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  • Munich Shooter Considered Himself Aryan, Admired Hitler and Breivik. No Wonder the Media Has Moved On | Alternet
    http://www.alternet.org/grayzone-project/munich-shooter-considered-himself-aryan

    Once the dust of Munich cleared, the media settled on describing the massacre as a “classic shooting rampage,” and not an act of terror. The reason was simple: the shooter was not motivated by Islamist religious extremism, but by the same fanaticism as those who attempted to seize the moment to incite against Muslims.

  • In response to Elie Wiesel advertisement comparing Hamas to Nazis, 327 Jewish Holocaust survivors and descendants publish New York Times ad accusing Israel of ’ongoing massacre of the Palestinian people.’
    Holocaust Survivors Condemn Israel for ’Gaza Massacre,’ Call for Boycott - Diplomacy and Defense - Haaretz

    Haaretz Aug 23, 2014
    read more: http://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/1.612072

    http://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/1.612072

    Hundreds of Holocaust survivors and descendants of survivors have signed a letter, published as an advertisement in Saturday’s New York Times, condemning “the massacre of Palestinians in Gaza” and calling for a complete boycott of Israel.
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    According to the letter, the condemnation was prompted by an advertisement written by Elie Wiesel and published in major news outlets worldwide, accusing Hamas of “child sacrifice” and comparing the group to the Nazis.
    The letter, signed by 327 Jewish Holocaust survivors and descendants of survivors and sponsored by the International Jewish Anti-Zionist Network, accuses Wiesel of “abuse of history” in order to justify Israel’s actions in the Gaza Strip:
    “…we are disgusted and outraged by Elie Wiesel’s abuse of our history in these pages to justify the unjustifiable: Israel’s wholesale effort to destroy Gaza and the murder of more than 2,000 Palestinians, including many hundreds of children. Nothing can justify bombing UN shelters, homes, hospitals and universities. Nothing can justify depriving people of electricity and water.”
    The letter also blames the United States of aiding Israel in its Gaza operation, and the West in general of protecting Israel from condemnation.
    “Genocide begins with the silence of the world,” the letter reads.
    The letter ends with a call to bring the blockade of Gaza to an immediate end, and for a full boycott of Israel. “Never again” must mean NEVER AGAIN FOR ANYONE!,” the letter concludes.
    Full text of letter:
    "Jewish survivors and descendants of survivors and victims of Nazi genocide unequivocally condemn the massacre of Palestinians in Gaza
    "As Jewish survivors and descendants of survivors and victims of the Nazi genocide we unequivocally condemn the massacre of Palestinians in Gaza and the ongoing occupation and colonization of historic Palestine. We further condemn the United States for providing Israel with the funding to carry out the attack, and Western states more generally for using their diplomatic muscle to protect Israel from condemnation. Genocide begins with the silence of the world.
    "We are alarmed by the extreme, racist dehumanization of Palestinians in Israeli society, which has reached a fever-pitch. In Israel, politicians and pundits in The Times of Israel and The Jerusalem Post have called openly for genocide of Palestinians and right-wing Israelis are adopting Neo-Nazi insignia.
    "Furthermore, we are disgusted and outraged by Elie Wiesel’s abuse of our history in these pages to justify the unjustifiable: Israel’s wholesale effort to destroy Gaza and the murder of more than 2,000 Palestinians, including many hundreds of children. Nothing can justify bombing UN shelters, homes, hospitals and universities. Nothing can justify depriving people of electricity and water.
    “We must raise our collective voices and use our collective power to bring about an end to all forms of racism, including the ongoing genocide of Palestinian people. We call for an immediate end to the siege against and blockade of Gaza. We call for the full economic, cultural and academic boycott of Israel. “Never again” must mean NEVER AGAIN FOR ANYONE!”
    For full list of the letter’s signatories, click here

    • Des survivants de l’Holocauste condamnent Israël pour le massacre de Gaza et appellent au boycott
      Déposé par VB dans 26 août 2014
      http://www.gauche-anticapitaliste.ch/old/?p=12348

      Nous publions, dessous, un article paru le 23 août dans le quotidien israélien Haaretz portant sur une lettre rédigée par 327 juifs et descendants de survivants de l’Holocauste qui condamnent le massacre en cours à Gaza et appellent au boycott d’Israël.

