1) AP: U.S. to put high-tech towers along borders
2) Dominion: Public kept in dark about North American integration
3) PR: Air Canada to halt deportations aboard its aircraft
4) PR: Caledonia Group Plans Public Forum in Support of Six Nations
5) CP: Man., Que. migrant workers vote to join union
6) UK report on migrant deaths "Driven to Desperate Measures"
7) US: National Fast for Immigrant Justice
8) Lebanese Crisis and Its Impact on Immigrants and Refugees
9) In Case I Disappear By William Rivers Pitt
10) Border Invaders: The Perfect Swarm Heads South by Mike Davis

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U.S. to put high-tech towers along borders: report
Last Updated Wed, 20 Sep 2006 17:41:20 EDT
The Associated Press

Boeing Co. will be awarded a government contract worth $80-million US to
provide new high-tech ways to catch illegal immigrants trying to cross
land borders into the U.S. from Canada and Mexico, a congressional aide
said.

The Department of Homeland Security was expected to announce as early as
Wednesday the contract to help secure the borders, which reportedly
focuses on a network of high-tech guard towers, cameras and motion
detectors.

The full project had previously been estimated at $2 billion US, but the
Boeing award will be less, said the congressional aide, who spoke on
condition of anonymity because the department had not yet made its
announcement.

Homeland Security Department spokesman Jarrod Agen would not comment.

"Legally we are restricted from discussing details of the contract until
the award is officially announced," Agen said Wednesday.

Chicago-based Boeing was among several major defence companies competing
for the job. While other companies' proposals relied more heavily on using
flying drones to patrol the border, Boeing focused on a network of 1,800
high-tech towers, equipped with cameras and motion detectors, that could
feed live information to Border Patrol agents.

The Boeing-led team's victory was reported in several newspapers
Wednesday, citing unnamed sources.

The contract, part of the Secure Border Initiative, is the government's
latest attempt to use advanced technology to solve the illegal immigration
problem, which lawmakers have called a national security issue and which
has been given new attention in light of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist
attacks.

Homeland Security gave companies chasing the contract — including Lockheed
Martin Corp. and Northrop Grumman Corp. — unusual freedom to come up with
their own ideas for how best to apply new and developing technologies to
the problem.

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http://dominionpaper.ca/canadian_news/2006/09/26/public_kep.html
Public kept in dark about talks on North American integration

>From September 12-14, leaders from all three North American Conservative
governments met in Banff, British Columbia for the second annual
conference on North American integration, entitled "The 2006 North
American Forum." According to internal documents "not for public release"
obtained by the Banff Crag and Canyon, politicians including the Minister
of Public Safety, Stockwell Day, and the Minister of Defence, Gordon
O'Conner, met with government and business leaders from the US, Canada and
Mexico, including US Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, the president and
CEO of Canada West Foundation (an Alberta think-tank), a subdirector of
PEMEX (a Mexican oil company) and the president of the Lockheed Martin
Corp. (the world’s largest military contractor).

Although the conference, organized by the Canadian Council of Chief
Executives, examines issues of interest to the public, like North American
integration of energy and security, it has been held in secret for the
second year in a row, without advance warning and without a press release.

According to the Crag, the spokesperson for the forum, John Larsen,
refused to reveal who had paid for the forum or whether or not Rumsfeld
was attending. Larsen did talk about the secret nature of the event: "You
can imagine that if this was all televised or open to public scrutiny, the
nature of the conversations and ultimately what you would be able to do
with those conversations and how far you might be able to advance the
solutions around it would be different."

Maude Barlow, writing in the Toronto Star, pointed out that, "since Paul
Martin, Vicente Fox and George W. Bush signed the Security and Prosperity
Partnership in March 2005, discussions on continental integration have
gone underground. The media have paid little attention to this
far-reaching agreement, thus Canadians are unaware that a dozen working
groups are currently 'harmonizing' Canadian and US regulations on
everything from food to drugs to the environment and even more contentious
issues like foreign policy."

As of Sept. 25, only the Banff Crag and Canyon and the Toronto Star had
reported that the conference had occurred at all.

Geordie Gwalgen Dent

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Air Canada to halt deportations aboard its aircraft

MONTREAL, September 29 /CNW Telbec/ - Air Canada has the pleasure of
announcing to its clientele and the media the recent adoption of a
resolution aimed at re-evaluating certain aspects of its periodic
collaboration with the federal authorities in the area of immigration.
During the 2006 Annual General Share-holders Assembly held in Montreal on
May 30th, Resolution 2.3.28, initially brought forward by staff
representatives of company board members, was formulated and adopted.

The resolution aims, among its principal goals, to provide a concrete
response to concerns expressed by our clients, to conform to guiding
principles of international associations concerned with the regulation of
air transportation, and to increase on-board security of Air Canada
aircraft.

Robert Milton, Chairman, President and CEO of ACE Aviation Holdings Inc,
stated during his 30 May 2006 remarks, « ? it is an idea which has long
been in motion among foreign companies, and which I have communicated to
the highest levels of Transportation Canada and the Canadian Air Transport
Security Authority; it addresses a problematic situation, whether we are
talking flight safety, consumer confidence, or the simple logistics of
flight reservations, check-in, and boarding. In the current context, with
the security measures already in place occassioning numerous
inconveniences to our clients, we should not be afraid to move forward on
this issue. »

The resolution will phase out the deportation of immigrants on all
commercial flights of Air Canada and its affiliates by the end of the
present year.

