MFS - The Other News

                       Afternoon  Posting.

• Syria Live Blog - May 31. Here .(Al-Jazeera).

• Libya Live Blog - May 31. Here (Al-Jazeera). 

• Yemen Live Blog - May 31 . Here. (Al-Jazeera).

• Updated !Earthquakes in the last 24 hours in the world seismic activity in Japan  today 5.1  ! Lots of activity in Turkey.More info here.

• Japan - Latest official Situation Update No. 124..Source : Here .

• Japan : For the most accurate info on the nuclear disaster go to : Paul Langley's Nuclear History Blog.Here.

• Fukushima Soil Sample News. ‘Bout Time and it Ain’t good.(NuclearHistory).Dont know what the US is doing with the samples it collected in March. However Tomio Kawata, a fellow at the Nuclear Waste Management Organization of Japan hasnt been sitting on his hands: http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-05-30/japan-risks-chernobyl-like-dead-zone-as-fukushima-soil-radiation-soars.html

Fukushima Debacle Risks Chernobyl ‘Dead Zone’ as Radiation in Soil Soars. By Yuriy Humber and Stuart Biggs – Radioactive soil in pockets of areas near Japan’s crippled nuclear plant have reached the same level as Chernobyl, where a “dead zone” remains 25 years after the reactor in the former Soviet Union exploded.

Soil samples in areas outside the 20-kilometer (12 miles) exclusion zone around the Fukushima plant measured more than 1.48 million becquerels a square meter, the standard used for evacuating residents after the Chernobyl accident, Tomio Kawata, a fellow at the Nuclear Waste Management Organization of Japan, said in a research report published May 24 and given to the government.Radiation from the plant has spread over 600 square kilometers (230 square miles), according to the report. The extent of contamination shows the government must move fast to avoid the same future for the area around Tokyo Electric Power Co.’s Fukushima Dai-Ichi plant as Chernobyl, scientists said. Technology has improved since the 1980s, meaning soil can be decontaminated with chemicals or by planting crops to absorb radioactive materials, allowing residents to return.“We need to finish this treatment as quickly as possible, within three years at most,” Tetsuo Iguchi, a specialist in isotope analysis and radiation detection at Nagoya University in central Japan, said in a telephone interview. “If we take longer, people will give up on returning to their homes.”Soil samples showed one site with radiation from Cesium-137 exceeding 5 million becquerels per square meter about 25 kilometers to the northwest of the Fukushima plant, according to Kawata’s study. Five more sites about 30 kilometers from Dai- Ichi showed radiation exceeding 1.48 million becquerels per square meter.

When asked to comment on the report today, Tokyo Electric spokesman Tetsuya Terasawa said the radiation levels are in line with those found after a nuclear bomb test, which disperses plutonium. He declined to comment further.Japan’s government introduced a mandatory exclusion zone 20 kilometers around the plant following the March 11 earthquake and tsunami that knocked out power leading to three reactor meltdowns. Kawata’s study didn’t include samples from inside the exclusion zone, where only government and Tokyo Electric staff may enter.The government in April ordered the evacuation of towns including Iitate, Katsurao and Namie that are outside the 20- kilometer zone after finding high levels of radiation.

“Basically, the way in which the current zones have been drawn up aren’t a concern in terms of the impact on health,” said Chief Cabinet Secretary Yukio Edano. “Using Mr. Kawata’s report as a guide, we want to do what we can to improve the soil, so people can return as soon as possible.”While the area containing soil pockets over 1.48 million becquerels a square meter is smaller than around Chernobyl –600 square kilometers compared with 3,100 square kilometers — the level of contamination means soil needs to be cleaned or removed before residents can return, Kawata said in his report.“It might take about one or two years for people to return to land outside the 20-kilometer zone,” the University of Nagoya’s Iguchi said. “If we replace the soil, it is possible for people to return even inside the zone.”The “dead zone” around Chernobyl remains at 30 kilometers, Mykola Kulinich, Ukraine’s ambassador to Japan, said in Tokyo on April 26, the 25th anniversary of the disaster.Belarus, which absorbed 80 percent of the fallout from the Chernobyl explosion, estimates that 2 million, or 20 percent of the population, was affected by the Chernobyl catastrophe, while about 23 percent of the country’s land was contaminated, according to a Belarus embassy website. About a fifth of the country’s agricultural land has been rendered unusable, which means some $700 million in losses each year, according to the website.Using crops was one solution being considered by Belarus with the idea that grains harvested from contaminated areas could then be processed to make ethanol. A study funded by a philanthropy arm of Heineken NV (HEIA) found that radioactive elements do not transfer into ethanol and this would allow Belarus to become a major supplier of the liquid used to dilute gasoline to the European Union.Read the full story here.

