The top news headlines on current events from Yahoo ! News

Egypt’s Shiite killings raise alarm on hate speech
▻http://news.yahoo.com/egypts-shiite-killings-raise-alarm-hate-speech-192036237.html

A spokesman for the Muslim Brotherhood, from which Morsi hails, also denounced the killings.

But in a seeming show of conservative Sunnis’ distaste for the sect, he would not refer to the victims as Shiites. In a posting on his Facebook page, Ahmed Aref identified them as “the four dead who have beliefs of their own that are alien to our society.”

[…]

Al-Azhar, the world’s primary seat of Sunni Islamic learning, which has also warned against the spread of Shiism in Egypt, said in a statement Monday that it was “terrified” by the killings.

[…]

At a June 15 rally attended by Morsi, aimed at showing support for Syrian rebels, Salafi clerics railed against Shiites. One cleric, Mohammed Hassan, called on Morsi “not to open the doors of Egypt” to Shiites, saying that “they never entered a place without corrupting it.” Another called Shiites “filthy.” Morsi remained silent during the speeches.

Google bans Glass from its own shareholder meeting - Yahoo! News
▻http://news.yahoo.com/google-bans-glass-own-shareholder-meeting-193542140.html

#Google shareholders and other individuals were in for a surprise when they arrived at the company’s annual shareholder meeting on Thursday. Google, ironically, banned attendees from wearing the company’s own wearable computing device at the meeting. The company forbade people from using electronic devices such as smartphones, cameras and recording devices. (...)

“Google has unleashed one of the most privacy invasive devices ever,” John M. Simpson, privacy project director at Consumer Watchdog, said in a press release. “Google Glass aids and abets people who want to invade our privacy by videoing or photographing us surreptitiously, but when it comes to their own privacy Google executives jealously guard it.”

#google_glass #privacy

L’Union africaine dénonce la « chasse raciale » opérée par la Cour pénale internationale
▻http://www.lemonde.fr/afrique/article/2013/05/27/l-union-africaine-denonce-la-chasse-raciale-operee-par-la-cour-penale-intern

... la prise de position de l’UA aura un fort impact politique, le continent faisant bloc derrière MM. Kenyatta et Ruto, dont la victoire électorale a mis les capitales occidentales dans l’embarras. Depuis sa création, la CPI a inculpé une trentaine de personnes, tous des Africains , pour des crimes survenus dans huit pays d’Afrique (République démocratique du Congo (RDC), Centrafrique, Ouganda, Soudan (Darfour), Kenya, Libye, Côte d’Ivoire, Mali).

Les enquêtes ouvertes en RDC, Centrafrique, Mali et Ouganda l’ont néanmoins été à la demande des quatre Etats concernés, parties au Statut de Rome. Les affaires concernant le Darfour et la Libye – non signataires – l’ont été à la demande du Conseil de sécurité de l’ONU, tandis que le procureur de la CPI s’est auto-saisi des dossiers kényan et ivoirien.

African leaders urge ICC to transfer charges- ▻http://news.yahoo.com/african-leaders-urge-icc-transfer-charges-182840215.html

The African Union leaders’ decision was criticized by Human Rights Watch.

HRW serait infiniment plus crédible si elle appelait la CPI à se saisir des dossiers des Bush et autres criminels israéliens.

Pepe Escobar nous explique sur Russia Today comment interpréter les déclarations d’Obama sur le transfert des assassinats ciblés par drone de la CIA vers le Pentagone afin den accroître la transparence et le contrôle par le Congrès. Le tout, présenté par Obama, comme une manière de se démarquer de la Guerre globale contre le Terrorisme des néo-conservateurs.
Un rappel des déclarations d’abord : ▻http://news.yahoo.com/obama-talks-drones-increase-transparency-pentagon-lead-011607130.html

L’analyse d’Escobar :
▻http://rt.com/op-edge/us-pentagon-cia-war-742
Obama nous joue du pipeau :

