Mr. Ghorbanifar Resurfaces With Material on Tehran
After His Iran-Contra Role Concern He’s a New Chalabi

As tensions rise between the U.S. and Iran, Manucher Ghorbanifar has been fanning the flames.

Twenty years after gaining brief notoriety during the Iran-Contra scandal, the France-based Iranian exile has once again found an audience in Washington for insights into his native country — to the dismay of some U.S. officials who dealt with him in the past.

The Central Intelligence Agency blacklisted Mr. Ghorbanifar in 1984 for providing allegedly bogus information on threats against President Reagan. It soured on him further after the exiled Iranian businessman helped set up an arms-for-hostage deal with Iran that in 1986 rocked the Reagan administration and embarrassed the CIA.

Since the attacks of Sept. 11, as Washington has focused more on Iran’s role in the Middle East and beyond, Mr. Ghorbanifar, now 61 years old, has bounced back. He met envoys from the Pentagon in Rome with the blessing of the White House, and shared his views with Republican and Democratic congressmen who traveled to France to meet him and his longtime confidant, Fereidoun Mahdavi, a former Iranian minister, according to American intelligence and congressional officials.

His message: Iran’s weapons programs and terrorism connections are expanding, and Tehran is directly targeting the U.S.

CIA operatives have spent hundreds of hours since 2003 trying to corroborate information passed on by Messrs. Ghorbanifar and Mahdavi, former officials involved with the effort say. They say the tips are no better than they were during the Reagan era.
wsj.com

Where was the Wall Street Journal back in the day?

SOME of the main fundraisers for the terror group suspected of masterminding the Bombay train bombings are operating from Britain, according to Indian intelligence officials.

The officials accuse Britain of failing to act against a number of wealthy businessmen, who they claim are using bogus charities to funnel up to £8 million a year to Kashmiri militants groups, such as Lashkar-e-Taiba, which remains the main suspect for orchestrating the synchronised bombings that killed 182 people.
timesonline.co.uk

Reid uses new laws to ban two Islamist groups for ‘glorifying terrorism’

Powerful military explosive used in India
BOMBAY, India – Investigators said Monday that RDX ‹ a military explosive favored by Islamic militants in India’s part of Kashmir ‹ was used in the deadly attack on Bombay’s rail system.

The announcement by a leading investigator was seen as further evidence of a link between Pakistan-based militants and the July 11 attack that killed 182 people and wounded more than 800.

“The explosive used was a mixture of ammonium nitrate, RDX and fuel oil,” said K.P. Raghuvanshi, leader of the anti-terrorist squad investigating the bombings.

Pakistan is bein framed.

The Afghan government has alarmed human rights groups by approving a plan to reintroduce a Department for the Promotion of Virtue and Prevention of Vice, the body which the Taliban used to enforce its extreme religious doctrine.

The proposal, which came from the country’s Ulema council of clerics, has been passed by the cabinet of President Hamid Karzai and will now go before the Afghan parliament.

‘Our concern is that the Vice and Virtue Department doesn’t turn into an instrument for politically oppressing critical voices and vulnerable groups under the guise of protecting poorly defined virtues,’ Sam Zia Zarifi of Human Rights Watch said. ‘This is specially in the case of women, because infringements on their rights tend to be justified by claims of morality.’

Under the Taliban the Ministry for the Promotion of Virtue and Prevention of Vice became notorious for its brutal imposition of the Taliban’s codes of behaviour. Religious police patrolled the streets, beating those without long enough beards and those failing to attend prayers five times a day. Widows suffered particular hardship because of the diktat that women be accompanied by a male relative when out of their homes, an impossibility for thousands of women widowed during decades of war. The Ministry was also charged with the imposition of the Taliban’s interpretation of sharia punishment. Executions at Kabul football stadium, which included female prisoners shot in the centre circle, did much to fuel the Taliban’s international isolation.

However, the Minister for Haj and Religious Affairs, Nematullah Shahrani, defended the new body. ‘The job of the department will be to tell people what is allowable and what is forbidden in Islam,’ he said. ‘In practical terms it will be quite different from Taliban times. We will preach € through radio, television and special gatherings.’
belfasttelegraph.co.uk

Sounds peachy.

Tony Blair today led calls for an international stabilisation force to be deployed in southern Lebanon to halt the conflict between Israel and Lebanese Hizbullah militants.
The prime minister, speaking after private talks with the United Nations secretary-general, Kofi Annan, said: “The only way we are going to have a cessation of violence is if we have an international force deployed into that area.”

The Finnish foreign minister, Erkki Tuomoija, whose country holds the revolving EU presidency, said in Brussels that the EU or UN may deploy such a force to end the conflict. A small UN contingent has been in the area for many years.

However, Israel said it was too early to talk about a new international military force being deployed in southern Lebanon to monitor the border area once hostilities with Hizbullah guerrillas ceased.

Asked about a new international military presence, the Israeli government spokeswoman Miri Eisin said: “I don’t think we’re at that stage yet. We’re at the stage where we want to be sure that Hizbullah is not deployed at our northern border.”

