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Russia and China made up for their shameful conduct in the Libyan tragedy by vetoing the UN ploy to invade Syria, temporarily muffling those war drums. But the crazed drumbeat about Iran continues even though cooler heads argue against military action. This while they impose punishing sanctions on Iran in order to avoid diminished funds for Obama in an election year when American Zionist money is vital for the purchase of American Christian votes.

Wikileaks documents revealed Israel behind a group that murdered several Iranian scientists and when an attack was made on Israeli diplomats in the same fashion, charges that the Iranians were behind it all but drowned out the American presidential campaign farce. In all this fantasy, mainstream media are not just stenographers but leaders in hyping information poor Americans into believing Iran, Syria, Muslims and socialists are menacing the USA. A severely damaged global economy is major reason for this epidemic of unreason and its capitalist class becomes further detached from reality as the situation grows more critical.

After a recession bordering on a depression the U.S. continues economic war on its people by cutting public spending while other nations reduce their populations to even more misery. Greece slashes its minimum wage and lays off more than a hundred thousand public employees so that private investors can collect interest on the national debt. That is the same situation all over the capitalist world, including Russia and China. Though they have only recently jumped into that economic frying pan they seem to have noticed it has become so overheated that the entire kitchen may burst into flames at any moment.

The attack on economic survival is what financial rulers call an austerity program. It means the majority is being forced to pay for the profits of a small minority. As one example, the U.S. Postal Service – the nation’s number one public employer – is under assault because it uses too many workers in an electronic age that finds profits increasing even faster for the few by loss of jobs for the many. These economic rules are a malignant social disease which is at the root of much that threatens humanity’s future.

As western people suffer this austerity assault, those in countries not yet totally under the smothering blanket of finance capital are menaced with the even more deadly threat of war.

Like Libya, Syria has played according to rules not wholly in accord with global capital’s political priests and rabbis and for this reason they are treated as aberrations. They, and nations like Cuba , Iran and Venezuela are labeled anti-democratic by perverters of language who define democracy as the minority rule which exists everywhere in the western world. Libya is now controlled by foreign capital and much less a unified state than it ever was under Kaddafi’s rule. Syria has been run by a party and dynasty for a longer time and is less dependent on a single figure but more on a bureaucracy , a military and a middle class which probably supports the regime, including many who want change but not if it’s imposed on them for the benefit of the west. The depiction of a murderous dictator is a gross simplification, as in Libya, with infiltration and financing from outside the nation helping to foment violence among people with honest grievances, dishonestly provoked. Divisions are heightened among Islamic groups and economic classes with contradictions that find America’s supposed arch enemy al-Qaida now often aligned with its program.

While Syrian people are bombarded with violence and suffering at least partly caused by the west, western people are bombarded by media with inflated death tolls seemingly coming from the only Syrian not yet murdered but whose calculator may soon need new batteries so he can keep counting the slaughters he miraculously avoids.

Bloody foreign policy is an extension of America’s domestic problems, with a billion dollar presidential race that reduces social and moral issues to a battle between religious fanatic patriarchy and secular obsessed bigotry providing a distraction from the reality of a collapsing political sham resting on a precarious economic foundation. An emerging trend towards real democracy offers hope for the future but little immediate relief.

So we continue enduring attacks on our sanity and intelligence that claim Iran is a threat to the planet, especially Israel, while we pile embargos, sanctions and hostilities short of overt war on a nation which has never done anything to the USA or Israel, except rebel against our interference in its rule and criticize that apartheid state , a crime of genocidal anti-Semitism in the mental health crisis center of USraeli misinformation.

Surrounded by American and NATO military bases, without nuclear weapons and no history of invading any nation in modern times, Iran is a threat. Israel, with hundreds of nukes and a record of assaulting its neighbors, and the U.S, with hundreds of military bases all over the world and the only nation to ever use nuclear weapons, are guardians of the peace. If you believe that, you need to take a sedative and see a mental health professional. The rest of us need to further investigate our supposed democratic reality before we allow it to be imposed on other nations.

196 individuals – less than one millionth of a percent of our population! – – have each already given 100,000 dollars or more to “our” presidential candidates, and there are still nine months to go before the election. If excrement is cuisine and war is peace, that’s democracy. We’d better Occupy our government before it destroys us and the rest of the world as well.

By Frank Scott

18 February 2012

@ Countercurrents.org

Frank Scott writes political commentary and satire which appears in print in The Independent Monitor and online at the blog Legalienate http://legalienate.blogspot.com Email: fpscott@gmail.com

Aquino Aligns with U.S. Military Build-Up in Asia-Pacific, a Threat to Peace in the Region

Filipino-Americans across the U.S., under the banner of BAYAN USA, express condemnation and disgust over the efforts of Philippine President Benigno Simeon “Noy-Noy” Aquino III to accommodate the “new” U.S. defense strategy that entails a so-called “rebalance to Asia”, including an increase in U.S. military presence in the Philippines. BAYAN USA also denounces the U.S. government’s Cold War-style media offensive against economic rival China as a pretext to justify its gross expansion of U.S. military powers in the Asia-Pacific in order to increase U.S. economic, political, and military investments in the region.

Economically-Motivated

Under neoliberalism, the U.S. economy is largely dependent on the Pacific Rim, particularly because of its export position. In 2010, the 21 economies that make up the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) forum accounted for 61% of U.S. exports ($775 billion) and 37% of private services exports ($205 billion). The U.S. economy’s export position in the region accounts for nearly 5 million U.S. jobs. But for countries such as the Philippines, the U.S. investment and export position is at the heart of deepening crisis and poverty due to lack of sovereign claim to natural resources and territory. In line with their national interests, countries like the Philippines must wage fierce struggles against U.S. interventionism in order to assert their right to chart their own economic and political paths.

With China’s economic growth threatening U.S. dominion over the region, and with Obama’s push for a Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) agreement that would outline a US-dominated free trade zone in the region, the U.S. government has announced it will shift its military focus away from Iraq and Afghanistan and renew its commitment to assert its position in Asia-Pacific. It has found a reliable stooge in the Aquino government. Recent negotiations framed as a Strategic Dialogue between top Washington security and defense officials and the Aquino administration have laid the ground work for the consolidation of the Philippines as a key U.S. military base location, serving as a permanent staging ground for U.S. military offensives, storage space for surveillance drones, resupply and refueling station for U.S. warships and aircrafts, as well as rest and recreational facility for U.S. servicemen.

In addition to violating Philippine national sovereignty, Aquino’s compliance in accommodating U.S. saber-rattling seeks to undo the 1991 landmark decision of the Philippine Senate to reject the U.S. bases treaty that essentially shut down permanent U.S. military bases in Subic Bay and Clark Air Field by once again opening these ports for indefinite and “rotational” basing of U.S. troops and throughout the archipelago.

Aquino Positions the Philippines in the Crossfire

Not only does the Aquino government reach an all-time high in the barometer of U.S. puppetry with these negotiations, it is aligning the Philippines with a military scheme that will threaten peace in the entire Asia-Pacific region. The U.S. government, driven by its war-dependent economy, is expanding its military presence in Asia-Pacific region under the rhetoric of security in the South China Sea and in particular the territorial dispute over the Spratly Islands, when in fact it seeks an excuse to provoke military aggression and create a war-like situation against China that will boost its military-industrial complex at the expense of surrounding countries. Such compliance on the Aquino government’s part will surely position the Filipino people in the middle of the crossfire.

Starting with the Philippine-American War of 1899, which marked the advent of U.S. imperialism onto the global stage at the turn of the 20th century, 113 years of U.S. geopolitical strategy in the region has left the Philippines with a tragic history and ongoing reality of U.S. military infestation whose social costs have burdened its people with untold pain and misery. From hosting the largest U.S. permanent foreign military bases to succumbing to the onerous US-RP Mutual Defense Treaty (MDT)—the mother of all unequal military treaties and agreements—to the virtually permanent Visiting Forces Agreement (VFA), over one century of U.S. military presence in the country has been directly linked to the indiscriminate killings, rape and other sexual offenses, massive displacement of rural communities, waste, disease, and other forms of human rights abuses.

