Archives: Articles

By WSWS

10 Dec 2020 – The overwhelming bipartisan vote by the House of Representatives Tuesday [8 Dec] evening to approve the largest military budget in American history demonstrates the reality of capitalist politics. Democrats and Republicans are supposedly at each other’s throats over an array of social and political issues, but they are entirely in agreement on funding the world’s largest and most lethal military machine.

The House vote for the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) was by a massive margin, 335–78. Democrats supported passage by 195–37. Republicans supported passage by 140–40. Every leader of the House Democrats backed passage: Speaker Nancy Pelosi, Majority Leader Steny Hoyer, Majority Whip James Clyburn. They were joined by the top Republicans: Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy, Minority Whip Steve Scalise and the ranking Republican on the House Armed Services Committee, the co-sponsor of the massive bill, Mac Thornberry of Texas.

The margin was far more than the two-thirds required to override a threatened Trump veto, although it is not clear that Trump will actually follow up on his tweets demanding two changes in the bill, neither relevant to its basic purposes. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell has already said the Senate will pass the NDAA in the next few days. The margin is likely to be even more decisive than in the House.

While rubber-stamping the largest-ever Pentagon budget, the House and Senate remain locked in a protracted stalemate which has blocked the payment of a single dollar of federal supplemental unemployment insurance since the benefit expired last July 31.

The $741 billion for the Pentagon is approximately six times as much as the $121 billion in unemployment benefits paid out to 60 million workers since the coronavirus pandemic struck.

The goal of the NDAA, according to its preamble, is to achieve “irreversible momentum in the implementation of the National Defense Strategy” spelled out by the Pentagon in 2018, which identified “strategic competition” with Russia and China, not terrorism, as the “preeminent challenge” of US military policy. This includes, according to the various subdivisions of the massive bill, achieving “Superiority in the Air”, “Superiority on the Seas,” “Superiority on the Land,” and, in keeping with the demands of Trump, “Superiority in Space.”

It is not hard to imagine what the rest of the world is to think of this all-out US drive for military power “uber alles”: China, Russia and imperialist powers like Germany, Britain, France and Japan are all engaged in military build-ups to match that in America, bringing ever closer the danger of an uncontrolled military clash between great powers, most of them nuclear armed.

Well short of such an apocalypse, the arms race involves an unforgivable squandering of economic resources needed to meet social concerns such as education, health care, alleviating poverty and retirement security.

One of the largest single components of the Pentagon budget is Overseas Contingency Operations (OCO), funded to the tune of $69 billion. This is the spending for ongoing military operations where US forces are deployed: primarily Afghanistan, Iraq and Syria, as well as the Persian Gulf, where vast naval and air assets are arrayed against Iran. The OCO also covers active drone missile warfare operations across Central Asia, the Middle East and North Africa.

The bill puts billions into preparations to confront Russia and China, including fully funding the European Deterrence Initiative, the NATO build-up on Russia’s western borders, and the Pacific Deterrence Initiative, providing $2.2 billion for similar activity by US naval and air forces directed against China. The label “deterrence” is entirely deceptive: the Pentagon is not seeking to ward off Russian and Chinese aggression, but to prepare for US aggression against one or both countries, regarded as the main obstacles to maintaining US world domination. Another $250 million goes for the Ukraine Security Assistance Initiative, while $500 million (and likely much more) is earmarked for Israel.

Some other major provisions of the bill include:

Requiring the Air Force to maintain 386 operational squadrons comprising at least 3,850 combat aircraft. This includes $9.1 billion to buy an additional 93 F-35 Joint Strike Fighter aircraft, 14 more than the Trump administration requested.

Adding $108 million to the procurement of MQ-9 drones equipped to fire missiles.

Purchasing another seven C-130J transport aircraft, used to rapidly deploy troops, tanks and artillery to new war zones.

Procurement of additional major warships for the US Navy, including one additional Virginia-class nuclear-powered submarine, cost roughly $3 billion, and additional smaller submarines, amphibious ships and P-8 anti-submarine aircraft.

Funding to support redesign and improvement of land-based combat systems like artillery, tanks and armored vehicles for the “future of warfare against near-peer competitors” (war with Russia, China or another major power).

Equipping the Army with an additional 116 helicopters, including 60 UH-60 Blackhawks, 50 AH-64E Apaches, and six of the giant MH-47G Chinooks.

Continued funding for a systematic, across-the-board modernization of US nuclear weaponry, begun under Obama and continued under Trump, including submarine-fired missiles, land-based intercontinental ballistic missiles and heavy bombers capable of intercontinental flight.

The legislation incorporates a number of provisions to block military moves announced by Trump in recent months, delaying reduction of US troops stationed in Germany and South Korea, for example, until the next administration. Trump did not threaten a veto over these items, demonstrating that his threats of withdrawal were only for electoral purposes, or to extract more money from the countries being “protected” by US forces.

The veto threat came over one provision included in the bill, and one provision that the drafters left out despite Trump’s incessant demands to the contrary.

The provision Trump objects to establishes a procedure through which all US military bases named after Confederate commanders will be renamed in the course of the next three years. These include Ft. Bragg, North Carolina, and Ft. Hood, Texas, two of the largest centers of the US military, as well as Ft. Benning, Georgia, and Camp A. P. Hill in Virginia.

The provision Trump has demanded as an addition to the NDAA would repeal Section 230 of the Communications Act of 1995, which frees social media companies of liability for anything posted by their users. Because of this provision, Trump has been unable to sue Facebook and Twitter when they have placed warning messages on his tweets and postings of brazen falsehoods or incitements to violence. Both Senate and House leaders rejected Trump’s demand as extraneous to the Pentagon budget and likely to derail the legislation if included.

What is most remarkable, however, and almost unreported in the media, is the lockstep agreement between the Democratic Party and the Republican Party on this legislation. Under conditions where Trump is defying the outcome of the November election and seeking to overturn its results through unconstitutional actions, the Democrats nonetheless vote to provide the “commander in chief” with virtually a blank check.

Democratic and Republican leaders on the committees overseeing Pentagon policies and military budgets gave unanimous support to the NDAA, boasting that the military budget has passed Congress by huge majorities for 59 straight years, and the Fiscal 2021 budget will be number 60.

When it comes to the most critical institution of the capitalist state, there is not even a two-party system in America, there is only one party: the party of the military-intelligence apparatus, which is required both to assert US imperialist interests around the world and to defend the financial aristocracy against the looming threat of social disorder and class conflict at home.

14 December 2020

Source: www.transcend.org

By Richard Falk

6 Dec 2020 – This is an interview published in the Tehran Times on 2 Dec 2020 to questions posed by Zahra Mirzafarjouyan.

Fakhrizadeh Assassination Not Justifiable

Richard Falk says the assassination of Mohsen Fakhrizadeh cannot be legally, morally, or politically justified by any acceptable theory justifying the use of international force, and has very negative implications as an international precedent confirming prior political assassinations of nuclear scientists and opponents in recent years by drone strikes and other methods of attack as in this instance.

Top Iranian nuclear and defence scientist ‘Dr. Mohsen Fakhrizadeh’, who headed the Iranian Defense Ministry’s Organization of Defensive Innovation and Research (known by its acronym SPND), was targeted on Friday [27 Nov] in a multi-pronged attack involving at least one explosion and small fire by a number of assailants in Absard city of Damavand County, Tehran Province.

New York Times quoted intelligence officials as saying that Israel regime was behind the assassination of Iranian scientist Mohsen Fakhrizadeh.

“One American official — along with two other intelligence officials — said that Israel was behind the attack on the scientist,” New York Times reported, adding, “It was unclear how much the United States may have known about the operation in advance, but the two nations are the closest of allies and have long shared intelligence regarding Iran.”

The assassination of Iranian scientist Fakhrizadeh provoked many reactions in the region and the world but in the meantime, the silence of many human rights defenders in not condemning this assassination is debatable.

In this regard, the Iranian Foreign Minister had condemned the assassination of Mohsen Fakhrizadeh and called on the international community not to remain silent in the face of this terrorist act and to abandon double standards and condemn the act of state-sponsored assassination.

To know more about the issue, we reached out to Richard Anderson Falk, American professor emeritus of international law at Princeton University. Following is the text of our interview with him

************************

Isn’t the assassination of the Iranian scientist against international law and norms?

Fakhrizadeh’s assassination cannot be legally & politically justified by any acceptable theory governing the use of force in international relations and has very negative implications as an international precedent. Yes, it is a targeted use of international force against someone outside the combat zone that cannot be justified by a valid claim of self-defense, which by the UN Charter, requires a prior armed attack, or at least a well-documented threat of the imminence of such an attack. This assassination of a nuclear scientist amounts to an unlawful ‘extra-judicial execution,’ which the UN Human Rights Council has unconditionally condemned on several occasion.

