Thomas Paine's version of "you didn't build that":
"Separate an individual from society,and give him an island or a continent to possess,and he cannot acquire personal property. He cannot be rich. So inseparably are the means connected with the end,in all cases,that where the former do not exist the latter cannot be obtained. All accumulation, therefore,of personal property,beyond what a man's own hands produce, is derived to him by living in society; and he owes on every principle of justice,of gratitude,and of civilization,a part of that accumulation back again to society from whence the whole came"
Submitted by Leah
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Are Yemenis Arabs? And why are other Arabs bombing them?
A Yemeni girl cries after her father was killed by a Saudi-led air raid in Yemen’s capital Sanaa [Khaled Abdullah/Reuters]
“The war in Yemen is now the world’s worst humanitarian crisis, with more than 22 million people – three-quarters of the population – in desperate need of aid and protection,” we read in reports.
“As the conflict enters its fourth year, millions are without access to clean drinking water and the country is at high risk of a cholera epidemic.”
How did we come to this? By now, amid Donald Trump‘s antics constantly flooding the airways and the internet, you may have completely forgotten the causes of the war in Yemen. The answer is simple: counter-revolutionary mobilisation against the 2011 democratic uprising. This was and remains the main cause of this mayhem.
The counter-revolutionary effort transformed Yemen into a theatre for proxy wars. Outside interference by the Saudis and Iranians radically distorted the popular mobilisation into a sectarian conflict in which the Houthis turned from one of the voices of the uprising to puppets of Tehran. The counter-revolutionary commotion succeeded, the revolutionary momentum receded.
Foreign interference was detrimental to the Yemeni revolution and to the interests of both Saudis and Iranians. They are also victims of this counter-revolutionary mobilisation against a transnational uprising that endangered the Saudi and Iranian regimes alike. Needless to say, the US and British support and massive military sales to Saudi Arabia are a key factor in exacerbating this catastrophe.
From proxy war to regional conflict
Now, where are we three years into the “Yemen conflict”, as journalists in the US and Europe call the carnage? ………………..The state of war in Yemen is its purpose and objective: to kill the democratic aspirations of a nation, to force it to degenerate into sectarian hostilities, to turn Yemen into a proxy war between two sectarian hegemonies in the region – Iran and Saudi Arabia. That is the manifest condition in which Yemen and its future are now trapped.
But there is a far more evident, far more palpable consequence of the war in Yemen, to which all the factions have contributed. “At least 10,000 people have been killed in the war in Yemen,” this according to a conservative UN estimate reported in January 2017.
Other sources give much higher numbers. “In November 2017,” according to a report, “Save the Children confirmed that 130 Yemeni children were dying every day, with 50,000 children already believed to have died in 2017.”
These staggering numbers are getting worse with each report. “An international charity says more than a million children in Yemen under the age of five are suffering from malnutrition while more than half of the country’s population of 28 million face food shortages,” reports Al Jazeera. In another report we read, the war in Yemen “has left nearly three million homeless and 22 million in need of humanitarian aid”.
An international rights group is calling for an investigation into alleged disappearances, torture and likely deaths in prisons and “network of secret detention facilities” run by the United Arab Emirates and allied militias in southern Yemen. Amnesty International said in a report on Thursday that it has documented “systemic enforced disappearance and torture and other ill-treatment, amounting to war crimes” in the facilities. The report said “some [detainees are] feared to have died in custody”. Based on more than 70 interviews, the authors said “cruel and unlawful” practices were being committed in those prisons.
(Reuters) – A Michigan man seized overseas by a U.S.-backed Syrian militia has been charged with providing material support to Islamic State militants, the U.S. Justice Department said on Tuesday.
Ibraheem Izzy Musaibli, 28, of Dearborn, Michigan, provided support to the group from 2015 until last month, the department said in a statement. Musaibli, a natural-born U.S. citizen, will be arraigned in federal court in Detroit on Wednesday, it said.
U.S. prosecutors in Indiana said Musaibli was transferred from the custody of the Syrian Democratic Forces along with a U.S. woman, Samantha Elhassani, who has been charged with making false statements to the FBI.
Elhassani was accompanied by her four minor U.S. citizen children, who were placed in the care of the Indiana Department of Child Services, the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Northern District of Indiana said in a statement.
Both defendants arrived in Indiana on Tuesday. Musaibli was transferred to Michigan, and Elhassani, also known as Samantha Sally, will appear in federal court in Hammond, Indiana, at a later date, according to the statement.
Two other Isis militants are killed before they can blow themselves up, say state media
A suicide bomber in the southern Syrian city of Sweida has killed 38 people in an attack near a marketplace, state media said.
Thirty-seven people were reportedly wounded in the attack early on Wednesday.
Authorities chased and killed two other attackers before they could also blow themselves up.
Islamic State militants also attacked three villages north-east of Sweida, killing and wounding a number of people, it was reported. The head of the health authority gave the numbers dead and injured on state TV.
PARIS (Reuters) – The United Nations’ Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs in Syria said on Tuesday it was ready to provide support to a Franco-Russian initiative to deliver medical aid to government-controlled eastern Ghouta after earlier saying it would not.
France had said the cargo would be distributed under the independent supervision of a U.N. team so it could guarantee where and when it would go. A French diplomatic source said on Friday it was “not entrusting the aid with the Red Crescent”.
The 50 tonnes of aid, including blankets, clothes and tents, arrived on a Russian plane to Russia’s Hmeimim military base in northwestern Syria from France on Saturday and came after an agreement reached between President Emmanuel Macron and Russian leader Vladimir Putin in Moscow following talks since May.
“The Syrian Arab Red Crescent (SARC) will be distributing the aid and there is no U.N. supervision of the operation, contrary to previous reports,” a U.N. spokeswoman in Damascus said on Tuesday…………Macron considers aid delivery a first step to forging a wider political discussion with Russia to ultimately bring together international players to end the seven-year civil war.
