ISRAEL TRUTH TIMES

A blog dedicated to investigating events as they occur in Judea and Samaria, in Israel and in the world, and as they relate to global powers and/or to the Israeli government, public figures, etc. It is dedicated to uncovering the truth behind the headlines; and in so doing, it strives to do its part in saving Judea and Samaria, and by extension, Israel and the Jewish People, from utter destruction at the hands of its many external and internal enemies.

Tuesday, June 30, 2009

Did you hear about this latest atrocity?






Med Students Accused of Buying Bones of Holocaust Victims

Tammuz 8, 5769, 30 June 09 06:30
by Tzvi Ben Gedalyahu
(Israelnationalnews.com)

Medical students at the Iasi University in Romania allegedly have been purchasing bones from mass Holocaust graves and using them for research, the European Jewish Press (EJP) reported. The Rabbinical Center of Europe has been investigating the charges.

The alleged practice came to light after an American student notified the rabbinical group that local students bought bones and skulls of victims of the Holocaust who were buried in a nearby village. The bones were reportedly sold for $40 a piece and were used in research in place of those made of plastic.

Thousands of students from all over the world attend the university, which includes a well-known school of medicine and pharmacy.

The Rabbinical Center sent two students to the university to pose as medical students in order to verify or deny the claim. A caretaker of the mass grave did not deny being involved in the sale of the bones but apparently was suspicious of the would-be buyers and referred them elsewhere.

One Jewish student, who requested anonymity for fear of reprisals, said it was obvious the caretaker was concealing information, according to EJP.

Jewish medical students confirmed to the two "students" that information about the sale of human bones was available throughout the university, but no single purchaser has been identified.

The price for the bones included the workers' task to "clean them up nicely."

One of two death trains that left Isai during the Nazi regime stopped in the village of Podu Iloaiei, where nearly 1,200 Jews were buried in a mass grave after dying of starvation.





Comments:

Jack said:

This is appalling but not surprising. Almost 20 years ago, it was reported that medical schools in Germany are still using cadavers and organs of victims of the Holocaust preserved in alcohol. Everyone wants to profit from Amaleq.

A WORLD WITHOUT A LEADER


by Howard Galganov


Marv sent this:

A WORLD WITHOUT A LEADER

While the world is focusing on Iran, North Korea, the Palestinian/Israel conflict and Michael Jackson, no one seems to be noticing the obvious.

It's like that old saying about not seeing the 800-pound Gorilla in the room.

After more than 100 years of world leadership, the world is for the first time without a leader.

It was always assumed during the past century and accepted as fact by the world body, that the President of the United States of America is not only the Commander In Chief of the USA, but also the de facto LEADER OF THE FREE WORLD.

BUT NOT ANYMORE.

In just 6 months, Barack Obama has abandoned America's world leadership in speech and deed. He went on his global APOLOGY TOURS to diminish America by giving undeserved approbation for bad behavior to Europe, Asia, the Arab Middle East and Islam.

He made it clear that the USA will become just another country in the fraternity of nations. The most telling example being what he said about the crisis in Iran at the outset:

THAT HE WANTS TO WAIT AND SEE WHAT THE WORLD REACTION WILL BE BEFORE HE MAKES A STATEMENT.

I will use one of Obama's favorite lines: "LET ME BE CLEAR" - Obama has NEVER been a leader. Nor will he EVER be a leader.

A great many of Obama's supporters, especially in the propaganda LEFTIST media shrugged-off the fact that Obama chose to vote PRESENT in the Illinois State Legislature on just about EVERY contentious Bill that he would otherwise have to take a black or white position on.

This might have been acceptable in Illinois politics, but PRESENT isn't a position nor is it an option that is available to a US President.

The Iranian pro Freedom Uprising is Obama's FIRST REAL CHALLENGE.

He could have stepped up to the plate in defense of hundreds of thousands of unarmed people who took to the streets in their demand for Freedom.

He could have simply stated that he was with all of those who were prepared to sacrifice for the principles of FREEDOM and DEMOCRACY.

BUT HE DIDN'T.

What Obama said was so mealy-mouthed that it isn't worth repeating.

Where President Ronald Reagan stood tall with the Poles who rallied under Lech Walesa, Obama spoke his usual bombastic platitudes.

Where President Reagan challenged Gorbachev to "TEAR DOWN THAT WALL", Obama made no challenge whatsoever.

It was the British, the French and the Germans who challenged the Mullahs for their horrid response to demonstrations for FREEDOM. It was ONLY after Obama (probably is handlers) figured it out that the American people were upset by his silence on this outrage that he finally sort of ponied-up.

It's interesting how Obama kisses the backsides of world tyrants, but LAYS DOWN THE LAW TO ISRAEL, America's single greatest and most reliable ally in the world. Not to mention the only real Democracy in the Middle East.

WHAT DOES THAT SAY ABOUT OBAMA?

Worse – What does that say about the people who voted for and continue to support he who will go down in history as the worst President the United States of America has ever known?

And perhaps the very worst of all – We now live in a world where there is a leadership vacuum, when a World Leader is needed the most.

The last two times the USA abrogated its obligation to lead the world (1914 and 1939), only to watch other people make global decisions, the results were two world wars the USA had to finally step into to end.

Does that say it all?

Best Regards . . . Howard Galganov

CANADA TO VACCINATE ENTIRE POPULATION AGAINST SWINE FLU, STARTING WITH THE YOUNG. At least that country will not use COERCION, and has the decency to admit that safety might be an issue. EDUCATE, EDUCATE, PASS JANE BURGERMEISTER'S INFORMATION AROUND!



sent by anonymous



June 21, 2009

Five-to-40-year-olds and Canada's aboriginal communities should be the first to get vaccinated against human swine flu, experts say as Canadian officials decide who gets priority for the flu shots.

Under Canada's official pandemic plan, the entire population would ultimately be immunized against the H1N1 swine flu.

But the vaccine will become available in batches, meaning the entire population can't be vaccinated at once. It might take four or five months to get all the vaccine we're going to get, during which time a second wave of swine flu may well be underway.

The Public Health Agency of Canada is working on a priority list, deciding where the first batches should go, and who should get the injections first. All provinces and territories would be expected to follow the national prioritization scheme.

Unlike normal seasonal flu, the H1N1 virus appears to be disproportionately infecting older children and young adults. So far the largest number of confirmed cases have occurred in people between the ages of five and 24.

"It doesn't mean they're all getting sick and need to be hospitalized, but they're getting significant illness," said Dr. Noni MacDonald, a leader in pediatric infectious diseases and a professor of pediatrics at Dalhousie University in Halifax.

British researchers reported last week that targeting children first would protect not only them, but also unvaccinated adults.

"Even if you are concerned about the elderly, who are often mentioned as another risk group, their main connection to the big pool of infection is often their grandchildren," said Dr. Thomas House of the University of Warwick.

But adults older than 64 don't appear to be at increased risk of H1N1-related complications so far in the outbreak. It's possible they have some antibodies against the virus.

As well, children "are known to be really important for transmitting flu," said Earl Brown, executive director of the Emerging Pathogens Research Centre at the University of Ottawa.

"They're important for the cycle of infection. They tend to be naive as far as not having flu antibodies in their system before. And really young kids, their immune systems aren't fully mature.

"Children tend to be hit, and they can be hit harder," Brown said. By immunizing children first, "you get to try to block spread, and protect a vulnerable group."

