News for 01-18-07

01-18-07 - US congressmen seek Iran block ** One of the Democrats who supports the legislation said that a new resolution was needed because the Bush administration had lied so many times in the run up to the Iraq war.


01-18-07 - IAEA suspends some technical aid to Iran


01-18-07 - Iraq tells Iran, US to take their fight elsewhere Iraq told the United States and Iran to settle their scores elsewhere, while the US military confirmed it had searched Sudan's embassy in Baghdad as part of an anti-insurgent operation.


01-18-07 - Rice resists seeking talks with Iran Until the Iranians comply, "this is not the time to break a long-standing American policy of not engaging with the Iranians bilaterally," Rice said during a press conference with German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier


01-18-07 - Iran offered to cut off Hezbollah in overture to US in 2003: BBC Iran offered to cut off aid and support for the Lebanese Shiite militia Hezbollah and the Palestinian group Hamas, and promised full transparency on its nuclear program in a secret letter to the United States soon after the 2003 invasion of Iraq, the British media reported.


01-18-07 - Iran offers to help train, equip Iraqi forces


01-18-07 - Report: Cheney rejected Iran's offer of concessions in 2003 A package of concessions offered to the US by Iran in 2003 was very close to what the US is now asking from Tehran.


01-18-07 - US forces raid Kurdish refugee camp in northern Iraq In recent months Turkey has repeatedly asked the United States to move against PKK camps in northern Iraq but the US authorities have refused to act, saying their forces in Iraq are already stretched.



01-18-07 - Vast Data Collection Plan Faces Big Delay


01-18-07 - Gates: Iranians 'overplaying their hand' The Iranians are "overplaying their hand" on the world stage in a belief that setbacks in Iraq have weakened the United States, Defense Secretary Robert Gates said Thursday.


01-18-07 - Senators denounce Iraq buildup as against US interests


01-18-07 - Bush Backs Down on Warrantless Wiretaps The Congress still needs to investigate whether the warrantless wiretapping program was used to monitor not merely terrorist threats but domestic dissent.


01-18-07 - Libby on Trial The witness list is a veritable who's who of the OVP, and the Washington press corps, with some CIA to spice up the mix: star witnesses include Cheney, Doug Feith, Paul Wolfowitz, and Colin Powell. The prosecution is out to prove that, in an effort to throw sand in the faces of investigators, the defendant deliberately misled them as to his interactions with the media. Power to the (special) prosecutor.


01-18-07 - Iraq rape soldier to plead guilty A US soldier has agreed to plead guilty in the rape of a 14-year-old girl and the murder of her and her family in the Iraqi town of Mahmudiya last year


01-18-07 - US sets terrorism trial rules The new rules for military courts in the US allow convicted terrorists to be imprisoned or put to death using hearsay evidence or coerced testimony.


01-18-07 - U.S. Launches Armed Force to Block Iranian Influence in Iraq ** U.S. officials see Iranian fingerprints in violent attacks throughout Iraq and all but blame Iran for complicity in the deaths of American soldiers. This is the type of propaganda that the NY Sun was referring to when it alleged that Larry Franklin is vindicated. But it's just that - propaganda. Because we are about to attack Iran (a goal of Aipac/neocons).


01-18-07 - Iranians' love affair with America We can blame the Bush administration's poor grasp of daily realities in Iran on an almost three-decade-long freeze of contact between the American and Iranian governments. As a result of this isolation, so-called experts who have never been to Iran (or at least not since the Islamic Revolution of 1979) advise US government officials on the opinions of the Iranian populace. The comment by one influential US scholar comparing Iran to a concentration camp in which people would rather be bombed than live another day under such conditions, is a glaring example of misinformation.


01-18-07 - Simplify, then exaggerate:the neo-cons' route to disaster The "surge" idea was developed and promoted at the American Enterprise Institute, a Washington think-tank that has long served as neo-con central. The neo-cons, like President Bush, are getting another throw of the dice in Iraq......the experience of recent years should caution against basing policy on the urgings of neo-conservative journalists, no matter how persuasively they write.


01-18-07 - US condemns China 'space weapon' The United States, Australia and Canada have criticised China over a weapons test it is said to have carried out in space last week.


01-18-07 - Vindicating Larry Franklin Franklin, it turns out, was trying ? unconventionally ? to influence a debate in the administration in 2003 over a national security policy directive regarding Iran. He provided Aipac's Iran specialists, Steve Rosen and Keith Weissman, with his own list of specific instances of how Iran was sending teams from its Quds Force to sow terror, kill American soldiers, and pose a threat to Israeli operatives in northern Iraq Actually, all the latest news about Iran and etc has proven is that the Israeli lobby (via AIPAC, the neocons, and their cohorts at news outlets such as Fox News, the AP, etc) have still succeeded in lobbying the US to deal with Iran despite the Larry Franklin/AIPAC scandal. (And the NY Sun is a part of this lobby).


01-18-07 - Iraqi Refugees: Resettle the Most Vulnerable Although the violence in Iraq is so extreme that all civilians are at risk regardless of their religion or ethnicity, certain groups are particularly vulnerable. One such group is the Palestinians of Iraq.


01-18-07 - CIA leak case figures reject Cheney immunity


01-18-07 - Rice to brief PM on Mid-East tour


01-18-07 - Internet as Political Force Grows, Poll Finds The survey indicates that 11 percent of Internet users have become online political activists, defined as users who posted their own commentary to a newsgroup, Web site or blog, or posted or forwarded someone else's commentary, video or audio recordings.


01-18-07 - Response to Tough Dove on Dual Loyalty Charge, and Others I don't think a Washington thinktank should tell us to invade Iraq based on the views of someone who is voting in both Israel and the U.S.?without telling us as much. I don't think the New Yorker should be running pieces on All the good reasons to invade Iraq by a guy who served in the Israeli military, without telling us that


01-18-07 - Olmert seeks to cool rhetoric on Iran Ehud Olmert, the Israeli prime minister, has appealed to fellow politicians to cool their rhetoric about Iran?s nuclear ambitions and stop instilling in the public a fear that they threaten Israel?s existence. 'This fear campaign is directed at the American sheeple, it's not meant to scare our people, dammit!'


01-18-07 - New resident: No gov't will return Golan to Syria Construction continues in the Golan, despite media reports, which were denied Tuesday by the Prime Minister, of contact between Israel and Syria as a prelude to peace.


01-18-07 - Middle East hasn't turned out the way Bush, Rice predicted


01-18-07 - Lebanon says needs massive global aid Immediate material damage from the war has been put at 3.5 billion dollars in a country where public debt currently runs at 41 billion dollars -- or more than 180 percent of gross domestic product. Send the bill to Israel.


01-18-07 - The death of Saddam


01-18-07 - UN head says will work toward captive IDF soldiers' release "The UN needs to deal more with the Iranian threat," Gillerman said. Ban replied that denying the Holocaust, and the declarations by Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad about Israel's destruction, are unacceptable.