In the case of Afghanistan and its so-called ‘War on Terror,’ the US justified drone assassinations in various parts of the world either by an anti-terrorist rationale or by the contention that a hot battlefield has been extended to foreign countries if linked to a particular terrorist organization. Israel has resorted to extra-territorial assassinations since its inception despite frequent condemnations, as well as provocative assassinations in Occupied Palestine since 1967.

The assassination of Mohsen Fakhrizadeh cannot be legally, morally, or politically justified by any acceptable rationale, and has very negative implications as an international precedent.

Many believe the terrorist act has been committed by the Israeli regime. What do you think of this?

I find all forms of state terrorism to be unlawful, amounting to international crimes, and morally indefensible, especially aggravated when directed at civilians inhabiting countries which are at peace with one another, even if relations are strained by unresolved disputes.

Can such an act by the Israeli regime be done without coordination with Trump?

As such coordination is rarely acknowledged, we can only surmise that it occurs, and has been confirmed in the past, including in relation to Iran’s nuclear program. Given the timing of Pompeo’s visit to Israel prior to the assassination and after Trump was defeated in the U.S. presidential elections in November constitutes strong circumstantial evidence of knowledge before the event, if not active coordination. Israel’s failure to make any effort to deny their role in the assassination is also relevant.

Why have the terrors been focused on Iranian nuclear and defensive elites?

Israel, US, and likely Saudi Arabia have been carrying on an unlawful destabilization campaign against Iran for many years, which has intensified during the Trump presidency. Such a focus corresponds with Israel’s security narrative, which seems to have been unconditionally accepted in Washington during the Trump presidency. It alleges that Israel’s longer-range security is threatened by Iran’s nuclear program, which it further alleges seeks to gain a capability to develop produce nuclear weapons, a concern that is reinforced by claims that its immediate security is currently jeopardized by Iran’s large arsenal of sophisticated precision-guided missiles. Israel may feel emboldened by both Trump support and likely departure from the American presidency on January 20th, and further by the recent normalization agreements with the UAE and Bahrain.

What can be the consequences of such a criminal irresponsible act?

The Iranian choice of diplomacy versus some form of military retaliation will likely shape the future with respect to ‘consequences’ The chain of consequences initially depends on how and when Iran chooses to respond, essentially whether it awaits Biden’s inauguration as the US President on January 20th, hoping for a renewal of US participation in the Joint Comprehensive Program of Action (JCPOA)(2015 Agreement on Iran’s Nuclear Program), including the lifting of all sanctions. The Iranian choice of diplomacy versus some form of military retaliation will likely dominate future developments with respect to ‘consequences.’

There are other uncertainties. (1) will Trump/Netanyahu seek to provoke Iran by further aggressive actions in the interim before the Biden inauguration? (2) will Biden follow the Obama path toward diplomacy or be more guided by a policy that strikes a compromise between Obama’s and Trump’s approach? Such a compromise would extend the 2015 arrangement to cover non-nuclear regional security issues affecting Yemen, Gaza, and Lebanon, and possibly Syria, as well as possiby missile deployments. (3) do the normalization agreements between Israel and several Arab governments create a new regional situation that is different than what existed pre-Trump?

What are the goals behind the act considering the timing?

As the act itself has not been officially acknowledged, commentary on its goals is necessarily speculative. The most reasonable interpretation of goals is to provoke Iran so as to give Israel a pretext for retaliation and possibly draw the US into a combat role, and if this fails, to make a diplomatic accommodation with the Biden presidency more problematic for both sides.

Why haven’t European countries condemned the act strongly and somehow they have kept silent?

Europe is hoping mainly for a renewal of its special relationship with the US as soon as Biden takes overEurope has disengaged from active involvement in the region except possibly for France in relation to Lebanon and the East Mediterranean natural gas disputes. Europe is hoping mainly for a renewal of its special relationship with the US as soon as Biden takes over. It does not want to have any distractions from this goal, and it may feel that its future leverage is greater if it pursues equidistance diplomacy that appears not to take sides in this central confrontation between Iran and the Arab/Israel security partnership.

Richard Falk is a member of the TRANSCEND Network, an international relations scholar, professor emeritus of international law at Princeton University, Distinguished Research Fellow, Orfalea Center of Global Studies, UCSB, author, co-author or editor of 60 books, and a speaker and activist on world affairs.

14 December 2020

Source: www.transcend.org

By SIPRI

7 Dec 2020 – Sales of arms and military services by the sector’s largest 25 companies totalled US$361 billion in 2019, 8.5 per cent more than in 2018. The largest companies have a geographically diverse international presence. This is according to new data released today by the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI).

New data from SIPRI’s Arms Industry Database shows that arms sales by the world’s 25 largest arms-producing and military services companies (arms companies) totalled US$361 billion in 2019. This represents an 8.5 per cent increase in real terms over the arms sales of the top 25 arms companies in 2018.

US companies still dominate, Middle East represented in top 25 for the first time

In 2019 the top five arms companies were all based in the United States: Lockheed Martin, Boeing, Northrop Grumman, Raytheon and General Dynamics. These five together registered $166 billion in annual arms sales. In total, 12 US companies appear in the top 25 for 2019, accounting for 61 per cent of the combined arms sales of the top 25.

For the first time, a Middle Eastern firm appears in the top 25 ranking. EDGE, based in the United Arab Emirates (UAE), was created in 2019 from the merger of more than 25 smaller companies. It ranks at number 22 and accounted for 1.3 per cent of total arms sales of the top 25.

‘EDGE is a good illustration of how the combination of high national demand for military products and services with a desire to become less dependent on foreign suppliers is driving the growth of arms companies in the Middle East,’ said Pieter Wezeman, Senior Researcher with the SIPRI Arms and Military Expenditure Programme.

Another newcomer in the top 25 in 2019 was L3Harris Technologies (ranked 10th). It was created through the merger of two US companies that were both in the top 25 in 2018: Harris Corporation and L3 Technologies.

Chinese arms companies’ sales increase, Russian companies’ sales fall

The top 25 also includes four Chinese companies. Three are in the top 10: Aviation Industry Corporation of China (AVIC; ranked 6th), China Electronics Technology Group Corporation (CETC; ranked 8th) and China North Industries Group Corporation (NORINCO; ranked 9th). The combined revenue of the four Chinese companies in the top 25—which also include China South Industries Group Corporation (CSGC; ranked 24th)—grew by 4.8 per cent between 2018 and 2019.

Reflecting on the rise in the arms sales of Chinese companies, SIPRI Senior Researcher Nan Tian said: ‘Chinese arms companies are benefiting from military modernization programmes for the People’s Liberation Army.’

The revenues of the two Russian companies in the top 25—Almaz-Antey and United Shipbuilding—both decreased between 2018 and 2019, by a combined total of $634 million. A third Russian company, United Aircraft, lost $1.3 billion in sales and dropped out of the top 25 in 2019.

Alexandra Kuimova, Researcher at SIPRI, said: ‘Domestic competition and reduced government spending on fleet modernization were two of the main challenges for United Shipbuilding in 2019.’

Other notable developments and trends in the top 25

After the USA, China accounted for the second largest share of 2019 arms sales by the top 25 arms companies, at 16 per cent. The six West European companies together accounted for 18 per cent. The two Russian companies in the ranking accounted for 3.9 per cent.

Nineteen of the top 25 arms companies increased their arms sales in 2019 compared with 2018. The largest absolute increase in arms revenue was registered by Lockheed Martin: $5.1 billion, equivalent to 11 per cent in real terms.

The largest percentage increase in annual arms sales—105 per cent—was reported by French producer Dassault Aviation Group. ‘A sharp rise in export deliveries of Rafale combat aircraft pushed Dassault Aviation into the top 25 arms companies for the first time,’ says Lucie Béraud-Sudreau, Director of the SIPRI Arms and Military Expenditure Programme.

Mapping shows Global South becoming integrated into global arms industry

The report also looks at the international presence of the 15 largest arms companies in 2019. These companies are present in a total of 49 countries, through majority-owned subsidiaries, joint ventures and research facilities.

With a global presence spanning 24 countries each, Thales and Airbus are the two most internationalized companies—followed closely by Boeing (21 countries), Leonardo (21 countries) and Lockheed Martin (19 countries).

The United Kingdom, Australia, the USA, Canada and Germany host the largest numbers of these foreign entities. Outside the arms industry hubs of North America and Western Europe, the largest numbers of entities of foreign companies are hosted by Australia (38), Saudi Arabia (24), India (13), Singapore (11), the UAE (11) and Brazil (10).

