 50,000 residents remain trapped
within the city. They were too poor to leave, lacked friends or family
outside the city and therefore had nowhere to go, or they simply had not
had enough time to escape before the siege began, he said.

Aid workers in his organisation have reported that houses of civilians in
Kharma, a small city near Fallujah, had been bombed by U.S. warplanes. In
one instance a family of five was killed just two days ago, they reported.

"I don't know why the American leaders did not approach the Red Cross and
ask us to deal with the families properly before the attacking began,"
said a Red Cross aid worker, who also spoke on condition of anonymity.

"Suddenly they attacked and people were stuck with no help, no medicine,
no food, no supplies," he said. "So those who could, ran for the desert
while the rest were trapped in the city."

If the U.S. forces would call a temporary cease-fire "we could get our
trucks in and get the civilians left in Fallujah who need medical care, we
could get them out," he said.

Mosques have organised massive collections of food and relief supplies for
Fallujah residents as they did last April when the city was under attack,
but these supplies have not been allowed into the city either.

The Red Cross official said they had received several reports from
refugees that the military had dropped cluster bombs in Fallujah, and used
a phosphorous weapon that caused severe burns.

The U.S. military claims to have killed 1,200 "insurgents" in Fallujah.
Abdel Khader Janabi, a resistance leader from the city has said that only
about 100 among them were fighters.

"Both of them are lying," the Red Cross official said. While they agree on
the 1,200 number, they are both lying about the number of dead fighters."
He added that "our estimate of 800 civilians is likely to be too low."

The situation within Fallujah is grim, he said. If help does not reach
people soon, "the children who are trapped will most likely die."

He said the Ministry of Health in the U.S.-backed interim Iraqi government
had stopped supplying hospitals and clinics in Fallujah two months before
the current siege.

"The hospitals do not even have aspirin," he said. "This shows, in my
opinion, that they've had a plan to attack for a long time and were trying
to weaken the people."

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9) A short history of trade unionism in the Iraqi oil industry
August 24, 2004
http://www.iraqitradeunions.org/archives/000071.html


The history of trade unionism in the Iraqi oil industry began in
the 1930s, when union committees were formed in Baghdad,
Basra and Kirkuk.

In 1930, about 1600 workers were employed by the oil companies,
but improvements in production, the discoveries of new oil wells and
increase in exports meant that this soared very quickly to over 10,000
in 1957 and 48, 000 by 1975.

Oil union committees were formed and fought for workers' rights across
Iraq. The oil union at the Kirkuk plant organized the first strike on July
1946, but the government brutally suppressed the strike and 15 strikers
were martyred.

The state became increasingly dependent on oil revenue during the
1940s and 50s. This increased workers' awareness of importance of
trade unionism. New and determined leaders emerged through the
struggle for workers' democratic rights and membership of trade
unions also expanded. By 1969 18,000 members were part of 9 oil
workers branches but over the next two years this dropped to 16,000
in 8 branches due to political and economic instability.

By 1973 after the nationalisation of the oil industry, increased
efficiency and the significant jump in oil prices led to huge increases
in the workforce and union membership rose to 47,870.

It was in this context of mass unionisation of the lucrative oil industry
that Saddam's 1987 anti union Decrees (numbers 150 and 52) banned
public sector workers from joining or forming unions. These decrees
halved the number of unions from 12 to 6.

The Iraqi labour movement received a severe blow from Saddam's
fascist anti-union laws and state repression. A campaign of repression,
imprisonment and execution was carried out by Saddam's dictatorial
regime against oil workers. Many disappeared without trace.

But trade unionism in Iraq had deeper roots, which Saddam's brutal
regime could not manage to eradicate completely. A clandestine trade
union movement was formed. The Workers Democratic Trade Union
Movement (WDTUM) began organizing secretly in small trade union
groupings. But despite severe state repression, its leaders and activists
fought in defence of working people's legitimate rights to union
representation.

After the fall of Saddam's hated regime, many trade union activists
of different political persuasions, including oil worker activists,
initiated the rebuilding of Iraqi unions on a democratic and
pluralistic basis.

On 16 May 2003 the oil workers established their Oil and Gas Union
in an open meeting held at the Al Dora oil refinery in Baghdad and
a preparatory committee was established.

Since then 18 oil union committees have been formed in Baghdad.
Many tens of oil committees are also formed in Basra and Kirkuk.

Membership of the union runs into tens of thousands and the Oil
and Gas Union is affiliated to the Iraqi Federation of Trade Union
(IFTU).

Iraqi Oil workers like the rest of Iraqi working people are struggling
in the most difficult and complicated circumstances. They are
struggling to rebuild the infrastructure of the oil industry which
was destroyed as a result of wars, foreign invasion and occupation.
They are struggling along side other Iraqis for the return of full
Iraqi sovereignty.

Oil workers also struggle to defend their rights for decent job and
better pay. Wages are low and working conditions are dangerous.
Iraq has no labour code that guarantees and protects working people's
rights. Oil workers have been subjected to waves of bombing and
terrorist acts by local and foreign extremists which have killed
many oil workers.

The IFTU and the Oil and Gas Union back policies to ease oil workers
suffering, to improve wages and working conditions.

Oil workers along side other worker resist privatisation in the public
sector and especially in the oil sector. The Oil and Gas Union stated
clearly that oil must remain a property in the hands of Iraqi people.
Multinational companies should not be allowed to reap easy profits
at the cost of well-being of Iraqis.

Due the high level of unemployment not least of oil workers, the Oil
and Gas Union strongly oppose the importation of foreign workers,
whilst thousands of skilled Iraqis have no job. Jobs should go first
to Iraqi workers.


The Oil and Gas Union is working to strengthen its cooperation and
friendship with energy trade union centres around the world and
seeking their support and solidarity to enable the union better to
defend its members' rights.

Iraqi Oil and Gas Union
Baghdad
21 August 2004

U.S. Labor Against War (USLAW)
www.uslaboragainstwar.org
info@uslaboragainstwar.org
PMB 153
1718 "M" Street, NW
Washington, D.C. 20036
Gene Bruskin and Bob Muehlenkamp, Co-convenors Amy Newell,
National Organizer Michael Eisenscher, Organizer & Web
Coordinator Adrienne Nicosia, Administrative Staff

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10) A City Lies in Ruins, Along with the Lives of the
Wretched Survivors
By Michael Georgy in Fallujah and Kim Sengupta
Published on Monday, November 15, 2004 by the lndependent/UK
http://news.independent.co.uk/world/middle_east/story.jsp?story=582915
http://www.commondreams.org/headlines04/1115-01.htm


After six days of intense combat against the Fallujah insurgents,
US warplanes, tanks and mortars have left a shattered landscape
of gutted buildings, crushed cars and charred bodies.

A drive through the city revealed a picture of utter destruction, with
concrete houses flattened, mosques in ruins, telegraph poles down,
power and phone lines hanging slack and rubble and human remains
littering the empty streets. The north-west Jolan district, once an
insurgent stronghold, looked like a ghost town, the only sound the
rumbling of tank tracks.

[Photo not shown]
An Iraqi nurse treats 2-year-old child Mustafa Adnan, at a Baghdad
hospital, who lost a leg when his house in Falluja's Jolan district was
shelled by U.S. forces in the war-torn city November 14, 2004. U.S.
tanks shelled and machine-gunned rebels still holding out in Falluja
in heavy fighting that was preventing an Iraqi Red Crescent convoy
from getting aid to civilians trapped in the city for six days. Photo
by Ali Jasim/Reuters

US Marines pointed their assault rifles down abandoned streets,
past Fallujah's simple amusement park, now deserted. Four bloated
and burnt bodies lay on the main street, not far from US tanks and
soldiers. The stench of the remains hung heavy in the air, mixing
with the dust.

Another body lay stretched out on the next block, its head blown
off, perhaps in one of the countless explosions which rent the city
day and night for nearly a week. Some bodies were so mutilated it
was impossible to tell if they were civilians or militants, male or female.

Fallujah, regarded as a place with an independent streak where citizens
even defied the former leader Saddam Hussein at times, seemed lifeless.
The minarets of the city's dozens of mosques stood silent, no longer
broadcasting the call to holy war that so often echoed across the
rooftops, inspiring fighters to join the insurgency.

Restaurant signs were covered in soot. Pavements were crushed
by 70-ton Abrams tanks, and rows of crumbling buildings stood
on both sides of deserted streets. Upmarket homes with garages
looked as if they had been abandoned for years. Cars lay crushed
in the middle of streets. Two Iraqis in one street desperately trying
to salvage some of their smashed belongings were the only signs
of life.

As US soldiers walked through neighbourhoods, their allies in the
Iraqi forces casually moved along dusty streets past wires hanging
down from gutted buildings. They carried boxes of bottled water to
the rooftops of the upmarket villas they now occupy. The soldiers
sat on the roofs staring at the ruins.

As a small convoy of Humvees moved back to position on the edge of
the Jolan district, a rocket landed in the sand about 100ft away,
a reminder that militants were still out there somewhere, even if the
city that harboured them has fallen. The few civilians left in Fallujah
talked of a city left in ruins not just by the six days of the ground
assault, but the weeks of bombing that preceded the attack.

Residents have long been without electricity or water, abandoning
their homes and congregating in the centre of the city as the US
forces advanced from all sides. They had cowered in buildings as
the battle unfolded past the windows.

The reaction of US troops to attacks, say residents, have been out
of all proportion; shots by snipers have been answered by rounds
from Abrams tanks, devastating buildings and, it is claimed,
injuring and killing civilians. This is firmly denied by the
American military.

About 200,000 refugees fled the fighting, and there have been
outbreaks of typhoid and other diseases.

People leaving the city described rotting corpses being piled up
and thousands still trapped inside their homes, many of them
wounded and without access to food, water or medical aid. US
commanders insist civilian casualties in Fallujah have been low,
but the Pentagon famously claims it does not keep figures.

Escaping residents described incidents in which non-combatants,
including women and children, were killed by shrapnel or hit by
bombs. In one case last week, a nine-year-old boy was hit in the
stomach by shrapnel. Unable to reach a hospital, he died hours
later from blood loss. His father had to bury his body in their garden.

Those trapped inside the city say they are reaching a point of
desperation. "Our situation is very hard," said Abu Mustafa,
contacted by telephone in the central Hay al-Dubat neighbourhood.
"We don't have food or water," he told Reuters. "My seven children
all have severe diarrhoea. One of my sons was wounded by shrapnel
last night and he's bleeding, but I can't do anything to help him."

Aamir Haidar Yusouf, a 39-year-old trader, sent his family out of
Fallujah, but stayed behind to look after his home, not just during
the fighting, but the looting which will follow. "The Americans have
been firing at buildings if they see even small movements," he said.

As the fighting died down yesterday he said: "They are also
destroying cars, because they think every car has a bomb in it.
People have moved from the edges of the city into the centre, and
they are staying on the ground floors of buildings. There will be
nothing left of Fallujah by the time they finish. They have already
destroyed so many homes with their bombings from the air, and
now we are having this from tanks and big guns."

There was no sign of the guerrillas who scribbled graffiti along the
walls of the park, encouraging Fallujah's 300,000 residents to join
a holy war against US-led troops. "Long live the mujahedin," read
the graffiti.

Mohammed Younis, a former policeman, said: "The Americans
and [Iyad] Allawi [Iraq's interim Prime Minister] have been saying
that Fallujah is full of foreign fighters. That is not true; they left
a long time ago. You will find them in other places, in Baghdad.
We have been saying to Allawi and the Americans that they are
not here, but they do not believe us."

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11) THE CIVILIAN DEATH TOLL
By Harvey McGavin
http://news.independent.co.uk/world/middle_east/story.jsp?story=582915
http://www.commondreams.org/headlines04/1115-01.htm

US military officials were last night counting the cost of their week
long assault on Fallujah in which they claim to have killed some
1,200 insurgents and some 44 servicemen lost their lives.

But in the city which was once home to 300,000 people there
were few reports of the number of civilians killed.

Many are thought to have fled the fighting, but reports from the
city say it is impossible to tell how many of the bodies that litter
its rubble-strewn streets are those of ordinary citizens.

Last week a report collated by the UN said 20 doctors had died
during a US air strike on a clinic and there have been numerous
reports of the US dropping huge bombs.

The US Defence secretary Donald Rumsfeld claimed last week that
Iraqi civilians had been warned how to avoid injury. "Innocent civilians
in that city have all the guidance they need as to how they can avoid
getting into trouble. There aren't going to be large numbers of civilians
killed and certainly not by US forces," he said.

In addition to the 38 Americans and six Iraqis killed in the assault,
more than 200 US soldiers were injured. About 400 suspected
insurgents have been arrested in Fallujah including "some" foreigners,
interim Prime Minister Ayad Allawi said.

The Iraq Coalition Casualties website reported that, as of Saturday,
1,181 US troops had been killed in Iraq. One Iraq-based report
estimates civilian casualties to be 37,000. A report in the British
medical journal The Lancet put the figure as high as 100,000.

Prime minister Iyad Allawi said there had been no civilian casualties
during the battle for Fallujah, contradicting accounts from residents
inside the city.

(c) Copyright 2004 lndependent/UK

###

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12) GI SPECIAL 2#C22
thomasfbarton@earthlink.net
11.16.04
Huge Increase In Badly Wounded Floods U.S. Military Hospital;
419 Since Attack On Falluja Started

November 15, 2004 USA TODAY

She added that the influx has not yet let up. "When I see a sustained
decrease over more than 24 hours, I'll believe it," Cornum said.

LANDSTUHL, Germany - The number of injured U.S. military personnel
arriving at the Landstuhl Regional Medical Center this week, most from
the offensive against insurgents in the Iraqi city of Fallujah, reached
its highest level since April, a U.S. military official here said
Sunday.

The troops coming in over the past week have been more seriously injured
than usual, and twice as many have been wounded in battle, said Army
Col. Rhonda Cornum, commander of the hospital.

She added that the influx has not yet let up. "When I see a sustained
decrease over more than 24 hours, I'll believe it," Cornum said.

Patients treated here are not capable of returning to duty within seven
working days. Cornum said 419 patients, including one American
civilian, have been flown for treatment to Landstuhl since Nov. 8, the
day after the offensive began against militants in Fallujah, 40 miles
west of Baghdad.

She said 95% of those patients have come from Iraq, and 5% from
Afghanistan. Most of those from Iraq were wounded in Fallujah, but
Cornum could not say exactly how many.

There have been two peaks in the patient load: 98 arrived Thursday, 44
on Friday, 94 on Saturday, and 49 on Sunday, Cornum said. All of the
patients have been U.S. citizens.

Before the new offensive, the average number of patients admitted daily
had been 32. In the past week, that number has more than doubled to 70.
On Sunday, the number of patients in the hospital was 150, compared with
the typical average of 100. The injuries suffered include gunshot and
blast wounds and burns.

The seriousness of injuries is reflected by the number of inpatients.

About half the patients admitted since the Fallujah offensive began have
needed to be hospitalized. Hospital spokeswoman Marie Shaw said most
patients usually receive outpatient care.

More than 50% of incoming patients have had battle wounds this past
week, compared with 25% before the offensive. Among those seriously
injured patients, 37 are in the intensive care unit.

Because of the heavier-than-usual load and the increased seriousness of
injuries, the hospital has had to call in help from military facilities
in the area.

"This was not a holiday weekend for us," said Air Force Col. Todd Hess,
deputy commander for clinical services, referring to Veterans Day.

The number of beds in the medical-surgical ward has grown from 64 to
117. The number could be increased if necessary, Cornum said. The
intensive care unit has gone from 20 to 27 beds.

---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

13) 'Twas a Famous Rollover, Continued
By Fred Feldman

Clearly, the resistance forces decided not to stage an urban battle of
the Stalingrad-Warsaw Ghetto -- Khorramshahr -- Hue type. Except for
Hue, these were backs-against-the-wall battles by forces who faced utter
defeat and destruction if they could not hold the line. I was pointing
to the gravity of the battle they did fight.

One question I asked was whether any of the battles in the three Iraq
wars so far produced a comparable US death toll, let alone the injuries.
I don't think so. I think this is the most costly battle yet for the US
forces, that is, since the Gulf war of 91.

Dave said the Pentagon can accept 38 dead. The Pentagon can accept
100,000 US dead, or even a million. Maybe more than that, as long as
its not them that's dying.

The problem is what can the home front accept. I don't think the home
front will not tolerate 38 dead a week, I believe, or not for very long.

The public tolerance is lower, not higher or equal to the casulaltie
rates in Vietnam. For this reason, the entire methods of US warmaking
have been reorganized to prevent excessive casualties.

The US resistance to Vietnam led to a more advanced technology and
skillful organization of mass murder just as the proletarian struggle
for shorter hours and higher wages forces mechanization,
computerization, and so on of industry. The Rumsfeld reorganization is
built around the political limits imposed by the anti-Vietnam war
movement and the defeat in Indochina.

>From a political standpoint, 36 or 38 (the number is still rising for
some reason although the fighting has largely ended) is a very costly
price for a battle, and not one they will rush to repeat next week in
Mosul or wherever.

And the resistance has clearly gotten better at targeting GI'S than
they were in previous battles such as Najaf. Thirty-eight is a high
death toll, and its impact on the US public is going to be carefully
buried for as long as possible.

And the fighters were able to wage this gigantic (though not
world-historic scale) urban battle, and still take over Mosul and some
other cities. This seems to mark a shift in favor of the resistance in
the overall combat situation.

And yes, I suspect the US may for now -- precisely to stop the stream of
US dead -- be living with a significant degree of resistance strength IN
FALLUJAH, aside from the thousands who appear to have left to fight
another day somewhere else.

Overall, this seems to be neither a clear military victory for the
United States (aside from in the heavily propagandized US, which the
battle was substantially aimed at), nor a defeat or even a setback for
the national resistance, which seems to have become better organized
(more united?) and more effective militarily relative to the US-"Iraqi"
forces.

The low casualty rate among "Iraqi" government troops should be seen as
evidence that they carried little of the burden of fighting.

ffeldman@bellatlantic.net

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14) CONSPIRING TO COMMIT MURDER FOR PROFIT!
In a message dated 11/16/04 9:22:58 AM, Jibasmil writes:
Following is a pre-written message which I am lazy enough
to use. The fact that this "study" has been delayed is, I think,
due the use of the internet -- word of it got around very quickly
and the EPA felt the heat. We need to keep that heat up so the
#$%@&#* EPA kills it. --judy

Dear friend, The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has announced
plans to launch an outrageous new study in which participating low
income families will have their children exposed to toxic pesticides
over the course of two years. For taking part in these studies, each
family will receive $970, a free video camera, a T-shirt, and a framed
certificate of appreciation. The study entitled CHEERS (Children's
Environmental Exposure Research Study) will look at how chemicals
can be ingested, inhaled or absorbed by children ranging from babies
to 3 years old. Please take a moment to follow this link and join tens
of thousands of citizens in petitioning the EPA to terminate this study
prior to its proposed launch in early 2005. More information, related
newspaper headlines and petition here:
http://www.organicconsumers.org/epa-alert.htm
Please also forward this message.

