News for 01-31-07

01-31-07 - Report: US plans strike against Iran ** The US was drawing up plans to attack sites where Iran is believed to be enriching uranium before President George W. Bush's candidacy comes to an end, the UK-based Times reported on Wednesday.


01-31-07 - US military probing Iran link in Iraq attack that killed five **


01-31-07 - U.S.-Iran tensions could trigger war ** As the rhetoric grows more strident, a U.S. military official in the Gulf likened the U.S.-Iran standoff to the buildup in hostility in Europe before World War I, when the assassination of the heir to the Austrian throne triggered a tragic war that engulfed a continent.


01-31-07 - Iraq's Maliki warns US and Iran "But we're asking you please, solve your problems outside of Iraq. We do not want the American forces to take Iraq as a field to attack Iran or Syria, and we will not accept Iran to use Iraq to attack the American forces."


01-31-07 - Hague calls for tough Iran sanctions Britain should not rule out military action against Iran, the shadow Foreign Secretary, William Hague, said yesterday


01-31-07 - Saudi Arabia FM says Iran cooperating U.S. ally Saudi Arabia said Tuesday it was working with Iran, America's top rival in the Mideast, to find ways to ease the crises in Lebanon and Iraq - a departure from Washington's confrontational stance toward Tehran


01-31-07 - US 'reluctant' to hold direct talks with Iran: top US official The US is "reluctant" to hold direct talks with Iran until there is progress in the dispute over Tehran's nuclear program, John Negroponte, the incoming number two US diplomat, said.


01-31-07 - U.S. under pressure to stop saying no Millions of Iraqi refugees fleeing violence and sectarian cleansing after the U.S.-led invasion four years ago are finding it nearly impossible to get safe harbor in America, including those who risked their lives helping President George W. Bush's war effort.


01-31-07 - Iran nuclear negotiator lukewarm on proposed 'timeout'


01-31-07 - Iran two to three years from nuclear weapon: think tank Iran could be only two or three years away from being able to produce a nuclear weapon, the head of a leading international security think tank in London said.


01-31-07 - CCR and Other Groups Issue Open Letter Warning of Illegality of Any Offensive Military Action by US against Iran **


01-31-07 - Chuck Hagel and the Return of the Old Right Hagel represents a real threat to the hegemony of the neocons, especially if he earns the fealty of the Republican old guard and the Iraq Study Group crowd.


01-31-07 - Bush Is Not Above the Law by James Bamford Last Aug. 17, Judge Anna Diggs Taylor of the United States District Court in Detroit issued her ruling in the A.C.L.U. case. The president, she wrote, had ?undisputedly violated? not only the First and Fourth Amendments of the Constitution, but also statutory law, the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act.


01-31-07 - US 'Victory' against Cult Leader Was 'Massacre'


01-31-07 - Europeans Fear US Attack on Iran as Nuclear Row Intensifies **


01-31-07 - Sen. Robert Byrd: Bush Wants War with Iran **


01-31-07 - Europe Resists U.S. on Curbing Ties With Iran At issue now is how the resolution is to be carried out, with Europeans resisting American appeals for quick action, citing technical and political problems related to the heavy European economic ties to Iran and its oil industry


01-31-07 - Inflation: The Hidden Cost of War by Rep. Ron Paul As the war in Iraq surges forward, and the administration ponders military action against Iran, it's important to ask ourselves an overlooked question: Can we really afford it


01-31-07 - Iran Clock Is Ticking ** Military and intelligence sources continue to tell me that preparations are advancing for a war with Iran starting possibly as early as mid-to-late February....According to intelligence sources, Bush?s Iran strategy is expected to let the Israelis take a lead role in attacking Iran's nuclear facilities in order to defuse Democratic opposition and let the U.S. intervention be sold as defensive, a case of a vulnerable ally protecting itself from a future nuclear threat.


01-31-07 - Rerun: Cheap, safe drug kills most cancers Not neocon-related, but a story of import and one from a well-respected science news outfit. Don't want to see any CORPORATE interests quash this drug (if indeed it cures cancer).


01-31-07 - US money is 'squandered' in Iraq Millions of dollars in US rebuilding funds have been wasted in Iraq, US auditors say in a report which warns corruption in the country is rife.


01-31-07 - The Big Question: Does the US intend to attack Iran, or is it only sabre-rattling? **


01-31-07 - Israel has no plans against Iran ** Asked if he would rule out military action, Peres said, "By Israel, yes. Israel doesn't intend to use military action." Because in all likelihood, WE'LL be doing it for them.


