"Christians in Aleppo are victims of death and destruction due to the fighting which for months, has been affecting the city. The Christian neighborhoods, in recent times, have been hit by rebel forces fighting against the regular army and this has caused an exodus of civilians.
Some groups in the rugged opposition, where there are also jihadist groups, “fire on Christian houses and buildings, to force occupants to escape and then take possession [ethnic cleansing] (Agenzia Fides. Vatican News, October 19, 2012)
“The Sunni Salafist militants – says the Bishop – continue to commit crimes against civilians, or to recruit fighters with force. The fanatical Sunni extremists are fighting a holy war proudly, especially against the Alawites.(Agenzia Fides 04/06/2012)"
Above quote From : Terrorism with a “Human Face”: The History of America’s Death Squads Death Squads in Iraq and Syria. The Historical Roots of US-NATO's Covert War on Syria By Prof Michel Chossudovsky Global Research, January 04, 2013
Collateral Damage: A Haunting Anti-Drone Animation By Kyle Gordy Opednews,March 6, 2013
Published on 2 Mar 2013
When a child confronts Obama about his drone license to kill, he unleashes his unlimited war on terror powers against him. COLLATERAL DAMAGE is a haunting, animated adaptation of the President's stand-up drone routine at the White House Correspondents' Dinner. The correspondents laughed.
And the band played on.
Mainstream Media and Obama's "True Believers " ignore the trial of Heroic Whistle-blower Bradley Manning in order possibly to avoid embarrassing the Obama administration. Or have they deluded themselves by Obama's rhetoric which rarely reflects his rhetoric and speeches filled with platitudes and wishful thinking.
Glenn Greenwald calls the trial of Bradley Manning a mockery of justice.
The trial is a means for President Obama to send a message to all would be Whistle-blowers.
If they dare leak government documents to Wikileaks or the media they will also face 20 years in jail
But didn't Obama say in 2008 he would pass legislation to defend Whistleblowers and the internet and stop eaves dropping on innocent citizens and of course stop the insane ill-defined perpetual war on terror and stop indefinite detention or extrajudicial killings and torture???
Glenn Greenwald on Bradley Manning: Prosecutor Overreach Could Turn All Whistle Blowing into treason
Published on 5 Mar 2013
http://www.democracynow.org - As we broadcast from the Freedom to Connect conference, we look at one whistleblower who used the Internet to reveal the horrors of war: U.S. Army Private Bradley Manning. Military prosecutors have decided to bring the maximum charges against Manning after he admitted during a pre-trial hearing last week to the largest leak of state secrets in U.S. history. In a bid to secure a reduced sentence, Manning acknowledged on the stand that he gave classified documents to WikiLeaks in order to show the American public the "true costs of war" and "spark a debate about foreign policy." Manning pleaded guilty to reduced charges on 10 counts, which carry a maximum sentence of 20 years in prison. But instead of accepting that plea, military prosecutors announced Friday they will seek to imprison Manning for life without parole on charges that include aiding the enemy. Manning's court-martial is scheduled to begin in June. We speak with Guardian columnist Glenn Greenwald, who has long covered the case, about what this means for Manning, and its broader implications for whistleblowers and the journalists they often approach.
And now back to the eighties when the US revved up its oppression of Latin American countries setting loose the dogs of war in the form of "Death Squads" to murder priests, nuns, Archbishop Romero, social workers, teachers, academics, writers, singers, poets , community organizers, journalists and anyone preaching about freedom democracy and human rights.
Deja Vu now the US backed , financed, armed , trained "Death Squads" have expanded setting up franchises in Iraq, Syria, Libya all in the name of freedom and Democracy???
From Honduras to El Salvador to Iraq and Libya and Syria the US has used Death Squads to terrorize the opposition and to foment civil strife and sectarianism in order to create a failed state which can either be a puppet for the US and NATO or at least be no longer a threat.
Terrorism with a “Human Face”: The History of America’s Death Squads Death Squads in Iraq and Syria. The Historical Roots of US-NATO's Covert War on Syria By Prof Michel Chossudovsky Global Research, January 04, 2013
The recruitment of death squads is part of a well established US military-intelligence agenda. There is a long and gruesome US history of covert funding and support of terror brigades and targeted assassinations going back to the Vietnam war.
As government forces continue to confront the self-proclaimed “Free Syrian Army” (FSA), the historical roots of the West’s covert war on Syria –which has resulted in countless atrocities– must be fully revealed.
From the outset in March 2011, the US and its allies have supported the formation of death squads and the incursion of terrorist brigades in a carefully planned undertaking.
The recruitment and training of terror brigades in both Iraq and Syria was modeled on the “Salvador Option”, a “terrorist model” of mass killings by US sponsored death squads in Central America. It was first applied in El Salvador, in the heyday of resistance against the military dictatorship, resulting in an estimated 75,000 deaths.
...US sponsored death squads were recruited in Iraq starting in 2004-2005 in an initiative launched under the helm of the US Ambassador John Negroponte, [ who was dispatched to Baghdad by the US State Department in June 2004.
Negroponte was the “man for the job”. As US Ambassador to Honduras from 1981 to 1985. Negroponte played a key role in supporting and supervising the Nicaraguan Contras based in Honduras as well as overseeing the activities of the Honduran military death squads.
“Under the rule of General Gustavo Alvarez Martinez, Honduras’s military government was both a close ally of the Reagan administration and was “disappearing” dozens of political opponents in classic death squad fashion.”
