231 Goldstone: UN finds bomb which challenges Israeli version of attack on civilian building

Goldstone: UN finds bomb which challenges Israeli version of attack on civilian building

(1) Attention deficits of young people threaten newspaper survival - Ari Shavit
(2) Goldstone: UN finds bomb which challenges Israeli version of attack on civilian building
(3) Gaza in Plain Language, a documentary on Israel's war of 2008-9
(4) Israel pays 10.5 million dollars for damage to UN Gaza premises
(5) Hamas has accepted Israel's right to exist
(6) Netanyahu demands Israeli presence in a demilitarized West Bank
(7) 911: Beware of Webster Tarpley's Disinformation - Christopher Bollyn

(1) Attention deficits of young people threaten newspaper survival - Ari Shavit

{but why these attention deficits? is TV the cause? the "entertainment" culture? what does it portend for the transmission of civilization? Shavit says that American dollars of Sheldon Adelson are behind the rise of Netanyahu, via Adelson's free newspaper in Israel. Americans are no longer free to donate to Islamic fundamentalists, so why not stop this flow of funds to Jewish fundamentalism too? - Peter M.}

http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1144124.html

Media difficulties

By Ari Shavit

There is one subject journalists have difficulty dealing with: the press. For understandable reasons, newspapers and journalists who know how to critically look at the government, security, law and economics do not know how to deal with the media in the same way. Now there is no choice. The crisis in the Israeli media in 2010 requires public discourse and perhaps even public action. Newspapers and journalists no longer have the right to remain silent when it comes to the goings-on in their own backyard. They have to get rid of the skeletons in their closets, which are threatening the future of a free press in Israel.

Fundamentally, the crisis is global. In the United States and in Europe, the best and the strongest of media outlets are in danger. The Internet and the attention deficits of young people have caused the traditional press to lose paying readers at a murderous rate. Advertising is shrinking as a result. The business structure that allowed the existence of free, high-quality, privately funded media in the 20th century is no longer a valid model for the 21st century. One after the other, leading newspapers are closing, while the survivors are shriveling and becoming yellow and foolish.

In Israel, the global crisis has a unique dimension. Two and a half years ago the Jewish American billionaire Sheldon Adelson launched the free newspaper Israel Hayom, now distributed daily, with a circulation of about 250,000. In the short run, the appearance of this giant from Las Vegas in the local arena was good for the Haaretz Group, which cooperates in printing and distribution. However, from the point of view of the other two Hebrew dailies, Israel Hayom is an existential threat. Yedioth Ahronoth is bleeding and losing its hegemony. Maariv may fold in less than a year.

The result is all-out war. Yedioth Ahronoth and Maariv are trying to silence Israel Hayom through a bill prohibiting foreign ownership of newspapers. Other bills are now in the pipeline. Meanwhile, in an amazing coincidence, the two newspapers are furiously assailing those perceived as Adelson's proteges: Benjamin and Sara Netanyahu. Bibi's immediate ouster is not only a political aspiration, but now also an essential business interest of the two veteran afternoon papers. However, Adelson is made of strong enough stuff that threats do not deter him. On the contrary, he is upping distribution of his free paper to defeat, once and for all, Yedioth Ahronoth and its owner, Arnon Mozes.

In the short term, the Adelson-Mozes struggle is welcome. For too many years, too many Israelis have lived with the feeling that Noni Mozes is the strongest man in Israel. Politicians, businesspeople and journalists did not dare oppose him. Therefore, the fact that Adelson is undermining this hidden autocracy contributes to making Israeli society freer.

However, in the long term, this struggle of the titans is dangerous. If Maariv closes, it will be a serious blow to the Israeli press. If Haaretz has difficulties later on, it would be a disaster in terms of culture and values. Israel will be a different country. Even a very weak Yedioth Ahronoth is a serious problem. In the end, Israel could find itself in a situation in which total domination by one media giant is exchanged for total domination by another media giant.

