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By Juan Cole

26 January 13

@ Informed Comment

The US use of armed drones in northern Pakistan, Somalia and Yemen is now being investigated by the United Nations as a human rights abuse or even a war crime.

If drones produce significant civilian casualties, their use may be a war crime. If their use constitutes a disproportionate response, it could be a war crime. If, as The Bureau of Investigative Journalism claimed, the US sometimes hits a target, waits for sympathetic locals to rush to the aid of the wounded, and then abruptly strikes again, that would definitely be a war crime. Some Pakistani observers, however, are arguing that the Pakistani government’s own aerial bombardment by helicopter gunship or warplane of the tribal belt actually produces significantly more casualties than drone strikes.

Whether or not drone strikes are being conducted in such a manner as to rise to the level of war crimes is an important issue.

The other set of important questions around armed drones are constitutional in nature. The people being targeted by the drones are not an enemy army of a state on which the US has declared war. They are suspected criminals or terrorists. But they haven’t been put on trial.

The permission by Washington and London for drones to kill people

involves a clear depriving of those individuals of their right to due process.

The US Department of Justice insists that it has the capability of trying them and determining that they are in the process of attacking the United States, thus permitting them to be killed as a form of self=defense. But that review process occurs entirely within the executive branch, violating the principle of the separation of powers. The executive is the judge, jury and executioner.

The drone program in the United States is hugely anti-democratic because the whole thing is classified. Therefore, it cannot be publicly discussed or debated with the officials behind it, who can neither confirm nor deny its very existence.

In short, the biggest innocent victim of the drones, after the noncombatant adults and children who are killed in the strike, is the United States Constitution.

By Lyse Doucet

25 January 2013

@ BBC Middle East

It has been called the “capital of the revolution”. Homs has been all too much at the centre of events in Syria over the past two years.

The country’s third largest city has seen some of the worst of the fighting, a terribly large share of the casualties, and a shocking amount of destruction.

Nearly a year on from a blistering government assault on opposition enclaves, much of the city is in government hands. But, again, there were reports on Friday of another offensive on an opposition stronghold in a largely Sunni neighbourhood. Homs is still torn.

The fabric of a city once part of Syria’s much vaunted religious and ethnic mosaic is sadly frayed. Now it is stitched together by a network of army checkpoints across most of the city.

But there is still a desolate no-man’s land in the centre which has hardly changed since we visited last year, except for a clock tower with even less of a face.

The pavement is still a carpet of glass from shattered windows in every building. And the lanes of gutted houses lead to the historic Old City, the cherished heart of Homs which barely beats now.

Families in desperate need are trapped in the ruins still in opposition hands.

But in other corners of Homs staunchly loyal to the government traffic flows. You can sit in a cafe and order slices of piping hot pizza. From a Margherita to one with Mexican toppings, take your pick.

Hopscotch and gunfire

In the district of Baba Amr, which bore the brunt of much of the military onslaught in February and March 2011, a shiny new banner of President Bashar al-Assad is plastered on a building pockmarked by shrapnel and bullet holes.

Some families are slowly returning home, but “home” must seem like a different country. The area still lies in ruins.

But children do not even miss a step as they play hopscotch to a soundtrack of not so distant gunfire. This is their life now.

There is a constant sound of shelling and small-arms fire in some parts of the city, and clashes in others. The war is not over.

On the streets of one district, the “Lionesses for National Defence” are in action. Women are now manning the army checkpoints.

They are on the urban front line for President Assad – whose surname means Lion in Arabic – putting a new face on an old war changing the very soul of the city.

By Mario Candeias

24 January, 2013

@ Socialistproject.ca

“Another grand, left-wing concept with an adjective… Shouldn’t we rather work on concrete social-ecological projects – on initiatives for conversion, a process of ‘energy transition,’ or free public transport?” Undoubtedly, many problems of the left have resulted from its tendency to create grand utopias and attempt to bring social reality in line with them. Transformation starts with concrete entry projects, but where does this road go to? What is the common ground, the common direction of manifold initiatives? Ultimately, we need an antidote to pragmatism – American activists call it a ‘vision.’

What does this imply for green politics? One of the core tasks of left-wing politics is to constantly work on connecting the social and the ecological question. The left is credible on the social question – and there are promising attempts to become more convincing on ecology, even if the mainstream media does not seem to notice this much. There is the notion of ‘social-ecological transformation,’ which belonged to the agenda of the green parties in the 1980s. Today, it is used from the left as a paradigm for the ‘mosaic left’ in formation. But how can we make sure that it remains rooted in a counter-hegemonic project? How far is the profile of the socialist left different from that of Friends of the Earth? It is surely right to build bridges between diverging approaches to social change, but in the process, contradictions are often covered up, and a debate on contentious issues like property and the state is avoided. In this article, we are experimenting with the concept of ‘green socialism.’ We want to discuss whether it could fill the void of a left-wing, ecological, feminist imagination.

Background

If we consider the present relations of forces, the ‘green’ question does not appear to be a contentious issue – ‘socialism’ is what is controversial. The idea of ‘eco-socialism’ failed because its intervention coincided with deep ruptures in global history, namely the collapse of state socialism and the rise of neoliberalism. Socialism was no longer en vogue; it was seen as an ossified and defeated project. The eco-socialist current of the left shrank into a friendly cult, which emphasized what ought to be but rarely intervened in concrete social-ecological struggles. Around the same time, green issues became fashionable, not least because of the 1992 global summit in Rio de Janeiro. There was a “passive revolution” (Gramsci) divorcing the ecological from the social question. The ecological question was absorbed into neoliberal strategies of managing globalization. This happened through the institutionalization of environmental policy and global climate summits, as well as through the integration of green parties and NGOs into mainstream politics. From an ecological standpoint, the successes of the passive revolution were limited; there is an unbroken trend toward deepening ecological and social crises; the ecological crises have accrued considerable social costs and vice versa. Consequently, ‘green socialism’ has to be linked up with concrete struggles such as struggles over energy production and projects of conversion based on a ‘just transition.’

In the midst of the great crisis of neoliberalism and the authoritarian imposition of austerity throughout Europe, the prospect of a transition to ‘green capitalism’ (Fücks/Steenboom 2007; for a critique see Candeias/Kuhn 2008) or a ‘green economy’ (Heinrich-Böll-Stiftung 2012; for a critique see Brand 2012) raises the hopes of many people. The underlying political strategy focuses on channelling investment toward a process of ‘energy transition’ and kick-starting ecological modernization with the help of new technologies and an accumulation strategy that is supposed to create millions of jobs. The notion of a ‘green economy’ promotes growth and an increase in exports; it is not about limiting the use of resources. In contrast to older approaches, which were centred on ‘sustainability,’ it does not aim to overcome the contradiction between the economy and ecology. Rather, it advocates the commodification of nature and environmental protection, which means that the political management of the ecological crisis becomes a factor in, and a driver of, capitalist accumulation. In sum, the ‘green economy’ approach is about reproducing capitalist hegemony by taking on board ecological interests – it represents an elite consensus garnished with the vague hope that there will be a few new jobs.

Recently, the predominance of the politics of austerity in Europe has restrained the momentum behind the push for a green economy. And yet, there are debates whether the ‘growth components’ of the European Fiscal Compact should include incentives for, and investment in, ecological modernization. In this context, capitalist interests converge with those of social democracy and the trade unions (and this even applies to clearly left-wing appeals such as “Founding Europe Anew!,” which emerged out of the German trade union movement).

‘Green socialism’ is about taking a stand against – not for a long time realized – ‘green capitalism.’ The concept is about linking up a range of interests and movements in the name of “revolutionary Realpolitik,” ensuring that “their particular efforts, taken together, push beyond the framework of the existing order” (Rosa Luxemburg, Marxist Theory and the Proletariat). In the process, many of the old socialist themes – e.g., redistribution, power and property, planning and democracy – are updated and linked up with new issues. It is necessary to link ‘green socialism’ to real contradictions and conditions – to real social forces and movements that are tackling different issues, getting involved in different conflicts and developing concrete, experimental practices.

The Example of Redistribution

Redistribution is a key aspect of any kind of left-wing politics. It does not figure at all in the present conceptions of a ‘green economy’ and only plays a subordinate role in the project of a ‘Green New Deal’ even in times of austerity. This suggests that the issue is not taken seriously. For the German Green Party, softening the demand for redistribution is an act of “being straight” with the population, they say. From the neoliberal point of view, the debts of the financial institutions bailed out by the state have to be serviced. Social Democrats and Greens tend to go along with this: they want to regain the “trust of the markets,” which is why most of their party organizations in Europe have agreed to the ratification of the European Fiscal Compact. The pact will not only bring a new wave of ‘bottom-up’ redistribution, but it will also exacerbate the economic crisis and drive entire countries into depression. Importantly, it will not lead to a permanent reduction in debt.