      Des centaines de survivants et descendants de survivants de l’holocauste ont signé une lettre, publiée sous forme de publicité dans le New York Times de samedi, condamnant « le massacre des Palestiniens de Gaza » et appelant à un boycott total d’Israël.

      Selon la lettre, la condamnation a été motivée par une annonce écrite sous forme d’une publicité par Elie Wiesel et publiée dans les principaux organes de presse du monde entier, accusant le Hamas de « sacrifice d’enfants » et comparant le groupe aux nazis. Le chapeau de l’encart publicitaire que s‘est payé Elie Wiesel (prix Nobel de la paix, rescapé du nazisme) annonçait de façon plus que provocatrice « Les juifs ont rejeté le sacrifice des enfants il y a de ça 3,500 ans. A présent c’est au tour du Hamas ». La lettre, signée par 327 survivants et descendants de survivants de l’Holocauste juif et parrainée par le réseau international juif anti-sioniste, accuse Wiesel « d’abus de l’histoire » afin de justifier les actions d’Israël dans la bande de Gaza :

      « Nous sommes dégoûtés et scandalisés par la violence d’Elie Wiesel qui abuse notre histoire dans ces pages pour justifier l’injustifiable : l’effort systématique d’Israël à détruire Gaza et à assassiner plus de 2.000 Palestiniens, dont des centaines d’enfants. Rien ne peut justifier le bombardement des abris de l’ONU, les maisons, les hôpitaux et les universités. Rien ne peut justifier de priver les gens de l’électricité et de l’eau ». La lettre accuse également les Etats-Unis d’aider Israël dans son opération de Gaza, et l’Occident en général de protéger Israël de la condamnation. »Le génocide commence par le silence du monde », dit la lettre. Elle se termine par un appel à mettre immédiatement un terme au blocus de Gaza et à un boycott total d’Israël. La lettre conclue par « Never again » (ndlr : « Plus jamais ça ») doit signifier « Plus jamais ça pour qui que ce soit ! »

      Le texte intégral de la lettre :

      « Les survivants et descendants de survivants et victimes du génocide nazi condamnent sans équivoque le massacre des Palestiniens à Gaza.

      Comme survivants et descendants de survivants juifs et des victimes du génocide nazi, nous condamnons sans équivoque le massacre de Palestiniens à Gaza, l’occupation continue ainsi que la colonisation de la Palestine historique. Nous condamnons en outre les États-Unis pour fournir à Israël le financement nécessaire pour mener à bien cette attaque, et les pays occidentaux plus généralement, pour peser de tout leur poids diplomatique afin de protéger Israël de la condamnation. Tout génocide commence par le silence du monde.

      Nous sommes alarmés par l’extrême et très raciste déshumanisation des Palestiniens dans la société israélienne, qui a atteint un paroxysme. En Israël, les politiciens et les experts dans le Times d’Israël et le Jerusalem Post ont appelé ouvertement au génocide des Palestiniens, tandis que la droite israélienne arbore désormais publiquement des insignes néo-nazi.

      En outre, nous sommes dégoûtés et scandalisés par la violence d’Elie Wiesel pour justifier l’injustifiable : l’effort de guerre d’Israël consiste à détruire Gaza et à assassiner plus de 2.000 Palestiniens, dont des centaines d’enfants. Rien ne peut justifier le bombardement des abris de l’ONU, des maisons, des hôpitaux et des universités ! Rien ne peut justifier de priver les gens d’électricité et d’eau !

      Nous devons élever nos voix et utiliser notre pouvoir collectif pour mettre un terme à toutes les formes de racisme, y compris le génocide en cours du peuple palestinien. Nous demandons la fin immédiate du siège et du blocus de Gaza. Nous appelons au boycott économique, culturel et académique d’Israël. « Never again » doit signifier PLUS JAMAIS POUR PERSONNE ! »

    • Clinton Campaign Slams Max Blumenthal for Accusing Eli Wiesel of ’Inciting Hatred’

      ’Secretary Clinton emphatically rejects these offensive, hateful, and patently absurd statements about Elie Wiesel,’ policy adviser says.
      JTA Jul 07, 2016 2:19 PM
      read more: http://www.haaretz.com/world-news/u-s-election-2016/1.729514

      (...) Secretary Clinton emphatically rejects these offensive, hateful, and patently absurd statements about Elie Wiesel,” Jake Sullivan, a policy adviser to Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign, said in a statement shared with JTA on Wednesday. “She believes they are wrong in all senses of the term.”

