The Corner Report

By Harvey Wasserman

The Clintons are running for a third term in the White House. As expected, their first eight years in office are being given thorough scrutiny. Everything from NAFTA to Bosnia, from Monica to health care, are going rightfully under the microscope.

The disagreements are deep and generally predictable. But it is equally predictable that there is one issue—one man— being totally ignored by the mainstream media. His case marks the moral low point of the Clinton Era. He deserves to be a part of the primary process.

His name is Leonard Peltier.

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By HELEN THOMAS

When a fire broke out in Vice President Dick Cheney’s ceremonial office earlier this month, reporters quipped that someone must be burning the videotapes of the CIA interrogation of two al-Qaida detainees.

The joke was an allusion to the administration’s admission that the CIA videotapes had been destroyed. The videotapes reportedly showed the harsh interrogations and water boarding of the prisoners in secret prisons abroad.

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Ali Abunimah and Omar Barghouti
December 30, 2007

As two of the authors of a recent document advocating a one-state solution to the Arab- Israeli colonial conflict, we intended to generate debate. Predictably, Zionists decried the proclamation as yet another proof of the unwavering devotion of Palestinian - and some radical Israeli - intellectuals to the "destruction of Israel". Some pro-Palestinian activists accused us of forsaking immediate and critical Palestinian rights in the quest of a "utopian" dream.

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New York Times Confirms Hiring Bill Kristol As Op-Ed Columnist

William Kristol, one of the nation's leading conservative writers and a vigorous supporter of the Iraq war, will become an Op-Ed page columnist for The New York Times, the newspaper announced Saturday.

Mr. Kristol will write a weekly column for The Times beginning Jan. 7, the newspaper said. He is editor and co-founder of The Weekly Standard, an influential conservative political magazine, and appears regularly on Fox News Sunday and the Fox News Channel. He was a columnist for Time magazine until that relationship was severed this month.

Keep reading here.

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First, Main Candidates Urged To Plan 'Unity' Government

"I'm an American before I'm a Republican," said former senator John Danforth (Mo.). He is unimpressed with his party's presidential candidates. (By Craig Sands For The Washington Post)

By David S. Broder

New York Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg, a potential independent candidate for president, has scheduled a meeting next week with a dozen leading Democrats and Republicans, who will join him in challenging the major-party contenders to spell out their plans for forming a "government of national unity" to end the gridlock in Washington.

Those who will be at the Jan. 7 session at the University of Oklahoma say that if the likely nominees of the two parties do not pledge to "go beyond tokenism" in building an administration that seeks national consensus, they will be prepared to back Bloomberg or someone else in a third-party campaign for president.

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JERUSALEM (AFP) — Israel is insisting that Palestinian pilgrims returning to the Hamas-run Gaza Strip from the hajj in Saudi Arabia go through its security controls, the defence ministry said Sunday.

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By Saed Bannoura

A delegation of renowned Italians was denied entry into the Gaza Strip by Israeli forces on Friday. The delegation had been promoted by members of the Italian Parliament, academics and Christian dignitaries. Several members of Parliament were among those who traveled to Gaza on the delegation, but were denied entry at the Israeli-controlled border by Israeli troops.

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By Larry Chin

Global Research, December 29, 2007

It has been known for months that the Bush-Cheney administration and its allies have been manuevering to strengthen their political control of Pakistan, paving the way for the expansion and deepening of the “war on terrorism” across the region. The assassination of Benazir Bhutto does not change this agenda. In fact, it simplifies Bush-Cheney’s options.

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The commander of a pro-Taliban group in Pakistan has told news agencies by phone that Baitullah Mehsud, another pro-Taliban figure, denies any involvement in Benazir Bhutto's death.

Maulana Omar said on Saturday: "He [Mehsud] had no involvement in this attack. This is a conspiracy of the government, army and intelligence agencies."

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Will Israel's bogus lip-service only post-Annapolis "peace negotiations" lead to the third Intifada just as its fake "peace negotiations" in 1996 and 2000 lead to the first two Intifadas? Haaretz reporter Amira Hass asks.

Haaretz

By Amira Hass

The negotiations over the future of our land, from the sea to the river, and the two peoples living in it, are proceeding along two parallel channels. It has been that way since the Madrid and Oslo talks for 17 years now. One channel is between the Palestinians and Israelis - such as Tuesday's meeting in Jerusalem between chief Palestinian negotiator Ahmed Qureia and Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni. The other is being conducted between the Israelis and themselves. Will the only genuine point of contact between these two channels be another explosion of blood, as occurred in 1996 and 2000?

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Anjum Naveed / AP Protesters burn tires in Rawalpindi. Benazir Bhutto's supporters rampaged through cities Friday, ransacking banks and setting train stations ablaze. |

By Saeed Shah and Warren P. Strobel | McClatchy Newspapers

LARKANA, Pakistan — Violence and recriminations grew Friday over the assassination of former Pakistani Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto, as Pakistan's government changed its account of how she died while her supporters charged that the government withheld personal protection she'd requested.

