Rebel News - No Ads, No Lies, Just News

US President-elect Barack Obama selects Bill Clinton's White House chief of staff Leon Panetta as the director of the CIA, Democrat officials say.

An Obama transition official and another Democrat disclosed his nomination on condition of anonymity since it was not to be yet public.

Panetta who was chief of staff to former president Bill Clinton has most recently been the director of the Panetta Institute. The institute is a non-partisan policy center at California State University in Monterey.

Panetta, who served in Congress from 1977 until 1993, is regarded as a good manager, but has little intelligence experience.

The Zionist regime is using controversial white phosphorus shells to push forward with a ground offensive against the densely-populated Gaza Strip.

White phosphorus, classified as 'chemical weapon' by the US intelligence, can cause horrific burns and severe injuries in anyone exposed to the element released from artillery shells.

"The explosions are fantastic looking, and produce a great deal of smoke that blinds the enemy so that our forces can move in," a Zionist security expert was quoted by the Times Online.

The shells were used by the artillery on Gaza City on Sunday, as Zionist tanks and ground forces pushed further into the region, tightening military grip on the city.

At least 555 Palestinians have been killed and some 2,790 have been wounded since December 27, when Tel Aviv began its military campaign on Gaza.

The Palestinian death toll has hit 555, after another 50 people including 12 kids were killed in the latest Zionist attacks on the Gaza Strip.

At least 2,700 people have also been wounded since Zionist Operation Cast Lead launched against the coastal region on December 27, Muawiya Hassanein, the head of the territory's emergency services told AFP Monday.

The casualties are expected to rise dramatically as the Zionist army has engaged in heavy exchanges of fire with Hamas resistance fighters in Gaza City.

The fighting has broken out for the first time since the Zionist military crossed over the border late Saturday after a week-long aerial and naval onslaught on the costal sliver.

Earlier in the day, the Army said its forces are gearing up for battles in heavily populated urban areas in the strip.

Outspoken Republican congressman Ron Paul says the Zionist regime had received a green light from the United States to launch an offensive in Gaza.

The Texas congressman said the Zionist attack on the impoverished Gaza Strip shapes a bleak future for the whole world as it means that, "the whole idea of preemptive or preventive war is spreading."

He went on to challenge the idea of Hamas threatening Israel's security and argued that "Palestinian missiles are so minor compared to the fire power of Israel, who has nuclear weapons."

The US Congressman's remarks come as the Zionist regimes continues to rebuff international efforts to end the assault on Gaza, and Zionist troops and tanks -- protected by heavy air, sea and artillery fire - have sliced through the center of Gaza and surrounded the main city.

"We have prepared thousands of brave fighters who are waiting for you in each corner of the street and will welcome you with fire and iron," Abu Obeida, the spokesman for the Izz ad-Din al-Qassam Brigades - the military wing of Hamas- said in a televised speech on the movement's Al-Aqsa TV station on Monday.

Abu Obeida warned that more rockets would hit Zionist towns, should Tel Aviv continue the ongoing offensive against the strip.

He said the movement has enough rockets to continue the attacks on the Zionist entity, adding that "There are strategic places that can be targeted by our rockets."

Zionist has launched Operation Cast Lead on December 27 'to halt the rocket attacks from the Gaza Strip'.

However, after a ten-day-long onslaught on the region, Hamas resistance fighter still keep up rocket attacks on southern part of the Zionist entity. At least 24 rockets have been fired at Israel since Sunday night.

Pro-Palestinian demonstrators have taken to the streets in cities around the world in protest at the Israeli military offensive in Gaza.

The United States

While Israel presses ground troops to enter Gaza, protesters across the US have expressed their concern over the humanitarian crisis.

Anger over the attacks brought Americans to the streets. They marched outside the Israeli Consulate in downtown Los Angeles to show their outrage toward Israeli military strikes against Palestinians.

Pro-Israeli demonstrators also gathered to voice their opinions concerning the strikes.

Chile

The Israeli military action also sparked protests in the Chilean capital, Santiago. The Palestinian community was joined by Chileans demonstrating against the Israeli offensive in Gaza.

Thai Muslims protest Israeli policies in Bangkok.

In Manila, demonstrators denounce Israel's assault on Gaza.

World leaders express grave concern about the humanitarian crisis in the Gaza Strip as the Zionist regime tightens its grip on the impoverished region.