Alexandra Marksteiner of the SIPRI Arms and Military Expenditure Programme said: ‘There are many reasons why arms companies might want to establish themselves overseas, including better access to growing markets, collaborative weapon programmes, or policies in the host countries tying arms purchases to technology transfers.’

Of the 49 countries hosting foreign entities of the top 15 arms companies, 17 are in low- and middle-income countries. ‘Countries in the Global South seeking to jump-start their arms production programmes have welcomed foreign arms companies as a means to benefit from technology transfers,’ said Diego Lopes da Silva, Researcher at SIPRI.

Siemon Wezeman, Senior Researcher at SIPRI, said: ‘The Chinese and Russian arms companies in the top 15 have only a limited international presence. Sanctions against Russian firms and government-mandated limits on acquisitions by Chinese firms seem to have played a role in constraining their global presence.’

For editors

About the SIPRI Arms Industry Database

The SIPRI Arms Industry Database was created in 1989. At that time, it excluded data for companies in countries in Eastern Europe, including the Soviet Union. The current version contains data from 2015, including data for companies in China and Russia. An archive of the Top 100 data set for 2002–18 is available on the SIPRI website. For this data launch, only the data set for the top 25 has been updated with the latest available information.

‘Arms sales’ are defined as sales of military goods and services to military customers domestically and abroad. Unless otherwise specified, all changes are expressed in real terms. Comparisons (e.g. between 2018 and 2019 or 2015 and 2019) are based on the sets of companies listed in the respective year (i.e. the comparison is between different sets of companies).

About the mapping of the international presence of the arms industry

This year, SIPRI is releasing its data set on the arms sales of the world’s largest arms companies along with the results of a mapping exercise on the internationalization of the arms industry. For this, a new data set was created, comprising 400 subsidiaries, joint ventures and research facilities linked to the top 15 arms companies in 2019. Sources of data included company investment filings, information on company websites, public registrars and news articles. To be included in the mapping, an entity had to have been active for the majority of the 2019 fiscal year; be located in a country other than the one in which its parent company has its headquarters; and (a) manufacture military goods or provide military services to military customers; or (b) manufacture, or provide services for, dual-use goods to military customers.

This is the first of three major data launches in the lead-up to the publication of SIPRI’s flagship publication in mid-2021, the annual SIPRI Yearbook. Ahead of this, SIPRI will release its international arms transfers data (details of all international transfers of major arms in 2020) as well as its world military expenditure data (comprehensive information on global, regional and national trends in military spending).

Media contacts

For information and interview requests contact SIPRI Communications Officer Alexandra Manolache (alexandra.manolache@sipri.org, +46 766 286 133) or SIPRI Communications Director Stephanie Blenckner (blenckner@sipri.org, +46 8 655 97 47).

The Stockholm International Peace Research Institute is an independent international institute dedicated to research into conflict, armaments, arms control and disarmament. Established in 1966, SIPRI provides data, analysis and recommendations, based on open sources, to policymakers, researchers, media and the interested public.

14 December 2020

Source: www.transcend.org

By Ali Fathollah-Nejad

The November presidential election victory of Joe Biden against the incumbent Donald Trump raised alarm bells within the anti-Iran front in the Middle East – most notably Israel and Saudi Arabia. They reckon that the days of Trump’s ‘maximum pressure’ campaign against Iran are numbered, and fear that President-elect Biden will follow through on his campaign promise to return the USA to the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA, or the Iran nuclear deal), which will include easing sanctions on Iran in exchange for the latter’s return to the limits and restraints imposed by the JCPOA on its nuclear programme.

With just over a month left for the Trump administration, there has been a sense of urgency among Iran’s foes not only to sustain but to increase the pressure on Tehran in this period, by creating new facts that the Biden administration would not be able to ignore, and which will complicate any smooth transition to a new US Iran policy. These new facts could be achieved through new sanctions on Iran, or through other means, such as covert operations against Iran’s nuclear programme intended to provoke an Iranian reaction. This last possibility reportedly featured prominently in a November visit to the region by US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, especially in his meetings with Israeli, Saudi and UAE leaders. Given these attempts at increasing agitation by the anti-Iran front, as well as Trump’s unpredictability, concerns were raised in Tehran. Iran’s military leadership has, as expected and in its usual manner, reacted with a language of defiance and counter-threats.

The 27 November assassination of Iran’s top nuclear scientist, Mohsen Fakhrizadeh, near Tehran has, in a dramatic manner, given credence to those Iranian worries, while confirming the estimates that, rather than overt operations by the anti-Iran front, we are likely to witness covert ones in the period before Biden’s 20 January inauguration. While there is a strong likelihood that Israel was behind the assassination (since it had carried out such targeted killings against Iranian nuclear scientists in the past – between 2010 and 2012, in particular, and since Israel viewed Fakhrizadeh as a high-value target), there has been the usual ‘neither admit nor deny’ stance by Israel. And it is highly probable that the Trump administration was informed about, and approved of, the assassination.

Just over a week before the assassination, General Esmail Ghaani, the head of the Qods Force of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), had already put its allies and proxies in the region, especially in Iraq, on high alert, and had called on them to avoid provoking tensions with the USA. In this vein, the leader of the Iran-backed Lebanese Hiizbullah, Hassan Nasrallah, told his followers and allies in a speech early November, ‘All of us…should be on high alert in these next two months so that they pass peacefully.’ There is, clearly, little Iranian appetite for escalation in this US transitional period that is marked by fragility and uncertainty because of the unpredictable nature of the present occupant of the White House. Tehran does not want to alienate the incoming Biden administration – upon which the Iranian regime, despite rhetoric to the contrary by the Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, has pinned much hope for the easing of the extremely onerous sanctions imposed on the Islamic Republic, and thus reduce Biden’s willingness for compromise and sanctions relief.

The question is whether Trump might be willing – especially if pushed by Israel’s Prime Minister Benyamin Netanyahu – to satisfy his regional darlings by escalating actions against Iran in exchange for their and their American allies’ support for a possible 2024 presidential run. However, Trump’s options on the ground are limited, as US casualties may cost him more than any benefit he might accrue.

Therefore, if there is to be any further escalation from the anti-Iran front, it would involve covert drone attacks, cyber warfare and assassinations targeting Iran’s nuclear and military installations inside and outside the country (such as in Iraq or Syria). If such escalation occurs in this transitional period, the Iranians may respond with similar instruments and tactics, while ensuring that these will not lead to a large-scale conflagration, an outcome that Tehran fears and considers too costly in view of future diplomacy.

Possible scenarios

Rather than to set back Iran’s nuclear programme, the assassination of Fakhrizadeh was primarily aimed to provoke an Iranian reaction that might serve as a basis for a powerful, probably military, response by Israel and/or the USA, which could prove extremely costly for Tehran. Following this logic, Netanyahu may opt for similar further covert ops while Trump is still president, knowing that the outgoing US president will likely support him to further provoke Iran into (over-)reacting – a calculation that Iranian security officials are very aware of. Netanyahu may be preparing to push the USA to attack Iran’s nuclear infrastructure (partly underground or in mountains) with bunker busters, suspecting that Biden’s approach will be too ‘soft’ (for him and the rest of the anti-Iran bloc) on Iran’s nuclear programme.

Against this backdrop, there are several low-risk scenarios that Iran might opt for – with that of inaction in the transition period being, arguably, most likely. Any strong or proportional retaliation from Iran – by, for example, causing Israeli or American deaths – would run the risk of: 1) provoking an Israeli and/or USA military response that could result in the kind of military escalation that Tehran fears; 2) alienating the incoming Biden administration, thus undermining its willingness for concessions (easing of sanctions) that are desperately needed by the Iranian leadership; and 3) alienating European partners and reducing their willingness to help ease the pressure on Iran during Biden’s presidency. Based on this understanding, below are six possible scenarios for an Iranian response.

Scenario 1: Postponing retaliation until a less costly time

Iranian official reactions to the Fakhrizadeh killing included the usual defiance and counter-threats by the IRGC, as well as the well-worn mantra that the murder was a display of how desperate Iran’s foes are. It is probable that Iran will warn that it will forcefully retaliate at a time and place of its choosing, thus postponing any possible response to a time when the move may be less risky – within a different political and geopolitical environment. This scenario was hinted at by Esmail Kowsari, advisor to the IRGC commander-in-chief, who said that Tehran would not deal with the assassination ‘in an impulsive way’, but ‘we will never forget it’. He added that the ‘time, place and type’ of the promised retaliation was yet to be determined.

