Don DeBar's Blog

VIDEO: Surveying the damage, talking with students http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=91yClPLxvX0&feature=channel_video_title More NATO "Humanitarian Intervention: The Bombing of Al Fateh University, Campus B 14June 2011 By Cynthia McKinney Since coming to Tripoli to see first hand the consequences of the NATO military operations, it has become clear to me that despite the ongoing silence of the international press on the ground here in Libya, there is clear evidence that civilian targets have been hit and Libyan civilians injured and killed. This Tuesday morning I was taken from my hotel across the city through its bustling traffic to the Al Fateh University. On 9 June, Dean Ali Mansur was outside in the parking lot. The sky was blue like Carolina blue. The clouds were white--no chemtrails in sight. Puffy and white. Dean Mansur was visibly upset. It seems that some of the young men at Al Fateh University, Campus B were fighting over girls. He explained to me that Libyans are hot ...

It's been a week since we first started passing on the information coming to us from on the ground in Tripoli, and you can see that the truth is quite a bit different from the picture being painted by US media, including by such "progressive" outlets as Democracy Now and post-coup Pacifica Radio. There are still remaining, however, some free spaces within Pacifica where the word has been getting out - more on that within. Some of the Dignity delegation has returned to the US - our first two pieces today are interviews conducted here in the US after their return. First is an interview done yesterday with Dignity delegation member Dedon Kamathi, a producer for Pacifica Radio's KPFK-FM in Los Angeles. That interview, by Askia Muhammad, aired on Pacifica's Washington, DC station WPFW-FM yesterday. You can hear it at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=REd_YtUfrio Next is a piece written by Dignity delegation member Wayne Madsen, a Washington, DC journalist who specializ...

It is now 1:10 in the afternoon and as the daily life in Tripoli unfolds that includes teachers, staff, and children at school, shopkeepers working in their businesses, streetsweepers sweeping the streets, people moving to and fro in the cars, on bicycles, and on foot, Tripoli has thus far since around 11:00 up to now, received at least 29 bombs. Interestingly, the efforts of the Washington Post, New York Times, Associated Press, and others to portray Libya claims on the bombings as "absurd" are patently false and are merely efforts to defend in the court of public opinion, the indefensible bombing of civilians going about their lives in a heavily populated area. The Washington Post headlined "Libya government fails to prove claims of NATO casualties" and the Los Angeles Times headline blared "Libya officials put a spin on a conflict." These bombs and missiles are not falling in empty spaces: people are all over Tripoli going about their lives just as i...

WAYNE MADSEN REPORTING June 5, 2011 TRIPOLI, LIBYA - Shortly after Libya's rebel Interim Transitional National Council (ITNC) seized control of Benghazi, the second-largest Libyan city, they discovered the two keys for the cash vaults of the Libyan Central Bank in the city. However, because of control mechanisms, the cash vault required a third key held at the Libyan Central Bank in Tripoli, the capital. The rebel movement brought in a professional safe cracker from the United Arab Emirates who successfully opened the cash vault safe. The rebels had their hands on $900 million in Libyan dinars and $500.5 million in U.S. dollars. According to Central Bank officials in Tripoli, the rebels have now spent or siphoned to their offshore bank accounts the entire Benghazi Central Bank cash reserves. In addition, the rebel movement has squandered millions of euros provided by the Euriopean Union. The rebel's theft of money is so great, the U.S. Treasury has refused to provide frozen Lib...

PHOTO - Mostly black African refugees, who fled Libya after US allied rebels committed war crimes against them because of their skin color, in sprawling refugee camps on the Tunisian side of the border. June 4-5, 2011 -- TRIPOLI, LIBYA. WMR Exclusive. Western Libya portrait is not what is being painted by the Western media Western media reports continue to indicate that Libyan rebels trying to oust Libyan leader Muammar Qaddafi from power, backed by daily NATO air strikes, are gaining ground in western Libya. During a six-hour drive from the Tunisian border to Tripoli, the Libyan capital, this reporter saw no signs of Libyan rebel successes in western Libya. In fact, I witnessed a spontaneous pro-Qaddafi demonstration on the main Tunisia-Tripoli highway in a town about one and a half hours west of Tripoli. The green flag of the Libyan Arab Jamahiryah not only adorn flag poles in towns from Tripoli to the Tunisian border, but a number of private residences are flying the green flag fro...