www.timesonline.co.uk

West Bank torturers funded by Britain

Millions of pounds of British government money is going to Palestinian security forces which use methods of torture including hanging prisoners by their feet and putting them in “stress” positions for hours at a time.

Evidence to be published next month in a report by Human Rights Watch was corroborated last week in interviews by The Sunday Times with victims in the West Bank, ruled by President Mahmoud Abbas’s western-backed Palestinian Authority.

Prisoners who have emerged from Palestinian Authority jails – many of whom have never been charged with any offence or even seen a lawyer – said they had been subjected to mock executions, kicked, punched and beaten with sticks, plastic pipes and hoses.

The disclosures came at the end of a week in which a Berlin conference of 40 donor nations, including Britain, pledged £121m over the next three years to bolster the Palestinian security forces and judicial system in the West Bank.

Of this total, about £20m will come from Britain, which is already committed to spending £2.7m on the training of Palestinian security forces this year. A British brigadier based in the West Bank city of Ramallah is involved in the training. Britain has set aside a further £4.5m for reform, civil justice and public prosecution over the next three years.

A total of £4 billion overall has been promised to the government of Abbas, who is the commander-in-chief of the Palestinian security forces.

Western support for Abbas’s security forces is part of a strategy to isolate Hamas fundamentalists who seized control of Gaza last year.

However, many of those detained on suspicion of links to Hamas described a form of torture called “shabah” in Arabic – being forced to hold stress positions for prolonged periods.

Some have been made to stand with one leg and one arm raised for hours. Others have had to sit on the edge of a chair with their hands tied to their feet.

Amar al-Masri, 43, a Nablus businessman who is married to Kholoud al-Masri, an elected Hamas municipal official, has been held since last month in al-Jenid prison in Nablus. Last Thursday, his son Abdullah, 13, crossed off day 54 on a calendar on the family’s refrigerator.

“What is shocking me is that no charge has been addressed against my husband,” Kholoud said last week, sitting in her home in Nablus, a hijab (head-scarf) covering her hair.

“He is in a Palestinian jail, but we don’t know why.” She has been allowed to visit him only once.

“He said he was hung by his two legs by a rope connected to the ceiling,” Kholoud said. The prisoner’s lawyer said he had seen puffy wrists and legs that supported the testimony, as well as scabs on his legs and hands.

A former prisoner, interviewed at a coffee shop near his third-floor flat in Nablus after he was released at the end of a 50-day spell in prison, described similar experiences.

“They arrested me on fantasy charges that I had rockets,” said the 29-year-old law student, who did not want his name used out of fear the security forces would come after him.

“They tied my hands behind my back, and the rope was connected to a pipe,” he said. “They would stress the rope every 20 seconds. They said if they did it more I would be paralysed.”

He was eventually released without charge. “They [the security forces] told me, ‘You have been steadfast under torture so we have decided you are clean. We will not bother you again.’ ” The Palestinian Authority denied using torture in detention centres. “They are prisoners. We do not give them chocolate and roses,” said Akram Rajoub, head of preventive security in Nablus. “But I can assure you that we don’t use torture methods or shabah methods.”

The Foreign Office expressed concern at the Human Rights Watch revelations.

“The UK is concerned to hear reports of human rights violations in the occupied Palestinian territories,” a spokesman said. “We are committed to reforming the Palestinian security sector.”

British officials confirmed that the aid money pledged last week would be going to the West Bank security forces, which locals said were engaged in a crackdown on their political opponents in Hamas.

Although Hamas, a conservative Islamic party, was elected to power in January 2006, it has been largely shunned by the West because it refuses to recognise Israel or renounce violence.

Palestinian territory is virtually divided by internal disputes; Hamas’s writ runs in Gaza, while Abbas has appointed an emergency government composed mostly of officials from his Fatah party in the West Bank.

A spokesman for the Department for International Development, which administers the funds paid to the Palestinian Authority, confirmed that money was going to West Bank security forces but said some of it would be used to root out abuses.

“People are aware of irregularities in their behaviour . . . and that’s why we are investing in making them a more professional outfit and a more accountable police force,” the department said.

Human Rights Watch last week called for the aid going to the Palestinian Authority security forces to be made conditional on effective efforts to reduce arbitrary arrests and torture and on improving the system of justice.

Obama to Meet His Fans in Europe

By Gregor Peter Schmitz in Palo Alto, California www.spiegel.de

Barack Obama, the man most Europeans would like to see elected the next US president, plans to visit Berlin, Paris and London soon. The Democratic candidate is looking for statesmanlike images to boost his campaign and German politicians will be hoping some of his popularity rubs off on them.

According to the study "Imams in Germany," up to 20 percent of preachers belong to the more conservative, fundamentalist strand of Islam. The study also discovered that only one fifth of imam's possess academic qualifications.

