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NASA scientists have struggled to process the soil that the Phoenix Mars Lander scooped from the red planet's surface, finding that the Martian dirt was too clumpy to sift into the spacecraft's onboard laboratory. The scientists called it an important day last week when the Phoenix's robotic arm scraped its first, cup-sized sample from the planet's surface, but since then have been unable to get any of the clotted soil through a screen into the lander's Thermal Evolved Gas Analyser (TEGA). "What we've found is although we had an awful lot of dirt on that screen, virtually none of its has made it down into the oven," said William Boynton of the University of Arizona in Tucson, who is overseeing the TEGA experiments. The mission is searching for signs of water or conditions that could sustain life on Mars. Pictures of the first sample dredged up by Phoenix showed it to be made up largely of dirt clods, which were too large to make it through the small holes in the screen. Scientists spent the weekend vibrating the screen in hopes that the clods would break apart, but very few particles dropped into the instruments. "We now at least know that the vibrator is functioning," Mr Boynton said. "It looks like the soil is just too adhesive to make it through when it's put down as a mass." He said that if further attempts with TEGA's vibrator failed to get a sufficient amount of dirt into the machine, the next step would be to try again with a second scoop of soil, this time sprinkling a small amount onto the screen in hopes that it would go through. Mr Boynton said the team was optimistic that this dribbling technique would work and were not ready to give up on the soil samples. "It would be at least a week or two before we would start to get terribly concerned," he said. "We do have a fair number of things we're going to be trying." The scientists do not know why the martian dirt has proved so clumpy, saying that the area under the lander could have gotten wet from the spacecraft's thrusters or melting ice or that salts in the soil could act as a cementing agent. The $US420 million ($442 million) lander spent 10 months journeying from Earth and touched down on Mars 12 days ago. Its three-month mission was proposed after the Mars Odyssey detected frozen water below the Martian surface in 2002. This is the lander's first attempt to analyse soil, which might contain salt left behind by evaporated water or ice. They hope to learn what minerals make up the soil.

Shortly after I had gone from the seminary to my first pastorate in 1948, Louise invited my wife, Anna Marie, and me to have Sunday dinner with her family. She has been one of our dearest friends ever since. Recently, during one of the many visits we have had since then she said to me “My brother hates God because God made him gay, and he knows he is going to hell, and I do, too, for that is what the Bible says.” At that time I had only some suppositions - quite negative - about homosexuality and had never thought it needed study. But her words made me want to know as much as I could learn. When I began reading I soon realized things about myself I now deplore: I was ignorant of the many facts about homosexuality and what the Bible says about it. Yet, without facts, I had pre-judged it; I was prejudiced. With little thought I had read into the Bible what I presumed it ought to say instead of reading out of it what it did say. My idea of not needing to study the subject was pure anti-intellectualism. I am now grateful to God that He led me to study. I read some two score books, most by eminent sociologists, psychologists and theologians. Then I wrote this letter to Louise, reflecting what I have come to believe is the truth about homosexuality, what the Bible says and what God wants us to think and do about it. Now I want others to study seriously this matter of such importance to many lives and many churches and denominations. I asked for and received Louise’s permission to share her letter with others. I pray it may be helpful. Bruce W. Lowe, January 2002

Finally, someone is protesting the world’s most odious protester. The Million Fag March is set for Sunday morning, March 30 in Topeka, Kan., home of Fred Phelps’ Westboro Baptist Church. Fred and his family (13 children and 54 grandchildren) show up at military funerals with signs reading, “God Hates Fags,” “God Hates America,” “Fags Die, God Laughs,” etc. Fred apparently arrives at these insights after personal discussions with The Creator wherein He tells Fred that everything bad that happens in the world is His revenge for America “tolerating” gays. Organizers say it’s time to “show Phelps and his church that freedom of speech works both ways. There are two big challenges with the march. First is the laws passed in Topeka to protect other churches from Phelps. They prohibit the Freds of the world (of which, mercifully, there are few) from getting within 50 feet of a house of worship for a half-hour before or after services are planned. So the march might have to take place in Topeka but not too close to Westboro Baptist. The second challenge could be even harder. Organizers are determined to keep the protest peaceful, but since Fred’s whole goal is to whip up feelings of intolerance and hate, not responding in kind will be a toughie. Still, the expectation is clear. Absolutely. No. Violence. It doesn’t matter if Fred Phelps comes to the March himself and starts throwing punches. The police will handle it. If you feel that you could in any way be provoked, do not plan on attending. …The Phelps family uses hate speech to draw attention to themselves. To do that during the March would only be bringing ourselves down to their level. So, please, no hate speech on your signs, clothes, and mouths. Besides, “God Hates Fred” signs are lame and obvious. You can do better. Sending the message you want to send without being blatantly hateful shouldn’t be all that hard for you. If you’re anywhere near Topeka, please plan to attend the march. You can sign up here. If you’re not, organizers need donations for costs associated with permitting, security, etc. so your donations are welcome.