A Special Committee has been struck to negotiate a withdrawal from the
current arrangement between Air Canada and the Canadian Border Services
Agency under which the latter has been permitted priority reservation of
seats on all flights of Air Canada and affiliates. The Committee is
mandated to bring forward Air Canada's concerns to Federal authorities and
to conclude an agreement between the two parties according to a fixed
time-table at the end of which passengers aboard Air Canada aircraft will
be composed exclusively of Air Canada customers and professional staff.

The Special Committee, comprising international air transportation
specialists, was formed pursuant to a recommendation by upper management
of the Star Alliance, which plans to standardise these measures throughout
its network.

To read our press releases online, visit :
http://www.micronewswire.cjb.net/index_en.html

Pour consulter nos communiqués en ligne, rendez vous sur CNW :
http://www.micronewswire.cjb.net/

-30-

Information : Isabelle Arthur (Montreal) (514) 422-5788
Laura Cooke (Toronto) (416) 263-5576

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PRESS RELEASE - SEPT 19TH, 2006

Caledonia Group Plans Public Forum in Support of Six Nations

On Saturday, September 30, the Caledonia based group Community Friends for
Peace and Understanding with Six Nations will be holding a public forum in
Caledonia entitled “Moving Beyond Conflict and Blame: Why Canadians Should
Support Six Nations Land Rights.” The meeting is aimed at bringing
together people in Caledonia and surrounding communities to discuss the
Douglas Creek reclamation and the larger issue of indigenous land rights
in Canada.

The event will be held from 1-4 p.m. at the McKinnon Park Secondary School
(91 Haddington Street) in Caledonia. It will begin with a series of
presentations that will include: Jan Watson a Caledonia resident and
spokesperson for the Community Friends group, Andrew Orkin a lawyer
specializing in indigenous land claims, and Rolf Gerstenberger the
President of United Steelworkers Local 1005.

According to Community Friends spokesperson and Caledonia resident Jan
Watson, “we are holding this event as a way to try overcome the tension
and conflict in our community as well as to show that there are good
reasons why Canadians should demand that the government honor the treaties
and obligations it has made with First Nations peoples."

The objective of this meeting is to provide a forum for peaceful and
respectful discussion on the issue of the Douglas Creek reclamation and
the larger question of indigenous sovereignty and land rights in Canada.
As Watson notes "the primary aim of the meeting is to show that the
standoff over Douglas Creek Estates should not be simply portrayed as a
conflict between native people and non-native people, but rather one based
on larger questions of human rights, social justice and nation to nation
relationships.”

For more information about the event, please contact the Community Friends
group at smiley100 at mountaincable.net or by phone at 289-284-0154. The
group's web site can be found at www.honorsixnations.com.

-30-

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Man., Que. migrant workers vote to join union; similar vote unlikely in Ont.
Canadian Press
Published: Thursday, September 21, 2006

LEAMINGTON, Ont. (CP) - Migrant farm workers at three farms in Quebec and
one in Manitoba have voted to join the United Food and Commercial Workers
Union. The union called the vote a "historical breakthrough" which could
eventually impact thousands of migrant agricultural workers brought each
season to Canada. Application hearings will be held before the Quebec
Labour Relations Commission on Sept. 24 and before the Manitoba Labour
Relations Board before the end of October. Should the bids be approved,
workers at the four farms will be able to bargain for improved wages and
working conditions for the first time, which up until now have been set by
the Mexican and Canadian governments under the Seasonal Agricultural
Worker Program.

Every year nearly 18,000 workers from Mexico and Caribbean countries are
brought to Canada to help plant and harvest crops. They typically are
paid minimum wage and the union claims many of the workers are subject to
intolerable working and housing conditions.

"These men and women supply an essential service ... we have food on our
tables because of these workers," Wayne Hanley, the national director of
UFCW Canada said in a statement Thursday. "By choosing to form a union,"
said Hanley, "these workers will have a say in how they are treated and
compensated."

Most migrant workers are employed in Ontario, but they are banned from
joining a union under provincial legislation, said Leamington, Ont.-based
union official Stan Raper. The union filed a legal challenge in 2003 to
allow agricultural workers to join unions, but the courts have yet to rule
on matter, Raper told radio station CHYR Thursday.

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Driven to desperate measures
www.irr.org.uk/pdf/Driventodesperatemeasures.pdf

221 asylum seekers and migrants have died either in the UK or attempting
to reach the UK in the past seventeen years

Driven to desperate measures
By Harmit Athwal © Institute of Race Relations 2006

No section of our society is more vulnerable than asylum seekers and
undocumented migrants. Forced by circumstances beyond their control to
seek a life outside their home countries, prevented by our laws from
entering legally and from working, denied a fair hearing by the asylum
system, excluded from health and safety protection at work, kept from
social care and welfare, unhoused and destitute, vilified by the media and
therefore dehumanised in the popular imagination, their hopes of another
life are finally extinguished.

The IRR has catalogued a roll call of death of the 221 asylum seekers and
migrants who have died either in the UK or attempting to reach the UK in
the past seventeen years.

97 died taking dangerous and highly risky methods to enter the country.
With legal barriers in place to prevent them securing visas or work
permits to enter legally and sanctions applying to above-board carriers,
the desperate stow away on planes and lorries or attempt to cross the
channel in makeshift boats or cling to trains. The number recorded here is
probably only a fraction of those who have died in this way. Our figures
rely on news reports and by virtue of the subject matter these deaths are
not news.

