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Iran’s President Mahmoud AhmadinejadThe rise of the Arab masses has pushed Iran out of the headlines — for now. Even Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, whose theatrics rarely pass unnoticed, has lately failed to grab the attention of the U.S. media. America’s attention has instead turned toward Egypt, Syria and Libya.

This is likely to change in the next few months. Not as a result of any particular developments in Iran or between the United States and Iran, but because of the 2012 presidential elections. As the Republican presidential hopefuls turn their criticism toward President Obama and not each other, Iran will likely be one of the few foreign policy issues the Republicans will pursue.

Though their campaigns will center on the economy, there are four factors that will drive the GOP to make Iran one of its main foreign policy issues.

First, Iran unites all factions of the Republican Party (save the Ron Paul contingent) at a time when all other major foreign policy issues tend to divide them. For instance, the Republicans have been all over the map on the most important foreign policy development of the year: the Arab Spring.

Former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee criticized Obama for not standing by Egyptian dictator Hosni Mubarak, for instance, while others argued that Obama had been too slow in supporting the demonstrators. The Republican fault lines were even clearer on Obama’s intervention in Libya.

On Iran, however, there is unity. The Republican remedy is simply to up the ante and get tougher — no matter what. Whatever hawkish line Obama adopts, the Republicans will find a way to “outhawk” him. As the memory of the Iraq invasion slowly fades away, Republican strategists calculate, the American public will return to rewarding toughness over wisdom at the ballot boxes.

Second, just as Iran unites the Republicans, it divides the Democrats. As I describe in my forthcoming book on Obama’s Iran diplomacy, “A Single Roll of the Dice,” part of the reason Obama’s engagement with Iran was so short-lived (beyond all the challenges the Iranians themselves presented) was the pressure he faced early on from the Democrat-controlled Congress to abandon diplomacy and pursue sanctions.

Much of it had to do with Congress’ sensitivity to Israeli concerns. And much of it was a reaction to the Iranian government’s brutal human rights abuses following the 2009 election debacle. As a top Obama administration official explained to me, “skepticism in Congress against our strategy turned to outright hostility” after the 2009 elections. Congress’ honeymoon with Obama had not even begun before Democrats abandoned him on Iran.

Third, the Republicans believe that Iran provides an opportunity to portray Obama as weak. Glossing over the many differences between Iran, on the one hand, and Egypt, Tunisia, Syria and Libya on the other, the Republicans will accuse Obama of abandoning the Iranian people by not taking sides in the 2009 election dispute. But with the developments in the Arab world — and Obama’s more interventionist response to those conflicts — the Republicans will argue (mistakenly) that a similar posture by the U.S. in 2009 would have ensured the downfall of the Iranian theocracy.

Moreover, with Iran’s nuclear program progressing in spite of Obama’s limited diplomacy and his crippling, indiscriminate sanctions, the Republicans will present a narrative that states that diplomacy was tried and failed, sanctions are tough but insufficient, and the only remaining option is some form of military action. Yet, Obama has been too weak to pursue that option. According to this (false) narrative, the president’s weakness jeopardizes not only American interests, but also the security of Israel. This narrative, it must be noted, is not so much to provoke military action but to portray Obama as too weak to order it.

Which brings us to the fourth factor, which permeates all the others: Israel. Beyond dividing the Democrats and portraying Obama as weak, focusing on Iran also enables the Republicans to cast Obama as insensitive to Israel. From the very outset, Israel opposed Obama’s diplomacy with Iran.

“We live in a neighborhood in which sometimes dialogue … is liable to be interpreted as weakness,” then-Israeli foreign minister Tzipi Livni said during an interview with Israel Radio only 24 hours after congratulating President-elect Obama on his historic election victory in 2008. Asked specifically if she supported discussions between the United States and Iran, she left no room for interpretation: “The answer is no,” she declared.

Once Obama took office, Israel consistently pushed back against his engagement policy by calling for artificial deadlines for diplomacy, by pushing for sanctions before talks had begun and by setting unreachable objectives for the diplomacy.

Though Obama eventually adopted the line on Iran favored by Israel, his many clashes with the Netanyahu government over this issue cast a dark shadow over U.S.-Israeli relations that likely will not be undone in time for the elections. And the Republicans are poised to exploit it. Just this week, Texas Gov. Rick Perry took a jab at Obama in an Op-Ed in the Jerusalem Post. “It was a mistake [by] President Obama to distance himself from Israel and seek engagement with the hostile regimes in Syria and Iran,” Perry wrote.

Most likely, Obama will take the bait. Instead of defending his diplomacy and pointing out that no U.S. president has been closer to resolving the nuclear issue than he has, he will likely adopt the line that his limited diplomatic effort paved the way for far greater international buy-in for crippling sanctions than George W. Bush ever managed to secure.

Though this line of argument is technically correct — Obama’s attempt at diplomacy helped unite the permanent members of the Security Council against Iran and prevented Tehran from taking advantage of divisions within the council -– it suffers from several weaknesses.

First, sanctions have hurt the Iranian economy and likely slowed the growth of its nuclear program, but it has not changed Tehran’s strategic calculations or shifted the trajectory of the program. In short, the nuclear clock has kept ticking. This plays straight into the Republican narrative that neither Obama’s diplomacy nor his sanctions have succeeded. With a few more alarmist reports by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), the White House’s spin on having contained Iran will fall apart.

Second, by seeking to play up the hawkish aspects of his Iran policy, the Obama administration line permits the Republicans to set the metrics for success. However hawkish and pro-Israel the White House portrays its policy, there will always be a Republican willing to up the ante even further. If Obama permits hawkishness to be the criteria for success in the Iran debate, then he will set himself up for failure — even if he is technically right.

Democrats have failed in this game before. In the 1990s, Republicans in Congress dismissed the sanctions on Saddam Hussein’s Iraq and forced President Bill Clinton to adopt additional measures, including making “regime change” official U.S. policy and providing funding for the now-disgraced Iraqi “opposition” groups through the Iraq Liberation Act of 1998. Clinton’s attempts to push back against this pressure by out-hawking the Republicans only helped create a false binary choice between accepting a nuclear Saddam and taking military action. The parallels with developments with Iran today are plenty.

In spite of the Republicans’ recent gains, the candidate that stands the greatest chance of defeating Obama 2012 is Obama ’08. Instead of running away from his record and betraying the foreign policy values he promised to bring to the White House in 2008, Obama should restate the case for diplomacy and point out its benefits and virtues, including the superiority of diplomacy in addressing Iran’s flagrant human rights violations. And point to Iraq to remind the American public of the unacceptability of failure when it comes to diplomacy.

As Israel’s Deputy Foreign Minister Danny Ayalon told me recently in a sharp reminder of what the end game of the hawks is: “If diplomacy fails and the economic sanctions fail, [then] everybody understands that all options are on the table.”

By Trita Parsi

18 September 2011

@ Salon News

Trita Parsi is the 2010 Recipient of the Grawemeyer Award for Ideas Improving World Order. He is the author of the forthcoming book, “A Single Role of the Dice — Obama’s Diplomacy with Iran” (Yale University Press 2012). More: Trita Parsi

 

Environmental rights groups say internationally backed carbon capture schemes distract from real climate justice needs.

The earth swirls into rising dust as the parched lands of northeast Kenya crack beneath Hassan’s feet. The goat herder makes his way to a nearby water pump, paying a few shillings so his remaining livestock can get a drink of fresh water.

Hassan used to have 130 goats before the drought. Recently, he told Mercy Corps – an aid agency working to provide assistance to drought victims in Kenya – that only 30 goats have survived.

Life in Arbajahan in Kenya’s Wajir County wasn’t always like this, Hassan said.

Wajir once had large stretches of green and fertile land, there was regular rainfall, and people owned herds of healthy livestock. Before the drought, Hassan had enough to provide for two wives, 11 children, and a large herd of goats.

“It is very tough to look after them all [the family] and get by because of the drought. I feel bad that I could not do anything to keep my animals alive. They were the only way to provide for my people,” Hassan said.

Across East Africa, drought and famine, increasingly worsened by the harsh effects of climate change, have displaced thousands from their homes and lands.

While some aid is now available, world bodies like the UN Food and Agricultural Organisation (FAO) acknowledge that measures have remained largely reactive – even though the crisis did not come as a full surprise.

The FAO has called for investment in rural development, and the reconstruction of sustainable livelihoods, to prevent other similar disasters from occurring.

As part of land based efforts to tackle climate change, promote food security, and help people like Hassan, the FAO and other bodies like the World Bank have rallied behind processes like soil carbon capture.

Soil carbon capture

Carbon dioxide and other green house gases entering the atmosphere are the key culprits exacerbating the change in global temperatures.