• House Overwhelmingly Votes Down Increasing Debt Limit, 82 Dems Vote “No”!(Washington Examiner) — Eighty-two House Democrats joined every Republican in rejecting a bill to raise the federal debt ceiling to $16.7 trillion, and the measure failed by a vote of 97 to 318, with seven members (all Democrats) voting “present.”The Obama administration has argued for such a “clean” vote on the debt ceiling without strings attached (such as additional legislation to reduce the debt).Just last month, 114 Democrats signed a letter calling for a “clean” vote and Democratic Minority Whip Rep. Steny Hoyer, D-Md., also advocated one. But today, Hoyer announced he was advising his caucus to vote against the measure. Ultimately, just 97 Democrats voted for it, with 82 explicitly voting against it (on top of the seven “present” votes). A total of 10 members (six Democrats, four Republicans) did not vote.No doubt, this is political gamesmanship by the GOP meant to call the Democrats bluff and show that a stand-alone vote on the debt limit has no chance of passage. But it still is another demonstration that Democrats are reluctant to vote for anything that could open them up to criticism, even when it means voting for policies for which they had previously expressed support.Read the full story here.

• "The Most 'Transparant' Administration evah"!Dangerous Precedent for Press.(RealClearPolitics).By Salena Zito.A little more than a week ago, Vice President Joe Biden traveled to fundraisers in two battleground-state cities, Pittsburgh and Cincinnati.Neither stop included the White House press corps; requests by local media to cover the events were denied by the vice president's press office. The Democratic National Committee arranged the events for the Obama Victory Fund.A number of seasoned political reporters and former White House press-office staffers consider that lack of coverage a dangerous precedent."It would behoove the Obama administration to keep its promise of transparency even with fundraisers," agrees Jeff Brauer, a political history professor at Keystone College. "The United States is a democracy, after all."Having press coverage of fundraising events that feature the president or vice president matters for at least two reasons, Brauer explains."One, large amounts of taxpayer dollars are being used for personal security at such events. As with all tax dollars, they should be spent with accountability."Two, it is important for the public to know what the president and vice president are saying to donors. Is it the same message they are saying to the electorate at large?"Such knowledge helps citizens judge officeholders' authenticity and integrity.Several former and current White House correspondents see presidents choosing who covers them as a nightmare scenario. The correspondents also are agitated by Biden's refusal to be covered by local media, even if that means reporters cooling their heels outside an invitation-only fundraiser."What if something happened to him?" is the question they raise.All administrations want to bask in a warm glow. All members of the press want to protect democracy by keeping the public informed and holding administrations accountable.Late last month, the White House press office threatened to ban a San Francisco Chronicle reporter from pool reporting after she used a cell phone to record protesters heckling President Obama at a fundraiser."The administration must simply get used to the idea that some media outlets are going to be critical, and that is healthy in a democracy," says Brauer.John Adams did not learn that lesson. And it is no coincidence that he was the first one-term president and that his laws, such as the Sedition Act, were the death knell for his Federalist Party.Days before Biden was sworn in as vice president in 2009, he promised to be more open than his predecessor, Dick Cheney.Yet his official schedule more often than not lists meetings as "closed press" or shows no public events at all.You may not care what any vice president does. You may not care for the press, either. But you should care deeply about the fundamental right and obligation of the press to cover the vice president and president.Vice President Biden's comings and goings should not occur in an unobserved world that, to paraphrase Biden himself, is a big bleeping deal.Hmmmmm......Democracy or Dictatorship?Sounds more and more like meetings in the 1939 Germany.Read the full story here.

• Related -White House Likely to Step Up Bullying of Reporters.(WhitehouseDossier).The Obama White House has long practiced the tactic of bullying reporters who write stories it doesn’t like.It’s a tactic, a form of suppression of speech by the openness administration. I’ve written about it before on this website..The appointment of Jesse Lee to a White House postion that involves responding to negative stories seems likely to formalize the strategy and signals that such behavior is likely to escalate as the campaign begins, not decline.While the tactic is done frequently, what’s rare is a mainstream media reporter with the guts to talk about it.But courage is something Julie Mason of POLITICO has to spare. She gives us an insight into exactly what’s going on.Hmmmm......"Thugocracy or Democracy"?Read the full story here.