Well, so much for our new government taking an even-handed position on Israel/Palestine. Before our politicians even warmed their seats in the new parliamentary sittings, the Australian Prime Minister announced that he will lead a parliamentary motion to honour Israel on 12 March acknowledging Yom Ha'atzmaut, Israel's Independence Day. The Opposition Leader will second the motion. Then, celebrations will take place at a reception in the Mural Hall of Parliament House. If Palestinians and their supporters had any hopes of a sympathetic hearing from the new Rudd government on the multiple human rights abuses being perpetrated by Israel in the Occupied Palestinian Territories, those hopes are now well and truly dashed. This year marks 60 years of Palestinian dispossession and displacement and a savage, relentless occupation that is smothering the lifeblood of the Palestinians while Israel celebrates its ill-gotten gains. Palestinians are starving in Gaza, Palestinians are being sold out in the West Bank, Palestinians are dying. Their very existence is under threat. It is as simple and as awful as that. Every Australian ought to be asking why our Prime Minister and the parliament feel so humiliatingly obligated to Israel that they must go to these lengths to show their friendship with a foreign country that consistently violates international law, United Nations resolutions and human rights conventions? If supporting the Palestinian cause is too much to ask, then refusing to single Israel out for any kind of recognition would at least be sensitive to the Palestinians living here. The Palestinians were never asked if they would agree to the foreign imperial division of their country: most had their family homes and lands taken from them by Zionist forces ruthlessly pushing for a Greater Israel not intended by the 1947 United Nations Partition of Palestine. All suffer indescribable pain knowing their people live a hellish existence under Israel's occupation. It is on this human wreckage of Palestinian lives that Israel celebrates its independence, honoured so gratuitously by our government. Such demonstrations of affection are not new. Our former Prime Minister John Howard had already fostered this extraordinary bond when he declared Australia as Israel's closest friend. Many of his ministers followed suit and none was more accommodating than former Foreign Minister Alexander Downer when he said that he wore Israel as "a badge of honour" even as Israel's war planes decimated the Lebanese landscape in 2006. True to form, Israel has rewarded its friends with facile honours. John Howard received two in one year. He was awarded the Jerusalem Prize from the World Zionist Organisation and he had a forest named after him in the Negev by the Jewish National Fund, which specialises in acquiring property for "the purpose of settling Jews on such lands." These lands are the subject of legal proceedings brought by the now displaced indigenous Bedouins of the Negev who are being "moved out" for the exclusive benefit of Jews worldwide who want to live in Israel. Although these Bedouins live in what is now called Israel, 45 of their villages are not recognised by the Israeli government and have never received even the most basic amenities. All this falls hard on the heels of the new Prime Minister's moving apology to our own indigenous people and raises many questions about the sincerity of that momentous gesture. The similarity between the grievous losses suffered by both peoples--the Aborigines and the Palestinians--is not fanciful. Both peoples have been the hapless victims of the great white colonial enterprise and in both cases, it would have succeeded brilliantly, if these people would have just disappeared. But it is not so easy to kill off people and their dreams. There are some 11 million Palestinians worldwide whose collective memory is seared with the narrative of their people who fled in terror during Israel's 1948 purge of Palestine. About two-thirds of the Palestinian population never saw their homes again. Many still have the keys to their front doors, the deeds to their properties and lands, the photos of happier moments, and the endless familiar memories of smells and sounds unfaded by time. Around 7.2 million refugees are languishing today in refugee camps waiting to return home and to receive compensation for the calculated decimation of their society--one that had successfully developed culturally and economically over centuries, despite four hundred years under Ottoman rule. Palestine was not a land without people as Israel's mythmakers have tried to promote, particularly through the emotive Hollywood film "Exodus". Palestine was, in fact, populated by successful citizen merchants and officials who added an economically vibrant dimension to the essentially peasant population who were actively engaged in working the land. Not only did Palestinians own land, but even where there was no legal title, the land was considered as belonging to the Palestinians through their history of land use and uninterrupted possession. All the recent posturings by Israel's supporters, to show Israel as a first world country in the forefront of science and technology and the cutting edge of the arts in order to gain legitimacy with Western countries, might resonate with our politicians, but it does not with people who know Israel's atrocious human rights record. More and more people are beginning to wake up as intrepid journalists report a far from rosy picture in the Occupied Palestinian Territories. Yet, these are still lone voices in our Australian media and not enough to reach the wider population. For decades, Israel has won the battle for the hearts and minds of people, despite the official reports of every human rights organisation--from Amnesty International to Israel's B'Tselem--documenting in graphic detail Israel's litany of human rights abuses. Most are gathering dust, but they provide more than enough evidence to challenge the appropriateness of aligning ourselves with Israel. And there are stirrings in our churches, universities, the legal fraternity, social justice groups and in the consciences of people generally, to reach out to the Palestinians. In response, Israel has established the Peres Centre for Peace in Australia which is endeavouring to project an image of Israel as peacemaker. Rather than the usual rounds of dialogue and conflict resolution, it is being done on a populist level through sporting activities and culture. The Centre has already persuaded the Australian Football League (AFL) to include a friendly team of Israelis and Palestinians in their 18-team line up for this year's AFL International Cup. In this way, Israel hopes to normalise its image with the Australian public, and through a handful of players, show its willingness to work towards peace - something it has been unable to do at the negotiating table. However, Israeli tanks and soldiers are still shelling Gaza, and Israel is further tightening its siege on this tiny sliver of land with a population almost at bursting point The recent smashing of the wall with hundreds of thousands of desperate Palestinians swarming into Egypt to look for food and other basic necessities gave the world a glimpse into the misery of their lives. And, in the West Bank, Israel is increasing--not decreasing as it promised to do in the most recent peace negotiations - the number of checkpoints that totally suffocate the ordinary daily movement of another burgeoning population. The surest sign though of Israel's real intentions, is its blatant disregard of international law and all requests to stop its illegal settlement project that is literally turning thousands of Palestinians on to the streets--homeless and stateless and forced to rely on the world's pitiful humanitarian aid that can never bring them economic or political independence. As conditions deteriorate for the Palestinians, and the words "apartheid" and "ethnic cleansing" begin to enter mainstream consciousness after being given voice by former US President Jimmy Carter and Archbishop Tutu, Israel is employing new public relations strategies to secure its legitimacy in the global community. In Australia, where sport dominates so much of our cultural life and social interaction, using sport as a vehicle for peace is a powerful image. This latest venture by The Peres Centre - named after one of the more notorious Zionist architects of Palestinian ethnic cleansing--is already bedazzling the AFL administrators with the idea of people crossing all boundaries "for the simple love of the game" - a notion that would never be entertained by a government at war with an enemy state and one that has been rejected when political pressure through sports' boycotts is needed to stop countries behaving oppressively. Nowhere else was this so effective than in South Africa's anti-Apartheid struggle. There is no excuse for our leaders in politics and business to buy into this scam when they know that some 4 million Palestinians are being denied justice and basic human rights under Israel's illegal military occupation, with no sign of reprieve. If it were not for the West's craven politicians indecently rushing to join Israel's circus, Israel would long ago have had to find a solution to give justice and dignity back to the Palestinians. Regrettably, our leaders will continue to pursue their self-serving policies until ordinary, decent people force them to accept that our common humanity is worth more than the lucrative deals that bring such enormous profits to the multinational corporations, and from which many governments benefit. It is by no means impossible. Just as people brought down the Apartheid regime in South Africa, the people can bring down the ethnically divisive Zionist regime in Israel as well. This is why the word "apartheid" so rattles Israel's supporters. But, we have a long way to go, especially when governments insist on continuing their love affairs with Israel. In the meantime, al-Nakba--the Palestinian catastrophe of dispossession and displacement--is being accelerated. This crime against humanity is what needs to be acknowledged in our Parliament and not a motion honouring Israel. The Australian "fair go" that our Prime Minister so fondly embraces, has never sounded so hollow or sunk so low. Sonja Karkar is the founder and president of Women for Palestine in Melbourne, Australia. See www.womenforpalestine.com