Gymnasiums would be used for mass school-based vaccination programs but experts say the harder to reach group will be the 18-to-30-year-olds.

"Some of them are in school, a lot of them are not," MacDonald said. "They're very much living in the moment and don't necessarily see themselves as being at risk. We need some fast thinking about how to reach those people."

She suggested booths could be set up outside bars for information and immunization.

"You've got to be creative about this and really think out of the box."

Canada's aboriginal communities also appear to be getting more serious infections. Crowded, poorly ventilated housing and poor access to high-quality running water and sanitization are some of the factors being blamed. Aboriginals also have higher rates of asthma, chronic lung disease, obesity and diabetes — the very diseases early data suggests puts people at higher risk of life-threatening complications from swine flu.

The H1N1 vaccine will be a separate vaccine from the regular, annual flu shot. People will require two jabs, and possibly three, depending on how effective the vaccine is in producing immunity. The Public Health Agency of Canada says that no decisions have yet been made about who would get priority first.

One of the challenges will be getting people to agree to the shots. There will be limited information about any vaccine's safety before immunization campaigns are rolled out across the country.

"We usually do research in healthy adults before we do it in children, because this is a new vaccine, and you want to be sure that it's safe and effective before you give it to vulnerable populations, or populations who don't have full capacity to make an informed decision about getting it or not," said Dr. Joanne Langley, of Health Canada's National Advisory Committee on Immunization.

"There are pros and cons to putting (children) first."

Babies under six months of age are not vaccinated against flu.




http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=14121

Re: BENEDIKT AND OBAMA: ARE THEY THE GILGULIM OF BALAK AND BALAAM? HUMBLE REFLECTIONS ON THIS WEEK'S PARSHA.




See latest, July 9 2012 update here, with significant corrections:

http://petachganeden.blogspot.co.il/2012/07/you-can-see-full-text-to-my-post.html


B"H


Hello to all,


It is not exactly my forte to write a Dvar Torah, but I have been thinking of some strange coincidences lately, and you probably do know by now my interest in numerology and the Hebrew letters. So please let me share with you the following. Let me stress that these are just my thoughts, and do not necessarily represent the truth - although they just might!




This week's Torah portion in Israel will be PARSHAT BALAK.


In brief, it discusses how the king of Moab, Balak, became FRIGHTENED because ISRAEL WAS VERY NUMEROUS ( rings a bell? NO POPULATION GROWTH WANTED ANY MORE IN YESHA!) , and Moab feared being overpowered by Israel. So Balak devised a scheme to hire a "prophet" who was also a sorcerer, Balaam, who would CURSE ISRAEL and use SORCERY in order to vanquish Israel . When that scheme failed, Balaam advised Balak to DEBAUCH the people of Israel, knowing that this was the ONLY way to vanquish Am Yisrael.


Sure enough, THAT scheme worked; with the help of their Midianite ( Saudi) allies, Moab enticed Israel to follow the ANAL GOD BAAL PEOR. IN DEFIANCE OF Moshe ( the rabbis)  Zimri and Cozbi held a brazen, rebellious, debauched 'PRIDE PARADE' in front of the TENT OF MEETING ( the Temple of those days) .. As a result,  24,000 Israelites died in a plague , until Pinhas came along and put an end to the debauchery by  slaying the leaders of the debauchery movement.


This story, as does every Torah portion, has a very contemporary feel to it, and is totally relevant to what we are going through right now in Israel.

See what Eric Phelps had to say about the pope and sorcery - I have to stress that this is NOT a Jewish book, NOT part of the Torah and the Tanach, and therefore not kosher - I am just using his quote to support my claim:


Most correct.  The pope, the king of Rome, is the world's greatest sorcerer according to Revelation 17:23.

The pope has been using the services of Barak Obama, who considers himself a prophet of God, speaks  as though he is G-d's gift to humanity. He sincerely believes that he is a prophet. And he knows how to MESMERIZE audiences, he is a kind of magician in his own right.

We have seen how the pope , using NUMEROLOGY REPEATEDLY, SORCERY, on April 16-18  gathered 80 religious leaders in Rome to try and compose a common DECLARATION, to be used for the coming G8 meeting - the military-political entity - part of THE CURSE - against Israel.

 MUSLIMS did participate in the  interfaith meeting,  and Arab Nations - Midian - will participate in the G8 meeting as well, the scheme to destroy Israel.

The CURSE, which deliberately took place in Abruzzo, obviously did not work: on the 17th , instead of Israel bowing to the US, Hillary, the envoy of the papal crew to Israel, FELL AND BROKE HER ELBOW.

The pope, it seems,  wanted to use a FAKE HOLY ARK TO OVERPOWER ISRAEL as well - this failed too - maybe he became frightened himself of the REAL POWER of the Ark, Hashem, and decided to abandon THAT MAGIC TRICK? And decided to use the bones of an alleged saint instead? Who knows.... I suspect that this show of a RELIC is part of the sorcery used against Israel, THE CURSE, once again,

But the fact is, CURSES SO FAR DID NOT WORK AGAINST ISRAEL: see what happened Erev Pessach, when Jews were busy turning to God: instead, ALL THE POPE'S IDOLS WERE DESTROYED IN ABRUZZO!

THE ONLY THING THAT WORKS AGAINST ISRAEL IS DEBAUCHERY, AND THESE SORCERERS AND THEIR ARAB ALLIES KNOW THAT VERY WELL.

So instead, THE GAY PARADE IS BEING USED. EVEN IN WASHINGTON, OBAMA IS BUSY COWTOWING TO THE HIGH PRIESTS OF DEBAUCHERY today:

http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/story?id=7956893&page=1



(Not just to weaken Israel, mind you; also to weaken AMERICA in this case. Muslims know that, don't you think? They know that debauchery will weaken a nation, so they are VERY EAGER TO USE IT AGAINST AMERICANS AS WELL.)

In particular, the PRIDE PARADE took place this week IN JERUSALEM, AT "THE ENTRANCE TO THE TENT OF MEETING", next to the old city of Jerusalem and Har Habayit.

Because THIS is the ONLY way to weaken Israel, there is no other way.


We just found out this week, in my blog post MAJOR BOMBSHELL #2, THAT THE SCHEMES TO DEBAUCH THE WORLD ORIGINATE FROM THE CLUB OF ROME.

ARE YOU SURPRISED?

BenediK... B.....K

Balak..........B----K

He was also a great sorcerer. Both HE and Balaam were the two greatest sorcerers of their time.

oBaMa     B.....M, incidentally also B....K ( Barack)

Bilaam      B.....M

ARE BENEDIK AND oBAMa THE GILGULIM (REINCARNATIONS) OF BALAK AND BALAAM?

Is THIS WHAT THE SWINE FLU IS ALL ABOUT - to destroy Israel with a deadly plague, as in the days of old?

In this case, the United States is included in the SCHEME AGAINST ISRAEL, as it is being perceived as being PART of the JUDEO-CHRISTIAN nation by the sorcerers...

IF SO, WHAT WILL IT TAKE TO STOP THE PLAGUE, both in Israel and in the US???

I think the parsha told us that already: his name was PINCHAS, and he did what he had to do.

DS











NB; Make sure to read the posts under the label VATICAN SCHEMES AND LIES.


Comments:

Ed sent this:

BEWARE THE OBAMA 'EVIL EYE'
Tue Jun 30 2009 07:43:56 ET

As the summer begins, White House watchers have spotted a new look by President Obama: The Evil Eye!