The situation is clear: Israel's media are failing, and market forces alone are not enough to save them. The only solution is artificial intervention. Just as the American government saved the banks, the Israeli government should save the newspapers. Nicolas Sarkozy already did so in France. He granted the print media extensive tax breaks, distributed free subscriptions to young people and increased public advertising. At a cost of 600 million euros, he managed to implement an emergency program to save the press without interfering in its content and without impairing its freedom. A similar plan is now needed in Israel.

Israeli democracy needs Yedioth Ahronoth, Maariv, Haaretz and Israel Hayom. It must act with determination and creativity to ensure the future of a free press.

(2) Goldstone: UN finds bomb which challenges Israeli version of attack on civilian building

From: ReporterNotebook <RePorterNoteBook@Gmail.com> Date: 03.02.2010 04:58 PM

UN team find remains of aircraft-dropped bombs, contradicting Israeli report on military conduct during three-week conflict

Rory McCarthy | The Guardian | February 1, 2010

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/feb/01/gaza-war-report-accuses-israel
http://alethonews.wordpress.com/2010/02/02/un-find-challenges-israeli-version-of-attack-on-civilian-building-in-gaza-war/

A new Israeli report defending the military's conduct in the Gaza war was challenged tonight after evidence emerged apparently contradicting one of its key findings.

Israel submitted a 46-page report to the UN on Friday saying its forces abided by international law throughout the three-week war last year. It was meant to avert the threat of international prosecutions and to challenge a highly critical UN inquiry by South African judge Richard Goldstone, which accused both Israel and Hamas of "grave breaches" of the fourth Geneva convention, war crimes and possible crimes against humanity.

The Israeli report looked in detail at a handful of incidents, including the attack on the al-Badr flour mill in northern Gaza, which was severely damaged.

The UN mine action team, which handles ordnance disposal in Gaza, has told the Guardian that the remains of a 500-pound Mk82 aircraft-dropped bomb were found in the ruins of the mill last January. Photographs of the front half of the bomb have been obtained by the Guardian.

This evidence directly contradicts the finding of the Israeli report, which challenged allegations that the building was deliberately targeted and specifically stated there was no evidence of an air strike. Goldstone, however, used the account of the air strike as a sign that Israel's attack on the mill was not mere collateral damage, but precisely targeted and a possible war crime.

The flour mill attack was not the most serious incident of the war: although nearly 1,400 Palestinians and 13 Israelis were killed in just three weeks, no one died at the mill. However, because it was a civilian building producing food – the only operational mill in Gaza – the incident received particular criticism from Goldstone, who concluded that the building was hit by an air strike, the attacks were "intentional and precise", and they were "carried out for the purpose of denying sustenance to the civilian population". He added that the attacks violated the fourth Geneva convention and customary international law and may constitute a war crime.

In its defence, the Israeli report admitted the building had been hit by tank shells but said it was a "legitimate military target" because there were Hamas fighters "in the vicinity of the flour mill". It said the mill was "not a pre-planned target" and specifically denied it was hit by an air strike.

"The military advocate general did not find any evidence to support the assertion that the mill was attacked from the air using precise munitions, as alleged in the human rights council fact-finding report," it said. The military advocate general "found no reason" to order a criminal investigation.

But the Guardian visited the mill days after the war last year and on the first floor of the building saw what appeared to be the remains of an aircraft-dropped bomb in the burnt-out milling machinery.

The UN mine action team said it identified an aircraft-dropped bomb at the mill on 25 January last year and removed it on 11 February. "Item located was the front half of a Mk82 aircraft bomb with 273M fuse," according to the team. "The remains of the bomb were found on an upper floor in a narrow walkway between burnt-out machinery and an outside wall." The bomb was made safe by a technical field manager and removed.

The team also provided two photographs of what it said were the bomb remains, marked with the date and time it was identified: "25 Jan, 14:38". The team did not do a damage assessment of the building to see what other ordnance hit because that was not its task.

Asked to explain the new evidence today, the Israeli military referred the Guardian to an Israeli foreign ministry statement that summarises last week's report and states that the military is "committed to full compliance" with the law of armed conflict and to investigating any alleged violations.

As well as the heavy death toll, the Gaza war damaged a large amount of civilian infrastructure: more than 21,000 buildings and apartments were wholly or partly destroyed, including more than 200 major factories.