70 died as an indirect consequence of the iniquities of the
immigration/asylum system - either by taking their own lives when claims
were not allowed, or by meeting accidental deaths evading deportation, or
during the deportation itself, or by being prevented medical care, through
becoming destitute in the UK.

Since 1989, there have been 71 suicides of asylum seekers and foreign
nationals. 36 suicides of asylum seekers took place in the community and
22 suicides of asylum seekers and foreign nationals in prisons, removal
centres and psychiatric custody. Suicides are now of particular concern.
In the last five years alone there have been 41 suicides - 15 in detention
and 26 in the community. In 2004, 12 people died at their own hand. In the
last year there have been 5 suicides in the community.

6 asylum seekers have died since 1989 at one removal centre alone -
Harmondsworth. In the last five years, 8 asylum seekers/migrant workers
have died as a result of a racially motivated attack. In the last five
years, 21 people have died as result of using dangerous and risky methods
to enter the country. 4 have died after injuring themselves while jumping
onto trains traveling through the Channel Tunnel in France and another 4
have died in the channel itself. 4 have died while stowing away in planes
and being killed by the extreme temperatures. And another 7 people have
died after being run over or injured after stowing away in vehicles.

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JOIN THE NATIONAL FAST FOR IMMIGRANT JUSTICE
SEPTEMBER 30, 2006

September 30, 2006 marks the tenth anniversary of the enactment of the
Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act, (IIRIRA), a
heinous anti-immigrant and anti-family law. IIRIRA has caused great
suffering and irreparable harm to U.S. citizen children across the
country, and has torn countless families of U.S. citizens and immigrants
apart. IIRIRA mandates detention and deportation for whole classes of
immigrants, without regard to the hardships that will be suffered.

Edith Riva is a US citizen and mother of two young children. She filed a
petition for her husband to obtain permanent residence in the US. When he
went to Mexico for his visa appointment, he was told that under IIRIRA law
he would have to wait in Mexico for ten years. His application for a
waiver was denied. Edith cries herself to sleep every night and doesn't
know what to tell her children when they ask "when is daddy coming home?"
If IIRIRA had not become law, Elvira Arrellano, a single mother of a U.S.
citizen child, who has been given sanctuary in a church in Chicago, would
have been able to apply in Immigration Court for permanent residence based
on hardship to herself and her son, through a form of relief called
Suspension of Deportation. IIRIRA eliminated this form of relief.

Many of IIRIRA's harshest provisions are being applied retroactively,
causing even more suffering. IIRIRA also precludes judicial review of many
government decision, and bars millions of immigrants with U.S. citizen
family members and with long residence in our country from returning to
the United States for up to ten years, and in many cases for life!!!
IIRIRA is cruel, inhumane, and draconian. It must be repealed!!

The National Fast for Immigrant Justice will call attention to the horrors
of IIRIRA and put a human face on the suffering that this terrible law is
inflicting on the most vulnerable among us. Participants in the National
Fast for Immigrant Justice will donate the money they would have spent on
food to organizations that fight for justice for immigrants, and will
contact elected officials and let them know that they are fasting and why.

The Chairperson of the National Fast for Immigrant Justice is Delores
Huerta, the co-founder with Cesar Chavez of the United Farm Workers Union
(UFW). September 30, 2006 also marks the 44th anniversary of the
founding of the UFW. Cesar would often take part in fasts to raise
consciousness of the plight of migrant workers, and their struggle for
justice. The National Fast for Immigrant Justice is dedicated to Cesar
Chavez.

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http://www.migrationinformation.org/Feature/display.cfm?id=419

The Lebanese Crisis and Its Impact on Immigrants and Refugees
By Kara Murphy
Migration Policy Institute

September 1, 2006

Residents in Lebanon — citizens and foreigners — faced a perilous journey
to evacuate the war-torn country and reach safe havens in Syria and Cyprus
this summer. Before the ceasefire went into effect on August 14, up to
10,000 people arrived at the Syrian border each day, according to a report
from the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) in early
August.

Other people arriving at the Syrian border included tourists from the Gulf
region who were required to pay to enter Syria, as well as a number of
poor Palestinian refugees who were rejected.

About 15,000 American citizens (many of Lebanese origin) were evacuated,
as were thousands of Europeans and Australians.

Runways at Beirut's main airport, major bridges, and roads were destroyed
by the Israeli military in the fight against Hezbollah that began July 12.
In major southern cities like Tyre, infrastructure was so badly damaged
that people often were trapped without access to food, water, electricity,
or medical care.

At press time, Lebanon’s total losses amount to an estimated $9.4 billion,
according to Lebanon’s Higher Relief Commission. In cooperation with the
Lebanese government and the United Nations, Sweden hosted an international
donor conference on August 31 that brought together about 60 governments
and organizations to discuss humanitarian needs and early reconstruction
efforts in Lebanon.

The plight of Lebanese citizens has received extensive media coverage
around the world. However, another important population has been often
left out of the picture: Lebanon's hundreds of thousands of migrant
workers and refugees. Their hardships began well before the conflict, yet
their stories were rarely told in the media.

Estimates of the number of migrants in Lebanon vary widely since no
official records are kept on the migrant population. In the formal
economy, it is estimated that foreign workers, mainly from Sri Lanka and
Egypt, make up 30 percent of the official workforce, particularly in the
domestic and service sectors. Refugees, the majority of whom are
Palestinian, and asylum seekers make up about 10 percent of the total
Lebanese population of 3.9 million according to the International
Organization for Migration (IOM).