It is necessary to discuss the illegitimate debt weighing down on many European countries. This issue requires democratic consultation and decision-making and serious attempts to design a procedure for a debt audit (cf. Candeias 2011b). A comprehensive cancellation of debt, comparable to a currency reform, would be needed – not just for Greece. This should be combined with a just tax policy based on forcing the capital – and asset-owners to contribute more to financing the public sector, which would be an act of returning some of the social surplus product to the general public. This would put a stop to processes of “bottom-up” redistribution and open spaces for a politics based on social-ecological concerns. The people in Europe are prepared for a political intervention along these lines because they are currently exposed to the existential threat posed by debt. Numerous forces from civil society agree to it, for example the CDTM (the Greek campaign for a debt audit, cf. LuXemburg 2/2012) and left-wing parties like SYRIZA and Izquierda Unida. These organizations intervene in the current wave of European protests against the effects of the crisis and demand a debt audit, the taxation of assets, a financial transactions tax, a levy on banks etc.

The Socialization of Investment

Over the medium-term, it is necessary to socialize the investment function, which is an old Keynesian demand. Who in society should determine the use of (physical and social) resources, and who should decide which types of work are socially necessary? The market – purportedly the most efficient mechanism for the allocation of investment – has embarrassed itself. The over-accumulation of capital is regularly producing financial bubbles, followed by the destruction of capital and jobs. At the same time, the number of sectors of social reproduction that are deprived of funding and neglected until they collapse is constantly increasing. Childcare, education, environmental protection, the general infrastructure and public services are all affected. The “green economy” focuses on commodification and the market. Yet the market takes too long to resolve problems, and the big corporations behind “fossil capitalism” want to get a foothold in the “green economy” at the same time as keeping their fixed capital.

There will not be a smooth passage to a restructured economy: it is impossible to meet the challenge of reducing greenhouse gas emissions by 80 per cent and catapulting the entire economy from the 150-year old age of “fossils” into the “solar future” without ruptures and crises. If the transition is pursued with tenacity, it is unavoidable that some of the old branches of industry and their capital will come under attack, which in turn will trigger resistance. If the markets prove incapable of ensuring investment, this has to become, to a much stronger degree, a public project. What is needed is financial regulation, the nationalization of “systemically relevant” banks, a network of public banks, and the introduction of participatory budgeting at all levels of society. The socialization of investment and participatory investment decisions are two of the preconditions for a left-wing and socialist project of structural transformation. Without them, the gains made through successful policies of redistribution can be reversed easily.

Reclaiming the Public Sphere

It is necessary to transform the mode of production and living. This should not be done through the commodification and privatization of natural resources, but through the preservation of the universal and public character of the natural commons and other public goods, and through the expansion of collective public services that are cheap and eventually free. For example, free public transport networks should be expanded while subsidies for car-makers should be stopped. Green socialism focuses on the public sector; it is about “remunicipalizing” key parts of the infrastructure and guaranteeing democratic decision-making on issues concerning the transformation of the mode of production and consumption. Moreover, it is based on promoting collective forms of consumption rooted in the social infrastructure and universal, solidarity-based forms of social security. Demanding their expansion would also allow us to respond to the fixation of some left-wing trade unionists on wage increases and material consumption – and would do so without forcing us to get involved in debates on the need to rein in consumption. Besides, an expansion of the public sphere not based on commodification would also amount to markets and processes of privatization being pushed back.

In contrast, the idea of a “green economy” favours technological fixes based on private property, for example large-scale projects such as Desertec,[1] huge offshore wind parks, and monopolized, transcontinental super-grids for long-distance energy exports. Strong fractions of capital are already gathering behind the project. Their strategies undermine the potential for de-centralization inherent in the new technologies; they produce “false solutions” that create social-ecological conflict.

In light of this, the demands of social movements and local initiatives have started to converge with those of left-wing politicians operating at the local and the regional level. Both sides are fighting against attempts by big corporations to impose a process of “energy transition” from above; they are advocating de-centralized, local solutions, for example the remunicipalization of services of general interest and the establishment of energy cooperatives and bio-energetic villages. A variety of movements and groups are using the concept of “energy democracy” in order to create a shared perspective.

Focussing on Economies of Reproduction

For a successful socio-ecological transformation, it is necessary to focus on reproductive needs; existing, growth-oriented capitalist economies should be transformed into “economies of reproduction,” which know both how to limit themselves and to produce new wealth (cf. Candeias 2011a, 96). Sectors that are captured by a broad conception of “reproduction work” or “care work” would be at the heart of this transformation. There would be an expansion of needs-oriented social services such as healthcare, elder care, childcare, education, research, nutrition, environmental protection and others. In these areas, evrybody has been complaining about shortages for years; at the same time, they are the only sectors in the industrialized countries where employment is on the rise. They should remain under public control and should not be exposed to the market. This would be a contribution to the “ecologization” of the existing mode of production (working with people usually does not lead to environmental destruction), and to addressing the crises of wage labour and unpaid reproduction work. A process of transformation along these lines could contribute to shape gender relations in an emancipatory fashion.

This includes redefining and redistributing what we understand by “socially necessary labour” (4in1-perspective by Frigga Haug). This could be achieved by reducing labour time and expanding publicly funded, collective work processes. Such interventions are emphatically not about increasing surplus value, but about reducing the consumption of energy and raw materials, as well as assessing work on the grounds of its contribution to human development and the overall wealth in social relations.

In this context, it is important to see that the poor’s experience of being ruled and exploited by others coincides with the desire for participation and solidarity of the left-libertarian sections of the middle class. There is potential for a convergence of the demands of social movements critical of growth, feminist organizations, and service-sector unions like the German ver.di. Besides, the reorientation toward reproductive needs entails an economic shift toward domestic markets and production. Global chains of production have been overstretched for a long time, and they are wasting resources. This assessment should not be taken as a reflection of “naïve anti-industrialism” (Urban). It is motivated by the need to envisage an alternative production (the term used in the debates on conversion in the 1980s). It would be wrong to assume that continuing the export-oriented strategy of German car makers by promoting electric cars contributes to the emergence of an alternative form of production. After all, the production of the batteries needed for electric cars consumes considerable amounts of energy and raw materials and pollutes the environment because it involves a number of highly toxic substances. Moreover, the switch to electric cars does not do anything about the enormous use of space and the soil sealing caused by the construction of roads. Rather than talking about electric cars, we should discuss how the conversion of car makers into green service providers can be achieved, and how they can be transformed into companies dedicated to facilitating public mobility on the grounds of regionally rooted conceptions of transport.

Against the backdrop of such discursive shifts, trade unions like German metal union IG Metall, which are entangled in the export-oriented strategies of German corporations and in forms of “crisis corporatism,” could start to develop independent strategies. As a result, they would not constantly find themselves at loggerheads with other sections of the “mosaic left” – or appear as victors in a crisis that badly hits sister organizations in other parts of Europe.

A new focus on reproduction could trigger a process of economic de-globalization and re-nationalization. This would contribute to the reduction of current account imbalances and alleviate the pressure on countries in the global south to become part of global chains of production and policies of extraction. They would no longer have to accept the global flows of raw materials and the imperial way of life in the global north. In other words, spaces for independent development would emerge. This would have to be complemented by the development of global planning in the area of raw material and resources, which would guarantee a just distribution of wealth, limit consumption and address reproductive needs. In sum, an economy of reproduction means that people’s needs and the economy in general develop in qualitative not in quantitative ways.

Just Transitions

Transformation is not an easy path but produces a lot of social problems. Therefore the great transformation has to be combined with a just transition. This entails the shrinking of some sectors (e.g., those with a high turnover of raw materials), and the growth of others (e.g., the entire care economy). In any case, economic growth should be de-coupled from material growth. Temporarily, qualitative growth is necessary. After all, various national economies have deficiencies in the area of reproduction, especially those in the so-called global south. As a result, it is counterproductive to operate on the grounds of a simple juxtaposition of “pro-growth” and “post-growth” positions. The recent debates in the global south about Buen Vivir (“the good life,”) and social-ecological modes of development that go beyond western life-styles transcend standard conceptions of growth and modernization. In this context, it also important to avoid false juxtapositions: “Development” and “modern” civilization are not problematic concepts as such. They become problematic once they are bound up with certain forms of capitalist (or state socialist) expansion and the corresponding social relations of nature. At the political level, we have to work on “translating” the experiences of actors from different contexts. This will create opportunities for linking up social-ecological and transformative struggles in the global south with those in the north.

