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| Afghan villagers sit near the bodies of children who they said were killed during an air strike in Kunar province April 7, 2013. (Reuters) |
A NATO airstrike has killed 11 children and one woman in the East of Afghanistan, report local officials. A house collapsed during the attack, causing the casualties and leaving six women injured.
The civilians were killed during a joint Afghan-NATO operation late on Saturday night in the Shigal district of Kunar province, which borders Pakistan.
"Eleven children and a woman were killed when an air strike hit their houses," provincial spokesman Wasifullah Wasifi said on Sunday.
"Eleven children and a woman were killed when an air strike hit their houses," provincial spokesman Wasifullah Wasifi said on Sunday.
A Reuters journalist saw the bodies of 11 children being carried by their families and other villagers. They were on their way to the office of Mohammad Zahir Safai, the Shigal district chief, to register their protest.
The body of the female victim was not seen, as women’s bodies are not displayed in accordance of custom. However, local residents told the journalist of her death.
Six militants – two of them senior Taliban leaders – and an American civilian adviser to the Afghan intelligence agency were also killed in the operation.
A spokesman for the NATO-led security mission in Afghanistan said they were aware of reports regarding civilian casualties and were assessing the incident, Reuters reports.
The spokesman, Captain Luca Carniel, said the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) had provided “air support” during the operation, but that no ISAF troops were on the ground.
The spokesman, Captain Luca Carniel, said the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) had provided “air support” during the operation, but that no ISAF troops were on the ground.
The airstrike had been called in by NATO forces, and not their Afghan allies, he continued.
Earlier on Saturday, five Americans, including three US soldiers, a young diplomat and a US Defense Department contractor were also killed when a car bomb targeted their convoy in the southern province of Zabul.
Provincial governor Mohammad Ashraf Nasery was in the convoy, but was not injured in the attack, local and NATO officials said.
“Our American officials and their Afghan colleagues were on their way to donate books to students in a school in Qalat, the province’s capital, when they were struck by this despicable attack,” US Secretary of State John Kerry said in a statement.
The foreign service officer, identified 25-year-old Anne Smedinghoff, was described by Kerry as"vivacious, smart" and "capable."
Four other US diplomats were wounded, one critically, Kerry continued.
Recently, Afghan security forces have been taking the lead in operations against Taliban insurgency in preparation for the final withdrawal of alliance forces in 2014.
US Special Forces were forced to withdraw from two Afghan provinces back in February by the government after a number of reports of “harassing, torturing and murdering innocent civilians.”
Afghanistan’s President Hamid Karzai slammed the US forces for fueling “insecurity and instability” in troubled provinces located close to Kabul.
Despite President Karzai’s often contentious relationship with ISAF forces over “collateral damage”, NATO will continue to launch airstrikes when it is tactically beneficial, political analyst Habib Hakimi told RT.
“President Karzai actually banned Afghan security forces (almost two months ago) from calling NATO forces for air support during operations against Taliban forces and other militant groups. But it seems NATO doesn’t care about President Karzai’s concerns…about civilian casualties, particularly in giant operations with Afghan security forces against the Taliban and other militant groups.”
RT
Hacking group Anonymous claims to have launched operation with intent of "erasing Israel from cyberspace".
During Israel’s Operation Pillar of Defense against Palestinians in Gaza last November, Anonymous hackers launched a mass attack on Israeli government websites. In response to the eight day assault that killed 133 Palestinians, Anonymous’ #OpIsrael defaced thousands of Israeli sites and provided information for Gazans facing Internet and communications blackouts. 60 million hacking attempts were reportedly made.
Last week, Israeli airstrikes once again hit targets in Gaza, officially breaking a ceasefire established last November (although cross-border clashes have informally breached the ceasefire in recent months, leaving four Palestinians dead). In retaliation, Anonymous relaunched #OpIsrael this weekend, and according to an Anonymous spokesperson offering a partial damage report, 60,000 websites, 40,000 Facebook pages, 5,000 twitter accounts and 30,000 Israeli bank accounts got hacked, causing an estimated $3-plus billion damage. “Not bad for 24 hours,” Anonymous noted.