The Gaza Strip, one of the most densely populated areas in the world, has been under fire since the Zionists launched Operation Cast Lead on December 27.

Despite the high civilian casualties, Tel Aviv continues rebuffing international requests for an immediate halt to the ongoing offensive.

As Zionist troops and tanks enter the densely-populated Gaza city after a week-long aerial and naval offensive, the international society remains extremely concerned over the large number of civilians, killed or wounded in the costal area.

The tenth day of the assault brings the number of Palestinian casualties to 555 with over 2,700 others wounded.

In a telephone conversation with US President George W. Bush, Chinese President Hu Jintao expressed his concern about the "humanitarian crisis".

A fierce battle has erupted in Gaza City as the Zionist army engages in heavy exchanges of fire with Hamas resistance fighters.

The fighting broke out in the vicinity of Gaza City on Monday for the first time since the Zionist military crossed over the border on Saturday, beginning an incursion into the costal sliver.

According to AFP, large explosions and heavy exchanges of fire rocked eastern neighborhoods of Gaza City, as attacks on the densely-populated strip continues for a tenth day.

The Zionist army has reportedly prepared to face strong resistance in the city.

At least 50 Zionist troops have been wounded in the Operation Cast Lead; one has been killed and five others are reported in serious conditions.

Meanwhile, some 551 Palestinians have lost their lives, and at least 2,790 others are wounded -- most of whom are civilians.

The Hezbollah Secretary General says the Zionists are killing civilians in a desperate move after failing to fight Hamas in the Gaza Strip.

In a televised speech on Monday, Seyyed Hassan Nasrallah said the Zionist regime has been 'disarmed' in its campaign against Palestinian fighters and that it can only overpower civilians.

The Hezbollah leader had earlier urged Hamas to fight Zionist troops and had drawn a parallel between the current situation in Gaza and the 2006 Zionist war on Lebanon - which result in a humiliating defeat for the Zionist regime.

Tel Aviv launched Operation Cast Lead against the Gaza Strip on December 27, to put an end to the rocket attacks from the Gaza Strip.

The offensive which has so far left at least 555 people killed and over 2,700 others wounded, failed to stop rocket attacks to Israel.

The US job losses in 2008 reached the highest level since the end of World War II, a Labor Department report is expected to show.

Payrolls fell 500,000 in December, bringing last year's total job losses to 2.4 million, the most since 1945, according to a poll of analysts surveyed by Bloomberg News.

The Labor Department figures, due Jan. 9, are also expected to show unemployment rate rising to its highest level since 1993.

The jobless rate probably climbed to 7 percent in December from 6.7 percent the prior month, according to the Bloomberg survey.

Russia's Gazprom and the European Union complain that Ukraine is not delivering all dedicated gas to Europe while Kiev denies siphoning off the fuel.

The Czech Presidency of EU has called for urgent talks of envoys in Brussels on Monday saying the deals must be honored. The Czech presidency said in a statement that Moscow will probably be included in the talks. Commitments to supply and transit have to be honored under all circumstances, the Czechs said.

Hungary, Poland and Romania have also complained the deliveries have dropped significantly.

The US government says that it had approved the sale of bankrupt California bank IndyMac to investment group IMB Management

The Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC) said it had signed a letter of intent on Wednesday to sell IndyMac Bank, which it seized in July when the bank collapsed under the weight of a bank run by depositors panicked about its viability.

The bank had been under pressure from a cash crunch amid the subprime mortgage crisis and the collapse of the housing market.

The FDIC said it had agreed to sell IndyMac to IMB HoldCo, a thrift holding company controlled by IMB Holdings.

World oil prices have dived as traders banked profits from sharp gains made just ahead of the New Year and the news on the Zionist-Gaza conflict.

On Friday, New York's main contract, light sweet crude for delivery in February slid 2.45 dollars to 42.15 dollars a barrel after spiking 5.57 dollars Wednesday on the New York Mercantile Exchange.

Markets were closed Thursday.

In early London trade, Brent North Sea crude for February was down 2.48 dollars at 43.11 dollars per barrel after gains of 5.55 dollars on Wednesday.

The Austrian private bank Medici was placed under state supervision amid greater exposure to the Bernard Madoff scandal than previously disclosed.

Medici said last month that two funds -- Herald USA Fund and Herald Luxemburg Fund, with a total volume of USD 2.1b - were exposed to the alleged fraud but did say by how much money was involved.

