Eideard

Germany’s Interior Minister has warned of a “new form of far-right terrorism” as details emerged of a grotesque film left by members of a neo-Nazi cell in eastern Germany, in which they claimed the murder of nine immigrants between 2000 and 2006.

Prosecutors said police had arrested a suspected accomplice of the group, which referred to itself in the film as the “Nationalist Socialist Underground,” and which is also thought to be behind the murder of a policewoman in 2007 and a bomb attack on a Turkish area of Cologne in 2004.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel said the murders were shameful for Germany. “We must assume that this is right-wing extremism in the worst form, and it is shaming that such a thing can happen in our country,” she told German television.

The revelations, which have caused shock and outrage across Germany, began after police found the bodies of two men, Uwe Mundlos and Uwe Boehnhardt, both with far-right links, in a mobile home in Eisenach last week. Police believe they killed themselves after a botched bank robbery.

Shortly after the discovery investigators searched a burned-out house in Zwickau, used by the men and one woman, “Beate Z,” who later handed herself in to police. There they found guns used in the murder of the policewoman and of the nine vendors, eight of whom were of Turkish background and the other a Greek…

Protesters, many with Turkish roots, gathered at the Brandenburg Gate in Berlin Sunday to protest against neo-Nazis. Opposition politicians expressed anger that the cell went undetected for so long.

“Beate Z” faces charges of murder, attempted murder, arson and belonging to a terrorist organization.

Throw away the key. That would be a start.

Turks cared more for Furkan Dogan than does the Obama government

Turkey expelled Israel’s ambassador and suspended military accords Friday, a day after publication of a U.N. report saying that Israel had used unreasonable force in a raid on a Gaza-bound ship that killed nine Turks.

Stung by Israel’s refusal to meet demands for a formal apology, pay compensation to families of the dead, and end the blockade of two million Palestinians living in the Gaza enclave, Turkey announced it was downgrading ties with the Jewish state further.

“Turkey-Israel diplomatic relations have been reduced to a second secretary level. All personnel above the second secretary level will be sent home by Wednesday at the latest,” Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu told a news conference in Ankara…

Israel Friday said it accepted the findings of the U.N. report, and that it hoped to mend ties with Turkey, but reiterated that it would not apologize for the deaths. Of course not. Arrogance is thematic in Israeli politics.

Immediately after the attack on the aid convoy last year, Turkey withdrew its ambassador to Israel, suspended joint military exercises, and barred Israeli military aircraft from Turkish airspace.

Friday, Turkey went a step further by putting military pacts with its erstwhile ally on ice…

Erdogan’s stand on the Palestinian issue has held Turkey in good stead among Arabs agitating for greater democracy, notably in Egypt and more recently Syria…

Davutoglu also said support would be given to Turkish and foreign victims of the Israeli raid to seek justice from courts. One of the nine Turks killed was a U.S. citizen.

I presume you can guess how much support the United States has offered the family of the American murdered by the Israelis?

Yeah – I couldn’t find any support either from the Obama administration for Furkan Dogan the unarmed 19-year-old who was shot five times by Israeli gunmen. Obama did the usual “regrettable” everyone gets when the Israelis murder civilians. Furkan Dogan’s father has received no reply from requests to Hillary Clinton. And nothing additional that could be taken as criticism of Israel for the nine killings of members of the peace flotilla.

Five current or former police officers have been found guilty on a combined 25 counts of civil rights violations tied to fatal shootings on New Orleans’ Danziger Bridge in the chaotic aftermath of Hurricane Katrina.

Jurors reached a verdict in the closely watched trial after three days of deliberations.

The shootings occurred on Danziger Bridge on September 4, 2005, six days after much of New Orleans went underwater after the powerful hurricane slammed into the Gulf Coast.

Prosecutors contend the officers opened fire on an unarmed family, killing 17-year-old James Brissette and wounding four others. Minutes later, one of the officers shot and killed Ronald Madison, a 40-year-old man described by Justice officials as having severe mental disabilities.

Madison was trying to flee the scene when he was shot, according to a Justice Department statement. One of the officers allegedly “stomped and kicked” Madison before he died, the statement noted.

Officers Kenneth Bowen, Robert Gisevius, Robert Faulcon and Anthony Villavaso were convicted in the shootings along with a fifth defendant, former detective Arthur Kaufman.

The five men are scheduled to be sentenced on December 14. Bowen, Gisevius, Faulcon and Villavaso are facing potential multiple life sentences, as well as additional penalties for charges tied to a conspiracy to cover up what happened on the bridge. Kaufman faces a maximum penalty of 120 years in prison.

“Today’s verdict by these jurors sends a powerful, a powerful, unmistakable message to public servants, to law enforcement officers and to the citizens we serve and indeed to the world,” U.S. Attorney Jim Letten said. “That message is that public officials and especially law enforcement officers will be held accountable for their acts, and that any abuse of power, especially that power that violates the rights and the civil liberties of our citizens, will have serious consequences.”

