By Duncan Gardham, Security Correspondent

The headline over her latest article is Israel’s never-ending Holocaust. One of her main points is that Israel has never confronted the trauma of the Nazi holocaust and has “turned it into a placard in the service of the national trauma, to reinforce the constant existential fear and the aggressiveness that comes with it.”

Because what she wrote is so important, and in my view ought to be read by all peoples of all faiths everywhere who want to understand why the Zionist state is what it is, I am going to quote her at some length.

She wrote:

The Holocaust is the primary way Israel defines itself. And that definition is narrow and ailing in the extreme, because the Holocaust is remembered only in a very specific way, as are its lessons. It has long been used to justify the existence and the necessity of the state, and has been mentioned in the same breath as proof that the state is under a never-ending existential threat.

The Holocaust is the sole prism through which our leadership, followed by society at large, examines every situation. This prism distorts reality and leads inexorably to a forgone conclusion… that all our lives are simply one long Shoah (experience of persecution and extermination – my amplification not Merav’s).

The ‘Hitlers’ are always there: Just a week ago, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said for the nth time that there is no shortage of those who want to exterminate us completely. In other words, there is no lack of reasons to continue to reinforce the fear of the Holocaust – which, according to his father, historian Benzion Netanyahu, has never ended.

So it is that we don’t have any rivals, adversaries or even enemies. Only Hitlers. This is how the Holocaust is taught in school, this how it is that Israeli students are taken to visit death camps – and how it came to be that, as Ha’aretz reported on Friday, just 2 percent of Israeli youth feel committed to democratic principles after studying the Holocaust… That’s the way it is with traumas. Because of our human limitations, a trauma that is not dealt with makes us constantly see yet another trauma approaching – even when whatever is coming has no connection to the previous trauma and may even be a good thing. Trauma leads to belligerence and a strong tendency to wreak havoc on one’s surroundings, but first and foremost on oneself.

What we consider rational is actually a frightened, defensive, aggressive pattern. Our current leaders have made Israeli Judaism just a post-traumatic syndrome, while they lead us to self-destruction.

I imagine that most if not all Arabs and other Muslims everywhere would welcome the prospect of Israel self-destructing, but in my Gentile view it is not actually a prospect to be welcomed. Why not?

If there comes a time when it seemed to them that the Zionist state’s self-destruction was imminent, Israel’s leaders would respond in the same way as they would if their state was in danger of being defeated on the battlefield. As readers of my book Zionism: The Real Enemy of the Jews know, that response was put into words by Golda Meir in the course of one of my BBC Panorama interviews with her when she was prime minister. In a doomsday situation, she said, Israel “would be prepared to take the region down with it.”

The question arising is something like this. Is there any power on Planet Earth that could assist Israeli Jews to save themselves from themselves – perhaps I should say save themselves from their deluded leaders?

The more I think about this question, the more I am convinced that there is only one power that could do it – the Jews of the world. But that must be the subject of another post and I will welcome thoughts from others before I write it.

www.alanhart.net, January 30, 2012

JUDGE SAMUEL WEEMS

2012 SENESINE KADAR TURKISH FORUM’A 2012 AIDATLARINI GONDEREN UYELERIMIZ ARASINDA YAPILAN CEKILISDE

AVUSTURALYADAN , DEGERLI KURUCU UYELERIMIZDEN SAYIN TAYFUN EREN KAZANMISDIR

BUYUK TURKIYE DOSTU SAYIN HAKIM SAM WEEMS VEFATINDAN ONCE IMZALAMIS OLDUGU COK DEGERLI KITABINI

30 ARALIK 2012 TARIHINDE , CONNECTICUTDA YEMINLI NOTER OFISINDE YAPILAN CEKILISI KAZANAN SAYIN TAYFUN ERENI TEBRIK EDERIZ

TAYFUN BEYDEN RICAMIZ , KITABI GONDERMEDEN ONCE ADRESINI BIZE SON HALI ILE ULASTIRMASIDIR

KITAP PYANGOSUNA YENILIKLER ILE DEVAM YONETIM KURUMUZCA KARARLASTIRILMISDIR , YENI KURALLAR  ONUMUZDEKI HAFTA ILAN EDILECEKDIR

VERGIDEN DUSULEBILINEN 2012 AIDATLARINI ODEYEN TUM UYELERIMIZE VE KITAP SATIN ALARAK TURKISH FORUMUN DEVAMINA KATKIDA BULUNAN UYELERIMIZE  CANDAN TESEKKUR EDERIZ

DR. KAYAALP BUYUKATAMAN, BASKAN

TURKISH FORUM – DUNYA TURKLERI BIRLIGI

http://www.turkishforum.com.tr/en/content/turkish-forum-liquidation-sale/ 

TURKISH FORUMDAN SECME VE TENZILATLI KITAP SATISLARI BASLADI

UYELERE VE DERNEKLERE BUYUK INDIRIMLER VE UYELERE UCRETSIZ KITAPLAR

UP TO DATE NEWS FOR TURKISH DIASPORA AND FOR TURKEY

Please visit to English-Turkish-Russian or German pages of www.turkishforum.com.tr , each and every day

 UYE AIDATLARINIZ ICIN ASAGIDAKI LINKE (Donate) GIRINIZ

We wish him Good-luck, and we will support his actions  in the coming years and with all membership and with all available means of Turkish Forum.