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Throughout the year, the US and Israel tried to collapse the Hamas government, an objective sure to survive on the policy agenda of 2008, writes Saleh Al-Naami

Hamas exiled leader Khaled Meshaal smiles as Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas shakes hands with Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh during a meeting in Mecca

By Saleh Al-Naami

One November night in 2006 in his fourth floor office in the western wing of the Israeli Ministry of Defence, General Amos Gilad, head of the ministry's department of political security, met with Elliot Abrams, American deputy national security adviser. On the agenda of this meeting that Abrams had come specially to Tel Aviv for was only one item: how to ensure the fall of Hamas after it had grown clear that the siege on the West Bank and Gaza Strip had not only failed to cause its collapse but had actually increased support for Hamas among Palestinians.

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Key figures in Pakistan's Bhutto dynasty:

Sir Shahnawaz Bhutto: late grandfather of Benazir Bhutto. Senior figure in the Pakistan Muslim League, the party that helped split Pakistan from India and lead it to independence in 1947.

Zulfikar Ali Bhutto: Bhutto's father. Became prime minister in 1971 after founding the populist Pakistan Peoples Party with the motto: "Food, shelter and clothing for all." Executed in 1979 by the government of then-military ruler Gen. Mohammed Zia-ul Haq on charges of arranging the murder of the father of a political opponent.

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Abbas and Olmert failed to agree over the issue of Israeli settlements

Israel has balked at committing to a total freeze in settlement activity, a key demand of Palestinians for advancing US-backed peace talks.

In a meeting with Mahmoud Abbas, the Palestinian president, in Jerusalem on Thursday, Ehud Olmert, the Israeli prime minister, reiterated Israel's position on building new apartments in Har Homa, part of a ring of settlements built on confiscated Palestinian land in east Jerusalem.

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By Ray McGovern

“There are few things as odd as the calm, superior indifference with which I and those like me watched the beginnings of the Nazi revolution in Germany, as if from a box at the theater…Perhaps the only comparably odd thing is the way that now, years later….”

These are the words of Sebastian Haffner (pen name for Raimund Pretzel), who as a young lawyer in Berlin during the 1930s experienced the Nazi takeover and wrote a first-hand account. His children found the manuscript when he died in 1999 and published it the following year as “Geschichte eines Deutschen” (The Story of a German). The book became an immediate bestseller and has been translated into 20 languages-in English as “Defying Hitler.”

I recently learned from his daughter Sarah, an artist in Berlin, that today is the 100th anniversary of Haffner’s birth. She had seen an earlier article in which I quoted her father and emailed to ask me to “write some more about the book and the comparison to Bush’s America…this is almost unbelievable.”

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Asia Times

By Syed Saleem Shahzad

KARACHI - ”We terminated the most precious American asset which vowed to defeat mujahideen.” These were the words of al-Qaeda’s top commander for Afghanistan operations and spokesperson Mustafa Abu al-Yazid, immediately after the attack that claimed the life of Pakistani politician Benazir Bhutto on Thursday (December 27).

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A female prisoner is about to give birth in Israeli detention center

By Najeeb Farraj

Fatima Al Zuq is from Gaza and was kidnapped a few months ago, she's the fourth Palestinian prisoner to give birth inside an Israeli prison since the beginning of the Al Aqsa Intifada.

The Prisoner Society based in Palestine presented an official request to Israeli legal advisors to provide humanitarian conditions for the prisoner Al Zuq who is due to give birth this month. The Israelis accepted the request of the Society and have said the prisoner will not be blindfolded or handcuffed during her transfer to the hospital for giving birth. They also said she will not be handcuffed to the bed during the birth as has happened in previous cases. Lawyer Fatima Al Natsha, Director of the legal unit in the Prisoner Society reported that this decision will make the birth less painful for the prisoner and hopes that the Israeli side will be committed to the taking decision. Translated by Nisreen Qumsieh - IMEMC News.

International Middle East Media Center

A car destroyed by Israeli missile in Al-Bureij Thursday

GAZA, Palestine _ Israeli warplanes bombed the city of Khan Younis, in the southern Gaza Strip, and the refugee camp of Al-Bureij in the ventral Gaza strip on Thursday afternoon, killing three Palestinians and injuring ten others.

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No. 50/2007 13 - 26 Dec. 2007

The Annexation Wall obstructs the movement of Palestinian civilians in the West Bank

Palestinian Centre for Human Rights
http://www.pchrgaza.org

Israeli Occupation Forces (IOF) Escalate Attacks against Palestinian Civilians and Property in the Occupied Palestinian Territory (OPT), Especially in the Gaza Strip

* 23 Palestinians, including one civilian, were killed by IOF in he Gaza Strip.
* 10 of the victims were extra-judicially executed by IOF.
* 8 of the victims were killed by IOF during an offensive on al-Musaddar village in the central Gaza Strip.
* 32 Palestinians were wounded by the IOF gunfire in the Gaza Strip, and 9 persons, including an American human rights defender, were wounded by IOF in the West Bank.
* IOF invaded al-Musaddar village in the central Gaza Strip
* IOF razed 133 donums[1] of agricultural land.
* IOF partially destroyed 10 houses and arrested one Palestinian.
* IOF transformed a number of houses into military sites.
* IOF conducted 24 incursions into Palestinian communities in the West Bank.
* IOF arrested 87 Palestinian civilians, including a member of the Palestinian Legislative Council, in the West Bank.
* IOF have continued to impose a total siege on the OPT.
* IOF have isolated the Gaza Strip from the outside world and a humanitarian crisis has emerged.
* IOF prevented at least 150 Palestinian pilgrims to travel through Erez crossing.
* IOF troops positioned at checkpoints in the West Bank arrested 3 Palestinian civilians.
* IOF have continued settlement activities in the West Bank and Israeli settlers have continued to attacks Palestinian civilians and property.
* IOF demolished a house in Jerusalem
* Israeli settlers attacked a Palestinian farmer in Nablus.