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15) United for Peace and Justice
Development Coordinator
Job Announcement


About United for Peace and Justice
United for Peace and Justice, founded in October 2002, is a major
national anti-war coalition with over 800 member groups, ranging
from local groups such as Nebraskans for Peace and the Peoria Area
Peace Network to major national organizations like the American
Friends Service Committee, Black Voices for Peace, Peace Action,
and Global Exchange. Our primary areas of work include war and
occupation; immigrant rights and civil liberties; global justice;
and nuclear disarmament.

Job Responsibilities
United for Peace and Justice seeks a Development Coordinator
to oversee all aspects of fundraising for our coalition. Job
responsibilities will include the following:
- Seek out and cultivate relationships with major donors,
including direct solicitations.
- Oversee our direct mail program and donor database.
- Work with UFPJ member organizations on collaborative
fund raising efforts.
- Oversee foundation grant writing, including developing
strategies for foundation work and writing grant proposals.
- Improve UFPJ's online fundraising program.
- Develop plan for fundraising benefits and other activities.
- Work with UFPJ national coordinator and steering committee
to expand the existing funding base.

Qualifications
Applicant must be well organized, high energy, self-motivated
and creative. A commitment to UFPJ's peace and justice mission
is a must. Excellent written and oral communication skills are
essential. We are looking for someone with development experience
in social change and/or nonprofit organizations. Experience and
contacts in the progressive funding community is a plus but not
a requirement.

Salary: to be negotiated, plus benefits.

To Apply
UFPJ is an affirmative action employer and strongly encourages
people of color, women and lgtb people to apply. Send resume
and cover letter to:
Leslie Cagan
United for Peace and Justice
Times Sq. Station
PO Box 607
New York, NY 10108

or by email to: lesliecagan@igc.org
NO CALLS PLEASE.

UFPJ mailing list
UFPJ@mediajumpstart.net
https://secure.mediajumpstart.net/mailman/listinfo/ufpj

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16) Why I fear for the dream of my life
Commentary
Abdul Bariatwan
The Observer
Sunday November 14, 2004
http://observer.guardian.co.uk/comment/story/0,6903,1350959,00.html

I was born 54 years ago in a refugee camp in Gaza. My parents were
illiterate and, like thousands of others, were forced to leave their home
town in 1948 to create space for the Jewish immigrants pouring into
Palestine from Europe.

My parents' abiding dream was to go back to the farm and mud-brick
house in Ashoud, their sleepy home town on the Mediterranean. But
they spent their lives in transit, waiting for this dream to come true.
Their dream lives on in me and in my children, too.

Yasser Arafat worked very hard for 40 years towards the independent
Palestinian state he longed for, yet never saw. Despite his mistakes, he
brought this dream closer. He brought the Palestinian cause into the
global arena and the resolution of this struggle is now of enormous
significance in determining the security of the world, not only the
Middle East.

I was deeply saddened by Arafat's death, not only because I knew him
personally, but also because Arafat, like my parents, spent his life in
transit, from Amman to Beirut to Tunisia and thence to Palestine.
What an irony it is that, even in death, his coffin is in transit, awaiting
his final transfer to Jerusalem.

Last Friday, George W Bush and his closest ally, Tony Blair assured us
that we would see such a state within the next four years - but we have
heard this story before. Before the invasion of Iraq, Bush assured the
world that an independent Palestinian state would be in place before
the end of 2005.


The American project in Iraq is a fiasco. The war which was supposed
to be over on 9 April 2003 has started all over again.

This is the climate in which Bush and Blair have revived the notion of
an independent Palestinian state - without a single indication of how
this will be achieved.

Bush asserts that an independent Palestinian state must be a democracy.
But what constitutes democracy in this lexicon? Will this concept simply
become a useful tool, replacing Arafat as justification for Israeli
atrocities,
delays to the peace process and the establishment of a Palestinian state?
In 1996, Arafat was elected leader in an election supervised by US and
Israel, yet how easily he was written off three years ago when those
same powers found him insufficiently yielding in the peace process.

The US insists it is enabling democracy in Iraq - a benefit that has cost
100 000 lives. If this is the kind of democracy Bush wishes to impose
on the Palestinians, we have every reason to be afraid. Very afraid.

·Abdul Bariatwan is editor of al Quds
Guardian Unlimited (c) Guardian Newspapers Limited 2004

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17) Producer Prices Jump on Higher Energy Costs
By TERENCE NEILAN
November 16, 2004
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/11/16/business/16cnd-prices.html?hp&ex=11006676
00&en=3a278a97f6a5790e&ei=5094&partner=homepage


Soaring energy costs and a surge in food prices contributed to
a surprising 1.7 percent rise in United States producer prices in
October, the Labor Department reported today, the biggest gain
in almost 15 years.

Excluding the volatile food and energy sectors, the Producer Price
Index climbed 0.3 percent last month, the same as in September,
but ahead of the 0.1 percent gain anticipated by Wall Street analysts.

Energy prices soared 6.8 percent last month, the steepest climb
since February 2003, as gasoline costs increased by 17.3 percent,
home heating oil prices rose 17.9 percent and the price for liquefied
petroleum gas gained 14.7 percent. Residential electricity costs
climbed 2.3 percent.

After climbing to $55 a barrel last month, however, crude oil prices
have come down sharply, with oil for December delivery trading at
$45.95 around midday today in New York.

The seasonally adjusted increase in the overall Producer Price Index
was the largest since January 1990, outstripping wide expectations
for an increase of 0.5 percent to 0.6 percent.

The financial markets reacted negatively to the report, with stocks
and bonds falling moderately. Around midday, the leading stock indexes
were down more than half a percent. The Treasury's benchmark
10-year note was down 6/32 of a point, pushing its yield up to
4.21 percent, from 4.19 percent late Monday.

Analysts said the surge in producer prices reinforced the Federal
Reserve's strategy of gradually increasing short-term interest rates
to dampen inflationary pressures in the economy.

Some analysts took the surge in the overall Producer Price Index
in stride, especially given the impact of higher oil prices.

"The rise in the energy component was more or less expected, and
there's actually reason to be sanguine on that front, knowing that
energy prices have fallen in the past few weeks,'' said Haseeb
Ahmed, senior economist at Economy.com, an economic analysis
firm. "In fact, we should expect that component to fall in the next
report."

But Mr. Ahmed argued that the 0.3 percent rise in the core number
was actually more worrisome than the headline 1.7 percent.

"If the core number remains close to the 0.3 level for the next few
months, that would be evidence that there is significant pass-
through from lower levels of production,'' he said. "If this trend
continues, businesses may start raising prices."

The Producer Price Index issued today showed that food prices
rose 1.6 percent in October, compared with an 0.1 percent gain
in September.

A 34.2 percent surge in fresh and dry vegetables, most probably
the result of the hurricanes that struck Florida and other southern
states, followed a 12.1 percent increase in September. The rise in
vegetables was the highest in more than eight years. Fruit prices
rose by 11.3 percent, slowing from a 23.1 surge in September.

Prices for beef and veal, pork, soft drinks, dairy products and
processed fruits and vegetables rose in October, compared with
decreases in September, the government report said.

Zubin Jelveh contributed reporting for this article.

Copyright 2004 The New York Times

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18) Presbyterian Church receives arson threat over Middle
East policies
From: "Justice Freedom"
Date: Mon, 15 Nov 2004 21:08:17 -0800
[From Wendy Campbell]
http://www.lex18.com/global/story.asp?s=2561665&ClientType=Printable

LOUISVILLE, Ky. Presbyterian Churches in the U-S have been put
on high alert. This after a letter received at the church's Louisville,
Kentucky, headquarters threatened arson attacks because of the
church's policies toward the Middle East.

A church spokesman says the letter threatened to set churches on
fire while people were inside in retaliation for "anti-Israel and anti-
Jewish attitudes."

The spokesman says the letter had no return address, but was
postmarked Queens, New York.

The church's General Assembly decided in June to begin the
process of selective divestment from corporations supporting
the Israeli occupation of Gaza and the West Bank.

An FBI spokesman says the agency is investigating the letter
with help from the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and
Explosives.

- The Palestinian intifada is a war of national liberation. We
Israelis enthusiastically chose to become a colonialist society,
ignoring international treaties, expropriating lands, transferring
settlers from Israel to the occupied territories, engaging in theft
and finding justification for all these activities ... we established
an apartheid regime.
- Michael Ben-Yair, Israeli attorney general in the1990s, quoted
in The Guardian (U.K.), April 11, 2002

- I became convinced that non-cooperation with evil is as much
a moral obligation as is cooperation with good.
- Martin Luther King, Jr, Autobiography, Chapter 2

- The "Middle East Conflict" is not rooted in the Middle East, but
in the United States.

- Look, our strategy is to create chaos, to create a vacuum . . .
We will export death and violence to the four corners of the earth
in defense of our great nation.
- gw bush to his staff, after the Afghan war had started

- The lie can be maintained only for such time as the State can
shield the people from the political, economic and/or military
consequences of the lie. It thus becomes vitally important for
the State to use all of its powers to repress dissent, for the truth
is the mortal enemy of the lie, and thus by extension, the truth
becomes the greatest enemy of the State.
- Josef M. Goebbels

Daniel Stone
justice_freedom@earthlink.net

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19) S0CIALIST CUBA--THE HOPE OF THE PLANET
To: ufpj-disc@yahoogroups.com
By Dave Silver
Tue, 16 Nov 2004 16:55:02 -0500

The nature of the relentless and continuing colonial and imperialist
domination of Cuba by Spain and the United States especially since
1898 changed dramatically with the triumph of the Cuban Revolution
in 1959. The imperialist vulture to the North was driven out militarily,
economically, politically and culturally. However the imperialists,
fearing that a new humane and just model for the overwhelming
masses of people would not be good for exploitation and their super
profits, used new methods of destabilizing the new Cuba . On October
8, 1987, the 20 th anniversary of the death of Ernesto Che Guevara,
Fidel said that Che "was totally opposed to using and developing
capitalist economic laws and categories in building socialism." Che
advocated that the "building of socialism and communism is not just
a matter of producing and distributing wealth but is also a matter of
education and consciousness."

It then becomes apparent why Cuba, a beacon of internationalist
solidarity for oppressed peoples worldwide, became anathema not
only to the transnational corporate ruling class and their political
puppets in Wall Street, western Europe and Tokyo but also those
who have rejected Marxism for more pragmatic philosophies;
liberals, neo-liberals, neo-marxists, anarchists and various trends
within social democracy. Those who have never recognized
a really existing socialism, who have embraced opportunism,
were not prepared for nor could they accept the arming of the
Cuban masses, or the Committees for the Defense of the Revolution,
the Peoples' Assemblies, the voluntary work or the use of moral
incentives which were later modified under the pressures of the
imperialist Blockade-an act of war-according to international law.
No these folk could not accept Revolutionary Cuba's attempts at
creatively applying Marxism-Leninism.

The revisionists and opportunists discount the terrorist acts, over
flights, the C.I.A. funded Radio Marti, assassination attempts and
the support for counter revolutionaries in and outside of Miami .
No, they call for "free elections" bourgeois style which offers the
evil of two lessers to the masses. Or they call for freedom for
"dissidents" another useful code word that masks their counter
revolutionary acts within Cuba and connections to western
imperialist sources. Some like the former Chief of the U.S.
Interests Section in Havana , Wayne Smith, calls for an end to the
"embargo" (a more benign term) not because Cuba is a sovereign
state which first and foremost means the right to self determination
including the right to build socialism, NO. He and his ilk want to
end the Blockade for ulterior motives namely to bring a little
perestroika and glasnost to the island. In short they, like the
gusanos, look to a smooth "post Castro transition" really meaning
a post socialist Cuba .

Cuba 's nationalization and collectivization under the guidance of
the Communist Party was a political and economic declaration of
war against the capitalist countries and their financial representatives
at the IMF and World Bank. ( Canada is a partial exception) Cuba 's
staunch international solidarity includes supporting the armed
struggle in Angola to providing doctors and training university
students from other countries. This too is deeply hated by those
who would like to bring the "benefits" of gangsterism, corruption
and poverty now "enjoyed" by the Russian people. Those whom
Brecht called the intellectual pimps for the bourgeoisie belittle the
heroic accomplishments of a Cuba under siege such as safeguarding
the high standard of health, education, and literacy services while
seeing to it that no one goes hungry or is homeless.

Does this mean that this beacon and alternative model to the "free
market" has solved all basic social, political and economic questions?
Of course not. In his eulogy honoring Che, Fidel asks "what are we
rectifying?" Self critically including his own mistakes he says that
"we're rectifying all those things -and there are many- that strayed
from the revolutionary spirit, revolutionary work, and revolutionary
responsibility; all those things that strayed from the spirit of
solidarity among people. We're rectifying all the shoddiness and
mediocrity that is precisely the negation of Che's ideas, his
revolutionary thought, his style, his spirit, and his example."
Of course Fidel had in mind a developing bureaucracy as well as
technocrats and some intellectuals that never appreciated the fact
that while there may be compromise in dealing with other states
and Parties there could never be a compromise of the fundamental
ideological underpinning of the Revolution-Marxism-Leninism.

Cuba is a multicultural mixture of Spanish, African and Indigenous
peoples. Yet quite legitimately many comrades and friends have
questioned Havana 's policies and efforts toward bringing more
people of color into higher government, Party and professional
positions. The Central Committee of the Party acknowledged this
problem 15 years ago and made decisions accordingly. About three
years ago I had the privilege of attending a meeting arranged by
Black comrades who invited a member of the Department of International
Relations of the Central Committee of the Cuban Communist Party.
Our guest Adelina, is a Black woman who was in the U.S. on
a Fellowship to study the institutionalized racism in the U.S.
There were many hard and challenging questions as to the
proportionate representation of people of color and particularly
those of very dark complexion in all spheres of society. Our
guest provided data and policy decisions of the Party in the social,
economic and political areas whose goal was to significantly improve
this situation. The results of this truly affirmative action by the Party
and government more than doubled the number of people of color
in the leading bodies of society. This was accomplished in less than
5 years. Comrade Adelina indicated that the Party has made this an
ongoing priority.

Unlike China, who, while professing socialism and the supremacy of
the Party, is well on its way to dismantling its socialist infrastructure
and accepting the IMF version of globalisation meaning an entry of
transnationals into their economy using extremely cheap labor while
a comparatively few become wealthy. The Socialist Republic of
Vietnam is at a crossroads and seeking most favored nation status
while Nike sets up an outpost there for capital accumulation. It is
too early to tell whether North Korea will travel the same path. Of
course there are enormous contradictions between these countries
and the developed nations. Frequently the former are forced into
taking anti-imperialist positions which should be fully supported.
Cuba does have joint ventures with Canada and Germany for
instance but under conditions that guarantees benefits to its
economy. We must be crystal clear that there is no hybrid third
way. While certain compromises and even retreats are necessary
at a particular historic juncture, (such as Havana 's need for hard
currency and the development of a mini parallel economy around
tourism) the fundamental course is either socialist or capitalist.
Solidarity with and material and ideological support for Socialist
Cuba deserves the highest priority from all who seek to better.
the human condition.

UNITED FOR PEACE & JUSTICE | 212-868-5545

This email list is designed for discussions specifically related to
United for Peace & Justice business. It is NOT intended for general,
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articles or event announcements.

To post news articles or event announcements of interest to
member groups of UFPJ, join our news list by sending a blank
email to ufpj-news-subscribe@yahoogroups.com

posted 3:40 PM  0 comments

COME TO THE BAUAW MEETING TONIGHT!
MONDAY, NOVEMBER 15TH, 7:00 p.m
BRING YOUR IDEAS ON HOW TO
ACHIEVE UNITY IN THE MOVEMENT:
1380 Valencia Street
(Between 24th & 25th Streets, SF)
BAUAW: 415-824-8730

---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

Open letter to Bay Area Activists from Bay Area
United Against War (BAUAW):

Dear friends who organized, participated, and/or spoke in the
demonstrations sponsored by Not in Our Name and ANSWER
on Nov. 3 and Nov. 9.

At the concluding rally of the emergency demonstration ANSWER
called to protest the U.S. assault on Fallujah, Jahahara, of AFSC
and N'COBRA, issued a kind of challenge to all the major antiwar
organizations to make a unified response to the U.S. government's
war against Iraq. He called on the national organizations, of which
we are all affiliated to one or more-ANSWER, UFPJ, NION-to unify
in building a massive antiwar movement.

This call is so timely because the war and occupation continue
unabated, the consequences for the Iraqis are devastating (over
100,000 civilians killed by U.S. actions) and over 1,110 U.S. troops
are dead and tens of thousands injured.

Those of us who are old enough to have participated in the
movement against the U.S. war on Vietnam know that the most
effective mass actions against that war that called for bringing
all U.S. troops home now [Out Now!] were unified actions where
people of different ideologies were able to come together for
Out Now despite their divergent opinions on other topics. The mass
movement that was built on the streets of the U.S. created
a supportive environment for
U.S. soldiers to resist the war in multiple ways eventually
becoming an unreliable fighting force for U.S. imperialism.

Now, it is very clear from all who spoke at the last two
demonstrations, that we have wide areas of agreement.
We all spoke about the need for the movement to get back
into the streets to protest the war in massive demonstrations.
We all spoke about the need for unity. We all spoke about the
way to bring peace and end the war was for the U.S.
government to get out of
Iraq.

The next step is for all our organizations to meet together
and concretely plan how this unity will be carried out.

Bay Area United Against War is willing to host such
a meeting, or participate in such a meeting called by
others. Let's make it happen.