Staffers have joked about the menacing glance, which comes when the president meets with world leaders who are not aligned with his progressive view.

White House photographers have captured the "evil eye" in recent weeks, during sessions with German Chancellor Angela Merkel and Colombia's Alvaro Uribev.

Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi got hit with the commander's malocchio last week in the Oval office.

And at least one White House reporter has been on the receiving end of the daggers during a press conference.

Developing...



From nik:

nice sevora...


DS replies:

I have another one for you:

How do you write Obama in Hebrew? Aleph, vav, beth, me, heh.

Turn the letters around and you get, ha - Moab, Moav.


Obama the Moabite

How do you like that? his name is even the same as Moab. I think that is very interesting

nik replied:


excellent... moab... bill clinton is a gilgul of acheshvarosh and hitlery is vashti for sure... so why can't these mamzarim be biliam and barak...? nik.

obama = a moab... nice... works for me... nik.




Update, ON SHABBAT PARSHAT BALAK EXACTLY
:

Obama Turns to Pope to Back Mideast Plan


(Israelnationalnews.com)

U.S. President Barack Obama is turning to the Pope to back his vision of a new Arab state on all of Judea and Samaria and eastern Jerusalem.
The president told the Catholic Italian newspaper Avvenire, one week before a scheduled meeting with the Pope in Italy, "It [the Middle East] is a subject I am keen to discuss with the pope. I think he will share my approach."


OBAMA DECIDES TO JOIN FORCES WITH THE POPE AGAINST ISRAEL:

BALAK AND BALAAM TO WORK TOGETHER:

WHAT WILL THIS "NEW APPROACH" OF OBAMA/BALAAM THE MOABITE BE:

WILL IT BE DEBAUCHERY, OR WILL IT BE SORCERY?


Update:

See also:

Monday, June 29, 2009

Joseph Farah asks why U.S. supports creation of a new 'anti-Semitic hate state'. Thank you, Mr. Farah.









"It seems obvious to me. The world has accepted Hitler's definition of "peace": No Jews."
 
Jack


Obama tells Jews where they can live
 Joseph Farah asks why U.S. supports creation of a new 'anti-Semitic hate state' (WND)

 

By Joseph Farah


Barack Obama is taking what he and his administration refer to as "a more balanced approach to Middle East policy."

Let me explain what that literally means in real terms.

It means the U.S. government is now using its clout with Israel to insist Jews, not Israelis, mind you, but Jews, be disallowed from living in East Jerusalem and the historically Jewish lands of Judea and Samaria, often referred to as the West Bank.

I want you to try to imagine the outrage, the horror, the outcry, the clamoring, the gnashing of teeth that would ensue if Arabs or Muslims were told they could no longer live in certain parts of Israel – let alone their own country.

Of course, that would never happen with "a more balanced approach to the Middle East."

It's the 1930s all over again. This time, it's the enlightened liberal voices of Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama who are telling Jews where they can live, how they can live and how far they must bend if they want to live at all.

I know you haven't heard it put like this before. I don't really understand why. There is simply no other accurate way to explain the machinations behind the latest demands on Israel from the West and the rest of the world.

Israel is being reduced to "Auschwitz borders." Jews have already been told they can no longer live in the Gaza Strip. Now they are being told they can no longer choose to live in any of the areas being set aside by international elites for a future Palestinian state.

Again, I ask, "Why would internationalists seek to create, by definition, a racist, anti-Jewish state that doesn't even tolerate the mere presence of Jews?"

Can anyone answer that question for me?

Obama and Clinton – and, thus, by definition, you and me, the taxpayers of the United States – have determined they will yield to the racist, bigoted, anti-Semitic demands of the Palestinian Authority that no Jews be allowed to live in their new state.

I like to think that in any other part of the world, this kind of effort at ethnically cleansing a region would be roundly condemned by all civilized people. Yet, because most people simply don't understand the clear, official plan by the Arab leaders to force out all Jews from the new Palestinian state, the policies of capitulation retain a degree of sympathy, even political support, from much of the world.

Think about what I am saying: It is the official policy of the Palestinian Authority that all Jews must get off the land! Why is the United States supporting the creation of a new, racist, anti-Semitic hate state? Why is the civilized world viewing this as a prescription for peace in the region? Why is this considered an acceptable idea?

Is there any other place in the world where that kind of official policy of racism and ethnic cleansing is tolerated – even condoned?

Why are the rules different in the Middle East? Why are the rules different for Arabs? Why are the rules different for Muslims?

Why are U.S. tax dollars supporting the racist, anti-Semitic entity known as the Palestinian Authority?

That's what we do when we forbid "settlement construction," repairs, natural growth, additions to existing communities.

This is "balance"? Are there any impositions upon the Arabs and Muslims suggesting they can no longer move to Israel? No. Are there any impositions on Arabs and Muslims suggesting they cannot buy homes in Israel? No. Are there any impositions on Arabs and Muslim suggesting they cannot repair their existing homes in Israel? No. Are there any impositions on Arabs or Muslims suggesting the cannot build settlements anywhere they like? No.

Now, keep in mind, there are already quite a few Arab and Muslim states in the Middle East. Many of them already forbid Jews to live in them. Some prohibit Christians as well. But now, the only Jewish state in the world, and one that has a claim on the land dating back to the days of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, is being told Jews must keep off land currently under their own control, but destined for transfer to people who hate them, despise them, want to see them dead and will not even accept living peacefully with them as neighbors.

All the while, Israel continues to hold out its naïve hand of friendship to the Arabs and the Muslims – welcoming them in their own tiny nation surrounded by hateful neighbors. Arabs and Muslims are offered full citizenship rights – and even serve in elected office. They publish newspapers and broadcast on radio and television freely.

But, conversely, Jews are one step away from eviction from homes they have sometimes occupied for generations. Gaza is about to happen all over again.

I hope my Jewish friends remember this well. Many of them voted for Barack Obama. Many of them voted for Hillary Clinton. These are not your friends. These are the same kinds of people who turned away ships of Jewish refugees from Germany in the 1940s. These are the same kinds of people who appeased Adolf Hitler at Munich. These are the same kinds of people who made the reformation of the modern state of Israel so difficult.

I say, "No more ethnic cleansing. No more official anti-Semitism accepted. No more Jew-bashing. No more telling Jews where they can live, how they can – and if they can live."

 


Obama's deadly hand revealed, by Melanie Phillips


Jack sent this.

 

 

Obama's deadly hand revealed

Posted By Melanie Phillips
Jewish Chronicle, 26 June 2009

Among American Jews, a degree of 'buyers' remorse' has been detected recently.

Almost 80 per cent of American Jews voted for Barack Obama as President. Those of us who warned that this man would endanger Israel were scorned.

How could that possibly be, said the secular, liberal American Jews. He's a Democrat, he's black and he's pro-abortion. With this triple-lock of unassailable virtue, how can he be bad for Israel? Now some of them are getting an awful feeling that they may have made the biggest misjudgment of their lives.

As the world watched events unfold in Iran, Obama's double standard over Israel was illuminated in flashing neon lights. How come he's saying it is wrong for him to tell the Iranians what to do, people asked themselves, when he is dictating to Israel its policy on settlements?

Why was he so concerned not to antagonise the Iranian regime? Was it because he hopes to reach a Grand Bargain which would allow Iran to develop nuclear capability, provided it promises him ever so nicely it would never turn this into weapons — in exchange for which, Israel would be offered up on a plate?

