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By Seyed Hossein Mousavian

After years of bitter hostilities and escalating crises in the region, the era of diplomacy and wisdom has now arrived

News of the normalisation of relations between Iran and Saudi Arabia came as a surprise to international observers. The enmity between the Middle East rivals has been among the most persistent and dangerous in the region.

This month’s agreement came after two years of negotiations between Riyadh and Tehran in Baghdad, and Chinese President Xi Jinping played an important role in concluding the deal in Beijing. As part of the ensuing trilateral statement, Saudi Arabia and Iran agreed to implement a 2001 security cooperation agreement and a 1998 deal bolstering economic, cultural and technological ties.

This is based on an agreement the two countries reached in the mid-1990s that remained in effect until 2005. I negotiated the terms for then-President Hashemi Rafsanjani alongside then-Crown Prince Abdullah bin Abdulaziz Al Saud in Riyadh.

As I detailed in my recent book, A New Structure for Security, Peace, and Cooperation in the Persian Gulf, Rafsanjani and Abdullah agreed to revive relations. I was commissioned by Rafsanjani as his special envoy to discuss a deal with the crown prince. Over the course of four long nights in Abdullah’s mansion in Jeddah, we debated and finally agreed on a plan of action. Then, Rafsanjani’s son and I met King Fahd, and he approved the agreement.

After returning to Iran, the agreement was also approved by Rafsanjani and Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. It was implemented fully during former President Mohammed Khatami’s term (1997-2005). I was told by a high-level Saudi official that Abdullah viewed Khatami as continuing Rafsanjani’s policies. In 1997, Abdullah visited Tehran, and the cooperation and security agreements were subsequently signed.

Security concerns

In my negotiations with Abdullah, security issues were the primary concern. Riyadh was concerned about Tehran exporting Shiism and supporting Saudi Arabia’s Shia minority, and about demonstrations by Iranian pilgrims threatening the security of the annual Hajj ceremony.

For its part, Tehran was concerned about Saudi Arabia supporting the Sunni minority in Iran and spreading Wahhabi fundamentalism. The bilateral security pact greatly reduced anxieties in both governments over interference in each other’s internal affairs.

Unfortunately, the agreements collapsed after President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad took office in August 2005. Iran restarted its nuclear enrichment programme, the UN Security Council adopted resolutions sanctioning Iran, and Abdullah – by now the king of Saudi Arabia – repeatedly exhorted the US to “cut off the head of the snake” by launching military strikes to destroy Iran’s nuclear programme.

Then, in January 2016, Saudi Arabia executed a prominent Shia cleric, Sheikh Nimr al-Nimr, along with 46 other Shia dissidents. Nimr’s execution triggered protests in front of Saudi Arabia’s embassy in Tehran.

The proxy war between Iran and Saudi Arabia escalated in Yemen, as the Houthis used drones and missiles to attack Saudi oil installations. In ever, and Iran supported Syrian President Bashar al-Assad against internal and external efforts to overthrow him. Assad’s efforts to normalise his regime have made considerable progress during the past year.

Meanwhile, Saudi Arabia welcomed former US President Donald Trump’s decision to withdraw from the Iran nuclear deal, and supported reinstating economic sanctions on Iran – only to see it now enriching uranium to near weapons-grade levels.

Trump’s maximum pressure and sanctions campaign against Iran has been devastating. Ordinary Iranians have been confronted with skyrocketing prices and a greatly devalued currency. Last autumn, a wave of anti-government protests swept the country after the death of Mahsa Amini in police custody. Iran’s government responded by strengthening its military and political alliance with Russia, as evidenced by Iran’s supply of drones to Russia amid its invasion of Ukraine.

Serious distrust

The upshot of these developments was a lose-lose for both Riyadh and Tehran, demonstrating that their confrontation would have no winner. The recent agreement in Beijing shows that Iran’s conservative government, led by President Ebrahim Raisi, has restored relations with Saudi Arabia based on the two agreements formulated during the moderate government of Rafsanjani and implemented by the “reformist” government of Khatami.

The distrust between Tehran and Riyadh is both deep and serious. Both governments, however, have committed to observe the principles of the UN Charter, including respect for national sovereignty and non-interference in each other’s internal affairs. This is necessary, but not sufficient on its own. The agreement must be supplemented with additional commitments to ensure sustainable, friendly relations between Tehran and Riyadh.

By John Scales Avery

Over 300 wars!

As documented in the Wikipedia timeline of U.S. wars,

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timeline_of_United_States_military_operations

and in the Wikipedia list of wars involving the United States,

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_wars_involving_the_United_States

the United States of America has been more or less continuously at war ever since the American Revolutionary war of 1775-1783, which established the United States as a nation. Often several wars took place simultaneously. Many of America’s early wars were aimed at eliminating the First People, the native inhabitants of the country, and were thus genocidal in nature.

Global hegemony through military force

In recent years, the United States has aimed at “full spectrum dominance”, military dominance over all other nations, global hegemony through military force, and the construction of an empire. We should remember that the threat or use of military force violates both the United Nations Charter and the Nuremberg Principles.

Incredibly bloated military budgets

The United States Military-Industrial Complex seems to have a hold over both Republicans and Democrats. With almost no dissenting voices, both parties recently voted to give roughly a trillion dollars for weapons and other military purposes

Militarism is the US national religion

Here are some quotations from an article by William Astore:

“We believe in wars. We may no longer believe in formal declarations of war… but that sure hasn’t stopped us from waging them. From Korea to Vietnam, Afghanistan to Iraq, the Cold War to the War on Terror, and so many military interventions in between, including Grenada, Panama and Somalia, Americans are always fighting somewhere, as if we saw great utility in thumbing our noses at the Prince of Peace (that’s Jesus Christ, if I remember my Catholic Catechism correctly)

“We believe in weaponry, the more expensive the better. The underperforming F-35 stealth fighter may cost $1.45 trillion over its lifetime. An updated nuclear triad (land-based missiles, nuclear submarines, and strategic bombers) may cost that already mentioned $1.7 trillion. New (and malfunctioning) aircraft carriers cost us more than $10 billion each. And all such weaponry requests get funded, with few questions asked, despite a history of their redundancy, ridiculously high price, regular cost overruns, and mediocre performance. Meanwhile, Americans squabble bitterly over a few hundred million dollars for the arts and humanities…”

The U.S.-led invasion of Iraq

March 20, 2023 marked the 20th anniversary of the criminal invasion of Iraq. It was based on a lie, which asserted that Sadam Hussein possessed weapons of mass destruction. When Iraq was invaded, no such nuclear, biological or chemical weapons were ever found. However, as documented in the following article, the invasion ultimately resulted in more than 5 million Iraqi deaths.

https://countercurrents.org/2023/03/iraq-invasion-20th-anniversary-5-million-dead-in-iraqi-holocaust/?swcfpc=1

Many of those who died were children, deprived of food and medicines by postwar sanctions.

War has become prohibitively dangerous

War was always madness, always immoral, always the cause of unspeakable suffering, economic waste and widespread destruction, and always a source of poverty, hate, barbarism and endless cycles of revenge and counter-revenge. It has always been a crime for soldiers to kill people, just as it is a crime for murderers in civil society to kill people. No flag has ever been wide enough to cover up the atrocities of war.

But today, the development of all-destroying thermonuclear weapons has put war completely beyond the bounds of sanity and elementary humanity.

Today, the existing nuclear weapons have half a million times the power of the bombs that devastated Hiroshima and Nagasaki. A thermonuclear war would destroy human civilization, together with most of the plants and animals with which we share the gift of life.

Research has shown that fire-storms produced by a nuclear war would send vast quantities of smoke into the atmosphere, blocking sunlight, and blocking the hydrological cycle. The climate would become very cold for a period of about ten years. Human agriculture would fail. Plants and animals would also be killed by the nuclear winter.

Can we not rid ourselves of both nuclear weapons and the institution of war itself?

We must act quickly and resolutely before our beautiful world is reduced to radioactive ashes, together with everything that we love.

Many of my freely downloadable books can be found at the following web addresses:

https://www.johnavery.info/

http://eacpe.org/about-john-scales-avery/

John Scales Avery is a theoretical chemist at the University of Copenhagen. He is noted for his books and research publications in quantum chemistry, thermodynamics, evolution, and history of science.

20 March 2023

Source: countercurrents.org

By Prof Abdul Jabbar

This idea is based on the distinguished journalist Irfan Hashmi’s suggestion to prevent the imminent civil war and loss of millions of lives in Pakistan, including lives of those in power now who are violating the country’s laws and subjecting Pakistan’s people to unprecedented cruelty. What is the fault of the country’s 80% population? They are supporting Imran Khan. Why do those in power now want to kill him? Because he keeps on winning every election. The ruling junta, 65% of whom are on bail for one crime or another, are so used to be in power that they cannot tolerate anyone else to replace them. Now that they know they cannot win the elections, they want to kill Imran Khan. There have been many attempts to kill him. He barely and miraculously survived an attempt on his life in which he was severely injured.

To Imran Khan:

“Your enemies have decided that there will be no elections. They are bent on killing you and have almost succeeded twice, as you yourself said in your latest address to the nation today, March 19, 2023. Please request the Supreme Court Chief Justice to apply the law that calls for restoration of the provincial governments that were in power when the assemblies were dissolved if provincial elections are not held within 90 days after the dissolution. It is evident that the current government and Establishment are focused on arresting and killing you, not on elections, which they know they will lose. Legally mandated restoration of Punjab and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa governments is the only way to save you from murder and prevent civil war and bloodshed in Pakistan that is inevitable if the current criminal government assassinates you. Your courage and fearlessness has no parallel, but the nation would like to continue benefiting from your leadership, which can happen only if you are alive. Your supporters prevented you from surrendering to the police when the police unlawfully and in defiance of the Lahore High Court’s orders attacked your house and rained down tear gas shells on your house. You wanted to surrender voluntarily just to prevent bloodshed, even though you knew well that you might be killed if you surrendered. Your supporters prevented you from surrendering because they do not want to lose you.