With soil carbon sequestration (or capture), excess carbon dioxide is re-invested into the soil in organic form, to counteract the harmful emissions that enter the atmosphere via fossil fuels and other carbon-heavy processes.

The offsets that come from soil carbon capture schemes have been marketed by world bodies as a means to rechannel money back into climate-friendly agriculture.

However, environmental rights groups say the work of offsetting these emissions – and trading credits associated with the process on carbon markets – is where the big business lies.

“Instead of meeting obligations and reducing emissions in their own countries, instead of changing their

lifestyles, [developed countries] are finding it cheaper and easier to put the burden onto poor countries and poor people,” said Harjeet Singh, international climate justice co-ordinator at the non-profit organisation ActionAid.

Through the UN’s Clean Development Mechanism (CDM), industries in developed countries can “offset” the effects of their own hazardous emissions by paying to implement projects in developing countries.

This has included other carbon capture schemes – such as tree-planting or reforestation projects. Soil carbon capture is not currently part of the CDM, and soil carbon credits are only sold on the voluntary carbon market.

Bodies like the World Bank are trying to get soil carbon capture recognised under CDM and the credits traded on the compliance market.

“The World Bank and its allies want it to be included in CDM so that they have a bigger market,” Singh said.

The World Bank touts soil carbon capture as a “triple win” solution for developing countries, saying that the improved agricultural practice it fosters will have the potential to sequester about 60,000 tons of carbon dioxide equivalents per year.

Through improved agricultural processes, it sees soil carbon capture as a means to increase food security for African farmers. It also sees the process as a way of mitigating global warming, by offsetting green house gases; and as a way for African farmers to adapt to climate change, through the investment in climate-friendly agriculture.

Environmental rights groups, however, call it a “triple injustice” for African farmers.

“Soil carbon markets leave poor farmers vulnerable to land grabs, dependent on unpredictable funding from markets, and forced to shoulder the mitigation burden of a climate crisis they did not cause,” Singh said.

Shouldering the burden

A climate change specialist who works closely with African governments, providing advice on sustainability issue, thinks the carbon market is “a mechanism by which the rich countries reduce emissions in developing countries and earn credits for it”.

 

“It is not really funding for developing countries to reduce their emissions; it is funding for developed countries to transfer the burden of their own emissions elsewhere,” he said, speaking on condition of anonymity for fear of professional reprisal.

The specialist said that although there is agreement that emissions have to be offset on a global level, the question is who reduces them.

“Is it the poor Ethiopian farmer who lives off the land, or the American with the Hummer who lives on 20 gigatons of emissions a year?” he asked.

“A trivial amount of money goes to farmers involved in the process,” the specialist added. “It is cents really.”

Rights groups have questioned who really reaps the benefit for reducing carbon emissions, when the carbon credits are sold on international carbon markets, a far way away from the farmers who do the actual work offsetting them.

“Most of the money stays in the global North, even though projects themselves are in the South,” said the environmental rights group, the Gaia Foundation, in a statement earlier this year.

“Those that benefit most from carbon trading are financial speculators such as JP Morgan, Goldman Sachs and Merryl Lynch, who buy and sell carbon credits like they do any other internationally tradable commodity.”

“These projects are unlikely to deliver any benefits to the communities … They will certainly not benefit the climate. But they will be hugely profitable to financial speculators,” the Gaia Foundation said.

Doreen Stabinsky, a professor of global and environmental politics at College of the Atlantic in the US who consults with international environmental groups, agreed that the amount of money each farmer would make off the scheme is negligible.

“Four dollars a ton is what the World Bank says they will pay farmers per year,” Stabinsky said. Others have estimated that this amount may actually be more like $1 per ton once other costs are factored in.

“The average farmers own 0.6 hectares, and an average estimate is that each farmer will yield half a ton of carbon per hectare per year, so that is not a lot of money,” said Stabinsky.

“And after the World Bank pays farmers those dollars, it can then trade it on the secondary market for a higher amount. [The carbon credits are] theirs; they can do whatever they want with it.”

‘Icing on the cake’

The World Bank says environmental groups are approaching the issue from the wrong perspective.

 

“Carbon markets and credits are the wrong framing of this,” said Patrick Verkooijen, head of agriculture and climate change at the World Bank.

“The farmers themselves consider this as icing on the cake. The reason they do this is to increase productivity in the soil. Carbon sequestration is for them an add-on. So a few dollars a ton is indeed modest, but nevertheless, it generates additional income.

“With this triple win, they are not just focusing on one thing,” Verkooijen said.

“The long-term implications for smallholder farmers remain to be seen,” he admitted. “But the empirical data that has been gained is that the revenue goes straight to these farmers.”

Although there are, as yet, no formal soil carbon sequestration projects implemented in Africa, the World Bank has initiated the Kenya Agricultural Carbon Project, a pilot project in Kisumu in western Kenya, on 45,000 hectares of land and involving 60,000 farmers.

The Kenyan environmental ministry, however, was unavailable to comment when asked about the project.

Agriculture contributes more than 27 per cent to Kenya’s GDP, the World Bank stated. Almost 70 per cent of that agriculture is provided by smallholder farmers, said rights group the African Biodiversity Network (ABN).

Anne Maina, who works with the ABN on issues of climate change and advocacy among smallholder farmers in Kenya, said most farmers there do not understand the issues.

“They come into it thinking they are going to benefit from the carbon credits. But I can’t say I know of one community that has benefited from the credits. It’s the brokers who benefit.

“I see it as immoral that the consultants who don’t do the work get the majority of the money. We need to avoid a situation where a consultant earns $1 million a year and farmers earn just a dollar.”

Maina said governments and world bodies need to support processes to improve agriculture and sustainable development, especially given the drought in the region. By linking to projects that involve carbon markets and credits, “the real issues are not being addressed,” she said.

Land grabs

Soil carbon capture schemes require massive initial investment, because of the technical aspects involved in capturing and measuring carbon in the soil, the Gaia Foundation reported.

“Vast public funds” will actually be used to develop these projects, diverting money away from the actual agricultural needs of subsistence farmers, the group added.

ActionAid’s Singh said that instead of more money going to rural farmers, soil carbon capture “will in fact reduce the amount of public money going into agriculture in general and it is unlikely you will get adaptation money for these farmers”.

ActionAid believes such schemes will also increase the likelihood of land grabs in African countries.

Stabinsky said: “African governments see money; and the picture that the World Bank is painting is a very worthy one. The more land you have, the more soil carbon you can sell. And there is so much land tenure based on customary tenure in Africa; lots of people don’t have private title of their land.

“So if you really can create the need for a verifiable commodity [in carbon], there may be a reason for governments to go in and claim that land. And the government can do it if they want,” she said.

Soil carbon capture schemes also require farmers to sign deals allowing developers to lease their lands for many years, even decades. As part of these agreements, farmers would also be confined to using specific agricultural practices on their lands.

These so-called agro-ecological or “climate smart” farming practices – which include things like non-tilling of the soil, to ensure minimal disturbance of the captured carbon – are central to achieving the “triple win” solutions of climate change adaptation, mitigation and food security, the World Bank said.

However, Stabinsky said: “If you are a farmer dealing with the varies of climate change, you may have to do something different on the soil the next year. The flexibility needed by a small farmer living on the edge may not be the same as what the World Bank needs to be done.”

The climate change specialist who advises African governments said that even though implementing agro-ecological processes has benefits, “you don’t need a carbon market to do that; these are processes that we should be promoting anyway”.

Environmental rights groups say market-led approaches to agriculture and climate change mitigation in Africa only create climate refugees, but do not address the core problems.

Instead of investing in carbon markets and offset schemes that pass the burden to the developing world, farmers and rights groups say that what is needed is public finance based on debt and historical responsibility.

The situation in the Horn of Africa will only increase in frequency and intensity, the climate change specialist said. “African governments should listen first to their farmers, and what we are hearing at least from East African farmers is they are concerned.”

Singh said: “African governments and bodies like the World Bank think that soil carbon capture will be a silver bullet. But when African governments realise it won’t work, they will lose five more years and billions of dollars into setting up these carbon markets, before they can do anything.”

For people in East Africa – like Hassan in Wajir Country – who are losing their homes, livelihoods, cattle, and lands fleeing the harsh effects of drought and climate change, waiting five years for a policy turnaround is five years too long.