Just transitions are about creating new perspectives for the people worst affected by the climate crisis. But they also take into account the situation of the workers, communities and countries faced with increases in cost of living and a fundamental restructuring of employment, which may be caused by the switch to renewables and the conversion of certain industries, for example the arms industry. In this sense, the initiatives for a just transition try to bring together the movement for climate justice and the labour movement. In any other scenario, social and ecological interests are either played off against each other or the interests of the working classes and of employees more generally (a better environment, a conscious way of consuming, more jobs) are simply not considered. These are some criteria for a just transition to green socialism: It should be assessed whether the measures taken contribute to

>> a reduction in CO2 emissions;

>> a drop in poverty and vulnerability;

>> a decline in income inequality and other forms of inequality;

>> the creation of jobs and the promotion of “good work”; and

>> the democratic participation of individuals.

Obviously, this list can be extended endlessly. Nevertheless, these points are crucial for developing a provisional method of quantitative evaluation, which can be used for political interventions.

Participatory Planning

The need to instigate quick structural change under conditions of “time pressure” (Schumann 2011) also means that it is necessary to phase in participative planning, consultas populares, people’s planning processes and decentralized democratic councils. (The introduction of regional councils formed part of the recent German debate on the crisis of car manufacturing and the export industries, cf. IG Metall Esslingen 2009, Lötzer 2010, Candeias/Röttger 2009). There are some historical instances where planning proved highly effective in bringing about social change that had to be achieved quickly (e.g., the New Deal in the U.S. in the 1930s and 40s). Joseph Schumpeter was passionately in favour of the “creative destruction” caused by capitalism; nevertheless, even he spoke of the “superiority of the socialist central plan” (1942, 310ff). Considering the need for a quick transition, socialists have a strong case for planning – but this time it should be participatory planning (Williamson 2010). This approach to planning is the only one capable of establishing a mode of societalization that breaks with the obsolete relations of power and property in capitalism. In the light of negative experiences with authoritarian and centralized planning mechanisms, experimenting with participatory planning at the regional level might be the right entry point. Another potential entry point is the democratization and decentralization of existing transregional processes of planning, for example in healthcare, energy, the railways, education etc. The global allocation of raw material and resources is a more difficult issue: it seems hard to envisage the democratization of the modes of planning used by international organizations and transnational corporations.

Real Democracy

The crisis of representation and legitimacy of the political system is in many ways linked to the fact that the political system does not take into account the essential needs of the people, and that they are not invited to participate in decision-making. The public sphere should be extended with the aim of creating a “provision economy,” but this should be accompanied by the radical democratization of the state. The ‘benevolent,’ paternalistic and patriarchal welfare state from Fordist times; authoritarian state socialism; the neoliberal restructuring of public services on the grounds of the principles of competition and managerial efficiency – none of these ventures had an emancipatory character. A left-wing state project has to instigate the extension of participation and transparency demanded by the new movements for democracy and to work for the absorption of the state into civil society, as Gramsci put it. Participation does not just mean that people are able to voice their opinion, but that they are able to influence decision-making. This is where the movement against Stuttgart 21 converges with Occupy and the Indignad@s. The authoritarian-neoliberal mode of crisis management, in contrast, is at odds with this principle.

Yet democratization is not just about the public dimension of the state, but also about the economy. Today, there are serious doubts about the socio-economic “contribution” of management strategies based on shareholder value. This is due to their short-termism and their part in the financial crisis, in excessive remuneration for senior managers, tax evasion, mass redundancies and environmental destruction. Similarly, the classic forms of firm-level co-determination have proven incapable of challenging the pressure of transnational competition and of the dominance of finance. Sometimes, co-determination bodies became entangled in practices of collaboration and corruption. Therefore, it is time for a democratization of the economy that goes beyond co-determination and the in-depth participation of employees, trade unions, the consumers and the wider population in firm-level decision-making (along the lines of the entire transnational chain of production).

It is vital that all the mechanisms discussed become part of a wider project that amplifies collective agency. In other words, they should enable individuals to become the protagonists of their own (hi)stories. It is “the task of every one of us to unify the divergent” (Peter Weiss [1975] 1983, 204). The resulting association should be seen as a political association – as a left-in-transformation, which is aware of the fact that its political goals can only be achieved through fierce struggles (Goldschmidt et al. 2008, 836ff). •

Translated from the German by Alexander Gallas.

Bibliography:

Brand, Ulrich, 2012, Schöne Grüne Welt. Über die Mythen der Green Economy, LuXemburg argumente series, no. 3, Berlin

Candeias, Mario, 2011a: Strategische Probleme eines gerechten Übergangs, LuXemburg, No. 1, 90–7

Candeias, Mario, 2011b: Schuldentribunal und grüner Sozialismus. Die Schuldenkrise politisieren, Mehring-1, 18. November.

Candeias, Mario, and Armin Kuhn, 2008: Grüner New Deal – kapitalistischer Weg aus der Krise?, in: Das Argument 279, vol. 50, 805–12

Candeias, Mario, and Bernd Röttger, 2009: Ausgebremste Erneuerung? Gewerkschaftspolitische Perspektiven in der Krise, in: Das Argument 284, vol. 51, 894–904

Fücks, Ralf, and Kristina Steenbock, 2007: Die Grosse Transformation. Kann die ökologische Wende des Kapitalismus gelingen?, Böll.Thema, no. 1, www.böll.de

Goldschmidt, Werner, Colin Barker and Wolfram Adolphi, 2008: Klassenkampf, in: Wolfgang Fritz Haug (ed.), Historisch-kritisches Wörterbuch des Marxismus, vol. 7/1, Berlin, 836–73

Heinrich-Böll-Stiftung, 2012: Grüne Ökonomie. Was uns die Natur wert ist, Böll.Thema, no. 1.

IG Metall Esslingen, 2009: Treuhandfonds für die Region, Esslingen

Lötzer, Ulla, 2010: Industriepolitische Offensive – Konversion, Zukunftsfonds, Wirtschaftsdemokratie, in: LuXemburg 3/2010, 86–93

Schumann, Harald and Hans-Jürgen Urban, 2011: Gespräch über Konversion und Mosaiklinke, in: LuXemburg 1/2011, 84–89

Schumpeter, Joseph A., 1942, Kapitalismus, Sozialismus und Demokratie, Tübingen 1987

Weiss, Peter, [1975] 1983: Die Ästhetik des Widerstands, Frankfurt/M

Williamson, Thad, 2010: Democratic Social Planning and Worker Control, in: LuXemburg

Endnotes:

1. Desertec is a project aiming to launch the large-scale production of solar power in North Africa and its partial export to Europe, which is funded by various big German corporations.

Mario Candeias is a political economist, senior researcher at the Institute for Critical Social Analysis at Rosa Luxemburg Foundation in Berlin, and co-editor of the journal LuXemburg where this article first appeared (3/2012).

By Ernst Wolff

24 January, 2013

@ WSWS.org

Only thirteen days after starting a war in Mali, France is massively escalating its troop presence there, even as reports emerge of escalating ethnic killings by French-backed Malian troops.

On Tuesday the Malian regime extended the state of emergency declared on January 11 for three months. At the same time, French and Malian troops set up positions in central Mali around the strategic airfield at Sévaré.

The airfield was reportedly the main initial target of the French intervention. Paris wanted to keep it from falling into the hands of the northern-based Malian opposition, so France could use the airfield to fly troops and equipment into the region.

French forces are also blocking journalists from reporting from the war zone, to slow the stream of reports of killings of and atrocities against civilians by French and French-backed Malian forces. In Sévaré, at least 11 people were killed at a military camp, near its bus station and its hospital. “Credible information” pointed to about 20 other executions, with the bodies “buried hastily, notably in wells,” the International Federation for Human Rights (FIDH) reported.

A witness said the Malian army “gathered all the people who didn’t have national identity cards and the people they suspected of being close to the Islamists to execute them, and put them in two different wells near a bus station.” The soldiers allegedly poured gasoline into the wells and set them ablaze to hide the evidence.

Residents of Mopti in central Mali said that the Malian army had arrested, interrogated, and tortured innocent civilians, because the army thought that they were involved in the rebellion. Many Tuareg, who originally controlled the north, fled south when the Islamists took over and are being singled out for reprisals. Amnesty International claims to have evidence of extrajudicial killings of Tuareg civilians, the indiscriminate shelling of a Tuareg camp, and the killing of livestock.

A woman of the Fulani ethnic group described her situation: “The army suspects us—if we look like Fulani and don’t have an identity card, they kill us. But many people are born in small villages and it’s very difficult to have identification. We are all afraid. There are some households where Fulanis or others who are fair-skinned don’t go out any more. We have stopped wearing our traditional clothes—we are being forced to abandon our culture, and to stay indoors.”

The Malian army has a record of ethnic killings. Last September a truck with eighteen preachers from Mauritania crossed the border at Diabaly on their way to Bamako for a conference. Though none were armed and they had papers indicating their mission, all were massacred by the troops manning the border checkpoint.

