Category: World

Turkey ‘hunts down’ Israeli commandos on Facebook

Turkey compiles list of 174 Israelis, topped by Prime Minister Netanyahu, who were directly or indirectly involved in 2010 raid on Gaza-bound ship. Intelligence officials used social networks to track down participants, Sabah newspaper reports

Turkish intelligence officials have submitted to the state prosecution a list of 174 Israelis, mostly soldiers, who were involved in the 2010 raid on the Gaza-bound Mavi Marmara ship, the Turkish newspaper Sabah reported Monday.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu tops the list as the “primary responsible party.”

According to the report, the Israelis were identified from photographs and various media sources.

“Almost all of the Israeli soldiers who killed nine Turkish citizens and injured 30 others have been identified,” the report claimed.

It was stated that Israel’s government has not responded to the Turkish Justice Ministry’s demand to release a list of the individuals who took part in the operation, prompting the intelligence officials to pour over records of the raid. Facebook and Twitter were used later in the hunt for information.

The fact-finding team examined the names of the commandos ofShayetet 13 – the Navy unit that took over the Gaza-bound vessel – and matched them up with the numerous photos used in the media.

Furthermore, the officials reviewed correspondence written by soldiers whom they believed took part in the raid in order to confirm their participation. Names submitted by the IHHmovement, which organized the flotilla, were used in the search as well.

Lieberman, Barak also on list

According to the report, the Turkish prosecution intends to request the Israeli authorities to verify whether the people on the list, which includes 140 photos of 174 Israelis who directly or indirectly participated in the raid, were indeed ivolved.

Officials who allegedly contributed to the decision and issued the order to stop the Mavi Marmara, including Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman and Defense Minister Ehud Barak, made it to the top of the list as well.

“All of the Israeli Cabinet ministers were responsible for the order,” the report read.

The list also includes former IDF Chief of Staff Gabi Ashkenazi, former Israel Navy Commander Eliezer Marom, former Military Intelligence chief Amos Yadlin and a variety of other high- and low-ranking officers. Moreover, it includes 10 photographs of soldiers who are yet to be identified.

Ynetnews

September 26, 2011
AMERICAN TRAGEDY

GILAD ATZMON

Ynet’s Washington reporter, Yitzhak Ben – Horin, produced last night a clear and succinct reading of Obama’s recent UN General Assembly address:

“Likudnic in the White House.”

“Netanyahu could not have written it better.”

“Obama at this point, is in line with the Likud party.”

“Obama is a pro-Israel president …Since January 2009, he provided Israel with all its needs both in diplomacy and in terms of security”

Obama is not performing too well in the polls. He clearly needs the Jewish Lobby on his side. The American president ‘provided’ yesterday and the lobby was quick to react- “Israel has no better friend in the world today,” wrote the president of the National Council of Jewish Democrats, David Harris.

According to Ynet, hours before his UN General Assembly Address Obama sought to ensure that prospective Jewish voters pay close attention to his speech.

“Three of Obama’s aides held a conference call with the president’s Jewish supporters and community leaders. The advisers, all Jewish themselves, asked the supporters to “spread the word” that Obama will give a pro-Israel speech which reflects his own genuine positions and implored them to pay close attention to the president’s UN address.”

The three Jewish advisers “stressed that the Republicans intentionally distort Obama’s statements to portray him as an anti-Israel president, when in fact their arguments are baseless.”

If anyone was foolish enough to believe that America could ever be a broker for peace in the Middle East, the truth is now unavoidable. American political world is clearly hijacked by a foreign lobby that represents foreign interests. America cannot rescue itself. What we see in front of our eyes is basically a tragedy.

Greek tragedy depicts the downfall of a noble hero, usually through some combination of hubris, fate, and the will of the gods. The American tragedy contains the same elements. America has regarded itself as a ‘noble hero’ since its creation, ‘hubris’ is also far from being foreign to American culture. Americas’ fate has been written on the wall for more than a while. And what about the Gods, can you guess who the Gods are? I think that Obama and his party knew very well whom they were trying to appease last night. They know very well who their Gods are because they shamelessly mix with them at least once a year at AIPAC annual gathering.