Call for Resistance & Solidarity

As Filipinos in the U.S., BAYAN USA sees concretely how both the Aquino and Obama governments—guardians of financial oligarchy—are acting in betrayal of the broad interest of the Filipino and American peoples. Just as the poor grow poorer in the Philippines under Aquino’s failed economic policies, so are the working people in the U.S. forced to carry the heavy burden of paying for a debt crisis they did not create. As people’s resistance to the intolerable 1% escalates amidst the crisis, BAYAN USA joins the call for greater solidarity between people in the U.S. struggling against the U.S. military-industrial complex and for economic equality and the Filipino people’s ongoing struggle for genuine national independence and democracy. This must translate to greater efforts to expose and oppose the U.S. geopolitical strategy in the Asia-Pacific region as a scheme of the purveyors of crisis and war to maintain tight control over the region’s wealth. People’s resistance and firm solidarity are key in our efforts to frustrate U.S. interventionism in the region!

U.S. OUT OF THE PHILIPPINES!

U.S. OUT OF ASIA!

JUNK THE US-RP MUTUAL DEFENSE TREATY!

JUNK THE US-RP VISITING FORCES AGREEMENT!

UPHOLD PHILIPPINE NATIONAL SOVEREIGNTY!

LONG LIVE INTERNATIONAL SOLIDARITY!

Reference:

Bernadette Ellorin

Chairperson, BAYAN USA

chair@bayanusa.org

— BAYAN-USA is an alliance of 15 progressive Filipino organizations in the U.S. representing youth, students, women, workers, artists, and human rights advocates. As the oldest and largest overseas chapter of Bagong Alyansang Makabayan (BAYAN-Philippines), BAYAN-USA serves as an information bureau for the national democratic movement of the Philippines and as a campaign center for anti-imperialist Filipinos in the U.S. For more information, visit www.bayanusa.org

JERUSALEM (JWN and agencies)—”Action must be taken before it is too late, sanctions on Iran must be intensified,” Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu told reporters in Amsterdam on Thursday.

The Iranian threat to produce nuclear weapons is “the issue that most concerns Israel,” Netanyahu said, because Iran has already decided to become a nuclear state.

He told his host, Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte, that Israel and the Netherlands “stand together in opposing Iran’s feverish pursuit of nuclear weapons, while declaring its intention to wipe Israel off the map.”

“Nuclear arms in Iran are a threat to Israel, the region and the world,” he said in a speech in Amsterdam. “Sanctions should be applied to Iran’s central bank and its oil exports–and they should be applied now.”

“I want to thank the Netherlands for its support for strong sanctions on Iran,” Netanyahu added.

Turning to a conflict closer to home, Netanyahu reiterated his call to Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas to “start negotiations for peace with no preconditions.” He praised the Dutch Parliament for passing a motion last year calling on the PA to recognize Israel as the Jewish state. “The persistent [Palestinian] refusal to accept a Jewish state within any boundaries is the core of the conflict,” he said.

During an hour-long meeting at Prime Minister Rutte’s home in The Hague, he urged Netanyahu to freeze construction in territories beyond the pre-1967 armistice lines, saying his government “finds a freeze would be extremely beneficial.”

At a press conference after the meeting, Netanyahu responded to a question by a Dutch journalist regarding construction in east Jerusalem by pointing out that construction “was not an issue” during the 18 years since the signing of the Oslo Accords. The Palestinian Authority is “using this as a pretext to avoid negotiations,” he said, adding that the settlements concern only 2 percent of the territories and are therefore a “side issue.”

Earlier in the day Netanyahu met with the Foreign Affairs Committee of the Dutch parliament and with Queen Beatrix.

Netanyahu’s day began with a meeting with Prof. Johan van Hulst, 101, who saved hundreds of Jewish children during the Holocaust by helping them to reach safe houses across Holland.

“We say those who save one life save a universe. You saved hundreds of universes,” Netanyahu told him. “I want to thank you in the name of the Jewish people, but also in the name of humanity.” The prime minister presented Van Hulst with a copy of the Bible.

17 February 2012

@ Jerusalem World News

The Pentagon is rushing to send a large floating base for commando teams to the Middle East as tensions rise with Iran, al-Qaeda in Yemen and Somali pirates, among other threats.

In response to requests from U.S. Central Command, which oversees military operations in the Middle East, the Navy is converting an aging warship it had planned to decommission into a makeshift staging base for the commandos. Unofficially dubbed a “mothership,” the floating base could accommodate smaller high-speed boats and helicopters commonly used by Navy SEALs, procurement documents show.

Special Operations forces are a key part of the Obama administration’s strategy to make the military leaner and more agile as the Pentagon confronts at least $487 billion in spending cuts over the next decade.

Lt. Cmdr. Mike Kafka, a spokesman for the Navy’s Fleet Forces Command, declined to elaborate on the floating base’s purpose or to say where, exactly, it will be deployed in the Middle East. Other Navy officials acknowledged that they were moving with unusual haste to complete the conversion and send the mothership to the region by early summer.

Navy documents indicate that it could be headed to the Persian Gulf, where Iran has threatened to block the Strait of Hormuz, a crucial shipping route for much of the world’s oil supply. A market survey proposal from the Military Sealift Command, dated Dec. 22 and posted online, states that the floating base needed to be delivered to the Persian Gulf.

Other contract documents do not specify a location but say the mothership would be used to “support mine countermeasure” missions. Defense officials have said that if Iran did attempt to close the Strait of Hormuz, it would rely on mines to obstruct the waterway.

With a large naval base in Bahrain, and one or two aircraft carrier groups usually assigned to the region, the Navy has a substantial presence in the Persian Gulf and surrounding waters. Adding the mothership would do relatively little to bolster U.S. maritime power overall, but it could play an instrumental role in secretive commando missions offshore.

The deployment of the floating base could also mark a return to maritime missions for SEAL teams, which for the past decade have spent most of their time on land in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Other details of the project became public Tuesday when the Military Sealift Command posted a bid request to retrofit the USS Ponce, an amphibious transport docking ship, on a rush-order basis.

Until December, the Navy had planned to retire the Ponce and decommission it in March after 41 years of service. Among other missions, it was deployed to the Mediterranean Sea last year in support of NATO’s air war over Libya.

Instead, the ship will be modified into what the military terms an Afloat Forward Staging Base. Kafka said it would be used to support mine-clearance ships, smaller patrol ships and aircraft.

The documents posted by the Military Sealift Command in December, however, specify that the mothership will be rebuilt so that it can also serve as a docking station for several small high-speed boats and helicopters commonly used by Navy SEAL teams.

Among the vessels listed are Mark 5 Zodiacs, inflatable boats that can carry up to 15 passengers and can roll up into bags, and seven-meter-long Rigid Hull Inflatable Boats, which can carry an entire SEAL squad.

SEAL teams also deploy from regular warships, but most vessels in the Navy’s fleet must patrol or move around on a regular basis. A mothership can stay in one spot for weeks or months, effectively serving as a floating base for commandos as they monitor coastal areas or prepare for amphibious operations.

The U.S. Special Operations Command has sought a transportable floating base for several years, saying that a mothership would expand the range of commando squads operating from small speedboats, particularly in remote coastal areas.

Defense officials said the Ponce will serve as a stopgap measure until the Navy can build a new Afloat Forward Staging Base from scratch. In budget documents released Thursday, the Pentagon said it would fund that project starting next year.

The floating base also could be suited to the coast of Somalia, a failed state that is home to an al-Qaeda affiliate and gangs of pirates. A mothership there would give SEALs or other commandos more flexibility in missions such as Wednesday’s rescue of a pair of American and Danish hostages who had been held for months by Somali pirates.