This article investigates the impact of the crisis on several vulnerable
groups, including Lebanese citizens in Syria, internally displaced persons
(IDPs), and Lebanon's migrant workers and refugees. Finally, it highlights
the efforts of the Lebanese diaspora to help fellow nationals.

Lebanese in Syria and the Internally Displaced

By the time Lebanon and Israel signed the ceasefire agreement, the number
of Lebanese displaced by the conflict had reached nearly one million. Of
those, about 180,000 found refuge in Syria. Another 500,000 IDPs escaped
to mountainous regions of Lebanon, where they were sheltered in schools or
in homes of host families.

Throughout the crisis, the Syrian government has emphasized its support
for Lebanon. Political support was also reflected in its general openness
to displaced Lebanese arriving in Syria. In coordination with humanitarian
organizations, including UNHCR and the Syrian Arab Red Crescent, the
Syrian government has worked to provide shelter and relief to Lebanese.

Even in poor rural towns, Syrians accepted refugees into their homes and
donated what little food and blankets they owned. Given Syria's limited
resources, UNHCR appealed to the international community in early August
for help with relief efforts. UNHCR had received nearly $11 million (of
nearly $19 million sought) as of August 17.

In response, many countries, including Argentina, Bahrain, and others,
sent assistance to Syria in the form of monetary contributions or
shipments of supplies. The Turkish government sent nearly 40 truckloads of
humanitarian supplies to assist Lebanese in need.

Soon after the ceasefire announcement, many displaced Lebanese chose to
make the journey home despite fears that they would have nothing to which
to return. Because authorities and agencies are concentrating their relief
operations in the hardest-hit towns, people in outlying areas remain in
shelters, awaiting assistance to return home.

Nearly 300,000 Lebanese in Syria and Lebanon are still displaced,
Lebanon’s Higher Relief Commission reported on August 29. They either have
no home return to or fear the return is too dangerous. Their fears are not
unfounded: the Higher Relief Commission reported that in the two weeks
after the ceasefire, nearly 60 people, including several children, were
injured by still-active Israeli explosives in southern Lebanon.

Both the displaced and returning populations suffer from a lack of food,
medicine and safe drinking water. Since extreme fuel shortages shut down
many hospitals, UNHCR and other aid agencies are coordinating relief
operations to send 100 tons of fuel to southern Lebanon.

Migrant Workers

Workers from Sri Lanka, India, Vietnam, the Philippines, Ethiopia,
andelsewhere have been coming to Lebanon since the oil boom of the 1970s.
A majority of migrant workers are women, most of them working in the
domestic sector.

The governments of Sri Lanka and the Philippines encouraged emigration for
the purpose of obtaining remittances from workers abroad. No formal
agreements existed between Lebanese and Asian governments to facilitate
the movement of migrants. Instead, Lebanese employment agencies
established relationships with Asian agencies, and migrants were recruited
based on the demands of Lebanese employers.

This practice, facilitated by the Lebanese government’s laissez-faire
labor-market policy, continues today.

>From the early 1900s until the start of the 15-year civil war in 1975,
Lebanese households employed local and foreign Arab women as domestic
workers. During the oil boom, Lebanese employers began importing Asian
labor, a practice adopted from the Gulf states. This allowed them to hire
workers who were more submissive and who would work for lower wages than
Lebanese, Syrian, and other Arab workers.

Additionally, as a result of heightened political tensions after the civil
war, some employers preferred to hire Asian or African women, who were
less likely to cause tension in the household than local Arab women who
may have been from opposing religious or political factions.

Currently, Lebanon's Central Administration of Statistics (CAS) maintains
the only official record of migrants workers in the country: work permits.
According to CAS, 90,000 work permits were issued to foreigners in 2002
(see Figure 1).

But, according to some foreign embassy records, the number of their
nationals is three times the CAS figure. While Sri Lanka's embassy
estimated that around 160,000 of its nationals resided in Lebanon, only
32,497 reportedly held work permits; the rest, who number between 80,000
and 170,000, may hold expired work permits, be unemployed, or be in the
country without authorization.

The contract-labor work system in Lebanon isolates migrants from both the
local population and from their home country. Employment agencies charge
employers in Lebanon high fees to recruit the migrants. As a result,
employers withhold their workers' passports to ensure they cannot leave.

Indeed, since the fighting began, IOM has reported numerous cases of
employers threatening migrants in order to prevent them from evacuating.
Migrant workers without official identity or travel documents wanting to
evacuate have had to go to their home government's embassy to get the
needed documents or transportation to safety.

However, some foreign governments, like that of Vietnam, do not have
embassies in Lebanon. Migrants from those countries have been stranded for
long periods without travel documents. Despite the dangers, many migrant
workers have chosen not to leave, according to reports from aid workers.
Their reasons vary from fear of losing their jobs to going home with no
money after years of work to returning to a country where they have no
home.

Even governments with embassies in Lebanon have lacked the capacity to
help their nationals because they are understaffed and underfunded. Those
with some of the largest numbers of migrant workers —Sri Lanka,
Bangladesh, Ethiopia, and Ghana — also have the fewest resources to find
and evacuate their nationals.

Yet foreign governments have been willing to work together, even when
their own resources were limited. For example, India agreed to allow Sri
Lankan workers on their ships evacuating Lebanon, and Jordan and Syria
offered 4,000 jobs to Sri Lankans escaping Lebanon. Still, neither Syria
nor Jordan have clarified what long-term rights these migrants will be
accorded.