Asked about abuses committed by Malian forces in an interview Wednesday on France 24 television, French Defense Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian cynically commented, “There’s a risk.”

Amateur cell phone videos on the internet show huge blasts and fireballs in living areas, and bloggers from Mali are reporting numerous casualties. The United Nations has reported that thousands of people have been forced from their homes over the past ten days. An estimated 230,000 people are now displaced across the country. According to Melissa Fleming, a spokeswoman for the United Nations’ refugee agency, the violence could soon displace up to 700,000 in Mali and around the region.

The Norwegian Internal Displacement Monitoring Center reported that people in the north were increasingly heading into the desert, as Algeria had closed its borders. Many are fleeing on foot because they cannot afford boats or buses.

Sory Diakite, the mayor of Konna, who fled to Bamako with his family after a French raid, described the bombing of his town. He said that during the assault in the first days of the war, people “were killed inside their courtyards, or outside their homes. People were trying to flee to find refuge. Some drowned in the river. At least three children threw themselves in the river in order to avoid the bombs. They were trying to swim to the other side.”

The constant increase in the number of soldiers, the massive build-up of ever-deadlier weapons and the increasing willingness of its allies to step up their support signify that such violence will only continue to escalate.

France is deploying more soldiers and more high-tech weaponry. Some 2,150 French soldiers are in Mali, and their number will rise to 5,000 by the end of the month.

The African-led International Support Mission to Mali (AFISMA) will comprise almost 6,000 soldiers, instead of the initially planned 3,300 soldiers, costing around $500 million.

The Gazelle helicopters that participated in the first wave of French air attacks are being replaced by Tiger helicopter gunships, which have a longer range and greater firepower. “Cheetah” units based in France have been placed on alert, including a number of Leclerc heavy tanks and units armed with truck-mounted 155-millimeter artillery pieces.

So far nearly 1,000 African troops from Benin, Nigeria, Togo and Burkina Faso have arrived in Mali. Senegalese troops and up to 2,000 soldiers from Chad are on the way. Their transport is being provided by France’s allies: Denmark, Germany, Belgium, the Netherlands, Spain, the United Emirates, and Canada. Italy approved sending 15 to 24 military instructors to work alongside the European Union (EU) in training Malian forces and also agreed to provide logistical support with at least two cargo planes.

US forces began their mission in support of the Mali war on Monday. Five four-engine C-17 planes took off from the Istres-LeTubé airbase in southern France, loaded with French cargo which they dropped off in the Malian capital, Bamako.

According to German news magazine Der Spiegel, British forces were on “high alert” for possible deployment in Mali, in case France asks for help. The British foreign ministry denied the report, however.

Yesterday French Rafale and Mirage jets bombed targets near Gao, Timbuktu and Ansongo, a town near the border with Niger. Col. Oumar Kande, ECOWAS military and security adviser in Mali, said, “It is possible we will win back Timbuktu, Gao, and Kidal in a month, but it is impossible to say how long the overall war will last.”

Kande’s words are in line with remarks by British Prime Minister David Cameron, who said that the Mali war might last years or decades.

By NBC News staff and wire reports

January 24, 2013, 8:30 pm

@ NBCNews.com

JERUSALEM – Israel voiced doubt on Tuesday about claims that chemical weapons had been used against rebels fighting to topple President Bashar Assad.

Activists on Monday claimed civilians had suffered injuries consistent with exposure to some kind of poisonous gas.

“We have seen reports from the opposition. It is not the first time. The opposition has an interest in drawing in international military intervention,” Vice Prime Minister Moshe Yaalon said on Army Radio.

“As things stand now, we do not have any confirmation or proof that (chemical weapons) have already been used, but we are definitely following events with concern,” he said.

Syria activists: Several die after Assad’s forces use ‘poisonous gases’

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights gathered activist accounts on Sunday of what they said was a poison gas attack in the city of Homs. The reports are difficult to verify, as the government restricts media access in Syria.

The Observatory, a British-based group with a network of activists across Syria, said those accounts spoke of six rebel fighters who died after inhaling smoke on the front line of Homs’s urban battleground. It said it could not confirm that poison gas had been used and called for an investigation.

Syria has said it would never use chemical weapons against its citizens.

Asked about images purported to show patients being treated for possible gas poisoning, Yaalon said: “I’m not sure that what we’re seeing in the photos is the result of the use of chemical weapons.

“It could be other things,” he said, without elaborating.

On Sunday, senior Israeli defense official Amos Gilad said Syria’s chemical weapons were still secure despite the fact that Assad had lost control of parts of the country.

As Syria’s southern neighbor, Israel has been concerned about chemical weapons falling into the hands of Islamist militants or Lebanese Hezbollah fighters, cautioning it could intervene to stop such developments.

Earlier this month, President Barack Obama warned Assad that the use of chemical weapons by his regime would be “totally unacceptable.””If you make the tragic mistake of using these weapons there will be consequences and you will be held accountable,” he said.

By Jean Shaoul

24 January, 2013

@ WSWS.org

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s right-wing electoral alliance, Likud-Beiteinu, and his religious coalition partners won a much-reduced majority in Tuesday’s elections, resulting in a hung parliament.

The election was shaped by a number of key factors. Of particular importance was the larger than expected 67 percent turnout, the highest since 1999. This testifies to the fact that the social discontent manifest in the mass protests of summer 2011 has not gone away.

Secondly, there was a surprisingly strong showing for Yesh Atid, formed last year, which was able to benefit from professions of support for economic and social measures to benefit Israel’s middle classes.

And finally, there was the ongoing splintering of short-lived political parties and factions without any real social base, under the impact of the global financial crisis.

Netanyahu called an early election in the belief that the disarray of the opposition parties would enable him to win a large majority, in turn allowing him to push through an austerity budget for 2013, while at the same time pursuing an aggressive policy towards the Palestinians and preparations for an attack on Iran.

But hostility to his social and economic policies and his drive to expand Israeli settlements in East Jerusalem and the West Bank—which has strained his relations with Washington, Israel’s ultimate guarantor—meant that his calculations backfired.

There is still uncertainty about the number of seats won by some of the smaller parties and final results will not be known until January 30. But with 99 percent of the votes counted, the broad outline is clear.

Netanyahu has the support of about 61 members of the 120-seat Knesset, Israel’s parliament. This has forced him to say he will seek a broad coalition to govern Israel. Under the constitution, he has six weeks to try to strike a deal with either the religious parties or with Yesh Atid and other secular parties.

Under such conditions, he is unlikely to be able to form a stable government that can push through both his militaristic agenda abroad and his austerity programme at home. It portends increasing political and social volatility.

Likud will have 20 seats in this parliament, seven fewer than before, while Yisrael-Beiteinu will have 11, four fewer. The main winner on the extreme right with 11 seats is the newly formed Jewish Home party, led by Naftali Bennett, once Netanyahu’s political aide.

Shas and other religious parties have 18 seats.

Anti-austerity opinion and hostility to Netanyahu’s pro-war policies find no genuine means of articulation in the rightward-lurching official “left” and “centrist” alternatives. The political outcome of the mass social protests of 2011, whose leaders insisted upon a “no politics” politics, has been a temporary strengthening of these moribund and essentially reactionary parties.

Yesh Atid came a close second to Likud, taking 19 seats. Its very name—There Is a Future—testifies to the vacuous and unprincipled nature of its politics. Its leader, Yair Lapid, a television anchorman and son of the late Tommy Lapid, himself a TV personality who headed the secular Shinui party from 1997 to 2006, ran a campaign aimed at the middle class, whipping up tensions between the secular and ultra-Orthodox Jews. He called for the ultra-Orthodox to be drafted into the army and workforce. While seeking a deal with the Palestinians, he does so on Israel’s terms—refusing calls to give back East Jerusalem and insisting on the retention of the settlements.

Labour, which has seen several splits and defections of leading members, ran a campaign on “social issues,” with two of the leaders of the protest movement high up on its list. Despite that, it failed to make a significant impact, winning 15 seats, up from 13 in the 2009 elections, to become the third largest party.

Its leader, ex-journalist Shelly Yachimovich, distanced herself from her party’s former programme of “peace” with the Palestinians, supporting Netanyahu’s assault on Gaza last November and the settlement project.

Hatnua, with six seats, was formed by former Kadima leader and Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni. It campaigned on the issue of reaching a deal with the Palestinians, but only in order to forestall a Palestinian majority in Israel and the Occupied Territories.

Meretz, the social democratic party that was once associated with peace advocates, doubled its representation in the Knesset, with six seats.

It is still unclear whether Kadima, which won the most seats in 2009 (28), has gained enough votes to win any seats at all. The party collapsed last year after its leader Shaul Mofaz took Kadima into Netanyahu’s coalition only to quit six weeks later over the failure to secure an end to exemption from military service for ultra-Orthodox yeshiva students.