The term “mothership” is also commonly used to describe a vessel used by Somali pirates. After hijacking a large container or cargo vessel, pirate crews often turn it into a floating base to extend the range of their skiffs or speedboats far into the Indian Ocean, Gulf of Aden and Persian Gulf.

U.S. military officials declined to say what prompted them to give the Ponce a sudden new lease on life. But contract and bidding documents underscore the urgency of the project.

One no-bid contract for engineering work states that the military was waiving normal procurement rules because any delay presented a “national security risk.” Other contract bids are due Feb. 3. The Navy wants the conversion work to begin 10 days later on the Ponce, which is docked in Virginia Beach.

By Craig Whitlock,

28 January 2012

© The Washington Post Company

Libya’s foreign minister says the interim government cannot stop Libyans from joining the Syrian uprising, as Tripoli takes the hardest line in the Arab world against the regime of Bashar al-Assad.

On Thursday, Libya’s transitional government gave Syrian diplomats 72 hours to leave the country, just days after it handed the Syrian embassy in Tripoli to the opposition Syrian National Council – the first country to take this step.

This week, former Libyan rebel fighters from the city of Misurata announced the combat deaths of three Libyan comrades fighting against the Syrian regime. Many former rebel fighters speak approvingly of heading to Syria to join an increasingly armed uprising against Mr Assad.

“Actually, we cannot stop anyone from going to Syria,” Ashour Bin Khayal, the career diplomat now heading Libyan foreign affairs told the FT. “People want to go and fight with the Syrians; no one is going prevent them. Officially, we don’t have this stance; but we cannot control the desire of the people.

“Libya took a very revolutionary step to recognise the Syrian National Council,” he said. “Those who are fighting the regime in Syria, we are supporting them.

“The Syrian regime is pushing the country toward a stage that no one wants. They are doing the same as Gaddafi did. The regime will fall sooner or later.”

Libyan rebels may be motivated by the support the Syrian president gave Colonel Muammer al-Gaddafi, the former president, until the very end of his life, hosting a television channel that lambasted the former rebels as stooges of the west.

Libya barely has a functioning government and is still struggling to define itself after 40 years of one-man rule. But as it emerges from almost a year of chaos, it has already begun to reposition itself on the global stage, altering its postures toward the west, Africa and the rest of the Arab world, the foreign minister said.

Mr Bin Khayal, who spent decades in North America, sought to assure the international community that Libya would serve as a force for peace following the overthrow of Gaddafi’s regime.

“Libya now is not going to be a source of trouble,” he said. “It’s going to be a peaceful country.”

But the passions stirred by the Arab Spring uprisings that included Libya’s revolution may undermine the drive to normalise the country’s place in the world.

Mr Khayal said Libya would also reorient its approach to its southern neighbours, where Gaddafi lavished business projects. Libyans widely believe African regimes supported the former president during the uprising against his rule, supplying him with diplomatic support, weapons and mercenaries.

“The rules of the game toward Africa are going to be different,” Mr Khayal said. “The image of Africans among ordinary Libyans is not very good.”

He recently visited Niger, Chad and Mali and attended the African Union summit in Addis Ababa in part to “strengthen borders” between Libya and the rest of Africa to prevent the flow north of drugs, contraband and migrants.

But he also vowed to end the former regime’s nefarious activities in African countries. He revealed to his AU counterparts that Gaddafi was using Libyan diplomatic missions in 11 African countries to store and smuggle weapons and explosives, a practice he promised would end.

Mr Khayal predicted that the goodwill generated by Nato’s support for the Libyan uprising “is going to be translated in one way or the other” into better relations with western countries. His number one priority was to continue pushing western countries to release frozen assets held abroad. So far, restrictions on more than $100bn in assets have been lifted.

He was also trying to convince European and other international companies to return to Libya to staff oilfields and installations and to finish various construction projects, including a huge housing project in Benghazi.

Libya was “not yet at the stage” of trying to initiate debt relief or drum up new business. “We’re trying to focus on projects that are not finished,” he said.

By Borzou Daragahi in Tripoli

9 February 2012

@ Financial Times

Dear President Ahmadinejad of Iran, the Islamic Revolutionary Court & the Iranian people:

*PLEA to IRAN: Please free Mr. Amir Mirzaei Hekmati, the Iranian American charged with espionage & sentenced to death in Iran. (1) Please show Islamic Mercy & compassion on behalf of Mr. Hekmati. Iran, Please show the world you are a leader in Restorative justice & that you believe in offering an Olive branch of Peace to others.

*ISLAMIC MERCY & COMPASSION: RAHMAH: (2) Mercy plays an important role in the Islamic religion; To God & the Iranian people, Please have Mercy & empathy on Mr. Hekmati; Please show Compassion & sympathy toward this Iranian American. “When God says in the Quran, ‘My mercy embraces everything’ (7:156), this means that God has mercy on the entire universe.” (3) Specifically, “The more weak & poor a human being is, the more we are required to show mercy to him & be gentle with him.” [Quran 93: 9-10] (4) May God & the Iranian people be gentle & sensitive to Mr. Hekmati’s suffering. As so beautifully said by Dr. Chittick & the Islamic religion: “The goal of love is to overcome separation, to escape from the darkness and (the) pain that define our existential plight, and to enter into the light. … It is to take advantage of the universal mercy that embraces everything”. (5) To the Iranian people, please overcome the separation, escape the darkness & pain of our existential plight, please enter into the light & please have Mercy on Mr. Amir Hekmati.

*RESTORATIVE JUSTICE:

*Dear President Ahmadinejad & the Iranian people, Please rise to a level of enlightened human consciousness: Rather than punish Mr. Hekmati – Please allow him to participate in a Restorative/Transformative Justice program [X] [Y] that focuses on a Unified justice — including dialogue between the victims, the offender & the involved community – involving the United States & Iran. Please give Mr. Hekmati the opportunity to take Responsibility for his actions, to repair any harm done with an Apology [X] & to make a commitment to an education in Peace & International Conflict studies in the United States. [Z] As Mr. Ross states regarding Mr. Hekmati & Restorative justice: “Sparing Hekmati’s life would be an act of grace on the part of Iran in accord with the inspired teachings of the world’s great religions. … It would also provide an opportunity for restorative justice”. (6) To the Iranian people, please offer Mr. Hekmati a kind, peaceful solution to this conflict.

*PRISONS, CAGES & HUMAN SUFFERING: President Ahmadinejad I believe: “Prisons are violent institutions that only perpetuate violence” (7) & which cause great suffering. (8) Prisons violate the human rights of prisoners including: the most tragic violation of civil rights: The Death penalty; Other prison human rights violations include: Prisoner isolation, poor medical care, drug abuse, rape, tuberculosis risk, etc.. (9) Prisons are: “A failed solution to social, political & economic problems”. (10) There are ways to develop (community) safety that don’t rely on “Caging … to address social, economic and political problems”. (11) Please offer Mr. Hekmati a dignified alternative to prison — Peace education.

CONCLUSION: Dear President Ahmadinejad, The Islamic Revolutionary Court & the Iranian people: Please have Islamic mercy on Mr. Hekmati; Please offer the United States & Mr. Hekmati a gesture of Reconciliation & healing; & Please free Mr. Hekmati to the United States for an education in Peace & International Conflict studies.

Thank you. Respectfully & Humbly, Mary Hamer, M.D. Florida. U.S.A.

By Mary Hamer, M.D. U.S.A.

29 January 2012

@ Countercurrents.org

REFERENCES:

theweek.com. Will Iran Execute an American citizen? 1/10/12.

en.wikipedia.org. Compassion. Islam.

www.huffingtonpost.com. Chittick, William. Ph.D. The Islamic Notion of Mercy. 12/14/10.

www.islamweb.net. Islam the Religion of Mercy. 22/12/10.

www.huffingtonpost.com. Chittick, William. Ph.D. The Islamic Notion of Mercy. 12/14/10.