The al-Badr flour mill was the largest mill in the strip, with production lines spread over five floors – each of which were hit. Gaza's largest concrete factory, at a different site a few miles away, was also destroyed, as were several large food processing plants.

Goldstone said the nature of the attack on the flour mill "suggests that the intention was to disable its productive capacity" and said there was no plausible justification for the extensive damage. "It thus appears that the only purpose was to put an end to the production of flour in the Gaza Strip," his report said. It is not clear why Goldstone did not use evidence from the UN team in his report.

Rashad Hamada, one of two brothers who owns the mill, gave evidence at a public hearing in Gaza last June and said the mill was hit by an air strike. He said the factory twice received phone calls from the Israeli military telling them to evacuate the building in the days before the strike, but the factory was not used by Hamas or other Palestinian fighters.

Both Hamada brothers possess hard-to-obtain businessmen's permits to enter Israel and were therefore regarded as credible witnesses by the Goldstone team.

"What happened at the mill is total destruction of the whole production line of the factory," Hamada said. He estimated his losses due to the destruction were $2.5m (£1.7m) and said he believed that the mill had been targeted because it was working.

Four other flour mills in Gaza that were not operational were not targeted, he said. "As for the targeting, it is because [it was] a flour mill that is working," he said.

(3) Gaza in Plain Language, a documentary on Israel's war of 2008-9

From: galen <denzen@umich.edu> To: Anthony Lawson <lawson911@gmail.com> Date: 09.02.2010 02:23 PM

Gaza in Plain Language
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QFK5TNcmEmg

== The article Gaza in Plain Language, by Joe Mowrey, fwas irst published by Dissident Voice

http://dissidentvoice.org/2010/01/gaza-in-plain-language/

Gaza in Plain Language

by Joe Mowrey / January 19th, 2010

In articles acknowledging the one year anniversary of the assault on Gaza, blunt and unsparing language about what really happened is often avoided. Despite sympathy for and support of the Palestinian people in their struggle against dispossession and oppression, the description of what took place in January 2009 is sometimes buffered by a misguided sense of political correctness. Yes, it’s terrible. Yes, it is unjust. But we don’t want to be inflammatory or risk offending the sensitivities of those who through their own willful ignorance cling to the notion that Israel is a victim state, fighting for its very survival. The argument is that we should reach out to them and attempt to educate them and win them over.

I’ll be more forthright in this commentary.

The sociopathic Zionist administration of Israel, as part of its continuing brutal colonization of Palestine, set out to deliberately devastate the already nearly-incapacitated infrastructure which supports the existence of one and a half million human refugees. The people of Gaza, second-, third-, and fourth-generation dispossessed Palestinians, are living in forced exile from land their families inhabited and cultivated for generations. Half of them are children under the age of fifteen. Their culture and their economy has been systematically ravaged by Israel for decades and since 2006 a criminal siege supported by the United States, as well as much of the international community, has deprived them of all but the most minimal resources for subsistence. This oppressed and brutalized population was then bombed, bulldozed and terrorized mercilessly for twenty-three days.

Below is a small sampling of facts concerning what the fourth largest military in the world did to a captive and defenseless population. The source materials used to substantiate these statistics are available on request. If the reality presented here goes beyond the stretch of your imagination, you can verify the data yourself. Though you’d better hurry. Much of this information appears to be disappearing down Google’s memory hole, just as is the fate of the people of Gaza. A source referencing the percentage of agricultural land destroyed in the onslaught which was used for a shorter version of this article just a few weeks ago is no longer archived in Google’s cache. Surprise, surprise.

You will also find that exact figures vary somewhat depending on the source. But whether it was 21,000 structures or 22,000 structures destroyed, whether 280 schools were destroyed or badly damaged verses 230, the overwhelming truth of the physical devastation which took place in Gaza and the fact that this destruction was deliberate and premeditated is irrefutable. Even the Goldstone Report, itself a document with severe pro-Zionist overtones issued by a declared Zionist and a supporter of Israel, states unequivocally, “…[the] deliberate actions of the Israeli forces and the declared policies of the Government of Israel … cumulatively indicate the intention to inflict collective punishment on the people of the Gaza Strip in violation of international humanitarian law.”