• REWARD OFFERED For Arrest and Conviction of Weinergate Hacker.(BigGovernment).On Friday night a a photo surfaced on Congressman Weiner’s yfrog account and in his verified Twitter timeline of a man in tight underwear with a bulging erection. The photo was sent to one of the many young attractive coeds who Rep. Weiner “follows” on Twitter for his news and entertainment. The image was immediately deleted. Rep. Weiner claimed his account was hacked but the upstanding Congressman has not contacted the FBI or Capitol Police. However, he did lawyer up.What you can do to help:The humble Rep. Weiner may want to play down this criminal action but now you can help. We (Gateway Pundit Truth Alliance) are offering a $200 reward for anyone who offers information that leads to the arrest and conviction of the Weinergate penis hacker.This is a cause we can all rally around. Hacking into a public official’s personal account is a crime and a national security threat. Be a patriot. Do your part.Help us find the Weinergate penis hacker.Read the full story here.

• Related - Weinergate: Twitter User Dan Wolfe Denies Hacking Accusations; Welcomes FBI Investigation.(BigGovernment).“I hope he [Weiner] comes after me. Look up my IP. Nothing to hide here. I’d voluntarily hand anything they want over. Check me and my IP. Anything. I did not post that tweet.”Twitter user Dan Wolfe (known as @patriotusa76) has clarified several details concerning his involvement in the “Weinergate” scandal, insisting that a thorough investigation of the tweets in question will prove he did not compromise the verified Twitter account of Congressman Anthony Weiner (D, NY-9). In a series of direct messages on Twitter, Wolfe explains how he found the offensive image sent from Weiner’s Twitter account, his previous tweets about accounts followed by the Congressman, and his desire for law enforcement to investigate his online activity that night.Asked whether he followed Congressman Weiner or the recipient of the controversial tweet, Wolfe states he “wasn’t following either of them ever.” He named several other twitter uses who he regularly communicates with, explaining, “Our twitter group mentions him a lot because he appears in media a lot and says things we hate a lot. If he wasn’t saying anything, we wouldn’t comment.” Wolfe claims that on May 27th, the date the tweet went public, he navigated to the @RepWeiner account by clicking on Weiner’s username on a retweet in his Twitter stream. The tweet in question was the much-discussed one where Weiner announced the time of his upcoming appearance on the Rachel Maddow show with the hashtag #Thats545InSeattleIThink. “I found the 5:45 tweet weird,” Wolfe says.Describing his discovery of the lewd yfrog-image tweet, Wolfe states, “It was after [Maddow's] show and after the [Seattle] tweet that I had clicked on there– on his page, and he tweeted the pic to [redacted] and I clicked on it. I was shocked. I capped [screen captured] it. Capped the tweet, everything. That’s all. Then I RT [retweeted].” His retweet of Weiner’s account includes the same yfrog URL in screen captures and the TweetCongress archive of the original message. If Wolfe was not following both accounts, he would not have seen the tweet in his primary timeline, but if he was viewing Weiner’s profile, he would have seen the account’s latest tweets–even ones addressed to users Wolfe did not follow. By his admission of not following either account, Wolfe’s claim rests on a coincidence–that he was at the right place at the right time.The recipient of Weiner’s controversial tweet has returned to Twitter and refutes any claim that she has accused Wolfe of hijacking the @RepWeiner account. She also laments her continuing media attention: “I’m pretty sure it’s been 15 minutes; I’d like to fade back into oblivion now.” In the conflicting accounts and interpretations of the weekend’s events, one thing is clear: this mystery will be solved and the suffering of these two private citizens will cease most quickly with an official investigation of what IP address sent the controversial tweet from Congressman Weiner’s account.Hmmmmmm....."A tweet to far"?Read the full story here.