The parties to which Israel’s Palestinian citizens, who form 20 percent of the population, have traditionally given their votes have won 12 seats, 10 percent of those available.

Netanyahu now faces the need to fashion a coalition that will accommodate the far-right wing of his Likud party and other settler and religious parties, who have scuppered every attempt at a settlement with the Palestinians, as well as some of the centrist parties. All of them are seeking exemptions from the forthcoming austerity budget for their own social base. Netanyahu is in talks with the rightwing parties, Lapid’s Yesh Atid and possibly Livni’s Hatnua to try and cobble together a workable coalition.

Lapid is now in the position of kingmaker. Netanyahu called him shortly after the polls. Lapid, for his part, has indicated he is willing to work with Netanyahu, saying that the only way to face Israel’s challenges was “together.” He added, however, “What is good for Israel is not in the possession of the right, and nor is it in the possession of the left. It lies in the possibility of creating here a real and decent centre.”

Labour’s Yachimovich has said that she too would try and “form a coalition on an economic-social basis that will also push the peace process forward,” but it is unlikely that she can do so. At the very least, it would require her to include the parties which have the Palestinian Israeli vote, something that no governing party has ever been willing to do.

The “centre” and “left” agree on all fundamentals. Whichever parties ultimately form the next coalition government, they will support Netanyahu’s war agenda and impose the diktats of Israel’s plutocrats and the international financial elite on Israel’s already impoverished workers and their families through further cuts in welfare and public services, along with tax hikes.

Instead of relying on parties tied to capitalism and Zionism, Israeli workers, youth and students must organise themselves independently of all wings of the ruling class, and unite with their class brothers and sisters regardless of religion or ethnicity within Israel, the occupied Palestinian territories and throughout the Middle East. They must fight on a socialist programme for a workers’ government that will expropriate the banks and big business and reorganise the economy on the basis of social need not private profit.

By Oliver Campbell

15 January, 2013

@ WSWS.org

Speaking at a Holocaust memorial in New York on Saturday, UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon stepped up the vilification of the Syrian regime of President Bashar al-Assad by comparing the death toll in the country’s civil war to the Nazi genocide of Jews during World War II. Ban’s comments are another sign that the major powers are preparing for direct intervention in Syria.

Ban specifically invoked the UN’s fraudulent “responsibility to protect” that provides the pretext for the US and its allies to violate national sovereignty to “protect” the local population. “The responsibility to protect applies everywhere and all the time,” he declared. “It has been implemented with success in a number of places, including in Libya and Côte d’Ivoire. But today it faces a great test in Syria.”

The reference to Libya is significant. It provides a model for the operations being considered against the Assad regime—the imposition of a “no-fly” zone and relentless aerial bombardment to complement the arming of militias on the ground. Ban’s remarks coincide with the deployment of Patriot missile batteries and the stationing of 1,200 NATO troops on the Syria-Turkey border, a necessary prelude to any air war. Thousands more troops are stationed in neighbouring countries.

The propaganda war was also intensified by a draft letter signed by more 50 countries, calling for the situation in Syria to be referred to the International Criminal Court. As reported by the Associated Press on Saturday, France and Britain are the most prominent signatories. Apart from further demonising the Syrian regime, the move is designed to intensify pressure on Assad to go.

There are a number of indications that the US and its allies are preparing for direct intervention in Syria.

According to a CNN report, US Defence Secretary Leon Panetta countenanced the possibility of sending US troops to Syria, on the pretext of securing chemical weapons, once a “transition” from the Assad regime had begun. “We’re not talking about ground troops, but it depends on what… happens in a transition,” Panetta said last Thursday.

Speaking in the British parliament on the same day, Foreign Secretary William Hague again called for the scrapping of a European Union embargo on providing arms to anti-Assad militias in Syria, when the embargo comes up for review on March 1. He went further, however, declaring that “we should send strong signals to Assad that all options are on the table”—that is, including military intervention.

Qatar’s Prime Minister Sheikh Hamad bin Jassim Al-Thani was even more blunt on Saturday. He called for a deadline for diplomatic efforts to end the conflict in Syria of “three or four weeks, but no more.” Hamad again insisted that any “political solution” to the conflict required Assad’s removal.

Talks in Geneva last Friday between US Deputy Secretary of State William Burns and Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Mikhail Bogdanov, mediated by UN envoy Lakhdar Brahimi, resulted in no agreement. On Saturday, Russia reaffirmed its opposition to calls for the removal of Assad as a precondition for a “political transition in Syria.”

The Russian defence ministry announced on Friday that it would hold major naval exercises in the eastern Mediterranean, involving anti-ship, anti-submarine, and air defence operations. Russian Defence Minister Sergei Shoigu reportedly described the naval exercises as “the biggest in the history of our country.” Russia operates a naval maintenance base in Syria at the port of Tartus. The US and its allies already have warships in the same area.

The danger of the Syrian civil war sparking broader conflict has prompted concern in British ruling circles. Responding to Hague’s comments, Liberal Democrat MP Menzies Campbell warned: “There is a risk that we will have a proxy war between Russia and NATO fought out on the streets of Syria by Syrians.”

Anti-Assad forces appear to be targetting infrastructure outside the main cities. On Friday, opposition fighters claimed to have seized control of Taftanaz, a major helicopter base in the northern province of Idlib. The base has been the scene of heavy fighting for months. The opposition victory was reportedly due, in large part, to the arrival of Islamist reinforcements at the beginning of the year, including members of the al-Nusra Front, which has links to Al Qaeda in Iraq.

Largely as a public relations move, Washington branded the al-Nusra Front as a terrorist organisation in December, but is well aware that its Syrian proxies continue to collaborate closely with, and rely militarily on, the Islamists. A Washington Post article raised concerns, not over the role of the al-Nusra Front as a fighting force in assisting the US to oust Assad, but its role if and when he was forced out.

Entitled, “Worries about a ‘failed state’ in Syria,” the article explained that an intelligence report provided by Syrian sources to the US State Department referred the situation in Aleppo, where “disorganised fighters, greedy arms peddlers and profiteering warlords” were facilitating the growing influence of the Islamists.

The report provided a bleak picture of the pro-Western Free Syrian Army (FSA) in Aleppo: “The FSA has [been] transformed into disorganised rebel groups, infiltrated by large numbers of criminals. All our efforts with MCs [military councils] were abolished… Warlords are a reality on the ground now… A [failed] state is the most likely outcome of the current condition, unless adjustment [is] done.”

Washington Post writer David Ignatius warned that the “dangers of US passivity” could lead to a situation akin to Libya. He urged the Obama administration to support “moderate military forces” to assist “a stable transition.” In reality, the concern is to establish a pliable pro-US regime, based on “moderates,” to safeguard American economic and strategic interests in Syria, as in Libya. That has been Washington’s aim from the outset.

The conditions in Libya, more than a year after its so-called liberation, are a devastating indictment of Ban Ki-Moon’s promotion of intervention of the major powers under “the responsibility to protect.” A pro-Western regime sits atop a country divided up between rival regional and tribal militias, each vying for a slice of political power and oil profits, even as the majority of the population confronts mass unemployment and abject poverty. Now the same is being prepared for Syria.

By Kourosh Ziabari

15 January, 2013

@ Countercurrents.org

If you’ve ever tried to search for reliable information and analyses which expose the concealed and obscured side of the Israeli – Palestinian conflict, you’ve surely come across to the website “If Americans Knew.” This website belongs to a non-profit organization which focuses on the Israeli – Palestinian conflict and the foreign policy of the United States toward the Middle East . “If Americans Knew” publishes commentaries and articles that the American mainstream media pusillanimously shun and reject because of their fear of the influential Zionist lobby which predominantly rules the U.S. administration and Congress. “If Americans Knew” releases statistical reports on the history of Israeli – Palestinian conflict including the number of Palestinian casualties, the number of children murdered by the Israel Defense Forces, the number of Palestinians detained in the Israel jails and the number of Israel’s illegal settlements on the Palestinian lands.

American freelance journalist and researcher Alison Weir is the founder and executive director of “If Americans Knew.” She has written several articles and compiled investigative reports on the Israeli Palestinian conflict and provoked the furious and frantic criticism of Zionist organizations such as Anti Defamation League. Her articles have appeared on a number of media outlets and news websites including Counter Punch, Antiwar.com, The Link, Znet, Los Angeles Times, Greenwich Post, Poynter.org and Washington Report for Middle East Affairs.

Alison Weir is at the forefront of combating the biased coverage of Israeli – Palestinian conflict in the mainstream media and through her sincere efforts has revealed the plight of the Palestinian nation under the occupation of Zionist regime. She believes that criticizing Israel in public will cost a journalist his career. She says that it’s far less damaging for an American journalist to write critically of the United State government than of Israel .

