Editor's Note

After forty years of disappointments, difficulties and bumps on the road, growing up in a Palestinian refugee camp, spending years of displacement in Beirut and self-exile in Berlin, London, Paris, Montréal and Moscow, I decided to spend the rest of my life working exclusively for the common good of the humankind-A.G. Continue reading...
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  • Sep/11 Tenth Anniversary: Fruitless Debates and Mirage Issues

    On the tenth anniversary, the events of 9/11 are no longer the political concern of the U.S. Administration; they remain the topic of study for analysts, theorists, conspiracists and historians, away from any political implications or effect of change. This is because the desired outcome of 9/11 has already been realized at all political, social and legislative levels, domestically and worldwide.

  • Will the world achieve food security?

    The world has to increase food production by 50 percent by 2030 and double it by
    2050 to meet future demand. This seems to be the consensus among economists,
    scientists, politicians and representatives of the agricultural industry. But
    does the world really have to do so? Even if the global population crosses 9 billion by 2050, which looks likely given
    the present trend, the world may not need to double its food production if food
    is not wasted and dietary habits change to healthier ways.
    The need for a 100 percent rise in food production was based on a UN Food and
    Agriculture Organization report. But recent studies show the report implies
    that global food production during the 45 years from 2005 need to be raised by
    about 70 percent. The 30 percent gap is huge. In fact, it is equivalent to the
    food produced by the whole of the American continent.
    So, what is the message? The world has to increase, by hook or crook, the output of
    agricultural and livestock (milk, meat and eggs) products by at least 70
    percent. But isn't that a tough task, because urbanization across the world is
    eating into agricultural land, and once agricultural-surplus nations have been
    forced to become food-scarce countries today? For example, Mexico, the land
    where corn originated has to import corn.
    Isn't it surprising that China, where rice was first cultivated and which is still
    its largest producer, has to import its staple? Isn't it surprising that not
    China, where tea originated and which is still its largest producer and
    consumer, but Kenya is its largest exporter? Isn't it surprising that India,
    which introduced sugar to the world, has to import sugar today? And isn't it
    surprising that India and Pakistan, where cotton was first cultivated, have to
    import cotton today?
    The answer to all the questions is "no", for that is the natural outcome
    of market economy and globalization policies. Global food production and
    distribution no longer depends on the simple laws of demand and supply.
    Instead, they depend on the intricate and complicated policies of the World
    Trade Organization (WTO) and the whims of multinational companies
    Such policies and whims have given rise to supermarkets (even in the developing
    world) that waste food products, especially perishables, the most. (To see how,
    one needs to just watch veteran French documentary filmmaker Agnes Varda's The
    Gleaners and I.)
    If we can save food from being wasted (wasting food is a common phenomenon
    throughout world, but more intense in the West), and if we can change our
    unhealthy eating habits, the world may not even have to increase the food
    production by 70 percent to feed the projected population of more than 9
    billion people by 2050. But that would be contrary to the demands of market
    economy.
    Market economy is all about increasing production infinitely and making money. So, if
    millions of tons of food grains rot in Indian government warehouses, we should
    let them rot, instead of trying to distribute them among the poor and hungry
    people of the country. Why? Because distributing food for free goes against the
    laws of market economy.
    Despite what Economics Nobel laureate Amartya Sen says, a democratically elected
    government is no guarantee against famine. Or else how starvation can be
    explained in a democratic country like India?
    Food is no longer dependent on the backbreaking labor of farmers? It is not
    dependent on the whims of nature or proper irrigation, either? It depends on
    market laws worked out by international organizations such as the WTO,
    International Monetary Fund, World Bank and multinational corporations. It is
    their laws and schemes that have forced almost all or most of the African
    nations to become food-insufficient. It is their plans that force most of the
    developing world to depend on supplies from the developed countries, which
    perforce subsidize their agricultural products.
    The world today has more than 1 billion hungry people. And even it were to double
    its food production, as demanded by international organizations, by 2050, it
    would still have 290 million hungry people.
    Where will this cycle of poverty and hunger end? The answer is no one knows, not as
    long as the Bretton Woods institutes and multinational corporations are allowed
    to decide the fate of the world.
    The author is a senior editor at China Daily. He can be reached at
    oprana@.hotmail.com
    (Source:
    China Daily)
     
  • It Is Official: The US Is A Police State

     On September 24, Jason Ditz reported on Antiwar.com that “the FBI is confirming that this morning they began a number of raids against the homes of antiwar activists in Illinois, Minneapolis, Michigan, and North Carolina, claiming that they are ‘seeking evidence relating to activities concerning the material support of terrorism.’” 