Most migrant workers in Lebanon have depended heavily on the help of
international agencies, such as IOM, UNHCR, and CARITAS, a Catholic relief
organization, which coordinate with embassies in order to assist stranded
migrants. Since July 20, IOM has evacuated more than 13,000 migrants from
Lebanon. Once in Syria, migrants were placed in shelters, where they
waited until IOM could arrange their flights home. Following the
ceasefire, IOM expected to evacuate at least 1,000 more third-country
nationals provided adequate funding was available.

According to a representative from IOM, security has been a major concern
in its operations. Convoys carrying over 700 people at one time make a
dangerous, three-hour passage from Beirut to the border. Additionally, for
migrants to return home, IOM had to coordinate with countries such as
Saudi Arabia to allow charter flights over areas the organization had
never flown over before.

Thus far, foreign governments have supported IOM in its crisis-related
efforts. Norway has provided IOM with tents, family kits, blankets, and
other materials worth $640,000. The European Commission started a fund of
11 million euros to evacuate nationals from developing countries. This
fund makes up more than half of the Commission's total relief budget for
Lebanon. Individual European governments have also made significant
contributions.

Refugees in Lebanon

Refugees and asylum seekers in Lebanon make up about 10 percent of the
country's total population. Palestinians make up the majority of refugees,
followed by Kurds, Iraqis, and Sudanese (see Table 1).

Refugees have no official status in Lebanon, as the country has not signed
the 1951 UN Convention relating to the Status of Refugees. UNHCR, which
established an office in Beirut in the 1980s, keeps a close watch of
refugees and asylum seekers. The United Nations Relief and Works Agency
(UNRWA), in existence since 1949, operates under a different mandate than
UNHCR, and is responsible solely for Palestinian refugees.

Although refugees came to Lebanon seeking safety from violence and
instability in their home countries, the fighting has come to them.
Lebanon's refugee camps became home to both refugees and Lebanese
civilians in July. Many camps have been bombarded by Israeli attacks,
including the country's largest Palestinian camp, where at least two
refugees were killed and 15 were injured in August.

Refugees who tried to flee Lebanon generally faced long wait times, or
even rejection at the Syria-Lebanon border. Of the hundreds of thousands
of Palestinian refugees, only 1,000 had been allowed into Syria by the end
of July. Most of the stranded refugees held valid Lebanese-Palestinian
documents but were nevertheless denied by Syrian officials.

UNRWA found that in the three main refugee camps in southern Lebanon, only
around 2,900 out of 25,000 refugees left their camps. Attempts to supply
water, electricity, and food to refugees still in camps proved difficult
as attacks intensified. Nevertheless, UNRWA reported that a total of
nearly 29,000 displaced people (both Palestinians and Lebanese) received
aid. In addition, the agency opened numerous shelters in schools in both
Syria and Lebanon to house Palestinian and Lebanese refugees.

UNHCR reacted to complaints of rejection at the Syrian border by asking
Syria to loosen border controls for Palestinian refugees. All governments,
UNHCR stated, should follow the principle of nonrejection at their borders
during this time of crisis. It asked states not to forcibly return to
Lebanon any migrants, including Lebanese citizens, any refugees or
stateless persons, or any third-country national. Despite some setbacks,
UNHCR expressed overall satisfaction with the Syrian government's
cooperation in assisting all refugees coming from Lebanon.

The Lebanese Diaspora

During the 1975-1990 civil war, between 600,000 and 900,000 people fled
the country. Since then, internal conflict and invasions from Israel have
led to continued emigration. For this reason, Lebanese nationals living
abroad number over one million, or about 25 percent of the actual number
of people in Lebanon.

However, some estimates put the number of people of Lebanese descent
around the world as high as 15 million because of waves of emigration from
Lebanon that date back to the late-19th century. Current data show that
the United States, Australia, Canada, and Brazil are among the most
popular destination countries for Lebanese emigrants and their children.

Past crises in Lebanon have provoked strong reactions from Lebanese
communities worldwide, and the current conflict is no exception. From
raising millions of dollars to setting up relief centers in Lebanon
itself, Lebanese groups in the United States and Canada have provided
much-needed aid to their home country.

The Hairi Foundation, a nonprofit organization that promotes training for
Lebanese scholars in the United States and Canada, gained media attention
when it launched an emergency fund for Lebanon to help victims of the war.
In Dearborn, Michigan, the Arab Community Center for Economic and Social
Services held fundraising events to raise $200,000 for medical supplies in
Lebanon. A California-based organization, Islamic Relief, raised nearly $1
million by the first week of August for aid to Lebanon and Palestine.

In addition to raising money, organizations are preparing homes and
shelters to house fleeing Lebanese refugees. Community organizations have
been building their capacity to receive thousands of soon-to-be homeless
Lebanese-Canadians. Most of the Lebanese scheduled to arrive left Canada
in the past 10 years to return to Lebanon but maintain dual
Lebanese-Canadian citizenship.

Since July, protests against Israeli aggression have been a common
occurrence in Sao Paulo, Brazil. Before a ceasefire agreement was reach in
mid-August, Brazilian government officials had called for an end to the
fighting. In an appeal to UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan, Brazil's
President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva emphasized that the Lebanese-Brazilian
connection makes Brazil feel "directly affected by the violence against
civilians in the region."