Bring the Troops Home Now!
Carole Seligman, Bay Area United Against War (BAUAW)

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ALL OUT IN SUPPORT OF THE LOCAL 2 HOTEL WORKERS!
SOLIDARITY RALLY
Saturday, November 20 at 11 a.m.
Union Square, Downtown San Francisco

---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*--------

1) Powell to Step Down as Secretary of State
Three Other Cabinet Resignations Are Expected Later Today
By TERENCE NEILAN
November 15, 2004
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/11/15/politics/15cnd-cabi.html?ei=5094&en=e6d4c2
4b00751519&hp=&ex=1100581200&adxnnl=1&partner=homepage?hp&adxnnlx=1100539688
-75Ax1WBKZ9tnL1ScIwbofg

2) With Capture of Falluja, a Goal Is Met. What's Next?
MILITARY ANALYSIS
By ERIC SCHMITT
WASHINGTON
November 15, 2004
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/11/15/politics/15military.html?hp&ex=1100581200&
en=4b88f6d5188eaff9&ei=5094&partner=homepage

3) Feed the Billionaire, Starve the Students
OP-ED COLUMNIST
By BOB HERBERT
November 15, 2004
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/11/15/opinion/15herbert.html?oref=login&hp

4) Demonstrate at the front gate of the
PG&E plant on Monday December 8th, 2004 at 12 Noon.
THE MOTHERS "ACTION PLAN"

5) A Hollow Victory
By Kim Sengupta
Camp Dogwood, Iraq
15 November 2004
http://news.independent.co.uk/world/middle_east/story.jsp?story=582921

6) A Community Labor News E-Zine
Courts terminating Labor Contracts:The Bitter Fruits of
"Lessor Evilism"
By Roland Sheppard

7) A City in Ruins, Sky Thick with Smoke:
'Let's Kick Ass ... the American Way'
By Lindsey Hilsum
The Observer U.K.
Sunday 14 November 2004
http://www.guardian.co.uk/Iraq/Story/0,2763,1350831,00.html

8) When the Smoke has Cleared Around Fallujah,
What Horrors will Be Revealed?
By Kim Sengupta and Raymond Whitaker
The Independent on Sunday U.K.
Sunday 14 November 2004
http://news.independent.co.uk/world/middle_east/story.jsp?story=582722
As the Americans move street by bloody street towards control of the
insurgents' stronghold, aid agencies warn of a humanitarian catastrophe.

9) CHINA ROCKS THE GEOPOLITICAL BOAT
ASIA TIMES / Nov 6, 2004

---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

1) Powell to Step Down as Secretary of State
Three Other Cabinet Resignations Are Expected Later Today
By TERENCE NEILAN
November 15, 2004
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/11/15/politics/15cnd-cabi.html?ei=5094&en=e6d4c2
4b00751519&hp=&ex=1100581200&adxnnl=1&partner=homepage?hp&adxnnlx=1100539688
-75Ax1WBKZ9tnL1ScIwbofg

Secretary of State Colin L. Powell has told the Bush administration
that he intends to resign and the administration plans to announce
the move today, White House officials said today.

Three other cabinet members will also step down, the officials said:
Ann M. Veneman, secretary of agriculture; Rod Paige, the education
secretary, and Spencer Abraham, secretary of the energy department.

Mr. Powell, long reported to be at odds with some Bush policies,
will stay in office until a replacement is named, news agencies
reported. The others are also expected to remain until successors
are named.

Mr. Powell has often found himself differing on some key issues,
particularly with Secretary of Defense Donald H. Rumsfeld.

Mr. Powell led the fight at the United Nations for an attack on Iraq
to oust Saddam Hussein, arguing in an elaborate presentation with
graphics that a threat existed from weapons of mass destruction.

No evidence for the weapons has been found, and Mr. Powell is
said to have been dismayed that he made a case for the
administration based on faulty information.

But Mr. Rumsfeld, in particular, seemed to go out of his way
to upset European countries who opposed the way the United
States sent its troops into Iraq.

In the European view, the United States did not give the United
Nations enough time to reach a full conclusion that Saddam
Hussein did not possess weapons of mass destruction.

Mr. Rumsfeld referred to "old Europe" in his criticism of the
opposition to the war by France and Germany, in particular.

Mr. Powell, on the other hand, while supporting Mr. Bush
on Iraq, managed to maintain generally good relations
around the world.

Mr. Powell, a former chairman of the joint chiefs of staff,
submitted his letter of resignation to Mr. Bush on Friday,
The Associated Press reported.

The secretary was scheduled to meet later today with the
Israeli foreign minister, Silvan Shalom, was to attend
a meeting in Chile on Wednesday, as well as a multinational
conference on Iraq next week.

Copyright 2004 The New York Times

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2) With Capture of Falluja, a Goal Is Met. What's Next?
MILITARY ANALYSIS
By ERIC SCHMITT
WASHINGTON
November 15, 2004
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/11/15/politics/15military.html?hp&ex=1100581200&
en=4b88f6d5188eaff9&ei=5094&partner=homepage

WASHINGTON, Nov. 14 - American military commanders say
the weeklong assault that has wrested most of Falluja from
insurgent control has achieved nearly all their objectives well
ahead of schedule and with fewer pitfalls than anticipated.

But where do the United States and the government of the
interim prime minister, Ayad Allawi, go from here?

In the coming weeks, the two allies must still combat a resilient
and dangerous insurgency operating in most of Iraq, accelerate
a huge economic reconstruction effort and lay the groundwork
for elections to be held in January.

One goal of the offensive in Falluja was to eliminate a major safe
haven for insurgents in Iraq, a hub for assassinations, car bombings
and ambushes from Ramadi to Baghdad and beyond. Another
was to allow the city's 250,000 residents to take part in elections.

Registration is under way elsewhere in Iraq, so commanders will
face pressure to secure areas to permit Iraqi electoral commission
employees to work. Commanders and American diplomats in Iraq
are hoping that once rid of insurgents, cities in the Sunni heartland
north and west of Baghdad will join the political process, despite
calls by some Sunni groups last week to boycott elections.

But enormous obstacles remain to meeting these military, economic
and political targets. "The Falluja operation will be a military success,
but whether it's the key to political success will remain to be seen,"
said Senator Jack Reed, a Rhode Island Democrat on the Armed
Services Committee who visited Iraq on Friday and Saturday, in
a telephone interview. "The insurgents are working hard to derail
this, and commanders are expecting widespread violence leading
up to the elections in January."

Military commanders point to several accomplishments in Falluja.
A bastion of resistance has been eliminated, with lower than
expected American military and Iraqi civilian casualties. Senior
military officials say up to 1,600 insurgents have been killed and
hundreds more captured, altogether more than half the number
they estimated were in the city when the campaign began.

The offensive also shut down what officers said was a propaganda
weapon for the militants: Falluja General Hospital, with its stream
of reports of civilian casualties.

But American and Iraqi officials still face daunting tasks in the
aftermath of retaking the city.

"Falluja clearly will require a lot of effort even after the final pocket
of insurgents is eliminated in the city," one senior American general
in Iraq said in an e-mail message on Sunday. "Lots of challenges -
infrastructure, basic needs for returnees, security forces, and
governance, not to mention elections. Assume the insurgents will
continue to try to make life tough there as well."

Outside Falluja, the insurgency rages on, amid intelligence reports
that the battle has become a big recruiting draw for young Arab
men in mosques from Syria to Saudi Arabia. American commanders
acknowledge that hundreds of fighters and their commanders,
including Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the Jordanian militant whose
network has carried out many of the kidnappings, beheadings
and bombings, slipped away before the offensive.

American commanders say they expected that the fight for Falluja,
coinciding with the end of the holy month of Ramadan, would set
off a surge in violence across the country. But the scope and size
of the attacks in Mosul last Thursday stunned American officers
who were scrambling Sunday to regain the initiative.

"Our experience is that, after battles in which they lose many
fighters, the insurgents require some days to gather, treat their
wounded and try to figure out what to do next," Brig. Gen. Carter
Ham, charged with controlling northern Iraq, said Sunday in an
e-mail message. "Our job is to work to not let them rest and to
not allow them time to reset."

In Baghdad, where attacks were increasing even before the Falluja
offensive, Army soldiers said insurgents in at least one part of the
capital had shifted their tactics this week, massing in limited
numbers in their attacks on Americans, instead of shooting
from the shadows and rooftops, or carrying out ambushes with
roadside bombs.

"Overall, yes, the anti-Iraqi forces have been more aggressive
or stupid, depending on one's perspective," Sgt. Rowe Stayton,
an infantry fire-team leader in northern Baghdad, said Sunday in
an e-mail message. He said his troops killed 15 insurgents and
wounded 6 others, without suffering a single casualty.

But commanders say they are baffled over how to combat an
effective intimidation campaign that insurgents are waging against
Iraqis, from political leaders and police chiefs to the women who
do the laundry for troops at American bases.

"People are affected every day by criminality," said Senator Reed,
a former 82nd Airborne Division officer. "The situation has not -
is not - turning around."

American officials boast that about 100,000 Iraqi security forces
have been trained and equipped, and many are fighting side by
side with Americans, including 2,500 Iraqis in Falluja. But many
of those forces have only the most basic training and still lack
critical equipment like body armor, radios and vehicles.

"The good news is that significant numbers of Iraqi security forces
are standing their ground and fighting all over north-central Iraq,"
Maj. Gen. John Batiste, commander of the First Infantry Division
based in Tikrit, said Saturday in an e-mail message. "Our hard
work is paying off."

But not everywhere. Last week, scores of police officers in Mosul
fled their stations under attacks, allowing militants to loot half
a dozen stations and steal police vehicles, uniforms and hundreds
of weapons.

With most international aid organizations having withdrawn from
Iraq because of the conditions, and many contractors skittish about
sending workers into areas still vulnerable to insurgent attacks,
more United States troops will be called on to provide security to
allow reconstruction to move ahead.

The Pentagon has extended the tours of about 6,500 troops to
help with security, and senior commanders say that for now, the
more than 140,000 American forces in Iraq should be enough. But
enough for what, exactly? The experience of Falluja in the next
few weeks may be instructive.

"The operational lesson is that 'taking' cities is comparatively
easy, but that 'holding' them is harder and ultimately decisive,"
said one Army officer who just returned for a year's duty near
Falluja. "And that fight is largely one for Iraqis, not Americans,
to win."

Copyright 2004 The New York Times

---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

3) Feed the Billionaire, Starve the Students
OP-ED COLUMNIST
By BOB HERBERT
November 15, 2004
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/11/15/opinion/15herbert.html?oref=login&hp

The juxtaposition of the two articles, one in the news section and the other
in sports, was instructive.

We learned from a page-one story in last Thursday's Times that
pupils at Public School 63 in the South Bronx have to take their
gym classes in the school's lobby. They don't have a gymnasium.
Their teacher, Rose Gelrod, has marked a jogging path on the
lobby's floor. These makeshift classes, as reporter Susan Saulny
informed us, "are regularly interrupted by foot traffic to bathrooms
and deliveries to the cafeteria."

Welcome to the wonderful world of neglect, which is the daily life
of New York City schoolchildren.

Ah, but on the front page of the Sports section of that same paper
comes a different story. It was a profile of the pampered billionaire
owner of the New York Jets, Robert Wood Johnson IV, who is known
as Woody to his close friends and those many public officials who
stumble all over themselves trying to kiss his ring.

The very people who are crying poverty as they deny gyms and
playgrounds to the city's schoolchildren - starting with the billionaire
mayor of New York, Michael Bloomberg, and the governor, George
Pataki - are pulling out every stop in an effort to round up and hand
over hundreds of millions of taxpayer dollars to their friend Woody
so he can have the grandest, most luxurious, most expensive sports
stadium the country has ever seen.

The stadium would sit on some of the most valuable real estate in
the country, prime Manhattan riverfront property, which would also
be handed over for Woody's use. Oh, it's good to be a billionaire.

As for the kids. Well, forget about them. They don't have any money.
For 30 years, at least, they've gotten the back of the hand when it
comes to playgrounds and athletic facilities. Nearly a fifth of the city's
schools lack gymnasiums. Ninety-four percent have no athletic fields.
More than half have no playgrounds.

The politicians will tell you we can't afford to do better than that for
the kids in the public schools. But a billion-and-a-half-dollar
playground for the rich and famous, hard by the Hudson River?
No problem.

In the article about Mr. Johnson, The Times's Duff Wilson said:

"He is one of the biggest Republican fund-raisers in the nation,
and his grateful allies - President Bush, Gov. George E. Pataki and
Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg - make up a rare triple play
of powerful support."

When you lavish money on politicians, you expect something
in return. Among the things Mr. Johnson wants is $600 million
in city and state funds (at least) to make up the difference between
the $800 million he is putting up and the estimated $1.4 billion
the stadium will cost.

The state and the city are responsible for financing the city's
grossly underfinanced schools and they fight like gamecocks
over who should pay for what. But they are in the most harmonious
agreement that the estimable Woody should get the hundreds
of millions that he wants for his stadium.

It couldn't be because he's greased so many palms, could it?
I personally think this entire project is a scandal, a wholesale
giveaway of tremendous public assets to an incredibly wealthy
private interest. In the old days somebody would have called the
sheriff. But you don't hear much about bribery or quid-pro-
criminal-quos anymore because the rascals have figured out
how to make it legal.

Woody Johnson is not big on publicity. He goes out of his way
to avoid the spotlight. "He declines interviews for a profile,"
Mr. Wilson wrote. "He tells his closest family members and
longtime business associates not to talk about him, either."

He would like the public to know as little about him as possible.
And yet he has his hand out, palm wide open, ready to seize
as much of the public's money as he can get.

The neglect of New York City's schools goes far beyond the
lack of gymnasiums, athletic fields and playgrounds. Classrooms
are overcrowded and there is a dangerous shortage of qualified
teachers. Bathrooms in some schools aren't even equipped
with toilet paper or hand towels. Parents and teachers are often
forced to buy the most basic supplies.

You might think the powers that be would address those sorts
of things before catering to the wish lists of greedy, grasping
billionaires.

You might think that. But if you did, you'd be wrong.

Copyright 2004 The New York Times

---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

4) Demonstrate at the front gate of the
PG&E plant on Monday December 8th, 2004 at 12 Noon.
THE MOTHERS "ACTION PLAN"

On Wednesday, November 10th, a group of Moms from
Hunters View, a public housing neighborhood of Bay
View Hunters Point made the arduous journey to Folsom,
California to address the Board of Governors of
California Independent Systems Operator.

Just a few days before they had learned indirectly
through a press release from the Mayor and their
Supervisor, the decision to delay the closure of the
old Hunters Point power plant till 2007 with no
guarantee of closure even then. The Women, who were
not consulted in this so called 'Action Plan,' whose
toddlers need heavy medication for asthma and eczema
because of the cloud of particulate matter belched out
of PG&E's smoke stacks located within yards of their
homes, were angered at yet another broken promise.

They told their stories, once again, of the medical
emergencies and life threatening illnesses that
dominate their children's lives. For several women
this was the fourth time they pleaded their cause
before CAISO in Folsom.

They listened to the Board's deliberations.

What came down was the frightening tale, apparently
created by PG&E, of unacceptable risks of power
outages if the Hunters Point Power plant is dismantled
before a complicated assemblage of additional power
purchases, more fossil fuel burning equipment, new
power lines and other schemes are put securely in
place that will keep a select few of energy companies
assured of profits.

The Market Surveillance Committee gave a report
assuring everyone that the possibility of Energy
Corporationsí gaming the market, as was done in
2000-2001, is now blocked.

Ah ha! this supplied the motive for these ridiculous
projections. The corporations in the energy business
got caught gaming the market, so to keep the money
(schemed, not earned money) flowing into their
pockets, they decided to apply high pressure scare
tactics to a young new Mayor and an eager to please
those in power Supervisor. The intimidations did
succeed with our elected officials and their
unreasonable fears of black outs caused them to
concede (like the spineless Democratic Party) to the
demands of PG&E's with their lies about "unacceptable
risks."

Having followed, through the years, contradictory
declarations of future energy shortages, then proof to
the contrary and then proof that we will in the end
have and excess of energy, the Moms now know for sure
that if anyone will represent their ìunacceptable
risksî i.e. their children's' worsening illnesses, it
will have to be only themselves.

It is obvious they have no representation in City
Hall.

Even the Department of Elections sided against these
most vulnerable of citizenry in the South East
neighborhoods around Bayview Hunters Point.
When all else failed in their efforts to get someone
in City Hall to help them get the right to breathable
cleaner air, they conducted a petition drive to recall
Ms Maxwell.

On the day they delivered 6000 signatures, two hundred
more that required, they were informed that an
ordinance of the City Charter says the Mayor will
appoint the new Supervisor, should their petition be
deemed ìsufficient.î

This surprise came from the same Director Arntz who
had approved the wording ìwe demand election of a
successor in that officeî copied straight from the
handbook on recall rules given to them by the
Department before the people collected one signature.
And the wording spoke the intent. The Citizens wanted
a new and more conscientious Supervisor that of course
was chosen democratically.

Was Director Arntz ignorant of this rule himself when
he approved the original wording, or was he decieving
us? Either way any other neighborhood would demand
that he be fired.

After this bomb shell, it wasnít really much of a
surprise when the Department declared the collected
signature ìinsufficient.î The manager of the signature
collectors reviewed the petitions to learn the reasons
for so many disqualifications. Then she presented a
list of disputed disqualifications to the Election
Commission. Disenfranchisement is what the community
calls the impossible standards applied to most of
signatures, including the application of rules that do
not exist as well as with holding those declared ìnot
registeredî from review. It was sort of like a
literacy test you are not meant to pass. The
conclusion of Director Arntzs is still being disputed.
Even the exercising of the democratic right to recall
to have decent representation in City Government is
denied this community.

The residents of Bayview Hunters Point see that they
will have to take things into their own hands. They
are not as easily frightened as those in power at City
Hall. Their rage is growing and they are tired of
having their and the childrenís health and well being
placed at the bottom of our City's priority list. They
are angry at being so long ignored!

There will be a demonstration at the front gate of the
PG&E plant on Monday December 8th, 2004 at 12 Noon.

The Moms urgently request that all progressives in the
City join them in their revolt against this shameful
injustice.

NOTE: Here are some additional sad facts.

In March 2004 Mr. De Shazo, transmission manager,
announced that CAISO had no Environmental Justice
Policy and, further, he didnít see a reason to have
one. CAISO is a 501c3 non profit and receives special
tax breaks for ignoring the sicknesses caused by their
policies.

On November 2, the Environmental Protection Agency
told Marie Harrison of Green Action in effect that
they cannot deny a permit to continue operating the
Hunters Point Plant because ìinsuring adequate power
generation in San Franciscoî takes precedence over
adverse health effects on the residents.

The annual compensation of PG&E CEO, Mr Smith is
$10,517,611. Weekly, thatís $202,261 and daily it is
$40, 452. This includes salary, bonuses, stock awards,
payouts and "other compensation."

Kevyn Lutton
(415) 822-2744

---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

5) A Hollow Victory
By Kim Sengupta
Camp Dogwood, Iraq
15 November 2004
http://news.independent.co.uk/world/middle_east/story.jsp?story=582921

A hollow victory

The US and Iraqi authorities announced that Fallujah had been
pacified yesterday, saying they had smashed through the last
lines of resistance and killed more than 1,200 fighters.

Donald Rumsfeld, the US Defence Secretary, said allied forces
had "completed the move, for all practical purposes, from the
north of the town to the south". Iraq's interim Prime Minister,
Iyad Allawi, said there had been "a clear-cut win over the
insurgents and the terrorists".

But the pacification of the rebel stronghold could be a hollow
victory. The Americans will leave behind them a shattered city,
having unleashed the full might of the US military against an
estimated 6,000 insurgents.

There was plenty of evidence across Iraq that the war is far
from over, and the devastation of Fallujah is likely to have
fuelled the resistance.