We’ve heard time and again that more than 1400 Palestinians were killed, over 80% of them civilians, including 342 children. It has become a familiar talking point in discussions of last year’s assault, so much so that it may have lost its impact on our consciousness. But what we often aren’t reminded of is the horrific level of carefully-planned destruction of civilian infrastructure in Gaza orchestrated by Israel during Operation Cast Lead.

Financed and armed by the United States, the Israeli military destroyed fifteen percent of the structures in Gaza, approximately 22,000 buildings, including 5300 housing units destroyed or subject to major damage. Another 52,000 homes received some form of structural damage. Over 200 factories and 700 stores and businesses were destroyed or badly damaged. Of the residences, factories and businesses completely destroyed, 1300 of the homes and approximately 25% of the commercial property was deliberately and painstakingly bulldozed or exploded by Israeli ground forces. Eight hospitals and 26 primary health care clinics were damaged or destroyed. More than 280 schools were damaged or destroyed.

Water and sewage treatment facilities as well as electricity infrastructure were deliberately targeted leaving vast segments of the population with little or no power or clean water for the duration of the assault and for weeks and months to follow. Massive amounts of agricultural lands were systematically bombed or bulldozed. Some estimates suggest that as much as 80% of the arable land in Gaza has been ruined or declared off-limits to the people of Gaza over the last decade. Two million litres of wastewater at Gaza City’s sewage treatment plant, bombed during the assault, leaked into surrounding agricultural land making it unusable.

An Israeli television station boasted that Israeli war planes alone, without accounting for tank, ground troop and warship ammunition, dropped approximately one thousand tons of bombs on Gaza during Operation Cast Lead. The effort involved months, if not years, of carefully-considered target selection, giving lie to any claim that the devastation was incidental. It requires a stunning level of denial and self-delusion to pretend the destruction which was achieved in Gaza had anything to do with Israel’s “security” or the targeting of Hamas militants. This was savage and barbaric collective punishment unleashed on a civilian population, nothing more. Any suggestion to the contrary must be sharply and immediately ridiculed as absurd.

This was arguably the first aerial bombing campaign ever conducted on a defenseless civilian population held captive within a fenced enclosure and not allowed to escape the assault. It is a measure of the cynical mindset of the Israeli military that leaflets were sometimes dropped in neighborhoods about to be bombed suggesting the residents flee. We are about to destroy your home; you had better get out. Flee to where? Gazans are not allowed to leave their open-air prison, not even when under attack. This tactic on the part of Israel also gives lie to the claim that homes and buildings were targeted because there were Hamas militants “hiding” inside. Why then warn them to leave before destroying the structures?

Given this litany of horror and the coldly premeditated nature of its execution, we need to ask what kind of society condones this level of savagery on the part of their government? What precedent is there for such monstrous disregard for even the most basic tenets of human decency? We need look no further than the behavior of our very own United States, of course. In Iraq, the toll of our psychotic militarism is well over a million human beings (not counting the years of punishing economic sanctions) and a large part of the infrastructure of an entire nation of more than 26 million people has been obliterated. Let’s not even begin to tally up the deaths resulting from U.S. imperialism around the globe in the last sixty years alone. It would put the Zionists to shame–mere pikers in the annals of human slaughter.

And what of Gaza today, one year later? Israel’s continued illegal siege, enabled by the U.S., Egypt (a U.S. client state) and the international community has prevented any substantial amount of building materials from entering Gaza. Essentially, no reconstruction has been possible. The people of Gaza live amongst the rubble left to them by Israeli hatred and aggression. They are attempting to rebuild their society using mud bricks and materials salvaged from the wreckage.

The next time someone attempts to argue, “Israel has a right to defend itself,” or uses what I call the abusive spouse defense, ”Look what you made me do,” tell them, “No.” Tell them there is no and can never be any acceptable justification for the deliberate devastation of entire societies, no matter what political, ideological or “security” issues, real or imagined, may be at stake. It is unconscionable. It is wrong. Plainly put, there is no sane argument in favor of such behavior. Those who believe there is must be contradicted and opposed at every available opportunity.