Some analysts believe that a major ground invasion of southern Lebanon is being considered by Israel.

Israeli fighters continued to bomb Lebanon today after warplanes extended the bombing to the north of the country overnight.

Planes and artillery struck 60 targets overnight, Israel said, and there were reports that at least 23 people had been killed in Lebanon in that strike.

At least 140 Lebanese civilians have died since the violence broke out last week after Hizbullah kidnapped two Israeli soldiers. At least 12 Israeli civilians have died in Hizbullah rocket attacks on Israel, as well as 12 Israeli soldiers and sailors.
guardian.co.uk

As the bombs rain down, a refugee crisis unfolds on the streets of Beirut
‡ Thousands of homeless or trapped Shia seek shelter
‡ Fleeing families killed in Israeli attacks on roads

Lebanon was on the brink of a humanitarian crisis yesterday as Israeli forces continued their bombardment and thousands of Shia Muslims either fled their homes or found themselves trapped.

In Beirut, where Israel has dropped leaflets from the air urging residents to leave the teeming suburbs controlled by Hizbullah, schools are being overwhelmed as families set up temporary homes in classrooms. Hundreds of others are sleeping out in the open.

Among them were 600 homeless Shia, 70% of them children, who spent Saturday night in Sanayeh park, not far from the city centre. Police were turning journalists away yesterday. “No photographs,” one said.

Left-wing rally: Negotiate with Hamas, Hizbullah
Some 1,000 protestors joined Sunday evening in a rally in Tel Aviv to protest the IDF strikes in Southern Lebanon. Police have arrested three of the protesters claiming they were holding a demonstration without a permit.

The protesters, who marched from Hen Boulevards toward King George Street, chanted slogans such as “Olmert agreed with Bush: War and occupation.” “Stop the war monstrosity,” and “Say no to the brutal bombardments on Gaza.” They also accused Defense Minister Amir Peretz of murdering children in Gaza, and recited: “Peretz, don’t worry, we’ll be seeing you at The Hague.”

An Interview with George Galloway
… I am dismally aware of the extent to which the blood of Palestinians is not worth anything like the blood of Israelis, still less the blood of Westerners. A good case in point was on the BBC’s Question Time when every single member of the panel knew the name of the Israeli occupation soldier ‘kidnapped’ by the resistance, and they felt they had to pay endless sympathies to his family.

I found myself screaming at the television: “Can any of you name a single Palestinian victim, just say in the last 12 days, when 24 Palestinians, mostly women and children were killed by Israel in bomb, shell and rocket attacks?” No one knows the names of these victims, no one describes the Palestinian leaders who were kidnapped and languish in Israeli dungeons. All were seized in exactly the same way as this Israeli solder was seized. This is a double standard that does not occur to most people, but is endlessly burrowing away in my mind.

MOORE: I guess you’d say that the lack of recognition for the democratically elected Hamas Government is another example of Western double standards.

GALLOWAY: That is just one of many contradictions. Palestine is the only Arab country in which there is a free vote, and in it the Islamist party won, and the response from external powers was that the party that won should immediately scrap the policy on which it won the election and adopt the policy of the party it defeated. When they refused to do this, an economic and political siege was imposed on the entire kidnapped Palestinian population, because of their temerity at electing politicians of whom the West does not approve.

Behind The Crisis: How Iran is wielding its influence to wage a stealthy war against Israel and America-msnbc
…But battles and battle lines are rarely if ever simple in the Middle East. Nasrallah knows that. So do the Israelis, who saw hidden hands behind the Lebanese and Palestinian militants. They accused Syria, which harbors the Hamas leadership in exile and has a longstanding alliance with Hizbullah in Lebanon, of complicity. But they also saw the long arm of their ultimate enemy, Iran, the creator of Hizbullah, a patron of Hamas, the ally of Syria, the provider of rockets that struck 22 miles deep into Israel last week and a missile that crippled an Israeli warship. Iran, developer of nuclear technology and eventually, perhaps, nuclear weapons.

In an exclusive interview with NEWSWEEK’s Richard Wolffe, President George W. Bush said he thinks those suspicions are legitimate: “There’s a lot of people who believe that the Iranians are trying to exert more and more influence over the entire region and the use of Hizbullah is to create more chaos to advance their strategy.” He called that “a theory that’s got some legs to it as far as I’m concerned.”

Boo

…we heard from many people the news is just too depressing. Obviously, we can’t sugar-coat what’s going on, but there are cases where we can be more solution-oriented.”
usatoday.com

Yeah, can’t somebody do something about all this gosh-darn depressing news? It’s harshing my mellow.

A US army general who oversees the Guantanamo Bay detention camp has been chosen as Nato’s next military head.

General Bantz Craddock, chief of US Southern Command, has been picked to be Supreme Allied Commander, Europe.

The choice of Gen Craddock, who succeeds retiring General James Jones, needs approval by the US Senate.

Gen Craddock has normally defended the controversial camp against criticism, although he has ordered investigations into some claims of abuse of suspects.

In one case, he blocked attempts to get a Guantanamo commander reprimanded over abuse claims, insisting the officer had done nothing wrong.