Scenario 2: Stepping up the nuclear programme

Scenario 1 is likely to be accompanied by a marked stepping up of Iran’s nuclear programme in ways that are easily reversible in order to allow an easing of tensions between Tehran and the Biden administration when appropriate. Already, on 1 December, the Iranian Parliament – controlled by the administration’s conservative opponents – passed (with a 251 majority) a bill called Strategic Action to Lift Sanctions. It obliges the Rouhani administration to annually produce 120 kg of 20% enriched uranium (which approaches weapons-grade), stop the implementation of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty’s Additional Protocol (that enables unannounced inspections in declared nuclear facilities) if western JCPOA signatories do not re-establish Iran’s access to international banking and oil markets within two months’, and to build a new heavy-water reactor. The bill became law after the Guardian Council – a body also controlled by hardliners – ratified it on 2 December. Initially, the motion was passed by the Iranian Parliament’s National Security and Foreign Policy Commission and by its speaker, Mohammad-Bagher Ghalibaf.

This offensive by the legislative branch can be seen as: 1) a rather low-risk response to the Fakhrizadeh killing, and 2) as a push by hardliners to lessen the chances of a diplomatic breakthrough by the Rouhani administration, a foe of the hardliner-controlled Parliament. In any case, these measures are first and foremost intended to increase Iran’s bargaining leverage in future talks with the USA – a strategy Iran feels had worked successfully in the period preceding the JCPOA negotiations, when Iran’s advanced nuclear programme could be bargained for the Obama administration dropping the ‘zero-enrichment’ demand that had been put forward to Tehran.

However, it is not clear whether the bill’s provisions (in part or in total) will actually be implemented given the power structure in the Islamic Republic of Iran. In this vein, Rouhani administration spokesman Ali Rabiei said: ‘The government believes that, under the constitution, the nuclear accord and the nuclear programme […] are under the jurisdiction of the Supreme National Security Council […] and parliament cannot deal with this by itself.’ Indeed, the nuclear file has now been passed from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MFA) to the Supreme National Security Council (SNSC), where it had previously been located. Although a sign of the conservative camp’s ambition to control the nuclear file and possible negotiations around it, the SNSC also includes representatives from other political establishment factions, and it decides on key national security and foreign policy issues in a consensual manner, with Khamenei having an extraordinarily important say.

Iran tried to capitalise on Fakhrizadeh’s extrajudicial killing diplomatically and politically by trying to garner support among some European states, thereby portraying itself as the victim of unlawful practices while emphasising that it abides by international law (as Tehran argued after the USA withdrawal from the JCPOA). The EU has already condemned ‘this criminal act’, but with Iran’s execution of prominent dissident journalist Rouhollah Zam, Tehran’s relations with Europe have been strained.

Scenario 3: A (symbolic) cyber-attack

Another possible retaliatory attack is an Iranian cyber-attack on Israeli entities. However, it is not clear whether Iran could be successful in such an endeavour since Israel has superiority in this field, and, due to that superiority, Iran runs the risk of its nuclear and ballistic missile infrastructures becoming the targets of more damaging cyber-sabotage responses by Israel.

Scenario 4: A symbolic military reaction for domestic consumption

Interestingly, Khamenei’s wording of Iran’s contemplated retaliation to the Fakhrizadeh assassination as seeking ‘definitive punishment’ (mojâzât-e qat’i) was much milder than the ‘hard revenge’ (enteqâm-e sakht) he vowed after the January assassination of Qods force head, General Qassem Soleimani. That ‘hard revenge’ was merely a show of force with ballistic missiles launched at an Iraqi base housing US troops, and calculated to produce zero American deaths. The move was widely seen as being crafted to avoid a full-scale military escalation with the USA that could cost the Iranian regime’s survival.

Such a symbolic retaliation to satisfy domestic and regional proxies’ calls for revenge, albeit on a smaller scale than that demanded, could also play out in the Fakhrizadeh case, due to Iranian fears over a military escalation with Israel and the USA that could be severely damaging.

Scenario 5: Iranian or Iran-allied military responses against Israeli or US interests with no casualties

This mid-level risky scenario would not lead to Israeli or US casualties. It would involve, for example, a Hizbullah attack against Israel, or Iranian drones or missiles launched into the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights. Although this may lead to a further escalation by the anti-Iran front, the latter’s reaction would have to be proportionate for it to be wholly acceptable to much of the international community.

Scenario 6: Iranian response with casualties

This would be similar to Scenario 4, but would lead, instead, to casualties. The quantity and quality of the casualties may define the manner and scope of the anti-Iran front’s retaliation, given international opinion. However, given that front’s sense of urgency, they may opt to act in disregard of international public and political opinion. This scenario is, thus, a very risky one for Iran since it could trigger an escalation that could undermine any chance of Iran seeing sanctions eased next year. The result of that would be a destroyed Iranian economy, and possible destabilisation of the regime.

Dr Ali Fathollah-Nejad is a Non-resident Senior Research Fellow at the Afro-Middle East Centre, and a former Iran expert at the Brookings Institution in Doha (BDC) and the German Council on Foreign Relations (DGAP)

14 December 2020

Source: www.amec.org.za

By Dr Vacy Vlazna

I am revising a previous article, Palestine’s Achilles Heel: The Begging Bowl, to expose that the normalisation of the recent UAE and Moroccan ties with the Jewish ‘state’ of Israel brokered by Trump is a piddly PR show.

Spoiler alert! The Arab normalisation occurred 72 years ago and has never let up. This explains why Trump was not awarded the Nobel Peace Prize. Israel played Trump for a Chump.

Poor Palestine – over decades the major Palestinian players, Fatah and Hamas have degraded and set back the liberation movement by crawling with begging bowls to self-interested, absolutely not Palestine-interested, Arab states. Furthermore both are fickle beggars switching loyalties to conform to the US volatile currents in the Middle East.

The Arab regimes faint-hearted support for Palestine goes back to the Nakba,

“The five Arab states who joined in the invasion of Palestine were Egypt, Transjordan, Syria, Lebanon and Iraq; while the two contingents came from Saudi Arabia and Yemen. All these states, however, only sent an expeditionary force to Palestine, keeping the bulk of their army at home.” Avi Shlaim

The Arab coalition was doomed to fail Palestine. Apart from being outnumbered and outgunned by the superior Zionist forces typically, then (and now), the Arabs were disorganised, under-resourced, headed by weak commanders, military incompetence, conflicting national interests and fractured by internal rivalries: these fault lines were embedded in the Zionist ally, Jordan’s King Abdullah I’s ambitions to hold sway over a Greater Syria encompassing Transjordan, Syria, Lebanon and Palestine that threatened the independence of Lebanon and Syria as well as posing a potential challenge to the Egyptian leadership of the Arab world.

One would expect that the Palestinian leadership would have learnt from the debacle of Arab interference,

“[T]he League remained curiously unwilling to allow the Palestinians to assume control over their own destiny…. At Arab League meetings, the mufti argued against intervention in Palestine by the regular Arab armies, but his pleas were ignored. All the mufti asked for was financial support and arms and these were promised to him but delivered only in negligible quantities. It is misleading, therefore, to claim that all the resources of the Arab League were placed at the disposal of the Palestinians. On the contrary, the Arab League let the Palestinians down in their hour of greatest need.” Avi Shlaim

The Arab League’s unwillingness, to support Palestine over 72 years has slackened off into a paralysis that produced the flaccid Arab Peace Initiative described by Marwan Barghouti as,

“..the lowest the Arabs have gone in terms of a historical settlement with Israel. The statements of the Arab ministerial delegation to Washington in regards to amending the 1967 borders and accepting the land-swap inflict great damage on the Arab stance and Palestinian rights, and stimulate the appetite of Israel for more concessions. No one is entitled to amend borders or swap land; the Palestinian people insist on Israel’s full withdrawal to the 1967 borders, in addition to removing the settlements.”

Curiously, ‘the issue of the “right of return” isn’t even mentioned in the peace initiative. The wording is:

“Attaining a just solution to the problem of Palestinian refugees to be agreed upon in accordance with the UN General Assembly Resolution No 194.” The statement that the solution will be “agreed upon” points to an Israeli veto on every solution which we find unacceptable.” Amnon Reshef

The abandonment of refugees is the signal that the Arabs are spruiking the Zionist agenda.

These conditions, while untenable to Barghouti, President Abba$, on the other hand, in 2016, ‘rejected any changes to the Arab Peace Initiative, stressing that he is sticking to it as it was approved by the Arab League in 2002’.

Warned repeatedly by the intellectual likes of Edward Said, Naji Al Ali, Ghassan Kanafani and Mahmoud Darwish who distinguished the Arab people from their corrupt leaders, Hamas and Fatah know full well the politics of the dictatorial Arab regimes is a sordid 72-year revolving door of lethal intrigues, hypocrisies, betrayals.