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By Amy Goodman

On Dec. 18, the five commissioners of the Federal Communications Commission met in Washington, D.C., and, by a 3 to 2 vote, passed new regulations that would allow more media consolidation. This, despite the U.S. public’s increasing concern over the nation’s media being controlled by a few giant corporations.

Dissident FCC Commissioner Michael Copps said of the decision: “We generously ask big media to sit on Santa’s knee, tell us what it wants for Christmas, and then push through whatever of these wishes are politically and practically feasible. No test to see if anyone’s been naughty or nice. Just another big, shiny present for the favored few who already hold an FCC license-and a lump of coal for the rest of us. Happy holidays!”

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By Casey Woods

MIAMI — Three high-profile hostages held by Colombian rebels will soon be freed, perhaps as early as Thursday, Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez announced Wednesday in Caracas.

The release of the three, including an aide to kidnapped former presidential candidate Ingrid Betancourt, would be a major diplomatic coup for Chavez, who a month ago had been told to stay out of hostage negotiations by Colombian President Alvaro Uribe.

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A store in Bethlehem has replaced the traditional manger scene with an olive wood carving of the Israeli wall that cuts Bethlehem off from Jerusalem.

By Dion Nissenbaum and Cliff Churgin

BETHLEHEM, West Bank — For generations, the Holy Land Arts Museum has been selling carved olive wood manger scenes to thousands of religious pilgrims looking for souvenirs from the biblical birthplace of Jesus Christ.

This year, the small Bethlehem shop decided that it was time to update the traditional Christmas scene.

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By Lesley Clark

WASHINGTON — Rep. Robert Wexler is taking on the Bush administration — in cyberspace.

The Florida Democrat has launched a Web site — www.wexlerwantshearings.com — and is gathering signatures calling for impeachment hearings against Vice President Dick Cheney.

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By Jackson Browne

All the streets are filled with laughter and light
And the music of the season
And the merchants’ windows are all bright
With the faces of the children
And the families hurrying to their homes
As the sky darkens and freezes
They’ll be gathering around the hearths and tales
Giving thanks for all God’s graces
And the birth of the rebel Jesus.

Well they call him by the prince of peace
And they call him by the savior
And they pray to him upon the seas
And in every bold endeavor
As they fill his churches with their pride and gold
And their faith in him increases
But they’ve turned the nature that I worshipped in
From a temple to a robber’s den
In the words of the rebel Jesus.

We guard our world with locks and guns
And we guard our fine possessions
And once a year when Christmas comes
We give to our relations
And perhaps we give a little to the poor
If the generosity should seize us
But if any one of us should interfere
In the business of why they are poor
They get the same as the rebel Jesus.

But please forgive me if I seem
To take the tone of judgment
For I’ve no wish to come between
This day and your enjoyment
In this life of hardship and of earthly toil
We have need for anything that frees us
So I bid you pleasure
And I bid you cheer
From a heathen and a pagan
On the side of the rebel Jesus.

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Just days after agreeing to "peace talks" in Annapolis, including a freeze on illegal settler colonies, Israel announced its plan to expand the illegal settler colony of Har Homa, which is built on stolen Palestinian land on a mountain called Jabal Abu Ghneim, a sacred place to Palestinians.

Thursday's summit between Ehud Olmert, the Israeli prime minister, and Mahmoud Abbas, the Palestinian president, is the first since the two agreed to renew peace talks at the US-sponsored Annapolis meeting last month.

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Israel is accused of dropping about four million
cluster bombs during its war against Hezbollah [EPA]

Israeli military prosecutors have decided not to take any legal action over Israel's use of cluster bombs during last year's war in Lebanon. The Israeli army said on Monday that it was closing an investigation into a practice that has drawn heavy criticism from the UN and international human rights groups.

"The Israeli decision indicates that there is no difference between the judicial authority and political authority in Israel. They all work to commit and cover up crimes which are against humanity," the Lebanese official told The Associated Press, speaking on condition of anonymity in line with government regulations.

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Israel makes Church of the Holy Sepulcher and Church of Nativity, above, off limits to Christian Clergy

BETHLEHEM, Palestine - 24 Dec 2007 _ As the world celebrates this holiday season, Israel is blocking clergy from reaching their churches and Christmas celebrations in Bethlehem and elsewhere in the Holy Land. These Israeli actions are in blatant violation of international humanitarian law, block the right for religions to practice in the Holy Land, and defy every notion of basic common sense.

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