For the past six months, while Obama has been holding out the hand of friendship to Iran, he has been showing Israel a mailed fist.

Why, people asked themselves, was he singling out Iran's putative victim for the heavy treatment while soft-soaping Tehran? Why had he torn up the Road Map which requires the Palestinians to dismantle their infrastructure of terror before anything else can happen, telling Israel instead that its stubbornness over the settlements was the main impediment to a Palestinian state?

Why didn't he acknowledge the blindingly obvious — that the Palestinians' continuing, explicit refusal to accept Israel as a Jewish state was the fatal impediment?

And then there was the Cairo shocker of a speech. Even the American Jews could not ignore this. Obama stated falsely that the Jews' aspiration for a homeland was rooted in the Holocaust and their tragic history.

Airbrushing out both the Jews 3,500-year connection to their ancient homeland and the central place of Jerusalem within the religion, he thus effectively denied that Jews are in Israel as of right.

Sanitising Islam through false claims about its historic achievements and selective and misleading quotation from the Koran, he declared that it was part of his responsibility to fight against negative stereotypes of Islam wherever they appear.

Why? Did this mean therefore that he would fight against any condemnation of the theologically based Jew-hatred pouring out of the Islamic world, not least in Egypt where he was making this speech?

Did he not have a similar responsibility to fight against the negative stereotypes of Jews or Zionists that are inciting terrorism, war and genocide in the Muslim world?

Through the use of a Koranic reference, he also subtly implied that Jerusalem would become Muslim while stating that it should be home equally to Christians, Muslims and Jews.

And he referred to the region as being where Islam was first revealed. This was a revealing word to choose, implying acknowledgement of divine revelation. 'Revealed' is the language of a believer.

None of this proves Obama is really a Muslim. But it does all suggest that America has a pro-Islamist President.

Doubtless as a result of his constant sniping at Israel, the percentage of American voters who say they support Israel has plummeted, according to the Israel Project, from 69 per cent last September to 49 per cent this month.

The US and Israel could be heading for the greatest disagreement between the two countries in the history of their relationship, as Middle East expert Robert Satloff recently told Newsweek.

Even now, though, despite the outbreak of buyers' remorse, most American Jews still don't realise what they have done — and probably never will.

 URL to article: http://www.melaniephillips.com/articles-new/?p=671


Apparently things didn't work out too well for them with the Aron Hakodesh; maybe they had thought people - JEWS - would fall for it. But they need SOMETHING, some proof of Rome's great holiness to make up for it: this is it, I guess.



Pope Says Scientific Analysis Seems to Confirm Tradition


VATICAN CITY, JUNE 28, 2009 (Zenit.org).- The tomb of St. Paul may indeed contain the remains of the Apostle of the Gentiles, Benedict XVI affirmed in his homily at the closing of the Year of St. Paul.

The Pope presided at first vespers this evening for the solemnity of Sts. Peter and Paul, which marked the conclusion of the Pauline Year. The celebration took place at the Basilica of St. Paul Outside the Walls, where it has traditionally been believed St. Paul was buried.

"An authentic scientific analysis" conducted on the sarcophagus conserved in the basilica, the Holy Father said, "seems to confirm the unanimous and uncontested tradition that these are the mortal remains of the Apostle Paul."
 
"A tiny hole was drilled into the sarcophagus -- which over many centuries had never been opened -- in order to insert a special probe, which revealed traces of costly purple colored linen fabric, laminated with pure gold and a blue fabric with linen filaments," Benedict XVI explained.
 
"Grains of red incense and protein and chalk substances were also discovered," he continued. "There were also tiny bone fragments, which were sent for carbon-14 testing by experts who were unaware of their origin. These were discovered to belong to a person who had lived between the first and second centuries."
 
St. Paul is said to have been beheaded at Aquas Salvias -- where the Church of Tre Fontane was then erected -- while he was buried at the place where the Basilica of St. Paul Outside the Walls now stands, and where two basilicas -- one ordered by Emperor Constantine and the other the so-called basilica of the "Three Emperors" (Theodosius, Valentinian II and Arcadius) -- were constructed during the fourth century.
 
Despite the fact that the original tomb of St. Paul had been the object of profound devotion on the part of pilgrims from the beginning, over the centuries it disappeared from view and eventually could no longer be identified.
 
During the reconstruction of the basilica, which had been destroyed by a fire in 1823, two marble plaques dating from the time of Pope Leo the Great (440-461), which contained the barely visible inscription "Paolo Apostolo Mart" ("Paul the Apostle Martyr"), were discovered beneath the "confessio" altar.
 
The first archaeological inspections, which took place in 2002-2003 in the area of the "confessio," permitted the identification of the remains of the Constantinian and Theodosian basilicas.
 
Between May 2 and Nov. 17, 2006 excavations were carried out that brought to light a marble sarcophagus 2.5 meters long and about 1.2 meters long, which rested on layer of clay floor dating from 390, the time during which the Constantinian basilica was expanded.
 
Beginning in 2007, visitors were allowed to enter below the basilica's altar to pray before the tomb of the Apostle.



Examiner.com:

Ark of the Covenant

The details about the Ark’s public appearance were also set to be announced on Friday and since then, no details have been revealed. Some have questioned whether Pauolos was even in a position to bring the Ark into the public light. Others have speculated that that Pope Palpatine vetoed Pauolos’s decision to bring the Ark public. And many others have speculated that the Church fears the scientific analysis of the "magic box". Regardless of the reasons, no Ark of the Covenant has been revealed as promised.

Comments:

1. anonymous asks:

And why should that interest me?

DS replies:

I thought it is funny how they use something else, ANYTHING: it seems to me that this ark business was rather humiliating for them, so they had to find some kind of substitute. Just ironic, that's all. Obviously they had a scheme that misfired, regarding us, I am not sure what. Maybe they got scared of the consequences of fooling with the Aron Hakodesh, and desisted in the last minute, Maybe they realized the ark was a fake... who knows, but they had to SAVE FACE.

NB: make sure to read the latest post: Re: BENEDIKT AND OBAMA: ARE THEY THE GILGULIM OF BALAK AND BALAAM?

Coordinated attacks? Now that the checkpoints have been removed, you see how easy it is for the Arabs to attack settlements. Thank you, Ehud Barak, great patriot you are.






Arabs Set Fire to Granary in Bat Ayin

Tammuz 7, 5769, 29 June 09 01:16

(Israelnationalnews.com) Arabs set fire to a granary in the Judean community of Bat Ayin Monday in the early morning hours. Firefighters who arrived on the scene extinguished the blaze.

The police opened an investigation into the incident.



Fighting in Yitzhar after Arab Arson

Tammuz 7, 5769, 29 June 09 08:32

(Israelnationalnews.com) Confrontations were reported Monday evening in the Samarian Jewish community of Yitzhar after Arabs from the neighboring village of Atzhira set fire to agricultural land belonging to Yitzhar.

Yitzhar residents say that rocks were thrown at them when they came to put out the fire. They said the confrontations continued after the fire was quenched.




Update:

Tens of Simultaneous Fires in Northern Israel are ‘Terror Arson’

Tammuz 9, 5769, 01 July 09 10:54
by Gil Ronen

(Israelnationalnews.com) Fire fighters in northern Israel fought dozens of blazes that broke out during the day Wednesday, most of them around noontime.

A source in the Hadera Fire Services told News1 that due to the fact that numerous fires broke out in a relatively limited area, the working assumption is that they were deliberately set. “We still do not know how the fires were set and we do not have details about the arsonist or arsonists,” he said.

