The 9-11 Commission, its formal mission completed, is staying on as a private body, the 9-11 Public Discourse Project. In its first efforts, this private body is finding fault with the FBI for perceived inefficiencies in its intelligence capabilities, and the agency, in turn, assures that it is making amends. All freedom-lovers should shudder.

From the June 3 Stars & Stripes:

Advocates See Veterans of War on Terror Joining the Ranks of the Homeless
By Leo Shane III
Stars and Stripes

Friday 03 June 2005

Washington - Advocates for the homeless already are seeing veterans from the war on terror living on the street, and say the government must do more to ease their transition from military to civilian life.

More Koran desecration is being reported -- this time in Israel. Israeli parliamentarian Ahmed Tibi has called for a Knesset investigation of the incident, which is supposed to have taken place in Megiddo prison on June 7. Ha'aretz reports:

Prisoners claim that at approximately 10:00 A.M., security forces who raided the prison in order to disperse a riot entered the prisoner cells, where they ripped pages out of the Islamic holy book and, in some instances, stepping on them.

Palestinian security prisoners told Tibi that they have launched a hunger strike and that they will refuse to see visitors in protest to the alleged desecration.

A leading senator, Joseph Biden of Delaware, suggested the time has come to consider a gradual closure of the Guantanamo Bay prison camp. "This has become the greatest propaganda tool that exists for recruiting of terrorists around the world. And it is unnecessary to be in that position." The senator argued there should at least be an independent commission established to address the value of keeping Guantanamo. "The end result is, I think we should end up shutting it down, moving those prisoners. Those that we have reason to keep, keep. And those we don't, let go."

On May 27, Servicio Paz y Justicia (SERPAJ) Paraguay condemned an agreement approved by the Paraguayan Congress which will allow US troops into the country for an 18-month training and advisory mission from June 1, 2005 through December 31, 2006. The agreement grants full immunity from prosecution to all US personnel involved in the mission. Congress approved the agreement--apparently at the end of last year--with no debate and behind closed doors, and the public was largely unaware of it, according to SERPAJ Paraguay. "No one knows the extent of these accords and the dangers of a US strategy to violate them," the group warned.

The following item was featured in JTA on June 7:

Rudy to the rescue?
Rudolph Giuliani offered to help Israel fight crime.

"I am prepared to help you but it would have to be done on a clandestine basis, not publicly and not through a newspaper," the former New York City mayor said Tuesday when asked by Yediot Achronot about recent calls by Israeli authorities to emulate his law-enforcement policies, which curbed crime in New York City. Giuliani noted that during his time as mayor, New York had 55 police officers for every 10,000 citizens, more than twice the figure in Israel.

While Chilean ex-Minister of the Interior, Jose Miguel Insulza, assumes the post of Organization of American States (OAS) Secretary General, Chile’s indigenous Mapuche bring their case to that same organization, accusing the Chilean government of human rights violations. Having exhausted resources for the Mapuche leader’s defense, the denunciation is being presented before the OAS with the objective of restoring the honor of the Mapuche authority, and securing an end to the use of anti-terrorism legislation against the Mapuche people.

Israeli police faced off against Palestinians throwing rocks at Jews outside Jerusalem's al-Aqsa mosque June 6 during Israel's annual celebration of its 1967 capture of East Jerusalem. Police hurled several stun grenades as they moved into the area known to Jews as Temple Mount and to Muslims as al-Haram al-Sharif (Noble Sanctuary). Two Jews were slightly injured and one Palestinian was arrested.