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| Gen David Petraeus has previously said US online psychological operations are aimed at 'countering extremist ideology and propaganda'. Photograph: Cliff Owen/AP |
by Nick Fielding and Ian Cobain
Military's 'sock puppet' software creates fake online identities to spread pro-American propaganda
Jeff Jarvis: Washington shows the morals of a clumsy spammer
The US military is developing software that will let it secretly manipulate social media sites by using fake online personas to influence internet conversations and spread pro-American propaganda.
A Californian corporation has been awarded a contract with United States Central Command (Centcom), which oversees US armed operations in the Middle East and Central Asia, to develop what is described as an "online persona management service" that will allow one US serviceman or woman to control up to 10 separate identities based all over the world.
The project has been likened by web experts to China's attempts to control and restrict free speech on the internet. Critics are likely to complain that it will allow the US military to create a false consensus in online conversations, crowd out unwelcome opinions and smother commentaries or reports that do not correspond with its own objectives.
The discovery that the US military is developing false online personalities – known to users of social media as "sock puppets" – could also encourage other governments, private companies and non-government organisations to do the same.
The Centcom contract stipulates that each fake online persona must have a convincing background, history and supporting details, and that up to 50 US-based controllers should be able to operate false identities from their workstations "without fear of being discovered by sophisticated adversaries".
Centcom spokesman Commander Bill Speaks said: "The technology supports classified blogging activities on foreign-language websites to enable Centcom to counter violent extremist and enemy propaganda outside the US."
He said none of the interventions would be in English, as it would be unlawful to "address US audiences" with such technology, and any English-language use of social media by Centcom was always clearly attributed. The languages in which the interventions are conducted include Arabic, Farsi, Urdu and Pashto.
Centcom said it was not targeting any US-based web sites, in English or any other language, and specifically said it was not targeting Facebook or Twitter.
Once developed, the software could allow US service personnel, working around the clock in one location, to respond to emerging online conversations with any number of co-ordinated messages, blogposts, chatroom posts and other interventions. Details of the contract suggest this location would be MacDill air force base near Tampa, Florida, home of US Special Operations Command.
Centcom's contract requires for each controller the provision of one "virtual private server" located in the United States and others appearing to be outside the US to give the impression the fake personas are real people located in different parts of the world.
It also calls for "traffic mixing", blending the persona controllers' internet usage with the usage of people outside Centcom in a manner that must offer "excellent cover and powerful deniability".
The multiple persona contract is thought to have been awarded as part of a programme called Operation Earnest Voice (OEV), which was first developed in Iraq as a psychological warfare weapon against the online presence of al-Qaida supporters and others ranged against coalition forces. Since then, OEV is reported to have expanded into a $200m programme and is thought to have been used against jihadists across Pakistan, Afghanistan and the Middle East.
OEV is seen by senior US commanders as a vital counter-terrorism and counter-radicalisation programme. In evidence to the US Senate's armed services committee last year, General David Petraeus, then commander of Centcom, described the operation as an effort to "counter extremist ideology and propaganda and to ensure that credible voices in the region are heard". He said the US military's objective was to be "first with the truth".
This month Petraeus's successor, General James Mattis, told the same committee that OEV "supports all activities associated with degrading the enemy narrative, including web engagement and web-based product distribution capabilities".
Centcom confirmed that the $2.76m contract was awarded to Ntrepid, a newly formed corporation registered in Los Angeles. It would not disclose whether the multiple persona project is already in operation or discuss any related contracts.
Nobody was available for comment at Ntrepid.
In his evidence to the Senate committee, Gen Mattis said: "OEV seeks to disrupt recruitment and training of suicide bombers; deny safe havens for our adversaries; and counter extremist ideology and propaganda." He added that Centcom was working with "our coalition partners" to develop new techniques and tactics the US could use "to counter the adversary in the cyber domain".