• Canada - Quebec Muslim politician Amir Khadir is not pleased the royal newlyweds will be visiting calls them 'parasites'.(Yahoo). .Quebec politician Amir Khadir is not pleased the royal newlyweds will be visiting Montreal and Quebec City during their upcoming 9-day Canadian tour.Khadir, who is a member of Quebec's national assembly (MNA) and co-leader of Quebec Solidaire, referred to the royals as "parasites" in an interview with the Journal de Québec newspaper."What a waste of public money. All this to welcome those parasites," Khadir is quoted as saying in the article.A portion of the trip's cost will be covered by Quebec taxpayers.Khadir also told the newspaper that he doesn't mind laying out the red carpet for visitors with extraordinary ideas who have done remarkable things, but he finds it insulting to do so for those with royal blood.Prince William and his wife Kate chose Canada for their first international tour as a married couple. The pair will kick off their Canadian visit in Ottawa, landing on June 30, before heading to Montreal and Quebec City on July 2 and 3.Protests are already being organized by sovereignty group Réseau de résistance du Québécois (RRQ) to greet the royals in Quebec City."The Canadian people and the Quebecer people will pay for that [tour] and we strongly disagree with that," said RRQ spokesperson Julien Gaudreau.Another group, Société Saint-Jean-Baptiste, is also planning peaceful demonstrations.Khadir told the Journal de Québec he is not ruling out joining protesters on the streets.In April, Quebec's International Relations Minister Monique Gagnon-Tremblay announced Quebec would pay a portion of the costs of the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge's visit, although the amount was yet to be determined.When Prince Charles visited Montreal in 2009, it cost Quebec taxpayers $25,000.ADQ leader Gérald Deltell was quick to denounce Khadir's comments Tuesday, saying the remarks are "a great dishonour for us."Deltell said guests need to be treated with respect, regardless of any personal feelings about the role of the monarchy in Canada."You have to respect the tradition when you receive someone who is coming to your country," Deltell said.Hmmmmm.....But Amir Khadir has a lot more to hide.Read the full story here.

• US Soldier In Afghanistan Survives With Unexploded rocket propelled granade Inside His Stomach.(Dailymail).A U.S. soldier has told the astonishing story of how he survived being impaled by an unexploded bomb which became lodged in his abdomen during an ambush in Afghanistan.In a moment of incredible human triumph, Private Channing Moss, 23, has walked to the podium to collect various awards including the Purple heart and the Medal of Valor since recovering from his ordeal.Private Moss was on patrol in Paktika Province in Eastern Afghanistan on Thursday, March 16, when his unit was attacked - likely by Al Qaeda or Taliban insurgents - in a mountainous region bordering Pakistan. Around 24 men from the 10th Mountain Division's Alpha Company were driving a convoy of five Humvee armoured vehicles and a pick-up truck, containing Afghan National Army troops, when they were hit first by gunfire and then by a hail of rocket-propelled grenades (RPGs).The pick-up truck exploded, killing two of the Afghan soldiers, and as the rockets struck Moss' Humvee, the gunner recalls being thrown against the wall of the vehicle.'I smelled something smoking and I looked down... and I was smoking,' he told ABC News in a documentary. The team called for medical evacuation (MEDEVAC) via a helicopter based at Salerno, Afghanistan, but did not tell the crew that Moss had a live RPG lodged in his abdomen for fear that the crew would not want to transport him.The Black Hawk helicopter had to wait for the fighting on the ground to cease before they could land, which meant a long delay taking Moss outside of the 'Golden Hour' for trauma treatment that saves so many lives. When the helicopter landed the crew could see immediately what had happened to Moss and knew that he should not be rescued.The U.S. Army policy in such a situation states Moss should not have been transported because it could lead to the death of the four MEDEVAC crew members, three other wounded soldiers and the loss of a helicopter. However, the flight crew conferred and all agreed to take Moss, The Black Hawk crew flew him to the nearest field hospital at the Orgun-E base, but again the crucial unexploded detail of his injury was omitted. Once at the hospital the medical team, led by surgeons Major John Oh and Major Kevin Kirk, were confronted with the wound. 'It had fins coming out of the left side of his body and had a big bulge in the front of his right thigh,' said Maj. Kirk. Again, U.S. Army policy states that Moss should not be operated on because of the risk to medics and other patients.Moss' second major stroke of luck came when a bomb disposal expert, Staff Sgt. Dan Brown, was on the base. Brown explained the possible scenarios to the medical team, including the possibility that they could all become 'pink mist' if the grenade exploded, and they agreed to treat him  By this point Moss' heart had stopped due to massive blood loss and the medics had to administer epinephrine to restart the organ before they could operate. Sgt. Brown used a hacksaw to remove the RPG's tail fins and very slowly eased the rocket back out through the entry wound.Brown then walked the unexploded bomb out of the operating theatre to a bunker and detonated it.Moss was transferred to hospitals in Afghanistan and Germany en route to Walter Reed Army Medical Center in Washington DC, where he was reunited with his wife Lorena and his daughters Yuliana and Ariana, now six and four.Moss' internal organs were severely damaged and he had suffered a shattered pelvis, leaving him unable to walk. He had four major operations and years of gruelling physiotherapy that took him out of a wheelchair, onto a walking frame, and then to walking with a cane.But Moss' determination allowed him to walk to collect his purple heart. 'I wanted to walk and get my medal, I wanted to stand up, to let them know I fought hard to get where I came from,' he said. Moss has now recovered well enough to attend college in Georgia. The soldiers and medical team who helped save Private Moss were also honoured.Hmmmmm......."One of the finest armies" No THE Finest Army!Read and see (Video)the full story here.