Ross, Sherwood. CIA Spy Conviction Gives Iran Chance to Boost Relation. 1/10/12. Countercurrents.org.

www.criticalresistance.org. Critical Resistance.

Hamer, Mary. Prisons, Cages & Human Suffering. www.countercurrents.org. 8/16/10.

voices.yahoo.com. Human Rights Abuses against Prisoners subsequently lead to Suicide. By RmarkbleCourage.

www.criticalresistance.org. Critical Resistance.

en.wikipedia.org. Critical Resistance.

NOTES:

*X. Restorative Justice: “Restorative Justice (also sometimes called “Reparative justice”A) is an approach to justice that focuses on the needs of victims, offenders, as well as the involved community, instead of satisfying abstract legal principles or punishing the offender. Victims take an active role in the process, while offenders are encouraged to take responsibility for their actions, “To repair the harm they’ve done—by apologizing, returning stolen money, or community service”.B Restorative justice that fosters dialogue between victim and offender shows the highest rates of victim satisfaction and offender accountability.D … “The most important process of restorative justice, is the concept of ‘healing.’” “Various methods of restorative justice are practiced; examples include victim offender mediation, conferencing, healing circles, victim assistance,ex-offender assistance, restitution, and community service.” “Restorative justice is defined as:…a broad term which encompasses a growing social movement to institutionalize peaceful approaches to harm, problem-solving and violations of legal and human rights. These range from international peacemaking tribunals such as the South Africa Truth and Reconciliation Commission to innovations within the criminal and juvenile justice systems, schools, social services and communities. Restorative resolutions engage those who are harmed, wrongdoers and their affected communities in search of solutions that promote repair, reconciliation and the rebuilding of relationships. Restorative justice seeks to build partnerships to reestablish mutual responsibility for constructive responses to wrongdoing within our communities. Restorative approaches seek a balanced approach to the needs of the victim, wrongdoer and community through processes that preserve the safety and dignity of all.”E. [en.wikipedia.org. Restorative Justice. Referencing: A. European Journal on Criminal Policy and Research Volume 1, Number 1, 70-93, DOI: 10.1007/BF02249525 Reparative Justice: Towards a Victim oriented system. Elmar Weitekamp. B. “A New Kind of Criminal Justice”, Parade, 25 October 2009, p. 6. C. Marty Price, J.D. “Personalizing Crime,” Dispute Resolution Magazine, Fall 2001. D. Lawrence W Sherman and Heather Strang, Restorative Justice: The Evidence, University of Pennsylvania, 2007. E. Suffolk University, College of Arts & Sciences, Center for Restorative Justice, “What is Restorative Justice?”.]

*Y. Transformative Justice Definition: “Transformative justice is a general philosophical strategy for responding to conflicts. It takes the principles and practices of restorative justice beyond the criminal justice system. … Transformative justice uses a systems approach, seeking to see problems, as not only the beginning of the crime but also the causes of crime, and tries to treat an offense as a transformative relational and educational opportunity for victims, offenders and all other members of the affected community. … (Transformative justice) can be seen as a general philosophical strategy for responding to conflicts akin to peacemaking. Transformative justice is concerned with root causes and comprehensive outcomes. It is akin to healing justice more than other alternatives to imprisonment.” [en.wikipedia.org. Transformative Justice.]

*Z. Peace & International Conflict studies focuses on “The prevention, de-escalation, and solution of conflicts by peaceful means, thereby seeking (dual) ‘victory’ for all parties involved in the conflict. This is in contrast to war studies (polemology) which has as its aim on the efficient attainment of (solo) victory in conflicts.” [en.wikipedia.org. Peace & Conflict Studies. Referencing: John D. Brewer, Peace processes: a sociological approach, p. 7, Polity Press, 2010.]

Monday. February 13. 3.54 pm. A bomb explodes in the car of an Israeli diplomat. Three people, including the defence attaché’s wife Tal Yehoshua, are grievously injured.

30 minutes later, embassy officials are examining the remains of the vehicle in an area that has been cordoned off by the police.

Within three hours, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu accuses the Hizbullah and Iran: “Iran, which stands behind these attacks, is the largest exporter of terror in the world. The Israeli government and its security forces will continue to work together with local security services against these terrorist actions.”

He is pre-empting the inquiry, and the media is already talking about “Hizbullah in Delhi” and “Israel targeted in India”. We are calling ourselves a soft state when our own hardliners and security forces have been killing citizens inside the country.

The question is not whether global terror is being fought on Indian soil but how much of it is being arranged here. If it is legitimate to ask about the role of local handlers, then why has there been no concern about the incident of a planned vengeance by Israelis?

Cut to a report a few days ago when there was palpable revenge. The couple, Shneor Zalman and Yaffa Shenoi, arrived in India on a multiple-entry visa in March 2010. After the visa expired, they went back and returned within a month. What was their purpose that they paid a “disproportionately high rent” of Rs. 50,000 a month for a house in Fort Kochi, Kerala? A senior official was quoted in a report saying: “Central intelligence got an alert about a covert operation being carried out by suspected Israeli agents after the 26/11 Mumbai terror strike in which south Mumbai’s Chabad House came under attack and six Jews, including a Rabbi and his pregnant wife, were killed. We have traced the couple’s financial transactions. They will be questioned before they are deported. Preliminary investigations suggest some Israelis are camping in various parts of the country.”

This comes from official sources and all that they think of is deporting the couple. There has been complete silence from the usually active dispensers of opinion, too.

Let us return to the scene of Monday’s crime. The Indian and international media have gone ballistic about it without a shred of evidence. If the argument is that the Indian prime minister’s house is in the vicinity and reveals lapses in our security, then why is no one apprehensive about our situation? It raises questions beyond safety measures. Why are we falling in line with Israeli rules? What is the American effort in this proxy war? It is not Hizbullah that is fighting in India, but Israel.

With the top leaders’ comments, Israel is not only holding India to ransom but also trying to play its victim-aggressor game here. A bomb that went off simultaneously in Georgia was defused, for it does not resonate well with the anti-Arab/Iran narrative. One is not condoning any such attacks, but this most certainly does not look like a war against Israel, a state that has got its armour in place. Mossad is as pervasive as the CIA.

Foreign Minister Avigdor Liberman said, “It just shows that Israel and its citizens face terror inside and outside of Israel. We deal with it every day. We know how to identify exactly who is responsible for the attack and who carried it out. We will not allow this to affect our agenda.”

Has anyone questioned the agenda? The identification process assumes reprisal.

Blindly accepting the Israeli version of domestic links with groups will obviously lead to the blanket indictment of ‘jihadi’ organisations, many of them imagined entities of the right-wing parties. Is it not possible that some Hindutva terror groups now openly asserting themselves and held culpable for such activities could be used for Israel’s covert operations? Israel does not have suicide missions, but it understands the masochism paradigm only too well.

***

The revenge space is never empty. Philosopher Martha Nussbaum has written: “The primitive sense of the just…starts from the notion that a human life…is a vulnerable thing, a thing that can be invaded, wounded, violated by another’s act in many ways. For this penetration, the only remedy that seems appropriate is a counter invasion, equally deliberate, equally grave. And to right the balance truly, the retribution must be exactly, strictly proportional to the original encroachment. It differs from the original act only in the sequence of time and in the fact that it is response rather than original act – a fact frequently obscured if there is a long sequence of acts and counteracts.”

We need to look at a few examples to emphasise our vulnerability.

Members of the orthodox Jewish Chabad India Trust have moved out of Nariman House and are residing in an unknown location due to security reasons. Soon after the Mumbai attacks, six members of a group called Zaka (acronym for Zihuy Korbanot Ason – Disaster Victim Identification) arrived in the city to collect and arrange the body parts and blood of Jews so that they could be returned to family members and were afforded a dignified burial according to Jewish law. The police investigations were not completed.

