JERUSALEM — During visit to Israel, leading US conservative says he doesn't understand "why Obama pressuring Israel not to take action on Iran."

Any of the leading Republican presidential candidates, with the exception of Ron Paul, would “go further” on Iran than US President Barack Obama, former Arkansas  governor Mike Huckabee said Monday. 

Huckabee, making his yearly trip to Israel, said that Mitt Romney, Ron Santorum and Newt Gingrich all understand that the Middle East is “not made safer by dithering.” 

Asked by The Jerusalem Post why he assumes the Republicans would be tougher on Iran, when  Tehran made significant progress on its nuclear program under eight years of the Bush administration, Huckabee replied, “We are in a different position than we were four years ago.”

Calls for US to back Iran attack

Huckabee, who has a popular weekly television program on Fox News, and is also a radio talk show host, said he did not “understand why  the Obama administration is putting pressure on Israel not to take action” against Iran.

He said there should be a clear signal from the US that while it would like to see diplomacy stop Iran’s nuclear march, it would back Israel — or any other country — that decided to take military action to do the job. 

Huckabee said he was “concerned” about how Obama would be toward Israel if he won a second term and did not have to face the electorate again. 

'Working diligently' for Israel

“This is why I am working diligently” so Obama doesn’t win, Huckabee said. He added that he was also working to ensure a strong pro-Israel Congress that would act as a “backstop” if Obama was re-elected. 

Huckabee said he was bothered about the lack of “personal attention” Obama’s pays to  Israel. Saying that an Obama visit to Israel was “long overdue,” Huckabee asserted that the value of such a meeting would not just be symbolic, but also a “substantive way to say that Israel is our number one ally in the Middle East.”

Says both parties can agree on support for Jewish state 

Huckabee wondered why the Administration’s support for Israel seemed “more tepid” than that of the Democrats in Congress, adding that supporting Israel was one of the few issues Democrat and Republican representatives can agree upon.

Regarding a Palestinian state, Huckabee said that while he was not opposed to the idea, such a state should not be “on top of Israel.” He said Israel had a right to Judea and Samaria [the Palestinian West Bank], and that before talking about the “where” of a Palestinian state, it was important to talk about “what” it would be, and whether it would recognize the existence of Israel. 

Huckabee  refrained from criticizing Obama for his handling of the diplomatic process between Israel and the Palestinians, saying he was going to cut the President “some slack” on that issue since “no other President has been able to sew up  that garment.”

Urges anti-Palestinian stance 

Huckabee did say, however, that Obama made a tactical error by calling for a complete settlement freeze in the early days of his term. Huckabee advised a completely different approach, saying Israel should tell the Palestinians that if they did not come to the negotiation table, Jerusalem would  accelerate building and encourage as much construction in the settlements as possible.  

Huckabee, who after John McCain won the second largest amount of delegates in the 2008 Republican primaries, said he would not be endorsing any of the current Republican presidential candidates, and gave any one of them an “even” chance of beating Obama. 

Acknowledges difficulty of beating Obama

Huckabee acknowledged, however, that defeating Obama would be difficult because it was always tough to beat an incumbent, who can use all the trappings on his office to campaign; because  Obama will have more money than any other candidate in US history; and because the president is not being “beaten up” in a Democratic primary. 

Whoever comes out of the Republican primary will be broke and bleeding and will then  face a president “with a billion” dollars and no campaign bruises,” Huckabee said. 

He dismissed the likelihood that Ron Paul would run as a third-party candidate, saying that this would hurt his son, Rand Paul, a Republican Senator from Kentucky. Moreover, he said, Ron Paul would then be blamed for Obama’s victory.           

LONDON — The mother of a seven-year-old boy was told to sign a school form admitting he was racist after he asked another pupil about the color of his skin.

Elliott Dearlove had asked a five-year-old boy in the playground whether he was "brown because he was from Africa."

His mother, Hayley White, 29, said she received a phone call last month to say her son had been at the center of a "racist incident."

Mother receives summons

She was then summoned to a meeting with Elliott, his teacher and the deputy head of Griffin Primary School in Hull.

Summoned: Hayley White was called to her son Elliot’s school to deal with the "racist incident."

Ms. White, an NHS healthcare assistant, said: "When I arrived at the school and asked Elliott what had happened, he became extremely upset.

"He kept saying to me, 'I was just asking a question. I didn’t mean it to be nasty,' and he was extremely distressed by it all."

