Israelis are Playing Dirty, UN headquarters in Gaza Hit by ‘White Phosphorus’ Shells

The Israelis are fighting dirty. According to the UK Times Online, the main UN compound in Gaza was in flames today after being struck by Israeli artillery fire, and a spokesman said that the building had been hit by shells containing the incendiary agent white phosphorus.

The attack on the headquarters of the UN Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) came as Ban Ki Moon, the UN Secretary-General, arrived in Israel on a peace mission and plunged Israel’s relations with the world body to a new low.

Mr Ban told reporters in Tel Aviv that he had expressed “strong protest and outrage” to the Israeli Government over the shelling of the compound and was demanding an investigation. He said that Ehud Barak, the Israeli Defense Minister, had told him that it was “a grave mistake.”

I had no clue what white phosphorous shells were, so I did some research and was a little perturbed by what I read, including the fact that the U.S. used it in the Iraqi war.

White phosphorus (WP) is a flare- and smoke-producing incendiary device or smoke-screening agent that is made from a common allotrope of the chemical element phosphorus. White phosphorus bombs and shells are incendiary weapons, but can also be used as offensive anti-personnel flame compounds capable of causing serious burns or death. The agent is used in bombs, artillery and mortars, short-range missiles which burst into burning flakes of phosphorus upon impact.

White phosphorus is commonly referred to in military jargon as “WP.” The slang term “Willy(ie) Pete” or “Willy(ie) Peter”, dating from World War I and common at least through the Vietnam War, is still occasionally heard. White phosphorus weapons are controversial today because of their potential use against civilians. It is not considered a chemical weapon, but in recent years the United States, Israel and Russia have used white phosphorus in combat. Source: Wikipedia

Of course they have denied this, but they ought to learn from the mistakes of the United States and Russia, or even when they met such strong resistance from Hezbollah in the skirmish with Lebanon. The Israelis have made a grave mistake and there should be strong international condemnation of their actions.

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Filed under: Gaza Strip, Hezbollah, Incendiary Device, Israelis, Russia, UN Compound, United States, Weapons, White Phosphorous Shells

Russian Professor Igor Panarin Predicts End of U.S. in 2010

I was slightly amused to hear that the Russians are predicting the demise of the United States once again. For a decade, Russian professor Igor Panarin has been predicting that the United States will fall apart in 2010. Needless to say, since we are now in 2009, that argument is now getting more attention, from the Russia state media. You know, the propaganda machine. According to the Wall Street Journal, Panarin has been interviewed as much as twice a day about his predictions. Funny, aren’t the Russians facing serious economic problems too? Of course, why should they allow the world to focus on their problems? This new diversion is music to the ears of the Kremlin, which has had an icy relationship with Washington D.C., blaming the U.S. for everything from instability in the Middle East to the global financial crisis. Mr. Panarin’s views fit ever so neatly with their narrative that Russia is somehow returning to its place as the leader on the world stage. Hah! That’s a laughable notion.

Prof. Panarin, 50 years old, is not a fringe figure. A former KGB analyst, he is dean of the Russian Foreign Ministry’s academy for future diplomats. He is invited to Kremlin receptions, lectures students, publishes books, and appears in the media as an expert on U.S.-Russia relations. A polite and cheerful man with a buzz cut, Mr. Panarin insists he does not dislike Americans. But he warns that the outlook for them is dire.

“There’s a 55-45% chance right now that disintegration will occur,” he says. “One could rejoice in that process,” he adds, poker-faced. “But if we’re talking reasonably, it’s not the best scenario — for Russia.” Though Russia would become more powerful on the global stage, he says, its economy would suffer because it currently depends heavily on the dollar and on trade with the U.S.

Mr. Panarin posits, in brief, that mass immigration, economic decline, and moral degradation will trigger a civil war next fall and the collapse of the dollar. Around the end of June 2010, or early July, he says, the U.S. will break into six pieces — with Alaska reverting to Russian control.

In addition to increasing coverage in state media, which are tightly controlled by the Kremlin, Mr. Panarin’s ideas are now being widely discussed among local experts. He presented his theory at a recent roundtable discussion at the Foreign Ministry. The country’s top international relations school has hosted him as a keynote speaker. During an appearance on the state TV channel Rossiya, the station cut between his comments and TV footage of lines at soup kitchens and crowds of homeless people in the U.S. The professor has also been featured on the Kremlin’s English-language propaganda channel, Russia Today. Source: The Wall Street Journal

So just how is this going to affect the United States as we know it? In September 1998, he attended a conference in Linz, Austria, devoted to information warfare. It was there, in front of 400 fellow delegates, that he first presented his theory about the collapse of the U.S. in 2010.

He based the forecast on classified data supplied to him by FAPSI analysts, then the Russian equivalent of the U.S. National Security Agency, he says. He predicts that economic, financial and demographic trends will provoke a political and social crisis in the U.S. When the going gets tough, he says, wealthier states will withhold funds from the federal government and effectively secede from the union. Social unrest up to and including a civil war will follow. The U.S. will then split along ethnic lines, and foreign powers will move in.

California will form the nucleus of what he calls “The Californian Republic,” and will be part of China or under Chinese influence. Texas will be the heart of “The Texas Republic,” a cluster of states that will go to Mexico or fall under Mexican influence. Washington, D.C., and New York will be part of an “Atlantic America” that may join the European Union. Canada will grab a group of Northern states Prof. Panarin calls “The Central North American Republic.” Hawaii, he suggests, will be a protectorate of Japan or China, and Alaska will be subsumed into Russia. Source: The Wall Street Journal

Of course the White House declined to comment on this ridiculous prophecy. People predicted the collapse of the Soviet Union and the fall of the Berlin Wall, but I scarcely believe Prof. Panarin’s doomsday prophecy will be fulfilled. This is nothing but some balderdash.

Filed under: Atlantic Republic, California Republic, Central North American Republic, End of the U.S., Four Republics, Professor Igor Panarin, Russia, Texas Republic