*Reporting and information from Wajir, Kenya, provided by Erin Gray/Mercy Corps

By Sumayya Ismail

17 September 2011

@ Al Jazeera

The Arab Spring Will Lead To The Disappearance Of Despotism And Zionism From The Middle East

While the Middle East changing towards the values of democracy and human rights, nothing indicates that Israel is moving towards change. Those people won’t change because the whole Zionist culture is based on war said an Arab writer. This might be the explanation of the inability of the Israeli right wing to see the changes in the region, which makes the opposition leader Tsivi Livni warns that this road leads Israel to self destruction.

Indeed while the question of human rights has become the central issue in the Arab spring, the policy of theft and land grab continues to be the main characteristic of the Israeli policy. And there is no single indication which shows that Israel is ready to change this course.

The late episode of the killing of 6 Egyptian soldiers by Israel and the rejection of Israel to apologies is yet another evidence that Israel is unable to know that Arabs are changing .Israel apparently see that this apology reflects weakness of the state of Israel which suffered lately a heavy loss after the expulsion of its ambassador from turkey as a respond to the Marmara massacre where 9 Turks were killed by Israeli soldiers. And instead of trying to deal diplomatically with it. Israel declares that it will arm the PKK which is the outlaw Kurdish movement in turkey in a defiant step which most Middle East observers think it will worsen even more the Turkish Israeli relation.

In the view of several Egyptian observers the Egyptian popular march towards the Israeli embassy in Cairo was expected from the Egyptian people who felt humiliated and insulted by Israel. “Israel needs to know it is Egypt the Revolution which it deals with now and not Egypt Mubarak” said Wahid abd al majid from al ahram research centre.

It is worthy to remember that the state of Israel was planted by the European colonized powers in the Palestine in a period when most Arab countries were occupied and ruled by dictatorships after the independence. This might explain why Israel succeed end to defeat Arab countries which consolidate the myth in Israel that the small state of Israel defeat all Arabs and that one Jew worthy than one million Arabs etc of the Zionist propaganda of that time. But it is obvious that this myth also belongs to the past which is about to end.

The Egyptian popular march to the Israeli embassy provides solid evidence that Israel will have serious problems with the Arabs masses in the future. And the time of buying an Arab president and making a “peace treaty” with, belongs also to the same past which Israeli belongs to.

On light of these developments two major phenomenons are fading in the Middle East, the first is Arab despotic regimes, the second is Zionism. Both phenomenon are based on theft, oppression and power abuse. And thus both phenomenon are interdependent and the fall of one will necessarily lead to the fall of the other. This does not mean that this will happen tomorrow but the courses of these historical events indicate beyond doubt towards the disappearance of these two phenomenon.

By Salim Nazzal

13 September, 2011

@ Countercurrents.org

The writer is a Palestinian-Norwegian historian in the Middle East, who has written extensively on social and political issues in the region. His writing has been published in various publications and translated into more than 13 languages

 

 

 

 

 

 

The United States is watching the violence in Syria “with horror”, said White House Press Secretary, Jay Carney recently. The “horror”, of course, is the result of ongoing U.S. interference in Syria’s internal affairs aimed at destabilising Syria.

The U.S.-sponsored armed insurrection in Syria is a carbon copy of the U.S.-sponsored armed insurrection in Libya. It is designed to remove a nationalist government and replaced it with a puppet regime subservient to U.S.-Israel dictates, willing to serve U.S.-Israel Zionist interests. The imposition of sanctions by the U.S. and the European Union (EU) against Syria is part of a concerted propaganda campaign to demonise President Bashar al-Assad and his government.

Like Libya, Syria is not a U.S.-controlled client state and therefore Syria is subjected to U.S.-Western destabilisation policy. The Syrian Government is a nationalist government led by the Arab Socialist Ba’ath Party. Syria remains one of only a few independent Arab nations that have no “peace” treaty with, and have refused to recognise, the fascist state of Israel.

While the Syrian Government has somehow succumbed to U.S.-Western threats in recent time, for decades, the Syrian Government has supported legitimate Palestinian causes and stood against U.S.-Israel Zionist expansion in Palestine and in Lebanon. Syria is a frontline country (bordering Israel) that lies strategically between Iraq and Israel, making it a prime candidate for U.S.-Israel destabilisation policy. A “regime change” in Syria will see the U.S. and Israel in total control of the Middle East through a network of despotic and weak rulers. Palestinians will lose their only support and Iran’s relation in the region will be curtailed.

It is time for al-Assad to “get out of the way”, said U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, in flagrant violation of Syria sovereignty. Her message is aimed at the pro-U.S. despotic regimes, including Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Qatar, Bahrain and Kuwait, to toe the U.S. line of isolating Syria. As always, the Saudis led the pack and recalled their ambassador in Damascus and allowed leaders of the insurrection access to their media outlets.

On September 2nd, Hillary Clinton urged other governments (U.S. allies) to impose more sanctions against Syria to force President al-Assad to leave power. “The violence must stop, and [President al-Assad] needs to step aside”.

“Just as we have done in Libya, we are also encouraging the Syrian opposition to set forth their own roadmap for a tolerant, inclusive, and democratic path forward, one that can bring together all Syrians, Christians, and [Muslims]“. You wonder how American politicians get away with this kind of hypocrisy.

“U.S. imperialism and all the old regimes tied to it in the region are trying desperately to manage and contain the unfolding mass upheaval into channels that do not threaten imperialist domination of the region”, writes Sara Flounders of International Action Centre .

With the mainstream capitalist media in full swing distorting facts on the ground and demonising the Syrian Government, the prelude to war on Syria has already begun. In fact, none of the war crimes against Libya by U.S.-NATO army would have been possible without the one that preceded them; “crimes against peace”, fabricated and disseminated by propaganda organs like the BBC, Al-Jazeera, CNN and racist journalists and propagandists.

Libya as a Template

The pretext of “humanitarian” intervention with deadly bombs and missiles to “protect civilians” and justify U.S.-NATO military aggression against Libya has been exposed as an ugly lie. [1]. Thousands of innocent Libyan civilians were murdered by U.S.-NATO aerial bombings, missiles and U.S.-NATO-backed armed gangs.

Only fools buy into Western propaganda of “concern” for the human rights of dark-skinned people in Libya and elsewhere. If that were the motivation, American politicians and their Western allies would be at war with themselves for what they are doing to innocent civilians in Afghanistan, Iraq and Palestine. They are guilty of war crimes and should be put on trial. Moreover, where was U.S.-NATO army in 2009 when Israeli criminals killed more than 1,400 defenceless Palestinians, most of them women and children in the besieged Gaza Camp? They armed Israel to commit crimes.

Both, the U.S-NATO military aggression against Libya and the ongoing interference in Syrian affairs is part of an established propaganda campaign to manipulate the public and more importantly provides a diversion away from the deepening economic and social crises in the U.S. and Europe.

As we all know, in March 2011 the U.S. and its allies imposed sanctions against Libya, depriving Libyans of adequate supplies of food, water and medicines. Immediately after, the U.S.-NATO army began a campaign of terrorising the Libyan population using massive air power. In addition, U.S.-NATO military leaders continue to guide and provide air cover to the armed gangs (“rebels”) to create chaos and mayhem across Libya.

Curtis Doebbler, a renowned international human rights lawyer explains: “This was accomplished by the spurious actions of UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon, who issued special passes to the former Libyan diplomats after their government had withdrawn their credentials. Bypassing the UN General Assembly’s Credentials Committee and well-established protocol, the UN secretary-general for the first time in the world body’s history personally favoured one side in what was by now a civil war.

“The secretary-general apparently in pocket, the Libyan government’s voice silenced, the UN could move to vote on a series of resolutions that would finally result in the authorisation of the West to use force against Libya.”[2].

The ‘United” Nations (UN), the “International Criminal Court” (ICC) and the mainstream media, including the outrageous Al-Jazeera , DemocracyNow and several Internet propaganda organs such as ZNet Communication and the fascist Juan Cole’s “Informed Comment” did their best to justify U.S.-NATO military aggression and cover-up the most barbaric crimes, even by Nazis’ standards, against an entirely defenceless small nation of six million people. A peaceful and tolerant nation with the highest score on the UN’s Human Development Index (HDI) of all African countries has been deliberately destroyed in a barbaric fashion. The mainstream media and war propagandists are guilty of war crimes.

In an extremely rare departure from its usual anti-Arabs and pro-U.S. propaganda, the Guardian of London comments:

“If stopping the killing had been the real aim, NATO states would have backed a ceasefire and a negotiated settlement, rather than repeatedly vetoing both. Instead, after having lost serious strategic ground in the Arab revolutions, the Libyan war offered the US, Britain and France a chance to put themselves at the heart of the process while bringing to heel an unreliable state with the largest oil reserves in Africa”. (Seamus Milne, the Guardian , 24 August 2011).