Edward Said remarked, “All, however, have decided that they do not trust each other any more than they care strongly for the welfare of their own people (which is to say they care very little)”.

Take the UAE for example, on 10 July 2014, as Israel blasted trapped Gazan families with airstrikes, the UAE pledged $25 million in humanitarian aid. A mere 5 days later, the UAE met secretly in Paris with Avigdor Lieberman ‘to discuss how to eradicate Hamas from the Gaza Strip.’ By an amazing coincidence, the Saudi and Jordanian foreign ministers were meeting in Paris with John Kerry where it,

‘was agreed that Israel would execute the military operation against Hamas while the UAE provided the funds…. All that was required from Cairo was that it kept the Rafah crossing closed and coordinated with Israel when the assault began.’

In 2016, the Arab League including the Sauds, Egypt, Jordan attended, in a show of support, the pie in the sky Abba$/ French Peace Initiative in Paris while Jordan, UAE and Egypt were simultaneously manoeuvring (along with Israeli defence Minister Avigdor Lieberman) for Death-Squad-Dahlan to replace Abba$.

Let me remind you that in 2002, Arafat appointed Mohammed Dahlan as a Security Advisor who then set up the death squads controlling and murdering fellow Palestinians with Arafat’s blessing.

If that’s not enough to make your head spin, the under-the-radar rapprochement steps between arch enemies Dahlan and Hamas, should send you reeling; you recall in 2007 Israel’s darling, Dahlan and his death squads, under the supervision of US General Dayton, spread terror throughout Gaza, set up torture centres, assassinated Hamas officials and resistance fighters and led the failed military coup against Hamas.

Prior to the US-backed war on Syria, Hamas had it headquarters in Damascus, but in 2012, as Syria struggled against US/Saudi armed and Israeli backed Islamist forces, Hamas took its begging bowl to Egypt which kept the Rafah border closed in 2014 during the 51 days of the vicious Zionist assault on Gaza.

To date, not one Arab regime, Jordan, Egypt, Morocco, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, UAE, in 72 years, has saved an inch of Palestine from unabated Zionist theft and yet Hamas and Fatah leaders incompetently, stupidly, shamefully overlook the fact that all these regimes are puppets whose strings are controlled by the Zionist/USA alliance.

It had been said of George Habash, founder of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PLFP), “He was feared by Arab regimes, and respected and loved in the refugee camps.” Therein lies the key to revolutionary success à la Castro – the power lies with the people, lies within of the comradeship of struggle and within uncompromising focus on liberation and sovereignty.

In that spirit, in September 2016 Mohamed Ahmed Madi and young Gazan PLFP members formed a Palestinian solidarity committee for the Sahrawi people. The struggle for freedom from violent occupation’s theft of land and resources, wholesale government subsidised colonial immigration, the exile in refugee camps, a vast Separation Wall, dependence on humanitarian aid, and international betrayal is almost identical in the histories of Palestine and Western Sahara oppressed by the Zionist entity and Morocco respectively.

Respect goes to the young Gazans for defiantly continuing their solidarity online with the Sahrawi people and shame on Hamas for banning the group’s activities to toady up to King Mohammed VI who is Morocco’s Netanyahu clone.

It is hard to understand why Hamas would offer a begging bowl of appeasement to Morocco which the US had designated as a major non-NATO ally, which since the 1960’s has had public and covert intelligence connections with Israel and Mossad including the assassination scandal of Moroccan opposition leader Mehdi Ben Barka in Paris.

Even worse, in early 1967 King Hassan II passed on a secret recording alerting Israel that Arab leaders were ill-prepared for war giving the Zionists the edge for their preemptive strike and victory in the Six Day War in which the Jewish Zionists seized the Gaza Strip, the West Bank, Jerusalem, the Sinai Peninsula and the Golan Heights.

While Morocco and Israel ostensibly haven’t had formal relations since the First Intifada, Hamas would know that Israel has continued to supply intelligence and weapons, such as Heron drones to aid Morocco’s control over Western Sahara.

As for Trump’s magnanimous recognition of Morocco’s sovereignty over Western Sahara that was integral to the recent fake normalisation deal, well, that train left the station in the 70’s. It seems that Trump’s infamous astute grasp of his nation’s real-politic overlooked the bleeding obvious fact that the USA, since the 70s, has been funnelling military equipment to Morocco to fight the Sahrawi Polisario.

The examples here are but a drop in the ocean of decades of ‘diplomatic’ bungling by the Palestinian leadership that has obstructed the political rights of the people of Palestine – unlike the stones of resistance hurled by the young at the Zionist occupation.

The true identity of Palestine’s liberation movement is not in Hamas or in Fatah, but in the stones and hands that Palestine herself has brought into being. Hands that link together with oppressed brothers and sisters struggling for justice as in Ferguson, with Black Lives Matter, at Standing Rock, with the Australian Aboriginal Tent Embassy, with the millions who protested globally for Gaza in 2014, and who joined the global BDS action against Hewlett-Packard in over 100 cities.

Solidarity works. The people power of BDS has thrown the Zionists into paroxysms of panic demanding that Western flunkeys criminalise BDS and criticism of Israel.

There’s no place for begging bowls in the new order of growing global solidarity with Palestinians based on a dignified single-mindedness of purpose grounded in unity.

Unity, dignified and resolute – is – the only paradigm that Palestinians must demand of their future leaders after the dissolution of the PA/PLO collaboration with and normalisation of zionism. Unity alone will secure Palestine’s freedom,

“Isn’t it astonishing that all the signs of popular solidarity that Palestine and the Arabs receive occur with no comparable sign of solidarity and dignity for ourselves, that others admire and respect us more than we do ourselves? Isn’t it time we caught up with our own status and made certain that our representatives here and elsewhere realise, as a first step, that they are fighting for a just and noble cause, and that they have nothing to apologise for or anything to be embarrassed about? On the contrary, they should be proud of what their people have done and proud to represent them.” Edward Said

And yet, the Palestinian people for 27 years have tolerated the enemy within that facilitated the expansionism of the external enemy: in effect the PA/PLO/PNC/FATAH have been active Zionists. The tragic irony is that the Oslo Accords emerged from the Jewish state’s fear of Palestinian unity demonstrated in the First Intifada. Imagine where Palestinians would be today without the internal zionists preventing unity and resistance.

Dr. Vacy Vlazna is Coordinator of Justice for Palestine Matters.

13 December 2020

Source: countercurrents.org

By Farooque Chowdhury

To profiteers, this pandemic is very good; it hasn’t hurt their profit-making mechanism.

Net worth of US billionaires has soared by $1 trillion – to total $4 trillion – since Pandemic began, a report released on December 8, 2020 by Americans for Tax Fairness (ATF) and the Institute for Policy Studies (IPS) said:

“The total net worth of the 651 US billionaires rose from $2.95 trillion on March 18 — the rough start of the pandemic shutdowns — to $4.01 trillion on December 7, a leap of 36%, based on Forbes billionaires. By around March 18 most federal and state economic restrictions in response to the virus were in place. Combined, just the top 10 billionaires are now worth more than $1 trillion.”

The ATF and IPS made a comparison:

“The billionaires’ wealth growth since March is more than the $908 billion in pandemic relief proposed by a bipartisan group of members of Congress, which is likely to be the package that moves forward for a vote in the next week, but has been stalled over Republican concerns that it is too costly.

“The monstrous cash-pile amounts to double the two-year budget gap of all state and local governments, a figure estimated to reach $500 billion thanks to the devastating effects of the economic shutdowns on tax revenues. It even approaches the massive sum the federal government spends on Medicare and Medicaid – $644 billion and $389 billion in 2019, respectively.”

With this report, profit, politics of the ruling classes, and the state come to view.

The report mentions the way the information was collected:

“Forbes’ annual billionaires report was published March 18, and ATF and IPS collected the real-time data on December 7 from the Forbes website. The methodology of this analysis has been favorably reviewed by PolitiFact. The ATF-IPS analysis also looks at wealth growth since February 2019 — the date of Forbes’ immediately previous annual billionaires report published well before the start of the pandemic and resulting market gyrations.”

The report presented a few facts:

“The $1 trillion wealth gain by 651 US billionaires since mid-March is:

• More than it would cost to send a stimulus check of $3,000 to every one of the roughly 330 million people in America. A family of four would receive over $12,000. Republicans have blocked new stimulus checks from being included in the pandemic relief package.
• Double the two-year estimated budget gap of all state and local governments, which is forecast to be at least $500 billion. By June, state and local governments had already laid off 1.5 million workers and public services — especially education — faced steep budget cuts.
• Only slightly less than total federal spending on Medicare ($644 billion in 2019) and Medicaid ($389 billion in FY2019), which together serve 120 million Americans (69 million in Medicaid, 63 million in Medicare, less 12 million enrolled in both).
• Nearly four times the $267 billion total in stimulus payments made to 159 million people earlier this year.”