Conclusion

Many migrants and refugees in Lebanon have been trapped between a host
country where they face danger and a home country to which they are
hesitant or may not be able to return.

For Lebanese, the return home is uncertain and dangerous, as the ceasefire
agreement remains shaky. In the coming months, IOM plans to assist
displaced Lebanese families as well as migrants, a number of which still
want to return home. With its funds already running low, however, IOM will
require an additional $26 million for future operations.

The immediacy of the conflict in Lebanon makes it difficult to predict its
lasting effects on vulnerable populations. Whatever the outcome, the
impact of Lebanon's crisis on migrants and refugees will have implications
for the entire Middle East.

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In Case I Disappear
By William Rivers Pitt; Friday 29 September 2006
t r u t h o u t | Perspective

I have been told a thousand times at least, in the years I have spent
reporting on the astonishing and repugnant abuses, lies and failures of
the Bush administration, to watch my back. "Be careful," people always
tell me. "These people are capable of anything. Stay off small planes,
make sure you aren't being followed." A running joke between my mother and
me is that she has a "safe room" set up for me in her cabin in the woods,
in the event I have to flee because of something I wrote or said.

I always laughed and shook my head whenever I heard this stuff. Extreme
paranoia wrapped in the tinfoil of conspiracy, I thought. This is still
America, and these Bush fools will soon pass into history, I thought. I am
a citizen, and the First Amendment hasn't yet been red-lined, I thought.

Matters are different now.

It seems, perhaps, that the people who warned me were not so paranoid. It
seems, perhaps, that I was not paranoid enough. Legislation passed by the
Republican House and Senate, legislation now marching up to the Republican
White House for signature, has shattered a number of bedrock legal
protections for suspects, prisoners, and pretty much anyone else George W.
Bush deems to be an enemy.

So much of this legislation is wretched on the surface. Habeas corpus has
been suspended for detainees suspected of terrorism or of aiding
terrorism, so the Magna Carta-era rule that a person can face his accusers
is now gone. Once a suspect has been thrown into prison, he does not have
the right to a trial by his peers. Suspects cannot even stand in
representation of themselves, another ancient protection, but must accept
a military lawyer as their defender.

Illegally-obtained evidence can be used against suspects, whether that
illegal evidence was gathered abroad or right here at home. To my way of
thinking, this pretty much eradicates our security in persons, houses,
papers, and effects, as stated in the Fourth Amendment, against illegal
searches and seizures.

Speaking of collecting evidence, the torture of suspects and detainees has
been broadly protected by this new legislation. While it tries to
delineate what is and is not acceptable treatment of detainees, in the
end, it gives George W. Bush the final word on what constitutes torture.
US officials who use cruel, inhumane or degrading treatment to extract
information from detainees are now shielded from prosecution.

It was two Supreme Court decisions, Hamdi v. Rumsfeld and Hamdan v.
Rumsfeld, that compelled the creation of this legislation. The Hamdi
decision held that a prisoner has the right of habeas corpus, and can
challenge his detention before an impartial judge. The Hamdan decision
held that the military commissions set up to try detainees violated both
the Uniform Code of Military Justice and the Geneva Conventions.

In short, the Supreme Court wiped out virtually every legal argument the
Bush administration put forth to defend its extraordinary and dangerous
behavior. The passage of this legislation came after a scramble by
Republicans to paper over the torture and murder of a number of detainees.
As columnist Molly Ivins wrote on Wednesday, "Of the over 700 prisoners
sent to Gitmo, only 10 have ever been formally charged with anything.
Among other things, this bill is a (Cover Your Ass) for torture of the
innocent that has already taken place."

It seems almost certain that, at some point, the Supreme Court will hear a
case to challenge the legality of this legislation, but even this is
questionable. If a detainee is not allowed access to a fair trial or to
the evidence against him, how can he bring a legal challenge to a court?
The legislation, in anticipation of court challenges like Hamdi and
Hamdan, even includes severe restrictions on judicial review over the
legislation itself.

The Republicans in Congress have managed, at the behest of Mr. Bush, to
draft a bill that all but erases the judicial branch of the government.
Time will tell whether this aspect, along with all the others, will
withstand legal challenges. If such a challenge comes, it will take time,
and meanwhile there is this bill. All of the above is deplorable on its
face, indefensible in a nation that prides itself on Constitutional
rights, protections and the rule of law.

Underneath all this, however, is where the paranoia sets in.

Underneath all this is the definition of "enemy combatant" that has been
established by this legislation. An "enemy combatant" is now no longer
just someone captured "during an armed conflict" against our forces.
Thanks to this legislation, George W. Bush is now able to designate as an
"enemy combatant" anyone who has "purposefully and materially supported
hostilities against the United States."

Consider that language a moment. "Purposefully and materially supported
hostilities against the United States" is in the eye of the beholder, and
this administration has proven itself to be astonishingly impatient with
criticism of any kind. The broad powers given to Bush by this legislation
allow him to capture, indefinitely detain, and refuse a hearing to any
American citizen who speaks out against Iraq or any other part of the
so-called "War on Terror."

If you write a letter to the editor attacking Bush, you could be deemed as
purposefully and materially supporting hostilities against the United
States. If you organize or join a public demonstration against Iraq, or
against the administration, the same designation could befall you. One
dark-comedy aspect of the legislation is that senators or House members
who publicly disagree with Bush, criticize him, or organize investigations
into his dealings could be placed under the same designation. In effect,
Congress just gave Bush the power to lock them up.

