Assad of Syria Forces Increases the Murder and Rapes of Civilians

The violence and bloodshed in Syria have surpassed anything seen in the Middle East since the days of Saddam Hussein's Iraq, according to independent investigators in a report released on Monday. There are also reports of sexual violence, including at checkpoints or while being held by intelligence agencies.

The new report, which urges a political solution to what has become an increasingly militarized and sectarian conflict, described the conflict as reaching “new heights of destruction.” The report, released by the Independent International Commission of Inquiry, disturbed members of the United Nations Security Council, according to the commission's chairman, Paulo Pinheiro.

“If the national, regional, and international actors fail to find a solution to the conflict and stop the agony of millions of civilians, the alternative will be the political, economic and social destruction of Syria and its society, with devastating implications for the region and the world,” Mr. Pinheiro warned, speaking on behalf of the four-member commission.

http://www.thecuttingedgenews.com/index.php?page=37

The Powerful Death takes over us and we are Helpless Hugo Chavez

نيكولاس مادورو قبل وفاته خليفة له

الأربعاء، 6 مارس 2013 - 01:21

هوجو تشافز

Scary picture.

Illness and death[edit]

Chávez walking with a cane accompanied by Rafael Correa in Caracas in July 2011, shortly after his first cancer surgery.

Chávez was diagnosed with cancer following the discovery of a mass in his pelvic region in June 2011. He traveled to Havana, Cuba where he underwent a surgical operation which removed a malignant cancerous tissue mass 'about the size of a baseball' from his waist. He underwent a second surgical operation in Venezuela one month later. Over the next 12 months, the President followed a cycle of chemotherapy that had obvious effects on his body (hair loss, some weight loss and bloating, etc.) during the Presidential Election campaign in mid-2012. The type of cancer Chávez was diagnosed with was never made public which fueled speculation over his condition (with speculations from being prostate cancer to colon cancer among others). Following the presidential election in October 2012 (where he was re-elected to a fourth term), he was flown back to Cuba for medical treatment and to return to Venezuela and stay at an army hospital only weeks before his death. Successive announcements of his return and updates of his health were criticised by the country's opposition that the population were unaware of the president's health and location. The fact that the cancer had metastasised was not made public during the campaign, and strongly denied by Government officers. After the first lung infection (pneumonia) in the last stages of his life, the President was intubated nearing the end of December. His breathing worsened until his death was announced at 16:25 VET (20:55 UTC) on 5 March 2013. Hugo Chávez died in Caracas, almost two years after he was first diagnosed. The opposition has long argued that the President was artificially kept alive, presumably in a coma, up to the start of his next term, to avoid triggering a new election.

Vice-president Nicolás Maduro announced Chávez's death on a mandatory television cadena (a decree forcing all broadcasters to relay State television content).^[3]In an emotional eulogy Maduro said: "Let there be no weakness, no violence. Let there be no hate. In our hearts there should only be one feeling: Love."^[4] Maduro indicated that Chávez had died "after battling a tough illness for nearly two years."^[3] He added that police and troops would be deployed across the country 'to guarantee the peace.' The head of the presidential guard said Chávez died of a massive heart attack after great suffering and had inaudibly mouthed his desire to live. In an interview to the Associated Press he said that Chávez could not speak but he said it with his lips ... "I don't want to die. Please don't let me die".^[5] The BBC reported isolated incidents of violence following the announcement of Chávez's death. Although pro-Chavez supporters attached and burned tents of students who had camped demanding more official information about Chávez's health, there were no reported injuries.^[4] Vice-president Maduro indicated he had "no doubt" of foul play by "the historical enemies of our fatherland" behind Chávez's illness and death.^[3] Defence Minister Diego Morelo Bellavia^[6] said that the "Bolivarian" armed forces would be loyal to the vice president and National Assembly and urged supporters and opposition to remain calm.^[4]

U.S. Steps up Aid to Syrian Opposition, Humaniterian

In a significant policy shift, the Obama administration said Thursday it would for the first time provide non-lethal aid directly to rebels who are battling to oust Syrian President Bashar Assad, announcing an additional $60 million in assistance to Syria's political opposition.

The modest package of aid to the military wing of the opposition will consist of an as yet undetermined amount of food rations and medical supplies for members of the Free Syrian Army who will be carefully screened to ensure they do not have links to extremists.

The move was announced by U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry at an international conference on Syria in Rome, and several European nations are expected in the coming days to take similar steps in working with the military wing of the opposition in order to ramp up pressure on Assad to step down and pave the way for a democratic transition. However, a number of Syrian opposition figures expressed disappointment with the limited assistance.

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/03/01/world/middleeast/us-pledges-60-million-to-syrian-opposition.html?ref=world

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-21612130

http://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory/us-europe-move-expand-role-syrian-conflict-18610860

Syria: Unlawful Missile Attacks Kill More Than 140

The Syrian government launched at least four ballistic missiles that struck populated areas in the city of Aleppo and a town in Aleppo governorate during the week of February 17, 2013. The attacks killed more than 141 people, including 71 children, and caused immense physical destruction.

