A new report from POLITICO corroborates a suspicion long held by critics of George W. Bush and Dick Cheney. It affirms the former president and vice president not only had intelligence warning the terror attacks of 9/11 were imminent, but that they repeatedly ignored the CIA’s warnings. The most shocking assertion is that Bush and Cheney actively attempted to hide the paper trail documenting the fact that the evidence was presented to them.
The claim comes from none other than ex-CIA Chief George Tenet, who recounted with palpable frustration how Bush, Cheney, and National Security Advisor Condoleezza Rice ignored multiple warnings from both him and then-counterterrorism chief, Cofer Black, during the late spring and summer of 2001.
Previously, the most salient proof the Bush administration had advanced warning of 9/11 was the infamous August 6th edition of the CIA Presidential Daily Brief given to George W. Bush. Titled “Bin Laden Determined to Strike in U.S.,” the document has often been cited by journalists and whistleblowers making a case of willful negligence against Bush and Cheney. The new information from Tenet and Black presents a considerably deeper timeline, showing there was a consistent stream of intelligence warnings starting at least four months prior to September 11th.
According to Black, by May of 2001 “it was very evident that we were going to be struck, we were gonna be struck hard and lots of Americans were going to die.”
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William A. Cook
RINF Alternative News
In 2010 I edited The Plight of the Palestinians: A Long History of Destruction, a collection of articles by world renowned writers who unveil the genocide taking place in Palestine by the occupying power in this “advanced” civilization of 2014, a slow water torture of constant humiliation, destruction and death as the world watches and nothing is done to bring justice to the people of Palestine. In that text, Dr. Jeff Halper details the quest for “peace” that has been crippled by the state of Israel,
the intentional, calculated and indifferent response to the conditions
facing the Palestinian people every day. He offers this reality:
Israel’s
strategy until today is to bypass and encircle them, making deals with
governments that isolate and, unsuccessfully so far, neutralize the
Palestinians as players. This was most tellingly shown in the Madrid
peace talks, when Israel
only allowed Palestinian participation as part of the Jordanian
delegation. But it includes the Oslo “peace process” as well. While Israel insisted on a letter from Arafat explicitly recognizing Israel as a “legitimate construct” in the Middle East, and later demanded a specific statement recognizing Israel
as a Jewish state (both of which it got), no Israeli government ever
recognized the collective rights of the Palestinian people to
self-determination. Rabin was forthright as to the reason: If Israel recognizes the Palestinians’ right to self-determination, it means that a Palestinian state must by definition emerge – and Israel
did not want to promise that.4 So except for vague pronouncements about
not wanting to rule over another people and “our hand outstretched in
peace,” Israel has
never allowed the framework for genuine negotiations. The Palestinians
must be taken into account, they may be asked to react to one or another
of our proposals, but they are certainly not equal partners with claims
to the country rivaling ours (“The Problem with Israel,” Jeff Halper, 2007).
Seven
years ago, November 22, 2007, I wrote an article about George W. Bush’s
plan to bring peace to the mid-east, a plan that used the city of
Annapolis as its label with Condoleeza Rice acting as emissary from the
American government meeting with Israeli and Palestinian officials. That
article tracked the reality of the failed peace process from before the
Mandate to 2007. It is now 2014 and there is no peace—but there is once
again a “peace” initiative under way, an initiative every American
President seems obliged to give lip service to knowing beforehand no
peace will be affected. Why? Why go through a process all know will not
result in peace? Why exercise an illusion? For whose benefit? To what
end?
Resting on my bookshelf is a cunning little device, an object I’ve
had in my office for decades, a curiosity piece that grabs the attention
of children and adults, a strange unfamiliar gadget that appears to
have a purpose since it has a handle, two gears fastened to small
rounded cylinders that crisscross each other as one turns the handle,
it’s called a do-nothing machine. Someone conceptualized it and someone
created it and someone turns that handle to do nothing. Why? Why go
through a process all know will not accomplish anything? Why spend time
on an illusion? For whose benefit? To what end?
There it sits next to The Plight of the Palestinians and it seems to me Obama
and Kerry must have one just like it since they initiated a process
that they know will accomplish nothing, inspired no doubt by the
do-nothing machine. Why? Perhaps it’s to pretend that they are not owned
by the Israeli state or perhaps to defend themselves against the
perception that they have abandoned any thought of a peaceful two state
solution in Palestine or perhaps to extend time once again so Israel
can steal more land and create more settlements allowing the slow
motion genocide to continue. Perhaps an illusion is better than nothing
at all.
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