American and Iraqi forces were still "mopping up" pockets
of resistance yesterday and conducting house-to-house
searches. A US commander recognised that the city had
been "occupied but not subdued".

The US military also acknowledged that the Jordanian militant
leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi and other prominent members
of the insurgency had escaped from Fallujah. Mr Allawi said:
"Fallujah is no longer a safe haven for terrorists" but he
admitted that it would take "some days" to clear the
remaining nests of resistance.

The six-day air and ground offensive left 38 Americans and
six Iraqi government soldiers dead, according to the US military.
More than 200 US soldiers were wounded. Two hundred of the
insurgents who were killed were foreigners, the Americans said.

After failing in April to wrest Fallujah from the insurgents in
a three-week assault, this time the American military expressed
pride in the speed of the operation, which deployed six times
the number of troops dispatched to the city seven months ago.

But the number of Iraqi civilians killed or wounded in the fighting
was not mentioned. Mr Allawi said on Saturday that no civilian
casualties had been reported.

Mr Rumsfeld confidently asserted last week that civilians had
been given guidance on how to avoid getting injured. He predicted
that there would not be large numbers of civilians killed, and
"certainly not by US forces".

Up to half of the city's 300,000 resi-dents had fled before
or during the military operation aimed at pacifying the city
to enable elections to be held in January. But thousands
remained trapped. Yesterday charred bodies were scattered
in the streets, where rows of buildings lay in ruins.

People in the city said they had no water and no food, and
aid agencies warned that Fallujah and surrounding areas
were facing a humanitarian catastrophe. There have been
outbreaks of typhoid and other diseases. Some people leaving
the city told of rotting corpses being piled up and thousands
of people trapped, many of them wounded without access to
medical aid.

An aid convoy was held up at the city's main hospital in the
western outskirts. Captain Adam Collier of the US Army cited
security reasons as he explained that the seven trucks and
ambulances sent by the Iraqi Red Crescent to Fallujah with
medicine, food, blankets and water purification tablets would
not be allowed through. US Marines Colonel Mike Shupp said:
"There is no need to bring supplies in because we have supplies
of our own for the people. Now the bridge is open, I will bring
out casualties and all aid work can be done here."

Battles raged across Iraq yesterday. American helicopter gunships
attacked Baiji in the north, and tanks moved into the centre of
the city. In the northern city of Mosul, US and Iraqi security forces
struggled to retake a police station that had been overrun by
insurgents. They said the local security forces had lost control
of much of Mosul, Iraq's third-largest city with an estimated
population of 1.8 million Arabs, Kurds, Turkomen and Assyrian
Christians. Also in the Kurdish-dominated region, gunmen
ambushed and killed a senior official of the Iraqi Communist
Party and member of the national assembly, Waddah Hassan
Abdel Amir, on the road to Arbil. There were further gun
attacks in Baghdad.

There was also an ominous political unravelling as a direct
consequence of the Fallujah operation. A senior aide to
Muqtada Sadr, the Shia cleric who has led two uprisings
against the Americans, said he would not take part in the
elections while "Iraqi cities are under attack".

Meanwhile an Islamist group has freed two women related
to Mr Allawi but is still holding his male cousin hostage,
two Arab satellite channels said yesterday. A previously
unknown group seized the interim Prime Minister's
75-year-old cousin Ghazi Allawi along with Mr Ghazi's
wife and their daughter-in-law in Baghdad last Tuesday.

(c) 2004 Independent Digital (UK) Ltd

---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

6) A Community Labor News E-Zine
Courts terminating Labor Contracts:The Bitter Fruits of
"Lessor Evilism"
By Roland Sheppard

On Saturday, 11/13/04, the New York Times,
(www.nytimes.com/2004/11/13/business/13air.html?oref=login)
"US Air Asks Court to End Labor Contracts," by Micheline Maynard,
is very significant. If the bankruptcy courts terminate Labor Contracts,
then all collective bargaining can be null and voided.

It is another bitter fruit of the policy by the Trade Union Bureaucrats
when they decided to join and support the Democratic Party as the
"lessor evil" and to begin to promote their program of a "partnership
with capital." Which, they now openly advocated since the defeat of
the Air Traffic Controllers strike in 1981.

The first bitter fruit from this policy was the "No Strike" Pledge in
support of World War II. This was done while war profiteers made
millions during the war and the rejunivation of United States
capitalism. This led to the labor upsurge after World War II, as
the workers tried to get back what they had lost during the war.
The strength of the American Working Class was demonstrated
and the employers were forced to make concession to the workers.

The second bitter fruit was the Taft-Hartley Act, which was an
amendment to the National Labor Relations Act (NLRB) was passed
by the United States Government in 1947. It was promoted to
control the strength of "big labor" and equalize the "playing field"
for the employers.

This act, commonly know as the "Slave Labor Act," controlled
strikes, prohibited unions from making contributions to political
parties, and demanded that every laborer sign a statement that
he/she was not a Communist. December 12, 1947. Lewis
disaffiliated with the AFL because of disputes over the
Taft-Hartley Act.

At the center of the dispute, was the fact that this bill was
a declaration of war upon the unions by the government --
the AFL declared peace. The AFL wanted to oppose the
act through the court system, John Lewis wanted to take
economic action against it.

The main argument was the myth that the court would
be either "impartial" or pro-labor (Most of the judges had
been appointed by Franklin Roosevelt) and independent of
the government. The truth came to bear when the Supreme
Court upheld the law as constitutional.

Since that time, the employer’s government has systematically
turned the screws of the act a little bit at a time as they
concurantly increased the taxation of workers and decreased
the taxation of corporations and the ruling rich. Such have
been the bitter fruits of working class due to their "labor
leaders" support to the Democratic Party.

This process has continued until today. Now the labor
bureaucracy has used the Taft-Hartely Act to justify the
concept that "you can't win strikes anymore and it has
sought to build a "partnership" with the Boss, in exchange
for union dues. The NLRB has also been able to housebreak
the labor officialdom. In fact, they union officials are beholden
to the NLRB for their undemocratic control of the unions and
allowed to keep collecting dues, as long as they maintain the
"partnership."

If union contracts can now be voided by the court system and
the government, then it is time for the AFL-CIO leadership to
finally break with their "partnership" program and to organize
and call a nationwide strike against the government's action.
If they cannot do that, then they should resign!

The stakes are high, 70 years of collective bargaining is
at stake! Action against the employer's government (the
billion dollar government*) is imperative!

If the courts throw out contracts that were bargained for
by the union and voted by the union, then the "neutrality"
of the court system is exposed. If the unions no longer have
a contract--there should be no work, until the industry is
nationalized under workers control through an elected
tribunal of the airline workers, in particular and by all
workers, if this becomes a generalized practice.

(* The total spent by both Democrats and Republicans in
this year’s election was by the close to two billion dollars
this year.)

Roland Sheppard
Retired Business Reprsentative
Painter Local # 4 San Francisco

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7) A City in Ruins, Sky Thick with Smoke:
'Let's Kick Ass ... the American Way'
By Lindsey Hilsum
The Observer U.K.
Sunday 14 November 2004
http://www.guardian.co.uk/Iraq/Story/0,2763,1350831,00.html

Lindsey Hilsum joins the 1st Marine Expeditionary Force as it advances into
Falluja.

In the huge, muddy field which serves as a forward base,
Major-General Richard Natonski prepared his troops for the
battle ahead. 'We're goin' in to raise the Eye-raqi flag above
Falluja - to give it back to the Fallujans,' he shouted, the eyes
of the entire 1st Marine Division on him.

Pausing to remember the marine corps who fought in Vietnam,
Korea and the two world wars, they then stood to attention and
launched into the marine hymn.

'Only two songs send a shiver up my spine,' said one marine,
his face scored with the pockmarks and confidence of youth.
'The marine hymn, and that song by Toby Keith after 9/11 which
says "we're gonna kick you up the ass - that's the American way".'

Then the unit was on its way to war. Twenty-five behemoths -
tanks and amphibious assault vehicles - lumbered through the
desert towards the small, poor, dusty city which has become the
symbol of America's failure in Iraq. The idea that Falluja will one
day rank as a military victory to rival Hue City, Vietnam, may at
present seem ludicrous - but such is the significance the
Americans place on this battle.

They need to wrest back Falluja not simply to quell the
insurgency but also to show the 'hajis' - as they call the
rebels - that they cannot match the mighty US Army.

'After we take Falluja, the terrorists will have no sanctuary,
nowhere to hide,' said Major General Natonski, commander
of the 1st Marine Division.

No soldier can fight unless he hates the enemy - which
makes the message that this is all for the Iraqi people
difficult to absorb.

'I guess there are some good people - it's jus' that we
don' have nothin' to do with them,' mused a marine as he
and his colleagues sorted their kit and cleaned their M16
assault rifles. 'I see the little kids in the cars and I feel sorry
for them, but when they turn 16 they're evil.'


On Sunday night they slept in the desert - infantry under
the skies, trackers in vehicles. By the time they woke on
Monday, other units had seized the hospital and installations
on the west of the Euphrates. But the main assault east of the
river was still to come.

As they advanced on the city's north-western outskirts, black
smoke from earlier artillery and bombing barrages smeared the
horizon. On entering Falluja, marines burst into an apartment
building, evacuating residents. A huddle of women and children
were shepherded away, the women pulling their headscarves
tighter, the children staring wide-eyed at the huge, muddy
green juggernauts standing outside their home.

At a railway, the column came to a halt. The road bridge
beneath could be booby trapped; or there could be an ambush
lying in wait. Explosives were laid across the rails and two holes
were blown in the breach - one as a feint, one for real. Engines
roaring, the huge vehicles then rolled up and over the railway
embankment and into a cemetery, where they parked up until
dawn.

The following day, the real fighting began. Over the week,
the two units I'm accompanying have lost at least two marines
and seen several injured in the push through the Jolan district,
a rebel stronghold. Captain Brian Chontosh says about a dozen
men have been captured and a similar number killed. 'The
resistance is in pockets,' he adds. 'There's nowhere for them
to go now but jail or Allah.'

The resistance is heard but not seen. On the first day, every
time a helicopter gunship flew over, it would meet a barrage of
AK-47 fire as the insurgents took wild pot shots. The fire simply
alerted the Americans to their positions. By the second day,
airpower was scarcely used at all. It was the turn of the foot
soldiers, amphibious vehicles providing covering fire.

Marines went house to house, knocking down doors, searching
for insurgents and arms. Jolan is deserted. It's possible that
insurgents forced people from their houses weeks ago.

One man said they had forced him to keep arms in his house,
threatening to take him to the rebel leader Omar Hadid to have his
throat slit if he refused. He knelt blindfolded against a wall, waiting
for the marines to take him for interrogation by the ominously-
named 'exploitation teams'. Intelligence from prisoners has been
vital in locating arms stores.

The amphibious vehicles push down walls, and street stalls and
cars go up in spectacular explosions. The attitude is that
overwhelming force is necessary.

In one house, marines came across the bodies of five Iraqi men,
shot in the back of the head. Their story will probably never be
known. Much of Falluja is now in ruins. Every day, the marines
open up with mortars, mini grenade launchers, machine guns
and tank rounds, aiming to kill anyone hiding behind a wall or
in a house.

On Friday, in the debris, they found a family: mother, father
and five children. Alive. 'We heard on the radio it would be safer
to stay at home,' said Usil Abdul, nursing her baby. The children
sat on a sofa in a house marines had taken as a base. They
accepted sweets and drinks and chatted to soldiers, seemingly
unfazed by four days of bombing and mortar fire.

Other residents may be less sanguine when they return to
see the wreckage. Marines lounge in the armchairs of Falluja's
elite, blowing smoke rings and eating snacks. One stuck a paper
flower behind his ear and posed for the camera before changing
his mind - 'I don't want people to think I'm gay!'

Walls have been destroyed to clear lines of fire and terraces
are littered with spent cartridge cases, rubble and half-eaten
ready-to-eat meals. While some may blame the insurgents for
bringing this upon the city, many will point to the Americans.

Despite reports of 'heavy fighting', the overwhelming majority
of the firing has been one way. Twenty four US soldiers have died
and more than 200 injured. An unknown number of Iraqi soldiers
have also died. But the resistance in Falluja was sporadic. Insurgent
leaders probably fled several weeks before the onslaught. The
marines will claim this as a major triumph in the war on terror
but if the insurgency merely shifts elsewhere, they may find
Falluja is an empty victory.

Lindsey Hilsum is Channel 4 News's International Editor.

---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

8) When the Smoke has Cleared Around Fallujah,
What Horrors will Be Revealed?
By Kim Sengupta and Raymond Whitaker
The Independent on Sunday U.K.
Sunday 14 November 2004
http://news.independent.co.uk/world/middle_east/story.jsp?story=582722
As the Americans move street by bloody street towards control
of the insurgents' stronghold, aid agencies warn of a humanitarian
catastrophe.

Victory was being declared yesterday in the battle of Fallujah,
with 1,000 rebels reported dead, hundreds more in custody and
spectacular footage from embedded television crews, showing
Marines charging through deserted neighborhoods.

"It's like those pictures from the advance into Baghdad," said
one watcher as the TV showed the view over a tank gunner's
shoulder, with fire pouring down an empty street. But that
comment unconsciously identified the real problem: more
than a year and a half after George Bush declared major
combat operations in Iraq at an end, the US military, backed
by British and Iraqi forces, is having to fight the war all over again.

Yesterday, as American forces embarked on what were described
as "mopping-up" operations in Fallujah - though heavy shelling was
still being reported - relief organizations warned that there could be
a humanitarian disaster in the city. "Conditions in Fallujah are
catastrophic," said Fardous al-Ubaidi of the Iraqi Red Crescent.
The Iraqi Health Minister, Alaa Alwan, said ambulances had begun
transferring "significant numbers" of civilian wounded to Baghdad
hospitals, but did not say how many.

Washington and the Iraqi interim government could argue that
civilians in Fallujah had ample warning of what was to come. More
than 80 per cent of the population of 200,000 to 300,000 were
said to have fled before the assault was launched on Monday. But
enough reports trickled out of the besieged city to show that many
inhabitants still remained, despite their invisibility in the television
footage, and that their plight was severe.

Aamir Haidar Yusouf,a 39-year-old trader, sent his family out
of Fallujah, but stayed behind to look after his home, not just during
the fighting, but the looting which will invariably follow. "The
Americans have been firing at buildings if they see even small
movements," he said. "They are also destroying cars, because
they think every car has a bomb in it. People have moved from
the edges of the city into the center, and they are staying on the
ground floors of buildings.

"There will be nothing left of Fallujah by the time they finish.
They have already destroyed so many homes with their bombings
from the air, and now we are having this from tanks and big guns."

US commanders insist civilian casualties in Fallujah have been
low, but the Pentagon famously claims that it does not keep
figures. Escaping residents described incidents in which non-
combatants, including women and children, were killed by shrapnel
or hit by bombs. In one case earlier in the week, a nine-year-old
boy was hit in the stomach by shrapnel. Unable to reach a hospital,
he died hours later of blood loss.

"Anyone who gets injured is likely to die, because there's
no medicine and they can't get to doctors," said Abdul-Hameed
Salim, a volunteer with the Iraqi Red Crescent. "There are snipers
everywhere. Go outside and you're going to get shot."

Sami al-Jumaili, a doctor at the main Fallujah hospital who
escaped arrest when it was taken, said the city was running out
of medical supplies, and only a few clinics remained open. "There
is not a single surgeon in Fallujah," he said. "We had one ambulance
hit by US fire and a doctor wounded. There are scores of injured
civilians in their homes whom we can't move. A 13-year-old child
just died in my hands."

Around 10,000 people took shelter in Habbaniya, 12 miles to
the west of the city, and many had tragic stories. "There have been
a lot of innocent people killed," said Suleiman Ali Hassan, who lost
his brother. "The Americans say they are just aiming their tanks and
aircraft at the mujaheddin, but I know of at least eight other people
who have died beside my brother."

Samira Sabbah arrived at the refugee center yesterday with her
three children, but her husband stayed behind in Fallujah. "People
have been living like animals," she said. "There has been no electricity,
no food and no water. We were very afraid to move out because there
were so much shooting everywhere. I do not know how we will live now."

Rasoul Ibrahim, a father of three, fled Fallujah on foot with his wife
and children. "There's no water," he said. "People are drinking dirty
water. Children are dying. People are eating flour because there's
no proper food."

Mohammed Younis, a former policeman, said: "The Americans
and Allawi [Iyad Allawi, Iraq's interim Prime Minister] have been
saying that Fallujah is full of foreign fighters. That is not true,
they left a long time ago. You will find them in other places,
in Baghdad."

The truth of his words were confirmed by no less than Mr. Allawi's
national security adviser, Qassem Daoud, who said more than 1,000
"Saddamists and terrorists" had been killed in the battle for Fallujah,
and 200 captured. Of those 200, however, only 14 are believed to
be non-Iraqis, mostly Iranians. What of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi,
Washington's top bogeyman in Iraq, the al-Qa'ida arch-terrorist
whose supposed presence in Fallujah was one of the main
justifications for the assault? "He has escaped," said Mr. Daoud.

This was the first official admission of what virtually everyone
else in Iraq had realized long ago: that Zarqawi, even if he had ever
been in Fallujah, was not going to stay put to await arrest by the
Americans. Every time the interim government demanded of the
city's clerical leadership that they hand him over, they insisted
they did not have the power to hand over foreign extremists,
and did not even know where the Jordanian was.

They repeated this after a final ultimatum last weekend from
Mr. Allawi himself. The assault went ahead anyway, just as
everyone knew it would, even though a senior American officer
said as it was beginning that it was likely that most of the
"foreign fighters" had already melted away. So who were the
Americans fighting? In Mr. Daoud's parlance, nearly all appeared
to be "Saddamists" - in other words, Iraqis whose main motive
is to fight against the occupation, rather than "terrorists", who
presumably come from outside to force local people into acts
of resistance against their will.

Despite the Iraqi interim government officially having ordered
the attack, military strategy is still being driven by a White House
obsessed with "smoking terrorists out of their holes". Fallujah
has been the victim of this misconception of what is happening
in Iraq, but other places will follow - perhaps Mosul, which was
reported yesterday to be partly under insurgent control, or Ramadi,
where many of the hardliners fled from Fallujah.

The US simply does not have enough forces to pacify the
whole of the Sunni center of Iraq at once, which explains why
Britain was asked to send the Black Watch north. "As soon as
we press down hard in one place, they pop up somewhere else,"
complained one officer, and his words were borne out by a rash
of small-scale attacks yesterday in places where US troops had
been thinned out for the assault on Fallujah.

The city was unquestionably the base for many of the car
bombers and fighters who have staged attacks across central
Iraq in recent months, but the main reason it became so was the
resentment caused by the previous attempt to win hearts and
minds by military means - the botched US assault in April. In
military terms this operation has been more successful, but
politically it will be just as disastrous as its predecessor, which
fuelled the present insurgency.