In one of the fire locations, north of Rosh Pina, the fire spread to within close range of the residents of Rosh Pina, and dozens were asked to leave their homes. The Israel Land Fund said that more than 1,000 dunams of natural thickets had gone up in flames.

Initial investigations by fire fighter squads in the numerous fire locations found a likelihood of arson. “This is man-made terror,” a fire commander said. “Fires don’t just break out on their own.”

Fire locations included the Gilon Forest and locations near Karmiel and between Sakhnin and Kibbutz Eshbal. 200 dunams of natural thickets near the Yesha Fortress in the Upper Galilee were also burned. The vegetation in the area had been recovering from fires ignited by Katyusha rockets in the Second Lebanon War. %ad%

A large fire broke out in the hay storage facility at Kibbutz Giladi. Three large fires broke out near Tzfat, damaging electrical lines and causing disruptions to Tzfat’s power supply at noontime.

Dozens of fires broke out in the Wadi Ara area between Hadera and Afula. The thick smoke made it necessary to close off traffic on Highway 65 for some time.

That's the way to go! Smart, and Kol Hakavod to REGAVIM, whoever they are. I hope some of us join forces with these fellas, they are doing good work.





Illegal Arab Outposts Targeted in High Court Appeal

Tammuz 7, 5769, 29 June 09 06:27
by Gil Ronen

(Israelnationalnews.com) A pro-Land of Israel group has filed a motion asking the High Court of Justice to order a halt to construction of illegal Arab outposts in Judea and Samaria, as it has done in the case of illegal Jewish building. The petitioners hope that the court will be as strict with regard to Arab outposts as it was when groups like Peace Now and Yesh Din filed motions against Jewish construction.

The petitioner is an organization named Regavim, which is dedicated to safeguarding of Jewish national lands. It was filed Monday against the Minister of Defense and the Head of Central Command, and demanded that they issue demolition orders against illegal structures within the illegal outposts near the Arab villages of As-Sawiya and Yatma, next to the Jewish community Rechelim in Shomron (Samaria). Rechelim is located in territory that is labeled as "Area C", under full Israel security and administrative control.


Illegal Arab outposts near Rechelim (Israel news photo courtesy of Regavim)

The petitioners ask the court to issue an order requiring the Head of Central Command to declare the area where the illegal building is being carried out as a closed military zone and to instruct the Civil Administration to immediately issue work-stoppage orders and demolition orders against three structures that are in advanced stages of construction and which have not yet been populated.

In addition, they ask that the police initiate criminal proceedings against the builders. The High Court is requested to prevent the connection of the structures to the electricity grid and to water and sewage pipes, and to disconnect them if they have already been hooked up.

'Under the noses of the authorities'
Regavim is an organization dedicated to preventing unwanted elements from taking over national lands. It monitors the administrative agencies entrusted with safeguarding national lands to make sure that they operate properly.

The petitioners claim that "entire outposts are being built in broad daylight and in contravention of the law, under the very noses of the law enforcement authorities." The outposts, they say, "are built without the requisite authorization and include spacious mansions that would not look out of place in the most lavish neighborhoods in Israel and the world."

Three spacious homes
The constructors in the outposts "make a mockery of the legal authorities and invest large sums of money in building luxurious homes illegally and without the required permits," the motion states.

The motion includes documentation of three spacious homes that are in advanced construction, which were photographed on June 25th.

Despite the fact that Regavim informed the Defense Ministry and the Civilian Administration of the construction in early 2008, no steps have been taken against the builders. There are no "supervision files" and no work stoppage or demolition orders.

In a letter from the Civilian Administration received on February 17, 2008, the Administration claimed that work-stoppage and demolition orders were already issued and that further steps would be taken "in accordance with procedures and priorities as regards illegal construction" Regavim claims, however, that no enforcement steps have been taken in the 18 months that have passed since.

IDF report acknowledges problem
Attorney Amir Fisher, who represents Regavim, accused the authorities of adopting "a clear and declared policy of non-enforcement of planning and construction laws" and that builders of the outposts are well-aware of this fact. In this situation, he said, his clients had no recourse but to petition the High Court.

He quoted a 2008 report by the IDF Civilian Administration's Central Supervision Unit which said that "2008 was characterized by a near-total freeze of enforcement action with regard to the illegal Palestinian construction." The report acknowledged that "a freeze of demolitions and other enforcement activities with regard to infrastructures sends a negative message to the populace and makes it possible to create facts on the ground that we will have difficulty facing."



OK, so the Jew Madoff got 150 years. Now let's see how much Stanford with the nice little Hitler moustache gets! BTW, whatever happened to the $50 billion: now it is ONLY 13 billion? To be fair, STANFORD should get 92 years, that is 8/13 of 150.


Monday, June 29, 2009, 12:54pm EDT

Madoff sentenced to 150 years

Atlanta Business Chronicle

Bernard Madoff, the confessed mastermind behind the largest Ponzi scheme in history, will spend the rest of his life behind bars.

A U.S. District Court judge in New York sentenced Madoff to 150 years in prison, which was the maximum allowable sentence under the law.

Judge Denny Chin made his decision Monday morning after reviewing letters from many of Madoff's victims and hearing testimony from them in court.

According to reports filed by journalists in the courtroom, Madoff made a statement prior to the announcement of the sentence in which he said in part to his victims: "I cannot offer you an excuse for my behavior. I know this will not help. I'm sorry."

Madoff's attorney had asked Chin for a far more lenient sentence of 12 years.

Madoff plead guilty to 11 criminal counts, including securities fraud and money laundering, on March 12. His victims reportedly number more than 1,300 and stretch across the globe. Their losses are estimated at more than $13 billion.



Sir Allen Stanford arrested in US

June 19, 2009 Texan billionaire Sir Allen Stanford has surrendered to the US authorities after a warrant was issued for his arrest on criminal charges.

The 58-year-old already faces civil charges brought by the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) over an alleged fraud worth $8bn (£6bn).

Sir Allen turned himself in to the FBI in Virginia and is expected to appear in a Richmond federal court on Friday.

It was not immediately clear what criminal charges Sir Allen faces.

Dick DeGuerin, Sir Allen's lawyer, told The Associated Press he had surrendered "to some FBI agents who were hiding out in black SUVs outside the residence where he was staying in Virginia".

"He walked out and asked if they had a warrant," Mr DeGuerin said.

He said Stanford told the agents to arrest him if they had a warrant, but if they did not have a warrant, he would go back to Houston to turn himself in.

In February, the SEC, the US financial watchdog, described the alleged fraud at Stanford Financial group as a "fraud of shocking magnitude".

The cricket impresario is accused by the SEC of luring investors with promises of improbable and unsubstantiated high returns on certificates of deposit and other investments - what is known as a Ponzi scheme.

The billionaire financer has refused to talk to US regulators investigating his alleged fraud, and court documents show that Sir Allen pleaded the Fifth Amendment - the right to withhold potentially self-incriminating evidence.

In an interview with ABC earlier this year he insisted no money was lost by customers dealing with his financial services companies.

"If it was a Ponzi scheme, why are they finding billions and billions of dollars all over the place?" he said at the time.






Comments:

1. bill said:

Let's keep in mind that Madoff was in business for 40 years, giving people higher-than-normal returns.

Most of these people made more money than they invested with him.

He was so highly respected, that he was made chairman of THE NASDAQ STOCK EXCHANGE.