The extent of the damage from a single strike, the lack of aircraft in the area at the time, and reports of ballistic missiles being launched from a military base near Damascus overwhelmingly suggest that government forces struck these areas with ballistic missiles. Human Rights Watch visited the four attack sites, all in residential neighborhoods. Human Rights Watch found no signs of any military targets in the vicinity of any of the four sites, which would mean that the attacks were unlawful.

http://www.hrw.org/news/2013/02/26/syria-unlawful-missile-attacks-kill-more-140

http://www.presstv.com/

The Massacre of Bosnian Muslims in Srebrenicia , Bosnia

A Bosnian Muslim man cries near coffins prepared for a mass burial at the Memorial Center in Potocari, near Srebrenica July 9, 2012. The bodies of 520 recently identified victims of the Srebrenica massacre will be buried on July 11, the anniversary of the massacre when Bosnian Serb forces commanded by Ratko Mladic slaughtered 8,000 Muslim men and boys and buried them in mass graves, in Europe's worst massacre since World War Two.

Syria 20 Methods of Torture

"They forced me to undress. Then they started squeezing my fingers with pliers. They put staples in my fingers, chest, and ears. I was only allowed to take them out if I spoke," said a 31-year-old man who was detained in Idlib in June. "They used two wires hooked up to a car battery to give me electric shocks. They used electric stun-guns on my genitals twice. I thought I would never see my family again. They tortured me like this three times over three days."

Other torture methods described in the report include hanging detainees from the ceiling and beating them with cables, whips and pipes and pulling out fingernails with pliers.



Former detainees who were interviewed by Human Rights Watch reported witnessing the death of other detainees while in custody, though the rights group has not been able to confirm independently the numbers of fatalities in detainment.



While the majority of those interviewed were men between the ages of 18 and 35, Nadim Houry, the deputy director of HRW's Middle East and North Africa division, told ABC News the group also interviewed women, children and the elderly.



"I interviewed a child as young as 11 years old and a man over 70 who had been detained and tortured when security forces couldn't find his sons," said Houry.



Houry also said that activists from across Syria's religious communities, including the ruling Alawite minority, had reported being detained.

Anti-government protests have been raging across the country for over a year and have become increasingly violent over recent months. The Syrian authorities have maintained that they are battling foreign-funded terrorists while activists contend that they are fighting for freedom and democracy. The United Nations puts the death toll at over 10,000.

Syria Has 27 Torture Centers: Report
 
 

http://worldnews.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2012/07/03/12536841-rights-group-syrias-20-ways-to-torture-prove-its-crimes-against-humanity?lite

http://abcnews.go.com/Blotter/syria-27-torture-centers-report/story?id=16703453

Yasser Arafat was Poisoned by Radio Active Material Leading to his Death

Eight years after the death of Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat, Al-Jazeera network published on Tuesday findings of an investigation which attempts to shed light on the circumstances of his death. According to the report, Swiss experts found high levels of polonium, a highly radioactive element, in his personal belongings.

Arafat's death on November 11, 2004 had generated no small number of conspiracy theories, including poisoning by Israel and even HIV.



Al-Jazeera's report cites experts from the Institut de Radiophysique in Lausanne, Switzerland, who examined Arafat's belonging. "Tests reveal that Arafat’s final personal belongings – his clothes, his toothbrush, even his iconic kaffiyeh – contained abnormal levels of polonium, a rare, highly radioactive element," Al-Jazeera reported.



The tests that were conducted in Paris immediately after Arafat's death found no evidence of poisoning. Al-Jazeera's research indicated that Arafat was in good health until falling suddenly ill in October.



In 2005, Haaretz reported that Israeli experts who analyzed the report drawn up by the medical team that treated Yasser Arafat in Paris say that the most likely possibility is that he was poisoned in a dinner meal on October 12, 2004.
Yasser Arafat


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Yasser Arafat, who died yesterday aged 75, was the unchallenged leader of the Palestinian people and their movement for statehood over more than 30 years.

Muhammad 'Abd al-Rahman 'Abd al-Raouf 'Arafat al-Qudua al-Husseini was born in Cairo on August 24 1929, the sixth of seven children. (He assumed the forename Yasser, after a companion of the Prophet Mohammed, in the 1940s.) His father was a respectable wholesale foodstuffs merchant of modest means who moved the family from Gaza to Cairo.


In 1990, Yasser Arafat married, in conditions of great secrecy, 26-year-old Suha al-Tawil, a Palestinian Christian who converted to Islam on marriage, and who spent much of her time thereafter in Paris. They had a daughter, Zahwa.

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article31751.htm

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,139036,00.html


http://www.tutorgig.info/ed/Yasser_Arafat

http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5gC3BrMO_aYwFIwTAtXLsWoQnAing?docId=CNG.b427100ac45d92b76358ffa0029eb52a.261


http://littlegreenfootballs.com/article/40566_New_Lab_Tests_Suggest_Arafat_May_Have_Been_Poisoned

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/obituaries/1476400/Yasser-Arafat.html