One of the main Sunni populist groups, the Iraqi Islamic Party,
has resigned from the Iraqi government in protest against the
Fallujah battle. "The American attack on our people in Fallujah
has led, and will lead, to more killings and genocide without
mercy from the Americans," said its leader, Mohsen Abdel-Hamid.

The Association of Muslim Scholars, an influential group of
Sunni clerics , is calling for a boycott of January's planned
elections, saying they will be held "over the corpses of those
killed in Fallujah and the blood of the wounded".

Even President Bush admits that violence is likely to increase
rather than decline as the election approaches. But as American
forces contemplate what is left of Fallujah, some might remember
the words of a US officer standing amid the ruins of Hue in Vietnam
a generation ago. "In order to save the city," he declared without
a hint of irony, "we had to destroy it."


(In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, this material is
distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior
interest in receiving the included information for research and
educational purposes. t r u t h o u t has no affiliation whatsoever
with the originator of this article nor is t r u t h o u t endorsed
or sponsored by the originator.)

(c) : t r u t h o u t 2004
|t r u t h o u t

---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

9) CHINA ROCKS THE GEOPOLITICAL BOAT
ASIA TIMES / Nov 6, 2004


TEHRAN - Speaking of business as unusual.
A mere two months ago, the news of
a China-Kazakhstan pipeline agreement,
worth US$3.5 billion, raised some
eyebrows in the world press, some hinting
that China's economic foreign policy may
be on the verge of a new leap forward.
A clue to the fact that such
anticipation may have totally understated
the case was last week's signing of a mega-gas
deal between Beijing and Tehran worth
$100 billion. Billed as the "deal of
century" by various commentators, this
agreement is likely to increase by
another $50 billion to $100 billion,
bringing the total close to $200 billion, when
a similar oil agreement, currently
being negotiated, is inked not too far from
now.


The gas deal entails the annual
export of some 10 million tons of Iranian
liquefied natural gas (LNG) for a
25-year period, as well as the participation,
by China's state oil company,
in such projects as exploration and drilling,
petrochemical and gas industries,
pipelines, services and the like. The export of
LNG requires special cargo ships,
however, and Iran is currently investing
several billion dollars adding to
its small LNG-equipped fleet.


Still, per the admission of the head
of the Iranian Tanker Co, Mohammad
Souri, Iran needed to purchase another
87 vessels by 2010, in addition to the 10
already purchased, in order to fulfill the
needs of its growing LNG market. Iran
has an estimated 26.6-trillion-cubic-
meter gas reservoir, the second-largest
in the world, about half of which is in
offshore zones and the other half
onshore.


It is perhaps too early to digest fully
the various economic, political and
even geostrategic implications of this
stunning development, widely considered
a major blow to the Bush administration's
economic sanctions on Iran and
particularly on Iran's energy sector,
notwithstanding the Iran-Libya Sanctions Act
(ILSA) penalizing foreign companies
daring to invest more than $20 million in
Iran's oil and gas industry.


While it is unclear what the scope
of China's direct investment in Iran's
energy sector will turn out to be, it
is fairly certain that China's
participation in the Yad Avaran field
alone will exceed the ILSA's ceiling; this field's
oil reservoir is estimated to be 17
billion barrels and is capable of producing
300 to 400 barrels per day. And this
is besides the giant South Pars field,
which Iran shares with Qatar, alone
possessing close to 8% of the world's gas
reserves. To open a parenthesis here,
until now Tehran has been complaining
that Qatar has been outpacing Iran in
exploiting its resource 6-1. In fact,
Iran's unhappiness over Qatar's
unbalanced access to the South Pars led to a
discrete warning by Iran's deputy oil
minister and, soon thereafter, Qatar complied
with Iran's request for a joint "technical
committee" that has yet to yield
any result.


For a United States increasingly pointing
at China as the next biggest
challenge to its Pax Americana, the Iran-
China energy cooperation cannot but be
interpreted as an ominous sign of emerging
new trends in an area considered vital
to US national interests. But, then again, this
cuts both ways, that is, the
deal should, logically speaking, stimulate
others who may still consider Iran
untrustworthy or too radical to enter into
big projects on a long term basis.
Iran's biggest foreign agreement prior
to this gas agreement with China was a
long-term $25 billion gas deal with
Turkey, which has encountered snags,
principally over the price, recently,
compared with Iran's various trade agreements
with Spain, Italy and others, typically
with a life-span of five to seven
years.


Thus some Iranian officials are hopeful
that the China deal can lead to a
fundamental rethinking of the risks of
doing business with Iran on the part of
European countries, India, Japan, and
even Russia. Concerning India, which
signed a memorandum of understanding
with Iran initially in 1993 for a
2,670-kilometer pipeline, with more than
700km traversing Pakistani territory, the Iran-Chi
na deal will undoubtedly give a greater
push to New Delhi to follow Beijing's
lead and thus make sure that the "peace
pipeline" is finally implemented. The
same applies, mutatis mutandis, to Russia,
which has as of late been dragging
its feet somewhat on Iran's nuclear
reactor, bandwagoning with the US and
Group of Eight (G8) countries on the
thorny issue of Iran's uranium-enrichment
program. The Russians must now factor
in the possibility of being supplanted by
China if they lose the confidence of
Tehran and appear willing to trade favors
with Washington over Iran. Russia's
Gazprom may now finally set aside its
stubborn resistance to the idea of
entering major joint ventures with Iran.


Iran appears more and more interested
to join the Shanghai Cooperation
Organization (SCO) and form a powerful
axis with its twin pillars, China and Russia,
as a counterweight to a US power
"unchained". The SCO comprises China,
Russia, Tajikistan, Kazakhstan,
Kyrgyzstan and Uzbekistan.


China, Russia and Iran share deep
misgivings about the perception of the
United States as a "benevolent hegemon"
and tend to see a "rogue superpower"
instead. Even short of joining forces
formally, the main outlines of such an axis
can be discerned from their convergence
of threat perception due to, among
other things, Russia's disquiet over the
post-September 11, 2001, US incursions in
its traditional Caucasus-Central Asian
"turf", and China's continuing unease
over the Korean Peninsula and Taiwan;
this is not to mention China's fixed
gaze at a "new Silk Road" allowing it
unfettered access to the Middle East and
Eurasia, this as part and parcel of what
is often billed as "the new great game"
in Eurasia. Indeed, what China's recent
deals with both Kazakhstan
(pertaining to Caspian energy) and Iran
(pertaining to Persian Gulf resources) signifies
is that the pundits had gotten it wrong
until now: the purview of the new
great game is not limited to the Central
Asia-Caspian Sea basin, but rather has a
broader, more integrated, purview
increasingly enveloping even the Persian
Gulf. Increasingly, the image of the
Islamic Republic of Iran as a sort of
frontline state in a post-Cold War global
lineup against US hegemony is becoming
prevalent among Chinese and Russian
foreign-policy thinkers.


For the moment, however, the Iran-Russia-
China axis is more a tissue of
think-tanks than full-fledged policy, and
the mere trade interdependence of the US
and China, as well as Russia's growing
energy ties to the US alone, not to
mention its weariness over any perceived
Chinese "overstretch", militate against
a grand alliance pitted against the Western
superpower. In fact, the Cold
War-type alliances are highly unlikely to
be replicated in the current milieu of
globalization and complex interdependence;
instead, what is likely to emerge in
the future are issue-focused or, for the
lack of a better word, issue-area
alliances whereby, to give an example,
the above-said axis may be inspired into
existence along geostrategic considerations
somewhat apart from purely
economic considerations.


Hence what the SCO means on the
security front and how significant it will be
hinges on a complex, and complicated,
set of factors that may eventually
culminate in its expansion, from the
current group of six, as well as greater,
alliance-like, cooperation. It is noteworthy
that in Central Asia-Caucasus, the
trend is toward security diversification and
even multipolarism, reflected in
the US and Russian bases not too far from
each other. In this multipolar
sub-order, neither the US is capable of
exerting hegemony, nor is Russia's
semi-hegemonic sway without competition.
In the Caspian Sea basin, for example,
Kazakhstan has opted to take part in
several distinct, and contrasting, security
networks, including the North Atlantic
Treaty Organization's Partnership for Peace
program, the Commonwealth of
Independent States' Collective Security
Organization, the SCO, and membership
in OSCE (Organization for Security and
Cooperation in Europe).


Kazakhstan is not, however, an exception,
but seemingly indicative of an
expanding new rule of the (security and
strategic) game played out throughout
Central Asia-Caucasus. Economically, both
Kazakhstan and Russia are members of the
Central Asia Economic Cooperation
Organization, and all the Central Asian
states are also members of the Economic
Cooperation Organization (ECO), which was
founded by the trio of Iran, Turkey and
Pakistan. Certain economic alliances
are, henceforth, taking shape, alongside
the budding security arrangements,
which have their own tempo, rationale
and security potential. Concerning the
latter, in 1998, the ECO embarked on
low security cooperation among its members
on drug trafficking and this may soon be
expanded to information-sharing on
terrorism. Also, Iran has also entered into
low security agreements with some of
its Persian Gulf neighbors, including Saudi
Arabia and Kuwait.


The SCO initially was established to
deal with border disputes and is now
well on its way to focusing on (Islamist)
terrorism, drug trafficking and
regional insecurity. Meanwhile, the US,
not to be outdone, has been sowing its own
bilateral military and security arrangements
with various regional countries
such as Azerbaijan, Tajikistan, Kyrgyzstan
and Uzbekistan, as well as promoting
the Guuam Group, which includes
Azerbaijan and Georgia, formed alongside the
BTC (Baku-Tiblisi-Ceyhan) pipeline
as a counterweight to Russian influence.
Consequently, the overall picture that
emerges before us is, as stated above, a
unique multi-trend of military and
security multipolarism defying the logic of
Pax Americana. In this picture, Iran
represents one of the poles of attraction,
seeking its own sphere of influence by,
for instance, entering into a
military agreement with Turkmenistan
in 1994, and, simultaneously, exploring the
larger option of how to coalesce with
other powers in order to offset the
debilitating consequences of (post
-September 11) unbounded Americanization of regional
politics.


A glance at Chinese security narratives,
and it becomes patently obvious that
Beijing shares Iran's deep worries about
US unipolarism culminating in, as in
Afghanistan and Iraq, unilateral militarism.
Various advocates of US
preeminence, such as William Kristol, openly
write that the US should "work for the
fall of the Communist Party oligarchy in
China". Unhinged from the containment
of Soviet power, the roots of US unilateralism,
and its military manifestation
of "preemption", must be located in the logic
of unipolarism, thinly disguised
by the "coalition of the willing" in Iraq; the
latter is, in fact, as aptly
put by various critics of US foreign
policy, more like a coalition of the
coerced and bribed than anything else.


But, realistically speaking, what are
the prospects for any regional and or
continental realignment leading to
the erasure of US unipolarism,
notwithstanding the US military and
economic colossus bent on preventing,
on a doctrinal
level, the emergence of any challenger
to its global domination now or in the
future? The strategic debates in all three
countries, Russia, China and Iran,
feature similar concerns and question
marks. For one thing, all three have to
contend with the difficulty of sorting
the disjunctions between the different
sets of national interests, above all
economic, ideological and strategic
interests. This aside, a pertinent question
is who will win over Russia, Washington,
which pursues a coupling role with
Moscow vis-a-vis Beijing, or Beijing,
trying to wrest away Moscow from
Washington? For now, Russia does
not particularly
feel compelled to choose between
stark options, yet the situation may be
altered in China's direction in case
the present drift of US power incursions are
heightened in the future. The
answer to the above question
should be delegated

to the future. For now, however,
the quantum leap of China into the Middle
East and Caspian energy markets
has become a fait accompli, no matter how
disturbed its biggest trade partner,
the US, over its geopolitical ramifications.


Kaveh L Afrasiabi, PhD, is the author
of After Khomeini: New Directions in
Iran's Foreign Policy (Westview Press)
and "Iran's Foreign Policy Since 9/11",
Brown's Journal of World Affairs, co-
authored with former deputy foreign
minister Abbas Maleki, No 2, 2003.
He teaches political science at Tehran
University.


(Copyright 2004 Asia Times Online
Ltd. All rights reserved. Please contact
content@atimes.com for information
on our sales and syndication policies.)

COME TO THE NEXT BAUAW MEETING AND BRING YOUR IDEAS ON HOW TO
ACHIEVE UNITY IN THE MOVEMENT:

MONDAY, NOVEMBER 15TH, 7:00 p.m.
1380 Valencia Street
(Between 24th & 25th Streets, SF)
BAUAW: 415-824-8730

---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

Open letter to Bay Area Activists from Bay Area
United Against War (BAUAW):

Dear friends who organized, participated, and/or spoke in the
demonstrations sponsored by Not in Our Name and ANSWER on
Nov. 3 and Nov. 9.

At the concluding rally of the emergency demonstration ANSWER
called to protest the U.S. assault on Fallujah, Jahahara, of AFSC and
N'COBRA, issued a kind of challenge to all the major antiwar
organizations to make a unified response to the U.S. government's
war against Iraq. He called on the national organizations, of which
we are all affiliated to one or more-ANSWER, UFPJ, NION-to unify
in building a massive antiwar movement.

This call is so timely because the war and occupation continue
unabated, the consequences for the Iraqis are devastating
(over 100,000 civilians killed by U.S. actions) and over 1,110 U.S.
troops are dead and tens of thousands injured.

Those of us who are old enough to have participated in the
movement against the U.S. war on Vietnam know that the most
effective mass actions against that war that called for bringing
all U.S. troops home now [Out Now!] were unified actions where
people of different ideologies were able to come together for
Out Now despite their divergent opinions on other topics. The mass
movement that was built on the streets of the U.S. created
a supportive environment for
U.S. soldiers to resist the war in multiple ways eventually
becoming an unreliable fighting force for U.S. imperialism.

Now, it is very clear from all who spoke at the last two
demonstrations, that we have wide areas of agreement. We
all spoke about the need for the movement to get back into
the streets to protest the war in massive demonstrations. We
all spoke about the need for unity. We all spoke about the way
to bring peace and end the war was for the U.S. government
to get out of
Iraq.

The next step is for all our organizations to meet together
and concretely plan how this unity will be carried out.

Bay Area United Against War is willing to host such a meeting,
or participate in such a meeting called by others. Let's
make it happen.

Bring the Troops Home Now!
Carole Seligman, Bay Area United Against War (BAUAW)

---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

ALL OUT IN SUPPORT OF THE LOCAL 2 HOTEL WORKERS!
SOLIDARITY RALLY
Saturday, November 20 at 11 a.m.
Union Square, Downtown San Francisco

---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

1) Commentary: Will the Antiwar Movement Stand Up This Time?
Iraq Watch: From Peace No War Network
November 13, 2004
URL: http://www.PeaceNoWar.net
Fallujah and the Reality of War
By RAHUL MAHAJAN
November 6, 2004
http://www.counterpunch.org/mahajan11062004.html

2) U.S. Troops Set for Final Attack on Falluja Force
THE INSURGENTS
By DEXTER FILKINS and ROBERT F. WORTH
November 13, 2004
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/11/13/international/middleeast/13iraq.html?hp&ex
=1100408400&en=9553e430c442567f&ei=5094&partner=homepage

3) Humanitarian aid barred from Falluja
Red Crescent says 157 families are still in the heart
of Falluja
An Iraqi Red Crescent convoy blocked from entering Falluja
by US forces has asked the United Nations for help.
Sunday 14 November 2004 11:46 AM GMT
http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/443C3B4E-C2D2-4B18-9C5C-7C9B657A8DCF.
htm

4) Falluja Residents Desperate for Food, Water, Aid
By Omar Anwar
FALLUJA, Iraq (Reuters)
Sun Nov 14, 8:43 AM ET
http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=578&e=2&u=/nm/20041114/ts_nm
/iraq_falluja_scene_dc

5) U.S. Troops Hunt Falluja Rebels, Keep Aid Out
By Michael Georgy and Omar Anwar
FALLUJA, Iraq (Reuters)
November 14, 2004
http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=578&e=1&u=/nm/20041114/ts_nm
/iraq_dc

6) Pentagon Envisioning a Costly Internet for War
By TIM WEINER
November 13, 2004
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/11/13/technology/13warnet.html?hp&ex=1100408400&
en=27b47c63b0a8e037&ei=5094&partner=homepage

7) For the First Time Since Vietnam, the Army Prints
a Guide to Fighting Insurgents
By DOUGLAS JEHL and THOM SHANKER
WASHINGTON
November 13, 2004
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/11/13/politics/13army.html?oref=login

8) CRUSADES - NEW & OLD
By Mumia Abu-Jamal
[Col. Writ. 10/23/04]
Copyright 2004

9) IS FASCISM POSSIBLE HERE?
By Mumia Abu-Jamal
[Col. Writ. 10/28/04]
Copyright 2004

10) It's time to take the "No Blood for Oil" slogan to the
auto companies
Rally Sunday, Nov. 21, 12:00 noon-1:30 p.m.
Opening Day - San Francisco Auto Show
SF Moscone Center, 747 Howard

11) 31 U.S. Troops Killed So Far in Fallujah
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
November 14, 2004
Filed at 11:14 a.m. ET

12) Assemblyman Condemns Palestinian Art Show
November 12, 2004
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Filed at 9:31 p.m. ET

---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

1) Commentary: Will the Antiwar Movement Stand Up This Time?
Iraq Watch: From Peace No War Network
November 13, 2004
URL: http://www.PeaceNoWar.net
Fallujah and the Reality of War
By RAHUL MAHAJAN
November 6, 2004
http://www.counterpunch.org/mahajan11062004.html

The assault on Fallujah has started. It is being sold as liberation of the
people of Fallujah; it is being sold as a necessary step to implementing
"democracy" in Iraq. These are lies.

I was in Fallujah during the siege in April, and I want to paint for you a
Word-picture of what such an assault means.

Fallujah is dry and hot; like Southern California, it has been made an
agricultural area only by virtue of extensive irrigation. It has been
known for years as a particularly devout city; people call it the City of
a Thousand Mosques. In the mid-90's, when Saddam wanted his name to be
added to the call to prayer, the imams of Fallujah refused.

U.S. forces bombed the power plant at the beginning of the assault; for
the next several weeks, Fallujah was a blacked-out town, with light
provided by generators only in critical places like mosques and clinics.
The town was placed under siege; the ban on bringing in food, medicine,
and other basic items was broken only when Iraqis en masse challenged the
roadblocks. The atmosphere was one of pervasive fear, from bombing and the
threat of more bombing. Noncombatants and families with sick people, the
elderly, and children were leaving in droves. After initial instances in
which people were prevented from leaving, U.S. forces began allowing
everyone to leave except for what they called "military age males," men
usually between 15 and 60. Keeping noncombatants from leaving a place
under bombardment is a violation of the laws of war. Of course, if you
assume that every military age male is an enemy, there can be no better
sign that you are in the wrong country, and that, in fact, your war is on
the people, not on their oppressors,, not a war of liberation.