The Joint Special Operations Command (JSOC) at the Pentagon – which would then be in charge of the ’Drone Wars’ - is bound to remain secret.
And the Pentagon is not exactly yearning to retouch its definition of a “militant”, a prime candidate to be ’target-assassinated’; “any military-aged male in a strike zone”. “Muslim” male, it goes without saying.
Obama’s rhetoric is one thing. His administration’s ’Drone Wars’ are another thing entirely.
The President now insists GWOT is no longer a “boundless global war”.
That’s rhetoric. For the Pentagon, the “entire globe is a battlefield”.

Puisque la guerre contre le terrorisme continue Escobar nous en donne les règles du jeu qui reposent sur une terminologie subtile :

When the US – or “the West” – kills or ’target-assassinates’ Muslim civilians, that’s never terrorism.
When Muslims supported by “the West” kill other Muslim civilians – as in Syria – they are not terrorists; they are Reaganesque “freedom fighters”.
When Muslims kill Western soldiers – as in London – they’re terrorists.
When Muslims happen to come from regime-changeable Iran and Syria’s government, not to mention Hezbollah, they are by definition terrorists.
And when Muslims are lingering in Guantanamo just because they were in the wrong place at the wrong time when the US invaded a Muslim country, they remain terrorists – the umpteenth Obama promise to close Guantanamo notwithstanding.

Et en conclusion les inévitables « blowbacks » qui s’ensuivront et nourissent la logique générale de cette « guerre » :

The bottom line is that the entire globe will remain a battlefield – a self-fulfilling Pentagon prophecy.
So many Belmokhtars to fight, so many Syrian jihadis to support, so many “al-Qaeda” to target-assassinate, so many Muslim lone wolves to track.
Obama’s rhetoric is just a show. GWOT is bound to remain a serpent biting its own tail, eagerly feeding itself till the end of time.

La situation s’envenime un peu plus chaque jour au Bahrein, avec l’opposition qui suspend sa participation au dialogue national à la suite de la perquisition de la maison de Sh. Eissa Qassem

Main Bahrain opposition group temporarily boycotts talks -

▻http://news.yahoo.com/main-bahrain-opposition-group-temporarily-boycotts-talks-174513687.html

Main Bahrain opposition group temporarily boycotts talks

Bahrain’s information affairs minister, Samira Rajab, said Al-Wefaq’s decision to boycott the talks showed the group was not serious about helping overcome the problems that continue to divide the U.S.-allied Gulf Arab state.
Wefaq cited a raid by security forces on the home of Ayatollah Sheikh Issa Qassim near the capital Manama on May 17 and what it said was the deliberate “delay and absence of positive response” by government representatives at the talks as reasons for pulling out.
“Al-Wefaq National Islamic Society, and in coordination with the national democratic opposition parties, declares it will temporarily stop attending the dialogue’s preparation sessions for two weeks,” it said in a statement.

In a statement to state media, Bahrain’s chief of public security made no mention of the raid on Qassim’s home but said police in the area early on Friday had come under fire from a “locally made weapon”, injuring two officers.
In response, “necessary measures were taken to reinforce the security force patrols with members of an anti-terrorism unit ... to uncover the source of the gunfire”, Major-General Tariq Al-Hassan told the state news agency BNA.

Syrian opposition urges rebels to join key battle - Yahoo! News
▻http://news.yahoo.com/syrian-opposition-urges-rebels-join-key-battle-091542816.html

In Germany, the weekly Der Spiegel reported that the German intelligence chief has revised his assessment of the Syrian civil war.

The chief, Gerhard Schindler, told a small group of politicians dealing with security issues in a secret briefing that Assad’s military is stronger than it has been in a long time, according to Der Spiegel. Additional successful offensives of the regime are possible anytime, he said.

The German intelligence agency BND believes this is a turning point. At the end of 2012, it appeared the regime was in its end phase.