We also wish good-luck to ATAA’s sister organization FTAA . FTAA is now led by President Ali Cinar who is supported by wast majority of membership during the last months election. we  recognize the wast amount work with Mr. Ali Cinar has to face. Similarly, Our support will also be with FTAA  if he so desires.

Dr. Kayaalp Buyukataman, President

Turkish Forum -Dunya Turkleri Birligi

==============================================

President Message By Ergün Kırlıkovalı

Dear Members of the Turkish American Community coast-to-coast:

I hope you and your family have adjusted to the hustle and bustle of the New Year after having a wonderful holiday season.

The month of January has passed with fury and left me wondering where the whole month went.  When you take a look at what was achieved, you will see why.

What a start to the New Year!

ATAA component associations were busy arranging local events and our TABAN and Student Outreach programs were on the road, visiting Colorado, Nevada and Canada. Membership drive and fundraising were in full swing.  ATAA Türk Evi hosted the visiting graduate students from Bahcesehir University (İstanbul, Türkiye),  where distinguished lecturers like Mark Meirowitz, David Saltzman, and Gunay Evinch, have addressed the students, explaining to them how the U.S. Government operates and the U.S. legal system works.

ATAA leadership paid an official visit to the brand new headquarters of the Turkish Coalition of America only steps from the White House.  Joint programs were discussed.

ATAA leadership visited the offices of the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus to sign the book of condolences for the legendary Turkish Cypriot leader and the founder of TRNC, Rauf Denktash, who passed away on January 13, 2012.

ATAA leadership also paid a courtesy visit to the Turkish Embassy to show our community’s deep respect and love for our motherland, Türkiye.

ATAA leadership met with Dr. Elizabeth W. Shelton, executive director of American Friends of Turkey, to coordinate the upcoming events.  AFOT will be bringing to the U.S. Dr. Ufuk Kocabas, the Project Director of the Yenikapi, Istanbul Project (the Byzantine Port of Constantinople). As you know, the Istanbul University group undertaking the excavations has unearthed 36 vessels and cargoes, going back to the Fifth Century. It has been an amazing find. As you may well know, his trip will be the first time any information about this project will be presented to American audiences, and by all indications, the audiences will be packed to see his presentation and hear him lecture.

Congratulations FTAA President Ali Çınar!

On behalf of the Assembly of Turkish American Associations (ATAA), I congratulate Mr. Ali Çınar for his election to the presidency of the Federation of Turkish American Associations (FTAA). Established in 1956, FTAA is one of America’s leading national Turkish American organizations in a critical part of the country, New York and New Jersey. Ali Çınar comes to the FTAA Presidency with vast knowledge and experience in public advocacy and community empowerment. A former Vice President of ATAA (2009-11) and as Chief Advisor to the ATAA President since June 2011, Mr. Çınar a much loved, hard-working, creative, and energetic community leader. Mr. Cinar was also the founder of the Istanbul University Mezunlari US (IUMEZUS) and its first president.

ATAA looks forward to continued excellence in solidarity and cooperation with FTAA. I wish President Ali Çınar and the FTAA Team all the success.

Elections at ATAA

The ATAA Board of Directors resolved on January 18, 2012 to start a Nominating Committee to oversee the upcoming elections where one third of the Board will be up for election.

I am grateful to Lale Iskarpatyoti for accepting to chair the Nominating Committee and members Gunay Evinch (Past President, ATAA), Tunca Iskir (Past President, ATAA), Nurten Ural (Past President, ATAA) and Mehmet Celebi (President Elect, ATAA) for accepting to serve on this very important committee.

The positions up for election are the following: Treasurer (Esra Ugurlu), Vice President Midcentral (Feridun Bek), Vice President Southwest (Sibel Pakdemirli), Vice President Northwest (Sevgi Baran), West (Maria Cakiraga). Please note that all incumbents can run again for their seats as this is their first term in office and that the race is wide open to all other qualified candidates. I would be delighted, therefore, if you kindly participate in this democratic process by nominating candidates and/or voting.

