October´s death toll from the Baghdad morgue: 972.

Truth from the mouth of a leading zionist: Israeli attacks against Islamic Jihad have nothing to do with Jihad´s actions against Israel.

But Jihad´s actions against Israel, on the other hand, have everything to do with what Israel does. They revenge Israeli attacks against Palestinians by attacking Israelis, so Israeli leaders certainly know that they will cause attacks against Israelis when they murder members of Jihad. And their calculation that they can win by committing more murders than Jihad is not only criminal, it most likely doesn´t work.

US crimes in Iraq revealed.

Over 2000 US soldiers - and 199 other soldiers from it´s vassal states - have now died in Iraq. Also almost 300 non-Iraqi "contractors" working for the occupiers have died in the war - many of them former US, British etc soldiers turned mercenaries who have died doing duties normally reserved for army soldiers.

Some articles on the subject:

Death toll an awkward yardstick on Iraq
US media react to Iraq toll
2000 Too Many
US death toll hits 2,000—grim milestone in a criminal war
Casualties of a war a world away

But these are people who chose to go to war. They could have - at worst scenario - chosen prison instead. These people, on the other hand, had no choice.

The cost of war that most people don´t want to see in US.

The possibility of future attack by the combined forces of fundamentalist US, Israel - a mice on steroids - and the feeble UK against Iran is higher than usually believed.

Salman Rushdie writes about Orhan Pamuk´s problems with the Turkish authorities: How can a country that victimises its greatest living writer also join the EU?

A revolution betrayed.

Another white, European male wins the Nobel prize for literature.

75-year old Harold Pinter became the 11th playwright to win the prize. The greatest living British playwright, aknowledged, but there has been eras when that kind of praise meant more than it does today. Seriously, how many modern, living British playwrights you can name? More, more and more.

Guatemala's Maya Indians hit hard in new tragedy

Swedish language interview with the Syrian poet Adonis, who almost certainly will not win a Nobel prize today when the winner will be announced.

Most likely the winner will be somebody that most of us haven´t even remotely considered as a winner, but hopefully at least the winner will be someone who is relatively well known. I´m all for the rescuing of good, but little known authors from obscurity, but not every year. There have been some bad choices recently - like Naipaul - and the Swedish Academy probably should play it safe for a couple of years and give prizes to well known and deserving writers. More.

China has launched it´s second manned spacecraft with two taikonauts aboard.

Bush 'confident' as Iraq violence kills 46
Government issues arrest warrants for 23 defense Ministry officials

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At least 46 people were killed in attacks in Iraq, including a suicide car bombing in a crowded market, but U.S. President George W. Bush maintained an optimistic tone saying he was confident Iraqis would vote despite the bloodshed. In the bloodiest strike, 30 people were killed and 45 others wounded in the car bombing in the market of Tal Afar in restive northwestern Iraq, claimed by the Al-Qaeda group headed by Abu Musab al-Zarqawi. Another 16 people were killed in a rash of bombings and shootings, starkly underlining the battle facing Iraqi forces in their efforts to secure the country for Saturday's referendum on the constitution.

Gaza Last? The British Government's U-turn on Palestine

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As calls to hold the Israeli government to account grow louder, the British government whispers ever more softly in Sharon's ear. Responding to a legal letter from War on Want and The Dove and The Dolphin Charity this month, the Foreign Office, in a highly censored set of documents, revealed just how little they have really done over the last year to uphold their obligations under the Fourth Geneva Convention, spelt our in the International Court of Justice's decision on the Separation Wall. The Foreign Office admits quite openly that their strategy of close engagement with Israel has failed; hardly surprising given that the 'strategy' seemed to consist of mentioning the issue at a handful of meetings. Despite this, they have no other strategy apart from even closer engagement through 'European Neighbourhood Policy' (ENP) Action Plans. These plans provide for closer ties with Europe's neighbours, including Israel, to go "beyond co-operation, to involve a significant measure of economic integration and a deepening of political co-operation" in which Israel and the EU will "intensify political, security, economic, scientific and cultural relations". In other words, the opposite of suspending currently existing economic preferences for Israel, which the Palestinians have called for, and which the EU is actually legally bound, but unwilling, to do. So between encouraging Israel to flout international law in the Jerusalem Post; tripling arms sales to Israel in the first three months of 2005; and encouraging the EU to make even closer ties with Israel, British Foreign policy appears to be taking a turn for the even worse. Howells even suggests in the Jerusalem Post that Palestinian aid is on the line, if they refuse to play the game our way - Britain needs "a signal that it [the PA] is capable of good governance. This is not a bottomless pit that this money is coming from."