Colonel Muammar al-Qadhafi was willing to negotiate a peaceful solution, but after more than four decades of dealing with al-Qadhafi, U.S.-NATO leaders rejected any peaceful negotiation. The control of Libya was the goal and peace did not meet that goal.

The overwhelming majority of the Libyan population are against the violence unleashed by the armed gangs and NATO bombings which is the only thing that sustains the gangs’ violence. U.S.-NATO bombings of Libya “are in derogation of international law, actions that are criminal in terms of their consequences: the killings of children, the killing of people in their own homes, and this has been well documented”, said Michel Chossudovsky of Global Research in Montréal. Colonel al-Qadhafi enjoys 70 per cent of popular support across Libya.

In Libya, unlike in Tunisia, Egypt and Bahrain, there are no popular peaceful uprisings; it is a Western-backed armed insurrection. The so-called Transitional National Council (TNC), the Western-backed “Libyan rebels”, is a collection of expatriate criminals, C.I.A. operatives (“al-Qaeda”), xenophobic and racist hoodlums, and religious extremists. They are not peaceful ordinary Libyans struggling for democracy and human rights. They are U.S.-NATO ground forces.

According to the Guardian (25 August 2011):

“British and French special forces along with special forces from Qatar and some eastern European states are on the ground in eastern Libya, calling in air strikes and helping co-ordinate [armed gang] units as they prepare to assault Sirte, the last coastal town still in the hands of pro-Muammar Gaddafi forces”.

The armed gangs were financed, trained and armed by the U.S. and U.S. allies. Once they succeed, the U.S. will use the gangs as a façade of “democratic” government to control the country. There is hard evidence of mass killings of non-combatants, detainees and the wounded by the U.S.-NATO backed armed gangs.

For six months Libya was subjected to a barbaric U.S.-NATO military siege. U.S.-NATO aggression has been responsible for war crimes and crimes against humanity. According to NATO’s own record, over 21,000 air missions have been flown over Libya, including 8,000 combat sorties by U.S.-NATO warplanes destroying hospital, schools, homes, water supply and communication. Thousands of innocent civilians have been killed. The country’s civilian’s infrastructure, including hospitals, schools, water supply plants and roads have been destroyed and ruined. On 09 August 2011, a criminal attack by the U.S.-NATO army killed 85 innocent Libyan civilians, including 33 children, 32 women and 20 men.

As the attacks on the Libyan capital Tripoli – with a population of 2 million – approached, the number of U.S. air attacks on Libyan air defences, ground forces and other targets has nearly doubled during the 12 days up to August 20, compared with air attacks in the first 132 days. Eric Schmitt and Steven Lee Myers of the New York Times observed:

“Through Saturday [20 August 2011], NATO and its allies had flown 7,459 strike missions, or sorties, attacking thousands of targets, from individual rocket launchers to major military headquarters. The cumulative effect not only destroyed Libya’s military infrastructure but also greatly diminished the ability of Colonel Qaddafi’s commanders to control forces, leaving even committed fighting units unable to move, resupply or coordinate operations”. ( NYT , 21 August 2011). Indeed, it was the heaviest bombardment to date. Once the way was cleared, the armed gangs stormed the Capital, inflicting mass atrocities against the civilian population.

A Libyan eyewitness told Kim Sengupta of the Independent (24 June 2011): “The [armed gangs] are saying they are fighting government troops here, but all those getting hurt are ordinary people, the only buildings being damaged are those of local people. There has also been looting by the rebels, they have gone into houses to search for people and taken away things. Why are they doing this?” In another piece in the Independent (27 June 2011), Sengupta exposes another criminal character of the Western-backed armed gangs. She writes, “the mounting number of deaths of men from sub-Saharan Africa at the hands of the rebels, lynchings in many cases, raises disturbing questions about the opposition administration, the Transitional National Council (TNC) taking over as Libya’s government, and about Western backing for it”.

The U.S. and its allies will back any group of criminals as long as they serve their imperialist interests. It is important to remember that the so-called “Independent” is one of the most anti-Arab propaganda mouthpieces of all the racist British newspapers. As the Independent on Sunday editorial reveals:  “This newspaper supported NATO military intervention, and Britain’s part in it, when it began in March, but it was a choice between hard and complex options – and so it remains”. ( Independent on Sunday , 28 August 2011).

The aggression against Libya was in flagrant violation of international law and UN Security Council Resolutions, including Resolutions 1973 adopted in March to “use all means necessary to protect Libyan civilians”. There was no legal mandate to attack Libya and start a war. The sovereign Government of Libya committed no crimes.

It is clear that the aim of U.S.-NATO powers is to divide Libyans in order to seize control of Libya’s financial assets and oil reserves and strengthening imperialism’s grip on Libya and set the stage of the re-colonisation of Africa. It is a broad daylight robbery.

“In 1950, Libyans saw their country deliberately divided by Britain and France, and [the] seeds of division planted among them”, writes the renowned Canadian Middle East scholar, Henri Pierre Habib. After more than four decades of “independence”, the old seeds of division have germinated.

Meanwhile, U.S. politicians are blessed by what they are doing in Libya (violent aggression) and see it as a template to implement around the world.  “It is a good indication of the kind of partnership and alliances that we need to have for the future if we are going to deal with the threats that we confront in today’s world,” said U.S. Defence Secretary, Leon E. Panetta. In other words, the aggression against Libya will be used as a template to commit future aggression against other nations, such as Syria.

 

 

Syria Could be Next

The destabilisation campaign against Syria has been in the making for several years. The  Syria Accountability and Lebanese Sovereignty Restoration Act of 2003 was part of campaign to destabilize Syria and demonize President al-Assad. In 2005, the U.S. and its allies accused the Syrian Government of the assassination of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri. As revealed by Kurt Nimmo: “[i]n late 2005, Richard Perle, at the time described as the Prince of Darkness, attended a meeting at the home of Farid Ghadry, the head of the Syrian Reform Party. Ghadry had met with Dick Cheney to strategize about regime change in Syria. He told the Wall Street Journal that Perle’s pal Ahmad Chalabi ‘paved the way in Iraq for what we want to do in Syria’”. The aim is to topple the current Syrian Government and replace it with a pro-U.S. and pro-Israel dictatorship. [3].

The campaign intensified in early February 2011 and during the popular uprisings in Tunisia and Egypt. In all cases, the U.S. and its allies very quickly intervened to shape and control the uprisings for their own imperialist interests. Democracy and human rights are irrelevant to Western imperialist powers. In fact, they despise anything to do with democracy and human rights. The U.S. arms and supports a number of brutal dictatorial regimes throughout the world with a criminal record on human rights.

From the outset, the Syrian rebellion was a U.S.-sponsored armed uprising against the Syrian Government. You wonder why the French and American ambassadors to Syrian travelled to the City of Hama to show solidarity with the armed-insurrection while for decades their own governments have refused to show the slightest solidarity with the Palestinians under Israeli fascist repression.

According to Lebanese newspapers, shipments of high quality arms to the “rebels” (armed gangs) through Jordan and northern Lebanon have been intercepted by Lebanese army intelligence. According to Army investigators, ties between the smugglers and Lebanese political parties allied with Saudi Arabia and the U.S. have been uncovered. The revelations provide evidence that the insurrection is a U.S.-backed insurrection aimed at toppling the government of Syria.

Furthermore, the Washington Post reported (18 April 2011) that, the U.S. (through its allies in the region) is secretly financing and arming the opposition to topple President al-Assad. “The U.S. money for Syrian opposition groups, including a satellite TV channel to disseminate false propaganda, began flowing under President George W. Bush and has continued under President Obama, even as his administration sought to build relations with President al- Assad”. Hence, the U.S.-sponsored armed resurrection has been in the making for some time, just waiting for the right moment.

According to Israel’s Intelligence news DEBKA (15 August 2011): “Large caches of weapons including anti-tank and anti-aircraft missiles, mortar bombs and heavy machine guns will be sent via ground to criminal gangs in major Syrian cities witnessing unrest. On Saturday 03 September 2011, armed gangs killed six Syrian soldiers and three civilians in an ambush in central Syria. A further 17 people were wounded as gunmen ambushed the bus near Hama ( BBC News , 03 September 2011).

Furthermore, Al-Akhbar reported that Lebanese Army investigators have uncovered a connection between the smugglers of weapons to the Syrian opposition and the 14 March alliance of former Lebanese Prime Minister Saad Hariri, who is backed by the United States, Israel and Saudi Arabia. “The central idea was to foment unrest in a well circumscribed area and to proclaim the establishment of an Islamic emirate that would serve as a platform for the dismemberment of the country”, writes Thierry Meyssan, French intellectual and founder of Voltaire Network .