By writing this essay, I could be deemed an "enemy combatant." It's that
simple, and very soon, it will be the law. I always laughed when people
told me to be careful. I'm not laughing anymore.

In case I disappear, remember this. America is an idea, a dream, and that
is all. We have borders and armies and citizens and commerce and industry,
but all this merely makes us like every other nation on this Earth. What
separates us is the idea, the simple idea, that life, liberty and the
pursuit of happiness are our organizing principles. We can think as we
please, speak as we please, write as we please, worship as we please, go
where we please. We are protected from the kinds of tyranny that inspired
our creation as a nation in the first place.

That was the idea. That was the dream. It may all be over now, but once
upon a time, it existed. No good idea ever truly dies. The dream was here,
and so was I, and so were you.

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Border Invaders
The Perfect Swarm Heads South
by Mike Davis; TomDispatch; September 19, 2006

The visitor crossing from Tijuana to San Diego these days is immediately
slapped in the face by a huge billboard screaming, "Stop the Border
Invasion!" Sponsored by the rabidly anti-immigrant vigilante group, the
Minutemen, the same truculent slogan reportedly insults the public at
other border crossings in Arizona and Texas.

The Minutemen, once caricatured in the press as gun-toting clowns, are now
haughty celebrities of grassroots conservatism, dominating AM hate radio
as well as the even more hysterical ether of the right-wing blogosphere.
In heartland as well as in border states, Republican candidates vie
desperately for their endorsement. With the electorate alienated by the
dual catastrophes of Baghdad and New Orleans, the Brown Peril has suddenly
become the Republican deus ex machina for retaining control of Congress in
the November elections.

A faltering GOP hegemony, too long sustained by the scraps of 9/11 and the
imaginary weaponry of Saddam Hussein, now has a new urgency in its appeal
to the suburbs. Not since Kofi Annan conspired to send his black
helicopters to terrorize Wyoming, has such a clear-and-present danger
threatened the Republic as the sinister armies of would-be busboys and
gardeners gathered at the Rio Grande.

To listen to some of these demagogues, one would assume that the Twin
Towers had been blown up by followers of the Virgin of Guadalupe or that
Spanish had recently been decreed the official language of Connecticut.
Having failed to scourge the world of evil by invasions of Afghanistan and
Iraq, Republicans, supported by some Democrats, now propose that we invade
ourselves: sending the Marines and Green Berets, along with the National
Guard, into the hostile deserts of California and New Mexico where
national sovereignty is supposedly under siege.

As in the past, nativism today is bigotry as surreal caricature, reality
stood on its head. The ultimate irony, however, is that there really is
something that might be called a "border invasion," but the Minutemen's
billboards are on the wrong side of the freeway.

The Baby-Boomers Head South

What few people -- at least, outside of Mexico -- have bothered to notice
is that while all the nannies, cooks, and maids have been heading north to
tend the luxury lifestyles of irate Republicans, the Gringo hordes have
been rushing south to enjoy glorious budget retirements and affordable
second homes under the Mexican sun.

Yes, in former California Governor Pete Wilson's immortal words, "They
just keep coming." Over the last decade, the U.S. State Department
estimates that the number of Americans living in Mexico has soared from
200,000 to 1 million (or one-quarter of all U.S. expatriates). Remittances
from the United States to Mexico have risen dramatically from $9 billion
to $14.5 billion in just two years. Though initially interpreted as
representing a huge spike in illegal workers (who send parts of their
salaries across the border to family), it turns out to be mainly money
sent by Americans to themselves in order to finance Mexican homes and
retirements.

Although some of them are certainly naturalized U.S. citizens returning to
towns and villages of their birth after lifetimes of toil al otro lado,
the director-general of FONATUR, the official agency for tourism
development in Mexico, recently characterized the typical investors in
that country's real estate as American "baby boomers who have paid off in
good part their initial mortgage and are coming into inheritance money."

Indeed, according to the Wall Street Journal, "The land rush is occurring
at the beginning of a demographic tidal wave. With more than 70 million
American baby boomers expected to retire in the next two decades... some
experts predict a vast migration to warmer -- and cheaper -- climates.
Often such buyers purchase a property 10 to 15 years before retirement,
use it as a vacation home, and then eventually move there for most of the
year. Developers increasingly are taking advantage of the trend, building
gated communities, condominiums, and golf courses."

The extraordinary rise in U.S. Sunbelt property values gives gringos
immense economic leverage. Shrewd baby-boomers are not simply feathering
nests for eventual retirement, but also increasingly speculating in
Mexican resort property, sending up property values to the detriment of
locals whose children are consequently driven into slums or forced to
emigrate north, only increasing the "invasion" charges. As in Galway,
Corsica, or, for that matter, Montana, the global second-home boom is
making life in beautiful, natural settings unaffordable for their
traditional residents.

Some expatriates are experimenting with exotic places such as the Riviera
Maya in Yucatan or Tulum in Quintana Roo, but more prefer such
well-established havens as San Miguel de Allende and Puerto Vallarta. Here
the norteamericanos make themselves at home in more ways than one.

An English-language paper in Puerto Vallarta, for instance, recently
applauded the imminent arrival of a new shopping mall that will include
Hooters, Burger King, Subway, Chili's and Starbucks. Only Dunkin' Donuts
(con salsa?), the paper complained, was still missing.