However, Obama and his ‘advisers’ maybe mistaken here. Their ‘Gods’ are not stupid at all, they grasp what Obama is up to, Ben Horin wrote last night, they understand what ‘2nd term’ means in terms of Israeli politics. They remember, for instance, that during the election campaign in 2000, George Bush promised to move the U.S. embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, but once re-elected he was the man who pushed Sharon to withdraw from the Gaza Strip. They remember that the same George Bush was also the president who sided with Abu Mazen, and declared that negotiations with the Palestinians should be based on 49 armistice lines.

If Obama thinks that the ‘Gods’ are now beside him, he is deluded.

Obama made a grave personal mistake yesterday. But it is Americans, Israelis and Palestinians that will pay the price. What we see here is a classic tragedy, for America doesn’t posses the political power to save itself from itself.

The only question you may want to ask yourself at this stage is how long will it take for America to emancipate itself from its ‘Gods’.

www.gilad.co.uk, SEPTEMBER 22, 2011

September 26, 2011
Facebook wants your life story

Last night Mark Zuckerberg, Facebook’s founder and chief executive did it again: he made the web even more social. And naturally, he put Facebook at the heart of it.

By Emma Barnett, Digital Media Editor

At f8, Facebook’s annual developers conference in San Francisco, an increasingly polished and media savvy Zuckerberg took to stage to explain the site’s latest makeover – after a little aside in which he told the crowd that the site had managed to attract half a billion users in a single day.

After the cheers and whooping, which have become customary at these American live-streamed tech bonanzas, Zuckerberg introduced the ‘Timeline’.

The concept of Timeline, is that users put their entire lives on Facebook, organized by days, months and years. And then they can fill in the blanks – right back to their births.

Scan in baby pictures, upload old home movies, load in maps to chart memorable journeys – Facebook wants everyone’s life story loaded into its system.

Facebook members can edit the ‘Timeline’, erasing or adding chapters as they go. Boyfriends can be deleted and new ones added – it’s your life and therefore your story.

Zuckerberg and his team have been working on this radical makeover of the profile pages for the last 12 months, and did it because people couldn’t easily find the chats and stuff they shared from years ago.

And there are some lovely additions – such as the large background photo behind the profile picture – which makes each user’s page look more like a personalized website, rather than a subsection of Facebook.

Interestingly Timeline looks a little like the Flipboard, the social media magazine iPad app, but instead of aggregating and displaying media content beautifully, it shows off each user’s personal content.

Then came the announcement of media and content arriving onto Facebook. Partnerships with the likes of Spotify, The Washington Post and Netflix finally take Facebook into a world of content. Until now the users have had to bring the content to Facebook and after that, they have had to leave the site to see the material or listen to the song.

Now this ‘new breed of content apps’ will all appear in the Facebook News Feed and be watched, listened to or read, without leaving the site.

Facebook has just moved one step closer to becoming a web within the web – and certainly even nearer to becoming the social platform of the whole web – in spite of Google’s best efforts with Google+.

But what will be interesting to watch is whether people really do engage with their Timelines, filling in their past and charting their future through the various filters on offer.

Will fears about privacy and what is happening to our data stop users from taking these extra steps? Or has Zuckerberg created another form of behaviour, digitally scrapbooking our whole lives, that people didn’t yet know they would want to do until Facebook suggested it?

Certainly the intensely private Zuckerberg was practicing what he preached last night – by showing everyone his Timeline – including a photo of him and his girlfriend, Priscilla, on their first road trip.

However, despite all the changes, there has been very little noise about how the site’s advertising will alter to fit in around the new app-heavy News Feed and beautiful Timeline profiles.

A Facebook spokesman said there was nothing new to announce around the commercial side of the business – but a clear benefit of getting more and more of people’s data, going right back to their births, is exploiting for commercial gain when selling advertising solutions.

Nate Elliott, principal analyst at Forrester Research, still doesn’t think Facebook has this part of its strategy sorted.