The criminal police mafia’s latest action was in the form of an attack on your house and family when they knew you were on your way to appear before the High Court in Islamabad. They terrorized your wife, beat up your domestic helpers and guards, and ransacked your house. This cowardly and shameful action has no precedent in Pakistan’s history. Since you are truly concerned about Pakistan and its people, please accept the fact that you cannot fight the corrupt and power-wielding elements in the government, in the army, and all bureaucratic machinery. With your government in Punjab and KP restored in accordance with the law, you can continue your mission of having fair elections and can drive out the cowardly criminals at least from those two provinces.”

Prof. Abdul Jabbar is the first and longest-serving Pakistani-American academic in the United States, having taught Literature, Isam, and Globa Politics for more than half a century.

20 March 2023

Source: countercurrents.org

By Phil Pasquini

WASHINGTON (03-20) – Anti-war protesters demonstrated across the country yesterday on the 20th anniversary of the invasion of Iraq and the ensuing war. Across from the White House in Lafayette Square protesters heard speakers condemning America’s “eternal wars” and called for a reduction in the Pentagon budget, an end to the war in Ukraine through negotiations and cautioning against a war with Iran and China.

The devastating war in Iraq resulted in a more fragmented sectarian society divided in political ideology and religious differences, a growing ground for ISIS and environmental damage that will devastate the country for decades to come. In the end the net gain for Iraq in replacing Saddam Hussein and his Baathist Party has bred more corruption and violence and less of the hoped for democracy the war was supposed to install to the benefit of the Iraqi people. Instead, the fight over oil has set the country back decades in its development while driving masses into poverty.

As one speaker noted, “Two decades later, here we are, rallying around the country working to stop yet another terrible and senseless war.” And frighteningly the risk of a catastrophic nuclear war resulting by a tiny miscalculation or seemingly minor incident between the US, Russia or China is now more probable now than any time since the Cuban Missile Crisis of 1962.

“We need negotiations. We need sane, diplomatic, ‘rules-based,’ resolution of conflicts. We need sustainable self-governance free from imperial agendas” was the common demand from organizers of the protest. The Answer Coalition, the People’s Forum, Code Pink and World Beyond War all resonated in their calling for, “… a ceasefire and No War in China.”

After hearing from several speakers, protesters carrying six coffins representing victims from countries that the US has had recent conflicts in, marched a short distance to the White House where they called on President Biden to end the endless wars. Signs held aloft called for an end of the NATO alliance along with those critical of military weapons manufactures and other war profiteers. Included too were the banks that continually have funded and profiteered from war at the expense of raising the national debt and causing ongoing inflation. Other signs called for negotiating peace in Ukraine and echoing the common theme of No War with China.

The large group’s next stop on their march was at the headquarters of the Washington Post Building that they referred to as “The Pentagon Post” for the paper’s “unwavering support for war.” This they also accused of mainstream media as well for their lack of questioning the need to continually use military might rather than negotiations and diplomacy in avoiding conflict.

At the Post building protesters blocked the entrance with the coffins to shut the building down while a speaker enumerated their views of the paper along with its editorial staff challenging them to report on their demonstration. Also addressed was the mainstream media’s drumbeat to war with Iraq twenty years ago by reflecting on their “outright lie” fed to them by the Pentagon that Saddam had WMDs and portable biological labs capable of changing the very nature of conflict that ultimately proved to be untrue. Or as one protester who was quoted in a press release reflected, “As a new anti-war activist,… I was sitting on my couch eating Cheetos and even I knew Bush and Powell were lying.”

It may well be remembered too that the then well-known and respected New York Time reporter Judith Miller was fired from the paper that according to an article in the Daily Beast from 2015 occurred after she admitted that her “WMD stories were ‘totally wrong.’” She furthered with characterizing herself, “albeit unavoidably so—mistakes committed in good faith by a truth-seeking journalist working hard to do her best.” Her response “…was demonized by critics and enemies, inside and outside the Times, as an influential cheerleader for an unjustified and ultimately ruinous war conducted under false pretenses.”

After departing the Post building the protesters marched off to the New York Avenue Presbyterian Church near the White House where the rally ended.

Report and photos by Phil Pasquini

20 March 2023

Source: countercurrents.org

By Romana Rubeo and Ramzy Baroud

When Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu left Tel Aviv for Rome on March 9, he was flown to Ben Gurion airport in Tel Aviv by a helicopter because anti-government protesters blocked all the roads around it.

Netanyahu’s visit was not met with much enthusiasm in Italy, either. A sit-in was organized by pro-Palestine activists in downtown Rome under the slogan, ‘Non sei il benvenuto’ – ‘You Are Not Welcome’. An Italian translator, Olga Dalia Padoa, also refused to translate his speech at a Rome synagogue, which was scheduled for March 9.

Even Noemi Di Segni, President of the Union of Italian Jewish Communities, though unsurprisingly reiterating her love and support for Israel, expressed her concern for Israeli state institutions.

Back in Tel Aviv, Netanyahu’s trip to Italy was slammed by Israeli opposition leader Yair Lapid as “a wasteful and unnecessary weekend on the country’s dime”. But Netanyahu’s trip to Italy had other goals, aside from spending a weekend in Rome or distracting from the ongoing protests in Israel.

In an interview with the Italian newspaper La Repubblica, published on March 9, the Israeli prime minister explained the lofty objectives behind his trip to Italy. “I would like to see more economic cooperation,” he said. “We have natural gas: we have plenty of it and I would like to talk about how to bring it to Italy to support its economic growth.”

In recent weeks, Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni has shuttled between several countries in search of lucrative gas contracts. Not only does Meloni want to secure her country’s need for energy following the Russia-Ukraine crisis, but she wants Rome to be a major European hub for gas imports and exports. Israel knows this, and is particularly wary that Italy’s major gas deals in Algeria on January 23 could undermine Israel’s economic and political position in Italy, as Algeria continues to serve as a bulwark of Palestinian solidarity throughout the Middle East and Africa.

Netanyahu had other issues on his mind, aside from gas. “On the strategic front, we will discuss Iran. We must prevent it from going nuclear because its missiles could reach many countries, including Europe, and no one wants to be taken hostage by a fundamentalist regime with a nuclear weapon,” Netanyahu said with the usual fear-mongering and stereotypical language pertaining to his enemies in the Middle East.

Netanyahu has two main demands from Italy: not to vote against Israel at the United Nations and, more importantly, to recognize Jerusalem as the capital of Israel. Though East Jerusalem is recognized by the international community as an occupied Palestinian city, Netanyahu wants Rome to change its position, which is consistent with international law, based on the flimsy logic of the “strong and ancient tradition between Rome and Jerusalem”.

Using the same logic, that of natural resources and arms exports in exchange for political allegiance to Israel at the UN, Netanyahu has achieved much success in normalizing ties between his country and many African nations. Now, he is applying the same modus operandi to Italy, a European power and the world’s ninth-largest economy.

Whether this strategy is an outcome of the growing subservience of Europe to Washington and Tel Aviv, or Netanyahu’s own failure to appreciate the changing geopolitical dynamics around the world, is a different matter. But what is clear is that Netanyahu has perceived Italy as a country in desperate need of Israeli help. During the meeting with Meloni, Netanyahu promised to make Italy a gas hub for Europe and help Rome solve its water issues, while Meloni, for her part, reiterated that “Israel is a fundamental partner in the Middle East and at a global level”.

The most enthusiastic response to Netanyahu’s visit, however, came from far-right Italian Minister of Infrastructure, Matteo Salvini, who strongly backed the Israeli call to recognize Jerusalem as its capital “in the name of peace, history and truth”. This response, although inconsistent with Italian foreign policy, was hardly a surprise. The leader of the La Lega party has often been criticized for his racist language in the past. Salvini, however, was ‘reformed’ in recent years, especially following a visit to Israel in 2018, where he declared his love for Israel and criticism of Palestinians. It was then that Salvini began rising in the mainstream, as opposed to regional, Italian politics.

But this is not Salvni’s position alone. The Italian government welcomed Netanyahu’s visit without making a single criticism of his far-right government’s extremist policies carried out in Occupied Palestine. While this position is in line with Italian foreign policy, it is hardly surprising from an ideological point of view, as well.

Although Italian politics, in the past, showed great solidarity with the Palestinian people’s struggle for liberation and right of self-determination – thanks to the revolutionary forces that had a tremendous impact on shaping the Italian political discourse during World War II and the country’s subsequent liberation from fascism – that position shifted throughout the years. As Italy’s own politics itself reared towards the Right, its foreign policy agenda in Palestine and Israel completely moved towards a pro-Israel stance. Those now perceived to be pro-Palestine in the Italian government are a few, and are often branded as radical politicians.

However, despite the official pro-Israel discourse in Italy, things for Netanyahu are not as easy as they may appear, especially when it comes to recognizing Jerusalem as Israel’s capital.

Indeed, Meloni did not express an outright commitment to the Israeli demand. To the contrary, in an interview with Reuters last August, even before becoming Italy’s prime minister, Meloni seemed cautious, merely stating that this is “a diplomatic matter and should be evaluated together with the foreign ministry”.

There is a reason behind Meloni’s hesitation. Italy’s recognition of Jerusalem as Israel’s capital would place Rome outside the consensus of international law. In an open letter to Meloni, United Nations Special Rapporteur, Francesca Albanese, reminded the Italian government that the recognition of Jerusalem as Israel’s capital would constitute a stark violation of international law.