  • Vomiting Perfidy

    Who am I ? The eternal Question . Have not figured it out fully yet . All you need to know about me is that I am a Middle Easterner, an Arab Woman - into my 40's and old enough to know better.

  • Everything You Know About Iran Is A Myth

    There are some terms that people in Islamic and Western countries should never say to each other, because they confuse and inflame more than they clarify. The most obvious ones would be “jihad”, “crusade” and “great satan”.

     

  • The stark choice facing our species; Collapse or Survive

    We all know what has to happen. But are we too primitive and irrational to do it?
    We are – at the same time – thrillingly close and sickeningly far from solving our planetary fever. The world's leaders huddled in New York City yesterday to discuss man-made global warming, in a United Nations building that will soon be underwater if they fail. They all know what has to happen: their scientists have told them, plainly and urgently.

  • What Did Ahmadinejad Really Say?

    It is an important principle of journalism that when someone makes a statement, especially a controversial one with grave implications, the comment should be put in the fullest possible context so the reader can make an informed judgment. But that rule doesn’t seem to apply when the New York Times writes about Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

  • The World Seed Conference: Good for farmers?

    Last week marked a little-known and under-reported symposium held in Rome under the auspices of the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation -- the World Seed Conference. Although the subject may appear obscure, the conference theme and the issues discussed, including plant variety protection and seed improvement techniques, could not be more important to millions of farmers in the developing world.

  • How Low Will Israel Stoop in Its Propaganda War?

    'The Israel Project', a US media advocacy group, has produced a revised training manual to help the worldwide Zionist movement win the propaganda war, keep their ill-gotten territorial gains and persuade international audiences to accept that their crimes are necessary and conform to 'shared values' between Israel and the civilized West.

  • The News Media Scam

    Here's a quotation that should awaken every American.

    The enormous gap between what US leaders do in the world and what Americans think their leaders are doing is one of the great propaganda accomplishments of the dominant political mythology.  (Michael Parenti, political scientist and author)

  • Death Squads, Disappearances and Torture in Pakistan

    As the Obama administration prepares a major escalation of the so-called AfPak war, reports from Pakistan’s Swat Valley, near Afghanistan’s eastern border, provide a gruesome indication of the kind of war that the Pentagon and its local allies are waging.

  • Traficant speaks out against the powers that be on Fox News

    In his first interview after being released from prison last week, former congressman James Traficant let the cat out of the bag about the strangle hold that the Pro Israel Lobby has over Washington DC. The interview took place last night with Fox News's Greta Van Susteren.

  • What Role Did The U.S.-Israeli Relationship Play In 9-11?

    On the day of the 9-11 attacks, former Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was asked what the attack would mean for US-Israeli relations. His quick reply was: "It's very good. Well, it's not good, but it will generate immediate sympathy (for Israel)."

  • US presence in Iraq is actually growing

    Believe it or not, the U.S. presence in Iraq is growing under the leadership of antiwar president Barack Obama. A recent Washington Post by reporter Walter Pincus explains that when U.S. troops are "withdrawn," their jobs are taken over by......mercenaries -- the notorious "contractors," who are hired for fabulous sums of money to sustain the huge U.S. presence there.

  • 9/11 pretext for “war on terror”: an exclusive Zionist scheme

    On the eighth anniversary of 9/11 events, having witnessed and observed how the war was conducted, and how the atrocities and destructions were systematically executed, I believe, firmly and straightforwardly, that the whole scene has been an exclusive Zionist scheme that dragged into its inferno the US and the entire Western World.

  • Treason, Betrayal and Deceit: 9/11 and Beyond

    The attacks on September 11, 2001 have been a defining moment for America. The political and psychological impact on Americans of a concerted and visible attack in America was enormous -- indeed, it is an interesting "coincidence" that the attacks occurred on the one day of the year whose mention reinforces a public sense here of danger and emergency: 9-1-1.