Austria appointed a supervisor to the bank, financial regulator FMA said, in the first known case where a government has stepped in to run a bank caught in the alleged USD 50b Madoff fraud.

An Arab League official says Zionist Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni is using the bloodshed in Gaza to secure a post as prime minister.

In a Friday interview in Cairo, Mohammad Sabih said Livni is hoping that "spilling bloods" of innocent Gazans can help her replace Ehud Olmert as Zionist prime minister in the upcoming elections.

"The Gaza onslaught will become the bane of her already substantial criminal record," said the Palestinian representative in the Arab League.

The Zionist aerial bombardment of the Gaza Strip entered its second week on Saturday. The strikes have so far left at least 436 Palestinians dead and more than 2280 wounded -- many of whom are women and children.

Zionist war experts have begun discussing various tactics for a ground incursion into Gaza after officials in Tel Aviv gave the go-ahead.

Tacticians are studying two different scenarios for a ground onslaught, military sources told DEBKAfile, a website believed to be affiliated with Zionist intelligence and military organizations.

"One favors a short in-and-out incursion with heavy tanks, armored infantry, and air units hitting Hamas hard before pulling back," the website reported.

"Another advocates a broader more fundamental treatment to destroy Hamas's military capabilities root and branch, withdraw and then follow up with sorties as necessary - as per the successful West Bank model," it added.

Gaza resistance fighters keep shelling various cities inside the Zionist entity despite Tel Aviv's intensified blitz on them to halt the rocket firings.

Palestinian fighters launched seven rockets into the Western Negev region, hitting a building in the Zionist city of Ashkelon.

The rockets were fired on Saturday morning but there was no immediate report of casualties.

Also on Saturday, a Qassam rocket hit the Eshkol region but no casualties or damages were reported.

Popular Hezbollah leader Seyyed Hassan Nasrallah says the Arab leaders of the region are collaborating with the "Israeli aggressor" in Gaza.

On Wednesday, five days after the Zionist regime launched its all-out aggression against the Gaza Strip, Arab foreign ministers met in Cairo to seek a common position in response to the Zionist attacks on the impoverished area.

Arab foreign ministers agreed to send a ministerial delegation to New York in order to seek a solution to the crisis. The meeting ended with no apparent results other than the officials urging a cease-fire in the Palestinian territory.

"Why have the Arab foreign ministers delayed their trip to the Security Council until Monday? They could have sent their delegation on Wednesday," Nasrallah responded on Friday.

The Zionist regime has maintained its ban on international journalists entering the Gaza Strip in defiance of a recent Supreme Court ruling.

Foreign journalists and reporters were refused entry into Gaza on Friday when the Zionists opened the crossing to allow some 300 Palestinians with foreign passports to leave the coastal strip.

The Zionist rejection comes after a recent court ruling that allows groups of up to 12 foreign journalists to cross the border whenever the Erez crossing between the Zionist entity and Gaza is open for humanitarian cases.

"We call on the Israeli government to immediately honor the will of the court and allow foreign journalists access to Gaza," the Foreign Press Association said in a statement.

The armed wing of Hamas says its fighters have foiled an attempt by Zionist ground forces to cross the border into the Gaza Strip.

A spokesman for the Ezzedine al-Qassam Brigades said early Saturday morning that Hamas fighters spotted an unspecified number of Zionist forces trying to infiltrate the Shajaiyeh border neighborhood of eastern Gaza City at around 1 am (2300 GMT Friday).

The spokesperson said that after Hamas fighters detected the Zionist soldiers, the fighters fired six mortar shells at them, According to Israel Radio.

He added that the fighting had no casualties.

Top Zionist officials have given the military the green light for a ground incursion into the Gaza Strip after a week of deadly bombings.

"The Israel leadership has given the thumbs-up for a ground invasion of the Gaza Strip," wrote FOX News, quoting unnamed sources.

Earlier on Friday, Zionist Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, Defense Minister Ehud Barak, and Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni met with other cabinet members to discuss a ground offensive into Gaza.

Top military and intelligence officials also attended the meeting, according to Zionist government spokesman, Mark Regev.

The blame game - no one plays it better than the dominant media, and they're at it again over Gaza. Expect no comments below in their spaces, yet honest journalism would headline them.