Italy’s foreign policy is also accountable to the collective policies of the European Union, of which Rome is an integral member. The EU supports the UN’s position that East Jerusalem is an occupied Palestinian city and that Israel’s annexation of the city in 1980 is illegal.

Moreover, Italy’s recent landmark deal with Algeria’s state-owned gas company, Sonatrach, in January, makes it particularly difficult for Rome to take an extreme position in support of Israel. The delicate geopolitical balances resulting from the gas crisis, itself a direct outcome of the Russia-Ukraine war, make any shifts in Italian foreign policy on Palestine and Israel akin to an act of self-harm.

For Italy, at least for now, Arab gas is far more important than anything that Netanyahu could possibly offer. The new Rome-Algiers deal would grant Italy 9bn cubic meters of gas, in addition to the gas supply already flowing through the TransMed pipeline, ‘BNE Intellinews’ reported. This vital infrastructure connects Algeria to Italy via Sicily which, in turn, flows through pipelines under the Mediterranean Sea. “The expansion of these vital routes has already been planned, aiming to augment the current capacity of 33.5 bcm per year,” the business news website added.

Meloni, although a far-right politician with no particular affinity or respect for established international norms, understands that economic interests trump ideology. “Today Algeria is our first gas supplier”, Meloni said in a press conference in Algiers after signing the agreement. The deal, she said, would supply the country with “an energy mix that could shield Italy from the ongoing energy crisis”.

Such a fact would make it impossible for Italy to deviate, at least for now, from its current position regarding Jerusalem, and the illegality of the Israeli occupation of Palestine. While Israel would find it difficult to persuade Italy to change its position, Algeria, Tunisia and other Arab countries might finally find an opening to dissuade Italy from its blind support of Israel.

Romana Rubeo is an Italian writer and the managing editor of The Palestine Chronicle. Her articles appeared in many online newspapers and academic journals.

Dr. Ramzy Baroud is a journalist, author and the Editor of The Palestine Chronicle. He is the author of six books.

21 March 2023

Source: countercurrents.org

By M Adil Khan

On March 14, 2023 Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese stood side by side with the British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak and the US President Joe Biden at a Naval base in San Diego, USA and signed off the next phase of AUKUS deal, where Australia will purchase three nuclear powered submarines.  which would be based in Australia. According to the Australian government press release three leaders affirmed that the “trilaterally-developed submarine based on the United Kingdom’s next-generation design that incorporates technology from all three nations, including cutting edge U.S. submarine technologies.” is “a new security partnership [between Australia, UK and USA] that will promote a free and open Indo-Pacific that is secure and stable.”[1]

Following the above announcement, Australia’s former Labor government Prime Minister, Mr. Paul Keating strongly criticised the deal at a press briefing held on March 15, 2023, at the National Press Club in Canberra, Australia implying that the deal would do more harm than good to Australia.[2]

One of Australia’s leading media outlets, the SBS news, has termed Mr. Keating’s criticisms of AUKUS, “astonishing.”[3]

The Prince of Denmark

True, Mr. Keating’s response to the AUKUS, a deal which has been endorsed by the Australia’s Labor Party (ALP) government and a deal which was inked by its predecessor, the Liberal/National Party (the LNP) government, Labor’s supposed ideological rival, has indeed been scathing, but by no means, “astonishing.”

A deal, such as that of AUKUS, which has significant security and economic ramifications for Australia should have been discussed in much greater detail, within and outside the parliament, before it was inked. But was not.

By dissecting the deal in terms in of its security and economic implications and by the way, in a globalized economic system security and economic dimensions are interlinked, and by exposing the deal’s pros and cons for Australia, mostly cons, Mr. Keating in fact, has done Australia a favour. Mr. Keating played the Prince of Denmark, “be cruel to be kind”.

“Anglosphere” affinities

Australia, a country which happens to be in an ethnically varied and demographically daunting neighbourhood and a region from which it derives most of its economic benefits, needed to carefully weigh its foreign and security policies and in a manner that responded more practically and sensitively to the changing geoeconomics and geopolitics.

After all, the world is on the move where the old unipolar order is fracturing, giving way to a new multipolar world. If we can’t see it we are either doping or cerebrally challenged.

Mr. Keating, a man of exceptional vision is among few in Australia who has had the crystal ball in hand, who clearly saw these changes decades ago and acted to bring Australia closer to the region and not push it away. Thus he is fully aware of the danger the AUKUS deal poses to Australia, a deal which according to him fulfills the agenda of the “old colonial masters” and not Australia’s and a deal which is likely to be viewed by the Australia’s neighbours especially by China, an important trading partner, as “..an arms race in the Indo-Pacific, with a Cold War mentality” and a return “…to our former colonial master, Britain.”

To many in the Asia/Pacific region where Australia is physically located, the AUKUS deal revives bad memories. They see AUKUS, an initiative that seeks “security in and within the Anglosphere”, as revival of a hegemonic nexus that once colonised, waged wars and devasted their countries.

It was not that long ago that Australia, partnered with the US in all of wars for example, in Vietnam, Korea, Iraq, Syria, and Afghanistan – all illegal and immoral wars and all contributed to massacre of hundreds and thousands of their people, men, women and children and destroyed their countries.

However, The Albanese government defends AUKUS by saying “a really exciting opportunity for Australia” which do not pose threats to none let alone China and assures that AUKUS is a deterrent against future threats and not for attacking anyone.

However, Mr. Keating has trashed Labor government’s justification for the submarines as “rubbish” and warned of the dangera of installing a military facility in Australia that has the potential to intimidate, the “mighty” China, the unannounced but the real target of the submarines.

“Mighty” China

We all know and should know by now that China is no more Seventy’s impoverished poverty-stricken China that we once were familiar with. Nor is China, what we see in our China Towns – a great place to have cheap noodle soup, served by petit and polite waitresses!

China has progressed vastly – economically, technologically and military and reportedly, has outpaced the West, in certain aspects, apparently, in military arsenals.

Until recently, and thanks to Mr. Keating’s pro-China interventions during his time as the Treasurer and later as the Prime Minister of Australia, China became a major trading partner of Australia. AUKUS may be changing all that because China views the initiative a “path of error and danger.”

Gazing at the mirror

Several decades ago, during the Keating era especially at a time when Mr. Keating was aggressively promoting the idea that Australia is a part of Asia, mainly to benefit from Asia’s rising wealth, he apparently drew a map of Asia where he showed Australia as Asia’s part.

Around this time an Australian journalist who was based in Kuala Lumpur showed the map to Dr. Mahathir Muhammad, then the Prime Minister of Malaysia, to convince him that despite his contrary thoughts, Australia sees itself as part of Asia. However, typical of Mr. Mahathir who never missed an opportunity to insult Australia, retorted by saying, “To find out whether you Australians are Asians or not, do not look at the map, look at the mirror.”

Despite such antagonisms from some of the Asian leaders who refused to accept Australia as part of Asia Mr. Keating continued to persist with success, his mission of integrating Australia with Asia and the result has been that all parties gained, Australia more – two thirds of Australia’s exports go to Asia, bulk of it to China.

Sadly, the current political bunch, both LNP and Labor, don’t seem to see the picture and by embracing AUKUS seem to have embraced Mr. Mahathir’s advice – they are making policies by gazing at the mirror and not at the map, nor the economic and geopolitical realities of the day.

“Run by the military”

Mr. Keating also suspects that Australia’s sudden shift towards “Anglospheric” hegemonic security policy may be because presently, Australia’s foreign policy is “run by the military” and not by the foreign office. If true, this is ominous.

A story from the Indian sub-continent may explain better the harm the control of national policies, foreign or otherwise, by the military causes to a nation.

In 1974, in the aftermath of the 1971 Pakistan army’s defeat at the hands of the Indian Army and the Bangladesh liberation forces that led to the dismemberment of Pakistan and emergence of its erstwhile eastern wing into Bangladesh as an independent state, Mr. Tariq Ali, the Pakistan born-British political activist conducted an interview of Mrs. Indira Gandhi, the then Prime Minister of India at her office in New Delhi.[4]

During the interview Mr. Tariq Ali while reflecting on how the arrogant and myopic policies of the Pakistan army who at the time ran the country, contributed to a civil conflict, and led to the break-up of Pakistan, told Mrs. Gandhi that “Pakistan’s problem is that our Generals are stupid.” To this Mrs. Gandhi apparently replied saying, “Mr. Ali, how about I share one of my own experiences of an encounter with one of our Generals. You see, in 1971 when Pakistan army surrendered and East Pakistan was gone, our Chief of Army Staff, General Sam Manekshaw came up to me and said, ‘Madam Prime Minister, East Pakistan is gone, and we are also deeply inside in several parts of West Pakistan. If you order we can march into Islamabad, Pakistan’s capital city in 24 hours and take over rest of Pakistan.” After listening to General Manekshaw’s ambitious idea, Mrs. Gandhi told the General “General, why don’t you give me 24 hours to make the decision.” Mrs. Gandhi then called an emergency cabinet meeting and informed her cabinet colleagues of General’s idea. The Cabinet was unanimous in their response, “absolutely not”.  Mrs. Gandhi then turned to Tariq Ali and said, “you see when it comes to stupidity our Generals and your Generals are not different, they are all stupid. The only difference is that unlike Pakistan, Generals in India do not make policies.”

If Mr. Keating’s suspicion is correct that Australia’s military has taken over the running of the Australia’s foreign policy and in the process, weaponizing diplomacy, then it indeed is deeply concerning.

Given China’s formidable military might and its readiness to act in “self-defence” an attack or even a threat, is likely to be greeted with vicious venom. China is likely to respond with its newly acquired arsenals which most certainly would rain on Australia, the AUKUS bloke and not on those who would have had the cheque in their hands by then and thousands of kilometres away relaxing with the, “the band playing!”