His empire collapsed only when the U.S. Government destroyed the real estate market by forcing banks to make bad loans to people who could never afford to pay.

That same government runs the biggest Ponzi scheme in the world, the "Social Security" System.

Yes, the Jew will be thrust in front of the public, to be tarred and feathered, while the real crooks--the Clinton people who manipulated the real estate market, and the Congressmen who twisted the arms of the bankers, sneak away, laughing all the way to the (Swiss) bank.

By Bill Bonner, the Daily Reckoning newsletter:

The Extraordinary Evil of Bernie Madoff

by Bill Bonner
London, England


Let the punishment fit the crime!

Poor Bernie. The man has been ordered to spend 150 years in the hoosegow. What for? Who did he kill? A century and a half seems a little excessive for a financial crime. You could hold up three liquor stores and rape a whole convent and still not get 150 years. With a little bit of good lawyer-ing, a history of child abuse in the family, and good behavior in the big house, you'd be back on the street in 18 months.

But all the papers seem delighted. "Locked up for Life!" says one of today's headlines. The judge "threw the book at him," says another. His victims wanted him to get no mercy. The judge gave him none, imposing the maximum sentence. He is "extraordinarily evil," said the man on the bench.

Justice has been done. Right?

Here in the building with the gold balls on the roof, we're not so sure. We stand up for lost causes...die hards...and scalawags. Besides, we're not convinced that Bernie is extraordinarily evil at all. He seems much more like an ordinary evil to us.

They say he defrauded investors out of $65 billion. The amount is unusual, but the crime is as common as income tax evasion. Who gets 150 years for evading income taxes? Heck, in civilized countries it's not a crime at all - but a civil misdemeanor, subject to fine and retribution, not punishment.

But didn't he lie to investors? Well, yes...he exaggerated the returns investors were likely to get from his fund. But if you put every fellow on Wall Street who does that in jail, you wouldn't have any room for stick-up men and wife beaters.

Isn't he the biggest financial scammer of all time? Well...he's the title-holder now. But he has a lot of competition close on his heels. Bernie's crime was taking money from people under false pretenses...and then being unable to give it back to them. How is that different from the financing activities of the US government?

This year alone, the feds will borrow 50 times as much money as Bernie managed to take in during his whole 20-year career. They can only pay it back by borrowing even more money from more lenders. This is not very different from the typical "Ponzi" scheme, except that it's the government doing it. Eventually, the suckers are going to lose a lot of money.

And when you balance Bernie's sins against his virtues, we're not sure the man doesn't come out at least as well as many of his accusers. While Bernie was pretending to make his investors rich, the SEC was pretending to protect them from Bernie. In fact, neither were really doing what they claimed. Which is to say, both are guilty of ordinary evil.

As we pointed out yesterday, nothing is as dangerous as good luck. Madoff was not extraordinarily evil; he was just extraordinarily lucky. He was plying his trade when the feds were pumping up the biggest financial bubble in history. No wonder so much hot gas came his way. His luck ran out when the bubble popped. And now a court has found him guilty of fraud and a judge has ordered him locked up for a period equal to roughly the time between the end of the US War Between the States and the resignation of Richard Nixon.

While Bernie is behind bars, the SEC and FED officials are still at large. Both are clearly guilty of dereliction and negligence.


But, what is the point of keeping Madoff in prison? He represents no threat. Rather than pay $30,000 per year to keep him locked up, we suggest that he be forced to do community service work. He should be pressed into service as the next head of the Federal Reserve after Ben Bernanke's term expires in December. With Madoff in the big office, there would be no longer any illusions about what sort of bank the Fed is running.

A contrarian view:

Free Bernie Madoff



Bernie Madoff stole billions from the customers of his phony investment funds, running a racket rather than a financial service. People who aren't even his victims are furious, and nearly everyone enjoyed a 10-minute sense of vengeance when the judge threw him behind bars for 150 years.

Let me weigh in with a contrary view. Free Bernie Madoff, I say.

His life is already ruined. He is a pauper. He will never again do business.

From the innovative genius whose information technology in the 1960s became the basis of NASDAQ, he rose to the heights and fell to the depths where he will stay this way until death. He won't be able to be seen in public for the rest of his life without encountering scorn and derision from everyone around him.

Maybe the idea of jail is punishment. I don't see how it can be a worse punishment than he would face on the outside.

Maybe the idea is to impose on him a feeling of remorse. But does he not already feel regret, even deep sorrow? This man who was widely considered to be a historic phenom is now disgraced, forever. We all have one life to live, and his is now a complete wreck, going down in history as the worst financial criminal of all time.

What, then, precisely, is the point of jailing him? He is no direct threat to anyone. Society would not be safer because he is in the slammer. He is not going to rob people or beat people up.

He might write a book and donate the funds to charity or make some restitution to his victims. I, for one, would like to read that book.

Instead, taxpayers will be forced to pick up the tab for his living expenses. Victims get nothing. That's not justice. That's inhumane for both sides of the transaction: Bernie and us.

Will jail "rehabilitate" him? It's ridiculous. His rehabilitation, if there can be one, is probably already complete. Consider the dilemma in which he found himself. It began small, a simple scheme that anyone can play. His problem was that it worked better than most.

Once his scam began, he probably hoped the markets would turn around and he would become honest again. It didn't turn out that way. Then he couldn't dig his way out of it, no matter how much he hated his life. That it lasted decades instead of days is a testament to his marketing savvy, but that's not to say that he loved his life. Spending the rest of his life in the pokey won't rehabilitate him any more intensely than life on the outside.

The problem with prisoners is not that you are treated like an animal. Would that they had it so good! At the zoo, the animals are fed and groomed and cared for. They have value because they elicit affection from paying customers. Even slaves are in a better position, for at least they are valued to some small degree by their masters.

Prisoners, on the other hand, face a kind of metaphysical transformation. They go from being valued members of society to being treated like blobs of flesh taking up space. Their wardens see them as objects. They are abused by fellow inmates and live in a state of incredible degradation everyday.

All prisoners are therefore living amidst a kind of torture. It isn't modern. It isn't even medieval. It is contrary to all principles of civilization. Perhaps we should allow it for the most violent members of society, pending some other solution. But that doesn't apply to Madoff, and it doesn't apply to some ¾ of all the prison population.

But still, we are all supposed to feel some kind of joy at his captivity. For decades we've been told by sociologists that the real criminals in society are not muggers and murderers and rapists but rather "white-collars criminals" who are capitalists sneakily stealing money using fancy finance. They are the ones who should be in jail.

And so now, those educated by the sociologists, forever soft on real crime but oddly tough on financial crime, have their way, as the bourgeoisie cries out for vengeance against a guy whose sole victims were the rich people who were his own customers.

Can there be anyone doubt that Madoff has been set up as a scapegoat, a person on which to blame the downturn so that we will be distracted from the greatest scams of all that enjoy the cover of law?

So let us ask the unaskable: Just how unusually evil were Madoff's actions? Not that unusual. In fact, the whole notion of paying off past investors with the funds of present investors is at the very core of the Social Security system.

At least Madoff sought the consent of his investors who let him care for their money based on their own volition. And at least he didn't attempt to defend himself with the claim that he was conducting wise public policy.


Jeffrey Tucker is the editor of Mises.org.

http://mises.org/story/3546

Interesting, isn't it: notice how known Nazi supplier and collaborator Siemens is deeply involved in the suppression of freedom in Iran? Today, as NOKIA-SIEMENS, it is in the process of EXPANDING ITS NORTH-AMERICAN PRESENCE: just what we need!