Joe Mowrey is an anti-war activist and an advocate for Palestinian rights who lives in Santa Fe, New Mexico. He can be reached at jmowrey@ix.netcom.com. Read other articles by Joe.

(4) Israel pays 10.5 million dollars for damage to UN Gaza premises

By Haaretz Service, News Agencies

Last update - 21:31 22/01/2010

http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1144504.html

Israel has paid a total of 10.5 million dollars for the damage it caused to UN properties in Gaza Strip during its three-week offensive in the Gaza Strip against Hamas last winter.

The UN originally demanded 11.2 million dollars to cover seven raids by the Israeli Defense Forces that damaged or destroyed UN premises in Gaza, including schools and offices.

Israel said damage to UN premises was caused unintentionally when its troops responded to Palestinian fire and argued that Hamas operatives fought in, or near UN-protected buildings during the fighting.
A senior Israeli diplomat at the United Nations, who asked not to be named, said, "We have decided to make an ex gratia payment to the United Nations and we have indeed done it."

UN officials said the compensation related primarily to property since there had been no UN loss of life.

The main damage to UN property in Gaza came on Jan. 15 when Israeli shells hit a compound of the UN Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA), badly damaging a warehouse and training center. Several UN-run schools were hit in other strikes.

UNRWA provides aid to Palestinian refugees

UN spokesman Martin Nesirky said, "The final agreement for the payment of 10.5 million dollars closed the dispute between the two sides."

(5) Hamas has accepted Israel's right to exist

From: ReporterNotebook <RePorterNoteBook@Gmail.com> Date: 22.01.2010 03:47 AM

http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1263147942240&pagename=JPost/JPArticle/ShowFull

Jan 21, 2010 1:16 | Updated Jan 21, 2010 12:14

'Hamas accepts Israel's right to exist'

By KHALED ABU TOAMEH

Hamas has accepted Israel's right to exist and would be prepared to nullify its charter, which calls for the destruction of Israel, Aziz Dwaik, Hamas's most senior representative in the West Bank, said on Wednesday.

Dwaik's remarks are seen in the context of Hamas's attempts to win recognition from the international community.

Dwaik is the elected speaker of the Palestinian Legislative Council. He was released a few months ago after spending nearly three years in an Israeli prison.

Dwaik was among dozens of Hamas officials and members who were rounded up by Israel following the abduction of IDF soldier St.-Sgt. Gilad Schalit near the Gaza Strip in June 2006.

His latest remarks were made during a meeting he held in Hebron with British millionaire David Martin Abrahams, who maintains close ties with senior Israeli and British government officials.

Abrahams is scheduled to brief British Foreign Secretary David Milliband this weekend on the outcome of his meeting with Dwaik and other top Hamas officials in the West Bank.

Abrahams, a major donor to Britain's Labor Party, told The Jerusalem Post he would urge Milliband to "consider the implications of Hamas's positive overtures."

During the meeting in Hebron, Dwaik stressed that other Hamas leaders, including Damascus-based leader Khaled Mashaal and Gaza Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh, have voiced support for the idea of establishing an independent Palestinian state within the pre-1967 boundaries.

"The [Hamas] charter was drafted more than 20 years ago," Dwaik noted, adding that his movement would even be prepared to "nullify" the document.

"No one wants to throw anyone into the sea," he said.  ...

(6) Netanyahu demands Israeli presence in a demilitarized West Bank
From: Sadanand, Nanjundiah (Physics Earth Sciences) <sadanand@mail.ccsu.edu> Date: 23.01.2010 02:53 PM

JERUSALEM, January 21, 2010, The Hindu, Chennai (India)

Netanyahu demands Israeli presence in West Bank

http://beta.thehindu.com/news/international/article83364.ece

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Wednesday that Israel must have a presence in the West Bank even after a peace agreement is achieved, the first time he has spelled out such a demand.

He said the experience of rocket attacks from the Lebanese and Gaza borders means Israel must be able to prevent such weapons from being brought into a Palestinian entity in the West Bank.