He said the channels for restocking the regime’s weapons supplies are now open, and the supply of gas for tanks and aircraft is also working again. Schindler said Assad most likely won’t be able to defeat the rebels, but he can contain them and even win back some territory.

The BND predicts that in 2013, regime troops will be able to recapture additional territory. If the fighting continues as it has in recent weeks, the regime could recapture the entire south by the end of the year. In this case, the rebels would be left with only the north.

On Wednesday, Germany’s Foreign Ministry said it supports adding Hezbollah to the EU’s list of terrorist groups. The ministry linked the recommendation to a deadly attack on Israeli tourists in Bulgaria last year that was tied to Hezbollah.

Sylke Tempel, a Mideast expert at the German Council on Foreign Relations in Berlin, said she believed the German support for sanctions against Hezbollah’s military wing was due in part to its role in Syria fighting.

She said the presence of Hezbollah fighters in Syria has led Western and regional governments to ponder “what if Assad is going to win this thing” and “what if Hezbollah is a factor in making Assad win, or at least not lose.”

Obama delivers historic Morehouse commencement - Yahoo! News
▻http://news.yahoo.com/blogs/ticket/obama-morehouse-commencement-speech-172854207.html

“Many of you know what it’s like to be an outsider, to be marginalized, to feel the sting of discrimination,” Obama said. “That’s an experience that so many other Americans share. Hispanic Americans know that feeling when someone asks where they come from or tells them to go back. Gay and lesbian Americans feel it when a stranger passes judgment on their parenting skills or the love they share. Muslim Americans feel it when they’re stared at with suspicion because of their faith. Any woman who knows the injustice of earning less pay for doing the same work—she sure feels it.”

Puis,

“We know that too many young men in our community continue to make bad choices,” Obama said. “Growing up, I made a few myself. And I have to confess, sometimes I wrote off my own failings as just another example of the world trying to keep a black man down. But one of the things you’ve learned over the last four years is that there’s no longer any room for excuses.”

US seeks talks with Bahrain on worker rights | GulfNews.com
▻http://gulfnews.com/news/gulf/bahrain/us-seeks-talks-with-bahrain-on-worker-rights-1.1180637

The United States is seeking talks with Bahrain over workers’ rights following a report that cited the deterioration of labour protections in the Gulf state after the unrest in 2011, officials said on Tuesday.
Acting United States Trade Representative Demetrios Marantis and acting Secretary of Labour Seth Harris said they had requested consultations over the alleged firings of trade union leaders and sectarian-related discrimination in employment since the March 2011 general strike.
Such issues would be inconsistent with the labour chapter of the US-Bahrain Free Trade Agreement, they said.
“Ensuring that workers in Bahrain — and in other countries — can exercise their fundamental labour rights is a top priority for the Obama administration, and we expect that the action we are taking today will produce a collaborative discussion and positive resolution to these important labour issues,” Marantis said in a statement.

On Sunday, Bahrain’s cabinet approved a parliamentary proposal to take unspecified action to stop “interference” in the kingdom’s affairs by the US ambassador.
“The cabinet has approved a proposal by the parliament to put an end to the interference of US Ambassador Thomas Krajeski in Bahrain’s internal affairs,” government spokeswoman Sameera Rajab said, according to the official BNA news agency.
The measure also aims at ending “his repeated meetings with instigators of sedition” — a government term for protesters who frequently clash with police.

Si ce sont les rebelles qui utilisent des armes chimiques, est-ce que c’est « game changing » ?
▻http://news.yahoo.com/u-n-testimony-syrian-rebels-used-sarin-gas-043557114.html

U.N. human rights investigators have gathered testimony from casualties of Syria’s civil war and medical staff indicating that rebel forces have used the nerve agent sarin, one of the lead investigators said on Sunday.

The United Nations independent commission of inquiry on Syria has not yet seen evidence of government forces having used chemical weapons, which are banned under international law, said commission member Carla Del Ponte.