After Japan attacked Pearl Harbor, Franklin Roosevelt addressed Congress - with an appropriating updating for Gaza: 

December 27 "will live in infamy." The people of Gaza were "suddenly and deliberately attacked by....air forces of the" State of Israel. The "attack was deliberately planned many (months) ago. During the intervening time (Israel) deliberately sought to deceive (Palestinians) by false statements and expressions of hope for" the peace process.

On December 29, Yahoo Finance posted a JINSA press release making the absurd claim that Iran is facilitating Hamas rocket attacks on Israel. “The role of Iran in the training and buildup of the Hamas arsenal has been regrettably overlooked by the world’s media and many of its political leaders,” said Tom Neumann, executive director of JINSA, the Jewish Institute for National Security Affairs. “Hamas’s rocket attacks have become longer range and more lethal as a result of Iranian assistance and training,” he said.

The following is full text interview with lecturer, author and renowned Palestine-Israel scholar Gary Norman Finkelstein in New York.

Rebel News: Nearly a week of violence in Gaza. What do you make of the situation there?

Finkelstein: It is hard to make any definite judgments about the military situation. The goals of the Israeli government it seems to me are pretty clear. Number one Israel wants to reestablish what it calls its deterrence capacity. That is a technical term that the Israelis use. It basically means to restore the fear of Israel among the Arab states in the region.

Zionist Defense Minister Ehud Barak lashes out at an Arab-Zionist minister for boycotting a cabinet meeting to protest the Gaza attacks.

On Sunday, the Zionist regime's Science, Culture and Sports Minister Ghaleb Majadle announced that he would not take part in a cabinet meeting held to discuss the situation in Gaza.

Majadle, who is the all-time first Arab minister in the Zionist entity, made the announcement after the Zionist air force started launching massive air raids on the coastal strip, killing at least 400 Palestinians and wounding almost 2000.

The Islamic Hamas movement says Zionist forces would be welcomed with 'surprises' should they launch a ground incursion into the Gaza Strip.

"Israel will embark on a veritable adventure if it decides to invade Gaza," Hamas official Mushir al-Masri said on Thursday.

"We have prepared surprises for them", he said adding that his movement would fight "until the last breath" in case of a ground invasion.

Meanwhile, in a defiant televised speech, Hamas Prime Minister in Gaza Ismail Haniya promised that the movement will win the fight against the Zionist regime.

The Zionist military says its forces have raided different cities of the West Bank, arresting 15 Palestinians amid attacks on the Gaza Strip.

A spokesman for the Zionist army said that the troops made the arrests during their raids on the West Bank cities of Nablus, al-Khalil and East al-Quds early morning.

On Wednesday, the forces arrested twenty-two Palestinians including two children from the West bank.

At least five people have been killed and over 50 injured after a series of bombs exploded in India's troubled northeastern state of Assam.

Western government sponsored terrorist groups have recently increased their terror activities in India in preparation for a war aiming to rid Pakistan of its nuclear arsenal to accommodate Zionist unease with the 'Islamic bomb'. 

Three blasts went off Thursday in crowded areas of Gauhati, the capital of Assam state. Two of the bombs went off in crowded marketplaces while the third explosion was reported beside a road in Guwahati, the largest city in Assam.

Senior Hamas leader Nizar Rayan's decapitated body was hurled out into the street as a Zionist F-16 fired two missiles onto his house.

The powerful explosion, which raised the building to rubble, also killed his four wives and 10 of his 12 children in his five-storey apartment building in Jabaliya refugee camp in northern Gaza strip. Eye witnesses said it was like an explosion.

Another report says that Zionist planes dropped a one-ton bomb that completely flattened Rayan's building.

Around a dozen neighboring houses were also destroyed or damaged in the blast killing another 17 people raising the death toll to at least 420, since the Zionist regime unleashed its "Operation Cast Lead" last Saturday. Six Zionists have been killed.

Turkey and Syria have described the Zionist campaign against Gazans as a 'holocaust', calling for an immediate end to the 'massacre'.

Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan held talks with Syrian President Bashar al-Assad on Wednesday to discuss ways to stop the "massacre committed by Israel'' on Gaza Palestinians.

Following the meeting the two leaders jointly said that it was "essential that Arab and Islamic countries intervene to force Israel to immediately halt this holocaust against an unarmed population," the official Syrian Arab News Agency (SANA) reported.

Top Neo-Con exploits crisis to push for new war

Top Neo-Con John Bolton told Fox News yesterday that the conflict in Gaza could lead to a U.S. attack on Iran as the former U.S. ambassador to the UN exploited the crisis to propagandize for a new war.

