Israel-Egypt pipeline bombed for the 7th time in opposition to natural gas deal

Iran: “Israel Owns 300 Nuclear Missiles”
Iranian President, Ahmadinejad, stated during an interview with an Egyptian newspaper on Sunday, that Israel owns 300 nuclear missiles, the Maan News Agency reported.
http://www.imemc.org/article/62459

Iran pressures highlight rare Mideast common ground: Israel and Gulf Arabs
The Gulf states — a cornerstone for U.S. diplomatic and military pressure on Iran — are indispensable parts of any effort to confront Tehran’s nuclear ambitions. And even Israel, which has no direct diplomatic outreach to the Gulf, is likely brought into the Gulf-centric policymaking with U.S. envoys acting as go-betweens, experts say. “I would be surprised if there is no knowledge about the Saudi positions (in Israel) or knowledge in Saudi of the Israeli positions,” said David Menashri, director of the Center for Iranian Studies at Tel Aviv University. It’s part of a complicated mix of mutual worries and divergent risks — the Gulf, unlike Israel, has critical commercial and diplomatic ties with Iran — that puts Washington in the middle as the common ally and chief Western architect of pressure tactics on Iran.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/middle-east/iran-pressures-highlight-rare-mideast-common-ground-israel-and-gulf-arabs/2011/11/06/gIQAvwGWsM_story.html

Analysis of article preceding this one by Max Ajl: Alliance of Convenience
This recent article talks about the “alliances of convenience” in the Middle East between the Gulf Arab states and Israel. All alliances are “alliances of convenience,” but what the author of the article does not understand is that the Gulf Arab States would be relatively happy to normalize with Israel. That was one of the points of the 2002 Arab Peace Initative. Normalization with Israel would mean the end of primary, secondary, and tertiary boycotts – which are not necessarily observed these days anyway – and since Saudi Arabia and its Gulf satellites are the major holders of capital in the region, with far larger holdings than Israel, normalization would mean sales of petrochemical products and also metal to Israel, and less chicanery needed to circumvent the various boycotts. In the Middle East, Israel would take on the role of a high-tech manufacturing platform. The “resolution” of the Palestinian issue would allow these things to take place openly, without, they hope, stirring up a sense of Gulf betrayal of the most potent symbolic grievance against Western colonialism.
http://www.maxajl.com/alliance-of-convenience/

Remnick favors containment of Iran, calling war plans ‘a heedless attack that risks the whirlwind’, Philip Weiss
David Remnick has published a great piece at the New Yorker throwing cold water all over the idea of an attack on Iran as “a heedless attack that risks the whirlwind.” The piece is notable for beginning squarely in Jeffrey Goldberg’s psycho-historical territory– Israeli planes over Auschwitz– and ending in a good American space: the idea of containment after World War II that was pushed by wise man George Kenna
https://mondoweiss.net/2011/11/remnick-favors-containment-of-iran-calling-war-plans-a-heedless-attack-that-risks-the-whirlwind.html

Vicious Triangle Forming against Iran, Ismail Salami – Tehran
In recent days, there has been a vociferous interest in Israel, the US and the UK in fanning the flames of Iranophobia in what observers see as a political red herring to engage in a catastrophic war in the Middle East. The trio, which constitute a vicious triangle in their roguishly Iranophobic endeavors, have manifestly held secret meetings among the top security officials and formed a united front against Iran.
http://palestinechronicle.com/view_article_details.php?id=17224

Warmongering Jeffrey Goldberg calls on Obama to use missile strikes against Iran, Philip Weiss
We can now say for sure that after Jeffrey Goldberg smashed the New Yorker’s credibility to bits by publishing a bogus story about Saddam Hussein getting nuclear weapons, paving the liberals’ path to that disastrous war, he smashed the Atlantic Magazine’s credibility to bits last year by using the magazine to hysterically push an American attack on Iran– “The point of no return… who if anyone will stop Iran?” We can say as much because Goldberg is now plain about his agenda at Bloomberg News.
https://mondoweiss.net/2011/11/warmongering-jeffrey-goldberg-calls-on-obama-to-use-missile-strikes-against-iran.html