• THE day the rule of law died.President Obama’s Illegal War.(Britannica).In 2007 presidential candidate Barack Obama told Charlie Savage of the Boston Globe,

The President does not have power under the Constitution to unilaterally authorize a military attack in a situation that does not involve stopping an actual or imminent threat to the nation.

On March 19, 2011, President Barack Obama authorized military strikes on Libya to take out Libyan air defenses and protect rebels from attack. He told congressional leaders that the involvement would last “days, not weeks,” and he claimed the authority of the UN Security Council for his assault. But the UN can’t authorize American military intervention. As candidate—and senator and former professor of constitutional law—Obama understood in 2007, Congress must authorize the use of military force.

The administration offered various explanations of why it didn’t need authority from Congress. It had the authority of the UN. He “could reasonably determine that such use of force was in the national interest,” a rather sweeping justification for any exercise of presidential authority. And everybody’s favorite: It wasn’t war, it was “kinetic military action.” Gene Healy addresses many of these issues here.Article I, Section 8, Clause 11 of the Constitution vests in Congress the power to declare war. What about cases of imminent danger? The president may feel that there is no time to ask Congress about responding to an attack or an imminent threat. Well, in 1973 Congress tried to come up with a rule to deal with that eventuality. Over President Richard Nixon’s veto, Congress passed the War Powers Resolution, which provided that that the president can send U.S. armed forces into action abroad only by authorization of Congress or in case of ”a national emergency created by attack upon the United States, its territories or possessions, or its armed forces.” The resolution requires the president to notify Congress within 48 hours of committing armed forces to military action and forbids armed forces from remaining for more than 60 days without an authorization for the use of military force or a declaration of war.

There was no imminent threat in Libya. In the first place, Libya posed no threat to the United States. No “threat to the nation” was at issue. And in the second place, people had been discussing military intervention since late February. President Obama had plenty of time to ask Congress for an authorization for use of military force if he wanted legal authority. He chose not to seek such authority, despite warnings from senior members of Congress like Sen. Richard Lugar (R-IN) that he should not proceed without congressional debate and authorization.Now the 60-day clock has run out. Even if we conceded the “national emergency” point, the president should have obtained congressional authorization within 60 days. Members of Congress from both parties are complaining.Presidents have never liked the War Powers Resolution and have tried to ignore it, in cases such as Ronald Reagan’s sending Marines into Lebanon and Bill Clinton’s bombing of Yugoslavia. But law professor Peter Spiro says, “President Obama has clearly violated the letter of the law,” and unlike his predecessors he’s “not even bothering to go through the motions.”Presidents have an obligation to obey the Constitution and the law. But one of the ways that separation of powers works is that each branch of government is supposed to jealously guard its prerogatives from usurpation by the other branches. Too often Congress ducks that responsibility, preferring to let presidents make decisions, make law, and make war without the involvement of Congress. As Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr., explained in his book The Imperial Presidency, the expansion of presidential war-making power has been “as much a matter of congressional abdication as of presidential usurpation.”The president is derelict in his duty to obey the Constitution and the War Powers Resolution. And Congress is derelict in its duty to assert its constitutional authority. And I’m still wondering what’s happened to the antiwar movement, which ought to be loudly protesting not just the continuing wars in Iraq and Afghanistan but the newborn war in Libya.Hmmmm.....Dictatorship has moved in and Congress applauds it!Read the full story here.

