Paul Joseph Watson / Global Research & Prison Planet & Sorcha Faal / What Does It Mean.com – 2008-02-04 09:46:52
http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=7976
Middle East Internet Blackouts
Spur Geopolitical Suspicions
Paul Joseph Watson / Global Research & Prison Planet
(February 2, 2008) — Unprecedented mass Internet outages throughout the Middle East and Asia after no less than four undersea Internet cables were cut without explanation are spurring suspicions that a major event of geopolitical proportions may be just around the corner.
Internet blackouts are impacting large tracts of Asia, the Middle East and North Africa after four undersea cable connections were severed. Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, the United Arab Emirates, Kuwait, Bahrain, Pakistan and India, are all experiencing severe problems.
According to InternetTraffic.com, Iran has been completely cut off from the Internet, though Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s blog can still be accessed. Most notably, Israel and Iraq are unaffected by the outage.
“Stephan Beckert, an analyst with TeleGeography, a research company that consults on global Internet issues, said the damaged cables collectively account for the majority of international communications between Europe and the Middle East,” reports CNN.
Officials say that the cause behind the severing of the cables remains unknown, but United Arab Emirates’ second largest telecom company said the cables were cut due to ships dragging their anchors. Is this a precursor to throw a veil over an imminent staged event in the Middle East?
“What are the odds? Who benefits? asks the Crimes and Corruptions blog. “Let’s see. Iranian rapprochement: “Recent months have brought signs of a growing rapprochement between Iran and Egypt.”
“What nation would not like this and has subs which could cut the cables? Why do it? Payback as over-the-net business is badly damaged. Or is this a setup for more? Note the internet is working just fine in Israel.”
Over at WhatReallyHappened.com, Mike Rivero points out that the mysterious cable sabotage could portend another imperial Neo-Con crusade in the works.
“The biggest problem the Bush administration faced during Iraq were images coming over the internet that showed the horrors being visited on the Iraqi people, and exposed the government’s lies about Saddam,” he writes.
“I am greatly concerned that these undersea cable cuttings are intended to prevent the world from seeing something that is about to happen, other than through the government-controlled propaganda/media.”
US Crashes Internet In Middle East
After Saudi Threat,
Russia Responds With Air Forces
Sorcha Faal / What Does It Mean.com
MOSCOW (February 3, 2008) — Reports circulating in the Kremlin today are painting a grim picture of just how desperate US War Leaders have become as their economy continues its freefall towards total bankruptcy by their crashing of Global Internet access for the Middle East’s banking centers in Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Abu Dhabi, Iran, UAR, Turkey and Kuwait.
These reports state that the Americans became “enraged” this past week when the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) rejected US demands for an immediate increase in oil production.
Further angering the Americans this past week was Turkey’s rejection of US demands for them to sever banking ties with Iran’s Bank Mellat, which allows Iranian continued access to Global banking resources.
But, these reports state, the greatest fears of the United States were raised this past week when Saudi Arabia “warned” the United States to “back off” of its threats against Iran or face the Saudi’s decoupling the US dollar from its enormous World oil trade transactions.
Though the American President personally went to the Saudi Kingdom to lobby the US’s Middle East allies in agreeing for attacks against Iran for the Iranians decoupling of the US dollar from its oil trade, Bush was quickly rebuffed.
It should be noted that those Nations that have dared to decouple the US Dollar from their oil trade — Iraq, Iran, Russia and Venezuela — have come under withering attacks from the Americans, and their Western Allies; none worse than the Iraqis who are reported to have suffered over 1 million deaths since being invaded by the US in 2003.
But, as these reports state, the “worst nightmare” of the Americans appeared to be coming true this past week when their Saudi Arabian allies were reported to have begun the decoupling of the US dollar from their oil trade with the intention of replacing the rapidly declining American currency with the European Euro.
American War Leaders, though, have had previous warnings of the Saudis growing fears of being the holders of trillions of declining US Dollars with Saudi Arabia, for the first time, refusing to drop their interest rates in “lock-step” with the US Federal Reserve, and leading to fears of a “stampede” by other Middle Eastern Nations out of US-dollar-backed assets.
Under such a threat, and with the Saudi King growing closer to Iran’s President Ahmadinejad, Russian Military Analysts state in these reports that the United States invoked one of their so called “nuclear options” by severing the three major undersea cables connecting the Middle East’s major banking centers to their Western, and Global, counterparts.
The significance to the severing of these cables is the Middle East Banking Centers being denied access to the Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunication (SWIFT), based in Brussels and which carries up to 12.7 million messages a day containing instructions on many of the International transfers of money between banks, lies in Saudi Arabia, or any other Middle East Nation, being unable to change their previously, before loss of communication, encoded currency instructions from being changed.
Moscow’s actions against the West, in the severing by the United States of these cables, was swift as President Putin ordered Russian Air Force Fighters and Bombers to take immediate action to protect the Russian Nations vital undersea cables in the Arctic and Atlantic Oceans.
To some of the Russian Air Force assets used we can read as reported by the Reuters News Service article titled “Russia sends bombers, fighters to Atlantic, Arctic,” and which says:
“Air force pilots will carry out practice in the areas involving reconnaissance, missile-bombing attacks on a navy attack force of a hypothetical enemy, air-to-air combat and refuelling and patrolling,” an air force spokesman said. The bomber group included two Tupolev Tu-160 strategic bombers, codenamed “Blackjack” by NATO, two turbo-prop Tu-95 “Bear” strategic bombers, and eight Tu-22 “Blinder” bombers. MiG-31 and Su-27 fighters were also sent to the region.”
One Russian Banking Official, wishing to remain anonymous, [stated] that, “Should the Saudi’s effectively decouple their oil from the US dollar, the United States, for all practical purposes will cease to be a World power as it economy will collapse completely as the US dollar has no value in and of itself due to the staggering debt of the Americans. Without oil they are nothing.
© February 3, 2008 EU and US all rights reserved. Sorcha Faal sorchafaal@fastmail.fm
Posted in accordance with Title 17, US Code, for noncommercial, educational purposes.
Ships Did Not Cause Internet Cable Damage
Khaleej Times, from the Emirates /Agence France-Presse
CAIRO (February 3, 2008) — Damage to undersea Internet cables in the Mediterranean that hit business across the Middle East and South Asia was not caused by ships, Egypt’s communications ministry said on Sunday, ruling out earlier reports.
The transport ministry added that footage recorded by onshore video cameras of the location of the cables showed no maritime traffic in the area when the cables were damaged.
‘The ministry’s maritime transport committee reviewed footage covering the period of 12 hours before and 12 hours after the cables were cut and no ships sailed the area,’ a statement said.
‘The area is also marked on maps as a no-go zone and it is therefore ruled out that the damage to the cables was caused by ships,’ the statement added.
Two cables were damaged earlier this week in the Mediterranean sea and another off the coast of Dubai, causing widespread disruption to Internet and international telephone services in Egypt, Gulf Arab states and South Asia.
A fourth cable linking Qatar to the United Arab Emirates was damaged on Sunday causing yet more disruptions, telecommunication provider Qtel said.
Earlier reports said that the damage had been caused by ships that had been diverted off their usual route because of bad weather.
Egypt’s communication and information technology ministry said it would report its findings to the owners of the two damaged Mediterranean cables, FLAG Telecom and SEA-ME-WE4.
A repair ship was expected to begin work to fix the two Mediterranean cables on Tuesday.