“Our investigators have been in neighboring countries interviewing victims, doctors and field hospitals and, according to their report of last week which I have seen, there are strong, concrete suspicions but not yet incontrovertible proof of the use of sarin gas, from the way the victims were treated,” Del Ponte said in an interview with Swiss-Italian television.

“This was use on the part of the opposition, the rebels, not by the government authorities,” she added, speaking in Italian.

Admirer la présence d’esprit de la personne qui a installé une vidéo accompagnant cet article : l’article dit, très clairement, que pour l’instant l’ONU dispose d’éléments forts et concrets permettant de penser que ce sont les rebelles qui ont utilisé l’arme chimique, et que l’ONU ne dispose d’aucune indication, pour l’instant, de l’utilisation de telles armes par le régime ; la vidéo, elle, titre « Syria denies using chemical weapons », et ce titre est nettement plus visible que le texte qui dit exactement le contraire. Là je dis : bravo.

Army says no to more tanks, but Congress insists - Yahoo! News
▻http://news.yahoo.com/army-says-no-more-tanks-congress-insists-115422396.html

WASHINGTON (AP) — Built to dominate the enemy in combat, the Army’s hulking Abrams tank is proving equally hard to beat in a budget battle.

Lawmakers from both parties have devoted nearly half a billion dollars in taxpayer money over the past two years to build improved versions of the 70-ton Abrams.

But senior Army officials have said repeatedly, “No thanks.”
It’s the inverse of the federal budget world these days, in which automatic spending cuts are leaving sought-after pet programs struggling or unpaid altogether. Republicans and Democrats for years have fought so bitterly that lawmaking in Washington ground to a near-halt.

Yet in the case of the Abrams tank, there’s a bipartisan push to spend an extra $436 million on a weapon the experts explicitly say is not needed.

“If we had our choice, we would use that money in a different way,” Gen. Ray Odierno, the Army’s chief of staff, told The Associated Press this past week.

#lobbying #corruption_légale

Rappel : ça fait un bon mois qu’Israël et ses alliés font monter la sauce chimique en Syrie :
▻http://seenthis.net/messages/124026

Or, même l’Observatoire syrien des Droits de l’Homme désignait assez clairement les rebelles comme auteurs de l’attaque :
►http://news.yahoo.com/twenty-six-killed-syrian-attack-monitoring-group-124003651.html

“Sixteen Syrian regular army soldiers were killed in Khan al-Assal,” Rami Abdelrahman, head of the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, told Reuters. “Ten more died in hospital but I cannot confirm if they are civilians or soldiers.”

Le Telegraph indiquait également, selon plusieurs témoignages, qu’il s’agissait d’une bombe artisanale fabriquée par des rebelles :
▻http://seenthis.net/messages/124727

Il est assez charmant de voir la France et ses médias s’aligner, une fois de plus, avec autant de rapidité sur la dernière petite phrase du Département d’État. Vraiment charmant.

Israeli Doctors Are Treating Boston Bombing Suspect: New Details on His Condition - Yahoo! News
▻http://news.yahoo.com/israeli-doctors-treating-boston-bombing-suspect-details-condition-131043

As 19-year-old Boston Marathon bombing suspect Dzhokhar Tsarnaev “clings to life,” Israeli media revealed that two of the senior doctors treating Tsarnaev have abundant past experience treating victims of terror. That’s because they’re from Israel.

DOCUMENTAIRE • Haïti : un pays assassiné, dépecé | Courrier international
▻http://www.courrierinternational.com/article/2013/04/16/haiti-un-pays-assassine-depece

[Le documentaire] « Assistance mortelle » décrypte la répartition de l’aide humanitaire comme de celle dite aide au développement dans un pays comme Haïti. Il fait le décompte des bons sentiments de l’opinion publique mondiale, de la générosité intéressée des bailleurs et des attentes des assistés. Au bout du chemin, ces derniers recevront une bouteille d’eau, le pays, beaucoup de promesses, et les intermédiaires garderont tous les milliards.