Iran Plot: A Pretext for War
For many Iran observers, Washington’s latest accusations against Iran — implicating members of Iran’s Revolutionary Guard in an alleged plot to assassinate the Saudi ambassador to the United States — come off as surreal, if not wholly bizarre.
http://original.antiwar.com/javad-heydarian/2011/11/06/iran-plot-a-pretext-for-war/

Warmongers Eager for More Blood-letting, Stuart Littlewood
You can read about it on a British government website. ‘The UK and many other countries have serious concerns about the Iranian Government’s policies,’ says the Foreign Office, ‘its failure to address serious international concerns about its nuclear programme; its support for terrorism and promotion of instability in its region; and its continued denial of human rights…’ I really thought they were talking about Israel and had got the names muddled up. But no… “On Iran’s nuclear programme, we are actively seeking a solution through diplomatic engagement and sanctions to encourage compliance by Iran with the requirements of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) and six UN Security Council resolutions.”
http://palestinechronicle.com/view_article_details.php?id=17233

This is not what containment looks like, Paul Mutter
“To strengthen Iran sanctions laws for the purpose of compelling Iran to abandon its pursuit of nuclear weapons and other threatening activities, and for other purposes,” begins HR1905, aka the 2011 “Iran Threat Reduction Act” passed by the House of Representatives this week. It will increase sanctions on Iran and limit U.S. contact with Iranian citizens, and pressure to enact it will be strengthened by the release of an IAEA report today asserting that Iran has been secretly developing nuclear weapons (and a delivery system for them) since 2003.
https://mondoweiss.net/2011/11/this-is-not-what-containment-looks-like.html

Other Mideast News

Hezbollah can hit Israeli drones: report

Egypt’s Military Widens Crackdown as Prominent Blogger Alaa Abdel Fattah Remains Imprisoned
The mother of prominent Egyptian political activist and blogger Alaa Abdel Fattah began a hunger strike yesterday protesting her son’s detention by the country’s military council. Abdel Fattah was arrested last week after being accused of instigating clashes between military forces and Coptic Christians nearly a month ago at the state television building, Maspero. At least 28 people were killed in the incident. As calls among activists grow for limiting U.S. military assistance to Egypt, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said that the United States is not in favor of imposing any conditions on American aid. Democracy Now! correspondent Anjali Kamat is in Cairo and filed this report. Special thanks to Jacquie Soohen of Big Noise Films and Mosireen and Sarah Carr for footage.
http://www.democracynow.org/2011/11/7/egypts_military_widens_crackdown_as_prominent

Luxury Hajj: Iraqis Stew As Officials Make Pilgrimage In Style
MINA, Saudi Arabia — The Muslim pilgrimage of hajj is a moment of equality before God, with millions massed at Islam’s most revered sites asking for forgiveness of sins. Of course, some are more equal than others. At VIP tents, Iraqi lawmakers and politicians in their white pilgrim robes enjoyed the luxury of soft red carpets and air conditioning, fruit baskets set up on long tables and two refrigerators with cold water and soft drinks. It’s conveniently right next to the Jamarat, the site of three walls symbolizing the devil that pilgrims lined up to pelt with stones on Monday.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/11/07/vip-hajj-iraqi-officials-luxury-pilgrimage_n_1080418.html

Analysis / Op-ed

Why is an Israeli soldier worth more than a Palestinian child?, Dana Halawa
While the world focused on one freed Israeli soldier, no one considered the suffering of more than 160 Palestinian children who remain in Israeli detention.oldier, no one considered the suffering of more than 160 Palestinian children who remain in Israeli detention.
http://electronicintifada.net/content/why-israeli-soldier-worth-more-palestinian-child/10566?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+electronicIntifadaPalestine+%28Electronic+Intifada+%3A+Palestine+News%29#.TrmUlHIRSBM

Former corporate execs Leader (AOL) and Cooperman (Goldman Sachs) back online ‘Jerusalem U’ that does ‘Israel advocacy’, Philip Weiss
Fabulous reporting by the Forward’s Naomi Zeveloff on Jerusalem Online U., a website offering academic credits that good schools like George Washington are accepting, that is all about recruiting American students into Israel “advocacy.” The course offerings feature Benjamin Netanyahu and Alan Dershowitz. And notice the delicious reporting re Rashid Khalidi. Zeveloff’s revelations about the American corporate leaders’ support for this propaganda is deep in the story, but it is of course essential to an understanding of the lobby in motion.
https://mondoweiss.net/2011/11/former-corporate-execs-leader-aol-and-cooperman-goldman-sachs-back-online-jerusalem-u-that-does-israel-advocacy.html