“Facebook needs to focus on becoming useful to people who aren’t on Facebook.com – by adding social relevance and connections to the sites where all two billion global internet users spend time. Getting traffic to Facebook.com and monetizing that traffic with a self-serving advertising platform is pretty small thinking.

“The big thinking has to be about using their data to make the web richer to users on other sites, and monetizing that data in other ways other than simple little on-site ads.”

Facebook wants to host everyone’s life story, from start to finish, mixed with the web’s best content. Will Facebook’s seven hundred and fifty million users join in?

www.telegraph.co.uk, 23 Sep 2011

September 24, 2011
IMPERIAL NATIONALISM & TURKISH UNION

Republic of Turkey , born from the ashes of a 600-year Empire and having the character of independence , has pioneered many freedom movements which resulted with the establishment of new free countries within the first half of 20th century . The founders of the Republic under the leadership of Ataturk set up this new state by giving the whole nation , desolated and impoverished , the spirit of resistance and by getting their rights with force against the Western Allies at that time ; therefore , they deserve our feelings of gratitude and respect .

Today , at this point , we , as Turkey , need to follow much more active government policies . Personally , I strongly believe that the nationalism concept taking place among the founding principles of the Republic should be considered as Imperial Nationalism . In other words , Turkey , will exert its power and authority in every piece of land which it already exists or existed before and which it strongly wishes to exist in the future . No need to say , this is not an enlargement basing on the military power , but on the contrary , an enlargement policy by using all the historical and cultural close relations and by creating a land of attraction for other states and people . Military power must always be respected and must create hesitation among the possible enemies .

First of all , I want to start wit a basic fact of creation : every entity in the universe has an energy and the power of this energy is directly proportional to its mass .

If we apply this fact to politics , the way to gain power in world politics goes through creating unity , as our ancestors wisely said “union makes us strong” . Examples are many : USA today , Ottoman & Roman Empires in the past … Of course , the age of empires ended long time ago , but there is always a future for the unions . Even the United States , despite its present power and influence , continuously brainstorms about establishing a One-World-Government under the authority of the United Nations controlled & directed by the USA .

Under the light of the basic reality above , Turkey , in order to be effective in world politics , needs to unite . The candidates for setting up a union stand next to us : Azerbaijan , Kazakhstan , Turkmenistan , Uzbekistan , Kyrgyzstan and , due to geographical and historical ties , Georgia and Tajikistan . Except the last two , all Turkish origin states … This unification process can first start with the establishment of confederation and may end up with a federation .

Due to its historical experience and the effectiveness in state establishment , Turkey must perform a leadership for establishing “Eurasia Federation” consisting of the eight states above . This new Federation will represent a union covering approximaely 5 million square kilometers and a population of 150+ million , which is hard to ignore .

It is obvious that many of the other actors in the world politics will try every way in order to prevent such a powerful union . Moreover , the present administrators in these eight countries will be reluctant in giving up the power they currently use . However , nobody can claim that it will be easy . I personally do believe that the people forming the nations of those states will look at this unification idea with sympathy .

Finally , the last but not least , this new “Eurasia Federation” will need a technology-creating reliable partner in order to set up a confederation . That partner is JAPAN . Imagine Japan and Turkey with their own distinctive and leading characteristics and , right beside them , all other participating countries with their natural and social wealth . The future lies in the united political and social entities .

Even the idea itself is exciting !… Don’t you think this is worth trying ???

September 22, 2011
Cancer fear over cola colourings: Call to ban ingredient used in Coke and Pepsi

By Sean Poulter

A health risk? America's National Toxicology Program says both 2-MI and 4-MI found in Coke are animal carcinogens

An ingredient used in Coca-Cola and Pepsi is a cancer risk and should be banned, an influential lobby group has claimed.

The concerns relate to an artificial brown colouring agent that the researchers say could be causing thousands of cancers.

‘The caramel colouring used in Coca-Cola, Pepsi, and other foods is contaminated with two cancer-causing chemicals and should be banned,’ said the Center for Science in the Public Interest (CSPI), a health lobby group based in Washington, DC.