Sans tirer de conclusion, Assistance mortelle fait tout pour mettre fin à la carrière de Bill Clinton en Haïti. Le super envoyé spécial [des Nations unies pour Haïti] et tous ceux qui lui ressemblent en prennent pour leurs grade, titre et qualité.

Les assistés, mortellement atteints, ne sont pas épargnés.

Le parfum de décadence et de dilution qui se dégage d’Assistance mortelle est tenace. Raoul Peck peut mettre en chantier son prochain film, le séisme et les ravages de l’aide se poursuivent.

Syrie : les soupçons d’armes chimiques se précisent
▻http://www.lefigaro.fr/international/2013/03/20/01003-20130320ARTFIG00734-syrie-les-soupcons-d-armes-chimiquesse-precisent.

Bien qu’aucune confirmation indépendante et officielle ne soit intervenue, les suspicions d’usage d’armes non conventionnelles ont été renforcées mercredi. Pas seulement par les témoignages et les photos venus d’Alep. Mais par les déclarations de certains responsables internationaux. Pour Yuval Steinitz, le tout nouveau ministre du Renseignement israélien, il est « apparemment clair » que des armes chimiques ont été utilisées en Syrie. « Nous ne pouvons laisser ces armes tomber aux mains de terroristes », a prévenu le président israélien, Shimon Pérès, à l’issue d’une rencontre avec Barack Obama. Depuis des mois, Israël s’inquiète de ce que l’arsenal chimique syrien - le plus important de la région - puisse tomber dans les mains de groupes qui lui sont hostiles, notamment le Hezbollah libanais, allié de Bachar el-Assad. L’État hébreu est sans nul doute l’un des mieux informés sur la question. Alliée de Bachar, la Russie a repris à son compte les accusations du régime syrien.

– Comment Isabelle Lasserre peut-elle affirmer sans rire que l’« État hébreu est sans nul doute l’un des mieux informés sur la question » ?

– Il n’y a pas que « la Russie » qui reprend la version « du régime » ; pour le coup, l’Observatoire syrien d’Abdelrahman annonce lui aussi que ce sont bien des soldats de l’armée qui sont morts à Khan al-Assal :
►http://news.yahoo.com/twenty-six-killed-syrian-attack-monitoring-group-124003651.html

“Sixteen Syrian regular army soldiers were killed in Khan al-Assal,” Rami Abdelrahman, head of the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, told Reuters. “Ten more died in hospital but I cannot confirm if they are civilians or soldiers.”

– La confusion entretenue, ici, par l’expression « aux mains des terroristes » est très impressionnante : les Israéliens désignent explicitement le Hezbollah, et tous les autres désignent les groupes jidahiste en Syrie, qui sont ouvertement des ennemis du Hezbollah. L’annonce « changement de nature » du conflit repose alors tout entier sur cette confusion entretenue par le pays « le mieux informé » (mais qui ment malheureusement de manière pathologique) : ce sont des groupes jihadistes alliés des États-Unis qui sont accusés d’avoir utilisé des armes chimiques, ce qui « prouverait » que des groupes terroristes opposés aux États-Unis risqueraient d’obtenir ces mêmes armes chimiques.

Iraq War vet pens ‘last letter’ to Bush and Cheney | The Lookout - Yahoo ! News
▻http://news.yahoo.com/blogs/lookout/iraq-war-vet-letter-bush-cheney-tomas-young-154541674.html ?

An Iraq War veteran who joined the U.S. Army two days after 9/11 has written a powerful open letter to former President George W. Bush and ex-Vice President Dick Cheney accusing them of war crimes, “plunder” and “the murder of thousands of young Americans—my fellow veterans—whose future you stole.”

Tomas Young, who was shot and paralyzed during an insurgent attack in Sadr City in 2004, five days into his first deployment, penned the letter from his Kansas City, Mo., home, where he’s under hospice care.