More recently, Israeli national Nurit Toker was booked by the Mumbai police under the Arms Act, 1959, for carrying two live cartridges in her backpack while travelling from Mumbai to Kathmandu. In her petition she mentioned that she had completed her compulsory three-year training in the Israeli army and these were her personal ammunition, compatible with the M-16 assault rifle acquired during her military training. She had not carried the rifle, though. Sec. 3 clearly states “there is no requirement of use or intention to use the arm or ammunition” to pursue the case. Yet, the Israel Consulate intervened to say that the accused had accidentally left bullets in her bag.

This is not the first such instance. In 2006, Noa Haviv had cleared customs at Mumbai airport as well as the security agencies of Israeli airline El Al at Tel Aviv and arrived with 16 bullets and a magazine in her check-in baggage. The Israeli consul general had stated then: “We have every reason to believe that it was an innocent mistake. She had borrowed this suitcase from her brother, who is a licensed weapons holder. She was not aware of the bullets inside when she packed her bags.” Amazingly, only the airline filed a case and not the Airports Authority of India or the security agencies of the government.

In a country that arrests whole families on mere “tip offs”, this leniency is alarming. Worse, all 171 passengers on the El Al flight had walked out of the green channel and cleared customs in 15 minutes. Why this express service? Even Indians returning from a holiday take longer. The customs official at the time had said, “…this was a flight coming from Israel, where security measures are stringent.”

Are we to depend on another state’s security assurances? Israel is not above suspicion. No country is.

***

The attack on the embassy staff took place in India. We cannot allow investigations to be outsourced. Hillary Clinton offered US assistance to probe into “these cowardly acts” because the “scourge of terrorism is an affront to the entire international community”.

In an editorial, The Pioneer uses this incident for its grand-standing: “Governments around the world are mindful of such occasions when Israelis, both diplomats and civilians, are likely be targeted; sadly, the Government of India chooses to ignore them, busy as the Home Minister is defending himself in a corruption case while intelligence agencies are pre-occupied with snooping on the Congress’s political opponents and conducting ‘surveys’ in election-bound States”. It adds, with alacrity, that at least the people should be agitated “if not the Government whose Ministers are at the moment unabashedly pandering to Muslim extremism in Uttar Pradesh”.

Are we to be on our toes for Israel? Why did the papers not write editorials when suspicious activities of Israelis were noticed by these intelligence agencies? Why suppress those?

As expected, Pakistan and its Inter Services Intelligence are used as an example. There has been no proof. Israel is using Indian susceptibility with regard to relationship with Pakistan. There is an indeed an insurgency problem and the recent history of the Mumbai attacks. The fact that the Jewish Chabad House was one of the targets makes it appear as a legitimate connection. But Pakistan has closer ties with Saudi Arabia and is inimical to Iran, which is the current bone stuck in the throats of the western powers and Israel.

There are cursory references to the four Iranian nuclear scientists who were killed in the last two years. Instead, the bomb blast is being touted as revenge for the death of Hizbullah’s military chief Imad Mughniyeh in a car explosion. What is so important about the fourth death anniversary? Do also note that he was killed in Syria, so Israel has a virtual buffet meal at its disposal to point fingers at.

Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman Ramin Mehmanparast said. “Israel perpetrated the terror actions to launch psychological warfare against Iran.”

There are sniggers, but Israel has every reason to perpetuate such mind-numbing ideas, if not actions. In 1948, Menachem Begin’s unit slaughtered the inhabitants of Deir Yassin. In 1953, Ariel Sharon led the slaughter of the inhabitants of Qibya, and in 1982 arranged for their allies to butcher around 2,000 in the refugee camps of Sabra and Shatilla. He had declared, “We must hit, hit and hit them incessantly – not by means of large-scale war. Suddenly someone disappears there, someone is found dead here and somewhere else someone is found stabbed to death in a European nightclub.”

The history if Israel is as damning as it is damaged. It has flouted every rule and yet got the benefit of protection.

India is most certainly not a soft power that some of our own commentators are shamelessly projecting it as. It is a bit obsessed and still suffers from a colonial hangover. It has created its cocoon of goodwill based on the flimsy delusion of being a developed nation where hybrid progress is sustained in a greenhouse. In that, it is not too different from some of the wealthy Arab states that are only concerned about how they sell their oil and for how much. Just as they have their pecking order, India maintains a stoical distance from the larger pool of South Asian countries by virtue of its “close relations” with those who matter.

Self-preservation is the goal of any society, but when it becomes opportunistic it is difficult to demarcate the lines of control and of control freaks. By a process of natural selection that imbues it as a ‘doctrinaire liberal’ society, India is being co-opted in an unholy war

By Farzana Versey

16 February 2012

@ Countercurrents.org

Farzana Versey is a Mumbai-based writer. She can be reached at http://farzana-versey.blogspot.in/

On April 10, 2002, then British Prime Minister Tony Blair told the House of Commons, “Saddam Hussein’s regime is…developing weapons of mass destruction, and we cannot leave him doing so unchecked.”

A year later, Blair, enthusiastically joined a US-led coalition that launched an illegal war against Iraq. Their hunt for weapons of mass destruction was futile because no such weapons actually existed. The Iraq Survey Group, a 1,400 strong member organization set up by the CIA and the Pentagon, made every attempt to prove otherwise, but only came back empty-handed. In its final Duelfer Report, released in September 2004, the group “found no evidence of concerted efforts to restart the [nuclear] program.”

One would think that the years between 1991 – the first war on Iraq – and 2003 would have been enough to convince US-led western allies that economically besieged, politically isolated and war torn Iraq had no capacity for producing such weapons. Still, Iraq was attacked with a ferocity that left hundreds of thousands dead and a destroyed country. The outcome of the misadventure may be history to some, but it is a devastating reality for millions of Iraqis.

Considering all of this, shouldn’t we at least expect a slight change of course?

‘Drums of war beat louder as Iran and Israel step up rhetoric,’ declared a story headline in the British Independent newspaper on February 4, while ABC news stated that ‘Fear of Israel War With Iran Grows Amid Heightened Nuke Concerns.’

Of course, there is great deal of journalistic trickery in how the story is being reported. Iran did promise retaliation if attacked, but the possible war is being initiated and engineered by Israel.

In fact, contrary to popular perception, the potential war is not an exclusively Israeli-Iranian matter. While Israel is sorting out logistical issues, Western allies are actively working to both choke Iran economically and isolate it politically. The strategy may give the impression that Israel is the predator moving for the kill, but all other details are being sorted out in Western capitals.

As was the case with Iraq, Western allies are now hatching up both legal and political discourses. As they continue to escalate on multiple fronts, inspectors from the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) seem to conveniently run into all sorts of obstacles in Iran itself.

Meanwhile, mainstream media continues to hype the idea of Iran as a threat to Israel and the United States. Comments made during a Friday sermon by Iran’s supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, which threatened serious retaliation in case of attack, were stretched in every possible direction to give an impression of dangerous Iranian leadership. This was intended to retrospectively cement the bizarre Israeli narrative that ‘Iran must be stopped before it’s too late’.

U.N. Nuclear Inspectors’ Visit to Iran Is a Failure, West Says,’ declared a headline in the New York Times, although the story itself pointed to the fact that the inspectors merely faced problems meeting a key scientists and would return later in the month.

The media anxiety reached an all time high with the publishing of a report in the Independent, which suggested that US Defense Secretary Leon Panetta “believes Israel could strike nuclear targets in Iran before the summer after concluding that military action might be needed before it was ‘too late’ to stop Tehran’s nuclear program”.

The saber-rattling that preceded the Iraq invasion prepared public opinion for a war that should never have taken place. In the case of Iraq, Israel was a central piece in the US justification for war. Defending Israel from some imagined Iraqi threat was used by every war enthusiast in the US government and media.