• DisHonor killing? The Bizarre Case of Fatima Abdallah.(FaithFreedom).Why would a police department rule an almost obvious case of murder as an accidental death? Was it political pressure or has political correctness actually surpassed our judicial system?I have written many an article on Sharia in America. I have written on Dearborn, MI where Sharia takes precedent over our Constitution. I have written on Portland, ME where the District Attorney refused to investigate a bombing by a Muslim. I have written about so called “honor” killings and how our courts treat these murders differently due to Islamic culture.Now it seems that even murder can be covered up, called an accident and no one is even arrested, let alone charged.Tampa is a major city on the west coast of Florida. According to the 2010 Census it had a population of 335,709. The Tampa Police Department has grown from its inception in 1887 to over 1000 sworn officers and 350 civilian and support staff personnel today.The 2010 Census of the population of Tampa could have been 335,710 had it not been for the death of Fatima Abdallah on August 16, 2009.Fatima’s death is coming up on two years, so why is this just now coming to light? According to the Tampa Bay Tribune article from May 20,Florida Family Association, a conservative organization, is accusing the Tampa Police Department and the Hillsborough County Medical Examiner’s Office of mislabeling the death of a woman two years ago as an accident.The organization says it has enlisted a private investigator to look into the death of Fatima Abdallah, 48, who was found Aug. 16, 2009, at 8358 Old Town Drive, in the gated subdivision of Grand Hamptons.The organization thinks Abdallah was beaten to death, possibly in an honor killing. David Caton, the group’s executive director, said Abdallah was divorced and couldn’t have children. Women are typically victims of honor killings when they bring dishonor to a family.Caton worries that some law enforcement agencies in the United States have acquiesced to Shariah — Islamic law — when faced with legal controversies involving Muslims.“We don’t want to have cultural laws to form or shape how our laws are enforced in Florida,” Caton said.The organization on Thursday asked Tampa Mayor Bob Buckhorn and Hillsborough State Attorney Mark Ober to conduct a new investigation into Abdallah’s death. However, Tampa police said they reviewed the case Thursday and decided not to reopen it.Florida Family explains on their website that they are “an organization that is made up of thousands of supporters across America who share in the same goal of improving America’s moral environment.”I spoke with David Caton, Florida Family executive director about the Fatima Abdallah case. Caton and his organization have gone above and beyond, trying to get this case reopened.Regardless whether you agree or not with the biblical values of this organization, they are a non-profit that relies on public donations. I point this out because they, like any non-profit today, are hurting for lack of funds. Having seen an injustice they hired a private investigator to look into Fatima’s death.The Tampa Police Department and the Medical examiner determined that Fatima Abdallah died after she allegedly beat her own head against a coffee table and then on the floor until she died. Her death was ruled accidental and the case was closed.Actually, Tampa Police and the Medical examiner don’t agree, which is one of the problems with this case. Tampa Police concluded she beat her own head on the table repeatedly while the Medical Examiner says she fell and struck her head on the table and died.This goes much farther than the obvious ludicrousness that someone would commit suicide by beating their own head on a table. The inconsistencies in the police reports and statements, the 911 call report, the Tampa Fire Department medics and the Medical examiner are astounding.I come at this with a different perspective. Unbeknownst to most readers, I have a background in both the medical and investigative fields. I spent over 5 years with EMS as a Paramedic, 6 years as a Trauma nurse in an emergency room and spent several years as a mitigation investigator of capital punishment cases as a State employee. I have seen more crime scenes than I care to even think about and served as an expert witness on death penalty cases.I have read and re-read the all Tampa Police reports along with the 911 hardcopy call report, the Medical examiner report as well as the Private Investigators findings. I have examined all 158 Tampa Police photos from the crime scene and in my professional opinion this was an obvious case of murder, plain and simple.An anonymous email claimed that Fatima Abdallah is related to a high ranking member of CAIR (Council on American Islamic Relations), this has yet to be confirmed, but then again…Read the full story here.