The main hospital in Fallujah is across the Euphrates from the bulk of the
town. Right at the beginning, the Americans shut down the main bridge,
cutting off the hospital from the town. Doctors who wanted to treat
patients had to leave the hospital, with only the equipment they could
carry, and set up in makeshift clinics all over the city; the one I stayed
at had been a neighborhood clinic with one room that had four beds, and no
operating theater; doctors refrigerated blood in a soft-drink vending
machine. Another clinic, I,m told, had been an auto repair shop. This
hospital closing (not the only such that I documented in Iraq) also
violates the Geneva Convention.

In Fallujah, you were rarely free of the sound of artillery booming in the
background, punctuated by the smaller, higher-pitched note of the
mujaheddin's hand-held mortars. After even a few minutes of it, you have
to stop paying attention to it and yet, of course, you never quite stop.
Even today, when I hear the roar of thunder, I,m often transported
instantly to April 10 and the dusty streets of Fallujah.

In addition to the artillery and the warplanes dropping 500, 1000, and
2000-pound bombs, and the murderous AC-130 Spectre gunships that can
demolish a whole city block in less than a minute, the Marines had snipers
criss-crossing the whole town. For weeks, Fallujah was a series of
sometimes mutually inaccessible pockets, divided by the no-man's-lands of
sniper fire paths. Snipers fired indiscriminately, usually at whatever
moved. Of 20 people I saw come into the clinic I observed in a few hours,
only five were "military-age males." I saw old women, old men, a child of
10 shot through the head; terminal, the doctors told me, although in
Baghdad they might have been able to save him.

One thing that snipers were very discriminating about every single
ambulance I saw had bullet holes in it. Two I inspected bore clear
evidence of specific, deliberate sniping. Friends of mine who went out to
gather in wounded people were shot at. When we first reported this fact,
we came in for near-universal execration. Many just refused to believe it.
Some asked me how I knew that it wasn't the mujaheddin. Interesting
question. Had, say, Brownsville, Texas, been encircled by the Vietnamese
and bombarded (which, of course, Mr. Bush courageously protected us from
during the Vietnam war era) and Brownsville ambulances been shot up, the
question of whether the residents were shooting at their own ambulances, I
somehow guess, would not have come up. Later, our reports were confirmed
by the Iraqi Ministry of Health and even by the U.S. military.

The best estimates are that roughly 900-1000 people were killed directly,
blown up, burnt, or shot. Of them, my guess, based on news reports and
personal observation, is that 2/3 to were noncombatants.

But the damage goes far beyond that. You can read whenever you like about
the bombing of so-called Zarqawi safe houses in residential areas in
Fallujah, but the reports don't tell you what that means. You read about
precision strikes, and it's true that America's GPS-guided bombs are very
accurate when they,re not malfunctioning, the 80 or 85% of the time that
they work, their targeting radius is 10 meters, i.e., they hit within 10
meters of the target. Even the smallest of them, however, the 500-pound
bomb, has a blast radius of 400 meters; every single bomb shakes the whole
neighborhood, breaking windows and smashing crockery. A town under
bombardment is a town in constant fear.

You read the reports about X killed and Y wounded. And you should remember
those numbers; those numbers are important. But equally important is to
remember that those numbers lie in a war zone, everyone is wounded.

The first assault on Fallujah was a military failure. This time, the
resistance is stronger, better-armed, and better-organized; to "win," the
U.S. military will have to pull out all the stops. Even within horror and
terror, there are degrees, and we and the people of Fallujah ain't seen
nothin, yet. George W. Bush has just claimed a new mandate the world has
been delivered into his hands.

There will be international condemnation, as there was the first time; but
our government won't listen to it; aside from the resistance, all the
people of Fallujah will be able to depend on to try to mitigate the horror
will be us, the antiwar movement. We have a responsibility, that we didn't
meet in April and we didn't meet in August when Najaf was similarly
attacked; will we meet it this time?

Rahul Mahajan is publisher of the weblog Empire Notes, with regularly
updated commentary on U.S. foreign policy, the occupation of Iraq, and the
state of the American Empire. He has been to occupied Iraq twice, and was
in Fallujah during the siege in April. His most recent book is Full
Spectrum Dominance: U.S. Power in Iraq and Beyond. He can be reached at
rahul@empirenotes.org ( mailto:rahul@empirenotes.org )
For more photos and Videos from Iraq, visit:
"Report from Baghdad" July, 2003
http://www.actionla.org/Iraq/IraqReport/intro.html

Peace, No War
War is not the answer, for only love can conquer hate
Not in our Name! And another world is possible!
Tel: (213)403-0131

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WHEN SPIDERS UNITE, THEY CAN TIE DOWN A LION -- Ethiopian Proverb

---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

2) U.S. Troops Set for Final Attack on Falluja Force
THE INSURGENTS
By DEXTER FILKINS and ROBERT F. WORTH
November 13, 2004
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/11/13/international/middleeast/13iraq.html?hp&ex
=1100408400&en=9553e430c442567f&ei=5094&partner=homepage

FALLUJA, Iraq, Nov. 12 - American forces moved into position Friday
for a decisive battle with bands of insurgents, pounding some of their
last strongholds with airstrikes and repelling attempts by some fighters
to shoot their way out through the desert countryside south of the city.

But other fighters, among the most resilient the Americans have
encountered in five days of battle, seemed resigned to making a last
stand in Falluja's southern residential neighborhoods.

"Right now they've got no place to go," said Col. Craig Tucker,
commander of a regimental combat team encompassing several
battalions of American troops. "I think they've come here to die."

Twenty-two American servicemen have been killed and 170 wounded
in Falluja since the invasion began on Monday evening, said Lt. Gen.
John F. Sattler, the top Marine commander in Iraq. Of the Iraqi forces,
5 have been killed and 40 wounded, Gen. Abdul Qader Mohammed
Jassim, an Iraqi commander, said.

An audio recording posted Friday on the Internet and attributed
to Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the Jordanian terrorist who has become
the Americans' enemy No. 1 in Iraq, praised the efforts of the
jihadists in Iraq and said the blood spilled in Falluja "will light
the way to God's victory."

"I call for the heroes of Islam in Falluja to endure just for a short
time," he said, "and victory will come soon. I want you to remember
our Prophet Muhammad when he fought in the past."

In the north, Mosul remained restive on Friday as the government
deployed national guardsmen from outside the area to fill a security
vacuum after hundreds of Iraqi policemen fled Thursday in the face
of a guerrilla uprising.

The police chief of Mosul was fired, another senior Iraqi security
officer was assassinated and the top American commander in the
region said the loyalty and reliability of the city's entire 4,000-
to 5,000-member police force was now suspect.

On Friday morning, Al Jazeera, the Arabic satellite television network,
showed a videotape of a Lebanese-American hostage who had
been kidnapped earlier. Reuters also reported that a Syrian driver
who had been kidnapped in August with two French journalists,
Georges Malbrunot and Christian Chesnot, had turned up in Falluja.
No further details were available.

One prominent member of the Senate Armed Services Committee
said the increasing mayhem raised questions about whether the
United States could win the fight against a wider insurgency,
whatever the outcome in Falluja.

"The insurgency is not abating," the member, Senator Jack Reed,
a Rhode Island Democrat who is a former officer in the 82nd
Airborne Division, said in a telephone interview with reporters
after he visited American forces in Iraq on Friday. "In some respects,
it's becoming more pronounced in many parts of the country - not
all parts of the country, but many parts of the country. It's hard to
determine whether that's the last gasp or continued building
momentum."

On Thursday, insurgents overran at least a half-dozen police
stations in Mosul, set fire to squad cars and made off with weapons.

The crisis in Mosul has raised serious doubts about the ability
of Iraqi security forces to take over policing duties anytime soon
from the more than 140,000 American troops here.

"There is a struggle going on," Brig. Gen. Carter Ham, the
commander charged with controlling the north, said in a telephone
interview from his headquarters in Mosul. "I don't want to kid you
and tell you that every neighborhood is one you can walk down
the middle of," he said. "There are some very dangerous
neighborhoods. It's not over."

The American military said one soldier was killed Thursday
in Mosul.

General Sattler, the top Marine commander in Iraq, declared
that the American military controlled 80 percent of Falluja. But
many remaining insurgents waged intense gun battles and
appeared determined to make a last stand in Shuhada,
a neighborhood on the southern edge of the city.

There are indications that the remaining insurgents are running
low on weapons, supplies and morale, military officials said.
"We feel we've broken their back and spirit," General Sattler said.

Some insurgents are firing at the American military cordon
to the south, in an apparent effort to fight their way out, military
officials said. At the same time, insurgents in rural areas south
of Falluja have begun firing more rockets on the American
positions ringing the city.

Iraqi military forces have been going through houses in the city's
northern half, taking prisoners and seizing weapons caches. "We
are doing it very methodically, block by block, going into each
room," said Lt. Col. Rod Symons, the senior advisor to the Third
Brigade of the Iraqi Armed Forces. In one building, Iraqi troops
discovered a box Thursday containing insurgent DVD's and pamphlets,
along with the passport, driver's license and Defense Department
identification card of Cpl. Wassef Ali Hassoun, a Lebanese-American
Marine believed to have been kidnapped in June who later surfaced
in Lebanon. Elsewhere in the building were a new Marine uniform
without name tags and four large sacks of gunpowder and wire.
In the building's basement was a room with what appeared to
be blood on the walls and floor, officials said.

In at least one area of central Falluja, insurgents were already
infiltrating neighborhoods that they had just been rousted from,
forcing commanders to send troops to areas behind the main
battle lines.

About 300 fighters surrendered to Iraqi forces on Friday in
a mosque, General Jassim said at a news conference.

Elsewhere, a Blackhawk helicopter crashed after being struck
by antiaircraft fire near Taji, north of Baghdad, military officials
said. The three crew members were wounded but the helicopter
was recovered. It was the third American helicopter forced down
this week; two others crash-landed Thursday after being fired
on near Falluja.

In southern Baghdad, an American soldier was killed and three
others wounded Friday in an ambush.

A wave of coordinated attacks across Baghdad and the area to the
west appears to be a loosely organized counteroffensive to the
invasion of Falluja. American commanders say insurgent leaders
are likely to have fled Falluja before the invasion and are now
at work elsewhere.

In Baghdad, American and Iraqi forces arrested Sheik Mahdi al-
Sumaydai, a prominent fundamentalist Sunni cleric, and more
than a dozen of his followers after finding weapons in his sheik's
mosque, officials said. Mr. Sumaydai was arrested by the Americans
last winter and was released several months ago. His mosque is the
largest religious sanctuary in the capital for devotees of the Salafiya
branch of Sunni Islam, which Mr. Zarqawi and Osama bin Laden
practice.

A cleric representing Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani gave a lukewarm
condemnation of the invasion of Falluja during Friday Prayer in Karbala.
The ayatollah advocates following "a peaceful means of settling the
security situation and restoring peace in the restive cities," said the
cleric, Ahmed al-Safi.

It was the first statement attributed to Ayatollah Sistani on the
fighting in Falluja. Some Sunni leaders, including Mr. Sumaydai,
have criticized the ayatollah in recent days for not taking a stand
on Falluja.


Though the streets were quieter in Mosul than they had been on
Thursday, insurgents carried out sporadic attacks against Iraqi and
American forces there.

Gunmen raided the home of Brig. Gen. Mowaffak Daham, the head
of the anticrime task force, and led him, his brother-in-law and
a son out onto the lawn, said Salim al-Samedi, 29, a neighbor. The
insurgents stood them up against a wall and shot them dead while
chanting "God is great!" and then set fire to the house.

A fire engine rushed to the scene, and the gunmen shot dead two
of the fire fighters, Mr. Samedi said.

The governor of Ninevah Province had his home burned down on
Thursday, said Yasir Abdul-Razzaq, a relative, though the governor
was still safe in the confines of the government center, which is
protected by American armor and Iraqi troops.

The governor's office fired Mosul's police chief, Brig. Gen.
Muhammad Kheiri Barhawi. The police chief of Samarra, Taleb
Shamel, told The Associated Press that he had also been fired.

Iraqi officials said national guardsmen from near the Syrian border
were being sent to Mosul to help put down the uprising. The brigades
are made up of Kurdish militiamen. Kurds, Christians and Sunni
Arabs are the largest population groups in Mosul, and it was unclear
how the Sunni Arabs, who are leading the attacks, will take to the
heavy presence of Kurdish soldiers.

Reporting for this article was contributed by Eric Schmitt from
Washington; Iraqi employees of The New York Times from
Baghdad, Mosul and Karbala; and James Glanz and Edward Wong
from Baghdad.

Copyright 2004 The New York Times

---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

3) Humanitarian aid barred from Falluja
Red Crescent says 157 families are still in the heart
of Falluja
An Iraqi Red Crescent convoy blocked from entering Falluja
by US forces has asked the United Nations for help.
Sunday 14 November 2004 11:46 AM GMT
http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/443C3B4E-C2D2-4B18-9C5C-7C9B657A8DCF.
htm


US troops have directed the convoy, carrying emergency food, water
and medical supplies into the Falluja hospital on the outskirts of the
town, away from the reach of local citizens.



"They will not be allowed to cross the bridge today," Capt. Adam
Collier told Reuters at Falluja hospital, where the convoy is waiting
to cross the Euphrates River into the main part of the embattled
Iraqi city. He cited security reasons.



Abu Fahd, a member of the relief convoy, told Aljazeera that
"the relief convoy wants to enter Falluja town for humanitarian
purposes only, to save women, children and elderly people.



"I hope the United Nations will hear our appeals," he said.



"We are now in Falluja hospital, outside the city. There is no
one in the hospital except the medical team, doing nothing."



But the US military said it saw no need for the Iraqi Red
Crescent to deliver aid to people inside Falluja and said
it did not think any Iraqi civilians were trapped inside the city.



'Aid not needed'



"There is no need to bring [Red Crescent] supplies in because
we have supplies of our own for the people," said US marine
Colonel Mike Shupp.



The relief convoy aims to help
civilians stuck in Falluja town

"Now that the bridge (into Falluja) is open I will bring out
casualties and all aid work can be done here (at Falluja's
hospital)," he added.



He said he had not heard of any Iraqi civilians being trapped
inside the city and did not think that was the case.



But aid workers say there are still hundreds of families left in
the city, which has been pummelled by sustained aerial
bombardment and artillery fire in recent days.



"We know of at least 157 families inside Falluja who need our
help," said Firdus al-Ubadi of the Iraqi Red Crescent.



No medicines



The Iraqi Red Crescent sent seven trucks and ambulances to
Falluja on Saturday, hoping to get food, blankets, water
purification tablets and medicine to hundreds of families
trapped inside the city during the past six days of fighting.



"There is no need to bring [Red Crescent] supplies in because
we have supplies of our own for the people"

Colonel Mike Shupp,
US marine

"None of the injured residents are being allowed to come to the
hospital, while those outside are not allowed to go into the town,"
Abu Fahd said.



"The town is suffering from cuts in power and water supplies.
There are no medicines or ambulances either.



"The injured and the dead are now on the streets. Many families
want to get out of their houses, but they have no alternative
shelters to go into," he said.



"The US forces have prevented us from entering the town
claiming it is not safe. US forces have said they control 80%
of the town."



Relief team



"I have asked them to allow the relief team into the areas they
control, to offer humanitarian aid for women, children and
the elderly, and transfer the injured to the hospital, but they
have refused," Abu Fahd said.

Baghdad hospitals received
wounded refugee children



The Red Crescent sent a convoy of essential goods along with
53 volunteers and three doctors from Baghdad to attend to
people in Falluja.



It believes that 157 families are still in the heart of Falluja, but
it is concerned about the plight of tens of thousands of people
living in refugee camps and villages dotted outside.




"They are dying of starvation and lack of water, especially the
children," Red Crescent spokeswoman Firdus al-Ubadi said.



"If there is no solution to this crisis it will expand to other cities
and other parts of Iraq and there will be a great disaster here."



Earlier, the Red Crescent society despatched a convoy of four
relief trucks and an ambulance to Amiriyat al-Falluja and
a tourist village in Habbaniya, where an additional 1500
refugees are camped.

Aljazeera

---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

4) Falluja Residents Desperate for Food, Water, Aid
By Omar Anwar
FALLUJA, Iraq (Reuters)
Sun Nov 14, 8:43 AM ET
http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=578&e=2&u=/nm/20041114/ts_nm
/iraq_falluja_scene_dc

FALLUJA, Iraq (Reuters) - No food. No water. No help. As fierce
fighting casts a pall of smoke over the rubble-strewn Iraqi city
of Falluja, thousands of Iraqi families remain cut off from
desperately needed supplies.

Seven Red Crescent trucks and ambulances have reached the
main hospital on the western outskirts, but it is still too
dangerous for them to cross the Euphrates river to bring help
to locals, including hundreds of children, cut off for six days.

"Our situation is very hard," said one resident contacted by
telephone in the central Hay al-Dubat neighborhood on Sunday.

"We don't have food or water. My seven children all have severe
diarrhea. One of my sons was wounded by shrapnel last night
and he's bleeding, but I can't do anything to help him."

The man, who gave his name only as Abu Mustafa, said he had
seen U.S. troops and Iraqi national guards in his street as
explosions rang out. "There were bodies lying in the street."

Abu Mustafa said he knew of six families nearby in a similar
plight, but then broke down in tears.

"We are still fasting, though it is the Eid (end of Ramadan feast)
today. Allahu akbar, Allahu akbar (God is great)."

Aid groups describe the situation in Falluja, where U.S. and Iraqi
troops launched an full-scale military offensive last Monday to
crush insurgents, as a humanitarian disaster.

Up to half Falluja's 300,000 people fled during daily air strikes
in the countdown to the assault, but thousands remain trapped
as fighting rages around them.

There are no statistics on the number of civilians killed or
wounded in the fighting, only personal accounts of pain, hunger
and fear from those trapped in the city.

Some locals say the stench of decomposing bodies fills the air.
Others tell of children dying because it was too dangerous to get
them to help. One family buried their 9-year-old boy in the garden
after he bled to death over several hours from a stomach wound.

BODIES IN THE STREET

Thousands of refugees are living in makeshift accommodation
at camps outside the city, or with relatives.

"It was terrible. We had no water or electricity. I even saw dead
bodies lying in the street and a tank rolled over them," said Mohammed
Ali Shalal, a 65-year-old truck driver who fled on Friday and is
sheltering with a nephew in nearby Amriya, where 20 people were
crammed into a two-bedroom apartment.

"We ate dry bread and drank dirty water. I can't believe I'm safe
and speaking to you now."

Shalal said troops using loudspeakers told residents to go to
a local mosque, where they were interrogated.

"They let the old people go and detained the young," he said.

Red Crescent secretary-general Jamal al-Karbouli said he was
still waiting for U.S. permission to enter Falluja proper.