“The citizens of this country will not, should not, and we intend that they will never have to fear the individuals who are called upon to protect them,” Letten declared.

Overdue.

RTFA if you need your memory jogged. Local officials could have taken care of this – and didn’t. The police department could have come down on the side of justice and didn’t. Federal efforts on behalf of abused civil rights are still needed for justice in many of these United States.

Why am I going on the Freedom Flotilla II to Gaza? I ask myself this, even though the answer is: What else would I do? I am in my sixty-seventh year, having lived already a long and fruitful life, one with which I am content.

It seems to me that during this period of eldering it is good to reap the harvest of one’s understanding of what is important, and to share this, especially with the young. How are they to learn, otherwise?

Our boat, The Audacity of Hope, will be carrying letters to the people of Gaza. Letters expressing solidarity and love. That is all its cargo will consist of. If the Israeli military attacks us, it will be as if they attacked the mailman. This should go down hilariously in the annals of history. But if they insist on attacking us, wounding us, even murdering us, as they did some of the activists in the last flotilla, Freedom Flotilla I, what is to be done?

There is a scene in the movie “Gandhi” that is very moving to me: it is when the unarmed Indian protesters line up to confront the armed forces of the British Empire. The soldiers beat them unmercifully, but the Indians, their broken and dead lifted tenderly out of the fray, keep coming.

Alongside this image of brave followers of Gandhi there is for me an awareness of paying off a debt to the Jewish civil rights activists who faced death to come to the side of black people in the South in our time of need. I am especially indebted to Michael Schwerner and Andrew Goodman who heard our calls for help – our government then as now glacially slow in providing protection to non-violent protestors-and came to stand with us.

They got as far as the truncheons and bullets of a few “good ol’ boys’” of Neshoba County, Mississippi and were beaten and shot to death along with James Cheney, a young black man of formidable courage who died with them. So, even though our boat will be called The Audacity of Hope, it will fly the Goodman, Cheney, Schwerner flag in my own heart.

Bravo, Sister Walker. Glad to see you have the courage of your convictions.

You face a greater danger, I guess. At that time, in the beginning of my involvement in American civil rights struggles, racist mobs and their cohorts in uniform were only killing a few of those who challenged their evil. I fear the Israeli government truly doesn’t care about how many they maim and kill to defend the arrogance of ethnic superiority and their quest for lebensraum.

Three murderers who were expected to die in jail have launched a campaign for freedom based on their human rights and the European Court of Human Rights has agreed to hear the cases.

Jeremy Bamber, Peter Moore and Douglas Vinter – who killed 11 men between them and were each given “whole life” tariffs – claim their sentences amount to “inhuman or degrading treatment” and breach their right to a fair trial.

The court’s decision to hear their views is likely to anger both Parliament and the victims’ families. The House of Commons is already in a battle with Europe over prisoners’ rights, after it voted to maintain the ban on their voting against the orders of Brussels.

If the court, which is in Strasbourg, rules in their favour, all 41 of the prisoners serving the whole life terms would be eligible to claim for release. The list could include Ian Brady, the Moors Murderer, Rose West and Peter Sutcliffe, the Yorkshire Ripper.

Kenneth Clarke, the Justice Secretary, told the Daily Mail: “It goes without saying that the Government will be fighting the case vigorously and defending the principle of the whole life tariff. A small number of prisoners’ crimes are so appalling that judges rule that they should never become eligible for parole.”

Justice and jurisprudence appear to have become nothing more than a playground for lawmakers, lawbreakers and lawyers. It’s all some kind of game based on the exchange of large sums of money.

Thousands of people gathered along the shores of Istanbul on Sunday afternoon to welcome home the Mavi Marmara, the ship that was raided by Israel as it led a flotilla aimed at breaking the blockade of Gaza.

Nine people were killed in the raid last May, which drew international condemnation and helped lead to the easing of restrictions on Gaza. The raid also created a diplomatic standoff between Turkey and Israel.

Groups waving Palestinian and Turkish flags and chanting anti-Israel slogans stood by the ship, which had been confiscated by Israel. On its return on Sunday, it was decorated with posters of the dead passengers.

“Welcome to your soil,” said Ahmet Dogan, father of Furkan Dogan, a 19-year-old Turkish-American citizen who was killed in the raid. “Dear Mavi Marmara, hold your head high, you’ve done your duty, acted as the shield for the innocent…”

Turkey, which had long been a close ally of Israel, has demanded an apology and compensation for the deaths of the activists killed in the raid and recalled its ambassador. Israel has refused to apologize…as usual.

The Obama government, like every preceding government for the past 60 years, babbled a few criticisms of the Israelis – and returned to doing nothing for the dispossessed victims of Israeli expansionism.