The Ibrahimi mosque/Tomb of the Patriarchs in Hebron/Khalil has been a flash point for decades. It was split into Muslim and Jewish sides after Israeli settler Dr. Baruch Goldstein massacred 29 Palestinian worshipers in 1994. From Ma'an News Agency, Aug. 28 (via Kibush):

Israeli settlers break into Muslim side of Ibrahimi Mosque in Hebron

Hebron – Israeli settlers broke into the Al Is`haqiyyah area of the Ibrahimi Mosque in the West Bank city of Hebron on Sunday night.

Eleven Israeli settlers broke through the main gate of the Ibrahimi Mosque in spite of attempts by the mosque`s guards to prevent them entering.

As we noted in the case of Ayaan Hirsi Ali, Europe's xenophobe right is appropriating the causes of feminism and secularism. Through the proverbial looking glass. From the New York Times, Aug. 24 (emphasis added):

BRESCIA — A series of unrelated killings here this month has pushed this elegant city to the center of a national debate on the challenges of immigration and cultural integration.

An International Solidarity Movement press release, Aug. 25:

Peace Demonstrators Beaten in Bil’in

At today’s weekly demo against the Apartheid Wall in Bil’in soldiers attacked protesters with batons and fired rubber bullets at them from close range. Around 100 protesters including international and Israeli peace activists marching from the village mosque to the site of the Wall were confronted by lines of soldiers in riot gear at the edge of the village. Without provocation or intimidation the soldiers waded into the demonstration lashing out indiscriminately at the marchers. An American peace activist, Magan, suffered a concussion and severe bruising after being beaten on the forehead whilst Anna an American activist suffered severe hand injuries.

A seldom-talked about occupation and resistence. From IMEMC, Aug. 25:

Secret Resistance Committee founders in the Occupied Golan enter their 22nd year in prison
by Saed Bannoura

August 24 2006 marks the twenty-second year since the arrest of the founders of the Secret resistance movement in the occupied Syrian Golan Heights.

The Arabs48 news website reported that the Secret Resistance Movement is the first military movement in the Golan Heights and that it was established after Israel decided to consider the Syrian occupied Golan Heights as part of the State of Israel in December 14, 1981.

What a revealing piece of propaganda this is. British forces abandon Camp Abu Naji at Amarah, in southern Iraq, and not only Moktada al-Sadr but also the official Maysan provinical authorites proclaim it as a victory against the occupier. The British commander Maj. Charlie Burbridge asserts Iraqi army forces maintained "full control" of the base—even as it was being sacked by looters armed with AK-47s! Burbridge crows about how disciplined the Iraqi army maintaining (precarious) control of the base is—while a local brigade mutinies, and is apparently well-infiltrated by the Sadr forces! The British forces are evacuating the Amarah base to carry out "guerilla tactics" in the marshlands—an implicit acknowledgement that the insurgents are in control there! Finally, note that even the pacifistic Sufis have declared a jihad against the Anglo-American occupation (and the fundamentalist Shi'ites like al-Sadr who would like to exterminate them). From the Washington Post, Aug. 26 (emphasis added):

Mexico's Defense Secretariat has dispatched troops from the 36th Infantry Battallion, based at the 44th Military Zone headquarters in Minatitlan, Veracruz, to the Oaxaca City, which has been paralyzed by civil protests for weeks. The situation has promped the Popular People's Assembly of Oaxaca (APPO) to declare a "maximum alert," fearing that a violent eviction of their protest encampments in the city center is imminent. (APRO, Aug. 23)

This is how censorship works in the USA: by other names—which, of course, makes it more insidious. An ACLU press release, Aug. 24:

Village Cannot Impose Prohibitive Insurance Requirement as Condition of Free Speech, NYCLU Warns
NEW YORK -- The New York Civil Liberties Union today urged the village of Bellport to drop an arbitrary and unconstitutional requirement that any group wishing to march on the street must purchase $2 million in insurance and indemnify Bellport from liability as a condition of receiving a permit.

We welcome the Aug. 23 Amnesty International report taking Israel to task for massively targeting Lebanon's civilian infrastructure. But there is an ominous Achilles' heel to Amnesty's arguments. Contrasting Israel's actions to the "lawful targeting of military objectives" implicitly loans legitimacy to the concept of "collateral damage." In 1977, following the outcry over US carpet-bombing of Vietnam, Protocol II was added to the Geneva Conventions, with Part IV stating: "The civilian population...shall enjoy general protection against the dangers arising from military operations... The civilian population as such...shall not be the object of attack." The concept of "collateral damage" has served as a loophole to permit the targeting of the civilian population merely de facto rather than de jure—as the Pentagon's "Shock and Awe" plans for Iraq made nearly explicitly clear. In the actual event, the "Shock and Awe" plans were considerably scaled down due concerns about its "political consequences." This is evidence that protest is effective—it saves lives, at least sometimes, even if it falls short of its aims of stopping military aggression completely. But we should be wary of allowing the aggressors to set the terms of the debate.