"If we have any hope of entering, we will wait here, even for
another night if necessary," he said. "Otherwise we will return
to Amriyat al-Falluja and distribute the goods there."

At least 10,000 civilians from Falluja have been sheltering in
nearby towns such as Amriya and Habbaniya since before the
offensive.

Copyright (c) 2004 Reuters

---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

5) U.S. Troops Hunt Falluja Rebels, Keep Aid Out
By Michael Georgy and Omar Anwar
FALLUJA, Iraq (Reuters)
November 14, 2004
http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=578&e=1&u=/nm/20041114/ts_nm
/iraq_dc

FALLUJA, Iraq (Reuters) - U.S. and Iraqi forces hunted rebels in
the devastated Iraqi city of Falluja on Sunday as fighting subsided
after a ferocious six-day-old assault.

No help has reached civilians since the offensive began on Monday
and U.S. forces kept an Iraqi Red Crescent aid convoy of seven trucks
and ambulances waiting at the main hospital near a bridge over the
Euphrates River on the edge of Falluja.

U.S. Marines swept through a last rebel redoubt in a southern quarter
of the city that they see as a bastion for foreign fighters loyal to al
Qaeda ally Abu Musab al-Zarqawi.

"These are pretty diehard. These people down there are not sniping
or firing, but waiting in their defenses for the Marines coming to
their buildings. That's when they open fire," Marine Colonel Mike
Shupp told Reuters at the hospital.

A Reuters correspondent who drove through the city saw utter
destruction. Bodies lay in the streets. Homes were smashed,
mosques ruined, and power and telephone lines hung uselessly.

Shupp said the Red Crescent did not need to deliver aid to civilians
in Falluja and questioned whether there were any.

"There is no need to bring supplies in because we have supplies of
our own for the people. Now that the bridge is open, I will bring
out casualties and all aid work can be done here."

Shupp said he had not heard of any Iraqi civilians being trapped
inside the city and did not think that was the case.

"We will wait for permission and we will stay here tonight," Red
Crescent convoy leader Jamal al-Karbouli told Reuters.

Interim Prime Minister Iyad Allawi, who has vowed to crush a raging
insurgency before elections in January, said on Saturday there had
been no civilian casualties in Falluja.

His assertion contradicted accounts from residents inside the city,
where intense violence has halted medical services and made any
independent assessment impossible since Monday.

"Our situation is very hard," said one resident contacted by telephone
in the central Hay al-Dubat neighborhood. "We don't have food or
water. My seven children all have severe diarrhea.

"One of my sons was wounded by shrapnel last night and he's
bleeding, but I can't do anything to help him."

"BODIES IN STREET"

The man, who gave his name only as Abu Mustafa, said he had
seen U.S. troops and Iraqi national guards in his street as
explosions rang out. "There were bodies lying in the street."

Abu Mustafa said he knew of six families nearby in a similar plight,
before breaking down in tears. "We are still fasting, though it is the
Eid (end of Ramadan feast) today. Allahu akbar, Allahu akbar
(God is great)," he sobbed.

It is unclear how many of Falluja's 300,000 people remain, but
about half are thought to have fled the fighting.

Tank and artillery fire shook Falluja for much of the day but by
nightfall the fighting had died away.

Shupp said U.S. and Iraqi forces controlled the Sunni Muslim city
and were going house to house in search of insurgents.

A senior Iraqi official said more than 1,000 guerrillas had been
killed in the offensive. The U.S. military says at least 22 American
and five Iraqi troops have also died.

The Falluja offensive has fueled violence across Iraq ( news -web
sites )'s Sunni Muslim heartland, especially in the northern city of
Mosul, where an uprising has left gunmen roaming some districts.

Insurgents overran a police station in Mosul on Sunday and U.S.
troops, backed by Iraqi security forces, were battling to retake it
from them, according to a U.S. military spokesman.

The U.S. commander in the north, Brigadier General Carter Ham,
earlier told Reuters all nine Mosul police stations overrun and
looted last week were back in U.S. or Iraqi forces' hands.

In the refinery city of Baiji, U.S. helicopters fired missiles at
insurgents, witnesses said. U.S. forces backed by tanks moved
into the city center after clashing with rebels. A local doctor said
seven people had been wounded in the fighting.

Insurgents mortared a police station in Muqdadiya, northeast of
Baghdad, killing one policeman, on Sunday, police said.

On Saturday evening, rebels attacked a military base outside
Baghdad with "indirect fire," killing one U.S. soldier and wounding
three others, the U.S. military said. (Additional reporting by Luke
Baker and Lin Noueihed in Baghdad, Maher al-Thanoon in Mosul,
Sabah al-Bazee in Baiji)

Copyright (c) 2004 Reuters

---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

6) Pentagon Envisioning a Costly Internet for War
By TIM WEINER
November 13, 2004
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/11/13/technology/13warnet.html?hp&ex=1100408400&
en=27b47c63b0a8e037&ei=5094&partner=homepage


The Pentagon is building its own Internet, the military's world wide
web for the wars of the future.

The goal is to give all American commanders and troops a moving
picture of all foreign enemies and threats - "a God's-eye view" of battle.

This "Internet in the sky," Peter Teets, under secretary of the Air
Force, told Congress, would allow "marines in a Humvee, in a faraway l
and, in the middle of a rainstorm, to open up their laptops, request
imagery" from a spy satellite, and "get it downloaded within seconds."

The Pentagon calls the secure network the Global Information Grid,
or GIG. Conceived six years ago, its first connections were laid six
weeks ago. It may take two decades and hundreds of billions of
dollars to build the new war net and its components.

Skeptics say the costs are staggering and the technological
hurdles huge.

Vint Cerf, one of the fathers of the Internet and a Pentagon consultant
on the war net, said he wondered if the military's dream was realistic.
"I want to make sure what we realize is vision and not hallucination,"
Mr. Cerf said.

"This is sort of like Star Wars, where the policy was, 'Let's go out
and build this system,' and technology lagged far behind,'' he said.
"There's nothing wrong with having ambitious goals. You just need
to temper them with physics and reality."

Advocates say networked computers will be the most powerful
weapon in the American arsenal. Fusing weapons, secret intelligence
and soldiers in a global network - what they call net-centric warfare -
will, they say, change the military in the way the Internet has changed
business and culture.

"Possibly the single most transforming thing in our force,'' Defense
Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld has said, "will not be a weapons system,
but a set of interconnections."

The American military, built to fight nations and armies, now faces
stateless enemies without jets, tanks, ships or central headquarters.
Sending secret intelligence and stratagems instantly to soldiers in
battle would, in theory, make the military a faster, fiercer force against
a faceless foe.

Robert J. Stevens, chief executive of the Lockheed Martin Corporation ,
the nation's biggest military contractor, said he envisioned a "highly
secure Internet in which military and intelligence activities are fused,"
shaping 21st-century warfare in the way that nuclear weapons shaped
the cold war.

Every member of the military would have "a picture of the battle space,
a God's-eye view," he said. "And that's real power."

Pentagon traditionalists, however, ask if net-centric warfare is nothing
more than an expensive fad. They point to the street fighting in Falluja
and Baghdad, saying firepower and armor still mean more than fiber
optic cables and wireless connections.

But the biggest challenge in building a war net may be the military
bureaucracy. For decades, the Army, Navy, Air Force and Marines
have built their own weapons and traditions. A network, advocates
say, would cut through those old ways.

The ideals of this new warfare are driving many of the Pentagon's
spending plans for the next 10 to 15 years. Some costs are secret,
but billions have already been spent.

Providing the connections to run the war net will cost at least $24
billion over the next five years - more than the cost, in today's dollars,
of the Manhattan Project to build the atomic bomb. Beyond that,
encrypting data will be a $5 billion project.

Hundreds of thousands of new radios are likely to cost $25 billion.
Satellite systems for intelligence, surveillance, reconnaissance and
communications will be tens of billions more. The Army's program for
a war net alone has a $120 billion price tag.

Over all, Pentagon documents suggest, $200 billion or more may go
for the war net's hardware and software in the next decade or so.
"The question is one of cost and technology," said John Hamre,
a former deputy secretary of defense, now president of the Center
for Strategic and International Studies in Washington.

"We want to know all things at all times everywhere in the world?
Fine," Mr. Hamre said. "Do we know what this staring, all-seeing
eye is that we're going to put in space is? Hell, no."

The military wants to know "everything of interest to us, all the
time," in the words of Steven A. Cambone, the under secretary
of defense for intelligence. He has told Congress that military
intelligence - including secret satellite surveillance covering
most of the earth - will be posted on the war net and shared
with troops.

John Garing, strategic planning director at the Defense Information
Security Agency, now starting to build the war net, said: "The
essence of net-centric warfare is our ability to deploy a war-
fighting force anywhere, anytime. Information technology is
the key to that."

Military contractors - and information-technology creators not
usually associated with weapons systems - formed a consortium
to develop the war net on Sept. 28. The group includes an A-list
of military contractors and technology powerhouses: Boeing ;
Cisco Systems ; Factiva, a joint venture of Dow Jones and Reuters;
General Dynamics; Hewlett-Packard ;Honeywell ;I.B.M. ; Lockheed
Martin; Microsoft ; Northrop Grumman; Oracle ;Raytheon ; and
Sun Microsystems . They are working to weave weapons,
intelligence and communications into a seamless web.

The Pentagon has tried this twice before.

Its Worldwide Military Command and Control System, built
in the 1960's, often failed in crises. A $25 billion successor,
Milstar, was completed in 2003 after two decades of work.
Pentagon officials say it is already outdated: more switchboard
than server, more dial-up than broadband, it cannot support
21st-century technology.

The Pentagon's scientists and engineers, starting four decades
ago, invented the systems that became the Internet. Throughout
the cold war, their computer power ran far ahead of the rest of
the world.

Then the world eclipsed them. The nation's military and
intelligence services started falling behind when the Internet
exploded onto the commercial scene a decade ago. The war
net is "an attempt to catch up," Mr. Cerf said.

It has been slowly evolving for at least six years. In 1999,
Pentagon officials told Congress that "this monumental task
will span a quarter-century or more." This year, the vision
gained focus, and Pentagon officials started explaining it in
some detail to Congress.

Its scope was described in July by the Government Accountability
Office, the watchdog agency for Congress.

Many new multibillion-dollar weapons and satellites are "critically
dependent on the future network," the agency reported. "Despite
enormous challenges and risks - many of which have not been
successfully overcome in smaller-scale efforts" like missile defense,
"the Pentagon is depending on the GIG to enable a fundamental
transformation in the way military operations are conducted."

According to Art Cebrowski, director of the Pentagon's Office
of Force Transformation, "What we are really talking about is
a new theory of war."

Linton Wells II, the chief information officer at the Defense
Department, said net-centric principles were becoming "the
center of gravity" for war planners.

"The tenets are broadly accepted throughout the Defense
Department," said Mr. Wells, who directs the Office of Networks
and Information Integration. "Senior leadership can articulate
them. We still have a way to go in terms of why we should spend
X billion dollars on a certain program. In the fight between widgets
and digits, widgets tend to win."

He said $24 billion would be spent in the next five years to build
new war net connections. "No doubt these are expensive," Mr. Wells
said. "Technology developments always are."

Advocates acknowledge that weaving American military and intelligence
services into a unified system is a huge challenge.

The military is filled with "tribal representatives behind tribal
workstations interpreting tribal hieroglyphics," in the words of Gen.
John Jumper, the Air Force chief of staff. "What if the machines talked
to each other?" he asked.

That is the vision of the new web: war machines with a common
language for all military forces, instantly emitting encyclopedias of
lethal information against all enemies.

To realize this vision, the military must solve a persistent problem. It
all boils down to bandwidth.

Bandwidth measures how much data can flow between electronic
devices. Too little for civilians means a Web page takes forever
to load. Too little for soldiers means the war net will not work.

The bandwidth requirements seem bottomless. The military will
need 40 or 50 times what it used at the height of the Iraq war
last year, a Rand Corporation study estimates - enough to give
front-line soldiers bandwidth equal to downloading three feature-
length movies a second.

The Congressional Research Service said the Army, despite plans
to spend $20 billion on the problem, may wind up with a tenth of
the bandwidth it needs. The Army, in its "lessons learned" report
from Iraq, published in May, said "there will probably never be
enough resources to establish a complete and functioning network of
communications, sensors, and systems everywhere in the world."

The bottleneck is already great. In Iraq, front-line commanders
and troops fight frequent software freezes. "To make net-centric
warfare a reality," said Tony Montemarano, the Defense Information
Security Agency's bandwidth expansion chief, "we will have to
precipitously enhance bandwidth."

The military must also change its own culture.

For decades, the Army, Navy, Air Force and Marines have built
separate weapons, radios, frequencies and traditions. They guard
their "rice bowls" - their turf - from rival services.

But Mr. Rumsfeld's vision depends on interoperability: warfare
using all four services in joint operations.

In a net-centric world, "you would not have a Army, Navy, Air Force
and Marines," but a unified force, said William Owens, a former
vice chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.

For the Pentagon's visionaries, Mr. Montemarano said, "the single
biggest obstacle is a cultural one.''

"Breaking these rice bowls - that's a huge job."

Copyright 2004 The New York Times Company

---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

7) For the First Time Since Vietnam, the Army Prints
a Guide to Fighting Insurgents
By DOUGLAS JEHL and THOM SHANKER
WASHINGTON
November 13, 2004
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/11/13/politics/13army.html?oref=login


WASHINGTON, Nov. 12 - For the first time in decades, the Army
has issued a field guide to counterinsurgency warfare, an
acknowledgment that the kind of fighting under way in Iraq
may become more common in the years ahead.

The Army field manual on counterinsurgency operations is the
first since the early Vietnam era, and the first ever intended for
the kind of regular Army units now embroiled in battles in Iraq,
as opposed to the Special Operations forces who have taken the
lead in previous counterinsurgencies.

Under orders issued in February, the manual was prepared on
an accelerated basis by the Combined Arms Center in Fort
Leavenworth, Kan., and was distributed to all officers, in Iraq
and elsewhere, beginning last month. An introduction says the
"aftermath of instability'' in Iraq that followed the toppling of
Saddam Hussein's regime underscored the need for an updated
Army guide to counterinsurgency warfare.

Until now, formal American military doctrine for fighting
insurgencies has been so limited that many Marines were
deployed to Iraq with copies of the Marine Corps' "Small Wars
Manual,'' issued in 1940. The most recent Army guides on the
subject, written principally for Special Operations forces, were
prepared in 1963 and 1965, in the early stages of the Vietnam
War. Like the Army, the Marine Corps is also updating its manual.

The new Army guide contains instructions on such matters as
searching a family car and setting up a hasty checkpoint. Other
passages address the role played by "transnational insurgents,''
like the foreign fighters in Iraq, and emphasize the role of
intelligence, rather than Vietnam-era search and destroy
missions, in finding insurgents.

The guide also includes a stark warning about the dangers
of prolonged counterinsurgency operations, saying that the
longer American forces take the lead in such efforts, the greater
the resentment they breed among the host-country population.

"A long-term U.S. combat role may undermine the legitimacy of
the H.N. government and risks converting the conflict into a U.S.-
only war," the manual says, using an abbreviation for host nation.
"That combat role can also further alienate cultures that are hostile
to the U.S."

In some ways, military officials said, the guide just reflects tactics,
techniques and procedures that troops in Iraq and Afghanistan
already use, such as armoring vehicles against improvised explosives.

But for a hierarchical organization like the Army, the distribution
of the guide is a sign of the importance being attached to the issue.

Army officers who have recently returned from yearlong duty in Iraq
applauded the doctrine, but said its methods were nothing new to
field commanders, who have been employing and refining such tactics
for months. The guide's distribution in October came nearly 18 months
after the Iraq insurgency began in May 2003, following President Bush's
declaration of an end to major combat operations. Army officers have
acknowledged that the Army was ill-prepared to contend with the
new environment.

"The important point here is that the Army has again, a bit late,
recognized the importance of counterinsurgency, and is working
to improve its capability to fight and win low-intensity conflicts,"
said an Army officer who recently returned from Iraq and demanded
anonymity because of the sensitive nature of the issue.

The document is unclassified, but the Army has limited its distribution
to Defense Department personnel, "to maintain operations security,"
the document says. A copy of the document, dated October 2004,
was posted Thursday on a Web site run by the Federation of American
Scientists.

Officially, the document is a "field manual interim,'' a new designation
that allows the Army to accelerate its normal schedule for preparing
doctrine. The guide's principal author, Lt. Col. Jan Horvath of the Army,
said in a telephone interview that it was completed in just five months;
the Army usually insists on developing new doctrine over a period of
three years.

"The stunning victory over Saddam Hussein's army in 2003 validated
U.S. conventional force T.T.P.," the document says, using an
abbreviation for tactics, techniques and procedures. "But the
ensuing aftermath of instability has caused review of lessons
from the Army's historical experience and those of the other
services and multinational partners."

According to the field manual, known as F.M.I. 3-07.22, the impetus
for its creation "came from the Iraq insurgency and the realization that
engagements in the Global War on Terrorism (G.W.O.T.) would likely use
counterinsurgency T.T.P.'s." It says its purpose is to review "what we
know about counterinsurgency" and to explain "the fundamentals of
military operations in counterinsurgency environment."

Even before the document was published, military officers said that
the Army's main training centers at Fort Polk, La., and Fort Irwin, Calif.,
had begun to consider lessons and comments from soldiers engaged
in the Iraq counterinsurgency.

One purpose for the manual, Colonel Horvath said, was to update
archaic language and concepts. The "Small Wars Manual," which
many Marines carried to Iraq, includes sections on the "management
of animals'' like mules, and assertions like a warning that mixed-race
societies are "always difficult to govern, if not ungovernable, owing
to the absence of a fixed character.''

The Army did issue a manual in 1990, F.M. 3-20, on the subject
of military operations in low-intensity conflict, and that document
included a section on counterinsurgency. But Colonel Horvath said
that his commanders, including Lt. Gen. William Wallace, a top Army
commander during the invasion of Iraq who now heads the Combined
Arms Center, had found it to be inadequate.

Senior Army officials said that events on the ground in Iraq and in
Afghanistan made it clear months ago that the service had to revamp
its doctrine for fighting insurgents.

"We needed to update the counterinsurgency doctrine," General Wallace
said in an interview in late summer, as the document's authors were
putting on the finishing touches. "That hadn't been looked at since
the post-Vietnam era."

General Wallace, who commanded the Army's V Corps during the Iraqi
war, said that Army authors worked closely with the Marine Corps and
with the British military, which has extensive counterinsurgency
experience in places like Northern Ireland. But General Wallace
cautioned that successful counterinsurgencies required calibrating
the right degree of force with economic development and political
institutions.

"We've got to strike the right balance," General Wallace said. "Security
has to be there for the economy and government to work. But having
an economy and government is essential for security."