First round in Internet war goes to Iranian intelligence

DEBKAfile Exclusive Report

June 28, 2009, 4:00 PM (GMT+02:00)

Millions of sympathizers around the world looked forward to seeing Iran's protest movement using the Internet for the first online coup in history. Instead, the Iranian Islamic regime turned the tables: Its Internet police, arguably the largest in the world, pushed "control," "halt," "delete" and "send" buttons to activate a deadly weapon for suppressing the movement, as soon as it took to the streets to protest the June 12 election which was believed to have given Mahmoud Ahmadinejad a false victory.

By Sunday, June 28, when the Guardian Council was to hand down its final verdict on their complaints, the street rallies had petered out.

Part of the reason, DEBKAfile's intelligence sources report, was their organizers' heavy reliance on YouTube, Twitter, Facebook, Flickr and other social sites to orchestrate their protest movement. They did not at first appreciate that Iranian intelligence Internet experts, operating from secret headquarters established months ago, were using their communications to shoot them down.

According to our sources, that headquarters is located at the telecom center on Sepah (Khomenei) Square in Tehran. It was built for the Shah in the 1970s by the Israel construction contractors Solel Boneh and designed by Israeli intelligence and telecommunications experts.

The high-end apparatus, installed in late 2008 by the German Siemens AG and Finnish Nokia Corp. cell phone giant, gave Iranian intelligence the most advanced tools anywhere for controlling, inspecting, censoring and altering Internet and cell phone messaging. Those tools were being used weeks before the poll to identify penetrations by alien spy services, their local agents and dissident activists.

This system is capable of conducting "deep packet inspection" of every type of text and video communication in all parts of Iran on three tracks:

1. Like other advanced electronic spy systems in the world, this one uses such keywords as attack, weapons, cash, data, explosives, meeting, demonstration, resistance, protest, etc. to alert Iran within milliseconds to feeds of interest by computer or phone - mail, signals or visuals.

In a flash, intelligence analysts get a fix on the sender and the electronic addressee which are then placed on a surveillance list for further monitoring. Once identified, the sender or receiver and their connections are closely shadowed by field agents.

2. By "deep packet inspection," the secret controllers can cause delays in online data transfers, which surfers may attribute to glitches connected with their providers. The more targets under surveillance, the more online transfers are slowed down.

DEBKAfile's Iranian sources report that the day after the presidential poll and resulting street outbreaks, Iran's Internet control and tracking supervisors took over the 10 leading service providers in the country. Their first action was to slow down incoming and outgoing cyber traffic from 1,500 to 54 kilobytes to make sure that not a single byte by Internet or cell phone to or from protest leaders escaped their notice.

Tehran has vented its ire on Britain because it is accused of providing the organizers of the dissident movement with London telephone numbers to circumvent the deliberate slowdown of online traffic from inside the country. These numbers gave anti-government activists instant, direct links through Western Internet providers for getting their messages out to the world. Iran suspects they were laid on by British intelligence.

Eventually, the British lines became jammed by overload.

3. Iranian intelligence made cynical use of the large amount of electronic and personal data accumulated on anti-regime elements. Instead of detaining their prey at once, Iranian intelligence invaded their computers and cell phones to plant false leads for smoking unsuspecting activists out in the open and keeping them under inspection.

Within a few days of their protest, Mir Hossein Mousavi and the bulk of his supporters, realizing their electronic campaign had been taken over by the regime to hunt them down, disappeared from the streets of Tehran.

Wednesday, June 24, when the extent of the damage the Iranian Internet invasion had inflicted on American interests was brought home to him, US secretary of defense Robert Gates ordered a special cyber defense system set up to protect the US armed forces' 15,000 Web sites, which encompass seven million computers. Lt. Gen. Keith Alexander, head of the National Security Agency, was put in charge of getting the new system up and running by the end of 2010.

Tuesday, June 23, a group of US senators led by the Republic presidential candidate John McCain and independent Joe Lieberman initiated legislation to fund a cyber defense system capable of combating Internet assaults like the one mounted by the Iranian government.

***************************************************************

Review my article dated April 8th, 2008: SIEMENS: HAS THE LEOPARD CHANGED ITS SPOTS?

World War II Era

Preceding World War II Siemens was involved in the secret rearmament of Germany. During the Second World War, Siemens supported the Hitler regime, contributed to the war effort and participated in the "Nazification" of the economy. Siemens had many factories in and around notorious extermination camps such as Auschwitz and used slave labor from concentration camps to build electric switches for military uses. In one example, almost 100,000 men and women from Auschwitz worked in a Siemens factory inside the camp, supplying the electricity to the camp.[5] The crematorium ovens at Buchenwald bear the Siemens label.


Report: German Company Sold Iran Surveillance Equipment

4 Nissan 5768, 09 April 08 11:17
by

(IsraelNN.com) The German company Siemens was very likely responsible for selling sophisticated surveillance equipment to Iran, according to the Jerusalem Post.  Austrian investigative journalist Erich Moechel first broke the story.

Moechel said he was "99 percent certain" that Siemens had provided Iran with equipment used to track landline and cellular phone conversations.  Iran also purchased "Intelligence Platform" systems allowing it to monitor financial transactions and travel, he said.

Siemens spokesmen did not confirm or deny the allegations, but said the company was careful to obey all European Union guidelines regarding trade with Iran.


**********************************************************

See also:

http://www.adl.org/Braun/dim_13_2_forgetting.asp

Contemporary scholars are continuing to learn about the extent to which Siemens, and every major German business in the Thirties and Forties, was implicated in the brutality of Nazi economic policies, most egregiously through the abuse of forced and slave laborers. Siemens ran factories at Ravensbrück and in the Auschwitz subcamp of Bobrek, among others, and the company supplied electrical parts to other concentration and death camps. In the camp factories, abysmal living and working conditions were ubiquitous: malnutrition and death were not uncommon. Recent scholarship has established how, despite German industry's repeated denials, these camp factories were created, run, and supplied by the SS in conjunction with company officials -- sometimes high-level employees.


********************************************************

And this from the Wall Street Journal: Notice how they play so self-righteous - it is all for the benefit of humanity, of course. These evil monsters are hypocrites too.COMBATING TERRORISM in Iran? Please explain to me, maybe I don't quite understand: I thought the Iranian regime IS TERROR!


How do you say "Operation Pinwale" in Farsi?

According to a somewhat confusing Wall Street Journal story,( what's so confusing about this? It seems very clear to me: we are talking collaboration with the Iranian regime here, DS) Iran has adopted NSA-like techniques and installed equipment on its national telecommunication network last year that allows it to spy on the online activities and correspondence — including the content of e-mail and VoIP phone calls — of its internet users.

Nokia Siemens Networks, a joint venture between Germany's Siemens and Finland's Nokia, installed the monitoring equipment late last year in Iran's government-controlled telecom network, Telecommunication Infrastructure Co., but authorities only recently engaged its full capabilities in response to recent protests that have broken out in the country over its presidential election.

The equipment allows the state to conduct deep-packet inspection, which sifts through data as it flows through a network searching for keywords in the content of e-mail and voice transmissions. According to the Journal, Iran seems to be doing this for the entire country from a single choke point. "Seems," because although the Journal states that Nokia Siemens installed the equipment and that signs indicate the country is conducting deep-packet inspection, the paper also says "it couldn't be determined whether the equipment from Nokia Siemens Networks is used specifically for deep packet inspection."

