Baithak World Jun 30: Seymour Hersh on Bush-Iran, News & Views, Cartoons, RealNews

Late last year, Congress agreed to a request from President Bush to fund a major escalation of covert operations against Iran, according to current and former military, intelligence, and congressional sources. These operations, for which the President sought up to four hundred million dollars, were described in a Presidential Finding signed by Bush, and are designed to destabilize the country’s religious leadership. The covert activities involve support of the minority Ahwazi Arab and Baluchi groups and other dissident organizations. They also include gathering intelligence about Iran’s suspected nuclear-weapons program. Clandestine operations against Iran are not new. United States Special Operations Forces have been conducting cross-border operations from southern Iraq, with Presidential authorization, since last year. These have included seizing members of Al Quds, the commando arm of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard, and taking them to Iraq for interrogation, and the pursuit of “high-value targets” in the President’s war on terror, who may be captured or killed. But the scale and the scope of the operations in Iran, which involve the Central Intelligence Agency and the Joint Special Operations Command (JSOC), have now been significantly expanded, according to the current and former officials. Many of these activities are not specified in the new Finding, and some congressional leaders have had serious questions about their nature. The Bush Administration steps up its secret moves against Iran. by Seymour M. Hersh

News & Views

$200-A-Barrel Oil: Envisioning What The World Would Look Like
Tomgram: The Urge to Surge
Mia Farrow: My Photos of Darfur, Eastern Chad, and CAR
Pakistani operation against militants raises questions
The papers report an impending showdown between Pakistan and the Taliban.
Tactics that ended apartheid in S. Africa can end it in Israel
War and Consequences - M J Akbar
Spain crowned Euro champions
Obituary: Field Marshal Sam Manekshaw
Lighting lamps: cartoons from the Middle East
'Unfiltered: The Complete Ralph Bakshi' by Jon M. Gibson and Chris McDonnell

Ali Ferzat is the doyen of Arab cartoonists, famed for
highlighting the absurdities, miseries and injustices of daily life

Doonesbury@SLATE

Paul Jay presents RealNews

Bush lawyers on child torture and burial alive ANP: Two leading architects of Bush admn.'s policies on torture give evasive answers to simple questions view The price of hunger ANP: Hunger is a growing crisis in US, stagnant economy and rising fuel price cause cost of food to soar view