  • A 9/11 Reality Check

    What if eight years ago the World Trade Center had been leveled by a small nuclear bomb that took out most of lower Manhattan as well? How many millions of innocent civilians would we have killed in retaliation? Would we still be a free society, or would Dick Cheney have attained the power of a demented king, having moved on from snooping on our phone calls and outing honest CIA agents to destroying the last vestiges of the rule of law?

  • Europe’s Complicity in Evil

    There is a widespread supposition that Obama, being black and a member of an oppressed race, will imbue US foreign policy with a higher morality than the world experienced from Bush and Clinton.  This is a delusion.

  • US's 'Arc of Instability' Just Gets Bigger

    The New Great Game is not only focused on the face-off between the United States and strategic competitors Russia and China - with Pipelineistan as a defining element. The full spectrum dominance doctrine requires the control of the Pentagon-coined "arc of instability" from the Horn of Africa to western China. The cover story is the former "global war on terror", now "overseas contingency operations" under the management of President Barack Obama's administration.

  • Go to Pittsburgh, Young Man, and Defy Your Empire

    Globalization and unfettered capitalism have been swept into the history books along with the open-market theory of the 1920s, the experiments of fascism, communism and the New Deal. It is time for a new economic and political paradigm. It is time for a new language to address our reality. The voices of change, those who speak in powerful and yet unfamiliar words, will cry out Sept. 25 and 26 in Pittsburgh when protesters from around the country gather to defy the heads of state, bankers and finance ministers from the world’s 22 largest economies who are convening for a meeting of the G-20. If we heed these dissident voices we have a future. If we do not we will commit collective suicide.

  • Will Wall Street's Meltdown Turn America Into a Police State?

    I'm not much of an Army Times reader, but after reading that a brigade was shipping from Iraq in October to serve as "an on-call federal response force for natural or manmade emergencies and disasters, including terrorist attacks" in the homeland right before the election, my antennae perked up. Same as they did when I read that an electoral college doomsday scenario exists in which Dick Cheney casts the deciding vote that gives McCain-Palin the White House.
  • An Emergency Bailout Plan That Americans Will Love

    There is a great economic emergency looming in our country. But, it seems to me that we—or at least our elected leaders—have only looked at one side of the crisis, that of the housing bubble-inspired financial credit crunch. By doing so, we’ve missed the bigger picture and the solutions needed. So, here is one person’s take on the Emergency Economic Bailout package that will heal the economy.
  • The Illusion of Sovereignty

    Perhaps sovereignty is relative; how else can one explain the subjugation of the most powerful industrial nations to the will of another while under the delusion of independence, national interest, democracy, and even capitalism? A single country, Israel and its powerful lobby AIPAC have altered the course of history in America and by extension, the rest of the world.
  • The financial meltdown explained

    Today’s banking crisis is the THIRD trillion dollar plus US-caused financial meltdown in the last 20 years. Each one of these crises came into being through the same basic mechanism . . . the fraudulent over-valuing of financial assets by Wall Street -- with a “wink and a nod” (and sometimes a lot more) from the White House and Congress.

  • The Creation of the Second Great Depression

    Whenever a Great Bipartisan Consensus is announced, and a compliant media assures everyone that the wondrous actions of our wise leaders are being taken for our own good, you can know with absolute certainty that disaster is about to strike.
    The events of the past week are no exception.
  • Two-State Solution Failed: the Future Is One Nation

    The one-state solution is now part of mainstream discourse. Increasingly, Palestinians - and some Israelis - support it as the only alternative to a Palestinian state subordinate to Israel. One-state groups have sprung up and conferences and studies are under way.
  • When 'viral sovereignty' threatens the world's health

    Here's a concept you've probably never heard of: "viral sovereignty." This dangerous idea comes to us courtesy of Indonesia's minister of health, Siti Fadilah Supari, who asserts that deadly viruses are the sovereign property of individual nations - even though they cross borders and could pose a pandemic threat to all the world's peoples. Political leaders around the world should take note - and take very strong action.
  • The Democrats endorse the "Global War on Terrorism"

    Obama's "American Promise" is War.  Barack Obama has embraced the "Global War on Terrorism" (GWOT).  The Obama-Biden campaign has endorsed the very foundations of the Bush administration's foreign policy agenda: "Go after Osama bin Laden, "take him out".   The rhetoric is softer but the substance is almost identical: 
  • Pakistan's Balkanization