"We cannot afford to have that across from the centre of our country," he told foreign reporters on Wednesday in Jerusalem.

"We are surrounded by an ever-growing arsenal of rockets placed in the Iranian-supported enclaves to the north and to the south," he said, referring to Lebanon and the Gaza Strip.

Palestinians want to create an independent state in the West Bank, Gaza Strip and east Jerusalem with no Israeli presence, military or civilian.

Under the current situation, Israel is in overall control of the West Bank and its borders, though the Palestinian Authority patrols main population centres.

Mr. Netanyahu outlined the defensive systems Israel is developing to knock down incoming rockets, but he admitted that they are "prohibitively expensive." He said that Hezbollah in Lebanon and Hamas in Gaza get their rockets from neighbouring countries, and that must be stopped.

At the news conference, Mr. Netanyahu also appealed for tough international sanctions against Iran. He said there is "wide acceptance" of Israel's view that Iran poses a strategic threat because of its nuclear programme.

"The question is, is there a willingness to act. We will soon find out," he said.

(7) 911: Beware of Webster Tarpley's Disinformation - Christopher Bollyn

http://wakeupfromyourslumber.com/blog/joeblow/2010/february/07/webster-tarpley-exposed

Webster Tarpley exposed!

http://www.bollyn.com/index.php#article_11619

Beware of Webster Tarpley's Disinformation

January 20, 2010

A reader sent me a link to a YouTube video of Webster Tarpley being interviewed on Russia Today (RT) television on December 29 about the false-flag "attempted terror" attack that occurred on Christmas Day on Delta's Northwest Airlines Flight 253 from Amsterdam's Schiphol Airport to Detroit. The video is interesting because it shows how Tarpley lies to protect Israel and the Mossad by putting the blame for the attempted bombing on the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), which is currently headed by Leon E. Panetta, a man I have met on several occasions when he was my Congressman for the Monterey Bay area of California.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TQY6brH5OPE[/youtube]

Webster Tarpley spews his usual disinformation when he says that Al Qaida in Yemen is "a creation wholly of the U.S. intelligence agencies." Who exactly is Tarpley protecting with these lies and who is he really serving?

I happen to know something about Webster Tarpley, having been part of the same four-man panel during Jimmy Walter's 9-11 Truth Tour in Europe in the summer of 2005. During the tour Tarpley put the blame for 9-11 on a nebulous group that he never actually identified but one would infer was tied to NATO and the CIA. Tarpley, like all the other panelists on the tour, never mentioned any Israeli or Zionist role in 9-11. My speech, on the other hand, focused on the real evidence that 9-11 was an Israeli false-flag terror atrocity designed to start the "War on Terror" and change the face of America. Finally, in Rome, in the presence of journalist Maurizio Blondet and others, I asked Mr. Tarpley why he insisted on blaming nebulous U.S. entities, without providing any evidence, while avoiding the real evidence of Israeli/Mossad involvement in the terror attacks of 9-11?

Tarpley blames the false-flag terror attacks of 9-11 on U.S. intelligence, as can be seen from the cover of his book. He carefully avoids the abundant evidence of Israeli involvement in 9-11 and the "War on Terror", which is a Zionist-designed conflict pushed by the current Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu since the mid-1980s.

In the RT video about Al Qaida in Yemen, Mr. Tarpley provides the same faulty logic and avoids any mention of Israeli intelligence, which has carried out large-scale operations in Yemen since 1949.

Here are the relevant quotes from Tarpley on RT television:

"Al Qaida, of course, is functioning, as always, as the CIA Arab-Islamic legion."
(Note the use of affirmative phrases to bolster his lie.)

"Al Qaida in the Arab Peninsula is a creation wholly of the U.S. intelligence agencies."

[The Christmas bomber Abdul Mutallab] is a "protected patsy", according to Tarpley, "an asset controlled by U.S. intelligence."

Webster Tarpley and his wife, the former Leah J. Peltier, live in the Washington, D.C. area. Leah is 17 years younger that Webster and only obtained a college degree in 2009. She has been with Tarpley since his days with the Lyndon LaRouche movement in the early 1990s. Her lack of real estate expertise or education notwithstanding, Leah is the Executive Vice President of Operations at the Washington D.C. office for the privately-owned Cresa Partners LLC, where she has worked only since 2007.