Although the Journal has published questionable "spying" stories in the past, we're willing to go with them on this one.

It's previously been reported that Iran was blocking access to some web sites for people inside the country as protesters took to the streets and the internet to dispute the results of the country's recent presidential election.

But sources told the Journal that the government's activities have gone beyond censorship to massive spying. They say the deep-packet inspection, which deconstructs data in transit then reconstructs it, could be responsible for network activity in Iran having recently slowed to less than a tenth of its regular speed. The slowdown could be caused by the inspection at a single point, rather than at numerous network points, as China reportedly does it.

A brochure promoting the equipment sold to Iran says the technology allows for "the monitoring and interception of all types of voice and data communication on all networks."

A spokesman for Nokia Siemens Networks defended the sale of the equipment to Iran suggesting that the company provided the technology with the idea that it would be used for "lawful intercept," such as combating terrorism, child pornography, drug trafficking and other criminal activity. Equipment installed for law enforcement purposes, however, can easily be used for spying as well.

"If you sell networks, you also, intrinsically, sell the capability to intercept any communication that runs over them," the spokesman told the Journal.

He added that the company "does have a choice about whether to do business in any country" but said, "We believe providing people, wherever they are, with the ability to communicate is preferable to leaving them without the choice to be heard."

In March, the company sold off its monitoring technology to a German investment firm.

********************************************************************


Now this piece of business news, just days ago:

http://blogs.wsj.com/digits/2009/06/23/inside-the-nortel-nokia-siemens-deal/

I am not sure exactly what EXPANDING ITS NORTH AMERICAN PRESENCE MEANS, but if the IRANIAN MODEL IS ANY INDICATION... WE ARE IN BIG TROUBLE HERE!

....Nokia Siemens, the world's No. 2 maker of wireless telecommunications gear by sales, has long sought to expand its North American presence....

******************************************************



What is also glaring in its absence is any kind of CONDEMNATION, or SANCTION, by the German government. After all, they have known about Siemens's activities in Iran for a long time. Have YOU heard about any fine, or prosecution, or incarceration, of Siemens executives regarding this specific matter? I haven't.

On the other hand, they have been FINED and INVESTIGATED over OTHER MATTERS, mind you, both in the U.S. and in Germany: over corruption and bribery issues. But what about the issue of COLLABORATION with an enemy? Nothing.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2008/dec/16/regulation-siemens-scandal-bribery

http://www.spiegel.de/international/0,1518,462199,00.html

Siemens even uses as their defense the argument that they are not violating any criteria of the European Union regarding trade with Iran.

What this tells us is something very clear about both Germany and Europe's, and even the United States' position re: Siemens's activities in Iran: TACIT ACQUIESCENCE. The leadership of Iran is obviously NOT an enemy in their eyes, and it is OK to give it the most advanced technological capability, both to oppress their own population, and of course to SPY ON ISRAEL, so it can destroy it better.

.... and we already know WHO the European Union works for.....


SEE ALSO MY POST: A WRITER'S VIEW OF TODAY'S GERMANY.

THE LEOPARD, TRULY, HAS NOT CHANGED ITS SPOTS!

Update, 7/17/09 AsiaNews

» 07/17/2009 16:18

IRAN
Nokia accused of being in the service of VEVAK, Iran’s spy agency
Dariush Mirzai
Iran’s opposition calls for a boycott of Nokia and Siemens, accused of providing Iran’s secret services with technology capable of monitoring telephone use. Along with the Pasdaran and Basij, the powerful spy agency has one main purpose, to crush the country’s democratic aspirations, by torture and beheading if necessary.

Tehran (AsiaNews) – A month ago Ahmadinejad’s opponents used electronic means of communication to organise and broaden their protest. The regime’s first reaction was to unleash the brutal Basij, the “volunteers” of the Revolution.

Such armed militiamen are the foot soldiers of Iran’s domestic secret service, the VEVAK, which is part of the Ministry of Intelligence (MOI). With some 20,000 employees, the MOI is at the disposal of Iran’s hard-line rulers, men like President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei. But at one time, when Rafsanjani was president, the VEVAK was in the “state terrorism” big time, threatening and killing the regime’s opponents even in Western countries.

According to Yves Bonnet, a former director of the Direction de la Surveillance du Territoire (DST) (Directorate of Territorial Surveillance, the French secret service), in just two month in 1988 the VEVAK executed some 33,000 people on the order of Khomeini. No wonder then, that the VEVAK is listed as a “terrorist organisation in some countries like Canada”.1

Today the domestic spy agency runs its own prisons, torturing and beheading enemies of the state. Unlike the Pasdaran and the Basij whose task is to keep an eye on the streets of Iranian cities, VEVAK’s business is spying on Iranians and propaganda, great tools to undermine Iran’s pro-reform and pro-democracy movement.

Recent reports suggested that two major European mobile phone companies, Nokia and Siemens, with big sales in Iran (especially Nokia), have sold Iranian authorities sophisticated surveillance technology. As soon as the information became public a boycott of Nokia products was launched in Iran.

Boycotts are nothing new in the Islamic Republic. In the past “anti-Islamic” or “Zionist” firms have been targeted, sometimes on behalf of the former’s foreign competitors. Whether directly involved or not, this boycott campaign is of high propaganda value for VEVAK because in the current economic climate, fewer Iranians can afford to have a mobile phone. With fewer Iranians willing to test high tech phone surveillance, fewer dangerous messages will be sent.

All this does not mean that the report about Nokia and Siemens is not true. Over the years, business people, journalists and politicians in Tehran have developed the habit of not taking their mobile phones with them into rooms where they meet, leaving them instead outside the entrance or in a separate room. The reason for this is VEVAK’s capability of using any mobile phone left on standby as a microphone to pick up conversations.

Such high level espionage is not the only card up the spy agency’s sleeve. The best way for it to keep on eye on everyone is to monitor phone text messages. Indeed what Tehrani hasn’t received or sent a joke about the clergy or Ahmadinejad? Now fear of getting caught will lead many to censor themselves. And by blocking communications (a technique used at the height of the protest movement), the VEVAK can weaken the opposition and reinforce the image of an all-powerful state.

In order to manipulate public opinion the VEVAK does not rely on technology alone. It has established charities (in favour of suffering Iraqis and Lebanese for example) to show how good Iran is compared to the wicked West.2

Another way for the VEVAK to manipulate public opinion is to organise and invite Westerners on visits to Iran, showing nice things about Iran which will be picked up by the CNN or the BBC. The intent of Iran’s spy masters is not so much to change opinions in the West in favour of the Islamic regime, but rather to show to Iranians with access to Western media that their country is not so bad after all.

In its 30 years of existence the Islamic Republic has learnt how to stay in power. The VEVAK is the equivalent of the Shah’s brutal SAVAK. One of the reasons for the collapse of the Pahlavi regime lies in the decision made by many SAVAK officials and agents to jump ship and join Khomeini and the regime he was setting up.

At present such a “migration” appears very unlikely and this despite the contacts and parallel networks Rafsanjani built years ago inside the services which are now in the hands of his political opponents.

------------------------------------------------------

1. BONNET Y., Vevak, Au service des ayatollahs, Paris : Timée-Éditions, 2009, 454 p.

2. So-called collateral damage in the Iraq and Afghanistan wars and provocative speeches by George W. Bush and Ariel Sharon have been very useful in demobilising Iran’s opposition.