We will issue a CIS on this immediately with more election information and specifics. Due to time limitations and in the interest saving paper and labor, a separate paper mass-mailing via USPS will not be done. We will try to reach every member via this monthly e-Newsletter and a separate CIS, as well as press releases, media coverage, and www.ataa.org site. We hope, with your support, to complete the nominating process by February 15, 2012, so that the elections may be completed by March 15, and the approved by the AOD on April 15, 2012. Your cooperation and participation is, again, greatly appreciated.

Damnation Without Representation:  French Memory Law

We all know what “taxation without representation” led to in 1776: Expulsion of the British from colonial America.

And now we will see what “damnation without representation” will lead to in 2012: expulsion of the French culture from the Turkish/Turkic world.

I am, of course, referring to the draconian French memory law that cleared the French Senate on January 23, 2012, which criminalizes the denial of the so-called “Armenian genocide”, allegedly carried out in Ottoman Empire during World War I.  The passage of the measure, adopted a month earlier by a mere 50 out 577 deputies in the lower chamber of the French Parliament, makes a mockery of the notion of “participatory democracy”, not to mention the freedom of speech.

The WW I era atrocities in Eastern Anatolia were never tried by a “competent tribunal” as the 1948 United Nations Convention on Prevention and Punishment of genocide stipulates. “Intent” to exterminate was never proven, leaving the discredited political claim as just that.  “No court verdict” was issued characterizing these events a genocide. This historical controversy has become fodder to election year politics in France, destroying the freedom of expression along with it.  No law can be used retroactively, 1948 UN convention on genocide included. And yet, these rock solid facts, values, and concepts,  which are foundations of modern life cherished by humanity were respected by only 86 courageous French Senators who tried to stop that shameful memory law with their “No” votes.  The law passed by the “Yes” votes of 127 Senators, despite the rejection of the same law by the Constitution Sub-Committee a few days earlier.  Now it looks like it is heading for the Constitution Committee for a final verdict on whether it is constitutional to criminalize thought.

Some French parliamentarians, it seems, felt compelled by ethnocentric political agenda in an election year, to play the judge, the jury, the executioner, and while at it, the expert historian. We all know they are none of these.  The harsh memory law, reminiscent of those in the defunct Soviet Empire, places a severe limitation on the French democracy, curbs free speech, undermines dialogue, destroys scholarly research, and discourages scholarly dissent.

France currently serves as a co-chair country of the OSCE Minsk Group on the resolution of Armenian-Azerbaijani Nagorno-Karabakh conflict. Adoption of a law upholding the victims of one ethnicity over another on a historically controversial issue would question the practicality of French role as a mediator on an issue, which both Azerbaijan and Turkey view as directly linked to Turkish-Armenian reconciliation.

This law might also be considered the epitaph of the Nabucco pipeline and the European energy security, if not also anything French in the culture of the people of the vast geography that stretches from the Balkans to the Caucasus, from the Middle East to North Africa, and from Anatolia to Central Asia.

Armenians have a cause, not a case

Armenians took up arms against their own government. They joined the invading enemy armies. They wreaked havoc among the unprotected Muslim villages of Anatolia with their Huncak, Dashnak, Ramgavar, and other bands and thugs. They demanded territory for what can only be described as the first apartheid  of the 20th Century (i.e. the Greater Armenia.)  These and other such aspects are grouped under the “NINE T’s OF THE TURKISH ARMENIAN CONFLICT”.   If one ignores these, one ignores half the story gets no closure.

The assertion of Armenian genocide is based on a racist and dishonest version of history. Racist because Turkish suffering is deliberately ignored; and dishonest because the 9 T’s are ignored.

Just look at this 1906 photo of Cadets at an Armenian Military Academy, established in Bulgaria, with all in uniforms and their Russian “Mosin” weapons brandished. This single frame of an old photo destroys the entire Armenian narrative: that Armenians were peaceful; that they were poor, starving, and helpless; that all happened one day in 1915 without provocation; and that Armenians never killed any Turks.  How much evidence does one need to wake up and smell the Armenian deception? Didn’t Armenians die?  Didn’t they suffer?  Yes, of course, but along with many more Muslims, mostly Turks.  Wartime suffering? Yes.  Genocide? No, not by even a long shot.