From Balfour to Obama: Colonial Thinking on Palestine, Roger Sheety
The phrase “British Mandate of Palestine” is as commonplace in Western and Zionist scholarship on Palestine as to be inoffensive and therefore barely given a second thought.  Indeed, a quick internet search of this seemingly innocuous term reveals some two million results of wildly varying quality and usefulness. There was, however, no such thing as “British Mandate” of Palestine; it was and remains a purely European/Western colonial construct, an abstraction with real and disastrous consequences.  In reality, the Palestinian people never consented to be occupied by British colonials, never agreed to have their ancestral land partitioned and given away to other Europeans, and never asked to be “civilized” by an imperial government which was completely ignorant of their language, culture and history.  The same could be said of “French Mandate” Syria and Lebanon or “British Mandate” Iraq.
http://palestinechronicle.com/view_article_details.php?id=17228

Balfour’s Apartheid Legacy, Stuart Littlewood
Arthur Balfour’s infamous ‘Declaration’ was written 94 years ago this week. Palestinians, of course, don’t need reminding. And to mark the anniversary Israel ordered its warships to carry out yet another act of piracy on peaceful, innocent shipping carrying humanitarian relief to the imprisoned people of Gaza. Let’s cast out minds back…. Stephen Ostrander’s simple verse cuts through all the rhetoric to the root cause of the Arab-Israeli conflict.
http://palestinechronicle.com/view_article_details.php?id=17225

Palestine 1948 at the University of Virginia, Helena Cobban
On Saturday, I was delighted to attend the first two sessions of a half-day conference held at the University of Virginia on the topic ‘1948 in Palestine.’ The main speakers at those sessions were Susan Akram of Boston University Law School and Rochelle Davis of Georgetown University. Both those sessions were really thought-provoking. Susan Akram presented a smart and thoughtful set of comments based on the recent essay in Jadaliyya in which she compared the international-law strategy pursued by the PLO over the years highly unfavorably with that pursued by SWAPO and its allies in an earlier era. Bill the spouse was the commentator for that. Rochelle Davis then gave a lovely presentation based on her recent book about “Palestinian Village Histories”, and someone from UVA Jewish Studies called Gabriel Finder was the commentator for that one.
http://justworldnews.org/archives/004234.html

Palestine at the United Nations: A Jewish Reaction, Edward S. Goldstein
As an American Jew with lifelong involvement in Jewish cultural and religious life, I watched the unfolding of the Palestinian application for UN membership with both admiration and a sense of scandal. Concerning the future, I feel only sadness. An objective person must admire the Palestinian decision  to make explicit to the world what close observers have known for years, that the Oslo “peace process” amounts to peace talks to nowhere except a Greater Israel.  President Abbas’ move drops Palestine into the center of international law and dialogue once again after being sidetracked for17 years by the Oslo process.  The statehood application did not preclude further negotiations, it merely promised Palestinians increased diplomatic leverage at the negotiating table in the face of overwhelming Israeli power and American bias.
http://palestinechronicle.com/view_article_details.php?id=17227

The Citizenship of Grief, A Dialogue Between Naomi Shihab Nye and Robert Bonazzi
Naomi Shihab Nye’s latest book of poems, Transfer (BOA Editions), focuses on her loving relationship with her late father, Aziz Shihab. She has written or edited 32 books in various genres, including 19 Varieties of Gazelle: Poems from the Middle East, a finalist for the National Book Award. Aziz Shihab’s memoir of Palestine, Does the Land Remember Me?, was published in 2007. Shihab Nye is poetry editor at the Observer.
http://www.texasobserver.org/feature/item/18159-the-citizenship-of-grief

