Shops and stores in downtown Gaza City closed their doors Feb. 23 as part of a general strike to protest Israel’s siege of the Gaza Strip. Shop owners carried banners reading “closed because of the siege” in Arabic and English…. Read moreGeneral strike against Israeli siege in Gaza —and against PA in West Bank
Personally, we aren’t too comforted by the fact that this thing was blown up in the sky instead of falling to earth—releasing all that toxic hydrazine into the atmosphere. But we are glad this Feb. 21 account from the UK… Read moreChina protests double standard on satellite strike
The New York Times reports in a front-page story Feb. 23 that the Justice Department has opened an internal ethics investigation into the notorious August 2002 Bybee Memo that gave the imprimatur of legality to the Administration’s use of “waterboarding”… Read moreSupreme Court Justice Scalia defends torture
Earth First! blockades power plant From Everglades Earth First!, Feb. 19: Early Monday morning hundreds of concerned community members from Palm Beach County and all over the nation put their bodies on the line to halt construction of FPL’s West… Read moreBlockade shuts down Florida power plant construction site
Everglades Earth First! blockades construction site of the West County Energy Center natural gas plant, Palm Beach, Florida, Feb. 18. Photo: Everglades Earth First!
The anti-immigration blog VDare (who get creds for being bilingual) approvingly note from a persual of Monterrey’s daily El Porvenir that the Monterrey suburb of San Nicolas is planning to build a security fence on its border with the neighboring… Read moreSecurity fences go up —within Mexico
The high-tech Project 28 “virtual fence” on a 28-mile stretch of the US-Mexico border near Nogales, AZ, is ready for operation, Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff announced Feb. 22. The $20 million project of sensor towers and advanced mobile communications,… Read moreHomeland Security approves “virtual” border fence
From the Committee in Solidarity with the People of El Salvador (CISPES), Feb. 21: On Tuesday, February 19, 13 political activists arrested last July in the town of Suchitoto were set free, and all charges against them were dismissed. This… Read moreAll charges dropped against “Suchitoto 13”
From the Committee in Solidarity with the People of El Salvador (CISPES), Feb. 21: In a recent visit to the United States, Salvadoran president Antonio Saca expressed concern about the findings of a recent US intelligence report, which predicts that… Read moreNational Intelligence Director: Venezuela to intervene in Salvadoran elections
On Feb. 11, the Nicaraguan navy captured the Honduran-flagged fishing boat Seas Star just east of the 82nd meridian in the Caribbean Sea. The 82nd meridian is claimed by Colombia as the border between its territorial waters and those of… Read moreNicaragua’s maritime dispute with Colombia heats up
Just as oil is hitting $100 a barrel, come warnings of an impending global food shortage. In an article based on a study by Goldman Sachs, the UK’s Telegraph Feb. 9 argues that “peak oil” is morphing into “peak food”… Read moreNext: “peak food”?
Three bombings in as many days have left 140 dead in Afghanistan’s Canadian-occupied Kandahar province. More than 100 were killed in a suicide attack on a dog-fighting competition on the outskirts of Kandahar city attended by local luminaries Feb. 17…. Read moreKandahar carnage; Canada sends in the drones