• Israel was preparing a number of "surprises" for the ships that are expected to participate in the flotilla.(Jpost).The Israel Navy is prepared to intercept and take control of the ships participating in the new flotilla to the Gaza Strip, a senior Navy officer said Tuesday on the anniversary of the IDF operation to stop the Mavi Marmara that ended in the death of nine Turkish nationals."We will order the ship to stop, but if they don't, we are prepared to intercept and board the ship," a senior officer told reporters.The flotilla of 15 ships, organized by the Turkish humanitarian organization, IHH - which is outlawed in Israel due to its ties with Hamas, as well as The Free Gaza Movement - is planning to sail to the Gaza Strip in late June.The organizers are currently working to raise funds to purchase the necessary ships for the flotilla and the predictions are that it is possible that they will have to delay their launch date by several days and even weeks.The Israel Navy has been asked by the government to prepare an operational response to prevent the flotilla from breaking the sea blockade that Israel has imposed over the Gaza Strip. Under the blockade, Gazan fisherman are allowed to sail three kilometers off the coast of Gaza but no further. Ships are not allowed to enter waters that are twenty kilometers from the Gaza Strip.According to international maritime laws, however, the Israel Navy is allowed to intercept and take control of a ship that declares its intentions to sail to Gaza even before it enters the waters that are under the blockade. The Navy has been conducting training exercises in recent weeks in conjunction with the Air Force and in line with the lessons learned from last year's flotilla. Members of Israel Police and the Prison Service, who specialize in quelling civilian protests and violence, will participate in the operation to stop the flotilla together with the commandos from the Navy Flotilla 13, better known as the "Shayetet."The senior Navy officer said that Israel was preparing a number of "surprises" for the ships that are expected to participate in the flotilla.He said that soldiers were under order to use force to neutralize armed danger and neutralize attackers if necessary, but that in general, the objective and the goal would be to take over the ship non-violently and without casualties on either side.On May 31 2010, the Israel Navy stopped a Turkish flotilla and when commandos boarded the Mavi Marmara they were attacked by a group of mercenaries. In ensuing violence, nine of the mercenaries were killed, and a number of Israeli commandos were seriously wounded. In addition to military preparation, the Foreign Ministry is leading Israeli efforts to convince other countries to use necessary means to prevent the flotilla from departing to Gaza.Hmmmmm........Surprise?Read the full story here.

• Obama's 'peace partners' Hamas: Withdraw Arab Peace Initiative; Article In Hamas Newspaper: Holocaust Is A Lie.(Memri).Hamas says that the Arab Peace Initiative Monitoring Committee's May 28 response to the speech by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in the U.S. Congress was weak, and encouraged the Zionist occupation to continue its settlement and Judaization activity. Hamas said that Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud 'Abbas and the leaders of Arab countries must withdraw the Arab peace initiative and support the resistance of the Palestinian people's resistance to the occupation. In his column in the Hamas newspaper Falastin, 'Issam Shawer called for awakening from the illusion of peace with Israel and acting to remove "the Zionist occupation from every inch of Palestine... in all possible ways, including disproving their false version of history, from the lie of the Holocaust of six million Jews to the falsehood that Palestine is the land of their forefathers."Shawer also called on the PLO "to withdraw its mistaken recognition of the occupation state and its legitimacy, and to stress the Jews' right to exist in any country they choose except Palestine and the Islamic countries, except for the tiny minority of those who have local Arab roots." Read the full story here.