Zero tolerance on 'racism'

Ms. White claimed she was asked at the meeting to read a copy of the school rules and in particular its zero-tolerance policy on racism.

"I was told I would have to sign a form acknowledging my son had made a racist remark, which would be submitted to the local education authority for further investigation," she said.

"I refused to sign it, and I told the teacher in no way did I agree the comment was racist. My son is inquisitive. He always likes to ask questions, but that doesn’t make him a racist."

In Britain teachers have begun the practice of branding children as racist or homophobic following ordinary playground squabbles.

In 2011 more than 20,000 pupils aged 11 or younger were put on record for so-called hate crimes, such as using the word "gaylord."

TEHRAN — Iran has stopped selling crude to British and French companies, the oil ministry said on Sunday, in a retaliatory measure against fresh EU sanctions on the Islamic state's lifeblood, oil.

"Exporting crude to British and French companies has been stopped ... we will sell our oil to new customers," spokesman Alireza Nikzad was quoted as saying by the Ministry of Petroleum website.

The European Union in January decided to stop importing crude from Iran from July 1 over its disputed nuclear program, which the West says is aimed at building bombs. Iran denies this.

Oil cutoff set for 'some' European countries

Iran's oil minister said on February 4 that the Islamic state would cut its oil exports to "some" European countries.

The European Commission said last week that the bloc would not be short of oil if Iran stopped crude exports, as they have enough in stock to meet their needs for around 120 days.

Industry sources told Reuters on February 16 that Iran's top oil buyers in Europe were making substantial cuts in supply months in advance of European Union sanctions, reducing flows to the continent in March by more than a third — or over 300,000 barrels daily.

France's Total has already stopped buying Iran's crude, which is subject to fresh EU embargoes. Market sources said Royal Dutch Shell has scaled back sharply. Shell had no comment on the announcement.

Greece most exposed

Among European nations, debt-ridden Greece is most exposed to Iranian oil disruption.

Motor Oil Hellas of Greece was thought to have cut out Iranian crude altogether and compatriot Hellenic Petroleum along with Spain's Cepsa and Repsol were curbing imports from Iran.

Iran was supplying more than 700,000 barrels per day (bpd) to the EU plus Turkey in 2011, industry sources said.

EU oil imports shrink

By the start of this year imports had sunk to about 650,000 bpd as some customers cut back in anticipation of an EU ban.

Saudi Arabia says it is prepared to supply extra oil either by topping up existing term contracts or by
making rare spot market sales. Iran has criticized Riyadh for the offer.

Iran said the cut will have no impact on its crude sales, warning that any sanctions on its oil will raise international crude prices.

Oil prices shoot up

Brent crude oil prices were up $1 a barrel to $118.35 shortly after Iran's state media announced last week that Tehran had cut oil exports to six European states. The report was denied shortly afterwards by Iranian officials.

"We have our own customers ... The replacements for these companies have been considered by Iran," Nikzad said.

EU's new sanctions includes a range of extra restrictions on Iran that went well beyond UN sanctions agreed last month and included a ban on dealing with Iranian banks and insurance companies and steps to prevent investment in Tehran's lucrative oil and gas sector, including refining.

The mounting sanctions are aimed at putting financial pressure on the world's fifth-largest crude oil exporter, which has little refining capacity and has to import about 40 percent of its gasoline needs for its domestic consumption.

KABUL — Iran's president Mahmoud Ahmedinejad has quietly offered to finance the Pakistani portion of a multinational gas pipeline project opposed by the United States, in a strong signal of Tehran's intent to build closer ties with its neighbor.

Ahmedinejad left Pakistan Friday after meeting with Pakistan's president Asif Ali Zardari and Afghan president Hamid Karzai, a trilateral summit seeking a formula to stabilize conditions in Afghanistan.

Three countries agree on mutual cooperation

A joint statement issued by Pakistan's foreign ministry after the meeting said the three countries agreed to "develop mutually beneficial cooperation in the energy, mining and minerals, agriculture and other sectors" without providing further details.

But an Iranian official in Islamabad who spoke to CBS News on condition of anonymity said, "The IP [Iran-Pakistan] gas pipeline is very close to our heart. President Ahmedinejad indicated Iran's intent to finance the project on the Pakistani side if Pakistan has difficulty with finding the money".

Though an exact cost is not known yet, the Iranian official said that "Iran was ready to start from financing $1.5 billion for the project and build it up further if needed."

Pipeline could eventually reach India and China

The project is proposed to transport surplus gas from southern Iran. In the past, Pakistani officials have speculated that the supply line could be extended to India and China.