‘In contrast to the caramel one might make at home by melting sugar in a saucepan, the artificial brown colouring in colas and some other products is made by reacting sugars with ammonia and sulphites under high pressure and temperatures.

‘Chemical reactions result in the formation of two substances known as 2-MI and 4-MI which in government-conducted studies caused lung, liver, or thyroid cancer or leukaemia in laboratory mice or rats.’

America’s National Toxicology Program says that there is ‘clear evidence’ that both 2-MI and 4-MI are animal carcinogens, and therefore likely to pose a risk to humans.

Researchers at the University of California, Davis, found significant levels of 4-MI in five brands of cola.

The executive director of the CSPI, Michael F Jacobson, has petitioned America’s food regulator, the Food & Drug Administration, to take action.He said: ‘Carcinogenic colourings have no place in the food supply, especially considering that their only function is a cosmetic one.’

Mr Jacobson said the name ‘caramel colouring’ does not accurately describe the additives, explaining: ‘It’s a concentrated dark brown mixture of chemicals that simply does not occur in nature.’

Popular drink: The Beatles drinking bottles of coca cola in Paris in 1964. Scientists say its 'caramel colour' is a mixture of chemicals that does not occur in nature

He added that while regular caramel could not be described as healthy, ‘at least it is not tainted with carcinogens’.

U.S. regulations distinguish between four types of caramel colouring, two of which are produced with ammonia and two without it. The CSPI wants the two made with ammonia to be banned and has received backing from five prominent cancer experts, including several who have worked at the National Toxicology Program.

The type used in colas and other dark soft drinks is known as Caramel IV, or ammonia sulphite process caramel. Caramel III, which is produced with ammonia but not sulphites, is sometimes used in beer, soy sauce, and other foods.

The CSPI admitted that any risk associated with consumption of the chemicals would be extremely small. It said the ten teaspoons of sugar found in a can of regular cola would be more of a health problem.

However, it argued the levels of 4-MI in the tested colas still may be causing thousands of cancers in the U.S. population alone.

Earlier this week, it was claimed that Coca-Cola’s secret recipe had been leaked. It was even suggested it might be possible to recreate the taste and look on the kitchen table.

The leak claims were denied by the company, where a spokesman said: ‘Many third parties have tried to crack our secret formula. Try as they might, they’ve been unsuccessful because there is only one “Real Thing”.’

Coca-Cola and Pepsi did not respond to a request for a response to the CSPI claims.

This morning Coca-Cola rejected the CSPI’s concerns.

A spokesman said: ‘Our beverages are completely safe. CSPI’s statement irresponsibly insinuates that the caramel used in our beverages is unsafe and
maliciously raises cancer concerns among consumers.

‘This does a disservice to the very public for which CSPI purports to serve.

‘Studies show that the caramel we use does not cause cancer.’

The company said its drinks do not contain 2-MEI. It said they do contain 4-MEI in trace amounts.

It said: ‘These extrapolations by CSPI to human health and cancer are totally unfounded.’

www.dailymail.co.uk, 17th February 2011

September 21, 2011
Facebook Censoring Some Alternative News Sites…

… While Allowing Hackers To Attack Others

Alexander Higgins
The Intel Hub

Facebook now appears to be censoring some alternative news sites while allowing hackers to go after others. It is no wonder they lost 6 Million users in the US last month.

I recently talked to Alex Thomas from The Intel Hub who was listed as an honorable mention in the top 10 most influential people in alternative media list published by Activist Post.

I am frequently a guest contributor on the site and during our conversation he told me that Facebook is starting to ban articles from the site. At that point I figured most likely his account was flagged and left it at that.

Lo and behold, top item in Reddit’s conspiracy section right now is this.

Facebook Not Allowing Users To Share Articles From The Intel Hub

So it is not just Alex’s account that has been banned but other users are also being censored from sharing Intel Hub articles.

www.activistpost.com, june 15 2011

September 20, 2011