The so-called opposition groups and the media were financed by NGOs and the C.I.A. through USAID, the National Endowment for Democracy (NED), and Freedom House. NED and NGOs are now used by the CIA as the preferred way to overthrow legitimate governments. Meanwhile, the majority of Syrians from all political persuasions oppose any outside interference, including foreign military intervention, and President al-Assad remains popular. According to a CNN Arabic poll, conducted in 2009, President al-Assad is one of the most popular leaders in the Arab world.

As in Libya, the truth has been turned on its head in Syria. The mainstream media distorted events on the ground in Syria to propagate a U.S.-sponsored armed-insurrection as a “popular uprising” that needs “humanitarian intervention” with deadly bombs and missiles.  The media continue to fabricate endless news of endorsing new war of aggression against Syria and downplaying the violence against the government while amplifying the size of the anti-government protests and sensationalizing the death of protesters. Moreover, President al-Assad’s commitment to reforms through a National Dialogue has no space in the mainstream capitalist media.

As Pierre Piccinin observes:

“This portrayal of Syria in full scale revolution and of a Baath Party on the brink do not correspond in any way whatsoever to the reality of the situation; that the government holds control and what is left of the protests have in effect splintered and become considerably marginalised”.

Indeed, the security situation right now is much better and the Government of President al-Assad is on a solid ground. As mentioned earlier, the propaganda campaign was designed as a prelude to war.

Finally, like all countries, Syria may be not perfect, but it is up to the Syrian people to decide what kind of reforms they need without foreign interference in their nation’s affairs. Outside pressure on the U.S. government and its allies has to be mobilised to try and prevent Syria becoming a target for another U.S.-NATO military aggression.

Footnotes

[1] Maximilian Forte, The Top ten Myths on the War against Libya, CounterPunch , 31 August 2011.

[2] Curtis Doebbler, Libya: Who wins? Al-Ahram Weekly , 2011, 1042.

[3] Kurt Nimmo, Cables Reveal State Department, CIA, NGOs Fomented Syrian Unrest , Infowars.com , 18 April 2011.

By Ghali Hassan

7 September 2011

Countercurrents.org

Ghali Hassan is an independent political analyst living in Australia.

The UN Palmer Report, which largely exonerated Israel for murdering nine unarmed Turkish civilians in international waters on May 31, 2010, seemed in some ways like the last straw. Prior to its publication, the camel’s back had already mostly broken, and a collapse in Turkish-Israeli ties was looming.

Turkey’s sin was seeking an apology for the killing of its citizens – on their way to deliver essential, life-saving supplies to malnourished and besieged Palestinians in Gaza – at the hand of Israeli army commandos.

If the civilians had been Israelis, and the commandos part of a Turkish force, all hell would have broken loose. Israel and the US would have declared Turkey a pariah state. Turkey, however, merely demanded an apology, and it was affronted further for doing so.

Of course, this is not the first time that Israel deliberately provoked and tested Turkish patience. Israel has attempted to infiltrate Turkey’s own political spaces by supporting its regional opponents and arming various rebel groups with the aim of destabilizing Turkey.

Instead of acknowledging the country’s rising significance and accommodating to the rules of the ‘new Middle East’ political game, Israel resorted to intimidation and insults. It repeatedly placed Turkey – a thriving democracy and a proud regional power of 80 million – in a very sensitive standing.

However, the anti-Turkish attitude in Israel was not an outcome of the Mavi Marmara incident last year. “The height of humiliation” is how an Israeli newspaper described a scene in which Israel’s Deputy Foreign Minister Danny Ayalon summoned Turkish ambassador, Ahmet Oguz, last January to humiliate him before Israeli media. Oguz was reprimanded over a fictional Turkish TV show that was critical of Israel. To ensure that the point has been successfully made, Ayalon “urged journalists to make clear that the ambassador was seated on a low sofa, while the Israeli officials were in much higher chairs,” according to the BBC (January 13, 2010). Ayalon noted that is “there is only one flag here” – the Israeli flag – and “we are not smiling”.

How did Turkey respond? A statement issued by the foreign ministry ‘invited’ their counterparts in “Israeli foreign ministry to respect the rules of diplomatic courtesy.” Hardly outrageous. The gist of the Turkish message that followed the murder of the Turkish humanitarian activists a few months later was not much different. It basically asked for an apology.

Turkey was shunned for the seemingly unreasonable demand. An unnamed senior Israeli official explained the Israeli logic to Ynet news on September 2, following Turkey’s decision to downgrade ties with Israel. “Turkey is an important country in the Middle East, but an apology is a very strategic precedent for Israel in this region,” he said. That is true, Israel’s diplomacy is predicated on unfair trade, violent storming of humanitarian boats, subservient activities, espionage and much more. Indeed, an apology for the murder of Turkish’s civilians would be a precedent.

Even after the recent publishing of Palmer Report – a contradictory and obvious attempt at exonerating the Israeli army while implicating Turkish humanitarian activists – Turkey acted responsibly. But it also acted with the poise and dignity that is expected of a democratic country expressing the wishes of the vast majority of its people. It downgraded military, trade and other ties with Israel. Why should Turkey share military intelligence with a country that murders Turks, humiliates its diplomats and refuses to apologize?

Still, from Israel’s point of view, Turkey has crossed all the limits of acceptable behavior. “Turkish warships will escort any Turkish aid vessels to Palestinians in the Gaza Strip,” said Turkish Prime Minister, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, in an interview with Al Jazeera (as quoted in the Guardian, September 8). At the same time, Turkish diplomacy continued to offer a window of opportunity to detain further escalation. “Our embassy in Israel is open, and the Israeli embassy in Ankara is open. The relations would return to the old days if Israel apologizes and accepts to pay compensation,” said Huseyin Celik, Deputy Chairman of the ruling Justice and Development party (according to the Guardian, September 8.)

Since an apology is a ‘precedent’, Israel responded in the only way it knows how. An accusatory campaign was launched against Turkey with outlandish insinuations and direct threats.

“This is part of the Islamization spreading there, and we must recognize it,” said the senior official to Ynet. The leading Israeli news source also published a column by one Ron Ben-Yishai, calling the Turkish Prime Minister a “short-tempered thug.” In ‘Turkey no great power,’ Yishai accused the country of failing on most fronts. “Turkey under Erdogan’s leadership is neither a reliable ally nor a credible rival,” he charged.

These views are hardly marginal, and were matched by specific threats by Israeli Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman. “We’ll exact a price from Erdogan that will prove to him that messing with Israel doesn’t pay off,” Lieberman reportedly said. More specifically, he “urge(d) all Israeli military veterans to refrain from traveling to Turkey and facilitate cooperation with the Armenians — Turkey’s historic rivals.” He said he also plans to meet with the Turkish rebel group PKK to “cooperate with them and boost them in every possible area,” according to UPI, September 9.

Per this logic, demanding an apology for murder equals a thuggish act, while stirring regional instability and admitting to supporting armed militias is an acceptable diplomatic maneuver.

Turkey had no other option but to escalate before an obstinate ‘ally.’ And considering the latter’s existing isolation in the region – and the growing anti-Israeli sentiment in Egypt and elsewhere – it is likely that Israel, not Turkey, will lose out in this political tussle.

Even the US, Israel’s ‘unconditional’ ally, seems to recognize the dangerous game being played by Israel and its rightwing government of Benjamin Netanyahu. Recently revealed comments made by then US Secretary of Defense Robert Gates indicate that Americans are simply fed up with supporting Israel’s ‘dangerous’ policies, while ‘receive(ing) nothing in return’ (Bloomberg, September 5).

It is these very dangerous policies that guide Israel’s brewing conflict with Turkey amid complete lack of political wisdom in Tel Aviv. But if extreme militancy was not enough to intimidate or weaken the resolve of a tiny and besieged place like Gaza, why should it work against a great and rising power like Turkey?

Rational thinking in Netanyahu’s government might also be an acceptable precedent.

By Ramzy Baroud

14 September 2011

@ 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), available on Amazon.com.

 

 

 

Virginia Tilley, writing in the Electronic Intifada, under the title, ” Bantustans and the unilateral declaration of statehood” has argued that the Palestinian Authority’s move toward a UN resolution declaring statehood is destructive of Palestinian aspiration for statehood.

Unfortunately, Ms Tilley’s grasp of the Palestinian situation is distorted by her experience with South Africa . Ms Tilley is herself South African. She fails to appreciate the significant difference between the South African proposal establishing Bantustans for South Africa ‘s black residents and the Palestinian proposal at the United Nations for statehood.