According to a report by the inspector general of the US defence department in Iraq, OEV was managed by the multinational forces rather than Centcom.
Asked whether any UK military personnel had been involved in OEV, Britain's Ministry of Defence said it could find "no evidence". The MoD refused to say whether it had been involved in the development of persona management programmes, saying: "We don't comment on cyber capability."
OEV was discussed last year at a gathering of electronic warfare specialists in Washington DC, where a senior Centcom officer told delegates that its purpose was to "communicate critical messages and to counter the propaganda of our adversaries".
Persona management by the US military would face legal challenges if it were turned against citizens of the US, where a number of people engaged in sock puppetry have faced prosecution.
Last year a New York lawyer who impersonated a scholar was sentenced to jail after being convicted of "criminal impersonation" and identity theft.
It is unclear whether a persona management programme would contravene UK law. Legal experts say it could fall foul of the Forgery and Counterfeiting Act 1981, which states that "a person is guilty of forgery if he makes a false instrument, with the intention that he or another shall use it to induce somebody to accept it as genuine, and by reason of so accepting it to do or not to do some act to his own or any other person's prejudice". However, this would apply only if a website or social network could be shown to have suffered "prejudice" as a result.
• This article was amended on 18 March 2011 to remove references to Facebook and Twitter, introduced during the editing process, and to add a comment from Centcom, received after publication, that it is not targeting those sites.
Courtesy:
Originally published: http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2011/mar/17/us-spy-operation-social-networks
Last week, the hacker organization “Anonymous,” symbolized by the famous “Guy Fawkes” mask, hacked Israel’s Mossad.
By Gordon Duff
"After all, who is better to carry out acts of terrorism than an organization with 30,000 covert operatives around the world, almost all trained in use of explosives and demolition, building IEDs, car bombs, kidnapping and assassination and with a long and very public history of, not just murdering people but getting away with it as well.”
The hack, initially exposing a hidden network of 30,000 covert operatives, some openly labeled “hitman,” came only days after Israel admitted to their 2010 act of piracy and terrorism against the Freedom Flotilla.
Now the Israeli regime has filled the internet with threats against “Anonymous,” if detailed information on their terror cells is leaked.
After all, who is better to carry out acts of terrorism than an organization with 30,000 covert operatives around the world, almost all trained in use of explosives and demolition, building IEDs, car bombs, kidnapping and assassination and with a long and very public history of, not just murdering people but getting away with it as well.
Every day we see it in the news, dozens killed in Pakistan, dozens more in Iraq, Kenya, Nigeria, the covert army of 30,000, planning terror, building a dozen car bombs a day and then being able to, not just write the lies blaming others but, in most cases, direct public officials, controlled through blackmail, threats or bribery, to “respond as directed.”
Did I forget Syria?
The army, more correctly the “cells” exposed by Anonymous include:
1. Direct Action: Assassins, explosives experts (for the Mossad “signature” car bombs) and kidnap/rendition teams
2. Espionage: Made up of trained agent handlers and signals intelligence personnel, often specially trained while posing as doing their “national service,” this group runs the Pentagon and White House, makes up Congressional employees, most think tanks, AIPAC and the ADL/SPLC. Key espionage operatives are seldom Israeli. Many are Turkish, Saudi, Jordanian and even Cuban diplomats.
3. Controlled opposition: Most obvious are the White Supremacist/Neo-Nazi groups recently exposed as being funded through Merkel’s government in Germany at the direction of the Likudist Party in Israel. Nearly every individual or organization, with few exceptions, that describes itself as “holocaust denial,” “anti-Zionist” or “historical revisionist” is now funded and directed through Israel.