Setting up Abbas

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Today almost a half million Israelis live across the 1967 border. With financial backing of the Clinton Administration, a system of twenty-nine highways was constructed in the Occupied Territories to incorporate the settlements into Israel proper. In the meantime 96% of the Palestinians were locked into what Sharon calls ”cantons,” dozens of tiny enclaves, deprived of the right to move freely and now being literally imprisoned behind concrete walls twice as high as the Berlin Wall and electrified fences. Although comprising half the population of the country between the Mediterranean and the Jordan River, the Palestinians - including those with Israeli citizenship - are confined to just 15% of the country... Still, Israel needs a Palestinian state. Although the annexation of the settlement blocs gives Israel complete control over the entire country between the Mediterranean and the Jordan River, it needs to “get rid of” the almost four million Palestinian residents of the Occupied Territories to which it can neither give citizenship nor keep in a state of permanent bondage. What Sharon seeks, and what Bush has agreed to, is a truncated Palestinian mini-state, a Bantustan, a prison-state on 10-15% of the country that relieves Israel of the Palestinian population while leaving it firmly in control of the country and its resources. Whether or not we like the term, this amounts to full-blown apartheid, the permanent and institutionalized domination of one people over another... Sharon, in short, is priming Abbas for a set up, another “generous offer.” It worked well for Barak, why not try it again, this time for the whole pot? What would Abbas say if Sharon offered Gaza, 70-80% of the West Bank and a symbolic presence in East Jerusalem? True, it is not a just or viable solution. The Palestinians would be confined to five or six cantons on 15% of the entire country or less, with no control of their borders, their water, even their airspace. Jerusalem, now encased in a massive Israeli “Greater Jerusalem,” would be denied them, thereby removing the political, cultural, religious and economic heart of any Palestinian state. Israel would retain its settlement blocs and 80% of its settlers. But Sharon's “generous offer” would look good on the map and, he believes, viability is simply too complicated a concept for most people, including decision-makers, to grasp. But for Abbas it sets up a no-win situation. Say “yes” and you will be the quisling leader Israel has been looking for all these years, the one who agreed to a non-viable mini-state, to apartheid. Say “no” and Sharon will pounce: “See?! The Palestinians have refused yet another Generous Offer! They obviously do not want peace!” And Israel, off the hook, will be free to expand its control of the Occupied Territories for years to come, protected from criticism by American-backed annexation of the settlement blocs. Israeli unilateralism means only one thing: it has nothing to offer the Palestinians, nothing worth negotiating over. The Road Map asserts that only a true end of the Occupation and the establishment of a viable Palestinian state will finally see the end of this conflict with its global implications. A genuine two-state solution may already be dead, the victim of Israeli expansionism. A two-state “solution” based on apartheid cannot be an alternative accepted by any of us. Yet apartheid is upon us once again. Sharon must act fast to complete his life's work before his term of office expires within the next year. This is the crunch. We cannot afford to have our attention deflected by any other issue, important as it may be. It is either a just and viable solution now or apartheid now. We may well be facing the prospect of another full-fledged anti-apartheid struggle just a decade and a half after the fall of apartheid in South Africa.

This article is also to be found in here.

New Homo floresiensis remains have been found, making the claim of microcephaly even more unlikely than before. But the new species may not be part of the genus Homo; it´s more likely a remnant of the Australopithecines. More.

The Australopithecine hominid lineage rose at least 4,2 million years ago, most likely from the Ardipithecus lineage. About 3 million years ago it split into two branches, the first leading most likely to the genus Homo around 2,3 million years ago, the second leading to the genus Paranthropus, which is though to have become extinct 1,1-1,2 million years ago. The new hominid species from the island of Flores is then a descendant of either the Paranthropus lineage or some earlier Australopithecine species.

At least 23 000, but possibly up to 40 000 dead in Pakistan alone in the South Asia earthquake. The town of Balakot has been completely destroyed. More.

Yesterday´s earthquake in South Asia killed in Pakistan alone 18 000 people and injured 40 000. Hundreds, probably thousands more have perished in Afghanistan and India.

The US military can say whatever it wants about the situation in Iraq, but destroying 8 bridges that cross the river Euphrates is a clear sign of desperation. This not the action of a side that thinks it´s winning.

Israel bans use of human shields

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Israel's supreme court has banned the use of Palestinian human shields in arrest raids, saying the practice violates international law. The court issued a temporary injunction against the practice in 2002 after a teenager was killed when troops made him negotiate with a wanted militant. Human rights groups who brought the case say the Israeli army has repeatedly violated the temporary ban. The army cannot use civilians for its purposes, Israel's chief justice said. "You cannot exploit the civilian population for the army's military needs, and you cannot force them to collaborate with the army," Aharon Barak said.