• Turkey - The famous ‘Muslim-meter’ returns.(HurriyetDaily).In its May 26 issue, The Economist wrote: “[Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan] is increasingly rude about the EU and has gone as far as to declare that Turkey no longer has a Kurdish problem. Even more controversially, he has taken to attacking Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu, the leader of the main pro-secular opposition Republican People’s Party, for being an Alevi, a liberal branch of Shia Islam with 20 million adherents in Turkey – with the subtext that he is not ‘a real Muslim.’ In Turkey Sunni Islam and nationalism have long gone hand in hand,” in an article titled “Turkish sex scandals: Feeling blue.”Precisely. This is why every sensible constitution orders political parties to get their hands off religion in order to make elections a fair competition. But the political tradition Mr. Erdoğan comes from has the habit of producing votes out of religious sentiments, hence Mr. Erdoğan’s never-ending resentment over constitutional secularism.At every political rally in the last month Mr. Erdoğan reminded crowds of Mr. Kılıçdaroğlu’s Alevi identity, although the opposition leader has never revealed his religious beliefs. We simply do not know, but Mr. Erdoğan is certain about his rival’s choice of faith. Mr.. Kılıçdaroğlu comes from an Alevi family, but this does not make him an Alevi. He may have chosen to practice as a Sunni, have secretly become an apostate, an atheist or an agnostic, and that is no one’s business. But sadly, it’s essentially Mr. Erdoğan’s business.On Monday, Mr. Erdoğan, at another campaign rally, condemned Mr. Kılıçdaroğlu because the opposition leader had said, “he is not against imam schools” and “the number of such schools must be proportionate to the number of imams the country needs.” That is insane, an angry Mr. Erdoğan shouted, with the pious crowd booing Mr. Kılıçdaroğlu for prescribing just enough imam schools.With that speech, Mr. Erdoğan is telling the electorate he is a real Muslim and Mr. Kılıçdaroğlu is not, since a real Muslim would wish every pupil to attend imam schools. On the same day, the “bipartisan” (read: Justice and Development Party) parliament speaker, Mehmet Ali Sahin, expressed his dream that “one day an imam could be the acting president of Turkey.”Religion is the theme at the campaign rallies, and the pro-Kurdish Peace and Democracy Party is not immune to accusations of not being “Muslim enough” either. A few days ago, the always angry Mr. Erdoğan accused Kurdish politicians of “burning Kurdish children to stop them from being Muslims.” So, like the main opposition, the Kurdish opposition is not “real Muslim” either. This is a most annoying ethos of the pious Turk who overtly or covertly believes only he and Muslims like him qualify as “real Muslims.” And this, despite the fact there are very strict commandments in the Quran that Muslims should avoid gauging other people’s “Muslimness,” for only Allah can judge.In 2007, when the then-Parliament speaker, now deputy prime minister, Bülent Arınç angrily remarked that his party’s opponents “merely wanted to block the election to the presidency of a Muslim,” he was speaking along the lines of the same thinking. In Mr. Arınç’s, or Mr. Erdoğan’s, or other Islamists’ thinking, previous Turkish presidents were not Muslim, Muslim enough or real Muslims.But at the same time this thinking is in serious contradiction with another oft-repeated line, one of the Justice and Development Party, or AKP, folks’ favorite points of information: Turkey is 99 percent Muslim. For decades, the pious teased the less pious by calling them “ID Muslims only,” a reference to the ID cards that proudly showed the word Muslim in a small box. The less pious, according to the pious, were Muslims only because their IDs said so, in reality, they were not. And that is because they did not practice Islam in exactly the same was as the pious did.Now, Mr. Erdoğan calculates that he can cash in more votes by presenting Mr. Kılıçdaroğlu as an Alevi, someone who is not a real Muslim. He may be right. But this is one of modern Turkey’s most predictable elections anyway. So relax, Mr. Erdoğan. And remember real Muslims do not walk about with a Muslim-meter in their hands.Hmmmm.....“one day an imam could be the acting president of Turkey.”Erdogan is a product of the Imamhatip schools,so yes you have an Imam at the helm of the country next port :Turkey Iranian style.Read the full story here.

• Iranian Majlis Bill: Arrest Westerners In Response To West's Arrest Of Iranians.(Memri).The Iranian Majlis National Security Committee is discussing a bill on arresting citizens of Western countries in response to the arrest of Iranian citizens in the West. The Iranians were accused of purchasing military equipment, circumventing the sanctions on Iran.Source.

• Khamenei: America Submitting To Iran.(Memri).In a speech to cadets of Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) military academy, Iranian Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei said that despite activity against the Islamic revolutionary regime in Iran in order to establish it in 1979, today the U.S. is in a situation of submission to Tehran. He said that the changes in the region were making it lose the regimes identified with it were the actualization of God's promises. He added that the events of "Nakba Day," May 14-15, signified the expected "final victory" of the Muslims over Israel.Hmmmm.....The 'submission' part might be right considering this President.Read the full story here.

• Al-Azhar Sheikh: Egypt Won't Abandon One Inch Of Muslim Lands.(Memri).During his first meeting with Islamic Jihad secretary-general Ramadan Shalah and his deputy Ziad Al-Nakhala, who are visiting Egypt, Al-Azhar Sheikh Ahmad Al-Tayeb condemned statements by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Jerusalem as the united capital of Israel, and said that Jerusalem, the capital of Palestine, is the red line for Al-Azhar and for 800 million Muslims that stand behind it. He added that Egypt will not abandon a single inch of the Muslim lands. Al-Tayeb stressed that Egypt is willing to help the Palestinians in their struggle against the Israeli plans that are supported by the U.S., to plunder the lands and places sacred to Islam, and praised Shalah's position on the issue of the Islamic Ummah. Shalah said that Al-Azhar is the spearhead of the defense of the Islamic holy sites, and praised it for its support of the Palestinian cause and the Palestinian reconciliation. At a meeting between Shalah and Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud 'Abbas, the two discussed, inter alia, reinforcing the Palestinian reconciliation, the political arrests of Islamic Jihad members in the West Bank, and the struggle against the Israeli threats.Hmmmm......Never heard of Muslims or Palestinians 3000 years ago ,but the Jews were already long time there at that time.Read the full story here.