4. Thought Control: No textbook, no university chair, no broadcast executive nor any news editor is ever employed unless a member of the “30,000.” All belong, all are, not just “answerable,” but actively involved in creating cover stories to shift blame for mass killings, political assassination, economic crimes or simply to put forth a continual “drumming,” of the big lie.
Birth by Murder
The first major act of terrorism by Israel’s Irgun, the predecessor to the Mossad, was in 1949. America’s first Secretary of Defense, an office Chuck Hagel only recently assumed, a man under 24-hour protection against Mossad assassins even today, was James Forrestal.
Forrestal was an enemy of Stalin and his inner circle of Zionists who, with the influence of Secretary of Treasury Henry Morgenthau, took control of President Truman, pushing him to back the occupation of Palestine by Communists, establishing a Soviet foothold in the Middle East under the guise of a “Jewish state.”
Under the guidance of Morgenthau, one million German POWs were starved to death, Germany was de-industrialized and Stalin was allowed to move into Eastern Europe and gain de facto control of France, Italy, establish broad terror and espionage cells that spread across the world, particularly in Washington.
When the now reviled Senator Joseph McCarthy claimed the State Department was filled with communists, he was totally correct.
Bernard Baruch told Forrestal that Zionists were going to kill him. The Irgun had tried to kill British Foreign Secretary Brevin in 1946.
Forrestal, though Secretary of Defense, was continually attacked by the media, Walter Winchell and Drew Pearson, the most influential columnists of the day, wrote scathing attacks against Forrestal continually.
Assassination teams following Forrestal were arrested more than once but released on orders from President Truman who, in March of 1949, finally fired Forrestal over his opposition to Israel’s ethnic cleansing of the Palestinian people.
Soon afterward, Forrestal was poisoned and taken to Bethesda Naval Hospital. While there, he was thrown out of a 16th story window, his body showing signs of a desperate struggle, the room in disarray.
Walter Winchell, an accused Stalinist agent, called Forrestal’s death a “suicide,” a verdict certified later despite evidence to the contrary. The control of the press, likely 10,000 of the identities Anonymous accessed, seen today was “alive and well” many decades ago.
As, decades later, the public became aware that the killings of Forrestal, the Kennedy’s, Martin Luther King, even prominent American Jews like Senator Paul Wellstone and his family were Mossad operations.
The Hollywoodism “spin” on the Forrestal assassination is the classic. We are told that Secretary of Defense Forrestal killed himself because his brain had been taken over by one of the aliens that crash-landed at Roswell, New Mexico in 1947.
Jeremy Kagen, producer of the 1981 film, “The Chosen,” depicting New York’s Hasidic community, is responsible for the 1994 film, “Roswell,” which implies Forrestal was murdered by aliens.
We have seen it for over 60 years, if the trail leads to Tel Aviv, it must have been “little green men.”
Is the Story Dead?
As soon as the story hit, press assets, both “blogosphere shills” and the MSM passed on the word, “Mossad assassination teams know where to find ‘Anonymous’ and are ready to kill family members, pets, blow up neighborhoods or even shoot up another elementary school.”
Those passing on the threats are guilty as co-conspirators, covering for espionage and terror groups, using terrorism to protect terrorists.
Thus far, we have only seen the email accounts, a horror in itself, revealing what may only be the “tip of the iceberg.”
What if only 5,000 of the 30,000 are “agent handlers?” Does this mean there are tens of thousands of additional “deep cover agents” armed with dirty bombs or ready to kill public officials if, let’s say, there is a threat to cut aid to Israel?
Wait, isn’t this exactly what brought on 9/11?
Gordon Duff is a Marine Vietnam veteran, a combat infantryman, and Senior Editor at Veterans Today. His career has included extensive experience in international banking along with such diverse areas as consulting on counter insurgency, defense technologies or acting as diplomatic representative for UN humanitarian and economic development efforts. Gordon Duff has traveled to over 80 nations. His articles are published around the world and translated into a number of languages. He is regularly on TV and radio, a popular and sometimes controversial guest.
Courtesy: PressTV
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