 A Pakistani official who also spoke to CBS News on condition of anonymity confirmed the offer, though he said "it is still early to tell if Pakistan will go ahead with the project" in defiance of the US In the past, US officials have opposed the plan on the grounds that it will inject large new revenue in
Iran's ailing economy and further embolden the hard line Islamist country.

Asked about the pipeline Friday, Zardari said, "Iran and Pakistan are neighbors. We need to interdepend on each other. Our bilateral relationships cannot be considered or undermined by any international pressure of any kind."

'Americans have no alternative to offer'

Last summer, Iranian officials surprised their Pakistani counterparts when they disclosed that Iran had already built the pipeline to within 50 kilometers of Pakistan's border. The revelation from Iranian officials came just months after Pakistan experienced ugly riots in some of its larger cities when protests broke out over gas shortages.

The Pakistani official who spoke to CBS News said, "Theoretically, it would make a great deal of sense for Pakistan to import gas from Iran. The US may oppose the project, but the Americans have no alternative to offer for providing relief to Pakistanis. When people are protesting because they can't cook food at home, the compulsion to do whatever is necessary becomes very strong."

WASHINGTON — Lt. Col. Daniel L. Davis enlisted in the Army in 1985, left briefly to complete  ROTC, and has been rising in the officer ranks ever since. 

 He put all those years of hard work at risk this weekend when he went outside  his chain-of-command and told the press, and the Senate, what he sees as the lies being told to the American people by its military leaders.

After spending 12 months in country, covering more than 9,000 miles talking  to American troops, Col. Davis came away with a clear point of view.

"What I saw bore no resemblance to rosy official statements by US military leaders about conditions on the ground," Davis says in a piece  in the Armed  Forces Journal (AFJ).

He says that while he wanted to believe US efforts in Afghanistan were  succeeding, that he would have been content to witness even minimal progress, he  failed to find even that.

"I witnessed the absence of success on virtually every  level," he says.

Across the board, US troops say the Afghans they're training are cowards  and that they can't stand them.

The violence is also taking its toll. From AFJ:

In August, I went on a dismounted  patrol with troops in the Panjwai district of Kandahar province. Several troops  from the unit had recently been killed in action, one of whom was a very popular  and experienced soldier. One of the unit’s senior officers rhetorically asked  me, “How do I look these men in the eye and ask them to go out day after day on  these missions? What’s harder: How do I look [my soldier’s] wife in the eye when  I get back and tell her that her husband died for something meaningful? How do I  do that?”

One of the senior enlisted leaders  added, “Guys are saying, ‘I hope I live so I can at least get home to R&R  leave before I get it,’ or ‘I hope I only lose a foot.’ Sometimes they even say  which limb it might be: ‘Maybe it’ll only be my left foot.’ They don’t have a  lot of confidence that the leadership two levels up really understands what  they’re living here, what the situation really is.”

Check out the full piece at the Armed  Forces Journal 



AFGHANISTAN: Some Facts & Figures

• The US administration has been locked in an unwinnable war which, according to Gen. David H. Petraeus, former Afghanistan commander and current CIA director, will last for "the rest of our lives and probably our kids' lives."

• The United States has already started withdrawing troops from Afghanistan, with 10,000 leaving in 2011, with President Obama saying another 23,000 will depart this summer.

• The United States continues its military presence in Afghanistan, even though the stated goals of the war were to remove the Taliban from power and capture or kill al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden.

• Several Taliban negotiators have begun meeting with American officials in Qatar, where they are discussing preliminary trust-building measures, including a possible prisoner transfer, several former Taliban officials say.

• The US played an instrumental role in the 1980s in arming and  training local Afghan fighters called the "Mujahideen," who were fighting Soviet occupation. Many of the Mujahideen later became key figures of al-Qaeda and the Taliban. Even after the Soviet invasion ended, the US was one of only four countries in the world which recognized the Taliban after it militarily took over Afghanistan in 1996



Information about the Townsville mutiny has never been released to the public.

But the story began to come to light when James Cook University's Ray Holyoak first began researching why US congressman [later President] Lyndon B Johnson visited Townsville for three days back in 1942.

What he discovered was evidence detailing one of the biggest uprisings within the US military.

Mutiny by African Americans

"For 70 years there's been a rumor in Townsville that there was a mutiny among African-American servicemen. In the last year and a half I've found the primary documentation evidence that that did occur in 1942," Mr. Holyoak told AM.