“Dig two graves” – Confucius

Finally, since AUKUS is aimed at China (regardless of official denials, let us not kid ourselves – the target of submarines is China), it may also not be a bad idea to take a lesson or two from China itself to prepare against repercussions.

Confucius, one of China’s wisest men once said, “if you are planning for a revenge against an enemy, dig two graves – one for the enemy and one for yourself.”

Since China never considered Australia as an enemy and thus have no need to dig a grave. However as Australia has made China its target, it may need one and given that the AUKUS deal, the submarines, would cost Australian taxpayers $368.0 billion upfront to procure and billions annually to maintain including the costs and hazards of storage of fuel wastes and furthermore, as the deal would most certainly wreak the decades-long vital trade and investment ties between the two countries which most certainly would hurt Australia more than China, it is conceivable that Australia has already commenced digging its grave!

The author is a Professor (Adjunct) at the School of Social Sciences, University of Queensland, Australia, and former senior policy manager of the United Nations

[1] https://www.pm.gov.au/media/joint-leaders-statement-aukus

[2] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VmgxAoa1n-8

[3] https://www.sbs.com.au/news/article/former-colonial-master-paul-keating-launches-astonishing-attack-on-labor-aukus-deal/we38qsi9s

[4] Can Pakistan Survive?: The Death of a State (1983). ISBN 978-0-8052-7194-2; (1991) ISBN 978-0-86091-260-6

21 March 2023

Source: countercurrents.org

By Dr Binoy Kampmark

When will this hate-filled nonsense stop?  Surveillance balloons treated like evocations of Satan and his card-carrying followers; other innumerable unidentified phenomena that, nonetheless, remain attributable in origin, despite their designation; and then the issue of spying cranes.  In the meantime, there has been much finger pointing on the culprit of COVID-19 and the global pandemic.  Behold the China Threat, the Sino Monster, the Yellow Terror.

In this atmosphere, the hawkish disposition of media outlets in a number of countries in shrieking for war is becoming palpable.  The Fairfax press in Australia gave a less than admirable example of this in their absurd Red Alert series, crowned by crowing warmongers warning Australia to get ready for the imminent confrontation.  The publications were timed to soften the public for the inevitable, scandalous and possibly even treasonous announcement that the Australian government would be spending A$368 billion in local currency on needless submarines against a garishly dressed-up threat backed by ill-motivated allies.

For days, the Australian press demonstrated a zombie-like adherence to the war line that had been fed by deskbound generals no doubt suffering from piles and deranged civilian strategists desperate to justify their supper.  It is a line that always assumes the virtue of war; that going into battle, much like US President Theodore Roosevelt thought, will always outdo the tedium of peace in a haze of phosphorescent glory.  It is only in the morgues and the crowded cemeteries that we find a worthy patriotism.  Go out and kill, you noble sons and daughters.  Do your nation proud, however stupidly.

The desperation of such a measure is also a reflection of how public opinion rejects the war drive.  In a 2022 poll by the Lowy Institute think tank, 51% of Australians said they preferred their country to remain “neutral” in a conflict between the US and China over Taiwan.  This was not a bad return, given the repetitious insistence by various Australian government ministers that joining a war with the United States over Taiwan was simply assumed.

In the US, the Wall Street Journal was also doing much the same thing, plumping for great power competitions that can only end badly, rather than great power cooperation which, when it goes well, spares us the body bags, the funerals and the flag fluttering.

The introductory note of one article in that Rupert Murdoch-owned organ was not encouraging.  “Since 2018, the [US] military has shifted to focus on China and Russia after decades fighting insurgencies, but it still faces challenges to produce weapons and come up with new ways of waging war.”

The obsession with war scenarios rather than diplomatic ones is hardening.  It elevates the game to level pegging with peace overtures.  In fact, it goes further, suggesting that such measures are to be frowned upon, if not abandoned in their entirety.  Rather than considering discussions with China, for instance, on whether some rules of accommodation and observance can be made, the attitude from Washington and its satellites is one of excoriation, taking issue with any restrictions on the growth of the US defence complex.  Acid observations are reserved for the Budget Control Act of 2011, which supposedly “hampered initiatives to transform the military, including on artificial intelligence, robotics, autonomous systems and advanced manufacturing.”

As defence analyst William Hartung writes, the Pentagon has never been short of cash in its pursuits, though it has been more than wasteful, obsessed with maintaining a global military presence spanning 750 bases and 170,000 overseas troops, not to mention the madness of shovelling $2 billion into developing a new generation of nuclear weapons.  Far from encouraging deterrence, this is bound to “accelerate a dangerous and costly arms race.”

The same must be said of AUKUS, the triumvirate alliance that is already terrifying several powers in the Indo-Pacific into joining the regional arms race.  Here we see, yet again, the Anglosphere enthralled by protecting their possessions and routes of access, directly or indirectly held.

In the red mist of war, lucid voices can be found.  Singaporean diplomat and foreign policy intellectual Kishore Mahbubani is one to offer a bracing analysis in observing that China is hardly going to undermine the very order that has benefitted it. The Chinese, far from wishing to upend the rules-based system with thuggish glee, saw it as a gift of Western legal engineering.  “So the paradox about the world today is that even though the global rules based order is a gift of the west, China embraces it.”

He also has this to say about the US-China relationship. “China has been around for 5,000 years. The United States has been around for 250 years. And it’s not surprising that a juvenile like the United States would have difficulty dealing with a wiser, older civilisation”.

Mahbubani, ever wily but also penetratingly sharp, also offers a valuable point: that the notion of a remarkable weapon (the nuclear-propelled submarine is not so much remarkable as cumbersomely draining and costly) must surely come a distant second to the attainment of economic prosperity.  “Submarines are stealthy, but trade is stealthier,” he writes with a touch of serene sagacity. Both provide security, in a fashion: the former in terms of raw deterrence; the latter in terms of interdependence – but the kind of security created by trade, he is adamant, “lasts longer”.  To date, that realisation seems to have bypassed the AUKUS troika.

Dr. Binoy Kampmark was a Commonwealth Scholar at Selwyn College, Cambridge.  He currently lectures at RMIT University.

21 March 2023

Source: countercurrents.org

By Harsh Thakor

Invasion of Iraq and Crisis of American capitalism

The War of Iraq by the United States is an event that will be inscribed in black letters forever. Hundreds of millions of people in every part of the world revolted to the bloodbath of a merciless military power shattering a small and defenceless country. The invasion of Iraq was an imperialist war in the classic sense of the term: a barbaric act of aggression that manifested the interests of the most reactionary and predatory sections of the financial and corporate oligarchy in the United States. Its immediate purpose was s the establishment of monopoly over Iraq’s vast oil resources and converting that long-oppressed country to an American colonial protectorate.

Not since the 1930s—when the fascist regimes of Hitler and Mussolini were at the height  of their power and madness—was  the world faced with such International level of barbarism.  . The goal of the American military to harbour an onslaught   of thousands of missiles and bombs on the city of Baghdad is part of a conscious strategy to break the backs the Iraqi people. What the Pentagon referred to as the strategy of “Shock and Awe” drew its inspiration from the methods deployed by the Nazi Wehrmacht at the opening of World War II.

The purpose of this war was to eliminate Iraq’s so-called “weapons of mass destruction. Other major allegations, relating to the use of aluminium tubes for nuclear purposes and the existence of mobile laboratories producing chemical-biological weapons, were also investigated to be fabricated..

The second major justification for war against Iraq—that the Ba’athist regime of Saddam Hussein collaborated with Al Qaeda terrorists—is another false invention upon which the Bush administration depended upon , as the findings of the United Nations’ inspection team dispelled  claims of weapons of mass destruction.

The regime of Saddam Hussein is itself a creature of the nefarious efforts of the United States, throughout the 1950s, 1960s and even into the 1970s, to eradicate the socialist workers’ movement that once represented a significant political force in the Middle East. The coup d’etat of February 8, 1963 that overthrew the left nationalist Qasim regime and brought the Ba’athists to power for the first time was organized with the support of the CIA.

It was in such bloody operations that Saddam Hussein first sparkled as a major figure in the Ba’ath movement. Later in his career the United States supported his bloody purge of Iraqi Communists in 1979 that played a crucial role in his consolidation of power. Hussein’s decision to go to war against Iran in 1980 was encouraged by the United States, which provided him with material and logistical support for the next eight years. Much of the stockpile of biological agents that Hussein built up in the 1980s was provided by an American company, the American Type Culture Collection of Manassas, Virginia. This was done with the explicit approval of the Reagan-Bush administration. “ATCC could never have shipped these samples to Iraq without the Department of Commerce’s approval for all requests,” said Nancy J. Wysocki, vice president for human resources and public relations at the American Type Culture Collection, a nonprofit organization that is one of the world’s leading biological supply houses. “They were sent for legitimate research purposes.”[iii]

The attempt to champion democratic ideals as an excuse for attacking Iraq ignores one l democratic principle: that of national self-determination. The invasion and conquest of the country, and establishment of a military protectorate under would-be Generalissimo Tommy Franks, represent a gross te violation of Iraq’s national sovereignty.

.The vociferous glorification of war as a legitimate weapon of global imperialist realpolitik represents a political and moral regression. A significant body of international law was contrived on the basis of the bloodshed of the first half of the twentieth century. The carnage of World War I between 1914 and 1918, which killed tens of millions of people, led to a furious controversy over responsibility for the outbreak of hostilities—the question of “war guilt.” The issue of “war guilt” took an even more sinister form at the end of World War II. The undoubted responsibility of the Third Reich for the outbreak of war in 1939 led to the decision of the Allied powers, of which the United States was the most powerful representative, to place the former leaders of the German state on trial.