It presented another fact:

“At $4 trillion the total wealth of all US billionaires today is nearly double the $2.1 trillion in total wealth held by the bottom half of the population, or 165 million Americans.”

Two comments on the profit-wealth-fact are striking.

Frank Clemente, executive director of ATF said:

“Never before has America seen such an accumulation of wealth in so few hands. As tens of millions of Americans suffer from the health and economic ravages of this pandemic, a few hundred billionaires add to their massive fortunes. Their pandemic profits are so immense that America’s billionaires could pay for a major COVID relief bill and still not lose a dime of their pre-virus riches. Their wealth growth is so great that they alone could provide a $3,000 stimulus payment to every man, woman and child in the country, and still be richer than they were 9 months ago. Joe Biden won a tax-fairness mandate in November. We look forward to working with him and Congress to deliver on that mandate by taxing the massive wealth of these billionaires.”

Chuck Collins of the IPS said:

“The updraft of wealth to the billionaire class is disturbing at a time when millions face eviction, destitution, and loss. Billionaires are extracting wealth at a time when essential workers are pushed into the viral line of fire.”

The report added a few more facts, which help comprehend the grim situation:

“Ordinary Americans have not fared as well as billionaires during the pandemic:

• Nearly 14.9 million have fallen ill with the virus and 284,000 have died from it. [Johns Hopkins Coronavirus Resource Center]
• Collective work income of rank-and-file private-sector employees—all hours worked times the hourly wages of the entire bottom 82% of the workforce—declined by 2.3% from mid-March to mid-October, according to Bureau of Labor Statistics data.
• Nearly 67 million lost work between Mar. 21 and Oct. 7, 2020. [U.S. Department of Labor]
• 20 million were collecting unemployment on Nov. 14, 2020. [U.S. Department of Labor]
• 98,000 businesses have permanently closed. [Yelp/CNBC]
• 12 million workers have lost employer-sponsored health insurance during the pandemic as of August 26, 2020. [Economic Policy Institute]
• Nearly 26 million adults reported their household not having enough food in the past week between Nov. 11-23. From Oct. 28 to Nov. 7, between 7 and 11 million children lived in a household where kids did not eat enough because the household could not afford it. [Center on Budget & Policy Priorities (CBPP)]

• 4 million adults — 1 in 6 renters — reported in November being behind in their rent. [CBPP]”

The EPI predicts:

“[W]ithout more federal aid 5.3 million public-sector jobs — including those of teachers, public safety employees and health care workers — will be lost by the end of 2021.”

More facts are there as it said:

“The stock market surge and lock-down economy have been a boon to tech monopolies and helped create four U.S. ‘centi-billionaires’. Jeff Bezos, Elon Musk, Bill Gates and Mark Zuckerberg are now each worth more than $100 billion. Prior to this year, Bezos had been the only US centi-billionaire, reaching that peak in 2018. Bezos and other billionaires have seen particularly astonishing increases in wealth between March 18 and Dec. 7:

• Jeff Bezos’s wealth grew from $113 billion on March 18 to $184 billion, an increase of 63%. Adding in his ex-wife MacKenzie Scott’s wealth of $60 billion on that day, the two had a combined wealth of almost a quarter of a trillion dollars thanks to their Amazon stock. If Bezos’s $71.4 billion growth in wealth was distributed to all his 810,000 U.S. employees, each would get a windfall bonus of over $88,000 and Bezos would not be any “poorer” than he was 9 months ago.
• Elon Musk’s wealth grew by nearly $119 billion, from $24.6 billion on March 18 to $143 billion, a nearly five-fold increase, boosted by his Tesla stock. SpaceX founder Musk has enjoyed one of the biggest boosts in net worth of any billionaire. That $119 billion growth in wealth is more than five times NASA’s $22.6 billion budget in FY2020, the federal agency Musk has credited with saving his company with a big federal contract when the firm’s rockets were failing and it faced bankruptcy.
• Mark Zuckerberg’s wealth grew from $54.7 billion on March 18 to $105 billion, an increase of 92%, fueled by his Facebook stock.
• Dan Gilbert, chairman of Quicken Loans, saw his wealth rocket by 543%, from $6.5 billion to $41.8 billion, the second biggest percentage increase of all the billionaires.

The facts cited are from the country considered land of honey and milk, land of liberty, and land of opportunities. There’re sky-high opportunities: “Anyone can go to any length.” However, in real terms, those opportunities are for the few; while the rest pass their whole life only with a dream of a happy life. The jingle of “Dream” is circulated widely, in a planned way. But, now, that jingle doesn’t appeal as part of the mainstream media regularly tells: “American Dream” is now a shattered piece to those millions who once kept trust on that dream.

The facts cited above are from one of the advanced capitalist economies. The question is: what happens in other lands where the rich dominate? There, in those rich-dominated lands, the scene is more or less the same: The rich gain a whole while the ordinary persons languish in a difficult life, a life full with adversities, hurdles impossible to jump over. For them, no dream, nothing to hope; just everyday’s struggle to survive, and being silent witness of the loot by the rich. In some of those lands, similar facts surface on very few occasions, and in others, similar fact almost-never surfaces. These lands are designated as “democratic”, and “with free elections” as these are in the world system that the rich own. But the information essential for ascertaining character of the relevant economy and state are difficult to access. The ordinary persons, the men and women on streets, the ordinary taxpayers are not even aware that such information is required to know the economy, the power, and condition of life of the exploiters and of the exploited although it’s the taxpayers’ money that’s used by the exploiters to loot; and a part of the taxpayers’ money is also looted. All in these loots, the exploiters’ ruling machine is used – a coverage of law and legitimacy. But, this fact isn’t exposed to the ordinary taxpayers that include beggars, blind and lame, on streets also.

In this pandemic-period, this exposure is an opportunity to know an exploitative economy, a fact of mindless money gathering. A dig in other lands can also bring out to light similar facts of loot. The more similar facts/information will come out to public view, the more ordinary taxpayers will question: How an economy makes a few “fortunate” and super-“fortunate” while “maintaining” millions in misfortune, keeping millions in a world of uncertainty-hunger-unemployment-no/inadequate health care/public education tied to the exploiting system? What’s the mechanism? Shouldn’t the mechanism, the mechanism “benefitting” a few exploiters and keeping the rest “dumb-fool”-exploited, be identified and dissected? What’s the mechanism of profiteering by a few and the rest’s being powerless to question that mechanism?

Farooque Chowdhury writes from Dhaka, Bangladesh.

12 December 2020

Source: countercurrents.org

The IHRA definition of anti-Semitism is an attack on free speech- Over 120 Palestinian and Arab intellectuals published a statement in the Guardian last Sunday outlining the many pitfalls of the working definition of anti-Semitism, released in 2016 by the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA). In their letter, they highlight that the definition, “and the related legal measures adopted in several countries have been deployed mostly against left-wing and human rights groups supporting Palestinian rights and the Boycott Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) campaign.”

We, the undersigned Palestinian and Arab academics, journalists and intellectuals are hereby stating our views regarding the definition of antisemitism by the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA), and the way this definition has been applied, interpreted and deployed in several countries of Europe and North America.

In recent years, the fight against antisemitism has been increasingly instrumentalised by the Israeli government and its supporters in an effort to delegitimise the Palestinian cause and silence defenders of Palestinian rights. Diverting the necessary struggle against antisemitism to serve such an agenda threatens to debase this struggle and hence to discredit and weaken it.

Antisemitism must be debunked and combated. Regardless of pretence, no expression of hatred for Jews as Jews should be tolerated anywhere in the world. Antisemitism manifests itself in sweeping generalisations and stereotypes about Jews, regarding power and money in particular, along with conspiracy theories and Holocaust denial. We regard as legitimate and necessary the fight against such attitudes. We also believe that the lessons of the Holocaust as well as those of other genocides of modern times must be part of the education of new generations against all forms of racial prejudice and hatred.

