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Lebanon commemorates assasinated Intelligence Bureau chief [video]

PressTV
December 2, 2012

A ceremony was held in Northern Lebanon’s city of Tripoli to commemorate the death of the assassinated Lebanese Intelligence Bureau chief General Wissam Al Hassan. Hassan died in a car bombing that rocked central Beirut in mid October.

Press TV’s Serena Shim reports from Tripoli.

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Give us Your Guns, Get a Flu Shot

https://i0.wp.com/www.r-sw.com/custimages/dd395-fire%20%28site%29.jpgP.A.N.D.A. People Against The NDAA
December 3, 2012

Sounds like a fair trade:

The city of Worcester, Massachusetts is asking citizens to bring their weapons to the police department next weekend as part of the city’s annual “Goods for Guns Buyback Program.”  In return for the guns, the city will offer gift certificates, and – a free flu shot.

Telegram.com reports:

“City residents, or residents of any other community, may bring their unwanted weapons, unloaded and wrapped in a bag, from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. Saturday to the Worcester Police headquarters in Lincoln Square, or from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. on Dec. 8 to the Worcester Division of Public Health, 25 Meade St.”

http://cnsnews.com/blog/gregory-gwyn-williams-jr/city-give-us-your-guns-get-free-flu-shot-and-wegmans-gift-card

Netherlands to abolish blasphemy law

AFP Photo / Stan Honda

AFP Photo / Stan Honda

Russia Today
November 30, 2012

Dutch parliament approves a motion to scrap law that made insulting God a crime. The move is welcomed by freedom of speech supporters and confirms anti-Islamists’ right to criticize religion.

The blasphemy law is no longer relevant in the 21st century, a majority of Dutch parties stated. This law has not been in use for more than half a century, Dutch MPs added.

Liberal parties’ predominance in the current Dutch parliament has made the repeal of the 1930s law possible, with the same motion blocked by Christian political party’s allies back in 2008.

The issue was brought to the attention of the parliament following the 2011 Geert Wilders case.

Wilders, a far-right anti-Islam MP, was acquitted after facing trial on charges of inciting hatred and discriminations against Muslims. The judge ruled Wilders’ comparisons of Islam to fascism “acceptable,” allowing further criticism despite it insulting Muslims.

The blasphemy law abolition was welcomed by freedom rights activists across the globe as a victory.However the decision was dubbed as a “painful loss of a moral anchor and a symptom of a spiritual crisis” by Dutch Christian SGP party, media reported.

It is still illegal to insult police officers or the country’s monarch under the Dutch law.

Many European countries still have blasphemy laws restricting freedom of expression, rights activists say. Others have replaced such laws with more general legislation criminalizing religious hatred.

The UK has annulled its blasphemy law, replacing it with the Racial and Religious Hatred Act in 2007. The new law implies a prison term of up to seven years and an unlimited fine for the intention of stirring up religious hatred.

Ireland stood out by introducing a new blasphemy law in 2010, instead of abolishing it. The recent Irish Defamation Act makes “publication or utterance of blasphemous matter” punishable by a fine of up to €25,000.

Although such laws have not been invoked for decades in most of Europe, there remain some countries where charges on grounds of religious hatred have often been exercised.

In Poland causing offense to religious feelings is considered a crime, even though there is no separate blasphemy law as such. Several cases of people charged with violating the Polish criminal code for religious offence have attracted media attention over the last decade.

In 2008 a Finnish court sentenced the far right activist Seppo Lehto, to two years and fourth months in jail for defamation, inciting ethnic hatred and religious blasphemy against Islam.

US Considers Directly Arming Syrian Rebels

https://i0.wp.com/www.globalresearch.ca/wp-content/uploads/2012/11/syria9.gifby Jason Ditz
Global Research
November 29, 2012

Antiwar.com 28 November 2012

In July, Syrian rebel lobbyists reported that the Obama Administration had told them they would not be able to intervene in a serious way until after the November election. The vote’s over and now the meddling can begin in earnest.

That’s the message from US officials tonight, who say the president is now considering several options for deeper intervention into the ever worsening civil war, including the possibility of directly arming certain rebel factions.

Up until now the US has just been playing the role of facilitator, with the CIA smuggling other nations’ arms into Syria for them throughvarious intermediaries. Officials say no decision has been made yet on whether or not to move directly into arms supplying.

If the decision is made, it will make the question of which factions to arm all the more difficult, as the US at present maintains at least a level of deniability in its current smuggling. With various groups vying to be the Western-friendly “umbrella,” and myriad secular and Islamist factions on the ground, it will be an uphill battle for the US to convince the world it isn’t arming terrorists.

Articles by: Jason Ditz

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