Now, it’s Iran’s turn. The ugly deed this time is likely to be perpetrated by Israeli hands as early as April, according to Panetta. (One would argue that a dirty war is already underway as a number of assassinations targeting Iranian scientists have been committed.)

While the very suggestion of war was an Israeli-US ‘option’ that has been tossed back and forth since at least 2005, no sensible Iranian position is to be found in Western media reporting.

“Iran argues that as a signatory to the Non-Proliferation Treaty and a member of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), it has every right to develop and acquire nuclear technology for peaceful purposes,” read a news article published in Iranian Press TV website.

No such claims will be assuring enough to the Israeli leadership. When Hamas’ feeble home-made rockets are viewed by Israel’s official discourse as an ‘existential threat’, one can imagine the trepidation of co-existing with a militarily strong Iran. Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his Defense Minister Ehud Barak are the two major proponents of the ‘bomb Iran before it’s too late’ argument. Considering Israel’s existing arsenal of nuclear weapons, subscribing to the Israeli logic is paramount to accepting that only Israel somehow has the moral capacity to use WMDs wisely.

Chillingly, officials used the annual conference of Israel’s security establishment at the Inter-Disciplinary Centre in Herzilya to mostly discuss the ‘how’ and ‘when’ of launching their attacks. Vice Prime Minister, Moshe Yaalon is determined that “one way or the other…(the) messianic-apocalyptic” Iranian nuclear project would be stopped. Yaalon is a passionate supporter of the theory that Iranian ungrounded facilities can in fact be penetrated by bunker-buster bombs.

However, using the Iraq war narrative for comparison must end here. The fact is, there are also significant differences between both cases. Iran is a major regional power, geographically massive and cannot be politically ‘contained’ or economically choked without exacting a high price from all parties involved. No ground invasion is possible, for the US is counting its losses in Iraq and is cutting down its military budget. Iran has had enough time to anticipate and prepare for all grim possibilities. The American-British-Western public willingness to subscribe to another war rationale is at an all time low. And an act of war could destroy any remaining semblance of stability in a strategically and economically precious region during a time of global recession.

If history ever repeats itself, it does so only when we fail to learn its important lessons. Israel might be prepared to take such chances, but why should the rest of the world?

By Ramzy Baroud

10 February 2012

@ Countercurrents.org

Ramzy Baroud (www.ramzybaroud.net) is an internationally-syndicated columnist and the editor of PalestineChronicle.com. His latest book is My Father Was a Freedom Fighter: Gaza’s Untold Story (Pluto Press, London).

Updated: 11:14 a.m. ET — Deadly attacks on Iranian nuclear scientists are being carried out by an Iranian dissident group that is financed, trained and armed by Israel’s secret service, U.S. officials tell NBC News, confirming charges leveled by Iran’s leaders.

ROCK CENTER EXCLUSIVE

The group, the People’s Mujahedin of Iran, has long been designated as a terrorist group by the United States, accused of killing American servicemen and contractors in the 1970s and supporting the takeover of the U.S. Embassy in Tehran before breaking with the Iranian mullahs in 1980.

The attacks, which have killed five Iranian nuclear scientists since 2007 and may have destroyed a missile research and development site, have been carried out in dramatic fashion, with motorcycle-borne assailants often attaching small magnetic bombs to the exterior of the victims’ cars.

U.S. officials, speaking on condition of anonymity, said the Obama administration is aware of the assassination campaign but has no direct involvement.

The Iranians have no doubt who is responsible – Israel and the People’s Mujahedin of Iran, known by various acronyms, including MEK, MKO and PMI.

“The relation is very intricate and close,” said Mohammad Javad Larijani, a senior aide to Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Iran’s supreme leader, speaking of the MEK and Israel.  “They (Israelis) are paying … the Mujahedin. Some of their (MEK) agents … (are) providing Israel with information.  And they recruit and also manage logistical support.”

Moreover, he said, the Mossad, the Israeli secret service, is training MEK members in Israel on the use of motorcycles and small bombs.  In one case, he said, Mossad agents built a replica of the home of an Iranian nuclear scientist so that the assassins could familiarize themselves with the layout prior to the attack.

Much of what the Iranian government knows of the attacks and the links between Israel and MEK  comes from interrogation of an assassin who failed to carry out an attack in late 2010 and the materials found on him, Larijani said. (Click here to see a video report of the interrogation shown on Iranian televsion.)

The U.S.-educated Larijani, whose two younger brothers run the legislative and judicial branches of the Iranian government, said the Israelis’ rationale is simple. “Israel does not have direct access to our society. Mujahedin, being Iranian and being part of Iranian society, they have … a good number of … places to get into the touch with people. So I think they are working hand-to-hand very close.  And we do have very concrete documents.”

Two senior U.S. officials confirmed for NBC News  the MEK’s role in the assassinations, with one senior official saying, “All your inclinations are correct.” A third official would not confirm or deny the relationship, saying only, “It hasn’t been clearly confirmed yet.”  All the officials denied any U.S. involvement in the assassinations.

As it has in the past, Israel’s Foreign Ministry declined comment. Said a spokesman, “As long as we can’t see all the evidence being claimed by NBC, the Foreign Ministry won’t react to every gossip and report being published worldwide.”

For its part, the MEK pointed to a statement calling the allegations “absolutely false.”

Response to article from the National Council of Resistance of Iran

Ali Safavi, a long-time representative of the MEK, underscored the denial after publication of this article,

“There has never been and there is no MEK member in Israel, period,” he said. “The MEK has categorically denied any involvement. The idea that Israel is training MEK members on its soil borders on perversity. It is absolutely and completely false.”

The sophistication of the attacks supports the Iranian claims that an experienced intelligence service is involved, experts say.

In the most recent attack, on Jan. 11, 2012, Mostafa Ahamdi Roshan died in a blast in Tehran moments after two assailants on a motorcycle placed a small magnetic bomb on his vehicle. Roshan was a deputy director at the Natanz uranium enrichment facility and was reportedly involved in procurement for the nuclear program, which Iran insists is not a weapons program.

Previous attacks include the assassination of Massoud Ali-Mohammadi, killed by a bomb outside his Tehran home in January 2010, and an explosion in November of that year that took the life of Majid Shahriari and wounded Fereydoun Abbasi-Davani, who is now the head of Iran’s Atomic Energy Organization.

In the case of Roshan, the bomb appears to have been a shaped charge that directed all the explosive power inside the vehicle, killing him and his bodyguard driver but leaving nearby traffic unaffected.

Although Roshan was directly involved in the nuclear program, working at the huge centrifuge facility between Tehran and Qom, Iran’s religious center, at least one other scientist who was killed wasn’t linked to the Iranian nuclear program, according to Larijani.

Speaking of bombing victim Ali-Mohammadi, whom he described as a friend, Larijani told NBC News, “In fact this guy who was assassinated was not involved in the nitty-gritty of the situation.  He was a scientist, a physicist, working on the theoretically parts of nuclear energy, which you can teach it in every university. You can find it in every text.”

“This is an Israeli plot.  A dirty plot,” Larijani added angrily. He also claimed the assassinations are not having an effect on the program and have only made scientists more resolute in carrying out their mission.

Not so, said Ronen Bergman, an Israeli commentator and author of “Israel’s Secret War with Iran” and an upcoming book tentatively titled, “Mossad and the Art of Assassination.”

Bergman said the attacks have three purposes, the most obvious being the removal of high-ranking scientists and their  knowledge. The others:  forcing Iran to increase security for its scientists and facilities and to spur “white defections.”

He explained the latter this way: “Scientists leaving the project, afraid that they are going to be next on the assassination list, and say, ‘We don’t want this.  Indeed, we get good money, we are promoted, we are honored by everybody, but we might get killed.  It isn’t worth it.  Maybe we should go back to teach … in a university.’”