Russia was also not supposed to take part in its distribution because Paris wanted the initiative to not be derailed for political purposes, French officials said.
France, which has backed opponents to Assad in the seven year civil war, cut off diplomatic ties with Damascus in 2011.
BAGHDAD (AP) — A leading international watchdog has called on the Iraqi government to investigate the excessive use of force against protesters demanding better services and jobs in the country’s south.
In a report issued on Tuesday, the Human Rights Watch also urged that members of the security forces responsible for using lethal force at the rallies be disciplined or prosecuted.
Early this month, residents of oil-rich Basra province staged protests against the lack of jobs and poor services. The rallies spread to other provinces in Iraq’s Shiite heartland.
The protests turned violent with security forces killing a number of protesters who attacked policemen and damaged government property.
HRW’s Mideast chief Sarah Leah Whitson has warned that “as the government fails to address protester grievances, the danger of further bloody protests remains real.”
The US Department of Defense, Pentagon, on Monday informed regarding the modification of the contract for the purchase of ScanEagle unmanned aerial vehicles for the Afghan National Defense and Security Forces (ANDSF). “Insitu Inc., Bingen, Washington, is awarded $10,826,778 for modification P00004 to a previously issued firm-fixed-price delivery order (N6833518F0050) placed against basic ordering agreement
Gunmen have shot dead six members of an Afghan family in the outskirts of Peshawar city, the provincial capital of Khyber Pakhtunwa province of Pakistan, it has been reported. The incident has reportedly taken place late on Monday evening, apparently involving a brawl among an Afghan and a Pakistani family. “An exchange of fire took .
The Taliban militants have suffered heavy casualties during the ongoing operations in Greshk and Nad-e-Ali districts of Helmand province. The provincial government media office in a statement said at least seven militants were killed during the operations in Dagian and Syedan areas of Greshk district. The statement further added that three militants also sustained injuries
The Department of Defense announced today the death of an airman who was supporting Operation Inherent Resolve.
Staff Sgt. James T. Grotjan, 26, of Waterford, Connecticut, died July 12 at the Landstuhl Regional Medical Center, Germany, from injuries sustained in a non-combat related incident July 8 at Al Dhafra Air Base, United Arab Emirates.
He was assigned to the 4th Civil Engineer Squadron at Seymour Johnson Air Force Base, North Carolina.
The Department of Defense announced today the death of a soldier who was supporting Operation Freedom’s Sentinel.
Sgt. 1st Class Christopher Andrew Celiz, 32, from Summerville, South Carolina, died, July 12, in Afghanistan, of wounds sustained as a result of enemy small arms fire while conducting operations in support of a medical evacuation landing zone in Zurmat district, Paktiya province. The incident is under investigation.
Celiz was assigned to the 1st Battalion, 75th Ranger Regiment, Hunter Army Airfield, Georgia.
The Department of Defense announced today the death of a soldier who was supporting Operation Freedom’s Sentinel.
Cpl. Joseph Maciel of South Gate, California, died July 7, 2018, in Tarin Kowt District, Uruzgan Province, Afghanistan from wounds sustained during an apparent insider attack. The incident is under investigation.
Maciel was assigned to 1st Battalion, 28th Infantry Regiment, 3rd Infantry Division, Fort Benning, Georgia. Task Force 1-28 Infantry is currently deployed in support of the 1st Security Force Assistance Brigade.
All VA Medical Centers provide PTSD care, as well as many VA clinics.Some VA’s have programs specializing in PTSD treatment. Use the VA PTSD ProgramLocator to find a PTSD program.If you are a war Veteran, find a Vet Center to help with the transition from military to civilian life.
WAR DOCUMENTARY: IRAQ A DEADLY DECEPTION ALJAZEERA DOCUMENTARIES 2018 On the evening of 9/11, George W Bush made a vow to the American public – that he would defeat terrorism. Unknown to those listening in shock to the presidential address, the president and his advisers had already begun planning their trajectory into an invasion of Iraq. It was packaged as “holding responsible the states who support terrorism” by Richard Perle, a Pentagon adviser between 2001 and 2003. “I believe it represented a recognition that we would never succeed against the terrorists if we went after them one at a time and as long as governments were facilitating the organisation, training, equipping of, financing of terrorist organisations, we were never going to get it under control,” says Perle. After 100 days spent fighting those who had become publicly accepted as the culprits – Osama bin Laden, al-Qaeda and the Taliban in Afghanistan – the US set the ball rolling for war against Iraq. On the evening of 9/11 the president is saying: well, maybe we’ll be going after Iraq now and somebody said, well, that would be against international law. The president responded: I don’t care, we’re going to kick some ass.
The War Criminals
The war criminals, Bush,Cheney,Rice,Rumsfeld, Wolfowitz, and Powell
How many Iraqis have died as a result of the invasion 15 years ago? Some credible estimates put the number at more than one million. You can read that sentence again.
The invasion of Iraq is often spoken of in our country as a “blunder,” or even a “colossal mistake.” It was a crime.
Those who perpetrated it are still at large. Some of them have even been rehabilitated thanks to the horrors of a mostly amnesiac citizenry.
We condemned children to death, some after many days of writhing in pain on bloodstained mats, without pain relievers. Some died quickly, wasted by missing arms and legs, crushed heads. As the fluids ran out of their bodies, they appeared like withered, spoiled fruits. They could have lived, certainly should have lived – and laughed and danced, and run and played- but instead they were brutally murdered. Yes, murdered!
The war ended for those children, but it has never ended for survivors who carry memories of them. Likewise, the effects of the U.S. bombings continue, immeasurably and indefensibly.
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