Ms Tilley says:

“ But Israeli protests could also be disingenuous. One tactic could be persuading worried Palestinian patriots that a unilateral declaration of statehood might not be in Israel ‘s interest in order to allay that very suspicion.”

Thus, in Ms Tilley’s view, Israel’s protest, the diplomatic missions of Israeli diplomats visiting capitals to try to dissuade UN member from supporting the Palestinian initiative, the effort of the US Congress to intimidate the Palestinians by threatening to cut off funding to the PA, Netanyahu’s impassioned threats to annex much of what remains of Palestine, the commitment of the Obama administration to veto such a resolution if it reaches the UN Security Council, and the recent last minute effort of the Obama administration to derail the effort are all Burr Rabbit in the briar patch like tricks to achieve the opposite result.

The main difference, which Ms Tilley completely fails to recognize or address, is that the South African government proposed a series of disconnected Bantustans-islands completely isolated from one another each surrounded by the state of South Africa, with highly attenuated sovereignty, for the exclusive residence of the countries black majority, whereas the Palestinian proposal is for the very same state to which Arafat and the PLO agreed in 1988, that is, a continuously connected state on the West Bank with East Jerusalem as its capital and the Gaza Strip connected by a corridor and with control of its borders, water resources and airspace. Netanyahu opposes any such UN resolution because it provides international legitimacy for the right of a Palestinian state to exists in Palestine with East Jerusalem as its capital , enjoying the full rights of any nation, with control of its borders, its international relations, with embassies abroad and the right to bring legal matters before the United nations, including torts brought before the UN Criminal Court for Israel’s violations of human rights.

The Bantustan concept in which a Palestinian state would lack “any meaningful sovereignty over borders, natural resources, trade, security, foreign policy, water, …”is a concept which Arafat specifically rejected at Camp David in 2000 and does not comport with any reasonable concept of statehood, nor would it be the intention or understanding of the members of the UN Security Council voting for the Palestinian initiative, nor does it resemble anything the Palestinian Authority is seeking. The South African Bantustan was soundly rejected by the international community when it was proposed by the South African government.

But what is the alternative to this resolution?

The alternative would be a continuation of the present process which is no more than a cover to the continuous expropriation by Israel of all of Palestine , a expropriation which weare witnessing every day as Palestinians are constantly being displaced by Israeli expansion and their resources taken. Netanyahu argues that the expansion of Israel into East Jerusalem and the West Bank, which occurred in the context of the ’67 War, was legitimate and the West Bank and East Jerusalem is “disputed territory” in which Israel’s claim is as good as anyone else’s.

A UN resolution that East Jerusalem, and the West Bank, along with the Gaza Strip are properly part of a unified Palestinian state would undermine MrNetanyahu’s argument and directly contradict it, and especially the centrality of his determination of ethnically cleansing all of Jerusalem which he has especially coveted for all of his adult political life, as have the members of the Lukud coalition, heirs to the Revisionist wing of Zionism. Revisionism, which advocated the ‘revising’ the British Mandate for Palestine to include the east bank of the Jordan , is Netanyahu’sideological underpinning. Some strains of the Revisionists were committed to the creation of a Jewish State extending from the Nile to the Euphrates .

We must not underestimate Mr Netanyahu’s fanatic dedication to Zionist Revisionism, or at least one content, for the present, with the capture of all of Palestine west of the Jordan , the so called land of Judea and Samaria .

According to historian Avi Shlaim, in his recent book, Israel and Palestine ,

The day that the Knesset endorsed Oslo II by a majority of one, thousands of demonstrators gathered in Zion Square in Jerusalem , Benjamin Netanyahu, the leader of the Likud, was on the grandstand, while the demonstrators displayed an effigy of Rabin in SS uniform. Netanyahu set the tone with an inflammatory speech, He called Oslo II a surrender agreement and accused Rabin of ‘causing national humiliation by accepting the dictates of the terrorist Arafat.’ A month later, on November 1995, Rabin was assassinated by a religious-nationalist Jewish fanatic with the explicit aim of derailing the peace process. Rabin’s demise, as his murderer expected, dealt a serious body blow to the entire peace process.

Netanyahu contributed energy, emotional and rhetorical, that contributed to the assassination of Israeli Prime Minister Rabin.

Shlaim continues:

Netanyahu spent his two and a half years in power in a relentless attempt to arrest, freeze, and subvert the Oslo Accords. He kept preaching reciprocity while acting unilaterally in demolishing Arab houses, imposing curfews, confiscating Arab land, building new Jewish settlements and opening an archaeological tunnel near the Muslim holy places of the Old City of Jerusalem. Whereas the Oslo Accords left Jerusalem to the final stage of the negotiations, Netanyahu made it the centerpiece of his program in order to block progress on any other issue. His government waged an economic and political war of attrition against the Palestinians

This argument, by the way, that the territories occupied in the ’67 War are merely ‘disputed territories’ has never been opposed by Obama or by recent US administrations. Carter may have been the last US President to have explicitly rejected this self serving and false claim on the part of Israel . One has to think back a long way to even remember any mention by the American government of UN Resolution 242 whichwas written by the US government and passed by the Security Council in the aftermath of the ’67 War. UNR 242includes the clause, theillegitimacyof territorycaptured by military force .

We should all be clear on the Lukud’s plans for the West Bank and E Jerusalem and their program for negotiations with the Palestinians. These policies were outlined, most likely inadvertently, in a singular outburst of honesty by former Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir upon his electoral loss in 1992 after having served for longer than any Israeli prime minister with the exception of David Ben Gurion. He said:

”I would have carried on autonomy talks for ten years, and meanwhile, we would have reached half a million people in Judea and Samaria .”

Mr Shamir would be happy to learn that his policies have been continued by his successors, including Mr Netanyahu, and there are now half a million Jewish settlers living Judea and Samaria .

In fact, a UN Resolution declaring the legitimacy and existence of Palestinian state, even if passed only by the General Assembly, would establish a legitimacy on the par with, or even greater thanthat provided by General Assembly Resolution 181, which Israel claims provided its initial international legitimacy and is incorporated into the Israeli Declaration of Independence. UN GA Resolution 181 was only a recommendation for the partition of Palestine into two states, of roughly equal land area, one for Jews and one Arabs, with Jerusalem set aside to be administered internationally. Such a UN resolution, as sought by the PA, would be a stronger one than UNGA 181 which Israel claims as the origin of it legitimacy.Mr Netanyahu’s opposition to such a UN resolution has an urgency which Ms Tilley completely fails to grasp. Among other features, it would deny to Israel any legitimacy for the takeover of East Jerusalem and would be fatal to the argument that the occupied territories are merely disputed.

Like the 29 standing ovations which the US Congress gave the Israeli Prime Minister, Netanyahu would take a rejection of the Palestinian proposal in the United Nations as another imprimatur, this time provided by the world community, for the continuation of his present policies of grabbing a piece of Palestinian land every day.

Personally, I favor, like Ms Tilley, one unified state with equal rights for all its citizens regardless of race, religion, or ethnicity. But the more immediate and urgent problem is to halt the continual expansion of Israel and the dispossession of the Palestinians and to discredit Netanyahu’s argument that the occupied territories are ‘disputed territories’ rather than ‘illegally occupied’ territories.

By William James Martin

10 September 2011

@ Countercurrents.org

 

 

.

Sarkozy And Cameron In Tripoli: Scramble For Libya Is On

With their surprise visit to Tripoli Thursday, French President Nicolas Sarkozy and British Prime Minister David Cameron signaled that the scramble by the major powers for control of Libya’s oil wealth is in full swing.

The visit was unannounced and conducted under a massive security blanket. It included a brief visit to a Tripoli hospital and a joint press conference with Mustafa Abdel Jalil, the former Gaddafi justice minister who heads up the NATO-backed National Transitional Council, and Mahmoud Jibril, the US-trained economist and former Gaddafi official designated as the NTC’s “prime minister”.

Afterwards, the Sarkozy, Cameron and the chiefs of the NTC all left the Libyan capital under heavy guard for the eastern city of Benghazi, where the NTC leaders have said they will stay until the fighting with Gaddafi loyalists in several key cities is over.

The hasty departure from Tripoli suggested that neither NATO nor its Libyan clients are confident about security in the capital under conditions in which battles are still raging for control of the coastal city of Sirte and Bani Walid, about 90 miles southeast of the capital.

Undoubtedly even more troubling for Cameron’s and Sarkozy’s security details is growing evidence that the NTC’s control of Tripoli is tenuous at best. Islamist elements leading militias patrolling the capital’s streets have denounced the NTC leadership, calling for its resignation.