      The statement was in response to a series of tweets over the weekend by Max Blumenthal, a journalist who often writes critically about Israel. Although Blumenthal has no connection to the Clinton campaign, he is the son of Sidney Blumenthal, a longtime confidante and adviser to the presumptive Democratic presidential candidate. The connection is mentioned frequently by other journalists when writing about Max Blumenthal.

      Just hours after Wiesel’s death on Saturday, Max Blumenthal wrote a flurry of tweets insisting Wiesel should not be be honored because of his unwavering support for Israel.

      “Elie Wiesel is dead. He spent his last years inciting hatred, defending apartheid & palling around with fascists,” Blumenthal wrote.

      “Elie Wiesel went from a victim of war crimes to a supporter of those who commit them. He did more harm than good and should not be honored.”

      In his response, Sullivan said Blumenthal and others “should cease and desist” from criticizing the Auschwitz survivor and author.

      “Elie Wiesel was a hero to her as he was to so many, and she will keep doing everything she can to honor his memory and to carry his message forward,” Sullivan wrote of Clinton.

      Responding to the campaign’s statement, Max Blumenthal accused Clinton of remaining silent when Wiesel accused Palestinians of “ritual child sacrifice.” He was referring to an advertisement in 2014 by The Jewish Values Network in which Wiesel spoke out against Hamas and allegations that it had intentionally placed munitions and fighters in areas near children.

      Rabbi Shmuley Boteach, who heads The Jewish Values Network, has called Blumenthal an “informal adviser” to Clinton, which the campaign categorically denies.(...)

  • Kenneth Roth de Human’s Rights Watch est furieux contre le dernier livre de Noam #Chomsky,
    http://www.nybooks.com/articles/2016/06/09/a-case-against-america

    Who Rules the World? is also an infuriating book because it is so partisan that it leaves the reader convinced not of his insights but of the need to hear the other side.

    Entre autres parce que Chomsky occulterait le fait que Assad et Poutine sont aussi responsables que les #Etats-Unis quant à la situation délétère du Moyen-Orient,

    President George W. Bush’s invasion of Iraq fits his thesis of American malevolence, and the terrible human costs of the war get mentioned, but Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s decision to fight his country’s civil war by targeting civilians in opposition-held areas, killing hundreds of thousands and setting off the flight of several million refugees, does not. Nor does Russia’s decision to back Assad’s murderous shredding of the Geneva Conventions, since Chomsky’s focus is America’s contribution to global suffering, not Vladimir Putin’s.

    • Un vrai débat crucial et pas facile à mener étant donné l’activité propagandiste des grands médias qui opacifie ou floute notre perception des actions des différents acteurs.

      Les objections de Kenneth Roth sont valables. Mais on aimerait avoir sa vision complète de la politique étrangère d’Obama (rechargeant par exemple Israël en munition en plein bombardement de Gaza à l’été 2014).

    • The Supposedly Liberal NY Review of Books Published a Very Strange Review of Chomsky’s Latest | Alternet
      http://www.alternet.org/books/whats-wrong-review-noam-chomskys-new-book

      In the first paragraph of his surprisingly inept and unfriendly review in the New York Review of Books of Noam Chomsky’s Who Rules the World? (May 2016), Kenneth Roth described the 2003 U.S. invasion of Iraq as a “blunder.” This wasn’t a good sign, since it signaled either ignorance or rejection of the UN Charter’s prohibition of the threat or use of force by states in the conduct of their international relations. This stipulation in the Charter—Article 2(4)—has been described by a distinguished group of international law scholars as the “keystone” and “cardinal rule” of modern international law (see below). It is also a centerpiece of Noam Chomsky’s long-standing criticism of U.S. foreign policy, a fact about which Roth—the long-time head of Human Rights Watch—also seemed unaware. Roth’s “blunder” (defined as “a stupid or careless mistake”) signaled what was to come, and indeed spiraled downward into a web of chronic mistake-making in his analysis of Chomsky’s book.