US aid for Egypt: between American vision and Egyptian pressure
It is believed widely in Egypt that US aid to the country is a sign of Egyptian weakness, but the Americans see it differently. If Egypt wasn’t important strategically, a world superpower wouldn’t have given massive aid to Cairo for 30 years; the second highest levels of US aid to any country after Israel. Despite claims that the US only aids Egyptians to boost US imports and recruit US employees through the aid programme, this is not enough to explain the flow of around $65 billion of American taxpayers’ money to Egypt annually.
http://www.middleeastmonitor.org.uk/articles/middle-east/3040-us-aid-for-egypt-between-american-vision-and-egyptian-pressure

Occupy the Occupiers: A Jewish call to action, Young, Jewish, and Proud
We call for young Jews and allies nationwide to join in solidarity with Occupy Wall Street and with our Palestinian siblings living under their own form of occupation. Let us stand up to the 1% in our own community – the powerful institutions that support Israel’s corporate-backed military control of the Palestinian people and act as the gatekeepers for our community.
https://mondoweiss.net/2011/11/occupy-the-occupiers-a-jewish-call-to-action.html

Video of police attack on peaceful protesters at Occupy Berkeley
This video is difficult to watch and some viewers may find the footage from Berkeley, California disturbing. In it, a line of police in riot gear attempt to surge into a line of peaceful protesters, jabbing with night-sticks. Cries of pain and alarm are heard as the protesters are jabbed in the gut, punched, and knocked to the ground. In spite of what is apparently a police effort to scatter them, however, the protesters stand firm. They lock arms and chant “Stop beating students!” in unison and the video ends in a tense standoff.
http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2011/11/10/video-of-police-attack-on-peaceful-protesters-at-occupy-berkeley/

Occupy Oakland’s new target – foreclosed buildings
Now that their general strike is over, Occupy Oakland activists are looking for a new initiative to keep the momentum rolling – and their gaze is turning toward taking over foreclosed or abandoned buildings.
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2011/11/08/MNEO1LRP7D.DTL&feed=rss.bayarea

NYCLU: ‘Occupy Rochester’ protesters arrested for breaking ‘unconstitutional ordinance’
The New York Civil Liberties Union (NYCLU) called Monday on Rochester mayor Thomas Richards to immediately halt the enforcement of a city ordinance that is being used to restrict “Occupy Rochester” demonstrations in Washington Square Park. “The city’s crackdown on ‘Occupy Rochester’ demonstrations shows a disturbing disregard for the constitutionally protected right to protest,” said KaeLyn Rich, director of the NYCLU’s Genesee Valley Chapter. “Mayor Richards must use his authority to accommodate peaceful protest and stop enforcing local ordinances that violate people’s First Amendment rights.”
http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2011/11/07/occupy-rochester-protesters-arrested-for-breaking-unconstitutional-ordinance/

Occupy Wall Street to march on most of Manhattan
The annual New York City marathon is over for another year, but Occupy Wall Street will continue the Big Apple’s marathon fest with one of their own. Protesters have planned an 11 mile march from upper Manhattan neighborhood Washington Heights all the way to Occupy’s homebase Zuccotti Park, according to New York One news. The march, intended to be lead by community leaders, elected officials and grassroots organizers, will look to connect all of Manhattan’s communities to the demonstrations.
http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2011/11/07/occupy-wall-street-to-march-on-most-of-manhattan/

Occupy Atlanta: Police Arrest 5 People Following Protest
ATLANTA – Atlanta protesters aren’t going quietly, despite warnings from police and the mayor. In the latest act of defiance, five people were arrested early Monday at or near a downtown park that has been an off-and-on site of Wall Street protests similar to the ones being held in other U.S. cities.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/11/07/occupy-atlanta-police-arrests_n_1079226.html

Occupy Iowa Caucus: Anonymous Hacker Group Claims Responsibility For Web Video (VIDEO)
A new web video comes as evidence the hacker group Anonymous is getting involved in the 2012 election. The Des Moines Register reports that Anonymous has claimed responsibility for a clip encouraging viewers to disrupt January’s Iowa caucuses. The Hawkeye State-based outlet notes that local authorities are not taking the news lightly.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/11/06/occupy-iowa-caucus-anonymous_n_1078904.html

Occupy movement reaches tiny rural communities
The protest movement which began in New York with Occupy Wall Street and has since spread out to most of the nation’s large cities is now trickling down into tiny rural towns like Mosier, Oregon.
http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2011/11/06/occupy-movement-reaches-tiny-rural-communities/