During World War II, Townsville was a crucial base for campaigns into the Pacific, including the Battle of the Coral Sea.

About 600 African-American troops were brought to the city to help build airfields.

Mr. Holyoak says these troops, from the 96th Battalion, US Army Corps of Engineers, were stationed at a base on the city's western outskirts known as Kelso.

This was the site for a large-scale siege lasting eight hours, which was sparked by racial taunts and violence.

Alleged abuse by white officers

"After some serial abuse by two white US officers, there were several ringleaders and they decided to machine gun the tents of the white officers," Mr. Holyoak said.

He has uncovered several documents hidden in the archives of the Queensland Police and Townsville Brigade detailing what happened that night.

According to the findings, the soldiers took to the machine guns and anti-aircraft weapons and fired into tents where their white counterparts were drinking.

More than 700 rounds were fired. At least one person was killed and dozens severely injured, and Australian troops were called in to roadblock the rioters.

Never made the press

Mr. Holyoak also discovered a report written by Robert Sherrod, a US journalist who was embedded with the troops.

It never made it to the press, but was handed to Lyndon B Johnson at a Townsville hotel and eventually filed away into the National Archives and Records Administration.

"I think at the time, it was certainly suppressed. Both the Australian and the US government would not have wanted the details of this coming out. The racial policies at the time really discluded [sic] people of color," Mr. Holyoak says.

Rumors validated

Both the Australian Defense Department and the Australian War Memorial say it could take months to research the incident, and say they have no details readily available for public release.

But Townsville historian Dr Dorothy Gibson-Wilde says the findings validate 70-year-old rumors.

"Anytime it was raised, people usually sort of said, 'Oh you know, no that can't be true. Nobody's heard about that,' and in fact it must have been kept pretty quiet from the rest of the town," she said.

Mr. Holyoak will spend the next two years researching the sentences handed out to both the officers and the mutineers involved, and why the information has been kept secret for so long.

PARIS — An appeals court in Paris upheld a three-month suspended jail sentence against former far-right leader Jean-Marie Le Pen. The punishment, which also  included a 10,000 euro ($13,000) fine, was first imposed in 2008 after Le Pen was found guilty of denying a crime against humanity.

LOS ANGELES — This week, LDS [Mormon] Church leaders apologizedfor the unauthorized proxy baptism of the parents of Holocaust® survivor and Nazi hunter Simon Wiesenthaland punished Mormons responsible for the violation of the Church’s policies against posthumous baptism of Holocaust® victims, while Nobel Laureate Elie Wiesel called on presidential candidate Mitt Romney to intervene in the situation.

(Wiesel’s name was also located in the LDS genealogical database by Salt Lake City-based watchdog Helen Radkey, but Church officials clarified that the names of Mr. Wiesel and his relatives were never submitted for baptism.)

These incidents have reignited a long-simmering controversy over the LDS practice of baptism for the dead. Mormons view posthumous baptism as a demonstration of care and respect for ancestors, and they emphasize that the rites are ineffectual unless accepted by the souls of the dead. (Good secular explanations of baptism for the dead are also here and here.)

But Mormon theological reasoning means little to Jews and others, who view the performance of an unsolicited religious ritual over an individual name as a violation. For Jews, the fact that the religious ritual is a baptism connects with forced baptisms of Jews dating back to fourth-century Rome and other historical persecutions by Christians.

Further, the idea of having one’s name “inscribed in the Book of Life” carries deep theological and cultural significance among Jewish people. Given the historical and religious context, it is understandable that Jews would view having their ancestors’ names inscribed in Mormon temple records as a particular affront.

Jewish and LDS Church officials reached an accord in 2010 that was supposed to have protected the names of Holocaust® victims from proxy baptism. According to the terms of the accord, as reported in the Deseret News:

Church members are now asked to certify that their submissions for proxy baptisms meet church policy. Should any inappropriate submissions be identified, the new system allows the record of the baptism to be removed from the public database and the submitters are contacted to ensure such errors are not repeated. To that end, church staff also regularly search records to identify inappropriate submissions and prevent such baptisms from being performed.

In practical terms, this means that users who accesses the LDS “Family Search” genealogy database today must scroll through a list of policies including the proviso that names of “Jewish Holocaust® victims” should not be submitted by non-family members, and then must indicate that they are in keeping with policy when they submit names for proxy rites.