What follows is the complete text of my interview with Alison Weir in which we discussed a variety of topics including the dominance of Israeli lobby over the U.S. administration and Congress and also the biased coverage of the Israeli – Palestinian conflict by the western mainstream media.

Kourosh Ziabari: Ms. Weir; Let me start with the question that, what would really happen if Americans knew? What would happen if they knew that their taxes go to empower an occupying regime which kills women and children ruthlessly, massacres innocent civilians relentlessly and destroys their homes unjustifiably?

Alison Weir: They would be outraged and would demand that this stop. I have found that when I speak to groups around the country the most common question I receive is, “What can we do about this?!”

KZ: What made you think of establishing “If Americans Knew?” Actually, what were your motives for taking such a sensitive step?

AW: When I returned from my first trip to Gaza and the West Bank , I was determined to tell Americans what was going on. I felt that while I could probably occasionally get articles into the mainstream media, the context would remain so distorted that they would make little difference. Therefore, I felt it was essential to begin an organization that would work to get the information straight to the public in as many ways as possible and that would also study and expose media malfeasance on this issue.

KZ: What difficulties did you face while working on this project?

AW: One of the most difficult aspects is raising enough money to sustain the organization. The good news is that we have been able to keep going for almost ten years. The unfortunate reality is that there’s never been enough money to go beyond a paid staff of about 2-3 people. Zionist organizations of all sorts have extremely large staffs, extensive offices, etc. They also have a great many people of sufficient wealth that they can work on this issue without compensation. We’re in a far different situation.

KZ: Have you ever been pressured by the Zionist-controlled mainstream media or the Israeli lobby in the United States not to talk of Israeli regime critically?

AW: I don’t recall being pressured by the Israeli Lobby directly. Instead, they frequently try to pressure local organizations not to have me speak.

Mainstream media organizations also don’t pressure me directly. Rather, they simply don’t report about my information or inform their audiences about the existence of If Americans Knew. Democracy Now is among this group.

One book editor commissioned an article by me and then attempted to censor what I wrote.

KZ: Have you ever been threatened or seriously intimidated for the content which you publish?

AW: Yes. I received a death threat in 2003. You can read the details here . We periodically receive obscene or harassing emails and phone calls from Zionists. There are websites that misconstrue my work and that defame me, including the very powerful Jewish “Anti-defamation League.”

There are infiltrators in the pro-Palestinian movement who initiate whispering campaigns against me and work to prevent groups from inviting me to speak and from using our written materials. This often fails; sometimes it succeeds.

Recently a man knocked my phone from my hands. You can see this here .

Once when I tried to go to Palestine I was stopped at Ben Gurion Airport , held in a detention cell for 28 hours, and deported. Twice I have been briefly detained by Israeli soldiers while trying to film incidents in the Occupied Territories .

KZ: Several renowned politicians, academicians, activists and writers have likened Israel ‘s treatment of the subjugated Palestinians to the deplorable situation of the blacks under the South African Apartheid regime. From the former U.S. President Jimmy Carter to the Archbishop of Wales Barry Morgan and from the Nobel Peace Prize laureate Archbishop Desmond Tutu to former Israeli Knesset member Uri Avnery, many people believe that Israel undeniably resembles aspects of the South African Apartheid regime. What’s your viewpoint in this regard? Does the Israeli regime have the features of an apartheid state?

AW: While no two situations are ever identical, it is clear that Israeli actions are a form of apartheid. As you note, South African experts who have visited Palestine have stated this and they are clearly in a position to know.

The Human Sciences Research Council of South Africa commissioned a legal study of the Israel-Palestine situation to “scrutinize the situation from the nonpartisan perspective of international law, rather than engage in political discourse and rhetoric.” Their 15-month investigation found that “ Israel , since 1967, is the belligerent Occupying Power in occupied Palestinian territory, and that its occupation of these territories has become a colonial enterprise which implements a system of apartheid.”

In addition, inside Israel itself there is systemic discrimination against non-Jews.

KZ: In your recent article, you referred to statistical studies which reveal that primetime network news shows report on Israeli children’s deaths at rates up to 14 times greater than they report on Palestinian children’s deaths. The same is applicable to the other aspects of mainstream media’s portrayal of the Israeli – Palestinian conflict. For example, we clearly witnessed the exercise of double standards by the Western media during the Gaza War of 2008 – 2009. Why do the American media treat the Israeli – Palestinian conflict so unfairly?

AW: I feel there are most multiple causes. Below are some of the main ones:

1. Advertising and consumer pressure by Israel partisans against media that begin to provide more accurate coverage on this issue. These are often orchestrated and cause considerable financial damage to news organizations.

2. Reporters and editors who are biased towards Israel . I recently was astounded to learn how many of the allegedly “objective” journalists in the region reporting for American media have close ties to the Israeli military. Ethan Bronner, New York Times bureau chief, has a son in the Israeli army. Others have themselves served in the Israeli military. “Pundit” Jeffrey Goldberg, who is often interviewed for commentary on U.S. mainstream news broadcasts, served in the Israeli military.

I’ve written several articles and made a video on this topic:

1 , 2 , 3 and 4

The Associated Press is probably the primary source of international news for media all over the U.S. and is probably an extremely significant cause of the problem. Its control bureau, through which virtually all reports on the region must pass, is located in Israel and is staffed largely by Jewish and Israeli journalists, many with close family ties to the Israeli military. Their reporting invariably contains pro-Israel spin and context. Quite often, they don’t even send out reports on newsworthy items that reveal negative facts about Israel .

3. Media owners, publishers, CEOs, etc. who are biased toward Israel, for example, Mortimer Zuckerman, Leslie Moonves, Sumner Redstone, etc. Journalist Jeffrey Blankfort has reported on this .

4. Editors who know nothing about this issue and would not necessarily be Israel partisans but are taken in by AP, the New York Times, etc. Journalists who have never been to the region, never read a book on it, or studied it independently, often think they are experts on the subject because they’ve been reading AP et al reports for years. They have no idea how filtered and slanted these are.

5. Journalists quickly learn that reporting honestly on Israel-Palestine is not a good career move and often self-censor. It is much safer not to touch the “third rail” of American journalism; they are aware that the people who pay them won’t like it. It is far less damaging to one’s career to write critically of the American government than of Israel .

6. Fear of being called “anti-Semitic” and of being black-balled. The ADL, similar organizations, and Israel partisans are quite powerful in the U.S. People don’t wish to come under their attack; they’ve seen what happened to Helen Thomas and others.

KZ: Many American citizens who voted for President Obama in the 2008 presidential elections had hoped that he would be a different, sincere and trustworthy politician and a real man of change who would detach himself from the hawkish policies of George W. Bush. However, no essential change of policy was observed during President Obama’s administration. What’s your analysis of the performance of President Obama? Why did he fail to fulfill his promise of change?

AW: Because he is aware that pro-Israel groups and individuals determine who has the chance to be a major contender for the Presidency of the United States . If he tried to do something substantial, there would be a powerful – and successful – campaign to prevent him from winning a second term. This campaign would consist of funneling donations away from him to his opponents and of defaming him on a variety of issues in the media. Plus, even if he tried to do something, Congress would over-rule him, out of the same fears. Long before Mearsheimer and Walt wrote their exposé on this, Paul Findley described this situation in his powerful book, “They Dare to Speak Out.” Richard Curtiss, Janet McMahon, and Delinda Hanley, from the Washington Report on Middle East Affairs, have been exposing this for many years.

KZ: Following the 9/11 attacks, a wave of Islamophobic sentiments began to encompass the public sphere in the United States and the European society. The U.S. administration portrayed a horrific and appalling image of Islam and sowed the seeds of hatred against Muslims in the hearts of the Western citizens. However, we already know that they were not Muslims who planned and carried out the 9/11 attacks. Even if we admit that it was Osama Bin Laden who masterminded the 9/11 attacks, I as a Muslim should promulgate that he was not a devout Muslim, but rather a CIA asset since the Afghan-Soviet war in 1980s. What’s your viewpoint in this regard? Why is the American society’s stance toward the Muslim so repulsive?

AW: Islamophobia in the U.S. has been largely promulgated by media, individuals, and organizations working on behalf of Israel . This is one of their most despicable and dangerous campaigns and has been going on for decades. Among those whose work, statements, and or funding have resulted in making Americans fear and hate Muslims are Pamela Geller, Steve Emerson, Aubrey and Joyce Chernick, Martin Kramer, Charles Jacobs, David Horowitz, David and Meyrav Wurmser, Frank Gaffney, Caroline Glick, Daniel Pipes, etc. John Sugg has written on this topic for years; more recently Max Blumenthal, Maidhc O Cathail, and several others have exposed it.