In January 2005, the Pentagon, confirmed that it was considering:
” forming hit squads of Kurdish and Shia fighters to target leaders of the Iraqi insurgency [Resistance] in a strategic shift borrowed from the American struggle against left-wing guerrillas in Central America 20 years ago”.
Under the so-called “El Salvador option”, Iraqi and American forces would be sent to kill or kidnap insurgency leaders, even in Syria, where some are thought to shelter. …
...In the early 1980s President Reagan’s Administration funded and helped to train Nicaraguan contras based in Honduras with the aim of ousting Nicaragua’s Sandinista regime. The Contras were equipped using money from illegal American arms sales to Iran, a scandal that could have toppled Mr Reagan.
...Under Negroponte’s helm at the US Embassy in Baghdad, a wave of covert civilian killings and targeted assassinations had been unleashed. Engineers, medical doctors, scientists and intellectuals were also targeted.
Author and geopolitical analyst Max Fuller has documented in detail the atrocities committed under the US sponsored counterinsurgency program.
The appearance of death squads was first highlighted in May this year [2005], …dozens of bodies were found casually disposed … in vacant areas around Baghdad. All of the victims had been handcuffed, blindfolded and shot in the head and many of them also showed signs of having been brutally tortured. …
The evidence was sufficiently compelling for the Association of Muslim Scholars (AMS), a leading Sunni organisation, to issue public statements in which they accused the security forces attached to the Ministry of the Interior as well as the Badr Brigade, the former armed wing of the Supreme Council for Islamic Revolution in Iraq (SCIRI), of being behind the killings. They also accused the Ministry of the Interior of conducting state terrorism (Financial Times).
...As in Iraq, factional violence and ethnic cleansing were actively promoted. In Syria, the Alawite, Shiite and Christian communities have been the target of the US-NATO sponsored death squads. The Alawite and the Christian community are the main targets of the assassination program. Confirmed by the Vatican News Service:
"Christians in Aleppo are victims of death and destruction due to the fighting which for months, has been affecting the city. The Christian neighborhoods, in recent times, have been hit by rebel forces fighting against the regular army and this has caused an exodus of civilians.
Some groups in the rugged opposition, where there are also jihadist groups, “fire on Christian houses and buildings, to force occupants to escape and then take possession [ethnic cleansing] (Agenzia Fides. Vatican News, October 19, 2012)
“The Sunni Salafist militants – says the Bishop – continue to commit crimes against civilians, or to recruit fighters with force. The fanatical Sunni extremists are fighting a holy war proudly, especially against the Alawites... (Agenzia Fides 04/06/2012)"
...Reports confirm the influx of Salafist and Al Qaeda affiliated death squads as well as brigades under the auspices of the Muslim Brotherhood into Syria from the inception of the insurgency in March 2011... .
It is argued by some that Mercenaries are being hired as part of Death Squads are being trained and sent into Syria with the aid of the US in league in this case with NATO forces . As we have seen again and again atrocities committed in Syria are blamed on the Syrian government when many if not all are the result of the Western backed anti-government forces.
In Libya and Syria the Rebel Forces also use snipers during peaceful protest to shoot and kill protesters at random and then blame the deaths on the government forces to stir things up and to try to persuade the peaceful protesters that they need to change tactics in the face of a (fabricated)brutal government crackdown .
As the Guardian/BBC documentary shows the Death Squads program in Iraq was under direct control and authorized by Donald Rumsfeld and so can be traced to the White House and possibly the Oval office.
It is difficult to gauge how aware NATO forces are of these brutal tactics. In any case the NATO countries are being used to give a veneer of validity,legality and a need for foreign involvement based upon ostensibly Humanitarian needs .
Syrian rebels accused of war crimes :Human Rights Watch says it has documented more than a dozen summary executions of prisoners Ian Black, Middle East editor guardian.co.uk, September 17,2012
Opposition groups in Syria have been accused of committing war crimes including torture and the summary execution of prisoners, and the UN has been warned of a growing number of human rights violations and the presence of foreign Islamist fighters ranged against the regime of Bashar al-Assad.
Human Rights Watch said it had documented more than a dozen executions by rebels in the northern provinces of Idlib and Aleppo and the coastal region of Latakia. Three opposition leaders who were confronted with evidence of extrajudicial killings said the victims had deserved to die, HRW reported.
The Free Syrian Army, the main armed opposition group, came under pressure from foreign supporters to end abuses after the public execution of 14 members of a clan of pro-regime militiamen in Aleppo in August. It then issued a code of conduct and pledged to respect human rights and humanitarian law.
"Declarations by opposition groups that they want to respect human rights are important, but the real test is how opposition forces behave," said Nadim Houry, deputy Middle East director at HRW. "Time and again Syria's opposition has told us it is fighting against the government because of its abhorrent human rights violations. Now is the time for the opposition to show that they really mean what they say."
Assad's government has been repeatedly condemned by human rights organisations and foreign governments for systematic abuses that are said to amount to war crimes and crimes against humanity.
In Geneva, meanwhile, the UN human rights council heard a report describing the "increasing and alarming presence" of "foreign Islamist elements" in Syria. That presence tended to radicalise homegrown rebels who had also committed crimes, said the investigator Paulo Pinheiro. "Gross violations of human rights have grown in number, in pace and in scale," Pinheiro told diplomats.
and so it goes,
GORD.
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