Social construction of Memory

This is a term used by sociologists to describe the process of rebuilding a group memory by social acts, not history’s facts. In order to make the long discredited political claims of Armenian genocide stick, Armenian propaganda, agitation, terror, raids, revolts, treason, territorial conflicts and the Turkish victims resulting from them, are all swept under the rug. Novels, letters, exhibits, parliamentary resolutions, films, rallies, political pressure, in short, anything but facts are employed in “social reconstruction” process. Such dramaturgical approaches and ethno-methodology, unfortunately shape most perceptions, feelings and behaviors. People soon start thinking “All this hype cannot be without justification.” French politicians or American columnists or others are not immune to such symbolic and seemingly humane interactions. Before long, one is consumed by “social construction of reality”, i.e. defining reality through social interactions, not objective realities, just like in the case of the alleged Armenian genocide today. Consider this: until 1990s, most media reports used the qualifier “alleged” before genocide, but now they dropped it. Why? Did new research unearth heretofore unknown information? Did a “competent court” determine Ottoman “intent” to exterminate? No and no. What happend is, the Armenians have since increased the dose of pressure to intimidation and harassment levels. That’s social construction at its worst !

May love and peace win over hate, bigotry and discrimination one day . . .

Ergün Kırlıkovalı
President
Assembly of Turkish American Associations

Below zero: Snow falls on Istanbul’s Istiklal Avenue. Turkey was paralysed by the blizzard, and elsewhere in Europe the freezing temperatures proved deadly. Picture: AFP Source: AFP

FREEZING weather has killed dozens of people in central and eastern Europe over the past few days.

And temperatures are set to drop even further, authorities warned yesterday.

In Poland, police said 10 died over the weekend as temperatures plunged to -27C, raising the death toll from exposure to 46 since the start of the winter, which had been unusually mild up to now.

Ukraine’s health ministry said 18 people have died of hypothermia in the last four days. Most of them were homeless who froze to death in the streets or old people who died in their flats or after hospitalisation.

Nearly 500 people sought medical help for frostbite and hypothermia in just three days last week, the emergency situations ministry said. Authorities have opened 1500 shelters to provide food and heat, as temperatures plunge to 30 degrees below zero Celsius in some regions of the country.

Police also reported that at least three people died of exposure over the weekend in the Baltic state of Lithuania. A 91-year-old woman and a 78-year-old man were among the victims.

A Palestinian migrant froze to death trying to cross the river Evros between Greece and Turkey and two more were missing, one of them a nine-year-old girl, local police said yesterday.

The Palestinian, whose age was not disclosed, was part of a group of 15 Asians and Africans trapped by rising waters on the river, a key crossing point into Europe for scores of thousands of migrants annually.

Another nine migrants were rescued from the Evros on Sunday after their rubber dinghy allegedly overturned but a nine-year-old Afghan girl and her 55-year-old grandfather were still missing, a local police source said.

Temperatures in the area fall to around -20C after nightfall.

In the Czech Republic, a 26-year-old man was found frozen to death in a field near the eastern town of Opava on Saturday.

Forecasters have warned temperatures are likely to plunge to -30C in the country this week, after hitting -20C in some places on Sunday.

In Bulgaria, five died in snow storms last week, local media reported yesterday as a Siberian cold front hit the Balkan country with temperatures dropping to -24C in some places. Most were elderly people who lost their way and were left stranded out in the cold.

The towns of Chirpan in the south and Sevlievo in the centre recorded the lowest temperatures early yesterday, at -24C and -23.4C respectively, the national weather service said.

It forecast that the mercury would drop even further in the next few days.

Four more people died over the past 24 hours in Romania, the health ministry said, raising the overall death toll to six.

In Serbia, three died of hypothermia over the weekend, the Tanjug news agency said yesterday.

In the Valjevo region, 80km south-west of Belgrade, a 49-year-old woman was found dead by workers clearing snow on a road and a 52-year-old man died close to his home in the village of Bobovo.

An 81-year-old woman was found dead in her own home in the village of Taor, Tanjug said.

Heavy snowfalls, that seriously disrupted road traffic and power supplies, ceased yesterday but the country was still experiencing a fierce cold snap as temperatures fell to -20C overnight in central Serbia.

Heavy snowfall blanketed Turkey’s commercial hub Istanbul, a city of 15 million, yesterday, paralysing daily life and disrupting air and land transport.

Officials said almost 200 flights were cancelled due to the snow expected to continue until late today, while hundreds of people were stuck in private vehicles or public transport.

Turkey is facing a severe winter and temperatures in the capital Ankara are expected to fall as low as -15C in the next couple of days.

via Killer freeze hits Europe | The Courier-Mail.

Editor’s Note: Soner Cagaptay is a senior fellow at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy. Hale Arifagaoglu is a research assistant at the Institute. Bilge Menekse is a former research intern at the Institute.

By Soner Cagaptay, Hale Arifagaoglu and Bilge Menekse – Special to CNN

Over the course of the 20th Century, Turkey’s world became increasingly Eurocentric. The country joined European and broader Western institutions, such as the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), while also moving to become a member to the European Union (EU).