In his speech in Tripoli, Cameron stressed that the NATO war on the country would continue. “There are still parts of Libya under Gaddafi’s control, Gaddafi is still at large, and we must make sure this work is completed,” said Cameron. “We must keep up with the NATO mission until civilians are all protected and this work is finished.”

The pretense that the “NATO mission” is protecting civilians becomes more absurd each day. As Cameron spoke, NATO warplanes bombed the towns of Sirte and Bani Walid. NATO’s massive fire power is being used to enable the “rebels” to carry out the kind of siege of these population centers that the Western alliance initially claimed it was intervening to stop pro-Gaddafi forces from carrying out in Benghazi.

Cameron added that Britain would release some $948 million in Libyan assets held in Britain—a fraction of the total—and deploy a team of British military “advisers” to assist the NTC.

For his part, Sarkozy insisted that France had no ulterior economic motives in attacking Libya.

“We have done what we did, because we thought it was the right thing to do,” he claimed. He insisted that there had been no “behind the scenes deals on oil or reconstruction and that “we have asked for no preferences.”

In his own remarks, however, Jalil made it clear that precisely such preferences were in the works. “Our friends will have a preferential role, in accordance with their efforts to help Libya,” he said. While the NTC has stated that it would honor all previous contracts concluded by the Gaddafi government, Jalil indicated that this was by no means assured.

“We will accept the existing contracts as long as they are clean and transparent—but as a previous member of government, I know that some are not and must be reviewed,” he said. Other NTC officials have flatly threatened that China and Russia would be frozen out of Libyan deals because of their opposition to the United Nations resolution authorizing a “no-fly” zone to protect civilians, which the NATO powers used as a pretext to wage a war for regime change.

There has been widespread speculation in the media that the Sarkozy government would cash in on being the first to recognize the NTC and the first to begin bombing Libya, with the French oil giant Total emerging as the number one beneficiary.

Libya’s National Oil Corporation announced Wednesday that Libyan oil exports will resume within 10 days. Production could reach 1 million barrels per day within six months.

Jeffrey Feltman, the US assistant secretary of state for Near East affairs, arrived in Tripoli the day before the Sarkozy-Cameron visit. He came to secure American interests in the impending imperialist carve-up of Libya.

He also used the occasion to dismiss concerns that Islamist elements, some of them tied to Al Qaeda, have gained significant political power as a result of the NATO war to topple Gaddafi. “We are not concerned that one group is going to dominate the aftermath of what has been a shared struggle by the people of Libya,” Feltman said in response to a question on the rising power of the Islamists.

That such concerns are growing, however, was made unmistakably clear with the publication Thursday of articles in both the New York Times and the Washington Post reporting on the rise of the Islamists, and growing struggles between them and the former Gaddafi officials and Western-connected émigrés backed by Washington and NATO. Both pointed to the increasing power of two Islamist figures: Ali Sallabi, who directs an Islamist umbrella group known as Etilaf; and Abdel Hakim Belhaj, the former leader of the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group, who had collaborated with Al Qaeda in Afghanistan and is now Tripoli’s military commander.

This week Sallabi issued a statement demanding that NTC chairman Jibril resign, charging members of the council with monopolizing decision-making to reap personal fortunes for themselves. He warned that the NTC officials were preparing “a new era of tyranny and dictatorship.”

Sallabi’s statement provoked a demonstration by NTC supporters in Tripoli against the Islamists.

The New York Times quoted an aide to Belhaj as saying, “Jibril will be gone soon.” The warning is ominous, given the fate of the NTC’s former military commander and ex-Gaddafi interior minister, Gen. Abdel Fateh Younes. His burned body was dumped outside Benghazi last July, after he apparently fell afoul of Islamist militiamen.

The London-based Arabic daily Al-Quds Al-Arabi warned in an editorial Wednesday that the political tensions could turn into “bloody clashes between the two warring parties.”

Though fighting continues in Libya and there are signs that the NATO-sponsored regime change may produce a new civil war, both Sarkozy and Cameron suggested in their speeches Thursday that the Libyan war provided a new model for imperialist interventions.

In his remarks, Sarkozy issued a veiled threat that Syria could be the next target. “I dream that one day young Syrians will be as lucky as the young Libyans today, that one day they will also be able to say: ‘democracy and a peaceful revolution are for us.’”

Meanwhile, the commander of the Pentagon’s Africa Command (AFRICOM) made it clear that the US military sees the Libyan war as the prelude to new imperialist wars in the region. Gen. Carter Ham indicated that AFRICOM’s role in the Libyan intervention had been something of a baptism by fire for a command that had been largely dedicated to military assistance missions and attempts to find bases for US military forces on the African continent.

“Dropping bombs and Tomahawks, those kind of things, was not something the command had practiced to the degree we were required to do” in Libya, he said. “The question for us now is how do we sustain that so that if we would have to do this again, we’d start at a higher plateau.”

Ham also said that he wanted to secure more special operations forces for AFRICOM to conduct “counterterrorism” operations in Africa. He pointed to three groups that he said posed a threat: Al-Shabab in East Africa, the Nigeria-based Boko Haram and Al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM).

This last group, AQIM, had merged in 2007 with the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group from which much of the leadership of the NATO-backed rebel forces in Libya are drawn.

Ham voiced concern about reports that portable surface-to-air missiles from the Gaddafi regime’s stockpile had gone missing as a result of the US-NATO war. He also said that Washington and NATO had to ensure that the Islamist elements that they have armed and supported do not “reemerge to be part of the interim government or subsequent government.”

16 September 2011, @ WSWS.org

Tripoli: As part of its 7th set of US sanctions against Syria, which began in June, 2011, the Obama administration has targeted a messenger, a sometime spokeswoman, a positive image of Syria, someone people of all religions and cultures have easily identified with over the past several years, Dr. Bouthainia Shaaban. The US administration acted thus for the sole purpose of pressuring the government of Syrian President Bashar Assad, but has succeeded in undermining American values of freedom of expression much more.

On August 28, 2011, the US Treasury and State Departments targeted Dr. Bouthainia Shaaban, and froze any assets she might have in the US.

According to State Department spokesman, Victoria Nuland, who two US Senate Foreign Relations Committee staffers speculate may view Dr. Shaaban as a rival of sorts given their job descriptions, and Dr. Shaaban’s stellar performances during meetings with US officials both in the US and Syria, the explanation for blacklisting a Syrian nationalist and media advisor remains: “She (Dr. Shaaban) has served as the public mouthpiece for the repression of the regime.”

No US official to date has stepped forward to defend the sanctions against Dr. Shaaban with any more substantive or detailed complaint or supporting evidence.

Theodore Kattouf, former US ambassador to Syria was reportedly astonished to see Dr. Shaaban’s name on the latest sanctions list and he expressed on television his regret for such a bad decision. Former Ambassador Kattouf explained that sanctioning Dr.Shaaban was a serious mistake because Dr. Shaaban is well known of her positive and constructive attitudes and positions against wars and injustices and bloodshed.

True, Dr. Shaaban, among several others, is a trusted advisor to the Syrian administration. She presumably offers counsel and insights; perhaps much like Theodore Sorenson did for President John Kennedy, and Bill Moyers for Lyndon Johnson. But she is not and has never been a decision maker. Presumably her advice is considered, but who knows to what degree. Which advisor is also a key decision maker?

Surely the Obama administration knows well that when any person occupies a position as media advisor or even press secretary, he/she speaks for and explains the policy of the administration he’s working for. To sanction them violates American notions and values of freedom of expression and immunity from harassment for performing a vital job that benefits all by way of clear understanding and communication of a country’s position on political, social, and economic issues of the day.

Dr. Shaaban’s background is well known to recent US administrations and also much appreciated according to Washington sources. She is known as an independent thinker, reformer, writer, University Professor (she taught in Eastern Michigan for two years and earned her PhD from Warwick University in the UK and was a Fulbright Scholar at Duke University (1990-1991) and received prestigious McCandless Professorship at Eastern Michigan University for 2000. She is known for her ability and willingness to take a minority position, if her evaluation of the facts of a case or issue leads her there, and is never reluctant to speak truth to power. Her writings, many of which have appeared in the left of center Counterpunch (counterpunch.org) always advance positions against wars, violence and occupation.

The Obama administration knows that Dr. Shaaban has no account in the US, earns a modest salary, is the wife of the manager of the Syrian Estabishment for Food Indurstry and this ‘sanction’ is designed solely to harm her excellent reputation that she has earned during the past couple of decades. When pressed for details of her assets both the US Treasury, and State Department spokeswoman Nuland only offered: “Let’s just leave it at that.”, whatever that is supposed to mean.

Dr. Shaaban’s office avers that she has very few assets at all and certainly none in the US.