01-31-07 - Rice to press for faster 'roadmap' plan for Israeli-Palestinian peace 'We need to attack Iran NOW!'


01-31-07 - "We Probably Gave Powell the Wrong Speech" The policy was set. The war in Iraq was coming and they were looking for intelligence to fit into the policy.


01-31-07 - Iran Blame Game Shifts into High Gear CNN, as a faithful propaganda handmaiden, is speculating, thus adding fuel to the attack Iran fire now smoldering, ready to break out into a five alarm conflagration, as planned, with the appropriate admixture of irresponsible speculation, as usual backed up with little more than thin air.


01-31-07 - Turkey, Syria call for Iraq's territorial integrity, unity


01-31-07 - Journalist Sy Hersh has harsh words for Bush On Friday, Hersh spoke at length about the administration's ambitions to cope with the threat of a nuclear Iran, drawing from his research for "The Iran Plans: Would President Bush go to war to stop Tehran from getting the bomb," published in the New Yorker on April 17, 2006.


01-31-07 - Libby lawyers pepper Cooper about Rove Cooper, Time magazine's White House reporter at the time, became the second reporter to testify at the CIA leak trial that Libby was a source for their learning that Valerie Plame, wife of ex-ambassador Joseph Wilson, was a CIA operative


01-31-07 - Peretz visits NATO Amir Peretz visited the international security alliance?s headquarters in Brussels on Wednesday for what his aides said was primarily a discussion of the global threat posed by Iran?s nuclear program


01-31-07 - The neocons have learned nothing from five years of catastrophe by Francis Fukuyama


01-31-07 - 9 arrested in alleged plot to behead soldier Counterterrorism police arrested nine men in an alleged kidnapping plot Wednesday - a plan that reportedly involved torturing and beheading a British Muslim soldier and broadcasting the killing on the Internet.


01-31-07 - French report: Former U.N. envoy Bolton says U.S. has 'no strategic interest' in united Iraq


01-31-07 - Hysteria at Herzliya by Patrick J. Buchanan ** There is no need for war. Yet, Israelis, neocons, and their agents of influence are trying to whip us into one. Senators who are seeking absolution for having voted to take us into Iraq ought to be confronted and asked just what they are doing to keep us out of a war in Iran.
Give 'em hell, Buchanan.


01-31-07 - Lebanon Crisis Fails Mediation, Plays into Israeli Hands It was sarcastically ironical for Bush to describe the Syrians as ?occupiers,? a word that he has so far missed to learn or utter in reference to his country?s four-year old occupation of Iraq or to the 40-year old Israeli occupation of the Syrian, Palestinian and Lebanese Arab territories.


01-31-07 - Muslim congressman condemns Iran's Holocaust denial Singer said the meeting is part of WJC's efforts to solicit condemnations of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad?s Holocaust denial from world leaders.


01-31-07 - Spooked Beirutis fear new 'balloon-borne' Israeli plot "It wasn't enough that they violate our skies daily with their drones and warplanes, now they sending over their balloons to terrorize the Lebanese people,"


01-31-07 - Judge Refuses To Deport Two Men Khader Hamide and Michel Shehadeh, two Palestinian men who were accused along with six others of having ties to Palestinian terrorists, were allowed in a ruling made public Tuesday to retain their U.S. citizenship, The Los Angeles Times reported. Strike that. Reverse (my earlier comments)...


01-31-07 - Textbooks promote jihad, Israeli study says Israel 'promotes Jihad' when it continually goads the US into fighting its wars in the Middle East. This has proved very costly both in terms of American blood and treasure.


01-31-07 - American Road Trip Through Arab Eyes


01-31-07 - Iran, Israel, The Big Lie and The Real Threat While many groups have been terrifying their members by depicting Ahmadinejad as bent on exterminating Jews, the Israeli lobby has been doing the same job on our government.


01-31-07 - Soldier's wife joins lawmakers' appeal U.S. Reps. Gary Ackerman (D-N.Y.), Mike Pence (R-Ind.) and Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (R-Fla.) held a news conference Tuesday with Karnit Goldwasser, whose husband, Ehud, is one of two Israeli soldiers being held captive in Lebanon. Somebody out there with time on their hands should compile a report detailing exactly how much time Capitol Hill is engaged in Israel-related activities, and exactly which legislators are involved.