Today, however, the country’s single-minded European trajectory appears to be a thing of the past. Turkey, which has experienced phenomenal economic growth in the past decade, no longer feels content to subsume itself under Europe.

Since 2002, the Turkish economy has more than doubled in size, reaching a magnitude of $1.1 trillion. Gone is the Turkey of yesteryear, a poor country begging to get into the EU.

Enter the new Turkey: A country that feels confident, booming as the world around it suffers from economic meltdown. In the third quarter of 2011, the Turkish economy grew by a record 8.2%, outpacing not only the county’s neighbors, but also all of Europe.

Europe’s economic doldrums coupled with Turkey’s new trans-European vision under the Justice and Development Party (AKP) government means that the country’s traditional commercial bonds with Europe are eroding while its trade links with the non-European world flourish. Accordingly, the Turks are increasingly trading with the non-OECD world (see the chart above).

Paralleling this trend, Ankara has pursued a foreign policy that transcends Turkey’s old European focus.

The AKP’s vision of reaching beyond Europe politically is now Turkey’s vision as well. The following graph shows the number of new diplomatic missions Turkey has opened up since the AKP came to power in 2002:

Source: Turkish Republic Ministry of Foreign Affairs official website (http://www.mfa.gov.tr). OIC stands for Organization of Islamic Conference.

If Turkey is no longer trying to fit into Europe, then what is it doing? The best way to describe the new Turkey is as a “Eurasian China” – a country that is aggressively trading with the entire world while building connections to distant destinations. The next graph compares direct destinations served from Istanbul by the country’s flagship carrier, Turkish Airlines, in 1999 and 2010:

Source: Turkish Airlines official website (http://www.turkishairlines.com/tr-tr/). MENA stands for the Middle East and North Africa. CIS stands for the Commonwealth of Independent States, including Russia and former Soviet states.

Is the “Eurasian China” model sustainable? This requires the Turkish economy to keep humming along and the country’s politics to remain relatively stable.

There is a foreign policy angle at work here: Turkey is relatively stable at a time when the region is in upheaval. This, in turn, attracts investment from less-stable neighbors like Iran, Iraq, and Syria. Investors are looking for a stable economy. Ultimately, political stability and regional clout are Turkey’s hard cash. Its economic growth and ability to rise as a “Eurasian China” will depend on both.

The views expressed in this article are solely those of Soner Cagaptay, Hale Arifagaoglu and Bilge Menekse.

via Op-chart: Turkey’s changing world – Global Public Square – CNN.com Blogs.

The Government of Turkey has been assailed by several members of the European Union, the European Parliament, and various arms of government in the United states for failing to concede that the 1915-23 treatment of Armenian subjects by the Ottoman Empire constituted genocide under terms of the Genocide Convention. One strategy for discouraging such gratuitous insults to history and justice is to demonstrate that Turkey’s accusers have been guilty of the same misconduct but have staunchly resisted self-condemnations as perpetrators of genocide, in other words, they are applying a double and hypocritical legal standard for the crime of genocide.
This essay elaborates on that strategy, and demonstrates the moral selectivity of the EU and the United States in political and moral posturing over the claimed Armenian genocide.

The Genocide Convention of 1948 defines the crime as any of the following acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group, as such:

1. Killing group members; 2. Causing serious bodily or mental harm to group members; 3. Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part; 4. Imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group; and, 5. Forcibly transferring children of the group to another group.

The Convention also extends the crime of genocide to reach conspiracy, direct and public incitement, and attempt to commit genocide, or complicity in the same.

With regard to the claimed Armenian genocide, strong disproving evidence can be summoned. The relocations and killings of Armenians were not based on ethnicity, but on reasonable suspicions that they were aiding and aborting the war enemies of the Ottoman Empire during World War I. Indeed, at the Versailles Peace Conference, Armenians boasted of their treason to the Ottoman government and military heroics for the World War I victors,
especially Russia and France. Moreover, tens of thousands of Armenians were left undisturbed during the war in Istanbul, Izmir and elsewhere in non-military sensitive zones, which shows that the Armenian relocation orders pivoted on reasonable war necessities, not ethnicity, a fundamental element of genocide. Additionally, Ottoman officials prosecuted and
punished more than 1,000 wayward soldiers for killings or abuses of Armenians.