By Tanene Allison February 27, 2008 Lawrence “Larry” King was shot to death and the media thought that you didn’t need to know about it. Larry, as you might have now learned, was fifteen and in his junior high school computer lab when Brandon McInerney, 14, followed through on a previously declared threat and shot King. The mainstream media apparently didn’t think that you needed to know that King had recently come out as gay and had started to wear lipstick, mascara, earrings, and a pair of particularly fierce high heeled boots. The first LA Times article on the shooting made no reference to Larry’s sexual orientation, or his manner of dress. When the mainstream media first reported the murder, it was stated that the violence stemmed from a “personal dispute” between the two boys. In contrast, ten years ago, the first AP story on Matthew Sheppard’s assault included information about his sexual orientation, a fact that had played a role in his victim status. Youth groups across the country began holding marches in King’s honor. Details of his death was spread virally on youth-dominated, Facebook. Queer media outlets bubbled over with coverage of the story. The mainstream media remained silent. Only now, two weeks after King’s murder, is the mainstream media providing coverage of the story. All of those who did not cover the story when it was, well, news, are now covering how it was a story no one else covered either. Anderson Cooper, wrote in his blog: “Tonight… we are focusing on a story that hasn’t received the attention it deserves…According to many accounts, he had been bullied repeatedly, and some parents have even claimed students knew of threats to Lawrence’s life. At this point it doesn’t seem clear how much school officials knew of the bullying, but a full investigation needs to be done. If this had been an African-American student bullied by a teenage skinhead, would it have received more attention? “Would school officials have taken it more seriously if it had been a Christian campus leader attacked by another student because of his/her religious beliefs? I don’t have the answers to those questions, but I do think they are worth asking.” All good questions, and I’m grateful they’re being asked, but where was Cooper two weeks ago? Not that Cooper is alone in his delay. It took the two Democratic candidates for President thirteen days to release comments on King’s death. The New York Times took four days before running an AP snippet on the murder, and eleven days before they wrote their first story. MTV News, a leader in coverage of youth issues, ran its first story on King nine days after the murder. You get the idea. I bring this all up because these are indeed questions to which there are no easy answers. It is not a new concept that violence against the queer community is often seen as a non-story. And yet, despite temptation to declare this mainstream silence as a blatant expression of homophobia, I believe it’s more complicated than just that. As a journalist who presently works in a position where it is my job to notice civil rights stories the media is ignoring, and to seek appropriate coverage, this case particularly stood out for me. Despite my daily intake of large amounts of newsfeeds, I also first learned of this story via a friend’s Facebook post. Although this particular story falls outside of the purview of my job, I began emailing various journalist friends to figure out what was going on with their silence. These email exchanges quickly produced no real answers. In an exchange with one of my most queer-friendly, mainstream media pals, no answers were found to the question of the silence. It was almost as if the institutional hindrances to seeing this as a story were so thick that they were impossible to define. I asked my journalist source why the story hadn’t received the coverage it deserves. She said she didn’t really know, but likely the large shooting outside of Chicago was simply seen as a larger story. I pointed out that King was shot and two news cycles went by before the Illinois shooting. I pointed out that it was hard not to see shades of homophobia in the media not seeing King’s death as a big story. She wrote back that a boy wearing women’s clothing is exactly the type of thing the media would love to make a story out of. I replied that regardless of that assumption, the lack of coverage would say otherwise. This went on for a number of rounds. Our exchange ended with her agreeing to research the story a bit more, and with her asking if I had contacts for King’s friends and family. I had to point out that I wasn’t inquiring to pitch her for my work; that I was merely an upset citizen, trying to make sense of the silence. Her news organization took days more before they ran their first piece of coverage. That “Mainstream Media” is made up of endless such folks, people who cared about the story, who engaged in private exchanges about it. And yet, and yet, the coverage remained absent. I believe that we know the answer to Anderson Cooper’s questions. Yes. Yes, the death of Queer folks earns less mainstream outrage. (Has anyone heard of Simmie “Beyonce” Williams Jr.? Another feminine dressing, out-as-gay, young male of color, who was murdered this last weekend? Or Senesha Steward, who was killed in early February? It also deserves to be examined what role the races of these youth played in the lack of coverage their murders were given.) Yes, such crimes tend to be taken less seriously. What I don’t know is why. Why the impenetrable silence on this story, when reporters in numerous organizations agree that it was always a story worth covering? And perhaps even more bizarrely, why the sudden onrush of belated coverage? Why is it now popular for the mainstream media to cover how unpopular it was for the mainstream media to cover King’s death in the weeks after it first occurred? Lawrence King is dead. And were it not for groups of hurt and angry young people, none of us may have ever heard King’s name. Whether the mainstream media agrees or not, that fact is something worth our attention. Share and Enjoy: These icons link to social bookmarking sites where readers can share and discover new web pages. * Digg * del.icio.us * Reddit * StumbleUpon * Technorati * Fark * Facebook * NewsVine * YahooMyWeb Filed under: Crime, Culture, News 3 Responses to “Why the mainstream media doesn’t care about the murder of gay teens” 1. Shams, on February 28th, 2008 at 1:31 pm Said: As a member of the MSM also, and as someone who did not hear about the story until it appeared in the magazine that I work for, I think the response time lagged for a couple of reasons, none of them involving homophobia. 1) King is a racial/ethnic minority. Racial/ethnic minorities do not attract the MSM’s attention as much as attractive white people do, period. Race/perceived race/nationality, I believe, trump homophobia in the newsroom in terms of attracting coverage. Look at all the young Latinas and Asian and black women who were pregnant and killed by lovers during the time that Lacy Peterson was big, big news (like every week/day news). They were all ignored, regardless of their sexual orientation and gender identity. Minority women (gay, straight, bi, etc), transwomen and teenaged girls are always ignored when they go missing like Natalee Holloway. I am convinced this had more to do with Lawrence King’s race than with his sexuality/gender identity. Newsrooms in the mainstream media are almost completely devoid of ethnic-looking Spanish-speaking Americans and other minority groups in this country, so when they’re looking for a story, the editors are looking for a story about themselves. Period. This is obviously a problem, but it’s a negligence problem, not malicious avoidance. I know that in my newsroom, there are a lot of people looking and searching specifically for stories about people in the queer/two spirit communities. Myself included. We are on a personal as well as an editorial mission to broaden our scope and to get our own community represented. 2) His family situation is complicated. He was a ward of the state. When you have a child killed that was in foster care, there are a number of legal difficulties to writing a story about that child. End of story. I’m sure that this took a lot of time to work through. And that may have had some effect on the way it was reported initially. For instance, after the shooting, it became clear to most observers that it was a hate crime. But you’re dealing with a suspect who is a minor, who is not convicted or even charged. You cannot say that he “committed a hate crime” or that it is “an apparent hate crime.” Your sources in the police department can say that, but to print it, is slander until the DA charges him with a hate crime. Until someone is charged, you can’t speculate on the motive. Until someone is convicted, you cannot say that they “committed” anything. There are a lot of legal and logistical things that go on in mainstream newsrooms that the blogging and online community do not have to deal with. Whether they turn out to be positive hurdles or negative hurdles has yet to be determined and is the subject of much debate (ie. how do we get the story in the book as fast as possible without putting ourselves in a legally risky position? How do we report out a story that involves speculation and underage criminality and a legal guardianship that respects privacy?) Before blaming the MSM for being slow in its response due to something as charged as homophobia or outright racism, think about other possibilities of unintentional negligence (never a good thing, I admit), legal difficulties and barriers to finding out information. Blogs can print speculation. The Wall Street Journal cannot. 2. Bob Zuley, on February 28th, 2008 at 3:39 pm Said: February 25, 2008 BY NEIL STEINBERG Sun-TimesColumnist Why hast thou forsaken him? A reader inquires why no one in Chicago has yet written aboutLawrence King, the Oxnard, Calif., boy who was murdered two weeks ago forthe crime of being gay. King, 15, had begun sometimes coming to class wearing makeup, acapital offense in the view of 14-year-old Brandon McInerney, who,according to police in the town north of Malibu, strode into their middleschool computer lab Feb. 12 and shot King in the head in front of twodozen classmates. “Where’s the moral outrage?” asks reader Bob Zuley, who answershis own question: “This hateful behavior is learned by a society thatcondones homophobia expressed through families that practice bigotry,churches and schools that practice exclusion, and national leaders thatfight to prevent equality and acceptance.” Sounds right to me. But is that the complete answer? One couldonce count on Chicago’s active gay community to raise an outcry oversuch matters, but they have gone quiet in recent years. I’m mystifiedas to why — perhaps the reduced lethality of the AIDS crisis haslowered the flame under gay social activism. Perhaps gays have growncomfortable and secure — a tad prematurely, perhaps, given crimes such as theone against King. Perhaps their voices are lost in the swelling informational cacophony. Religious groups are another matter. They’re always going on howthey love the sinner while loathing the sin. That said, and given how religion is responsible for much of the vacant faux moralblather that underlies hatred of gays, you’d think they’d step up after casessuch as King’s with the bold pronouncement that, vile as the sin of homosexuality is, you shouldn’t murder gays, at least not whilethey are still children. We seem to expect the entire Muslim community torise as one and publicly denounce every act committed in their faith’sname anywhere in the world. Why shouldn’t our home-grown faiths take responsibility for the fruit of their efforts? Typically, condemnation for a crime falls upon the criminal. Butwhen that criminal is a child, it is easier to see the hand ofsociety at work. Lawrence King died for your sins. 3. Bob Zuley, on February 28th, 2008 at 3:40 pm Said: . . . from the Illinois House of Representatives FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE FOR MORE INFORMATION: February 27, 2008 State Rep. Greg Harris (773) 348-3434 Greg@GregHarris.org Rep. Harris’ Statement in Response to the Murder of Lawrence King 15 year-old victim attacked due to his sexual orientation CHICAGO – I am gravely concerned about senseless acts of violence occurring across our nation. On February 12th of this year, 15 year old Lawrence King of Oxnard California was murdered by a classmate while in his school’s computer lab. Lawrence King was not a victim of the kind of random violence that has become prevalent in our nation’s schools, most recently at Northern Illinois University in my home state of Illinois; rather he was targeted because he was openly gay. He was not harming anyone, he was not threatening anyone; he was killed because he had the courage to be himself. I am outraged by this act of classroom violence and wish to make clear that intending harm against people based on their sexual orientation is, without exception, completely and totally unacceptable, as are attacks based on religion, race, ethnicity, gender or any personal characteristic. Members of the gay, lesbian, bi-sexual, transsexual and questioning community deserve to live their lives proudly without fear of being victimized by these despicable acts of targeted violence. I urge my colleagues across the nation to join me in condemning this act of disturbing brutality