. The principal objective of the war was to capture control of Iraq’s oil resources. No other natural resources have played such a central role in shaping the political and economic objectives of American imperialism over the last century as oil and natural gas. Involved in this central preoccupation is not only the profits of American-owned oil conglomerates, with the  stability of America’s financial-monetary structure and its dominant world position being all dependent upon the vast oil resources of the Persian Gulf and, more recently, the Caspian Basin.

To recognize the centrality of oil in the geo-political calculations of the United States does not mean, however, that it provides an accurate explanation of the war against Iraq and the general embrace of militarism. The manner in which the United States, or another capitalist country, chalks out  its critical interests, and the means by which it seeks to obtain them, , are basically designed  by the entire structure and internal dynamics of the given society. This invasion of Iraq was a  manifestation of intensifying social and political contradictions in the American body politic.

There is no impenetrable barrier that separates domestic and foreign policy. They represent interdependent components of the class policy elaborated by the dominant strata of the ruling elite. While subject to the continuous pressure of global economic forces, the foreign policy pursued by the ruling elite reflects, complements and projects its essential domestic interests.

. The aggressive policies of American imperialism were responsible for   living standards of the working class either stagnating or deteriorating in America; and within the so-called “Third World” a terrifying deterioration in the conditions of hundreds of millions of people. For the ruling class and the wealthiest sections of the upper-middle class, these policies were an absolute blessing.

Mass Demonstrations before the War

The mass demonstrations that erupted simultaneously to engulf the globe on the weekend of February 15-16, 2003, preceding the American attack on Iraq, will shimmer forever in history. They were an unparalleled manifestation of international human solidarity against war. In the face of the militaristic frenzy of the most ruthless imperialist regime in the world, more than 10,000,000 people had raised the fists against the plans for an invasion of Iraq.

These demonstrations marked a turning point in world politics. From North and South America, through Europe and Asia to Australia and Africa, the mass and largely spontaneous popular mobilizations of February 15-16 in the very heart of the body unfolded the deep and unbreakable political, social and moral chasm that divides the ruling elites and their media propagandists from the people.

In the aftermath of these powerful demonstrations, all pretence of democratic political legitimacy for the war policies of the Bush administration in the United States and the Blair regime in Britain were shattered. to the core. The demonstration of more than one million people in London and Glasgow was a stunning repudiation of Blair’s attempt to revive, through an alliance with Washington, the colonialist aspirations of British imperialism.

The marches held in cities engulfing many regions the United States were, if anything, even more intense. There, in the very egg of world imperialism, the mass demonstrations demonstrated that the American people are repulsed were enraged by the war frenzy of the Bush administration and the militaristic propaganda of the establishment media.

Without hesitation we should appreciate the significance of the massive outpouring of humanity in Barcelona, Rome, Paris and Berlin. In these great cities, the bitter experience of fascist barbarism—represented by the regimes of Franco, Mussolini, Pétain and Hitler—lives in the consciousness of the populace. The working people of Spain, Italy, France and Germany instinctively grasp the reactionary menace posed by the war-mongering of the Bush administration.

The demonstrations of February 15-16 were, not only an expression of massive popular opposition to an invasion of Iraq. What was witnessed and participated was the birth of a new international social movement of opposition to imperialism. Crystallising this development are profound objective processes. The global merging of capitalist production, spearheaded by transnational corporations knit the basis for the global integration of social struggles of the working class.

Just as the unparalleled development of world economy transcends the barriers of the national state, the class struggle as an objective historical process tends naturally to sweep across national borders. With consciousness brimming at an unprecedented level, the working class will define itself in international rather than national terms. It is precisely this tendency that found expression on Saturday, when 3,000 Jewish and Arab workers marched together against war in the streets of Tel Aviv.

Recommended Readings

Without fail readers should study the ‘Aspects of India’s Economy 33-34 ’, publication of Research Unit for Political economy on the Iraq War, published 20 years ago. It is one of the finest, most accurate, methodical and illustrative research or documents undertaken projecting the actual truth and happenings or what was concealed beneath the surface. With figures it tabulates how America wished to strangulate the oil resources because of it’s dwindling economy and ho w imperialism was an integral part of the war. Even non Marxists o Liberals, classed it as one of the most productive research .A classic work, in it’s own right.

It delves into the history unfolding Iraq from colony to semi-colony, Towards Nationalisation, The Iran-Iraq War: Serving American Interests ,. The Torment of Iraq , Return of Imperialist Occupation. . It analyses The Current Strategic Agenda of the United States,.Home Front in Shambles and   Military Solution to an Economic Crisis.

Setbacks

In important ways the Iraqi resistance have powerful echoes of previous anti imperialist wars. Unfortunately Iraq like Vietnam in the late 1960’s and mid 1970’s received no aid from a foreign country, as there was no superpower or Socialist country to offer it moral support.

Factional rivalries divided a united guerrilla resistance for over a decade after the Iraqi attack at the hands of United States of America. At the international level the anti imperialist movement was generally weak. Globalisation played an important role in sponsoring the American attack. Ironically and fittingly America had to retreat or lost, because it’s resources were exhausted and it’s economy in shambles. The USA economy received a mortal blow after the war, and heightened political consciousness of the people. Sadly progressive forces could not capitalise on it to build a class conscious movement against capitalism linked with imperialism.

Harsh Thakor is freelance journalist who has extensively studied imperialist wars .Thanks information from ‘Aspects 33-34’ and World Socialist Web Site.

21 March 2023

Source: countercurrents.org

It is true, western sanctions have failed miserably in destroying Russia’s economy. To the contrary, Russia’s economy has been booming since 2022 and keeps doing well, also projected into the future. Why?

“We have exponentially increased our economic sovereignty”, President Putin commented at a recent meeting with aircraft factory employees in Ulan-Ude, Buryatia. The autonomous Republic of Buryatia is in the south of Eastern Siberia, along the border with Mongolia.

Its territory takes up two thirds of the water area of Lake Baikal (see map below). This just as an idea of the enormous landmass, called Russia, and what lays above and beneath her.

Economic sovereignty, is one of the main reasons for Russia’s economic growth during the time of the worst sanctions any country has ever undergone by the west led, of course, by the US and its puppet Europe. The latter has followed the sanction circus, even though it is self-destructive for Europe. This, indeed, is well known to those who have been put into the position of “leading” – or rather destroying – Europe as an economic force.

Not by coincidence, the two key figures in this scenario are two Germans, the unelected President of the European Commission (EC) Madame Ursula von der Leyen, who calls all the important shorts, almost unquestioned, and the Chancellor of Germany Olaf Scholz, who is supposed to be leading the European economic powerhouse to annihilation. Madame von der Leyen is also on the WEF’s Board of Trustees and Olaf Scholz is a graduate of the WEF’s Young Global Leader’s (YGL) Academy.

As usual, it is the European people at large who have been betrayed by their so-called leaders – most, if not all of them, scholars of Klaus Schwab’s school for YGL. By no means have they ever been “infiltrated” to serve the interests of the people, who supposedly “elected” them. The farce and betrayal is so bold, that most people cannot and will not believe it.

That is precisely what the powers of those funding and directing the WEF are banking on. They are helped by decades of social engineering, highly professional mind manipulation, by the bought western main stream media.

The masterminds behind social engineering are Tavistock, the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), a Pentagon-linked think tank, and others, using most sophisticated technologies for bending people’s minds into directions they never wanted, but they have no saying.

Only once we recognize it, admit our laisser-faire “victimhood”, we may be able to react and resist. See this.

Paraphrased, “We are proud of having been able to infiltrate countries around the world with our YGLs”, is one of Klaus Schwab’s infamous sayings.

The point of these sanctions is much more to harm Europe than to destroy Russia. The prime objective is to cut Europe – primarily Germany – off the flow of cheap energy, gas from Russia, thereby ruining and possibly as much as deindustrializing Germany and by association Europe. The deliberate destruction by the US / NATO of the Nord Stream Pipelines is vivid testimony.

President Putin elaborated on the exponential success of Russia in the face of western sanctions,

“After all, what did our adversary count on? That we would collapse in two or three weeks or in a month? The expectation was that enterprises would cease due to our partners refusing to work with us, the financial system would collapse, tens of thousands of people would be left without work, take to the streets, protest, Russia would be shaken from the inside and collapse. That was their intention, but this did not happen”.

President Putin did, however, not explain one of the key underlying factors for Russia’s blooming rather than wilting, namely the almost complete dedollarization that Russia’s Central Bank has managed to carry out under top Russian economist and President Putin’s economic adviser, Sergey Glazyev’s guidance.

V. Putin and S. Lavrov

Through dedollarization which brings along in parallel a sizable de-euroization, Russia’s economy has grown stronger, more autonomous, and is now even closer linked to eastern economies, notably China.

A Ruble-Yuan swap agreement between Russia and China has been in force for many years and has been steadily expanded for mutual protection – thereby also extending Russia’s relation with other Asian economies, especially those within the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO), covering almost half of the world population and about a third of the world’s GDP.

This means sanction-free trading with half the world – a friendly rather than a belligerent world. That alone is a significant advantage compared to dealing with the west – which always expects that their “partners” dance to their tune.

Russia plays a major role within the BRICS-plus, meaning Brazil, Russia, India, China, South Africa, with the plus standing for Iran and many western countries having expressed interest in joining the group, with the ultimate expectation to integrate sooner or later into the “Eastern Fold”, mainly represented by the SCO.

Amazing, but given the above background, not surprising, is Russia’s significant trade surplus of over US$ 330 billion equivalent. Despite western Ukraine-related sanctions, Russia’s exports surged by nearly 20% in 2022.

Much of the trade surplus is driven by grain exports. Russia produces almost 12% of the world’s wheat, all non-GMO (2022/2023 est.). Total world wheat production for this period is estimated at about 781 million tons.