The gringo footprint is largest (and brings the most significant
geopolitical consequences) in Baja California, the 1,000-mile long desert
appendage to the gridlocked state-nation governed by Arnold
Schwarzenegger. Indeed, Baja real-estate websites ooze almost as much
hyperbole as those devoted to stalking the phantom menace of illegal
immigrants -- just in a far more upbeat tone when it comes to the question
of immigrant invasions.

In essence, Alta (Upper) California is beginning to overflow into Baja, an
epochal process that, if unchecked, will produce intolerable social
marginalization and ecological devastation in Mexico's last true frontier
region. All the contradictions of post-industrial California -- runaway
land inflation in the coastal zone, sprawling suburban development in
interior valleys and deserts, freeway congestion and lack of mass transit,
and the astronomical growth of motorized recreation -- dictate the
invasion of the gorgeous "empty" peninsula to the south. To use a term
from a bad but not irrelevant past, Baja is Anglo California's Lebensraum.

Indeed, the first two stages of informal annexation have already occurred.
Under the banner of NAFTA, Southern California has exported hundreds of
its sweatshops and toxic industries to the maquiladora zones of Tijuana
and Mexicali. The Pacific Maritime Association, representing the West
Coast's major shipping companies, has joined forces with Korean and
Japanese corporations to explore the construction of a vast new container
port at Punta Colonel, 150 miles south of Tijuana, which would undercut
the power of longshore unionism in San Pedro and San Francisco.

Secondly, tens of thousands of gringo retirees and winter-residents are
now clustered at both ends of the peninsula. Along the northwest coast
from Tijuana to Ensenada, a recent advertisement for a real-estate
conference at UCLA boasts that "there are presently over 57 real-estate
developments... with over 11,000 homes/condos with an inventory value of
over $3 billion... all of them geared for the U.S. market."

Meanwhile, at the tropical end of Baja, a gilded gringo enclave has
emerged in the twenty-mile strip between Cabo San Lucas and San Jose de
Cabo. Los Cabos is part of that global archipelago of real-estate hot
spots where continuous double-digit increases in property values suck in
speculative capital from all over the world. Ordinary gringos can
participate in this glamorous Los Cabos real-estate casino through the
purchase and resale of fractional time-shares in condominiums and beach
homes.

Although Western Canadian and Arizona speculators have taken large bites
out of Baja's southern cape, Los Cabos -- at least judging from the
registration of private planes at the local airport -- has essentially
become a resort suburb of Orange County, the home of the most vehement
Minutemen chapters. (Many wealthy Southern Californians evidently see no
contradiction between fuming over the "alien invasion" with one's
conservative friends at the Newport Marina one day, and flying down to
Cabos the next for some sea-kayaking or celebrity golf.)

Manifest Destiny, the Sequel?

The next step in the late-colonization of Baja is the "Escalera Nautica,"
a $3 billion "ladder" of marinas and coastal resorts being developed by
FONATUR that will open up pristine sections of both Mexican coasts to the
yacht club set.

Meanwhile, The Truman Show has arrived in the picturesque little city of
Loreto on the Gulf side of the peninsula. There, FONATUR has joined forces
with an Arizona company and "New Urbanist" architects from Florida to
develop the Villages of Loreto Bay: 6,000 homes for expatriates in
colonial-Mexico motif on the Sea of Cortez.

The $3 billion Loreto project boasts that it will be the last word in
Green design, exploiting solar power and restricting automobile usage.
Yet, at the same time, it will balloon Loreto's population from its
current 15,000 to more than 100,000 in a decade, with the social and
environmental consequences of a sort that can already be seen in the slum
peripheries of Cancun and other mega-resorts.

One of the irresistible attractions of Baja is that it has preserved a
primordial wildness that has disappeared elsewhere in the West. Local
residents, including a very eloquent indigenous environmental movement,
cherish this incomparable landscape as they do the survival of an
egalitarian ethos in the peninsula's small towns and fishing villages.

Thanks to the silent invasion of the baby-boomers from the north, however,
much of the natural history and frontier culture of Baja could be swept
away in the next generation. One of the world's most magnificent wild
coastlines could be turned into generic tourist sprawl, waiting for
Dunkin' Donuts to open. Locals, accordingly, have every reason to fear
that today's mega-resorts and mock-colonial suburbs, like FONATUR's entire
tourism-centered strategy of regional development, are merely the latest
Trojan horses of Manifest Destiny.

Mike Davis is the author, most recently, of Planet of Slums (Verso 2006),
and, with Justin Chacon Akers, No One is Illegal (Haymarket 2006). His
history of the car bomb -- Buda Wagon's -- which grew out of a two-part
Tomdispatch article, will be published by Verso early next year.

[This article first appeared on Tomdispatch.com, a weblog of the Nation
Institute, which offers a steady flow of alternate sources, news, and
opinion from Tom Engelhardt, long time editor in publishing, co-founder of
the American Empire Project and author of The End of Victory Culture, a
history of American triumphalism in the Cold War, a novel, The Last Days
of Publishing, and in the fall, Mission Unaccomplished (Nation Books), the
first collection of Tomdispatch interviews.]

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The No One is Illegal campaign is in full confrontation with Canadian colonial border policies, denouncing and taking action to combat racial profiling of immigrants and refugees, detention and deportation policies, and wage-slave conditions of migrant workers and non-status people. We struggle for the right for our communities to maintain their livelihoods and resist war, occupation and displacement, while building alliances and supporting indigenous sisters and brothers also fighting theft of land and displacement.