25 February 2008: One Click NICE Judicial Review Campaign Update 4. One Click Group Director Jane Bryant writes: Dear All I write to you today on a subject very dear to the hearts of hundreds of thousands of people around the world - the One Click Judicial Review of the appalling CFS/ME Guidelines produced by the National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (NICE) in the United Kingdom. So often I have wanted to write to you on this subject. To explain the weaving, the ducking and diving, the secretive duplicity and the sheer political malfeasance carried out by some over this court case. Each time I have stayed my hand. Stayed my hand in the hope that the sheer grinding hard work going on behind the scenes of this case would improve our position. It is my happy duty to announce to you today that thanks to the formidable representation carried out by our excellent lawyers Saunders Solicitors LLP and the work of One Click conjoined to help ME/CFS labelled patients, we have very good news to impart.One Click NICE Judicial Review Background One Click is taking on new global readers every day of the week and so I feel that it is beholden upon me to provide a short backgrounder for everyone in relation to this momentous High Court case. For many years, the One Click health advocacy pressure group has been a Registered Stakeholder on the development of the CFS/ME NICE Guidelines since their inception. One Click submitted our material to NICE contributed by patients, doctors, academics, health advocates, carers, families and friends from around the world. No matter how many obstacles were put in our way by NICE, we overcame them to submit our formal evidence. See The One Click Group Response - CFS/ME NICE Guidelines, submitted to NICE on 16 November 2006 and updated by us on 6 October 2007. Upon publication of these Guidelines in August 2007, it became abundantly clear that our formal representations to NICE by due process, along with many other Stakeholders besides, had made absolutely no difference. That the entire production and publication of these Guidelines had been unlawfully hijacked by the psychiatric lobby that has been permitted by government to control all research and treatment on ME/CFS in the United Kingdom for many years. In October 2007, One Click therefore formally and publicly announced our intention to take NICE to the High Court for Judicial Review of these Guidelines. Our announcement was sent to the NICE Chairman Michael Rawlins, Chief Executive Andrew Dillon and various NICE personnel. We subsequently approached the Legal Services Commission (Legal Aid) for their assistance in funding this momentous case. The Legal Services Commission complied. It provided us with initial funding to work with our formidable barrister, Kate Marcus from Doughty Street Chambers and to lodge our Application with the High Court. See 21 November 2007 Press Release, Health Advocacy Pressure Group Launches NICE High Court Action Today. Fundraising In December 2007, the Legal Services Commission asked us to raise £10,250 as our financial contribution for this case against NICE to be brought in the name of your young Ben, The One Click Group Technical Director. With great difficulty and with excruciating hard work, we raised the pain-soaked thousands of pounds demanded by them. From around the world we collected your financial pledges to fight this case, sent direct to Saunders Solicitors LLP. From a little boy donating his pocket money from the United States to an entire church congregation in the UK, the funds arrived from patients, their carers, families, friends, doctors, academics, researchers and selected charities from around the world. £5 here, £10 there and a bit more from those who could afford it. From Switzerland, Australia, the United States, Germany, France, New Zealand, South Africa, South America, Canada and the United Kingdom to name but a few, in came your contributions to challenge NICE in the High Court frequently accompanied by your words. The words of pain, medical neglect, malfeasance and of the psychiatric lobby manipulation of this neurological illness - your heartbreaking stories flooded in to One Click and its lawyers. Your response to us was so great. We immediately recognised that we are making legal history with this case. Never has anything like this been done anywhere else in the world before. The very idea of the Legal Services Commission forcing us to raise so much money to challenge deeply flawed government policy made me feel utterly sick because it fundamentally and completely conflicts with access to justice and the very concept of political democracy. Nonetheless we complied. Saunders informed the Legal Services Commission that we had reached their £10,250 target and on 20 January One Click published Very Simply We Did It to announce this momentous news. Breaking News Nothing is ever simple and straightforward with a case like this. To our considerable dismay – nay outrage - the Legal Services Commission response to our £10,250 contribution was to elect to deny us the funding that we required to place our expert witness testimony before the High Court. Lest we forget dear friends, the Legal Services Commission is a government-funded quango with a Legal Aid budget of £2 billion. See The Times, Public Let Down By Legal Services Commission. At that juncture it seemed to us that above all, the British government wished to place obstacles in the way of the pro bono expert witness testimony of Dr Bruce Carruthers - one of the foremost leading experts in the world on ME/CFS and whose international medical consensus Guidelines make those of NICE look like fatal amateur night – surfacing in the High Court. Dr Bruce Carruthers is the lead author and co-editor of the Myalgic Encephalomyelitis/Chronic Fatigue Syndrome: Clinical Working Case Definition, Diagnostic and Treatment Protocols (The ME/CFS Canadian Guidelines). Funded by government, the ME/CFS Canadian Guidelines incorporate most all scientific research done on ME/CFS for the last ten to fifteen years. Produced by a process of international consensus by a panel of scientists and expert physicians who have between them diagnosed/treated over 25,000 patients around the world, the ME/CFS Canadian Guidelines are the most advanced, consensual, clinical diagnostic criteria on this illness available in the world today. As such, they have long symbolised the wooden stake in the psychiatric lobby vampire heart ever since their publication in 2003. Previously a Research Scholar on the Medical Research Council of Canada amongst his many other senior posts, Dr Carruthers is without doubt one of the greatest ME/CFS experts alive in the world today in regard to criteria and guidelines over this neurological illness, classified as such by the World Health Organisation under ICD.10 G93.3. It was this man's expert witness testimony that the Legal Services Commission was refusing to allow us to place before the Judge together with other expert testimony on the issue of Randomised Clinical Trials - the very base upon which these entirely flawed Guidelines have been predicated. Had this Legal Services Commission funding refusal been allowed to stand, it would have represented the most crashing injustice and would have naturally caused worldwide outrage. We are now pleased to report that on the 20 February 2008, the Legal Services Commission were obliged to reconsider their position after the excellent work carried out by Saunders Solicitors LLP and The One Click Group conjoined in dedicated advocacy for patients. We would like to thank the Legal Services Commission for this latest decision and take this opportunity to gently remind them of their mission statement that announces:"Our work is fundamental to social and legal justice. In a democratic society all citizens have a right to access justice and get a fair trial." It is to this government-funded quango’s credit that they finally elected to see the legal light. I could go on at considerable length regarding the machinations of a High Court trial such as this that the British government simply does not want to happen, but it would serve no practical and useful purpose to blow the lid off the proceedings at this stage. What presently matters is that we have at last been granted the funding for our expert witnesses and our case is now full-steaming ahead. Sir Winston Churchill, British politician 1874 -1965, knew what he was talking about when he said, "The chain of destiny can only be grasped one link at a time." We have grasped our latest link most firmly and are now on to the next, employing the professional vice-like tenacity grip on your behalf for which One Click has become so famous. I would like to personally thank the expert witnesses who are providing pro bono medical testimony for our case in the High Court. I would like to particularly thank Saunders Solicitors LLP for their superb handling of legal events and also to thank our barrister Kate Marcus from Doughty Street Chambers who is now in a position to work up our expert evidence. But above all I would like to thank YOU. All of you from around the world who are making this case possible. I quote from the document Very Simply We Did It: “What this campaign has so starkly illustrated is that it is entirely possible for patients and their extensive friends around the world to band together and fight back to correct injustice. The days of the Expert Patient and their associates making their voices formally and legally felt have now arrived at last thanks to you all." Between us all from around the world, we have created a legal fighting force that will not be denied. I will be writing to you all further anon as our legal challenge of the appalling CFS/ME NICE Guidelines in the High Court progresses. Some of the information that I will doubtless have to impart to you all in the future may well rock you to your foundations. Onwards and upwards dear friends. Our legal course is set fair.