The combined BRICS-plus Iran output is almost half of global production. That of China (18%), India (13%), and Russia (12%), account for a combined 43% of total world production. Almost half of one of the world’s key food staples is produced by just three BRICS countries.

This fact is important – signaling that food leverage is not handled by the west.

Russia’s overall trade increased by 8.1% in 2022 over 2021, to US$ 850.5 billion equivalent. The bulk of Russia’s exports were energy products, gas and petrol, amounting to about two thirds of all exports, US$ 384 billion equivalent.

This is an almost 43% annual increase despite western sanctions. Moscow redirected energy that the west refused (sanctions) to China, India, and other Asian partners, at prices higher than the special low tariffs Germany and Europe benefitted from – and thus, made Europe’s economy more competitive worldwide. For details, see this.

The deliberate suicide attempt in Europe’s leadership (sic) against the will of the people, or rather by betraying the European population, becomes more than evident.

This trend is set out in the WEF’s Great Reset and UN Agenda 2030 – utmost possible destruction of the current mostly western economic system, so that it may be rebuilt according to WEF’s concept of a One World Order (OWO) which also includes massive population reduction. This may be precipitated over the coming years through the poisonous injections that were coerced upon the globe’s 8 billion people in the past two years. An estimated 70% were injected.

These jabs or “vaxxes”, with a variety of poisonous contents, were planned to bring death and infertility. The proof is slowly but surely seeping out. Now many even western politicians are no longer silent, as they are confronted with skyrocketing over-mortality and infertility.

With these overall plan and objectives of the WEF and its diabolical handlers from the shadows, it also becomes evident, that Russia and China become key targets for take-over, as the new planned OWO will need their energy and food – aside from a myriad of other life-supporting natural resources Russia and China possess.

What the Russian booming economy – because of the “sanctions” – and ever-growing trade surplus signals, is a more stabilizing independence of the east from the west, a shift in world leadership. The warmonger hegemon is gradually but ever more visibly fading. A new concept of peaceful multi-polarity is taking over. – That is humanity’s hope.

However, we must not forget that this concept of a constant western mode of aggression to govern the world, was designed already a century or more ago. It has been perfected by creating several weapons of mass destruction that may be used simultaneously worldwide – like the covid-scare and totalitarian measures, as long as the media-duped world sleeps. Alternatively, these weapons of mass destruction may be applied individually and by targeting specific countries and regions, to disguise their wanton damaging intent.

Other than a potentially all-destructive nuclear war – which may not be in the interest of those intending to run the world – there are a few other weapons of mass destruction:

(i) Artificial weather and climate modification which also includes triggering of deadly earthquakes – Environmental Modification Techniques, or ENMOD, which comprises the High-frequency Active Auroral Research Program, or HAARP system, as well as other DARPA developed technologies, see this and this. 
These technologies are fortunately not a western monopoly, but are also in control of Russia and China, and at least partially by a few other countries. This, despite Klaus Schwab’s (WEF) arrogant phantasy expressed during the recent World Government Summit in Dubai, that a small elite should control these world commanding technologies – see this;

(ii) The pharma-assault on the world, as we have witnessed with the covid-crime, where harming and deadly medication is forced upon the population; see this – and the impending all-nations overriding WHO supremacy with the revised International Health Regulations (IHR), of which the new Pandemic Treaty will be an integral part – tyrannizing the world with health measures that supposedly no government can oppose.
Though, police and military enforcement is foreseen, it is unlikely to hold against the power of the people. See this. The easiest and most effective answer is – EXIT WHO IMMEDIATELY; and

(iii) The global financial meltdown – which is largely and deliberately a derivative-based “financial weapon of mass destruction”. It may have started with the recent collapse of California’s Silicon Valley Bank (SVB), followed by the NYC Signature Bank – and the latest Credit Suisse (CS), just barely saved by the Swiss Central Bank with a US$ 54 billion equivalent lifeline credit. CS is one of the “Too Big to Fail” (TBF) banks. It may be just a matter of time, before the TBF banks will become too big of a tax-payer liability – and they must be dropped.
For details of the looming Financial Tsunami, see this and this.

These are but a few of the weapons of mass destruction that the west may want to use to maintain its Washington-led hegemony.

It is amazing but no coincidence, how the dots connect when analyzing the Russian booming economy, despite – NO, BECAUSE of western sanctions.

Aggressions, lies, deceit, deliberate killing are low vibrating deeds or behaviors. Sooner or later, they will succumb to higher spirituality, emitted by an awakened, an aware and a conscious society – We, the People.

*

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Peter Koenig is a geopolitical analyst and a former Senior Economist at the World Bank and the World Health Organization (WHO), where he worked for over 30 years around the world.

20 March 2023

Source: www.globalresearch.ca

By Dr Gideon Polya

The 20th anniversary of the war criminal US, UK and Australian invasion of Iraq in 2003 will fall on about 20 March 2023. On this occasion mendacious and racist Western media will at best remember the Iraq War as a US policy mistake. However decent people will remember the carnage. From 1990 onwards Iraqi deaths from US-imposed violence and deprivation have totalled about 5.0-5.5 million, similar to deaths in the WW2 Jewish Holocaust ( 5-6 million).

(A). Some important prefatory comments on violent deaths, avoidable deaths from imposed deprivation, and culpability.

One notes that “holocaust” implies a large number of deaths whereas  “genocide” is precisely defined by Article 2 of the UN Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide (the UN Genocide Convention) thus: “In the present Convention, genocide means any of the following acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnic, racial or religious group, as such: a) Killing members of the group; b) Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group; c) Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part; d) Imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group; e) Forcibly transferring children of the group to another group” [1].

Further, deaths in war and occupation come from violence and from imposed deprivation. Whether a child dies from violence (bombs, bullets or bashing) or from being deprived of life-sustaining requisites (food, potable water and medicine), the death is just as final, and the culpability of the perpetrator just as real. However while deaths in war from violence are often hard to assess, avoidable deaths from imposed deprivation can be estimated from comparative demographic data (that have been provided for the years from 1950 onwards by the UN Population Division). The methodology used to estimate avoidable deaths from deprivation is described in detail  in my book “Body Count. Global avoidable mortality since 1950” [2].

Culpability for avoidable deaths from imposed deprivation is set out by Articles 55 and 56 of the Fourth Geneva Convention ( the Geneva Convention relative to the Protection of Civilian Persons In Time of War) that state that the  Occupying Power  is obliged to supply the conquered Subjects with life-sustaining food and medical requisites “to the fullest extent of the means available to it”.These key injunctions of International Law have been grossly violated by the US and its degenerate and serial war criminal allies (notably the UK, Apartheid Israel, France and US lackey Australia) in the post-9/11 US War on Muslims [3, 4].

Scrupulously ignored by mendacious Mainstream media (M3) journalist, editor, politician, academic and commentariat presstitutes is the horrible reality that the ongoing Iraqi Genocide and Iraq Holocaust actually commenced 109 years ago with the British invasion of Iraq in 1914 for oil and imperial hegemony [2, 5]. The deaths in the various stages of the 109-year and ongoing Iraq Holocaust are succinctly set out below.

(B). Deaths from violence and deprivation in the ongoing, 109-year Iraqi Holocaust.

(a). British rule or hegemony (1914-1950): 4 million.

British interest in invading and conquering Iraq came from discovery of oil in adjacent Iran in 1908. Western violation of Iraq commenced with the British invasion for oil and imperial hegemony a mere 6 years later, in 1914 during WW1.  Churchill had forced the Ottoman Empire (1517-1924 Ottoman Caliphate) into WW1  by seizing British-built battleships that the Turks had already paid for. Assuming excess mortality of Iraqis under British rule or hegemony (1914-1950) was the same as for Indians under the British – interpolation from available data indicate Indian avoidable death rates in “deaths per 1,000 of population per year” of 37 (1757-1920), 35 (1920-1930), 30 (1930-1940) and 24 (1940-1950) –  one can estimate from Iraqi population data that Iraqi avoidable deaths from deprivation under British occupation and hegemony from 1914-1950 totalled about 4 million [2, 4-7].

(b). Gulf War (1990-1991) and Sanctions period (1990-2003): 1.9 million.

Violent deaths and avoidable deaths from violently-imposed deprivation in the Gulf War (1990-1991) and the Sanctions period (1990-2003) totalled  0.2 million and 1.7 million, respectively. During the Sanctions period the US, UK an Israeli air forces relentlessly bombed Iraqi infrastructure with consequent huge avoidable deaths from deprivation. On May 12, 1996, Madeleine Albright (US UN Ambassador and later US Secretary of State) defended UN sanctions against Iraq on a “60 Minutes” segment in which Lesley Stahl asked her “We have heard that half a million children have died. I mean, that’s more children than died in Hiroshima. And, you know, is the price worth it?” Madeleine Albright replied “We think the price is worth it” [6]. This was a singular instance in which the US admitted to its genocidal carnage. Back in 1990 eminent Australian medical scientist  Professor Fred Mendelsohn (his industrial chemist father Oscar Mendelsohn befriended and employed my Jewish Hungarian refugee father,  Dr John Polya, in about 1940) argued for peace and warned in a letter published by The Age (Melbourne) that huge numbers of children would die in the looming Gulf War. This wonderful and inspiring pro-peace humanitarian  was right – Iraqi under-5 infant deaths under Sanctions totalled 1.7 million, a massive crime against Humanity.

(c). Iraq War (2003-2011): 2.7 million.

The US Just Foreign Policy organization estimated, based on the data of expert UK ORB analysts and top US medical epidemiologists, 1.5 million violent deaths in the Iraq War (2003-2011). UN Population Division data  indicate a further 1.2 million Iraqi avoidable deaths from war-imposed deprivation in this period. In 2003-2011 Iraqi deaths  from violence (1.5 million) and imposed deprivation (1.2 million) totalled 2.7 million [2, 4-7].