Nato announced in Brussels that Gen Craddock had been chosen to replace Gen Jones, who was the first Marine to hold the post.

“The Nato Defence Planning Committee, which takes this decision, agreed but also expressed to General Jones, in the name of Nato governments, their gratitude for his distinguished service,” the alliance said in a statement.
bbc.co.uk

Brought up on war crimes in The Hague? Hecks no. NATO command.

MEXICO CITY, July 16 For the second time in eight days, thousands of supporters of the leftist presidential candidate, Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, filled this city’s historic central plaza to demonstrate their support for his demand for a vote-by-vote recount of Mexico’s disputed July 2 election.

The crowds at this rally, several hundred thousand, were considerably larger than the last and seemed to indicate that the movement started by the embattled former mayor of Mexico City remained strong.

Mr. Lopez Obrador told the throngs of people roaring his name that a recount was not too much to ask to resolve the political crisis that has gripped the nation since election officials declared his conservative opponent, Felipe Calderon, who appeared to be the winner by less than 1 percent of 41 million ballots cast.
nytimes.com

What if Al Gore had been more like Mexican presidential candidate Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador?

What if he had not merely demanded a recount in Florida but encouraged Democrats to pour out into the streets, rather than discouraging them?

For that matter, what if Kerry had called for demonstrations after Ohio?

Thousands of people have demonstrated in Haiti’s capital, Port-au-Prince, demanding the return of exiled former President, Jean-Bertrand Aristide.

Supporters chanted “Aristide or death!” and “Aristide’s blood is our blood!” as they marched to the National Palace on the ex-leader’s 53rd birthday.

Mr Aristide fled an armed revolt two years ago and is in South Africa.

President Rene Preval had said during this year’s election campaign he would consider allowing him to return home.

However, the US has warned this could destabilise the country.
bbc.co.uk

‘Fled’? Nice piece of revisionist history there…

Massacre of Haiti innocents
The killings began before dawn. Men armed with automatic rifles walked through the hillside slum of Grand Ravine, warning of a fire and yelling for residents to come out of their cinder-block and sheet-metal shacks. Those who obeyed were gunned down.

Several hours later, Haitian morgue workers and UN peacekeepers from Sri Lanka piled bodies in one of the slum’s main thoroughfares, a rocky stream bed at the bottom of the ravine after which the neighbourhood is named. The body count totalled 21, including three women and four children. Most of the victims were killed with a bullet to the head.

YENAGOA, Nigeria (Reuters) — Two suspected explosions at crude oil pipelines operated by Italian oil company Agip caused massive spills in Nigeria’s southern state of Bayelsa, state government officials said on Thursday.

In a separate incident in neighboring Delta state, heavily armed militants engaged troops protecting a convoy of Chevron supplies in a skirmish, but no-one was killed, a top military official said. The explosions on the Agip pipelines, which feed the 200,000 barrel-per-day Brass crude oil export terminal, occurred on Wednesday, said Bayelsa state’s Commissioner for Special Duties Dickson Bakebain.
cnn.com

MOGADISHU, Somalia When a Coca-Cola bottling plant opened here two years ago, the 400-plus investors invited to finance the project were carefully chosen by clan.

There were Abgal investors and Habar Gedir investors, and representatives of other clans around Somalia as well. All kicked in a minimum of $300 to help start the United Bottling Company, Somalia’s only Coca-Cola maker. It was a deliberate effort to create a feeling of communal ownership for the factory in a place where clan-based conflict has long been the rule.

It was a bold business venture, building a sparkling, $8.3 million facility in such a tumultuous capital. The thinking was that Somalia had huge business potential and that the anarchy that erupted after its last government collapsed in 1991 would give way to economic recovery.

But Somalia is a difficult place to read, and now, two years after the plant went up, the Coke brand faces a much changed business environment, one with both opportunity and peril. Islamic militias took over the capital in June and brought stability to the city, so much so that the Coke bottler here predicts its sky-high security costs will soon plummet.

‘Before, we had gunmen accompanying our distributors,’ Mohammed Hassan Awale, the sales manager and acting general manager of the plant, said in an interview. ‘Now, no guns are needed.’

There is another benefit to peace, he said. ‘If there is peace, there is opportunity for work, for business, and people will have money to buy Coke,’ he said.

The new political reality in Mogadishu has also taken a bite out of business, as some imams have begun railing against Coke, calling it an un-Islamic beverage that should not go down a proper Muslim’s throat.

Nur Barud Gurhan, a hard-line sheik in Mogadishu, raised the issue in January during a protest against cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad that were published first in Denmark and then in other countries. He declared that Westerners were enemies of Islam and that their products, anything from milk that originates in Denmark to Atlanta’s most famous carbonated export, should not be consumed by Somalis.

The anti-Coke campaign was picked up by members of the Islamic courts who took over Mogadishu. They defeated the secular warlords who long controlled the country, and who received American financial support in recent years for their efforts to root out terrorists.

Using Washington’s support for the warlords as a rallying cry, the Islamic militias have also railed against Coke, spreading a message in mosques that has already prompted many to abstain.
nytimes.com

How many other corporations?