Harry's Place

I saw it coming. El Universal reports:
Venezuela’s Hugo Chávez announced on Tuesday that he invited Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir to visit Venezuela, thus supporting the Sudanese ruler, who faces an international bench warrant issued by the International Criminal Court (ICC).
“I spoke with al-Bashir and asked him about the risks he is facing when he visits [...]

I am, as you know, a strong supporter both of freedom of speech, and the right of states to refuse admittance to those who are not its citizens. Whenever I make this point, and and told that there is a contradiction between these positions, I point out that it is possible nowdays for people in [...]

So, Ken Livingstone has started working for the propaganda station of the Islamic Republic of Iran.

Press TV publishes, approvingly, Holocaust denial material.
More recently, it published this:
Press TV has excelled itself by running a story that no reputable news outlet had reported: a supposed CIA study predicting the collapse of Israel within 20 years. The only [...]

According to the BNP, vote for them. 
Seriously. 
“The poster quotes from John 15:20 “If they have persecuted me, they will also persecute you” and asks the question “What would Jesus do?”
…
A spokesman for the BNP said: “We are putting them up there in response to the way the Church has attacked us. We believe we are [...]

According to a report on the Ynet News site, King Abdullah of Jordan’s pet dog has died at a veterinary hospital in Israel:
The Jordanian royal family’s dog was secretly rushed to Israel  for treatment in the midst of Operation Cast Lead  in Gaza, Yedioth Ahronoth reported Sunday.
Relations between the royal palace in Amman and the [...]

Neocons for Obama!
I asked the boss [Bill Kristol] for a reaction to the Afghan speech. He said he would have framed a few things differently, but his basic response was: “All hail Obama!”
And Kagan on Obama’s Afghan plan:
“He’s definitely saying no to pulling back,” said Fred Kagan, at the neoconservative Foreign Policy Initiative conference today [...]

According to this website, former Malaysian prime minister Mahathir “The Jews rule this world by proxy” Mohamed will share a platform in Trafalgar Square with Tony Benn, Arthur Scargill, Lindsey German, Daud Abduallah, Jeremy Corbyn, Ismail Patel and others at an “Alternative Summit” to the G20 at 3:30 pm on Wednesday April 1, sponsored by [...]

Today is the day Britain hands over control of Basra to the US. The Guardian reports how a British military pennant was “symbolically lowered over Basra” today as UK troops began their withdrawal from Iraq by formally handing command of the southern area of the country to the US army.
There are too many things to [...]

This is a guest post by Thursday Next
Five years ago, deciding a case brought by John Hirst, the European Court of Human Rights decided that the UK’s blanket ban on prisoners voting was unlawful.
Since then, the government has hemmed, and hawed, and dragged its feet, but has implemented no change – even as the rest [...]

I am no fan of Melanie Phillips. So it was with some trepidation I followed the links from her blog about the Arab Media Media watch organisation, which described a recent dinner they held:
Some 200 guests gathered at Kensington’s Royal Garden Hotel on 21 March 2009 to attend Arab Media Watch’s fifth annual fundraising dinner, [...]