  • The Bernie or Bust Movement Shows No Signs of Slowing Down | Alternet
    http://www.alternet.org/election-2016/bernie-or-bust-movement-shows-no-signs-slowing-down

    There is ample evidence that voters in 2016 demand a political system that appeals to their rational judgment, not one that preys on the unconscious. Perhaps party leaders, for all their posturing, really were afraid of a New Deal Democrat like Sanders. Perhaps they were so busy with the work of selling Clinton they didn’t have time to read the writing on the wall. Either way, their heavy-handed endorsement has only served to remind reformist-minded Democrats that they are part of the problem. Their only hope now is that Trump’s screaming orange face will scare us back to Clinton’s side. Who knows? Maybe they are right.

    But if we really want to treat the problem—not just the symptoms—I would recommend that we stop wringing our hands on cue and take the Bernie or Bust movement for what it really is. Not the ideological purity of dreamers, or the bad sportsmanship of losers, but a struggle to do something responsible with our faith in politics now that we’ve found it again.

  •  Parti Travailliste : offensive sioniste avec censure, mensonge et diffamation
    samedi 7 mai 2016 - Interview : Norman Finkelstein
    http://www.info-palestine.eu/spip.php?article16024

    (...) Le mois dernier, la membre du Parlement Naz Shah est devenue l’une des figures les plus médiatisées, à ce jour, dans le scandale de « l’antisémitisme » qui secoue toujours la direction du parti travailliste. Shah a été suspendue du parti travailliste pour, entre autres choses, avoir reposté une image sur Facebook qui a été considérée comme antisémite. L’image montrait une carte des États-Unis avec Israël en surimpression, et suggérait de résoudre le conflit israélo-palestinien en relocalisant Israël aux États-Unis. On a dit que Shah avait pris l’image sur le site Web de Finkelstein. J’ai demandé à Finkelstein pourquoi il avait posté cette image, et ce qu’il pensait des allégations selon lesquelles le parti travailliste avait un « problème juif ».

    Avez-vous fabriqué l’image controversée que Naz Shah a reprise ?

    Je ne suis pas assez habile avec les ordinateurs pour fabriquer une image. Mais j’ai posté la carte sur mon site en 2014. Un de mes correspondants internet doit me l’avoir envoyée. Elle était, et est toujours, drôle. N’était le contexte politique actuel, personne n’aurait remarqué que Shah l’avait postée. Il faut complètement manquer d’humour. Ce genre de plaisanterie est monnaie courante aux Etats-Unis. Donc, voilà la blague en question : pourquoi Israël ne devient pas le 51ième état ? Réponse : parce qu’alors, il n’aurait que deux sénateurs. Aussi fou que soit le discours sur Israël en Amérique, nous avons encore le sens de l’humour. Ce serait inconcevable aux États-Unis, qu’un politicien soit crucifié pour avoir posté cette carte.

    Le fait que Shah ait posté cette image a été présenté comme un soutien à une ignoble politique de « déportation » tandis que John Mann l’a comparée à Eichmann.

    Franchement, je trouve cela grotesque. Je doute que tous ces gens qui sont si prompts à invoquer l’Holocauste aient la moindre idée de ce qu’étaient les déportations, ni des horreurs qu’elles signifiaient. Ma défunte mère m’a décrit sa déportation. Elle était dans le Ghetto de Varsovie. Les survivants du soulèvement du Ghetto, environ 30 000 Juifs, ont été déportés au camp de concentration de Maijdanek. Ils étaient entassés dans des wagons de chemin de fer. Ma mère était assise à côté d’une femme avec un enfant. Et la femme - je sais que cela va vous choquer - la femme a tué son bébé en l’étouffant, devant ma mère. Elle a préféré étouffer son enfant, plutôt que de l’emmener là où ils allaient. Voilà ce que cela signifiait d’être déportés. Comparer cela à quelqu’un qui a posté un dessin humoristique inoffensif pour faire une petite blague sur la façon dont Israël est sous l’emprise des Etats-Unis, ou vice versa ... c’est carrément dément. Que leur arrive-il ? N’ont-ils aucun respect pour les morts ? Tous ces apparatchiks desséchés du parti travailliste qui traînent dans la boue l’holocauste nazi dans leurs luttes mesquines de pouvoir pour avancer leur carrière, n’ont-ils pas honte ? (...)