The Federal Government has promised practical measures will follow the symbolism of today's apology to the Stolen Generations. Prime Minister Kevin Rudd this morning delivered an emotional address to Australia's Stolen Generations in federal Parliament, in which he spoke of the "profound grief, suffering and loss" experienced by Australia's Indigenous people. Mr Rudd used the word "sorry" on three separate occasions in his formal apology and Opposition leader Brendan Nelson echoed his sentiments. The Prime Minister also called on the Opposition to join in a "war cabinet" to deal with Aboriginal housing issues and matters of constitutional change and spoke of moving into the future with "arms extended" rather than with "fists still clenched". Improving Indigenous housing will be the first priority of a new bipartisan commission to be chaired by Mr Rudd and Mr Nelson. "The object here is actually to take this one area of the public policy debate of Australia and just see what we can do to transcend the partisan divide," Mr Rudd said. "What I'd like to do before the end of this week is to sit down with the leader of the Opposition to work out how such a commission might work involving himself and myself as its joint chairs. "The nation is calling on us the politicians, to move beyond our infantile bickering, our point scoring and mindlessly partisan politics, and elevate this one, at least this one core area of national responsibility to a rare position beyond the partisan divide," he said. The founding chairman of the Council for Aboriginal Reconciliation Pat Dodson says the apology will allow Australia to re-commit to improving the lives of Indigenous people. Mr Dodson thanked those who genuinely tried to help the Indigenous people during the removal process and says today's apology will help Australians understand a complex issue. "To those who participated in the removal process and who have looked into their own hearts and found that their intentions were good, I thank you for the care and the love that you showed to those in need." "But to those whose intent was malign and motivations racist, your actions have now been exposed an repudiated."