Iraqi deaths from violence (1.7 million) and war-imposed deprivation (2.9 million) in the period 1990-2011 totalled  4.6 million.

(d). Post-Iraq War (2011 onwards): 0.4 million.

The US ostensibly withdrew from devastated Iraq in 2011 but returned in force to the region with a vengeance in 2012 to help Syria, Iraq and Iran deal with ISIS  in Syria (2012 onward)  and  thence in Iraq (2014 onwards) that has been associated with about 0.1 million violent Iraqi deaths, most notably in devastated Mosul (40,000 killed)  and in  twice US-demolished Fallujah [8-10]. One notes that the ruthless and barbarous ISIS subverted and took over the Sunni insurgency in Iraq against the corrupt, violent, US-installed Al Maliki Government, and similarly ISIS came to dominate the US Alliance-backed Sunni insurgency against the Assad Government in Syria. UN data indicate about 0.3 million avoidable Iraqi  deaths from deprivation in the period 2011-2020. Just as the US backed Islamists in Afghanistan  from 1978 onwards, so the US and its allies covertly supported ISIS Islamists in Iraq and Syria with the realized aims of a permanent  US presence in both countries, and the  Balkanizing of Iraq and Syria in the interests of Apartheid Israel. Only Russian support enabled the Syrian Government to survive.  Professor Michel Chossudovsky: “The Islamic State of Iraq and al-Sham: An instrument of the Western Military Alliance…In August 2014, Obama launched a so-called “counter-terrorism operation” against the ISIS which was firmly entrenched in Mosul. This “fake” counter-terrorist operation was launched against terrorists who were supported and financed by the US, UK, Turkey, Saudi Arabia, the UAE, and Israel (among others)” [11]. The Syrian and Iraqi Governments have demanded US withdrawal to no avail [12]. The Iraqi Genocide and Iraqi Holocaust continues.

 (e). Iraqi Holocaust deaths 5 million (1990 onwards) and 9 million (1914 onwards).  

Ignoring Iraqi deaths associated with the US-backed Iraq-Iran War, one can estimate about 9 million Iraqi deaths from UK or US violence and  imposed deprivation in the century after the 1914 invasion of Iraq by Britain, this constituting an Iraqi Holocaust,  and also an Iraqi Genocide as defined by Article 2 of the UN Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide [1].

Consideration of (c) and (d) above indicates post-1990 Iraqi deaths from violence and deprivation totalling 4.6 million + 0.4 million = 5 million [2, 4-7].

The huge avoidable deaths from deprivation of Iraqis under the British, Americans and the US Coalition is evidence of gross violation of Articles 55 and 56 of the Geneva Convention relative to the Protection of Civilian Persons in Time of War that state unequivocally that an Occupier must provide its conquered Subjects with life-preserving food and medical requisites “to the fullest extent of the means available to it” [3, 4].

(f). Check: an alternative 2023 estimate of 5.5 million Iraqi deaths from violence and deprivation from 1990 onwards.

An alternative estimate of Iraqi deaths from violence and imposed deprivation from 2003 onwards in the period 2003-2023 can be made as follows:

(i). Violent deaths totalled 1.5 million (2003-2011) as determined by Just Foreign Policy based on direct polling surveys by US epidemiologists and the UK polling organization ORB. However the Americans and their allies did not completely leave in 2011 and indeed rejected demands of the Iraqi Parliament for them to do so [12].  The renewed violent killing in response to the Sunni ISIS (ISIL, Daesh) rebellion includes 40,000 killed in the destruction  of the western part of  Mosul alone [10], and one can accordingly estimate  a further circa  0.1 million violent Iraqi deaths from 2011 onwards. Thus violent deaths have totalled about 1.6 million in the period 2003-2023.

(ii). Avoidable deaths from imposed deprivation in the period 2003-2023 can be estimated from  UN Population Division demographic data [2]. Thus in 2003 under-5 infant deaths totalled 114,400. Using impoverished and sanctioned but nevertheless well governed and peaceful Cuba  as a baseline, the corrected Iraqi under-5 infant mortality in 2003 was 111,752 [2]. Likewise the corrected Iraqi under-5 infant mortality in 2020 was 27,889 [2]. The average under-5 infant mortality in the period 2003-2023 was 69,821 and  totalled 69,821 per year x 20 years = 1,396,420 for 2003 onwards. For impoverished Global South countries total avoidable deaths from deprivation are about 1.4 times the under-5 infant mortality [2], or 1,396,420 x 1.4 = 1,954,988 or about 2.0 million.

Accordingly Iraqi deaths from violence and imposed deprivation total 1.6 million + 2.0 million = 3.6 million (2003 onwards), 1.9 million + 3.6 million = 5.5 million (1990 onwards), and 4.0 million + 5.5 million = 9.5 million (1914 onwards).

(g). Comparing the Iraqi Holocaust (5.0-5.5 million deaths) with the WW2 Jewish Holocaust (5.1-5.8 million deaths) and about 70 other genocides and holocausts.  

As outlined above, estimates of deaths from violence and imposed deprivation are of 5.0-5.5 million such Iraqi deaths from 1990 onwards and 9.0 -9.5 million such deaths from 1914 onwards. How does this compare with deaths in the WW2 Jewish Holocaust?

Eminent Jewish British historian and fervent  Zionist, Professor Sir Martin Gilbert (fellow of Merton College, Oxford, author of 88 books, and expert on Winston Churchill, WW1, WW2 and Jewish history) [13] estimated  5.1 million WW2 Jewish Holocaust deaths in his “Jewish History Atlas” (1969)[14], and 5.8 million in his “Atlas of the Holocaust” (1982) [15].

Deaths from violence and imposed deprivation in the 1990 onwards Iraqi Holocaust (5.0-5.5 million) are commensurate with those in the WW2 Jewish Holocaust (5-6 million), the WW2 Polish Holocaust (6 million), and the WW2 Bengali Holocaust (WW2 Indian Holocaust, WW2 Bengal Famine; 6-7 million Indians deliberately starved to death for strategic reasons in Bengal, Bihar, Assam and Odisha by the British with food-denying Australian complicity), but much fewer than in the WW2 European Holocaust (30 million mostly Russian and other Slavic victims as well as Jewish and in Roma victims), and the WW2 Chinese Holocaust (35-40 million Chinese deaths from violence and deprivation under the Japanese, 1937-1945).

For detailed listings of about 70 genocides and holocausts see “Report Genocide” [16]  and  my books “US-imposed post-9/11 Muslim Holocaust and Muslim Genocide” [4] and “Jane Austen and the Black Hole of British History” [17]. The Iraqi Holocaust and Iraqi Genocide [2, 4-7] was part of a wider 21st century Muslim Holocaust and Muslim Genocide in which (as determined in 2015) 32 million Muslims died from violence (5 million) and imposed deprivation (27 million) in 20 countries invaded by the US Alliance since the US Government’s 9/11 false flag atrocity in which about 3,000 innocent Americans perished [18-20].

(h). Holocaust ignoring  and genocide ignoring by the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA) that is largely composed of US Alliance members including  the major  perpetrators of the Iraqi Holocaust.

The major perpetrators  of the Iraqi Holocaust (the US, UK and Australia) are  among the 35 members of the all-European, anti-Jewish anti-Semitic, anti-Arab anti-Semitic, pro-Apartheid, genocide-ignoring and holocaust-ignoring IHRA. Of these 35 soiled, pro-Apartheid  countries: (1) all are European; (2) the 5 located outside Europe (Argentina, Australia, Canada, Apartheid Israel, and the US) were all created based on the genocide of the Indigenous People; (3) 9 members were part of the genocidal WW2 Nazi Germany Alliance; (4) 4 (the US, UK, France and Apartheid Israel) are nuclear terrorist states; (5) 28 belong to the 30-member nuclear-armed NATO that accepts  mass incineration of billions of men, women and children as an acceptable military strategy; (6) 14 were notably involved in the brutal conquest and genocide of Indigenous non-European people over 5 centuries; (7) only 2 (Austria and Ireland) have had the moral decency to sign and ratify the Treaty for the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons (TPNW); and (8) all but 4 shockingly voted No to the annual UNGA Anti-Nazi Resolution in 2022 that condemns Nazism, neo-Nazism and related racist obscenities [21, 22].

The IHRA Definition of “antisemitism” lists 11 false examples of assertions (e.g. criticism of Apartheid Israel, Nazi-style Israeli policies and hugely disproportionate Zionist influence) that it regards as anti-Jewish anti-Semitic. All 11 examples can be shown to be utterly false assertions  designed to damage and defame anti-racist Jewish and non-Jewish critics of genocidally racist Zionism and of Apartheid Israel and its ongoing Palestinian Genocide. The IHRA Definition of anti-Semitism is anti-Jewish anti-Semitic (by falsely defaming anti-racist Jewish critics of Apartheid Israel as anti-Semites) , anti-Arab anti-Semitic (by falsely defaming anti-racist Palestinian, Arab and Muslim  critics of Apartheid Israel as anti-Semites) and holocaust-ignoring and genocide-ignoring  (by ignoring all WW2 holocausts and genocides other than the WW2 Jewish Holocaust and indeed ignoring 70 other holocausts and genocides) [21, 22].