  • How I Got The 84,000 Hepatitis C Drug For $1500 By Buying It From India
    http://www.alternet.org/personal-health/84000-hep-c-drug-only-1500

    I paid my money and I took my chances. The package arrived in nine days, untouched by customs. There were indeed three bottles of pills labeled as Hepcinat LP manufactured by Natco, with seals and even a folded paper insert with all the drug information on it. I took the pills for 83 days (saving one for possible testing just in case), waited a couple of weeks, then went to my doctor and had my blood drawn. The following week, he reported that my hepatitis C viral load was now zero. I was cured.

    #big_pharma #santé

    • Seymour Hersh: The Saudis bribed the Pakistanis not to tell us [that the Pakistani government had Bin Laden] because they didn’t want us interrogating Bin Laden (that’s my best guess), because he would’ve talked to us, probably. My guess is, we don’t know anything really about 9/11. We just don’t know. We don’t know what role was played by whom.

      KK: So you don’t know if the hush money was from the Saudi government or private individuals?

      SH: The money was from the government … what the Saudis were doing, so I’ve been told, by reasonable people (I haven’t written this) is that they were also passing along tankers of oil for the Pakistanis to resell. That’s really a lot of money.

  • The Government’s Unprecedented Position in #CIA #Torture Lawsuit Is Very Good News
    https://www.aclu.org/blog/speak-freely/governments-unprecedented-position-cia-torture-lawsuit-very-good-news

    Those responsible for the CIA torture program have never had to face their victims’ claims in a U.S. court because the government has always shielded the perpetrators. Until now.

    Next week, three victims of the CIA’s post-9/11 torture program are taking a critical and unprecedented step in seeking accountability from the men who devised their torture. On April 22, a federal court in Spokane, Washington, will hear the ACLU’s argument on behalf of Suleiman Abdullah Salim, Mohamed Ahmed Ben Soud, and the family of Gul Rahman. They have sued James Mitchell and John “Bruce” Jessen, the psychologists who teamed up with the CIA to design, implement, and oversee the agency’s torture program, which ensnared at least 119 men from its inception in 2002 until it was shuttered in 2008.

  • George and Amal Clooney Co-Hosting $34,300-A-Person Clinton Fundraiser With Pro-Israel Mega-Donor
    http://www.alternet.org/grayzone-project/george-and-amal-clooney-co-hosting-34300-person-clinton-fundraiser-pro-isr

    Hollywood A-lister George Clooney and his lawyer-activist wife Amal have cultivated a reputation for defending human rights.

    But on April 16th, they will hold a high-priced, pro-Hillary Clinton fundraiser at their mansion alongside co-host Haim Saban—a fervent Israel supporter who has called for Muslim-Americans to be deprived of key civil rights protections and for the United States to consider ruthlessly bombing Iran

    This is not the first time that the media mogul Haim Saban, and his wife Cheryl, have raised large sums for the Clinton campaign. As AlterNet previously reported, the couple together directly contributed $5 million to the Hillary Clinton Super PAC—Priorities USA Action—between 2015 and 2016.

    Three million of those dollars came in after Clinton wrote a letter to Haim Saban in which she pledged to “work together” to defeat the growing BDS (Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions) movement to win human rights and self-determination for Palestinians. Clinton has repeatedly vowed to make a close relationship with the right-wing government of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu a centerpiece of her presidency if she is elected.

  • NY Times Portrays Islam More Negatively Than Cancer, Major Study Finds | Alternet
    http://www.alternet.org/grayzone-project/ny-times-portrays-islam-more-negatively-cancer-major-study-finds

    “Sexual Misery and Islam,” published February 12 and responding to the alleged New Year’s Eve attacks on women in Germany, is a clear example. The author, Kamel Daoud , writes, “In some of Allah’s lands, the war on women and on couples has the air of an inquisition,” adding that, “People in the West are discovering, with anxiety and fear, that sex in the Muslim world is sick, and that the disease is spreading to their own lands.” 