There are unconfirmed reports in the Israeli press and elsewhere that Israel and the MEK were involved in a Nov. 12 explosion that destroyed the Iranian missile research and development site at Bin Kaneh, 30 miles outside Tehran.  Among those killed was Maj. Gen. Hassan Moghaddam, director of missile development for the Revolutionary Guard, and a dozen other researchers. So important was Moghaddam that Ayatollah Khamenei attended his funeral.

Unlike the assassinations, Iran claims the missile site explosion was an accident; the MEK, meanwhile, trumpeted it but denied any involvement.

Indeed, there may be other covert operations carried out either by Israel acting alone or in concert with others, according to Bergman.

“Two labs caught fire,” said Bergman, enumerating the attacks. “Scientists got blown up or disappeared.  A missile base and the R&D base of the Revolutionary Guard exploded some time ago, with the director of the R&D division of the Revolutionary Guard being killed along with … his soldiers.”

Bergman added, “So, a long series of … something that was termed by an Israeli (Cabinet) minister … as ‘mysterious mishaps’ happening and rehappening to the project. Then the Iranians claim, ‘This is Israeli Mossad trying to sabotage our attempts to be a nuclear superpower.’”

Dr. Uzi Rabi, director of the Dayan Center at Tel Aviv University, said the supposed accidents could all be part of “psychological warfare” conducted against Iran. “It seems logical. It makes sense,” he said of possible MEK involvement, “and it’s been done before.”

Rabi, who regularly briefs Israel’s parliament, the Knesset, on Iran also said the ultimate goal of the range of covert operations being carried out by Israel is “to damage the politics of survivability … to send a message that could strike fear into the rulers of Iran.”

For the United States, the alleged role of the MEK is particularly troublesome.  In 1997, the State Department designated it a terrorist group, justifying it with an unclassified 40-page summary of the organization’s  activities going back more than 25 years.  The paper, sent to Congress in 1994, was written by Wendy Sherman, now undersecretary of state for political affairs and then an aide to Secretary of State Madeleine Albright.

The report, which was obtained by NBC News, was unsparing in its assessment. “The Mujahedin  (MEK) collaborated with Ayatollah Khomeini to overthrow the former shah of Iran,” it said. “As part of that struggle, they assassinated at least six American citizens, supported the takeover of the U.S. embassy, and opposed the release of the American hostages.”  In each case, the paper noted, “Bombs were the Mujahedin’s weapon of choice, which they frequently employed against American targets.”

“In the post-revolutionary political chaos, however, the Mujahedin lost political power to Iran’s Islamic clergy. They then applied their dedication to armed struggle and the use of propaganda against the new Iranian government, launching a violent and polemical cycle of attack and reprisal.”

U.S. officials have said publicly that the information contained in the report was limited to unclassified material, but that it also drew on classified material in making its determination to add the MEK to the U.S. list of terrorist organizations.

The MEK and its sister organizations have since the beginning been run by Massoud and Maryam Rajavi, a husband-wife team who have maintained tight control despite assassination threats and internal dissent. Massoud Rajavi, 63, founded the MEK, but since the U.S. invasion of Iraq has taken a backseat to his wife.

The State Department report describes the Rajavis as  “fundamentally undemocratic” and “not a viable alternative to the current government of Iran.”

One reason for that is the MEK’s close relationship with Saddam Hussein, as demonstrated by this 1986 video showing the late Iraqi dictator meeting with Massoud Rajavi. Saddam recruited the MEK in much the same way the Israelis allegedly have, using them to fight Iranian forces during the Iran-Iraq War, a role they took on proudly.  So proudly, they invited NBC News to one of their military camps outside Baghdad in 1991.

“The National Liberation Army (MLA), the military wing of the Mujahedin, conducted raids into Iran during the latter years of the 1980-88 Iran-Iraq War,” according to the State Department report. The NLA’s last major offensive reportedly was conducted against Iraqi Kurds in 1991, when it joined Saddam Hussein’s brutal repression of the Kurdish rebellion. In addition to occasional acts of sabotage, the Mujahedin are responsible for violent attacks in Iran that victimize civilians.”

“Internally, the Mujahedin run their organization autocratically, suppressing dissent and eschewing tolerance of differing viewpoints,” it said. “Rajavi, who heads the Mojahedin’s political and military wings, has fostered a cult of personality around himself.”

The U.S. suspicion of the MEK doesn’t end there. Law enforcement officials have told NBC News that in 1994, the MEK made a pact with terrorist Ramzi Yousef a year after he masterminded the first attack on the World Trade Center in New York City.  According to the officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity, Yousef built an 11-pound bomb that MEK agents placed inside one of Shia Islam’s greatest shrines in Mashad, Iran, on June 20, 1994.  At least 26 people, mostly women and children, were killed and 200 wounded in the attack.

That connection between Yousef, nephew of 9-11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammad, and the MEK was first reported in a book, “The New Jackals,” by Simon Reeve. NBC News confirmed that Yousef told U.S. law enforcement that he had worked with the MEK on the bombing.

In recent years, the MEK has said it has renounced violence, but Iranian officials say that is not true, that killings of Iranians continue.  Still, through some deft lobbying, the group has been able to get the United Kingdom and the European Union to remove it from their lists of terrorist groups.

The alleged involvement of the MEK in the assassinations of Iranian nuclear scientists provides the U.S. with a cloak of deniability regarding the clandestine killings. Because the U.S. has designated the MEK as a terrorist organization, neither military nor intelligence units of the U.S. government, can work with them.  “We cannot deal with them, “ said one senior U.S. official. “We would not deal with them because of the designation.”

Iranian officials initially accused the Israelis and MEK of being behind the attacks, but they have since added the CIA to the list. Three days after the Jan. 11, 2012, bombing in Tehran that killed Roshan, the state news agency IRNA reported that Iran’s Foreign Ministry had sent a diplomatic letter to the U.S. claiming to have “evidence and reliable information” that the CIA provided “guidance, support and planning” to assassins directly involved in the attack.

U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton  immediately denied any connection to the killings. “I want to categorically deny any United States involvement in any kind of act of violence inside Iran,” Clinton told reporters on the day of the attack.

But at least two GOP presidential candidates have no problem with the targeting of nuclear scientists.  In a November debate, former House Speaker Newt Gingrich endorsed “taking out their scientists,” and former Pennsylvania Sen. Rick Santorum called it, ”a wonderful thing.”

The MEK’s opposition to the Iranian government also has recently earned it both plaudits and support from an odd mix of political bedfellows.

A group of former Cabinet-level officials have joined together to support the MEK’s removal from the official U.S. Foreign Terrorist Organization list, even taking out a full-page ad last year in the New York Times calling for the removal of the MEK from the U.S. terrorist list.  Former Vermont Gov. Howard Dean, former U.S. Attorney General Michael Mukasey, former U.N. Ambassador John Bolton; former Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge, former FBI Director Louis Freeh and former Rep. Patrick Kennedy were among those whose signatures were on the ad.

“There’s an extraordinary group of bipartisan or even apolitical leaders, military leaders, diplomats, the United States … the United Kingdom, the European Union, even a U.S. District Court in Washington, said that this group that was put on the foreign terrorist organization watch list in 1997 doesn’t deserve to be there,” Ridge said in November on “The Andrea Mitchell Show” on MSNBC TV.

U.S. politicians also have been pushing the U.S. government to protect the 3,400 MEK members and their families at Camp Ashraf in Iraq, about 35 miles north of Baghdad.  With the departure of U.S. troops, the MEK feared that Iraqi forces, with encouragement from Iran, would attack the camp, leading to a bloodbath. At the last minute, however, agreement was brokered with the United Nations that would permit the MEK members’ departure for resettlement in unspecified democratic countries.  As of this week, there’s been little movement on the planned resettlement.

The Iranians see what’s happening as terrorism and hypocrisy by the United States.  They have forwarded documents and other evidence to the United Nations – and directly to the United States, they say.