    Re-mapping of the Muslim world is under spotlight in the US and Pakistan's balkanization forms a part of this agenda. American strategists are propagating the need to redraw its borders on ethnic lines by creating new political entities in the name of justice long denied to 'oppressed Muslim minorities'. 'Internal factors' are identified in each case, sometimes very naïvely, that they believe could lead to desired fragmentation. Redrawn maps were released, ostensibly to test the waters. That this also reflects the mindset of the US administration can be seen by its efforts and actions to engineer grounds for military intervention, regime-change or fragmentation in target countries.
  • The Point of No Return

    Following another eratic day of trading on the stock market, Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson and Federal Reserve chairman Ben Bernanke convened an emergency meeting of the Senate Banking Committee and other congressional leaders to request fast-track authority for a sweeping plan to buy back illiquid assets and other complex securities from distressed and under-capitalized banks.
  • The Party's Over

    The Crash of 2008, which is now wiping out trillions of dollars of our people's wealth, is, like the Crash of 1929, likely to mark the end of one era and the onset of another.
    The new era will see a more sober and much diminished America. The "Omnipower" and "Indispensable Nation" we heard about in all the hubris and braggadocio following our Cold War victory is history.
    Seizing on the crisis, the left says we are witnessing the failure of market economics, a failure of conservatism.
  • "We Blew Her to Pieces"

    Book review
    Aside from the Iraqi people, nobody knows what the U.S. military is doing in Iraq better than the soldiers themselves. A new book (Winter Soldier: Iraq and Afghanistan by Aaron Glantz )gives readers vivid and detailed accounts of the devastation the U.S. occupation has brought to Iraq, in the soldiers' own words.
  • Washington Is Risking War with Pakistan

    As Wall Street collapsed with a bang, almost no one noticed that we're on the brink of war with Pakistan. And, unfortunately, that's not too much of an exaggeration. On Tuesday, the Pakistan's military ordered its forces along the Afghan border to repulse all future American military incursions into Pakistan. The story has been subsequently downplayed, and the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff, Mike Mullen, flew to Islamabad, Pakistan's capital, to try to ease tensions. But the fact remains that American forces have and are violating Pakistani sovereignty

  • Has the U.S. Invasion of Pakistan Begun?

    As Andrew Bacevich tells us in the latest issue of the Atlantic, there's now a vigorous debate going on in the military about the nature of the "next" American wars and how to prepare for them. However, while military officers argue, that "next war" may already be creeping up on us.
  • The American War Moves to Pakistan

    The decision to make public a presidential order of last July authorizing American strikes inside Pakistan without seeking the approval of the Pakistani government ends a long debate within, and on the periphery of, the Bush administration. Senator Barack Obama, aware of this ongoing debate during his own long battle with Hillary Clinton, tried to outflank her by supporting a policy of U.S. strikes into Pakistan. Senator John McCain and Vice Presidential candidate Sarah Palin have now echoed this view and so it has become, by consensus, official U.S. policy.
  • Common plastics chemical linked to human diseases

    plastics harm humansLONDON (Reuters) - A study has for the first time linked a common chemical used in everyday products such as plastic drink containers and baby bottles to health problems, specifically heart disease and diabetes.

  • Bush's Overseas Policies Begin Resembling Obama's

    Barack Obama contends that a John McCain presidency would amount to little more than President Bush's third term. But as it turns out, an Obama presidency might look a bit like Bush's second.
  • 9/11 and the Great American Decline

    "9/11 was wielded as a kind of weapon to take down the planet."
    "S
    o, what do you think will happen now?" The question was posed by the taller of two young Israelis, my sole companions in this section of Liberty State Park on the Jersey City side of the Hudson River, the morning of September 11, 2001.
    "Everything has changed," I replied, unaware that the same phrase was simultaneously forming on the lips of millions around the globe.
  • Reflections on 9-11

    It is the 7th anniversary of September 11, 2001 and it seems like a good time to reflect on what our nation has lost since that tragic day and what we can do to go forward.