Australia's government on Thursday released graphic pictures of Japanese hunters harpooning whales and dragging their bleeding carcasses onto a ship near Antarctica, calling it evidence of the "indiscriminate" slaughter of the animals. Japan denied one of the photographs showed a mother and its calf being killed, and accused Australian officials and media of spreading propaganda that could damage ties between the two nations. The images were the latest salvo in the new Australian government's stepped-up campaign against Japan's annual whale hunt, which resumed recently after being interrupted by environmental activists who chased the fleet through icy waters at the far south of the world. The pictures were taken from the Oceanic Viking, an Australian customs service ship sent to monitor the hunt and collect evidence for a legal challenge the government wants to bring against Japan's claim that it kills whales only for scientific purposes. "It is explicitly clear from these images that this is the indiscriminate killing of whales, where you have a whale and its calf killed in this way," Australian Environment Minister Peter Garrett told reporters. "To claim that this is in any way scientific is to continue the charade that has surrounded this issue from day one," he said. The images include video footage of a harpoon being fired into a swimming whale, which writhes as it is hauled toward the ship. The whale eventually stops moving and lies still in bloodstained waters, the harpoon clearly visible piercing its body. One picture shows two whales - one far smaller than the other - being dragged by ropes or cables up a ramp in the stern of a ship as blood dribbles down. Hideki Moronuki, chief of the Japanese Fishing Agency's whaling section, denied the photograph depicted a baby whale. "The fleet is engaged in random sampling, which means they are taking both large and small whales. This is not a parent and calf," Moronuki said in Tokyo. He also accused Australian officials of getting dangerously close to Japan's whaling ships to take the pictures. The Institute of Cetacean Research, the Japanese government-affiliated organization that oversees the hunt, posted a statement on its Web site headlined: "Australian Customs Photos Mislead the Public." "The Government of Australia photographs and the media reports have created a dangerous emotional propaganda that could cause serious damage to the relationship between our two countries," institute director Minoru Morimoto said in the statement. Japan has staunchly defended its annual killing of more than 1,000 whales, conducted under a clause in International Whaling Commission rules that allows whales to be hunted for scientific purposes. Critics call the Japanese program a disguise for commercial whaling, which has been banned by the commission since 1986. Japan had planned to kill up to 50 endangered humpback whales this season, but backed away after strong international condemnation. It has a quota to kill 935 minke whales and 50 fin whales. The whalers resumed their hunt in recent days after earlier being interrupted by ships sent by the Greenpeace environmentalist group and the militant activist group Sea Shepherd. Two Sea Shepherd activists using a small boat got on board one of the harpoon ships in January and spent several days in detention before they were picked up by Australian customs officers. Greenpeace says it chased the fleet's whale processing ship out of the hunting grounds. Both the Sea Shepherd and Greenpeace vessels later left Antarctic waters after running low on fuel and supplies. Prime Minister Kevin Rudd's left-of-center Labor Party government replaced a conservative administration in November elections and has sought to burnish its environmental credentials on a number of fronts, such as quickly signing the Kyoto Protocol on global warming. In late December, the government announced it was sending a ship and plane to collect evidence for a case against Japan's whaling program before the International Court of Justice, the International Whaling Commission or the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea. Home Affairs Minister Bob Debus said the images released Thursday could be proof the Japanese program is a sham. "We have got evidence of whaling being carried out in circumstances that we believe it should not be done," he told reporters. Animal welfare groups expressed horror at the images. "Japan's whaling is not just cruel, it's criminal," said Darren Kindleysides of the International Fund for Animal Welfare. "The evidence is clear. It is time for Australia to take legal action to end this illegal, unnecessary and inhumane activity once and for all."

The most visible and powerful voice for LGBT equality in the Christian community will address thousands of activists on Feb. 9 during the National Creating Change Conference in Detroit. In 2003 Rev. Gene Robinson's consecration as the U.S. Episcopal Church's first openly gay bishop sent shockwaves across the globe that threatened to divide the Anglican Church. Despite death threats, relentless media attention and political fallout, Robinson has become a beacon of hope and reason for those focused on working for change within faith based communities. "Because religion has treated LGBT people so horribly it is the last place we will look for support," said Robinson during an interview with BTLlast week. "There is no civil rights issue so closely tied to religious issues as homosexuality." His plenary address at Creating Change will outline the connections between the fight for LGBT rights and religion. "We cannot ignore the religious piece of the argument, since it is the greatest stumbling block to us making progress. I think it will take religious voices to counter the religious right." Coming out as people of faith The very nature of the "religious right" and the pervasive use of the Bible to justify denial of LGBT rights, said Robinson, has made tackling faith based roadblocks the last priority for many activists, leading many into a spiritual closet. "LGBT people need to come out as being religious. I think it sometimes easier to come out as gay than it is to come out as religious." During a recent visit at the D.C. offices of the Human Rights Campaign, he asked a group of 100 staffers to raise their hands if they were active in a church. "About two-thirds of them raised their hands," recalled Robinson. "But only 3 people said they had told other people in the building that they were religious." To create change, Robinson believes that LGBT people of faith need to view themselves as missionaries - building bridges between churches and the greater lesbian and gay community. Reclaiming Religion "Religion is not monolithically our enemy." But, homophobia justified by Biblical interpretation leads many LGBT people to stereotype all churches as the right arm in the religious right. Robinson points to his consecration as proof that change is possible in faith based communities. "In the Episcopal church, with me being elected, there have been lawsuits and people leaving the church. This is the church risking its life for gay and lesbian people. The church has put itself on the line to protect us." Calling the notion of "church or a belief in God" far from a stagnate thing, Robinson encourages LGBT people to seek out communities of faith that accept them for who they are. "The church that you left when they were feeling so discriminated against may not be the church that it is there now. There is a church or synagogue that can, with an open heart, help you put back together your spirituality." Article continues.............

THIS month Australia will remember terrible events long ago for which no adequate apology has ever been made. They will recall territorial aggression, racial intolerance, brutal murder, enslavement, starvation, degradation and the forcible removal of women and children. After all these years, an unambiguous apology would make no practical difference to the lives of the survivors of those bitter times or to their families, but would restore their faith in justice and enrich their self-esteem. And those Australians whose lives were shattered by these events would be deeply hurt by claims that an apology was meaningless. The apology would have to come from a government elected by generations that had no involvement in those terrible events but it would be an act of national cleansing that would enhance their reputation in the eyes of the world. I refer, of course, to the suffering of Australian service personnel and civilian detainees after Singapore fell to the Japanese 66 years ago this month. Though a process of osmosis, the victims of Japan's wartime savagery have received slippery words of regret over generalities and some monetary compensation from their own government, but have never heard the simple word "sorry" uttered directly to them. But in the weeks leading up to that sad anniversary, most Australians will be more occupied with a government apology to our own Stolen Generation. And, just as Japan's occasional foray down the road to apology has been demeaned by national denial, wounded pride, legalistic quibbling and tawdry domestic politics, so too is this simple act of decency in Australia. However, of all the reasons I have heard for not offering an apology to the Stolen Generation, the feeblest must have been that from Opposition Leader Brendan Nelson. The Government, he said, should focus on the "real issues" facing indigenous people, such as low life expectancy and unacceptable levels of sexual abuse. He was perplexed that the apology seemed to be the Government's top priority, even though many people were struggling with the rising price of petrol and groceries, and interest-rate pressures. "You really have got to ask yourself: is this the highest priority for the Australian Parliament?" What you really do have to ask yourself is whether 150 members of Parliament, 76 senators, more than 500 government staffers, an incalculable number of public servants and all the party apparatchiki are truly incapable of formulating and making a simple symbolic apology to indigenous Australians without the core business of government grinding to a halt. If the answer is "yes", we must conclude that this giant publicly funded pit of politicians, public servants, minders, advisers and backslappers is collectively incapable of walking and chewing gum at the same time. And, if the answer is "yes", we are entitled to ask just when would be an appropriate time to apologise to Aboriginal people. Would Nelson like to nominate a more propitious time? If his answer were to be "never", it would be rather more honest than questioning the timing rather than the political difficulty of taking a simple moral stance. In truth, the highest priority for Nelson is ducking an issue that has divided the Liberal Party morally and politically. Such declarations of priorities and the drawing of lines between "real issues" and presumably spurious issues are standard cop-outs for politicians who haven't the moral courage to make a stand, the strength to formulate a binding party policy or the will to gamble on the fundamental decency of the electorate. Priorities were cited in former prime minister Bob Hawke's initial refusal to entertain Aboriginal land rights and in stifling the movement towards establishing a republic. Priorities were again smelly red herrings during John Howard's cynical referendum on the republic. In the Queensland Parliament, the National Party cited misplaced priorities when it opposed property rights for homosexual couples. In all three cases, it was nothing more than raw politics and regressive social views wrapped in a threadbare cloak of practicality. It is nothing short of amazing how politicians manage their time. Wave a pay rise under their noses and they'll rake up a quorum at a minute to midnight; give them a decade or so to think about an apology and they still need more time. They display a selective sense of urgency and purpose that even I couldn't have matched when confronted with a Sunday afternoon lawnmowing task. The simple fact is that, despite claims to the contrary, an apology was part of the Labor Party's election platform. Is there any greater priority than delivering on a promise to the people? Let's get on with it and let's put it behind us. If we don't, 66 years from now we still be wrestling with semantics and bogged down in pointless argument.