See 1 , 2 , 3 and 4

KZ: The Zionist lobby and organizations such as Anti Defamation League, as you have pointed out in your articles, denounce as anti-Semitic and anti-Jewish every single criticism of the actions and policies of the Israeli regime, thus demoralizing and discrediting the critics of Israel who dare to call into question the illegal and immoral actions of this regime. What’s your take on this? How should the critics of Israel find podiums to voice their opposition to the actions and policies of the Israeli regime without being demonized?

AW: This is one of their most widely used tactics. Their intention is two-fold: to undermine the credibility of people speaking and writing accurately on Israel , and to intimidate people from doing this.

I feel that people should simply ignore these attacks and continue to write and speak as honestly and accurately as possible. Such smears have become so widespread that they are beginning to be a bit like crying wolf too often. An increasing number of Americans are rolling their eyes when they hear that yet another person with no record of bigotry is allegedly “anti-Semitic.” In fact, such an attack often helps to raise interest in the person being so maligned, many people assuming – often correctly – that this is a person giving the true facts on Israel and/or the Israel Lobby.

KZ: You may admit that as long as the United States gives its unconditional support to the Israeli regime, vetoes any UNSC resolution critical of Tel Aviv and prevents the international community from investigating its crimes and illegal activities, including its underground military nuclear program, no progress may be made in the course of holding Israel accountable for its actions and policies and therefore no change will be resulted and the suffering of the Palestinian nation will continue. Do you foresee a future in which Israel is eventually held responsible for its criminal actions before the international community? Is such a thing practically possible at all?

AW: Yes, I believe strongly that this will change when Americans learn the facts and demand a change in U.S. policies. The reality often forgotten in analyses on this issue is that Israel ‘s power comes from the U.S. When the sleeping giant in this relationship, i.e. the American public, wakes up, everything will change. The fact that this is already starting is reflected by the creation of entities such as J Street trying to co-opt this growing movement.

Kourosh Ziabari is an award-winning Iranian journalist and media correspondent. He writes for Global Research, CounterCurrents.org, Tehran Times, Iran Review and other publications across the world. His articles and interviews have been translated in 10 languages. His website is http://kouroshziabari.com

By Dr Paul Larudee

13 January, 2013

@ Counterpunch.org

Amazing stuff, India ink. A few drops spread vigorously with a roller for several minutes on an iron plate are enough for eight sets of fingerprints and two sets of handprints on four ancient double-sided and folded Indian police fingerprint forms. By contrast, the mug shot was taken with a digital camera. After that, I was issued an official deportation order, for which I signed to acknowledge receipt. My passport remained in police custody until I got to the security check at the airport, when it was returned to me.

My crime? I had spoken to an audience of 22,000 youth at a Student Islamic Organization conference in Kerala State without having a visa that authorized public speaking or conference participation. India is perhaps the only “democracy” where free speech for foreigners depends upon the visa they are carrying. In fact, it is probably the only such country that has no visit visa category at all, and which has one of the most convoluted, bureaucratic and invasive visa application procedures this side of North Korea.

Not that the visa restrictions are always enforced. However, the myriad regulations and procedures (“for public protection”) permit the security apparatus to control individuals and events at their discretion without having to cite the true reasons for their enforcement. Every effective police state knows the drill.

In my case, I used a tourist visa, because the conference visa is a truly onerous procedure unless it is a state-sponsored event. In fact, that is the only type of conference participation permitted, because even private groups must seek state sponsorship in order to bring speakers from outside. In today’s India, however, state sponsorship is hardly a routine bureaucratic procedure.

It shouldn’t have been this way. India was supposed to have been the model for tolerant multi-ethnic, multi-linguistic, multi-confessional societies. And when India was a leader of the Non-Aligned Movement, carefully balancing its relationships among great and small powers and supporting those who might otherwise be a mere pawn in world affairs, this promise seemed plausible.

Regrettably, India has now become a home-grown Raj, choosing sides and fomenting discord between competing interests as a means of governing and controlling, in the best traditions of its colonial past. Thus, for example, conservative Salafist clerics are welcome when they attend conferences on tourist visas, while human rights speakers like David Barsamian, John Esposito, Yvonne Ridley, Wilhelm Langthaler and myself are unwelcome, and are denied visas or expelled, and/or their hosts are prosecuted.

The Salafist treatment is part of a Machiavellian formula hatched by India with its newest partner, Israel. Salafists deserve free speech as much as anyone, but the reason India accords more of it to them is on the advice of Israel. Israel promotes Islamophobia as part of its strategy of demonizing Palestinians and Arabs, a majority of whom are Muslims, and the Salafist brand of Islam fits Israel’s agenda of portraying Islam as an extremist ideology. This stokes the flames of the more extreme nationalist Hindu groups in India and plays on the fears of many other non-Muslim groups, as well. Since Pakistan is an external Muslim enemy, such demonization helps to unify non-Muslim India and permit popular tolerance of greater government control as well as encroachment of security forces on civil rights and privacy.

In fact, India has its own version of the U.S. Patriot Act, curbing the rights of its people. It is called the Unlawful Activities Prevention Act (UAPA), and while the title is more honest than “Patriot”, it is also a bit scary. It implies that people can be snatched from the edge of a sidewalk on the pretext that they were intent on jaywalking. No need for the infraction to happen first.[i] UAPA is an illustration of the degree to which human rights have been marginalized in the land of M.K. Gandhi and Abdulghaffar Khan.

Not that India doesn’t have real security concerns. Communal strife is as old as India itself and has sometimes risen to the level of genocide, which drove the 1947 Pakistan secession. However, it is one thing to use law enforcement to prevent fighting and quite another to use it to drive a wedge between communities with a view towards playing them off against each other.

A case in point is the role that Israel is playing. The self-proclaimed Jewish state is selling itself to India as a worthwhile ally on the basis that it is a) an experienced and effective leader in the fight against Islamist extremism and terrorism, b) a supplier of high-tech weapons and intelligence, and c) a means of access to U.S. support and cooperation. In effect, Israel is saying that both states have common friends and enemies and that Israel is in a position to provide what India needs.

India appears to be buying, and is currently the largest customer for Israeli military arms systems and services. Never mind that the expensive Iron Dome systems are effective less than 50% of the time against rockets from Gaza that use 16th century technology. Like most governments, India has been seduced by the promise of omniscient surveillance systems and the prospect of winning battles rather than preventing them.

This is obviously a devil’s bargain. True to the nature of such contracts, however, are the surprises that await the unwary. It is instructive to remember that Israeli agents once planted bombs in Baghdad synagogues to encourage Iraq’s Jews to emigrate to Israel. (It worked, and encouraged Iraqi thugs toward violence, as well.)

Since then, Israel has stolen nuclear weapon technology and weapons grade fissionable material from the U.S., conducted the most massive spying operation in U.S. history against its “ally”, and staged numerous assassinations and “black ops” actions outside its borders, including friendly countries. Questions currently surround the killing of Israeli tourists in Bulgaria and the putative assassination attempt on Israeli diplomats in India. Israel blamed both of these on Iran on the basis of flimsy evidence, possibly fabricated in collaboration with its allies, the violent Mujahedin-e-Khalq Iranian exile group.

India would do well to be more circumspect toward friends like this. Vilifying Iran is high on Israel’s current agenda, and Israel reportedly provided “evidence” and pushed the Indian government to prosecute the case. The result was the arrest of journalist Syed Mohammed Ahmed Kazmi, who anchors a news program on West Asia providing alternative views of events in the region. His open advocacy of better relations with Iran and his Iranian contacts were enough make him an Israeli target and an Indian suspect. After seven months of incarceration, however, the Indian government had to release him for lack of evidence.

Kazmi and I shared the podium at the SIO conference in Kerala and I was able to chat with him privately just prior to the event. He is a courageous man, willing to accept the risk of speaking in public so soon after his release, but appears to hold no bitterness. Peaceful dissent of this kind needs to be encouraged in India, which is well advised to heed John F. Kennedy’s warning that, “Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable.”

Sadly, Israel sees violent revolution in foreign countries to be in its national interest, under the “divide and conquer” principle. However, one would think that India’s principle would be the opposite if it wants to remain a successful unified nation with a highly diverse population seeking assurance that all their voices are heard in a national consensus. Furthermore, there is no need for India to acquire the same enemies as Israel. It may be in Israel’s perceived interests, but is it in India’s?

My few days in Kerala were an inspiring glimpse of what is possible. I saw thousands of young Indian Muslims whose religious and social mission is to benefit all mankind, to alleviate the social ills of Muslims and non-Muslims alike, to promote interfaith cooperation and to create an umbrella that is inclusive of everyone.

Although this was a Muslim event, many who attended were not Muslim and were invited directly by their Muslim neighbors. I was invited to be the keynote speaker even though I am not Muslim and spoke more generally about human rights and about Palestinian issues, which are not specifically Muslim or Indian. Roughly 40% of the attendees were young women, in a society not always known for its success in promoting women’s rights.