Furthermore, a substantial number of Armenian massacres during the war were retaliation for their massacres of Ottoman Muslims, not because of ethnicity or religion. Moreover, there was no historical animosity of the Ottoman’s toward Armenians, who had climbed to peaks of official power and economic prosperity within the Empire before the World War I. More could be said against the claimed Armenian genocide, but the above sketch of contrary evidence enables a comparison with the proof of genocide charges that could be asserted against EU members and the United States. The following summarizes some of the genocide indictments that might reasonably be brought against Turkey’s detractors:

1.   Germany
Germany committed genocide against the Herero tribe in then Southwest Africa during its colonial occupation in the 1890s. The best evidence shows the Germans slaughtered members of the tribe because they believed they were genetically and mentally inferior. The tribe was not guilty of treason and not provoked the German savagery by its own massacres of Germans. The butchery of the Hereros was not during wartime when excesses are inevitable. Those who survived the initial German genocide revolted against their brutal treatment with the Hoitentots in 1904, but were viciously destroyed with vastly superior arms or otherwise.
2.   France
Substantial evidence implicates France in Algerian genocide during 1954-62 war of independence in which more than 200,000 Muslims were slaughtered. Senior French officers who fought in Algeria have recently confessed that torture and summary executions were routine grisly instruments of French warfare. President Chirac and Prime Minister Jospin, however, have fiercely opposed a parliamentary inquiry into the genocide as exploring a subject best left to historians.
3.   Belgium
Belgium is seemingly guilty of genocide during its gruesome colonization of Belgian Congo under King Leopold II. The genocide spurred the legendary book by Joseph Conrad, Heart of Darkness. The King deliberately inflicted on numerous Congolese tribes conditions of calculated to bring about their physical destruction in whole or in part. Belgium’s ugly Congo genocide has been recently chronicled in the book, King Leopold’s Ghost.
4.   Portugal
Portugal’s apparent genocides uncurtained in Angola, Portuguese Guinea, and Mozambique during colonial years. The Portuguese sold back tribal members as slaves, and inflicted brutal conditions of slave and caused death to Angolan, Guinean, and Mozambican tribes.
5.   Spain
Spain seems implicated in the genocides of hundreds of Caribbean and Central and South American peoples, like the Mexican Aztecs, and the genocide of Basques in mainland Spain. Spanish killings and enslavements of indigenous tribes and peoples are notorious, and stretched over centuries. Ditto for Spanish Basques living on the border with France. Slavery was not ended in Cuba until Spain’s defeat in 1898 Spanish-American war. Spain may also have been guilty of genocide in Spanish Morocco during its colonization.
6.   Great Britain
The British apparently committed genocide of the Irish during the Great Potato Famine, 1845-48. the Irish lost ½ their population from emigration provoked by starvation conditions, and the British aggravated the starvation by callous policies permitting the exports of foodstuffs from Ireland during the famine calamity. The state of New York in the United States teaches the Potato Famine as an example of genocide.
7.   Austria
Austria is guilty of the Jewish Holocaust. The sole reason it escaped that hideous stigma is because of Cold War politics after World War II when it was occupied by the West and the Soviet Union until 1955.
8.   Greece
Greece is guilty of genocide of Ottoman Muslims in Crete and of Turkish Cypriots in Cyprus twice, 1963-64 and 1974. The evidence of genocide is voluminous, including testimony from former U.S. Undersecretary of State George Ball and foreign reporters on the scene.
9.   Italy
Italy is guilty of genocide in Ethiopia and Somalia during its colonization and war aggressions, and a co-inspirator in the Jewish Holocaust as an ally of Hitler’s Third Reich.
10.  Netherlands
The Dutch seem indictable for genocide of Indonesian tribes during its long colonial rule that ended only after World War II. The Dutch slaughtered and subjugated indigenous populations for economic gain and a belief in their racial and religious superiority.
11.  United States
The United states is seemingly guilty of genocides of several Native American Indian tribes and blacks during slavery. The Sand Creek massacre of helpless Indian woman and children and General Phil Sheridan’s fighting fighting creed that only good Indian is a dead Indian exemplifies the former genocides. The lethal conditions of black slavery captured in Harriet Beecher Stowe’s Uncle Tom’s Cabin illustrates the latter genocide.
12.  Australia and New Zealand
Neither country is a EU member, but both associated with its lofty ideology of moral superiority, and were former colonies of Great Britain. Both under the colonialism of the latter and during their early years of independence, these twin nations committed genocides against Australian aboriginals and New Zealand Maoris, respectively.

http://turkisharmenians.cjb.net/

© NASA Earth Observatory

Istanbul in 1975. Vegetated areas appear red while urbanized ones appear gray in this satellite image.

Recently released satellite photos of Istanbul provide striking visual evidence of what building more roads can do to a city — and the results aren’t very pretty.

A NASA Earth Observatory image acquired from a Landsat satellite in 1975, when Istanbul’s population was around 2.5 million, shows a relatively small area of urban settlement (depicted in gray) surrounded by broad swathes of red (representing “plant-covered land”).