Holocaust-ignoring and genocide-ignoring are far, far worse than repugnant holocaust denial and genocide denial because the latter can at least permit public refutation and public discussion, subject, of course, to censorship by the  mendacious Mainstream media (M3) presstitutes who dominate public life and public perception of reality in the Western Corporatocracies and Murdochracies. Not surprisingly, the racist and mendacious IHRA Definition has been condemned by scholars around the world and by over 40 anti-racist Jewish organizations [23]. However the IHRA holocaust ignoring has made great strides in Zionist-subverted US, UK and Australia, the major perpetrators  of the Iraqi Holocaust. Thus, for example, in Australia the  Australian Labor Government,  the Coalition Opposition, the Labor Government of South Australia,  the Labor Government  of Victoria, and 5 out of Australia’s 43 universities (Melbourne, Wollongong,  Macquarie, Monash, and Sunshine Coast Universities) have all adopted the egregiously false, racist, anti-Semitic and genocide-ignoring IHRA Definition of Anti-Semitism [21, 24- 26]. This attack on academic and societal  free speech  and Truth is just as bad in the Zionist-subverted UK and in the  Zionist-subverted US (notwithstanding  the First Amendment of the US Constitution that guarantees free speech for Americans).

Final comments.

On the occasion of the 20th anniversary of the illegal and war criminal US Alliance  invasion of Iraq on 20 March 2003 decent people will pause to reflect on the devastation inflicted on Iraq. Iraqi deaths from violence and war-imposed deprivation totalled about 5 million for the period 1990 onwards. The killing continues in US-devastated Iraq. In 2020, for example, the under-5 infant deaths as a percentage of total population for Iraq was 52 times greater than that for Japan, and 14 times greater than that for impoverished and sanctioned but peaceful Cuba [2, 27]. However this appalling and continuing carnage is resolutely ignored by the mendacious Mainstream media (M3) journalist, editor, politician, academic and commentariat  presstitutes of the countries that perpetrated the ongoing Iraqi Holocaust and Iraqi Genocide.

Decent anti-racist  folk around the world will demand truth-telling and justice for the devastated people of Iraq and will impose Boycotts, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) on the perpetrators  just as BDS is applied to the Apartheid Israel and all its supporters complicit in the ongoing Palestinian Genocide (2.2 million deaths from violence, 0.1 million, and deprivation, 2.1 million, from  WW1 onwards) [28-30].

In 2005, when first expert reports on the growing carnage in Iraq were emerging,  anti-racist Jewish British writer Harold Pinter in his Nobel Prize Acceptance Speech stated: “The invasion of Iraq was a bandit act, an act of blatant state terrorism, demonstrating absolute contempt for the concept of international law. The invasion was an arbitrary military action inspired by a series of lies upon lies and gross manipulation of the media and therefore of the public; an act intended to consolidate American military and economic control of the Middle East masquerading as a last resort all other justifications having failed to justify themselves as liberation. A formidable assertion of military force responsible for the death and mutilation of thousands and thousands of innocent people. We have brought torture, cluster bombs, depleted uranium, innumerable acts of random murder, misery, degradation and death to the Iraqi people and call it ‘bringing freedom and democracy to the Middle East’. How many people do you have to kill before you qualify to be described as a mass murderer and a war criminal? One hundred thousand? More than enough, I would have thought. Therefore it is just that Bush and Blair be arraigned before the International Criminal Court of Justice” [31]. 5 million? Surely enough, I would have thought.

References.

[1]. Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide: https://treaties.un.org/doc/publication/unts/volume%2078/volume-78-i-1021-english.pdf .

[2]. Gideon Polya, “Body Count. Global avoidable mortality since 1950”, 2nd edition, Korsgard Publishing, Germany , 2021.

[3]. “Fourth Geneva Convention relative to the Protection of Civilian Persons in Time of War”, 12 August 1949: https://www.un.org/en/genocideprevention/documents/atrocity-crimes/Doc.33_GC-IV-EN.pdf .

[4]. Gideon Polya, “US-imposed, Post-9/11 Muslim Holocaust and Muslim Genocide”, Korsgard Publishing, Germany, 2020.

[5]. Gideon Polya , “20th Anniversary Of Huge Demonstrations Against Impending Iraq War”, Countercurrents, 15 February 2023: https://countercurrents.org/2023/02/20th-anniversary-of-huge-demonstrations-against-impending-iraq-war/?swcfpc=1  .

[6]. “Iraqi Holocaust Iraqi Genocide”: https://sites.google.com/site/iraqiholocaustiraqigenocide/ .

[7]. “Muslim Holocaust Muslim Genocide”: https://sites.google.com/site/muslimholocaustmuslimgenocide/ .

[8]. Gideon Polya, Review: “The Sacking Of Fallujah. A People’s History” – Ongoing Iraqi Genocide”, Countercurrents, 30 January 2021: https://countercurrents.org/2020/01/review-the-sacking-of-fallujah-a-peoples-history-ongoing-iraqi-genocide/ .

[9]. Ross Caputi, Richard Hil, and Donna Mulhearn, “The Sacking Of Fallujah. A People’s History”, University of Massachusetts Press, 2019.

[10]. Gideon Polya, “Mosul Massacre latest in Iraqi Genocide”, Countercurrents, 24 July 2017: https://countercurrents.org/2017/07/mosul-massacre-latest-in-iraqi-genocide-us-alliance-war-crimes-demand-icc-bds .

[11]. Professor Michel Chossudovsky, “The Engineered Destruction and Political Fragmentation of Iraq. Third War against Iraq initiated by Obama”, Global Research, 16 March 2023: https://www.globalresearch.ca/the-destruction-and-political-fragmentation-of-iraq-towards-the-creation-of-a-us-sponsored-islamist-caliphate/5386998 .

[12]. Gideon Polya, “US, UK,  Australia, Canada & Germany Reject Iraqi Parliament’s Quit Iraq Demand”, Countercurrents, 16 January 2021: https://countercurrents.org/2020/01/us-uk-australia-canada-germany-reject-iraqi-parliaments-quit-iraq-demand/ .

[13]. Gideon Polya,  “UK Zionist Historian Sir Martin Gilbert (1936-2015) Variously Ignored Or Minimized WW2 Bengali Holocaust”, Countercurrents, 19 February 2015: https://countercurrents.org/polya190215.htm .

[14]. Martin Gilbert, “Jewish History Atlas”, Weidenfeld and Nicolson, London, 1969.

[15].  Martin Gilbert “Atlas of the Holocaust”, Michael Joseph, London, 1982.

[16]. “Report Genocide”; https://sites.google.com/site/reportgenocide/home .

[17].  Gideon Polya,  “Jane Austen and the Black Hole of British History. Colonial rapacity, holocaust denial and the crisis in biological sustainability”, 3rd edition, Korsgaard Publishing,  2023.

[18]. Gideon Polya, “Paris Atrocity Context: 27 Million Muslim Avoidable Deaths From Imposed Deprivation In 20 Countries Violated By US Alliance Since 9-11”, Countercurrents, 22 November, 2015: http://www.countercurrents.org/polya221115.htm .

[19]. “Experts: US did 9/11”: https://sites.google.com/site/expertsusdid911/ .

[20]. Gideon Polya, “Lying Mainstream Media Ignore Expert New 9/11 WTC7 Demolition Report”, Countercurrents, 22 August 2020: https://countercurrents.org/2020/08/lying-mainstream-media-ignore-expert-new-9-11-wtc7-demolition-report/ .

[21]. Gideon Polya, “Melbourne University Adopts Anti-Semitic & Holocaust-Ignoring IHRA Definition Of Anti-Semitism”, Countercurrents, 5 February 2023: https://countercurrents.org/2023/02/melbourne-university-adopts-anti-semitic-holocaust-ignoring-ihra-definition-of-anti-semitism/ .

[22]. Gideon Polya, “Zionists & Pro-Zionist, US Lackey Australian Government Threaten Australian Academic Free Speech”, Countercurrents, 7 March 2023: https://countercurrents.org/2023/03/zionists-pro-zionist-us-lackey-australian-government-threaten-australian-academic-free-speech/?swcfpc=1 .

[23]. Jewish Voices for Peace, “First ever: 40+ Jewish groups worldwide oppose equating antisemitism with criticism of Israel”, 17 July 2018: https://jewishvoiceforpeace.org/first-ever-40-jewish-groups-worldwide-oppose-equating-antisemitism-with-criticism-of-israel/#english .

[24]. Gideon Polya, “85 Ways Zionist Australian Labor Government Betrays Palestinian Human Rights & Humanity”, Countercurrents, March 2023: https://countercurrents.org/2023/03/85-ways-zionist-australian-labor-government-betrays-palestinian-human-rights-humanity/?swcfpc=1 .

[25]. Michael Bradley, “Does being anti-Israel mean you’re anti-Semitic?”, Crikey, 14 March 2023: https://www.crikey.com.au/2023/03/14/anti-israel-anti-semitic-university-ihra-definition/  . .

[26], “Criticising the nation of Israel is justified. Demonising Jewish people is not”, Crikey, 17 March 2023: https://www.crikey.com.au/2023/03/17/anti-semitism-israel-jewish-people-ihra-definition/ .

[27]. Richard Hil and Gideon Polya, “Imperial power: The Iraq war, 20 years on”, Pearls & Irritations, 16 March 2023: https://johnmenadue.com/iraq-and-imperial-power-20-years-on/ .

[28]. BDS – Boycott Apartheid Israel: https://sites.google.com/view/bdsopinions/home .

[29]. “Palestinian Genocide”: https://sites.google.com/site/palestiniangenocide/ .

[30]. 2023, 75th Nakba Anniversary: 1948 Nakba (Catastrophe) & Palestinian Genocide: https://sites.google.com/site/palestiniangenocide/1948-nakba-catastrophe-palestinian-genocide .

[31]. Harold Pinter, “Art, Truth And Politics”, Countercurrents, 8 December, 2005: https://countercurrents.org/arts-pinter081205.htm .

Dr Gideon Polya taught science students at La Trobe University, Melbourne, Australia over 4 decades.

19 March 2023

Source: countercurrents.org