“I write this letter, my last letter, to you, Mr. Bush and Mr. Cheney,” Young wrote in the letter published on Truthdig.com. “I write not because I think you grasp the terrible human and moral consequences of your lies, manipulation and thirst for wealth and power. I write this letter because, before my own death, I want to make it clear that I, and hundreds of thousands of my fellow veterans, along with millions of my fellow citizens, along with hundreds of millions more in Iraq and the Middle East, know fully who you are and what you have done. You may evade justice but in our eyes you are each guilty of egregious war crimes, of plunder and, finally, of murder, including the murder of thousands of young Americans—my fellow veterans—whose future you stole.”

Kurdish refugees have mixed feelings about Syria - Yahoo ! News

►http://news.yahoo.com/kurdish-refugees-mixed-feelings-syria-194359359.html

Quel avenir pour les Kurdes en Syrie ? Lire aussi le compte rendu dans Le Point de la médiation de Michel Kilo entre les Kurdes et l’Armée syrienne libre
►http://www.lepoint.fr/monde/syrie-rebelles-et-kurdes-enterrent-la-hache-de-guerre-grace-a-un-opposant-20

Kurdish refugees have mixed feelings about Syria - Yahoo ! News

►http://news.yahoo.com/kurdish-refugees-mixed-feelings-syria-194359359.html

Quel avenir pour les Kurdes en Syrie ? Lire aussi le compte rendu dans Le Point de la médiation de Michel Kilo entre les Kurdes et l’Armée syrienne libre
►http://www.lepoint.fr/monde/syrie-rebelles-et-kurdes-enterrent-la-hache-de-guerre-grace-a-un-opposant-20

Kurdish refugees have mixed feelings about Syria - Yahoo ! News

►http://news.yahoo.com/kurdish-refugees-mixed-feelings-syria-194359359.html

Quel avenir pour les Kurdes en Syrie ? Lire aussi le compte rendu dans Le Point de la médiation de Michel Kilo entre les Kurdes et l’Armée syrienne libre
►http://www.lepoint.fr/monde/syrie-rebelles-et-kurdes-enterrent-la-hache-de-guerre-grace-a-un-opposant-20

Et maintenant, la couverture américaine. Tu m’étonnes qu’Israël viole le droit international à chaque fois que possible :
▻http://news.yahoo.com/us-warns-syria-not-transfer-weapons-hezbollah-052920656.html

In the warning, White House deputy national security adviser Ben Rhodes said ’Syria should not further destabilise the region by transferring weaponry to Hezbollah.’

#wag_the_dog

Karzai : US troop immunity up to Afghan elders - Yahoo ! News
►http://news.yahoo.com/karzai-us-troop-immunity-afghan-elders-094837712.html

En Afghanistan, c’est à l’Assemblée des anciens (Loya Jirga) de décider d’une éventuelle immunité pour les troupes états-uniennes après 2014. Les États-Unis conditionnent le maintien de soldats à la garantie de cette immunité (H. Karzaï)

KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) — The Afghan president said Monday that a meeting of the nation’s elders should convene to decide whether U.S. troops staying in the country after 2014 would be immune from prosecution under Afghan law.
President Hamid Karzai’s remarks were his first since returning from Washington, where he met last week with President Barack Obama about the future of the alliance between the two countries.
This was also the first time Karzai has floated the idea that Afghans should hold a “loya jirga” — a national assembly of elders — to make the decision on U.S. troop immunity.
The United States has said that it needs to maintain sole legal jurisdiction over its forces in Afghanistan as part of the agreement for forces that will stay after 2014. In Iraq, it was the Iraqi government’s refusal to grant such jurisdiction that caused U.S. troops to completely quit that country.
“We want our national sovereignty and the Americans want the safety of their soldiers,” Karzai said in Kabul. “They don’t want their soldiers to be under the laws of another country.”