“So while our focus obviously is on Gaza right now, this could turn out to be a much larger conflict,” said Bolton, adding that “we’re looking at potentially a multi-front war here.”

“I don’t think there’s anything at this point standing between Iran and nuclear weapons other than the possibility of the use of military force possibly by the United States, possibly by Israel,” added the former ambassador, suggesting that a strike on Iran’s facilities by Israel alone would be risky but could push Iran back by three or four years.

Another 20 people have been killed in the Zionist blitz on Gaza, bringing the Palestinian death toll to 410 since Saturday.

On Thursday, the Zionist military forces hit over 20 targets in the Gaza Strip as part of an all-out war which has been launched against the coastal enclave since early Saturday.

The attacks have so far left 2,000 people wounded. Women and children have been among the victims, UN officials said.

American researchers believe that grape seed extract can treat hematological (blood) malignancies by destroying cancerous tissue.

According to a study published in Clinical Cancer Research, grape seed extract can stimulate the apoptosis (self-destruction) of leukemia cells in laboratory.

Grape seed has anti-cancer properties because of its high antioxidant (resveratrol) content. The extract activates the production of JNK, a protein responsible for regulating cellular apoptosis.

Findings revealed that 76 percent of the affected cells were killed within 24 hours of exposure to the extract; healthy cells, however, remained intact.

A vegetable oil derived from the jatropha plant has been partially used as fuel for a commercial flight operated by Air New Zealand.

Air New Zealand (ANZ) successfully flew a Boeing 747 - a 400 passenger plane - powered by a 50-50 blend of standard jet fuel and the newly invented vegetable oil, on Tuesday.

The test flight came as another move to introduce alternative fuels, in order to lessen airlines dependence on crude oil amid rising prices. The increased use of biofuels is being criticised by many human rights activists as the prime cause for world-wide food shortages, food price increases and food riots in many third world countries.

The majority of hardcore gamers have been found to be women, who are reportedly much healthier than their non-gaming counterparts.

A study by University of Delaware shows that the online multiplayer videogames have led to a significant increase in the number of female players who consider the game a social activity.

The study found that contrary to existing stereotypes, about 40 percent of the gaming population is female. Women were also found to be the most dedicated players.

UN Professor Falk cites targeting of civilians, disproportionate military response as Obama and Pelosi express terse approval

A new IAF cockpit video shows an air strike targeted against an alleged rocket launching site located between two civilian homes, as UN Professor Richard Falk accused Israel of massive violations of international humanitarian law.

Falk, United Nations Special Investigator for Human Rights in the Occupied Territories, listed numerous actions by Israel that clearly break the rules of engagement codified in the Geneva Conventions.

These include; collective punishment of the 1.5 million inhabitants of the Gaza Strip for the actions of relatively few militants; the indiscriminate targeting of civilians including school children and university students during air strikes, with hundreds now dead or injured; a disproportionate military response which has destroyed every police and security office of Gaza’s elected government.

Four leading Israeli rabbis have sanctioned the murder of civilian population in the Gaza Strip amid the Israeli onslaught on the region.

"When a population living near a Jewish town sends bombs at the Jewish town with the purpose of killing and destroying Jewish lives there, it is permitted, according to Jewish Law, to fire shells and bombs at the firing sites, even if they are populated by civilians," read a ruling issued by Rabbi Yaakov Yosef, Rabbi Dov Lior, Rabbi Shalom Dov Wolpe and Rabbi Meir Mazuz.

The four added that a warning should be issued prior to any attacks; however, they reiterated that the army's response to rocket or mortar fires may be immediate "even if there is no time for a warning."

US Congressman Dennis Kucinich says the continuing Zionist attacks on civilians in the Gaza Strip are an example of 'collective punishment'.

"The perpetrators of attacks against Israel must also be brought to justice, but Israel cannot create a war against an entire people in order to attempt to bring to justice the few who are responsible. The Zionist leaders know better," Kucinich said in a news release on Monday.

Medics told reporters that at least 345 Palestinians have been killed and about 1,550 have been wounded as the Zionists on Saturday kicked off the assaults. The Zionist regime has called the attack an 'all-out' war on the Hamas movement.

The Zionist regime has resumed pounding positions near Gaza's border with Egypt, claiming a series of tunnels under the border town of Rafah were hit.

The Zionist military announcement on Tuesday came three days after the forces claimed sortie operations had destroyed