Leah Tarpley works under Gene S. Sachs, a "managing principal" and member of the board of directors of the Boston-based company. Leah is not the only Tarpley working for Mr. Sachs. Chloe Tarpley is also listed as an administrator in his firm. Chloe, who has only worked for Cresa Partners since May of 2008, is Webster Tarpley's daughter.

{caption} Chloe Tarpley resembles her father.
(Source: Facebook) {end}

It is interesting to note that the Tarpley women work for the preferred agent of one of the world's largest defense contractors. Mr. Sachs' biggest client is BAE Systems North America. Sachs has completed more than 275 assignments for BAE in twenty states of the United States in the past five years. BAE Systems is the world's third largest defense contractor and Britain's leading aerospace/defense company.

In the company's own words:

BAE Systems Inc. is the U.S. subsidiary of BAE Systems plc, an international company engaged in the development, delivery and support of advanced defense and aerospace systems in the air, on land, at sea and in space. Headquartered in Rockville, Maryland, BAE Systems, Inc. employs some 45,000 employees in the US, UK, Sweden, Israel and South Africa generating annual sales in excess of $10 billion. BAE Systems Inc. consists of three operating groups that provide support and service solutions for current and future defense, intelligence, and civilian systems; design, develop and manufacture a wide range of electronic systems and subsystems for both military and commercial applications; and design, develop, produce, and provide service support of armored combat vehicles, artillery systems and intelligent munitions.

{caption} BAE's "Typhoon" is just one of the many war-fighting systems made by the British weapons giant. {end}

Sachs has been the preferred real estate provider for BAE Systems NA since 2000 and manages some 18.5 million square feet of property for the sprawling British defense contractor. He is also the Treasurer of CresaPartners in Washington, according to Hoover's, so with two members of the Tarpley family working in his office, we can see that Mr. Sachs has a significant influence over the income flow for the Tarpley household.

{caption} Leah Tarpley works for Gene S. Sachs at the Washington office of CresaPartners LLC. {end}

{caption} Gene S. Sachs, Managing Principal of CresaPartners LLC and preferred agent for the British defense giant BAE Systems, is Mrs. Tarpley's boss and paymaster. {end}

If Mr. Tarpley has any solid evidence that Al Qaida in Yemen is, in fact, "a creation wholly of U.S. intelligence agencies" he should bring this information to the attention of the U.S. government and Leon E. Panetta, the Director of the CIA. Mr. Tarpley should explain who controls Al Qaida in Yemen, which he says is "functioning, as always, as the CIA Arab-Islamic legion." Pray tell Mr. Tarpley, which part of the CIA is running Al Qaida in Yemen? Is it under the direction of Mr. Panetta or is it a rogue outfit of the agency?

Mr. Tarpley should be asked if the CIA was running Al Qaida in Yemen when the USS Cole was bombed in 2000, an attack that killed 17 sailors and wounded 39 others. Perhaps Mr. Tarpley can explain the logic of why the CIA would attack a U.S. Navy ship in Yemen.

The bombed USS Cole looked very much like the USS Liberty after Israel bombed it in 1967. If "Al Qaida" in Yemen is really "controlled by U.S. intelligence," as Webster Tarpley says, he should explain why they would bomb their own ship. He should present his evidence to the U.S. government and Director of the CIA, if he has any.

Tarpley mentions that the Christmas bomber Abdul Mutallab flew through Amsterdam but he doesn't mention the conspicuous fact that security for both Schiphol Airport and Delta Airlines is provided by the Mossad-run company, International Consultants on Targeted Security -- the same company that provided passenger screening services at the crucial airports on 9-11.

So who is Webster Tarpley really serving with his disinformation?

{caption} Christopher Bollyn with Italian 9-11 journalist Maurizio Blondet at the Excelsior Hotel in Rome in June 2005 after asking Webster Tarpley why he avoided any discussion of Israeli involvement in 9-11. {end}