    A collective response from scholars to the article, published in Jadaliyya, notes that “the author recycles the most well-worn orientalist clichés, from Islam as a religion of death to the psychology of the Arab crowds. Far from offering a profound and detached approach to the question— something that is required given the gravity of the current situation—Daoud’s article only feeds the Islamophobic fantasies of a growing proportion of the European (and American) public and under the comfortable pretext of refusing to engage in a naive optimism.”

    #New_york_times

  • The #FDA Now Officially Belongs to Big #Pharma | Alternet
    http://www.alternet.org/news-amp-politics/fda-now-officially-belongs-big-pharma

    It is hard to believe only four senators opposed the confirmation of Robert Califf, who was approved today as the next FDA commissioner. Vocal opponent Bernie Sanders condemned the vote from the campaign trail. But where was Dick Durbin? Where were all the lawmakers who say they care about industry and Wall Street profiteers making money at the expense of public health?

    #conflit_d’intérêt

  • The Death of the Professional: Are Doctors, Lawyers and Accountants Becoming Obsolete? | Alternet
    http://www.alternet.org/books/death-professional-are-doctors-lawyers-and-accountants-becoming-obsolete

    More than this, human experts in the professions are no longer the only source of practical expertise. There are illustrations of practical expertise being made available by recipientsof professional work—in effect, sidestepping the gatekeepers. On various platforms, typically online, people share their past experience and help others to resolve similar problems. These “communities of experience,” as we call them, are springing up across many professions (for example, PatientsLikeMe and the WebMD communities in medicine). We say more about them in a moment. More radical still are systems and machines that themselves generate practical expertise. These are underpinned by a variety of advanced techniques, such as Big Data and artificial intelligence. These platforms and systems tend not to be owned and run by the traditional professions. Whether those who do so will in turn become “new gatekeepers” is a subject of some concern.

  • Bernie Sanders Brilliantly Explains the Strategy of the ’Ruling Class’ in Two Minutes
    http://www.alternet.org/economy/bernie-sanders-brilliantly-explains-strategy-ruling-class-two-minutes

    What did the whole system tell these white workers, who were the lowest-paid white workers in the U.S. — [...]

    What they said is, you can go over to that water fountain and take a drink, and this black guy can’t. You can go to this bathroom, you can go to this restaurant. Man, you got it good.

  • Sorry, You Can’t Have Fries With That: 10 Foods That May Disappear Thanks to Climate Change | Alternet
    http://www.alternet.org/environment/10-foods-may-disappear-due-climate-change

    Food may be one of the most apparent and immediate ways many of us will feel the impact of climate change. “The general story is that #agriculture is sensitive,” said David Lobell, deputy director of the Center on Food Security and the Environment at Stanford University. “It’s not the end of the world, but it will be a big enough deal to be worth our concern.”

    #climat #aliments

  • Who’s Buying ISIS’ Oil? | Alternet
    By Vijay Prashad / CounterPunch
    December 10, 2015
    http://www.alternet.org/news-amp-politics/whos-buying-isis-oil

    On December 2, Russia’s Deputy Minister of Defense Anatoly Antonov made a strong statement about Turkish complicity with ISIS. The charge sheet is long and detailed. It mentions many aspects, but the most incendiary is the accusation about “ISIS oil.”

    ISIS controls Iraqi oil fields near Mosul. They have been making millions of dollars each day by selling oil from these fields. How does ISIS get the oil from the fields in Mosul to the market?

    What ISIS has done is to use the old networks that have smuggled oil from the Kurdish Regional Government without any consideration given to Baghdad’s sovereignty over that oil. This had been a point of contention for decades, since the Kurdish region began to exercise autonomous control of the north. Kurdish oil was sold to smugglers who would cart them in tankers across the border into Turkey. In Turkey the trucks would run the length of the country to the Mediterranean port of Ceyhan. From Ceyhan, which is a port run by the Turkish government, the oil is purchased by transporters whose ships go to Malta, where the oil is transshipped to destinations such as Ashdod (Israel). This has long been a bone of contention between the Iraqi government, the Kurdish Regional Government and the Turkish government. It was documented by Tolga Tanış in his book Potus ve Beyefendi (2015). Tanis accuses Berat Albayrak, son-in-law of Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, of involvement in this illegal scheme. ISIS has merely replaced the Kurdish Regional Government in the new arrangement.

    #Pétrole #EI #ISIS