The research is the work of a Duisburg social scientist, Rauf Ceylan, the son of Turkish immigrants. To conduct the study he attended religious services in mosques and carried out interviews with Muslim preachers.

According to Ceylan, the religious groups running mosques in Germany were mainly interested in their preachers correctly reciting the Koran. "An examination of the content of the holy book," he said was "not the primary goal."

Ceylan also found that many imams were susceptible to "superficial interpretations" of the Koran, because they lacked a proper academic education. It was not uncommon, Ceylan said, for these lay preachers to be drawn from the ranks of extremists.

Among the preachers who do have an academic qualification, the majority are employed in mosques run by a Turkish umbrella organization, DITIB. According to the study, these elite preachers are the only imams who are in a position to help members of their congregations to integrate.

However, these imams only come to Germany for four years. In the abscence of any exchange of knowledge between those preachers who have considerable experience of Germany and the newcomers, new imams have to start from scratch, the study concluded.

Khar, AFGHANISTAN (AFP)

Pakistani Taliban militants executed two Afghans in front of thousands of people on Friday after accusing the men of spying for U.S. forces, an AFP correspondent and officials said.

Gunfire also broke out in the crowd after the killings near Khar, the main town in the troubled northwestern tribal district of Bajaur, leaving another eight people injured, the correspondent and witnesses said.

The militants beheaded one man and shot dead the other after accusing them of passing information to coalition forces in Afghanistan that led to a missile strike in Bajaur in May which killed 14 people.

"There was a public execution by militants of two people who were kidnapped two days ago by Taliban on spying charges," a local security official told AFP, adding that it occurred 10 kilometers (six miles) west of Khar.

An AFP correspondent who witnessed the executions said more than 5,000 people had gathered at the patch of open ground to watch.

The Taliban then announced on megaphones that the men were spies who provided information to U.S. forces in Afghanistan that prompted May 14's air raid.

"The men's faces were covered and their hands were tied. One was slaughtered with a knife, the other was shot with a burst of fire from a Kalashnikov," the correspondent said.

After the executions the Taliban started firing in the air in jubilation, but when some shots fired from within the crowd it sparked a brief gun battle in which eight people were hurt.

"It was complete chaos, we managed to survive," a witnesss said.

In May militants beheaded a Pakistani paramilitary soldier and dumped his corpse with a note saying that he was killed in revenge for the missile strike in the Damadola area of Bajaur.

The missile strike targeted the houses of two local militant leaders, according to security officials.

Violence has risen in Pakistan's northwest in recent days despite ongoing peace talks between militants and the government, with reports this week saying that the main northwestern city of Peshawar was now under threat.

The execution came a day after U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates said Pakistan's failure to put pressure on Taliban forces on the border was a "concern".

In addition to the Israeli flag and the words of Israeli anthem "Hatikva," the hackers embedded the symbol of the Kach movement, an ultra-rightist organization founded by the Jewish Rabbi Meir Kahane that was banned from the Knesset in 1988 and later deemed a terrorist organization by Israel. The symbol appeared with the words "Kahane was right."

Pictures were also embedded on the sites showing Palestinian children strapped with explosives under the words "murderers from birth."

In a statement also printed on the site, the rightists wrote, "This site was hacked due to its blatantly anti-Zionist contents. Israel is not interested in people like you who are burdens on the process of proper decision-making in the government. If you oppose what you call the 'Israeli occupation' then there's no place for you here."

The 30-minute event at Washington's historic Mayflower Hotel took place the evening before the Democratic stars are to seal their reconciliation with a joint rally in the tiny New Hampshire town of Unity.

Obama gave Clinton a personal check for the legal maximum of 2,300 dollars, aides said, to help towards canceling campaign debts of 22.5 million dollars racked up in her ultimately doomed bid for the White House nomination.

Introducing Obama to more than 200 of her leading money people, Clinton lamented that the Democrats had won only three of the past 10 presidential elections.

‘That is a sobering thought,’ she said. ‘For me this is intensely personal, because I want to see our country once again not just solving problems... but lifting up our sights and finding the promise of our country.

‘We have to make it a priority in our lives to elect Barack Obama the next president of the United States,’ the New York senator said, to sustained applause.

Obama was warmly received as he dwelt on the historic nature of their primary epic, during which Clinton did markedly better among older women, Latino voters and working-class whites.

‘I recognize that this room shared the same passion that a roomful of my supporters would show. I do not expect that passion to be transferred,’ he said, describing Clinton as ‘unique.’

But Obama added: ‘Senator Clinton and I at our core agree deeply that this country needs to change. I'm going to need Hillary by my side campaigning during this election, and I'm going to need all of you.’