“I think this is very cynical plan.  This is unacceptable,” said Larijani. “This is a bad trend in the world.  Unprecedented.  We should kill scientists … to block a scientific program?  I mean this is disaster!”

Daniel Byman, a professor in the School of Foreign Service at Georgetown University and also a senior fellow with the Saban Center for Middle East Policy at the Brookings Institution, said that if the accounts of the Israeli-MEK assassinations are accurate, the operation borders on terrorism.

“In theory, states cannot be terrorist, but if they hire locals to do assassinations, that would be state sponsorship,” said Byman, author of the recent book, “A High Price: The Triumphs and Failures of Israeli Counterterrorism.” “You could argue that they took action not to terrorize the public, the purpose of terrorism, but only the nuclear community.  An argument could also be made that degrading the program means that you don’t have to take military action and thus, this is a lower level of violence and that really these are military targets, where normally terrorist targets are civilians.”

But ultimately, Byman said, there is a “spectrum of responsibility” and that Israel is ultimately responsible.

Ronen Bergman, while not speaking on behalf of the Israeli government, suggests that there is a justification, citing an oft-repeated but disputed quote in which Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s said that Israel should be wiped off the face of the earth.

“Meir Degan, the chief of Mossad, when he was in office, hung a photograph behind him, behind the chair of the chief of Mossad,” notes the Israeli commentator.  “And in that photograph you see — an ultra-orthodox Jew — long beard, standing on his knees with his– hands up in the air, and two Gestapo soldiers standing — beside him with guns pointed at him.  One of — one of them is smiling.

“And Degan used to say to his people and the people coming to visit him from CIA, NSA, et cetera, ‘Look at this guy in the picture. This is my grandfather just seconds before he was killed by the SS,’” Bergman said. “’… We are here to prevent this from happening again.’”

9 February 2012

By Richard Engel and Robert Windrem

@ NBC News

Richard Engel is NBC News’ chief foreign correspondent; Robert Windrem is a senior investigative producer.

A lengthy article, “Will Israel Attack Iran,” published in this week’s New York Times confirms that Israel has made advanced preparations for military strikes on Iran. The author—Ronen Bergman, a well-connected political analyst with the Israeli newspaper Yedioth Ahronoth—concluded: “After speaking to many senior Israeli leaders and chiefs of the military and the intelligence, I have come to believe that Israel will indeed strike Iran in 2012.”

Bergman corroborated previous articles in the Israeli press reporting that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Defence Minister Ehud Barak have been pressing for the country’s security cabinet to authorise an attack on Israel. Vice Prime Minister Moshe Ya’alon told Bergman last week: “It is a matter of months before the Iranians will be able to attain military nuclear capability… We are prepared to defend ourselves in any way and anywhere that we see fit.”

Claims that Iran is on the point of constructing a nuclear weapon are not supported by facts. The latest International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) report—a political document designed to justify the latest US and European sanctions against Iran’s oil exports—provided limited evidence of Iranian research related to aspects of building a nuclear bomb. Much of the “evidence” came from US, European and Israeli intelligence sources. Most of the research projects were discontinued after 2003. Iran continues to deny any plans to build nuclear weapons.

Highlighting the bogus character of Israeli claims, veteran journalist Robert Fisk commented in the Independent: “The Israeli President [Peres] warns us that Iran is on the cusp of producing a nuclear weapon… Yet we reporters do not mention that Shimon Peres, as Israeli Prime Minister, said exactly the same thing in 1996… And we do not recall that the current Israeli PM, Benjamin Netanyahu, said in 1992 that Iran would have a nuclear bomb by 1999.”

The prominence given to the New York Times article suggests that Bergman is the conduit for a message from the Israeli establishment to pressure the Obama administration and more broadly the US ruling elites to take more aggressive action against Iran. The US and European Union have effectively imposed an embargo on Iranian oil exports, as well as the country’s central bank, to operate fully from July.

In a barrage of comments, senior Israeli figures this week called for tougher measures. Defence Minister Barack demanded “very strong and quick pressure on Iran,” repeating the lie that Iran was producing “nuclear weapons without hindrance.” Finance Minister Yuval Steinitz questioned whether the US/EU embargo was sufficient and called for “a massive blockade” of Iran by sea and air—itself an act of war under international law. Yesterday, former Israel Defence Force (IDF) chief Gabi Ashkenazi stressed that Israel had to “keep a reliable [military] option on the table with the willingness to use it if necessary.”

In Tuesday’s State of the Union speech, President Barack Obama boasted that his administration had ensured that Iran was “more isolated than ever before” and “faced with crippling sanctions.” He pointedly warned: “Let there be no doubt: America is determined to prevent Iran from getting a nuclear weapon, and I will take no options off the table to achieve that goal.” In other words, the US is prepared to launch war against Iran on the pretext of halting its nuclear programs.

Bergman’s article underlined the close collaboration between the US and Israel, and pointed to the likely timetable for an attack on Iran. Barak told the journalist that “no more than a year remains to stop Iran from obtaining nuclear weaponry.” A senior Israeli security source declared: “The Americans tell us there is time, and we tell them that they only have about six to nine months more than we do, and that therefore the sanctions have to be brought to a culmination now, in order to exhaust that track.”

Bergman explained that the Israeli military, particularly since Barak became defence minister, “has prepared in unprecedented ways for a strike against Iran.” The Israeli Air Force “maintains planes with the long-range capacity required to deliver ordnance to targets in Iran, as well as unmanned aircraft capable of carrying bombs to those targets and remaining airborne for up to 48 hours.” The IDF had also prepared plans to deal with any Iranian retaliation.

The article detailed the criminal covert war of assassination and sabotage waged by the Israeli intelligence agency Mossad inside Iran since 2004. Under Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, Mossad was given “virtually unlimited funds and powers” for a “five-front strategy,” involving “political pressure, covert measures, proliferation, sanctions and regime change.” Mossad chief Meir Dagan sent a secret cable to Washington in August 2007 stressing that “the United States, Israel and like-minded countries must push on all five fronts in a simultaneous joint effort.”

The gangster-like operations of Mossad, acting with the complicity or involvement of the US, included financial sabotage, computer viruses, the sale of faulty parts and raw materials, unexplained plane crashes, explosions at Iranian facilities, and the murder of Iranian scientists, most recently of Massoud Ali Mohammadi on January 11. The article indicated that Mossad had financed, armed and trained two groups—the Muhjahedin Khalq (MEK) and the Sunni extremist outfit Jundallah—to carry out the assassinations.

The barely disguised gloating over these crimes, in Bergman’s article and by Israeli leaders and officials, points to their real purpose—to goad Iran into retaliation that could provide for the further media demonisation of the regime and the pretext for war. This thuggery underlines the fact that the greatest danger of war in the Middle East stems from Israel, which has an estimated arsenal of 300 nuclear weapons and has repeatedly resorted to wars of aggression to maintain its dominance, and its backers in Washington, which has already invaded Afghanistan, then Iraq and is now menacing Iran.

While publicly the Obama administration has focussed on the “crippling sanctions” on Iran, it is also carrying out preparations for military action—a subject openly debated in US newspapers and journals. The Pentagon this month doubled the number of aircraft carrier battle groups near the Persian Gulf and thus its capacity to wage an air and sea war against Iran.

Washington’s allies in Europe are getting ready for war as well. French and British warships accompanied the aircraft carrier, the USS Abraham Lincoln, into the Gulf last Sunday. British Defence Secretary Philip Hammond declared on Monday: “The UK has a contingent capability to reinforce its presence in the region should at any time it be considered necessary to do so.”

By recklessly escalating the economic embargo and military threats against Iran, the US, Israel and the European powers are heightening the danger of a slide into war that has the potential to engulf the region and to spread internationally

By Peter Symonds

27 January 2012

@ WSWS.org