More Roads Mean More Sprawl

Thirty-six years later, by which time the city’s population had swelled to more than 13 million, many of those red areas had, unsurprisingly, turned gray. But the pattern of urbanization appears quite strongly to be not just the result of more people, but of more roads:

© NASA Earth Observatory

Istanbul in 2011. Development is clearly following the new roads (depicted as purple lines) leading to the second Bosphorus bridge.

In 1973, the first bridge across the Bosphorus opened, connecting the Asian side of Istanbul to the European side. The bridge is faintly visible in the 1975 image, and the urban areas in the newly connected east are near the bridge. In 1988, Istanbul opened a second bridge across the Bosphorus. Farther north, this bridge is visible in the 2011 image. Not surprisingly, the dark gray of dense settlement has filled in the area between the two bridges on both sides of the strait.

(NASA’s website has a cool image comparison feature that overlays the 1975 and 2011 pictures to make the contrast even starker.)

No Solution To Traffic Problem

Opponents of a controversial plan to build a third bridge over the Bosphorus have long argued that it would have a similar effect as the first two spans, destroying green areas, increasing sprawl, and doing little to ease the city’s traffic woes.

But while forward-thinking municipalities in the United States and elsewhere are recognizing that building more roads typically creates more traffic — and even removing highways to reduce congestion — the Turkish government is plowing ahead with its unpopular bridge plan. If they succeed in building the span, and the 400-plus kilometers of road that would go along with the project, it’s not hard to imagine what a satellite image taken in 2047 would show.

via NASA Satellite Images of Istanbul Put Causes and Consequences of Urban Sprawl in Stark Relief : TreeHugger.

by Joshua Blakeney

Obama once again renewed US threats against Iran during his State of the Union address before a joint session of Congress on January 24, saying that Washington will maintain pressure on the Islamic Republic over its nuclear program.

“America is determined to prevent Iran from getting a nuclear weapon, and I will take no options off the table to achieve that goal,” the US president said.

Iran has categorically refuted the US-led allegations regarding its nuclear program, insisting that the country’s nuclear program is only intended for peaceful civilian purposes.

Joshua Blakeney, staff writer from Veterans Today; joins Press TV to share his opinions on the issue of the US president’s State of the Union Speech.

What follows is an approximate transcript of the interview.

[SOURCE: http://www.presstv.ir/detail/223209.html]

Press TV: Joshua Blakeney thank you so much for joining us. Let us go directly to the first question which starts with what the US president in the State of the Union address said and is it really a disinformation and that is that, Iran is on the path of acquiring a nuclear weapon?

Blakeney: Yes, it was a quite myopic speech, coming from the president of the United States. I mean, I found it particularly telling that he made the statement that “the world was once divided and”, thanks to him, “the world is now united on the question of Iran.”

I am having some feedback, I apologize. But the reality is of course that the Non-Aligned Movement – which is consisted of a 120 nations – issued a statement just eight days ago in which they endorsed Iranian sovereignty and expressed their hostility towards the US encroaching on Iranian sovereignty.

And therefore that was one utterance from the President of the United States that was evidently false.

Obama forgot to mention in his State of the Union address that the 120 members of the Non-Aligned-Movement support Iranian sovereignty and denounce US-Israeli hostility towards Iran

Obviously the insinuation that Iran is trying to acquire nuclear weapons is buttressed by no evidence and of course the IAEA, [International Atomic Energy Agency], any statements they have made in which they have indirectly implied this, has been inferred from evidence, so called, provided to them by itsmember states like the United States and Israel and Britain and therefore their statements are not reliable at all.

Iran clearly is trying to develop a civilian nuclear program, like France has; like many countries in the world have; which is completely justifiable and indeed legal.

And so the president of the United States I think reflected not necessarily his own perspective but those of his backers. You know, the United States political system is one where money speaks; in a capitalist system those who own capital have political clout.

And the statements that Barack Obama made vis-à-vis the Middle East, and really in general to do with domestic economics also, I believe, were the product of his backers.

And we know who is supporting the Democrat Party financially and what their agenda is in terms of Middle East policy.

And that in my humble opinion is to promote the interest of the state of Israel, often in fact jeopardizing traditional US-Middle East policy which was to try and do bilateral negotiations within ensconced Middle East regimes. And therefore this speech has to go down as an embarrassment.

And in fact if you look, if you go to about an hour, into Barack Obama’s State of the Union Address in about an hour into it, you will see that when he mentions Iran and when he mentions his ironclad support for the State of Israel, that actually only about half of the Congress persons clapped which might indicate that there is some discontent with this tendentious policy of the United States towards the State of Israel.

Press TV: Joshua Blakeney, this all options on the table is something again perhaps, maybe because of a reelection year for Obama maybe its a signal and some say for the Israeli lobby at the same time the great length that the United States is going to get sanctions on Iran.