Eric Schmitt contributed reporting for this article.

Copyright 2004 The New York Times

---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

8) CRUSADES - NEW & OLD
By Mumia Abu-Jamal
[Col. Writ. 10/23/04]
Copyright 2004

Shortly after 9-11, US President, George W. Bush,
initially announced the beginning of a "crusade" against
the forces that unleashed September 11th. Under
criticism from his advisers, who said that the term
evoked outrage in much of the Arab world, he relented,
and the term was heard no more.

While the word "crusade" may no longer be used in
presidential speech, there can really be little doubt
that it is precisely the concept of "crusade" that
actuates many of the actions of the US government
vis-à-vis the countries of the Middle East. Bush
has spoken often of "remaking the face of the
region."

There is a reason why Arab countries and
communities reacted with outrage and horror at
the mere mention of the crusades; Arabs and
Europeans view that past differently, because
their respective cultures were in conflict then.
The Europeans saw the Crusades as a noble
assignment from the Popes to "liberate" Jerusalem
from the hands of the "infidels", the Muslim Arabs
and Moors. The Arabs saw the era as one of
unrelenting bloodshed and cruelty at the hands
of the Christians, and saw the dark days of
European colonialism as an echo of that
earlier period.

For many Americans, the notion of
"crusades", while not as loaded as either,
evokes bright, shiny images of knights with
crosses on their shields, defending the poor
and the weak.

Behind the various images of the crusades,
however, lies its awful and bloody history, which
British historian Edward Gibbon, in his classic
The History of the Decline and Fall of the
Roman Empire [Abridged], does not hesitate
to relate. He is not one who recites the
glories of these mass military campaigns.
It, "...[Appear[s] to me," Gibbons writes,
"that these 200 years of 'holy wars', have
checked rather than forwarded the maturity
of Europe" (691). Gibbons writes:

The lives and labours of millions, which
were buried in the East, would have
been more profitably employed in the
improvement of their native country:
the accumulated stock of industry and
wealth would have overflowed in
navigation and trade; and the Latins
would have been enriched and
enlightened by a pure and friendly
correspondence with the climates
of the East. [691]

The Crusades were not absolutely evil,
he argues, in that they did away with another
evil: the crusades unleashed an untold number
of Europeans, who were tied to the soil as
serfs. These people were thrown into the
teeming armies of the crusades, and the
costs of such ventures "dissipated" the
estates of the barons, allowing the poor
to agitate for some semblance of freedom,
and some social standing free of the
rapacious nobility.

Gibbons reminds us that wars begin
for many, various reasons; yet few of us
can see their end. Surely, the nobles of
church and state, who alone bore the stamp
of "citizen" or "men," before the 200 years of
war, could not foresee their dissipation, and
loss of power and prestige afterwards. They
saw only the promise of vast wealth, and the
misty inheritances of martial glory.

Yet, as ever, there are lessons in history.

"War," the saying goes, "is the sport of kings."
It is also, often, an engine of societal change,
that transforms the nations that wage war, as
often as the nations that are warred against.
The first crusades weakened, rather than
strengthened Europe, but this was lost to
those ruling and wealthy classes, who could
not see past their own avarice.

We are told that these wars too, will, in
the crippled words of Bush, "last for
generations."

None of us can see the beginning of an
end. But, if history teaches us anything, it
is that change is coming.

It will change them; but assuredly, it will
change us, as well.

Copyright 2004 Mumia Abu-Jamal

---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

9) IS FASCISM POSSIBLE HERE?
By Mumia Abu-Jamal
[Col. Writ. 10/28/04]
Copyright 2004

Fascism.

The very word evokes dark, menacing images of troops,
marching in lockstep, in support of a terrible, malevolent
ideology.

In a word, it suggests the followers of Mussolini in Italy,
or Hitler in Germany.

To most of us, its very mention suggests its foreign
nature; its Otherness.

Therein lies its danger. For, because it is seen as a
foreign ideology, the inevitable idea arises: "It can't
happen here."

Those who say this, either don't know, or don't want
to know, American history. They prefer the safe myths,
to the ugly truths of how this country came to be what it
is.

What is fascism? In short, it is the merger of state
and corporate interests.

What is totalitarianism? On April 23rd, 1976, the U.S.
Congress issued its Final Select Committee report,
which charged:

We have seen segments of our Government adopt
tactics unworthy of a democracy and occasionally
reminiscent of the tactics of totalitarian regimes.
... [T]he chief investigative branch of the federal
government [FBI], which was charged by law
with investigating crimes and preventing criminal
conduct, itself engaged in lawless tactics and
*responded to deep-seated social problems by
fomenting violence and unrest.* [From Dr. Huey
P. Newton, *War Against the Panthers: A Study
of Repression in America* [Ph.D. Dissertation
(New York: Harlem River Press, 1996), p. 110]

Six months earlier, then-Sen. Walter Mondale (D-Minn.)
would make similar comments as he opened hearings
into the COINTELPRO revelations. On Nov. 19, 1975,
he stated:

.... Yesterday, this committee heard some of the
most disturbing testimony that can be imagined in
a free society. We heard evidence that for
decades the institutions designed to enforce the
laws and Constitution of our country have been
engaging in conduct that violates the law and
the Constitution. We heard that the FBI, which is
part of the Department of Justice, took justice
into its own hands by seeking to punish those
with unpopular ideas. We learned that the chief
law enforcement agency in the federal Government
decided that it did not need laws to investigate
and suppress the peaceful and constitutional
activities of those whom it disapproved.

Sen. Mondale added, on the floor of the Senate:

We heard testimony that the FBI, to protect the
country against those it believed had totalitarian
political views, employed the tactics of
totalitarian societies against American citizens.
We heard that the FBI attempted to destroy
one of our greatest leaders in the field of civil
rights [here, he refers to Rev. Dr. Martin
Luther King, Jr.], and then replace him with
someone of the FBI's choosing. [From: U.S.
Senate, *Hearings Before the Select Committee
to Study Governmental Operations With Respect
to Intelligence Activities:* [ (Vol.6)-F.B.I.
(Wash., DC: U.S. Gov't Printing Office, 1976),
p. 61.]

The state waged war against its own alleged
'citizens', with impunity.

But now, years after these hearings, thanks to the
cleverly-named U.S. PATRIOT Act, what was illegal
during the COINTELPRO era, is legal today. People
who have opposed the Iraq War, or other actions of the
Bush Regime, have been beaten, pepper-sprayed,
framed, jailed, and tortured, in Los Angeles, New York
City, Philadelphia, and beyond -- for following their
alleged 'rights' under the 1st Amendment. They have
been caged, and corralled into so-called 'Free Speech
Zones!' Which almost literally begs the question: If
cages are 'free speech zones', what do you call the
huge tracts of land and air that are outside these
cages? Non-free-speech zones? And virtually
every judge who has been asked to protect the
people's rights to protest and assemble, over the
cop's 'right' to cage and repress, has gone the
cops way.

Fascism -- the merger of state and corporate
power -- has made the struggle of workers for an
8-hour day, for the right to unionize, for vacation
days, for collective bargaining, one stained with the
blood of thousands of martyrs, martyrs for labor,
like many of the members of the Industrial Workers
of the World (IWW), known as the Wobblies. They
were beaten, thrown off trains, jailed by the dozens,
framed, and slain, for defending worker's rights.

Fascism is more than a funny-sounding word; it
is dyed deep into the fabric of American life; and
creeps forward today, under cover of 'Law.'

[*Sources*: Newton, H.P., *WATP*.; Donner,
Frank. *The Age of Surveillance: The Aims and
Methods of America's Political Intelligence System*.
(NY: Vintage, 1981); McGuckin, Henry E.,
(Memoirs of a WOBBLY) (Chi.: Kerr, 1987).]

Copyright 2004 Mumia Abu-Jamal

---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

10) It's time to take the "No Blood for Oil" slogan to the
auto companies
Rally Sunday, Nov. 21, 12:00 noon-1:30 p.m.
Opening Day - San Francisco Auto Show
SF Moscone Center, 747 Howard

Dear Friends:

One of the key ways to break the incentives for war and empire
is to break America's addiction to oil.

It's time to take the "No Blood for Oil" slogan to the auto companies
and demand that they act now to dramatically reduce our oil
dependence so that we aren't having to send US troops to Iraq,
or West Africa, or Colombia.

On Sunday, Nov 21, there will be a rally at the opening day of the
SF Auto Show. A call to action is below.

Please mark your calendars and please spread far and wide.
Thanks!

Peace

Jason Mark
Clean Car Campaigner
Global Exchange

Break America's Addiction to Oil!
Jumpstart Ford and Declare Energy Independence!

Rally at Opening Day of San Francisco Auto Show

When: 12:00 Noon - 1:30 p.m., Sunday, November 21

Where: San Francisco Auto Show, SF Moscone Center, 747 Howard

What: Rally, Leafleting and Street Theater Calling on Ford Motor
Company to Break America's Oil Addiction

Who: Global Exchange, Rainforest Action Network, Bluewater
Network, SF Bike Coalition, and YOU.

The United States is addicted to oil. Although less than 5 percent
of the world's population, we consume 25 percent of the world's
oil. This dependence on oil endangers our environment, weakens
our economy, and undermines our national security.

The quickest way to break our oil habit is by challenging Ford
Motor Company to take immediate action to dramatically increase
the fuel economy of its cars. According to the US EPA, Ford is the
worst gas-guzzler in the auto industry, falling last place in fuel
economy rankings for five years in a row.

A great place to challenge Ford is at the wildly popular SF Auto
Show. Attended by hundreds of thousands of people, the show
is a critical venue for Ford to promote its products.

When it comes to making sensible, fuel-efficient vehicles, Ford
has have very little to brag about. And that means the auto shows
offer a fantastic opportunity for concerned citizens to raise public
awareness about the very real costs of our oil addiction.

WHAT YOU CAN DO:

1) Come to the Auto Show rally on Sunday, Nov. 21 and join human
rights activists, environmentalists, cyclists and others for a lively
rally calling on Ford to break America's oil addiction. Add your voice
to the call for energy independence.

2) Reduce your own oil consumption by biking more! It's fun
and easier than you might think. A great way to start is by taking
a FREE Bike Ed class offered by the San Francisco Bicycle Coalition.
For more information & class schedules,
see http://www.sfbike.org/edu


For more information, contact Jason Mark at 415-558-9490 or
jason@globalexchange.org
.

Please act today to break our addiction to oil!

---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

11) 31 U.S. Troops Killed So Far in Fallujah
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
November 14, 2004
Filed at 11:14 a.m. ET

NEAR FALLUJAH, Iraq (AP) -- The U.S. military's ground and air assault
of Fallujah has gone quicker than expected, with the entire city occupied
after six days of fighting, the Marine commander who planned the
offensive said Sunday. The military said 31 Americans have been
killed in the siege.

Marine Maj. Gen. Richard Natonski said he and other commanders
learned from April's failed three-week Marine assault on Fallujah,
which was called off by the Bush administration after a worldwide
outcry over civilians deaths. This time, the military sent in six times
as many troops and 20 types of aircraft. Troops also faked attacks
before the assault to confuse enemy fighters.

``Maybe we learned from April,'' Natonski said in an interview with
The Associated Press. ``We learned we can't do it piecemeal. When
we go in, we go all the way through. We had the green light this time
and we went all the way.

``Had we done in April what we did now, the results would've been
the same.''

Natonski spoke during a visit to the 1st Cavalry Division's 2nd
Brigade, the unit charged with isolating Fallujah under a security
cordon.

More than 1,200 insurgents have been killed during the operation,
he said.

The offensive has killed at least 31 American troops and six Iraqi
soldiers, said Lt. Gen. John Sattler, commander of the 1st Marine
Expeditionary Force. The number of injured Americans was ``up
in the high 200s,'' although some have returned to duty already,
Sattler said.

Rebel attacks elsewhere -- especially in the northern city of Mosul
-- have forced the Americans to shift troops away from Fallujah.

Exploiting the redeployment, insurgents stepped up attacks in areas
outside Fallujah, including a bombing that killed two U.S. Marines on
the outskirts of the former rebel bastion 40 miles west of Baghdad.

On Sunday, Marines and Army units were still battling gritty bands
of defenders scattered in buildings and bunkers across the Sunni
Muslim stronghold. Behind them, Iraqi troops were enmeshed in
the painstaking task of clearing weapons and fighters from every
room of Fallujah's estimated 50,000 buildings.

U.S. forces now occupy -- but have yet to subdue -- the entire city.
It still could take several days of fighting to clear the final pockets
of resistance, the military said.

On Sunday, U.S. soldiers from Task Force 2-2 of the 1st Infantry
Division discovered an immense series of underground bunkers
linked by tunnels that insurgents stocked with medical supplies,
a CNN correspondent embedded with the unit reported.

Warplanes dropped four 2,000-pound bombs on the bunker
network in the city's southeast corner, setting off 45 minutes of
secondary explosions as weapons stockpiles detonated, CNN
correspondent Jane Arraf said.

Also, Marines reopened the bridge where the bodies of two American
contractors killed by militants were strung up in March, sparking the
earlier U.S. siege.

``This is a big event for us,'' Maj. Todd Des Grosseilliers, 41, of
Auburn, Maine, said before Marines rolled back concertina wire
and swept the bridge for booby traps.

Also, Marines in Fallujah found the mutilated body of what they
believe was a Western woman. The body was lying in the street
covered with a blood-soaked cloth.

A Marine officer speaking on condition of anonymity said he was
``80 percent sure'' it was a Western woman. Two foreign women
were kidnapped last month -- Margaret Hassan, 59, the director
of CARE International in Iraq and Teresa Borcz Khalifa, 54, a Polish
-born longtime resident of Iraq.

In Warsaw, the Polish Foreign Ministry said it was seeking more
information.

The Iraqi Red Crescent Society said another convoy would travel
from Baghdad to Fallujah on Monday, carrying food and aid for
about 2,000 families living in the area, director Fardous al-Ubaidi
said. A convoy of four such vehicles arrived in Fallujah on Saturday.

In central Buhriz, 25 miles northeast of Baghdad, demonstrators
marched to protest the Fallujah offensive and denounce Iraq's
interim prime minister, Ayad Allawi.

Associated Press Television News footage showed some armed
men, heads covered with black hoods and brandishing Kalashnikov
rifles, among the marchers. The demonstrators, estimated by police
to number about 70, carried banners calling Allawi a ``thug'' and
``traitor.''

``Allawi, Fallujah will be your tomb!'' some chanted. ``You are
a coward, an American agent!''

In Mosul, Iraq's third-largest city, militants attacked two police
stations, killing at least six Iraqi National Guards and wounding
three others, Iraqi officials said. One insurgent was killed and three
others were wounded, they said. Iraqi security forces regained
control of both stations, witnesses said.

About 300 Iraqi National Guards and a battalion of police from
Baghdad patrolled the streets in a visible show of force after an
insurgent uprising believed to have been mounted in support of
Fallujah's militants.

Three days earlier, armed and masked militants stormed police
stations, bridges and government buildings in Mosul as Iraqi police
apparently failed to put up a fight. Mosul's police chief was fired
after criticism that militants infiltrated police forces.

Planning for Fallujah began in September, with Natonski given
responsibility for the combat phase, said Lt. Col. Dan Wilson,
a Marine planner with the 1st Marine Expeditionary Force.

After troops uproot the insurgents, contractors are supposed
to swarm into Fallujah to cart away rubble, repair buildings
and fix the city's utilities, Wilson and Natonski said.

The Iraqi government already has picked leaders for Fallujah,
and thousands of Iraqi police and paramilitary forces have been
recruited to impose order.

Natonski described the six days of ground war as a ``flawless
execution of the plan we drew up. We are actually ahead of
schedule.''

Several pre-assault tactics made the battle easier than expected,
he said.

Insurgent defenses were weakened by bombing raids on command
posts and safe houses. Air-dropped leaflets also may have
demoralized some defenders and convinced some residents the
city would be better off under government control, he said.

In the days before the raid, ground troops feinted invasions,
charging right up to Fallujah's edge in tanks and armored vehicles.
Natonski said these fake attacks forced the insurgents to build up
forces in the south and east, perhaps diverting defenders from the
north, where six battalions of Army and Marine troops finally
punched into the city Monday.

The deceptive maneuvers also drew fire from defenders' bunkers,
which were exposed and relentlessly bombed before the ground
assault.

``We desensitized the enemy to the formations they saw on the
night we attacked,'' Natonski said.

Another key tactic was choking off the city, the responsibility of
the 2nd Brigade of the Army's 1st Cavalry Division, Natonski said.

That prevented insurgents from slipping out during the assault,
although many, including top leaders like Jordanian Abu Musab
al-Zarqawi, Sheik Abdullah al-Janabi and Omar al-Hadid, are
believed to have fled.

``We never expected them to be there. We're not after Zarqawi.
We're after insurgents in general,'' Natonski said.

Copyright 2004 The Associated Press

---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

12) Assemblyman Condemns Palestinian Art Show
November 12, 2004
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Filed at 9:31 p.m. ET

WHITE PLAINS, N.Y. (AP) -- A Jewish assemblyman said Friday
that an exhibit of Palestinian art and crafts, scheduled
for display in a public building, should be canceled
because it is anti-Israel and ``promotes terrorism and
violence.''

Items to be shown include an Arab headdress trapped in a
Star of David made of barbed wire, and a piece paying
homage to ``Palestinian martyrs in the anti-Israel uprising
that began in 2000.''

The curator of the exhibit said that while some of the art
deals with Israel's military presence in the Palestinian
territories and ``the apartheid-type life that Palestinians
are forced to live under ... what comes through is the
desire for a peaceful life.''

Westchester County's executive has demanded a preview of
the exhibit before deciding whether it should be canceled.
The exhibit, scheduled for Nov. 20 at the county center in
White Plains, is entitled ``Made in Palestine.''

Assemblyman Ryan Karben, a Democrat from neighboring
Rockland County, based his objections on artworks from
another exhibit, also called ``Made in Palestine,'' that
was on display at the Station museum in Houston last year.
Those works are in storage, but their images will be shown
as part of the White Plains display, said Nada Khader of
WESPAC, a peace group that is sponsoring the display with
the artists' group Al-Jisser (which means ``bridges'').
Among other things in the Houston exhibit that Karber
objects to are a reference to the creation of Israel in
1948 as a ``catastrophe,'' and works by an artist described
in the Houston exhibit as ``a former general in the
Palestinian Liberation Organization.''

``Whether they are in a display case or on a projection
screen, these divisive and anti-Israel pieces that glorify
terrorism have no business being displayed,'' said Aaron
Troodler, Karben's spokesman.

Haifa Bint-Kadi, the artist who is curating the White
Plains exhibit, said she was disappointed that Karben would
``make something divisive out of this, when what we're
trying to do is get people to know one another rather than
do harm to one another.''

UNITED FOR PEACE & JUSTICE | 212-868-5545

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