These young people were politically aware, committed, well organized and motivated. Society is supposed to create models for young people, but in this case it was the young that created a model for their society.

Dr. Paul Larudee is a human rights advocate and one of the co-founders of the movement to break the siege of Gaza by sea. He was deported from India on 31st December, 2012.

[i] For a fictional treatment illustrating the absurdity of this proposition, see the film Minority Report (2002).

By Eileen Fleming

13 January, 2013

@ Eileenfleming.org

Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Day this year coincides with the inauguration of President Barack Obama’s second term.

To bring attention to the urgent need for action on climate change, leaders and individuals from Buddhist, Christian [Catholic, Evangelical and Protestant], Hindu, Jewish, Muslim and other faith traditions will unite with the Interfaith Moral Action on Climate for “A Pray-in for the Climate” in front of the White House on Tuesday, January 15th, the 84th birthday of Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.

On January 19, the Jewish Voice for Peace, American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee and Washington Interfaith Alliance for Middle East Peace will lead a Rally and March to the White House calling for “No Blank Check for Israel” which can be signed onto here: http://www.obamaletter.org

Inspired by Rev. King’s Letter from Birmingham Jail, which directly challenged his “fellow clergymen” I seized the liberty to spin it as a Citizens of Conscience Manifesto for my 2012 run for US House of Representatives:

I am on the Internet because injustice can be expressed here. I am cognizant of the interrelatedness of all communities and states. I cannot sit idly by in comfort and not be concerned about what happens in Israel Gaza Palestine.

Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere. We are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tied in a single garment of destiny. Whatever affects one directly, affects all indirectly. Never again can we afford to live with the narrow, provincial “outside agitator” idea. Anyone who lives in the world can never be considered an outsider anywhere within its bounds.

In any nonviolent campaign there are four basic steps: collection of the facts to determine whether injustices exist; negotiation; examining one’’s motives and acting on conscience with direct action.

Nonviolent direct action seeks to create such a crisis and foster such a tension that a community, which has constantly refused to negotiate, is forced to confront the issue. It seeks so to dramatize the issue that it can no longer be ignored I am not afraid of the word “tension.” I have earnestly opposed violent tension, but there is a type of constructive, nonviolent tension, which is necessary for growth.

Too long has The Peace Process been bogged down in a tragic effort to live in monologue rather than dialogue.

Lamentably, it is an historical fact that privileged groups seldom give up their privileges voluntarily. We know through painful experience that freedom is never voluntarily given by the oppressor; it must be demanded by the oppressed. We must come to see that “justice too long delayed is justice denied.”

There are two types of laws: just and unjust. I would be the first to advocate obeying just laws. One has not only a legal but also a moral responsibility to obey just laws. Conversely, one has a moral responsibility to disobey unjust laws. I would agree with St. Augustine “an unjust law is no law at all.”

A just law is a man made code that squares with the moral law or the law of God. An unjust law is a code that is out of harmony with the moral law. To put it in the terms of St. Thomas Aquinas: An unjust law is a human law that is not rooted in eternal law and natural law. Any law that uplifts human personality is just. Any law that degrades human personality is unjust.

Segregation [Translates to Apartheid in Afrikaner] distorts the soul and damages the personality. It gives the segregator a false sense of superiority and the segregated a false sense of inferiority. Segregation, to use the terminology of the Jewish philosopher Martin Buber, substitutes an “I it” relationship for an “I thou” relationship and ends up relegating persons to the status of things.

Hence segregation; apartheid, conscription and military occupation is not only politically, economically and sociologically unsound; it is morally wrong and sinful. Paul Tillich has said that sin is separation. Is not segregation an existential expression of man’s tragic separation, his awful estrangement, his terrible sinfulness?

An unjust law is a code that a numerical or power majority group compels a minority group to obey but does not make binding on itself. This is difference made legal. By the same token, a just law is a code that a majority compels a minority to follow and that it is willing to follow itself. This is sameness made legal.

One who breaks an unjust law must do so openly, lovingly, and with a willingness to accept the penalty. I submit that an individual who breaks a law that conscience tells him is unjust, and who willingly accepts the penalty of imprisonment in order to arouse the conscience of the community over its injustice, is in reality expressing the highest respect for law.

Everything Adolf Hitler did in Germany was “legal” and it was “illegal” to aid and comfort a Jew in Hitler’’s Germany.

Shallow understanding from people of good will is more frustrating than absolute misunderstanding from people of ill will.

Lukewarm acceptance is much more bewildering than outright rejection.

Oppressed people cannot remain oppressed forever and if repressed emotions are not released in nonviolent ways, they will seek expression through violence; this is not a threat but a fact of history. -End of Letter from Birmingham Jail [1]

In his Letter from Birmingham Jail, King reminded his fellow clergymen that Jesus was an extremist for love who taught his follower’s to “Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you, and persecute you.”

King recalled to his fellow clerics that the Hebrew prophet Amos was an extremist for justice: “Let justice roll down like waters and righteousness like an ever flowing stream.”

The world is pulled to change by extremism and our only dilemma is what will we be extremists for? Hate or love? God or State? The preservation of injustice or the extension of justice; equal human rights?

The clinging to the status quo is a form of extremism for all around US are the deep groans from the oppressed, as King addressed from his jail cell:

Few members of the oppressor race can understand the deep groans and passionate yearnings of the oppressed race, and still fewer have the vision to see that injustice must be rooted out by strong, persistent and determined action.

Too many others have been more cautious than courageous and have remained silent behind the anesthetizing security of stained glass windows.

There was a time when the church was very powerful——in the time when the early Christians rejoiced at being deemed worthy to suffer for what they believed. In those days the church was not merely a thermometer that recorded the ideas and principles of popular opinion; it was a thermostat that transformed the mores of society.

Whenever the early Christians entered a town, the people in power became disturbed and immediately sought to convict the Christians for being “disturbers of the peace” and “outside agitators.”

Small in number, they were big in commitment and by their effort and example they brought an end to such ancient evils as infanticide and gladiatorial contests.

Things are different now. So often the contemporary church is a weak, ineffectual voice with an uncertain sound. So often it is an arch defender of the status quo. Far from being disturbed by the presence of the church, the power structure of the average community is consoled by the church’s silent——and often even vocal——sanction of things as they are.

If today’s church does not recapture the sacrificial spirit of the early church, it will lose its authenticity, forfeit the loyalty of millions, and be dismissed as an irrelevant social club with no meaning for the twenty-first century.

King wondered if organized religion was too inextricably bound to the status quo to save our nation and the world.

He knew that “Any nation that year after year continues to raise the Defense budget while cutting social programs to the neediest is a nation approaching spiritual death.”

We who claim to be Christian are called to love our enemies and that the daughters and sons of God are the peacemakers. The last words Jesus spoke to his follower’s before his martyrdom was to “put down the sword” and his first words after his resurrection was “My peace be with you.”

During one of my seven trips to occupied Palestine since 2005, Mohammad Alatar, film producer of “The Ironwall” addressed my group on an Israeli Committee Against House Demolitions tour through Jerusalem and to the village of Anata and the Shufat refugee camp, in the very area where the prophet Jeremiah in the 6th century B.C. critiqued the violent conflicts in the Mid East, which were already old news:

“I hear violence and destruction in the city, sickness and wounds are all I see.” [Jeremiah 6:7]

The remains of a 7-story Palestinian apartment building, one of over

22,000 Palestinian homes that Israel has demolished

After we broke bread and ate a typical Palestinian feast prepared by the Arabiya family in the Arabyia Peace Center, Mohammad Alatar said:

“I am a Muslim Palestinian American and when my son asked me who my hero was I took three days to think about it. I told him my hero is Jesus, because he took a stand and he died for it.

“What really needs to be done is for the churches to be like Jesus; to challenge the Israeli occupation and address the apartheid practices as moral issues.

“Even if every church divested and boycotted Israel it would not harm Israel. After the USA and Russia, Israel is the third largest arms exporter in the world. It is a moral issue that the churches must address.” [IBID]

While he lived the FBI placed wiretaps on Reverend King’s home and office phones and bugged his hotel rooms throughout the country. By 1967, King had become the country’s most prominent opponent of the Vietnam War, and a staunch critic of U.S. foreign policy, which he deemed militaristic.

In his “Beyond Vietnam”speech delivered at New York’s Riverside Church on April 4, 1967 [a year to the day before he was murdered] King called the United States “the greatest purveyor of violence in the world today.”

In 1986 the federal government ‘honored’ King with a national holiday.

I IMAGINE if we the people of this homeland would honor King by following his example, it would be a very different world.

1. Vanunu’s WAIT for LIBERTY, Remember the USS LIBERTY and My Life as a Candidate of Conscience for US HOUSE 2012