The Illinois senator recounted how he had told his top fundraisers this week ‘to get out their checkbooks and start working.... The debt that's out there needs to be taken care of.’

Obama and Clinton have exchanged warm words since she threw in the towel on June 7. But nothing talks in US politics like money -- and her supporters had been anxious for a financial gesture from the party's new champion.

Half of the debts were lent by Clinton herself from her ample family funds, and she says she needs to pay off her bills by the Democratic convention in late August to free her up for a full-throated campaign on Obama's behalf.

Obama's finance committee chairwoman Penny Pritzker wrote out a personal check of 4,600 dollars from herself and her husband to help retire Clinton's debt. ‘We're helping. It's important,’ the billionaire said.

Acknowledging the bruised feelings left by the five-month primary campaign, the former first lady said: ‘I know my supporters have extremely strong feelings, and I know Barack's do as well.

‘But we are a family, and we have an opportunity now to really demonstrate clearly we do know what's at stake, and we will do whatever it takes to win back this White House.’

Her husband, former president Bill Clinton, has given only tepid backing to Obama, and one of the questions going forward is what role the Democratic first couple will take in his campaign against Republican John McCain.

The ultimate gesture of reconciliation would be for Obama to select Hillary Clinton as his running mate. Outside the Mayflower, a small knot of protestors held placards demanding that ‘dream ticket.’

But polls suggest that all-important independent voters are skeptical about the idea, and that Clinton supporters are anyway now coalescing behind Obama.

Quinnipiac University polls released Thursday found Obama beating McCain in the battleground states of Colorado, Michigan, Minnesota and Wisconsin, thanks to rising support from women, ethnic minorities and younger voters.

Peter Brown, assistant director of the Quinnipiac University Polling Institute, said independents in the four states opposed Clinton as vice president by 16 to 29 percentage points.

Bavaria gets bareback in the saddle

Published: 25 Jun 08 17:54 CET
Online: http://www.thelocal.de/12711/

The Local (news@thelocal.de)

Mosque schools under investigation

Thursday 26 June 2008

Integration minister Ella Vogelaar has ordered an investigation into claims that Saturday mosque schools are using corporal punishment and that children are being indoctrinated to be anti-western, Trouw reports on Thursday.

The claims were made by an Amsterdam city councillor Ahmed Marcouch. Hundreds of children have lessons in the Koran and in Arabic in informal classes attached to mosques.

© DutchNews.nl

But, like so many of us, I am only human. How could I not dream of having a son who cared deeply about all the right things: fashion, musical theater, interior décor? But mostly a son who cared deeply about the most right thing of all: his mother? How could I not yearn for a son who would tell me that the bias cut emphasized my saddlebag thighs, that no one was staining concrete anymore, that the tiniest bit of white on the upper lids would open up my eyes and make me look 10 years younger? And now that California is handing out marriage licenses, what mother could resist the opportunity to micromanage a union in which both participants would obsess with her about whether the color theme celadon and peach or apple green and hot pink best expresses their love?

We all know the fate that awaits mothers of heterosexual sons. After straight boys learn how to order pizza, Mom becomes an abstraction. Straight sons sort of get that their mom is a tremendously powerful force in their lives, but, like the Federal Reserve System, they have no real understanding of or interest in how she works.

But gay men, whole other story. And that story is "Auntie Mame." Suddenly the maternal presence is a showstopping diva in chinchilla fitting a Benson Hedges into a 2-foot cigarette holder and zinging everyone in sight with one-liners, instead of Ma Kettle in a Mother Hubbard apron dishing up the possum stew and never exfoliating.

But remember all humor, to those who think it's funny, is amusing because there is a grain of truth in it. That truth, for people like this, is it's ok to be Gay. And if we can all just have one big laugh about it maybe it is alright. It's not funny, and it's not ok. She diguises her attempt to prop up an life style that is destructive, and more importantly, prohibited by God. Here is my advice to Mrs. Bird. First if you want friends that give you the selfish undivided attention you want, buy cat or something. Or try fostering this type of relationship with your husband. He should be your best friend anyway, now shouldn't he. Last a little admonition from the WORD OF GOD.

Matthew 18:6-8

6But if anyone causes one of these little ones who believe in me to sin, it would be better for him to have a large millstone hung around his neck and to be drowned in the depths of the sea.

 7"Woe to the world because of the things that cause people to sin! Such things must come, but woe to the man through whom they come! 8If your hand or your foot causes you to sin, cut it off and throw it away. It is better for you to enter life maimed or crippled than to have two hands or two feet and be thrown into eternal fire. 9And if your eye causes you to sin, gouge it out and throw it away. It is better for you to enter life with one eye than to have two eyes and be thrown into the fire of hell.

Just a little food for thought. Read the rest it's a real belly laugh /sarc.