The fight against antisemitism must, however, be approached in a principled manner, lest it defeat its purpose. Through “examples” that it provides, the IHRA definition conflates Judaism with Zionism in assuming that all Jews are Zionists, and that the state of Israel in its current reality embodies the self-determination of all Jews. We profoundly disagree with this. The fight against antisemitism should not be turned into a stratagem to delegitimise the fight against the oppression of the Palestinians, the denial of their rights and the continued occupation of their land. We regard the following principles as crucial in that regard:

1. The fight against antisemitism must be deployed within the frame of international law and human rights. It should be part and parcel of the fight against all forms of racism and xenophobia, including Islamophobia, and anti-Arab and anti-Palestinian racism. The aim of this struggle is to guarantee freedom and emancipation for all oppressed groups. It is deeply distorted when geared towards the defence of an oppressive and predatory state.

2. There is a huge difference between a condition where Jews are singled out, oppressed and suppressed as a minority by antisemitic regimes or groups, and a condition where the self-determination of a Jewish population in Palestine/Israel has been implemented in the form of an ethnic exclusivist and territorially expansionist state. As it currently exists, the state of Israel is based on uprooting the vast majority of the natives – what Palestinians and Arabs refer to as the Nakba – and on subjugating those natives who still live on the territory of historical Palestine as either second-class citizens or people under occupation, denying them their right to self-determination.

3. The IHRA definition of antisemitism and the related legal measures adopted in several countries have been deployed mostly against leftwing and human rights groups supporting Palestinian rights and the Boycott Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) campaign, sidelining the very real threat to Jews coming from rightwing white nationalist movements in Europe and the US. The portrayal of the BDS campaign as antisemitic is a gross distortion of what is fundamentally a legitimate non-violent means of struggle for Palestinian rights.

4. The IHRA definition’s statement that an example of antisemitism is “Denying the Jewish people their right to self-determination, eg, by claiming that the existence of a State of Israel is a racist endeavour” is quite odd. It does not bother to recognise that under international law, the current state of Israel has been an occupying power for over half a century, as recognised by the governments of countries where the IHRA definition is being upheld. It does not bother to consider whether this right includes the right to create a Jewish majority by way of ethnic cleansing and whether it should be balanced against the rights of the Palestinian people. Furthermore, the IHRA definition potentially discards as antisemitic all non-Zionist visions of the future of the Israeli state, such as the advocacy of a binational state or a secular democratic one that represents all its citizens equally. Genuine support for the principle of a people’s right to self-determination cannot exclude the Palestinian nation, nor any other.

5. We believe that no right to self-determination should include the right to uproot another people and prevent them from returning to their land, or any other means of securing a demographic majority within the state. The demand by Palestinians for their right of return to the land from which they themselves, their parents and grandparents were expelled cannot be construed as antisemitic. The fact that such a demand creates anxieties among Israelis does not prove that it is unjust, nor that it is antisemitic. It is a right recognised by international law as represented in United Nations general assembly resolution 194 of 1948.

6. To level the charge of antisemitism against anyone who regards the existing state of Israel as racist, notwithstanding the actual institutional and constitutional discrimination upon which it is based, amounts to granting Israel absolute impunity. Israel can thus deport its Palestinian citizens, or revoke their citizenship or deny them the right to vote, and still be immune from the accusation of racism. The IHRA definition and the way it has been deployed prohibit any discussion of the Israeli state as based on ethno-religious discrimination. It thus contravenes elementary justice and basic norms of human rights and international law.

7. We believe that justice requires the full support of Palestinians’ right to self-determination, including the demand to end the internationally acknowledged occupation of their territories and the statelessness and deprivation of Palestinian refugees. The suppression of Palestinian rights in the IHRA definition betrays an attitude upholding Jewish privilege in Palestine instead of Jewish rights, and Jewish supremacy over Palestinians instead of Jewish safety. We believe that human values and rights are indivisible and that the fight against antisemitism should go hand in hand with the struggle on behalf of all oppressed peoples and groups for dignity, equality and emancipation.

7 December 2020

Source: palestineupdates.com

By Dr. Alon Ben-Meir

The Israeli-Palestinian conflict, not only because it is over seven decades old, but because it is an increasingly intractable, explosive, and destabilizing situation, which reverberates throughout the Mideast, and several regional powers are exploiting it to serve their own national interests, which sadly contributes to its endurance.

It is expected that Biden will support a two-state solution given his past position on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, albeit a growing number of Israelis and Palestinians no longer believe that such an outcome remains viable.

Due to the inter-dispersement of the Israeli and Palestinian populations, the two independent states, however, will have to fully collaborate in many areas, especially on security and economic development. This will lead to the establishment of the framework for a confederation, which will be the final outcome after several years of peace and reconciliation.

For Biden to succeed where his predecessors failed, he must repair the severe damage that Trump has inflicted on the entire peace process and restore the Palestinians’ confidence in a new negotiation that could, in fact, lead to a permanent solution. To that end, he must take specific measures before the start of the talks and establish rules of engagements to which both sides must fully subscribe to demonstrate their commitment to reaching an agreement.

Reestablish the PLO mission in DC: Biden should allow the Palestinian Authority (PA) to reestablish its mission in DC. This would immediately open a channel of communication which is central to the development of a dialogue between the US and the PA and to clear some of the initial hurdles before resuming the negotiations.

It is essential that Biden restore the financial aid that the Palestinians had been receiving from the US. The Palestinian Authority is financially strapped and is in desperate need of assistance. The aid given should be monitored to ensure that the money is spent on specific program and projects. The Biden administration should inform the Israeli government that it will object to any further annexation of Palestinian territories. It will, however, keep the American embassy in Jerusalem and continue recognizing Jerusalem as its capital, leaving its final status to be negotiated.

Given the intense controversy about the settlements and their adverse psychological and practical effect on the Palestinians, Biden should insist that Israel impose a temporary freeze on the expansion of settlements. This issue should top the negotiating agenda to allow for a later expansion of specific settlements in the context of land swaps.

The Biden administration should invite Hamas to participate in the negotiations jointly with the PA or separately, provided they renounce violence and recognize Israel’s right to exist. If they refuse, they should be left to their own devices and continue to bear the burden of the blockade.

Unlike Trump’s envoys who openly supported the settlements and paid little or no heed to the Palestinians’ aspirations, Biden’s envoys should be known for their integrity, professionalism, and understanding of the intricacies of the conflict, and be committed to a two-state solution.

Invite Arab and European observers: The Arab states and the EU are extremely vested in a solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Saudi and German officials will be ideal observers who can render significant help in their unique capacity as leading Arab and European powers.

Establishing the end game: No negotiations succeed unless the parties involved agree on the nature of their desired outcome. For the Palestinians it is establishing an independent Palestinian state, and for Israelis it is maintaining the security and independence of a democratic Jewish state. Before embarking on new negotiations, the Biden administration should insist that both sides unequivocally commit to a two-state outcome.

Alon Ben-Meir is a professor of international relations at the Center for Global Affairs at New York University

7 December 2020

Source: palestineupdates.com

By Dr S Faizi

India is excited about an Indian origin Kamala Haris getting elected as the Vice President of USA. Kerala was particularly excited the other day when Priyanca Radhakrishnan, a first generation migrant from Kerala was appointed as a minister in the new government of Jacinda Arden of New Zealand. Neither in the case of Kamala nor Priyanca almost no one in their respective countries questioned their ‘foreignness’. This is in sharp contrast to India where a key political asset of a political party that has now come to power is the foreign origin of a leader of their opposite camp.

Has an Indian become prime minister in a foreign country, was a rhetorical refrain of the now-moderate LK Advani in the 1999 parliament election campaign meetings, to attack Sonia Gandhi. It was as if he was ignorant of the political life of the Indian diaspora; the Congress too seemed to be uninformed. The Congress party did not give him an informed response but was using in their campaigns an article I wrote in a newspaper about the political positions people of Indian origin holding in their adopted countries.

The world has been open and tolerant to Indian immigrants entering politics and holding key political positions, both in developing countries and developed countries, and in nearly all regions of the world. This is when we have no single political leader of foreign origin in India other than Sonia Gandhi and she is attacked more on account of her ethnic origin than for her alleged wrongs. It is not that we have a shortage of naturalised Indians of foreign origin and their descendants. I am happy to see Priyanca in sari and wearing bindi which her non-Indian voters did not find acceptable, while Sonia Gandhi has to entirely distance herself from her Italian cultural roots.

While the countries of the world are open and welcoming to Indians landing there, whether as indentured labourers of yore or modern day economic immigrants, the ideas of exclusion and ostracization inherent in our culture expresses itself when it comes to foreigners holding public offices in our country. The millennia old theologically ordained caste system that ostracises a large body of Indians cannot be readily welcoming to people of foreign origin even as we benefit from the liberal minds of foreign societies. The elevation of Indian origin persons to political positions in foreign lands is surprisingly large and is beyond the caste and religious barriers often found in India.