    I do not think that anyone alive on that day will forget the shock that struck our nation when the symbols of US capitalism and militarism were struck out of the clear blue sky. I was in panic mode for a few days, because I did not hear from Casey who was stationed at Ft. Hood on that day and his base went into lock-down and he was too busy to call. Even though we mourn with our fellow Americans, the loss of over 3000 innocent people and the pain their families have had to deal with, the attacks of 9-11 have touched every American.
  • Health-Care Realism

    Unless you've been living in the Himalayas, you know that huge numbers of Americans -- last year 46 million lack health insurance. By impressive majorities, Americans regard this as a moral stain. At the Democratic National Convention Sen. Ted Kennedy echoed the view of many that health care is a "right" that demands universal insurance. This completely understandable view is, I think, utterly wrong. Take note, Barack Obama John McCain.  

  • US Waves Goodbye to Prosperity and Democracy

    THE events of the weekend begin the greatest intervention in the US economy by the Federal Government since the Great Depression, with the Bear Stearns rescue but a splutter on this road we must now travel.
    If you were wondering what all the flag-waving at the Republican convention has been about, it is now clear. Americans are waving goodbye to the prosperity the nation has enjoyed since the Great Depression and a final goodbye to democracy. But while preparation for the most important decision made in the nation's post-depression financial history towered above the conventions, I don't think the fate of Freddie and Fannie and the remaining government-sponsored enterprises (GSEs) was mentioned during either convention.
  • Eat less meat and save the planet

    People should have one meat-free day a week if they want to make a personal and effective sacrifice that would help tackle climate change, the world's leading authority on global warming has told Britain's Observer newspaper.

  • Hypocrisy of this Magnitude has to be Respected

    The Democrats should run on the slogan "If you liked Bush, you'll love McCain", but that would be too outspoken, too direct for the spineless Nancy Pelosi and her spineless party. Or, "If you liked Iraq, you'll love Iran." But the Democrat leadership is not on record as categorically opposing either conflict.

  • The Iraq War: the trickiest fraud in human history

    On April 9, 2003, Baghdad fell as a result of what the Pentagon called the strategy of shock and awe, which allegedly means assuring rapid dominance without inflicting physical pain or destruction, but the senseless genocide and blind destruction against peaceful communities and innocent civilians have never stopped..

  • Turning away from American state terrorism

    The choice we face in November is very clear. It is a choice to continue to support the US “war on terror,”Cover-up or to turn away from this path of unlimited destruction. This lie-based war is all about terrorism -- whether America actually fights terrorism or promotes its use. To find the answer to this conundrum all we have to do is turn our gaze to Pakistan.

  • The Real McCain

    Meet the Senator Most Likely to Start a Nuclear War

    It's November 19, 2004, a mere two weeks after the election that returned George W. Bush to power, and Senator John nucllear threatMcCain has traipsed off to New Hampshire to give a speech calling for 50,000 more troops to be sent into the quagmire of Iraq, press flesh and raise money for an expected run at the presidency in 2008. John Sununu, former New Hampshire governor and Bush family consigliere, wryly quipped about McCain's junket to the Granite State, "What took him so long?"
  • World Bank says food crisis, silent famine to continue

    There is no end in sight to global food shortages and multiple crises from climate change and energy and water scarcity will soon intensify what is already a silent famine, the World Bank said on Wednesday.
  • The Revolution of the Meek

    What words can I conjure to give meaning to the visions that dominate my brain, images of evil and bloodlust, consuming the flesh of an unwary people. I see the rapidly approaching epic, the cataclysmic convulsion of a violent racist culture, stabbing feverishly at its own womb, hoping to abort the birth of the new man of peace and unity.
  • Who Is Wrecking America?

    Does the liberal-left have a clue? I sometimes think not. In his book, “What’s the Matter With Kansas?,” Thomas Frank made the excellent point that the Karl Rove Republicans take advantage of ordinary’s people’s frustrations and resentments to lead them into voting against their best interest.
    Frank’s new book, “The Wrecking Crew: How Conservatives Rule,” lacks the insight that distinguished his previous book. Why does Frank think that conservatives or liberals rule? Neither rule.
  • Stars, Stripes, War and Shame

    Freedom and justice are concepts we can no longer take for granted. They aren’t guaranteed by stars, stripes, and platitudes. The truth is that George Bush and Dick Cheney have sucked the life out of our Constitution, aided by Congressional Republicans and Democrats as well as too many among the electorate who are guilty by reason of fear or complacency.

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