But violations continue, and they are a source of great shame and embarrassment. Perhaps more can be done. Listening in on conversations among Mormons this week, I’ve heard important ideas bubbling up from within the community about how to instill greater accountability:

• What if LDS Church members who use the Family Search database to submit names for proxy religious rites were required to complete an annual online training with explicit instructions and penalties for inappropriate submission of names?
• What if LDS Church members who use the Family Search database were required to provide an electronic signature each time they submitted names for proxy religious rites acknowledging that they agreed to forfeit access to the database if they were found in violation of the policy?
• What if high-volume submitters were randomly audited for documentation of direct ancestral ties to the names they submitted for baptism, on penalty of being denied access to the database, or worse?
• What if letters were read in LDS Sunday meetings stressing the importance of the no-baptize policies, or talks given at LDS meetings by ranking Church officials stressing respect for the sanctity of the no-baptize policies?
• What if the Church crowdsourced efforts to monitor databases for the names of Holocaust® victims?

These steps may not address the deeper objections people of other faiths have to proxy baptisms, but would demonstrate a deeper commitment on the part of Mormons to respecting the memory of the Wiesenthal family and other Holocaust® victims.

WASHINGTON — Marriage across racial and ethnic lines continues to be on the rise in the United States. The share of new marriages between spouses of a different race or ethnicity increased to 15.1% in 2010, and the share of all current marriages that are either interracial or interethnic has reached an all-time high of 8.4%.

In 1980, just 3% of all marriages and less than 7% of all new marriages were across racial or ethnic lines. Both of those shares have more than doubled in the past three decades.

More Americans say it's 'OK'

While newlyweds who "married out" between 2008 and 2010 are very similar to those who "married in," judging by characteristics such as education, income and age, there are sharper differences among them based on the race, ethnicity and gender partnerships of the couples.

Just as intermarriage has become more common, public attitudes have become more accepting. More than four-in-ten (43%) Americans say that more people of different races marrying each other has been a change for the better in our society, while only about one-in-ten think it is a change for the worse.

Read the full report for detailed results on these findings:

• The rates of intermarriage among different racial and ethnic groups
• Socio-economic characteristics and education of newlyweds who intermarry
• Gender differences among those who "marry out" of their race or ethnic group
• Differences in "marrying out" among native-born population and immigrants
• Regional differences for intermarriage

LOS ANGELES — The Mormon Church has apologized for posthumously baptizing the parents of Nazi-hunter Simon Wiesenthal.

Jews Asher and Rosa Rapp Wiesenthal were baptized in proxy ceremonies in the US states of Arizona and Utah in January, records show.

Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints spokesman Michael Purdy said the Church' s leaders "sincerely regret" the actions of "an individual member."

'Outraged'

The Los Angeles-based Simon Wiesenthal Center denounced the news.

"We are outraged that such insensitive actions continue in the Mormon temples," said Rabbi Abraham Cooper, a spokesman at the center.

The Mormon religion allows baptism after death, and believes the departed soul can then accept or reject the baptismal rites.

Not kosher

An agreement in 1995 was supposed to ban the practice of baptizing by proxy Holocaust® victims, after it was discovered the names of hundreds of thousands of those who died had been entered into Mormon records.

Simon Wiesenthal's parents are long since deceased, with his father dying in World War I and his mother [allegedly] perishing in the Holocaust®.

He himself 'survived'

Wiesenthal himself died in 2005 after surviving the Holocaust® and dedicating his life to  documenting [alleged] Nazi crimes and hunting down perpetrators.

Mr. Purdy told the Associated Press news agency that the church considered the act "a serious breach of our protocol."

According to Mr. Purdy, the names of the Wiesenthal family were simply entered into a genealogical database by one person.

The Wiesel also baptized

"We have suspended indefinitely this person's ability to access our genealogy records," he said.

The name of that individual or the individuals who performed the rite were not released.

Evidence that Wiesenthal's parents had been baptized was found by Helen Radkey, a researcher and former Mormon, AP reported.

She regularly checks the Church' s database, and also recently found the names of Nobel laureate and Holocaust® survivor Elie Wiesel and several family members on the Mormon list.

Rabbi not satisfied

"None of the three names were submitted for baptism and they would not have been under the Church' s guidelines and procedures," said Mr. Purdy, the Mormon Church spokesman said.

Rabbi Cooper said any further discussion of the problem was useless.

"The only way such insensitive practices would finally stop is if church leaders finally decided to change their practices and policies on posthumous baptisms, a move which this latest outrage proves that they are unwilling to do," he said.