Singapore elected a Keralite as its president long before a Keralite was elected as the president of India. No one in Singapore opposed Devan Nair on the basis of his descent or his religion in a country where the Indian fecundity was at play, like anywhere else. (The only response to the Indian fecundity has been Lee Kuan arranging ‘match-making’ luxury voyages to the Chinese origin young people!). And years later one more president of Indian descent, S R Nathan, was elected. Malaysia always has 4-5 ministers of Indian descent in the cabinet, reflecting country’s splendid diversity. Fiji too has several ministers of Indian descent.

Mauritius, a fairly prosperous country off the coast of Africa, had several presidents and prime ministers of Indian origin. The current prime minister is Pravind Jugnauth of Indian descent. The last president was the Indian origin Aminah Gurrim-Fakim who succeeded the Indian origin Kailash Purryag. No one questioned them on their ethnic identity nor does anyone in the country makes the Hindu population growth, which is close to 50 per cent, an issue.

Salim Ahmed Salim, whose mother was of Indian origin, was the prime minister of Tanzania, and later headed the Organisation of African Unity. South Africa always had 3-4 ministers of Indian origin since its liberation into democracy. The Indian community had also played an important role in the freedom movement of the country. UK has three cabinet ministers of Indian origin while the prime minister of Portugal Antonio Costa whose father is Indian. No one in Portugal made an issue the foreign descent of this socialist leader, nor did anyone in Ireland raise questions about the ethnic origin of Leo Varadkar, their young prime minister, whose father was from India. Imagine how these ethnic questions would have been made an issue in India if leading politicians had such foreign blood relation.

Canada has four ministers of Indian origin and there are 22 MPs too. Justin Trudeau had commented that he had more Sikhs in his ministry than Modi had, such a comment by an Indian PM about a hypothetical population group of foreign descent could trigger a harangue in the country and the next election would be fought on this issue. President Irfaan Ali of Guyana is half Indian, and so was the former president Jagan Cheddi. Long time Secretary General of Commonwealth Sridath Ramphal was of Indian origin from Guyana. Kamala Prasad Bissessar of Indian descent had been a prime minister of Trinidad and Tobago while Noor Mohamad Hassanali of Indian origin had been a president.

This is a wonderful story of success of the Indian diaspora, achieved through hard work and dedication. And it also happens so because the world is by and large open and tolerant unlike what is injected into the Indian psyche by some political forces. Interestingly, the authors of these achievements are representative of the composite India, the rainbow of different languages, ethnic groups and religions, and not like the domination of a few privileged social groups. The diaspora, the beneficiaries of host societies that value diversity and tolerance, should vigorously seek to contribute to the efforts to transform India too into such a society that truly value diversity and tolerance, especially in these trying times for the country. Lest their own future abroad is at stake as the discrimination and atrocities in India are gaining global attention.

Dr S Faizi is an ecologist specialising in international environmental policy and had been a UN multilateral negotiator.

9 November 2020

Source: countercurrents.org

By Joseph Camilleri

Much of America is breathing a sigh of relief that, gracefully or otherwise, Trump will soon vacate the White House. Allies of the United States – not just governments but much of the commentariat – are expecting a less turbulent and more predictable international environment. That may be wishful thinking.

There is no denying that Trumpism has been a recipe for policy incoherence, administrative chaos, and vulgar, often untruthful discourse. Biden’s team will no doubt restore a measure of civility to American diplomacy and craft a set of domestic policies designed to repair some of the damage inflicted on health, environment, and race relations.

Yet, even here the signs are less than reassuring. Yes, we can expect climate change to be given a higher priority in foreign policy. The appointment of US Secretary of State John Kerry as special presidential envoy on climate change signals a willingness to return to the international negotiating table.

Under the 2015 Paris Agreement, Obama committed the United States to reduce its greenhouse gas emissions by 26-28% by 2025, from 2005 levels. The Biden administration will renew that commitment and may even set a goal of net zero emissions by 2050.

But let’s not forget, what can be done on the international stage depends largely on what happens domestically. Soon after his inauguration Biden is expected to use executive leverage to reverse some of Trump’s most egregious decisions, which erased or loosened nearly 100 environmental rules and regulations.

He may not, however, be able to reinstate all these rules. And, even if he can, this will not be enough to meet the net zero emission target. Eventually, a comprehensive legislative network will be needed. It is not clear how Biden proposes to do this, if, as seems likely, he is faced with a hostile Senate and an obstructionist Supreme Court.

Behind and beyond these institutional roadblocks lies the bigger hurdle – fossil fuel interests. Intense lobbying by coal, gas and oil companies, and the utility and transportation sectors, coupled with large donations to political parties, has been remarkably successful. Nothing said during the election campaign suggests Biden is of a mind to neutralise the fossil fuel lobby’s formidable political muscle.

As for Washington’s future engagement with the world, we may be in for a torrid time. When formally announcing the members of his national security and foreign policy team last week, Biden chose as his opening words ‘America is back’.

Which America is this, we may ask? Is it the America that took us to Korea, Vietnam, Afghanistan, Iraq and Libya? Is it the America that has steadfastly invoked external threats to justify in peacetime the deadliest military arsenal in human history?

Much has been made of America’s commitment to a rules-based international order. Yet, US administrations have made a habit of overthrowing foreign governments, whether by force or other means. Over the last 67 years, it has attempted regime change in 58 separate instances, that is, the equivalent of one every 14 months.

The defining feature of America’s presence in the world since 1945 has been the growth of its ‘national security state’. Though presidents come and go, the security apparatus has developed a mind of its own, and tentacles that reach into virtually every area of policy, every institution of government, and a great many foreign governments.

It is entirely possible that Biden has other ideas about future US security policy. He may favour a gentler, wiser, less interventionist America, less intent on reviving its ambition for hegemony. If so, he has yet to spell them out.

All we have at the moment are a few broad-brush sentences. The words he used to introduce his security team are nevertheless cause for concern, and merit restating:

‘It’s a team that reflects the fact that America is back. Ready to lead the world, not retreat from it. Once again, sit at the head of the table. Ready to confront our adversaries, and not reject our allies, ready to stand up for our values.’

We can only assume that the primary adversaries he has in mind are Russia and China. If so, the idea of confronting them raises troubling questions: confront them in response to what, by what means, and with what objectives?

There is, it seems, little appreciation that we are witnessing a shift in the centre of economic and geopolitical gravity from West to East, in part the result of East Asia’s renewed economic dynamism.

More importantly, the West-centric world in which first Europe and then the United Stated held sway, is slowly but steadily giving way to a new world in which other civilisational centres are emerging or re-re-emerging. This calls for new forms of dialogue and accommodation both across and within major civilisations.

Sadly, there is no indication that the incoming administration is aware of, not to say favourably disposed to, these possibilities.

In many ways, Biden’s choice of cabinet members is itself instructive. Antony Blinken (secretary of state), Avril Haines (director of national intelligence), and Jake Sullivan (national security adviser) all went to Ivy League schools, and were closely associated with the Obama administration. They are all quintessential products of the security and foreign policy establishment.

They all speak of an America that can resume global leadership as if they know what leadership entails at this historical moment. They assume the world is yearning to be led and to have the United States as its leader. This can be hardly true of Russia or China, and it is difficult to see either Germany or France meekly complying with US preferences and priorities.

Put simply, there is no evidence that the Biden administration is alive to the immense challenges posed by a rapidly transforming world. Significantly, neither the president-elect nor his appointees have referred to the existential threat posed by nuclear weapons. Nor have they indicated much interest in reaching out to other countries with a view to breathing new life into existing international institutions, in particular the United Nations.

Insofar as Biden and his entourage have referred to multilateralism, it has been primarily in the context of international military alliances and regional formations closely aligned to US interests and priorities.

They have been conspicuously silent on the institutions, decision making processes and resourcing needed to manage, or better still prevent, the financial, environmental and humanitarian crises that have become a regular feature of the international landscape.

They have waxed lyrical about their commitment to US values and human rights, implying that they will respond loudly and forcefully when these standards are violated by adversaries. But they have said little about how they propose to handle gross human rights violations by friends and allies, as is presently the case with the likes of Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Thailand and the Philippines .

It is fair to say that the Obama administration assumed office in January 2009 with a much grander vision and loftier rhetoric, but managed to deliver little in the ensuing eight years. It is conceivable that the Biden administration will assume office in January 2021 with a humbler agenda and still end up achieving more. Australia would be unwise to base its future on the strength of that assumption.

Joseph Camilleri is managing director of Alexandria Agenda, Emeritus Professor at La Trobe University in Melbourne, and a Fellow of the Australian Academy of Social Sciences. He is a member of the JUST International Advisory Panel (IAP)

30 November 2020

Source: johnmenadue.com