A Catholic conversation for: • Parents of gay and lesbian children: parents still in the closet, alone with their secret; parents out of the closet, struggling with their questions, their fears, their faith. • Parents of young children: moms and dads seeking information and insight for their own parenting role as teacher and counselor. • Family members who may be struggling to deal with the hurtful stereotypes that exist within both society and their Church. • Gay and lesbian people who may be searching for some sign of understanding from their Church. • Anyone who is curious about homosexuality and wanting to learn more. The series, originally created as an adult education program and carried for 14 weeks on the website of a Midwest Catholic parish, is intended for anyone interested in learning more about homosexuality and the pastoral challenges it raises for Catholics. Click to read how and why Jerry Furlong, parent of a gay child, came to develop the series. A new segment in the series will be posted on seven consecutive Mondays following the January 7th introduction. After the complete series has been posted, it will be archived for future access.

Pakistan's former prime minister and opposition leader Benazir Bhutto waves during an election rally in Rawalpindi December 27, 2007, shortly before she was killed in a gun and bomb attack. (Reuters: Mian Khursheed)

Thich Nhat Hahn, Nobel Peace prizewinner, famous for his activism during the Vietnam war, speaks about the monks of Burma and the Buddhist attitude to engagement

Danny Rubinstein, Arab affairs editor of Haaretz newspaper and a member of its editorial board, has landed himself in hot water with the British Zionist community. He had the temerity to say something outside Israel that can be read in his own newspaper and others quite regularly. At a UN conference on Palestinian human rights he called Israel an "apartheid state":

The Committee for Open Discussion of Zionism arises in response to the troubling practice in the United States of suppressing alternative views on Israel/Palestine and Zionism, which is growing more desperate and severe. A major instance of this is the recent effort to force the University of Michigan Press to suppress the distribution of Overcoming Zionism: Creating a Single Democratic State in Israel/Palestine by Professor Joel Kovel and pressuring it to cancel its contract to distribute Pluto Press in the U.S.