We know that they have made and introduced the sanctions, trying to get EU [European Union] which they got their approval even though it’s at the behest of Europe in terms of what they are going through regarding the Euro zone crisis, of course going with his co-worker [US Secretary of the Treasury] Timothy Geithner all the way to China and we saw what happened there regarding getting China on board and of course then with India.

I mean what is it that the US president means with this ‘all options on the table’?

Blakeney: Well, I think it is largely empty rhetoric from the President of the United States and I think there is a tendency among the political class to think if they repeat something as many times as possible that it would begin to be true.

And Barrack Obama said in his State of the Union address that the world is now united against Iran and that is patently false, is Venezuela against Iran? Is China against Iran? Is the Non-Aligned Movement of 120 nations against Iran?

I do not think so, so we are seeing the decline of Anglo-America and this kind of Euro- American imperialist world that the planet has been victim of for the past 500 years really since 1492 and we are living in a multipolar world now, one where Iran has some agency.

China and Iran continue to trade with each other irrespective of the sanctions imposed by the U.S. and E.U.

And if the European Union and the United States wants to work in Israel’s interests and against its own interests of doing commercial dealings with Iran, then Iran will go elsewhere and trade its resources and goods with other nations which I think is a good thing. I think it is good that we are living in a multipolar world.

One of the intellectuals authors of the “war on terror” was an individual named Charles Krauthammer, who in 1990 authored a paper entitled The Unipolar Moment, in which he said, oh this moment after the Soviet Union has declined US must jumped on it, because it won’t be there for ever.

And that unipolar moment, you know, metastasized into the invasion of Iraq and the invasion of Afghanistan. But I believe that actually they cannot invade and attack Iran because they are bereft of soldiers for a start; they’re overstretched militarily, the United States, and moreover Iran has a capability to defend itself.
Press TV: So what is it [the US] trying to do there when it keeps saying it Joshua Blakeney, I mean, some say well it is a distraction from the problems that he [Obama] is facing at home. And I am talking about the Occupy movement, do you agree with that?

Joshua Blakeney and Mark Glenn critically analyze Barak Obama’s State of the Union speech on Press TV.

Iran is on the right side of history contributing to the success of the Bolivarian Revolution in Latin America. Iran and many nations in Latin America are at the forefront of the resistance to the international imperialism of the US, Britain and Israel

Blakeney: Yes, to an extent. You know it offers a scapegoat, a smokescreen to distract people. So I do agree to a large extent with what my colleague said.

You know the fact of the matter is that US politicians need to pander and Kowtow to the Israel lobby in the United States.

JJ Goldberg did a study in the 1990′s in which he deduced that 45% of Democrat party donations came from individuals who are partisan to the State of Israel.

And in 2006 Richard Cohen did a study in the Washington Post, in which he indicated 60% of the Democrat Party [money] comes from individuals whose primary allegiance is to the state of Israel.

So if 60% of the Barack Obama’s money is coming from individuals whose first priority is Israel, is it very surprising that Barack Obama would have this so called ‘ironclad’ consensus with the state of Israel?

I think that this is historically precedented, if you look in 1965 for example, when the British empire was trying to extend self determination and self rule to the inhabitants of the Rhodesia, the natives of Rhodesia, we saw the local crazed ethnic nationalists form a schism in the British empire and rise up and declare independence likewise the US after the Cold War had no use for Israel anymore.

The divergence between a rational U.S. Middle East policy and the Israeli Middle East policy of denying Arabs and Muslims cohesion and stability is analogous with the divergence of interests between the declining British Empire and regional Rhodesian white ethnic nationalists in 1965 (as portrayed from 5 mins 52 seconds in the above video). ]

After 1967 Israel proved itself to be a formidable fighting force and within the context of the Cold War the United States could use Israel to smash up this or that Arab nation or to extend its Middle East policy.

After the Cold War what use did the US have for Israel or for South Africa? In the case of South Africa, the Afrikaners did not have a lobby in the United States and so the US cast them adrift in the 1980′s and the VETO they provided them in the United Nations dissipated.

Unfortunately, what would have been logical and rational from the perspective of US hegemony who would obviously want to win over Middle East governments to resist the hegemony of the …..

Press TV: Joshua Blakeney, the US president said that this is the right time for the United States to be on the right side of the Middle East.

Is the US on the right side of the Middle East? Quickly [we have] twenty seconds or less.

Blakeney: No, it is definitely not. In the 1980s the Israeli government formulated a new policy of wanting to destabilize the Middle East which goes against US oil interests, against the US rational interests as a global hegemon.

www.veteranstoday.com, January 28th, 2012