So Who’s Afraid of the Israel Lobby?By Ray McGovern 10/06/07 "ICH" -- -- Virtually everyone: Republican, Democrat—Conservative, Liberal. The fear factor is non-partisan, you might say, and palpable. The American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) brags that it is the most influential foreign policy lobbying organization on Capitol Hill, and has demonstrated that time and again—and not only on Capitol Hill. Seldom has the Lobby’s power been as clearly demonstrated as in its ability to suppress the awful truth that on June 8, 1967, during the Six Day War: o Israel deliberately attacked the intelligence collection ship USS Liberty, in full awareness it was a U.S. Navy ship, and did its best to sink it and leave no survivors; o The Israelis would have succeeded had they not broken off the attack upon learning, from an intercepted message, that the commander of the U.S. 6th Fleet had launched carrier fighters to the scene; and o By that time 34 of the Liberty’s crew had been killed and over 170 wounded. Scores of intelligence analysts and senior officials have known this for years. That virtually all of them have kept a forty-year frightened silence is testament to the widespread fear of touching this live wire. Even more telling is the fact that the National Security Agency apparently has destroyed voice tapes and transcripts heard and seen by many intelligence analysts, material that shows beyond doubt that the Israelis knew exactly what they were doing.The Ugly Truth But the truth will out—eventually. All it took in this case was for a courageous journalist (of the endangered species kind) to listen to the surviving crew and do a little basic research, not shrinking from naming war crimes and not letting senior U.S. officials, from the president on down, off the hook for suppressing—even destroying—damning evidence from intercepted Israeli communications. The mainstream media have now published an exposé based largely on interviews with those most intimately involved. A lengthy article by Pulitzer Prize winning investigative reporter John Crewdson appeared in the Chicago Tribune and Baltimore Sun on Oct. 2 titled “New revelations in attack on American spy ship.” (http://www.baltimoresun.com/news/world/chi-liberty_tuesoct02,0,6015776.story) To the subtitle goes the prize for understatement of the year: “Veterans, documents suggest U.S., Israel didn’t tell full story of deadly 1967 incident.” Better 40 years late than never, I suppose. Many of us have known of the incident and cover-up for a very long time and have tried to expose and discuss it for the lessons it holds for today. It has proved far easier, though, to get a very pedestrian Dog-Bites-Man article published than an article with the importance and explosiveness of this sensitive story.A Marine Stands Up On the evening of Sept. 26, 2006, I gave a talk on Iraq to an overflow crowd of 400 at National Avenue Church in Springfield, Missouri. A questioner asked what I thought of the study by John Mearsheimer of the University of Chicago and Stephen Walt of Harvard titled “The Israel Lobby and U.S. Foreign Policy.” The study had originally been commissioned by The Atlantic Monthly. When the draft arrived, however, shouts of “Leper!” were heard at the Atlantic. The monthly wasted no time in saying thanks-but-no-thanks, and the leper-study then wandered in search of a home, finding none among American publishers. Eventually the London Review of Books published it in March 2006. I had read that piece carefully and found it an unusual act of courage as well as scholarship. That’s what I told the questioner, adding that I did have two problems with the study: o First, it seemed to me the authors erred in attributing virtually all the motivation for the U.S. attack on Iraq to the Israel Lobby and the so-called “neo-conservatives” running our policy and armed forces. Was Israel an important factor? Indeed. But of equal importance, in my view, was the oil factor and what the Pentagon now calls the “enduring” military bases in Iraq, which the White House and Pentagon decided were needed for the U.S. to dominate that part of the Middle East. o Second, I was intrigued by the fact that Mearsheimer and Walt made no mention of what I believe to be, if not the most telling, then perhaps the most sensational proof of the power the Lobby knows it can exert over our government and Congress. In sum, in June 1967, after deliberately using fighter-bombers and torpedo boats to attack the USS Liberty for over two hours in an attempt to sink it and kill its entire crew, and then getting the U.S. government, the Navy, and the Congress to cover up what happened, the Israeli government learned that it could—literally—get away with murder. I found myself looking out at 400 blank stares. The USS Liberty? And so I asked how many in the audience had heard of the attack on the Liberty on June 8, 1967. Three hands went up; I called on the gentleman nearest me.Ramrod straight he stood: “Sir, Sergeant Bryce Lockwood, United States Marine Corps, retired. I am a member of the USS Liberty crew, Sir.” Catching my breath, I asked him if he would be willing to tell us what happened. “Sir, I have not been able to do that. It is hard. But it has been almost 40 years, and I would like to try this evening, Sir.” You could hear a pin drop for the next 15 minutes, as Lockwood gave us his personal account of what happened to him, his colleagues, and his ship on the afternoon of June 8, 1967. He was a linguist assigned to collect communications intelligence from the USS Liberty, which was among the ugliest—and most easily identifiable—ships in the fleet with antennae springing out in all directions. Lockwood told of the events of that fateful day, beginning with the six-hour naval and air surveillance of the Liberty by the Israeli navy and air force on the morning of June 8. After the air attacks including thousand-pound bombs and napalm, three sixty-ton torpedo boats lined up like a firing squad, pointing their torpedo tubes at the Liberty’s starboard hull. Lockwood had been ordered to throw the extremely sensitive cryptological equipment overboard and had just walked beyond the bulwark separating the NSA intelligence unit from the rest of the ship when, he recalled, he sensed a large black object, a tremendous explosion, and sheet of flame. The torpedo had struck dead center in the NSA space. The cold, oily water brought Lockwood back to consciousness. Around him were 25 dead colleagues; but he heard moaning. Three were still alive; one of Lockwood’s shipmates dragged one survivor up the hatch. Lockwood was able to lift the two others, one-by-one, onto his shoulder and carry them up through the hatch. This meant alternatively banging on the hatch for someone to open it and swimming back to fish his shipmate out of the water lest he float out to sea through the 39-foot hole made by the torpedo. At that Lockwood stopped speaking. It was enough. Hard, very hard—even after almost 40 years.What Else We Know John Crewdson’s meticulously documented article, together with the 57 pages that James Bamford devotes to the incident in his book “Body of Secrets” and recent confessions by those who played a role in the cover-up, paint a picture that the surviving crew of the USS Liberty can only find infuriating. The evidence, from intercepted communications as well as testimony, of Israeli deliberate intent is unimpeachable, even though the Israelis continue to portray the incident as merely a terrible mistake. Crewdson refers to U.S. Navy Captain Ward Boston, who was the Navy lawyer appointed as senior counsel to Admiral Isaac C. Kidd, named by Admiral John S. McCain (Sen. John McCain’s father) to “inquire into all the facts and circumstances.” The fact that they were given only one week to gather evidence and were forbidden to contact the Israelis screams out “cover-up.” Captain Boston, now 84, signed a formal declaration on Jan. 8, 2004 in which he described himself as “outraged at the efforts of the apologists for Israel in this country to claim that this attack was a case of ‘mistaken identity.’” Boston continued: “The evidence was clear. Both Admiral Kidd and I believed with certainty that this attack...was a deliberate effort to sink an American ship and murder its entire crew...Not only did the Israelis attack the ship with napalm, gunfire, and missiles, Israeli torpedo boats machine-gunned three lifeboats that had been launched in an attempt by the crew to save the most seriously wounded—a war crime...I know from personal conversations I had with Admiral Kidd that President Lyndon Johnson and Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara ordered him to conclude that the attack was a case of ‘mistaken identity’ despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary.” Why the Israelis decided to take the draconian measure of sinking a ship of the U.S. Navy is open to speculation. One view is that the Israelis did not want the U.S. to find out they were massing troops to seize the Golan Heights from Syria, and wanted to deprive the U.S. of the opportunity to argue against such a move. Another theory: James Bamford, in “Body of Secrets,” adduces evidence, including reporting from an Israeli journalist eyewitness and an Israeli military historian, of wholesale killing of Egyptian prisoners of war at the coastal town of El Arish in the Sinai. The Liberty was patrolling directly opposite El Arish in international waters but within easy range to pick up intelligence on what was going on there. And the Israelis were well aware. As for the why, well, someone could at least approach the Israelis involved and ask, no? The important thing here is not to confuse what is known (the deliberate nature of the Israeli attack) with the purpose behind it, which remains a matter of speculation.Other Indignities Bowing to intense pressure from the Navy, the White House agreed to award the Liberty’s skipper, Captain William McGonagle, the Medal of Honor....but not at the White House, and not by the president (as is the custom). Rather, the Secretary of the Navy gave the award at the Washington Navy Yard on the banks of the acrid Anacostia River. A naval officer involved in the awards ceremony told one of the Liberty crew, “The government is pretty jumpy about Israel...the State Department even asked the Israeli ambassador if his government had any objections to McGonagle getting the medal.” Adding insult to injury, those of the Liberty crew who survived well enough to call for an independent investigation have been hit with charges of, you guessed it, anti-Semitism. Now that some of the truth is emerging more and more, others are showing more courage in speaking out. In a recent email, an associate of mine who has followed Middle East affairs for almost 60 years, shared the following: “The chief of the intelligence analysts studying the Arab/Israeli region at the time told me about the intercepted messages and said very flatly and firmly that the pilots reported seeing the American flag and repeated their requests for confirmation of the attack order. Whole platoons of Americans saw those intercepts. If NSA now says they do not exist, then someone ordered them destroyed.” Leaving the destruction of evidence without investigation is an open invitation to repetition in the future. As for the larger picture, visiting Israel this past summer I was constantly told that Egypt forced Israel into war in June 1967. This does not square with the unguarded words of Menachem Begin in 1982, when he was Israel’s prime minister. Rather he admitted publicly: “In June 1967, we had a choice. The Egyptian army concentrations in the Sinai approaches do not prove that [Egyptian President] Nasser was really about to attack us. We must be honest with ourselves. We decided to attack him.” Israel had, in fact, prepared well militarily and mounted provocations against its neighbors, in order to provoke a response that could be used to justify an expansion of its b