“Bouthainia connects with people” according to a US Senate Foreign Relations Committee staffer who has met with her: “Whether with Hamas or Saudi Princes, and both know her views on full rights for women and justice for Palestinians, and with American officials too she is effective.”

For some of these reasons the US treasury and State departments have targeted her and the Obama administration, largely it appears, out of ignorance, according to Congressional sources, said, “Ok, if you think is a good idea go ahead.”

It was not a good idea. Attacking Mrs. Shabaan is a low blow and disgraceful by any standards and especially for one who is a very positive force helping bridge several divides between East and West.

President Obama erred in signing off on this mistake.

On losing her father last May, Dr. Shabaan wrote to an American friend, words that reflect both Syrian and American values and says something about this scholar and humanist.

“Dear Franklin,

“I was so touched with your message of condolences; it was so kind of you. Thank you very much. I was fortunate enough to look after my ailing mother for 7 years and after my father for the same period and then for a year and a half before the passing away of my father. I would like to say this is the most important and the most valuable and pleasurable thing I have ever done.

As Muslims we are requested in the Holy Quran to look after our aging parents and never to say a word to them that may hurt their feelings and this comes as second in importance only to believing in God and worshipping Him. In this sense I believe no parents should be sent to senior homes as their most desperate need is for love and affection and not only for food and bread I am so comforted that they lived happily and with integrity and I was an instrument to that. I want to write more about this very important aspect of human life in the future.

Thank you so much again and hope to see you soon in Syria.

Best wishes,

Bouthaina Shaaban”

The White House attacked a friend of America and of all people of good will. It needlessly assaulted a symbol of the great country of Syria, the great Syrian people, their history, culture, resistance values, profound dignity, and their decency.

In so doing the Obama Administration sullied American values and doubtless does not represent American values or the will of the American people. It did undermine American values of freedom of expression and compromised American notions of fair play and American legal norms of substantial justice.

Would that President Obama will immediately reverse this ill-considered action.

By Franklin Lamb

05 September, 2011

Countercurrents.org

Franklin Lamb is reachable c/o fplamb@gmail.com

The African National Congress, once a bastion of non-racism, has recently descended into racial politics.

The recent court judgment in a South African court declaring the singing of a popular liberation struggle song, “Shoot the Boer”, as hate speech has brought renewed attention to the racial dynamics that are so pervasive in this society. While no one should be surprised that race informs so much of the political discourse in a country with a history such as South Africa’s, the increasingly antagonistic nature of this discourse should be a matter of concern to all South Africans – as well as to those who seek to hold the South African “miracle” as an example of a country dealing successfully with the trauma of more than 300 years of colonialism and apartheid.

The “miracle” transition that South Africa experienced in the mid-1990s was extraordinary, in the sense that an oppressed population, having suffered the brutality of an inhuman system of apartheid and colonialism since 1652, felt not the slightest need for revenge, wide-scale violence or the expulsion of their white compatriots. This is especially notable – bordering on miraculous – given the fact that the transition itself was marked by a level of violence against black communities not even seen at the height of apartheid rule.

And yet we are now witnessing a racialisation of South African politics that is extremely dangerous and threatens to take us down a route of racial antagonism, the outcome of which we are unable to predict. Needless to say, history is replete with examples of miraculous transitions gone horribly wrong. It is about time that South Africans are liberated from their false exceptionalism – the idea that we are really different from all those other countries where the potential for fundamental transformation was swept away by the discourse of race, ethnicity, and tribe.

The relatively peaceful nature of the political transition in South Africa has been variously ascribed to the greatness of the political leaders of the two principled political formations, the African National Congress’ Nelson Mandela and FW De Klerk, the leader of the apartheid National Party. While Nobel Peace Prizes are awarded to great men such as Mandela and De Klerk, the real motive force behind the peaceful transition, and the absence of a race war in South Africa, was the African National Congress.

While it has become fashionable for everyone to preach non-racialism in contemporary South Africa, the ANC was the only major political party, together with its communist allies, that preached an unflinching non-racism for most of its 100-year history. Its adoption of the Freedom Charter in 1955 cemented the non-racialism of the ANC and provided the political platform on which the organisation challenged the apartheid system in the ensuing four decades. During its long years in exile, the ANC expelled prominent black members who preached a racially-defined struggle, suffered a significant breakaway with the formation of the Pan-Africanist Congress by disenchanted Africanists, and had to explain to thousands of angry youth, fresh from the battles of Soweto in 1976, why the struggle against apartheid was not a struggle of black against white.

Although race has been one of the fundamental contradictions of South African society, and its most apparent one at that, the ANC never based its political programme on pitting one race against another. The presence of white, coloured and Indian leaders in the ANC was never a token presence. Anyone who witnessed the reverence with which Joe Slovo, the white chief of staff of the ANC’s military wing, was received in South Africa’s townships would easily dispel that notion.

“What has thus far been a blessing to South Africans, and the main factor in preventing a racial polarisation, might now become a part of the racialisation of South African politics.”

Traumatised and divided societies often have one institution that commands the respect of a vast majority of the populace. These institutions are key centres around which transformative political projects can coalesce. In Latin America, the church often played this role in the struggle against the right-wing dictatorships; likewise, the monarchy in Spain after the death of Franco, the military in Egypt, and the clergy in Iran during the 1979 revolution provided the institutions and legitimacy that profound changes in these countries required. In South Africa, the ANC has historically played this role without wavering. The cohesion of the South African political system remains dependent on the cohesion of the ANC, and the continued commitment of the ANC to its legacy of non-racialism. Whatever opposition parties or the chattering classes say, there is no institution that commands the level of historical loyalty and legitimacy as this organisation.

What has thus far been a blessing to South Africans, and the main factor in preventing a racial polarisation, might now become a part of the racialisation of South African politics. The fact that most opposition parties represent the interests of particular racial groups, despite their protests to the contrary, means that they can never have the impact of a party such as the ANC. It is in this light that the emergence of an openly racial discourse within the ANC, and the organisation’s increased use of racial categories, becomes disconcerting.

The utterances by the ANC government’s chief spokesman Jimmy Manyi earlier this year, targeting the minority coloured community, and the ruling party’s subsequent attack on cabinet minister Trevor Manuel for defending the non-racism of the ANC against Manyi’s ethnic politicking, is indicative of at least a tolerance for racial politics within the organisation.

The ANC’s knee-jerk response to any criticism, blaming white interests or parties, and an automatic defence of ministers, party leaders or judicial candidates because they are black, intensifies this polarisation. Of course there are lots of white racists in South Africa, and race clearly remains a fundamental factor in the distribution of resources and opportunity in the country. This does not mean that all criticism of the ANC is based on race, or that our defence against such racism must mimic the very racial categories we are trying to defeat. Certainly, black South Africans also deserve competent ministers, judges and civil servants. Even in the Western Cape province, where the ANC lost power to the opposition Democratic Alliance, the organisation is attempting to regain power by adopting the principles of ethnically-based mobilisation by focusing its efforts on the coloured community, which constitutes a majority of the population in this province. Non-racism has been overtaken by political expediency and the rush for power.

A non-racial South Africa cannot be built without a non-racial ANC, and the recent history of the organisation indicates that this dream is in danger of being washed away by a combination of populist Africanist rhetoric, ill-considered defence of whomever is black in government or the civil service – simply because they are black, and the adoption of racial mobilisation tactics. It remains to be seen whether an ANC that has lost its political moorings and its firm foundations of non-racism – and instead has become a battleground for factional and material interests – can reposition itself at the vanguard of the struggle for a non-racial society.

Let no one be fooled that this mantle can simply be picked up by any of the myriad of opposition forces. The death of non-racism in the ANC means the withering away of this dream for the country as a whole.

By David Africa

23 September 2011

@Al Jazeera

David Africa is an independent security analyst based in South Africa. He has previously worked in counter-terrorism intelligence and research, and served in the underground of the then-banned African National Congress in South Africa.

 

The poverty rate in the US soared to 15.1 percent in 2010, its highest level since 1993, according to a report released by the Census Bureau on Tuesday. Household incomes continued to fall sharply, amidst the worst jobs crisis since the Great Depression of the 1930s, and the number of people without health insurance increased.

The bureau’s report documents a shocking decline in the living standards of millions of people, a devastating indictment of the policies of the Obama administration and the entire political establishment. The new figures cover conditions one year after the supposed beginning of the recovery in June 2009.

The poverty rate increased nearly a full percentage point, from 14.3 percent in 2009. It was the third consecutive annual increase in the poverty rate and the fourth consecutive annual increase in the number of people living in poverty. Last year, there were 46.2 million people living in poverty, defined at the absurdly low level of about $22,000 a year for a family of four and $11,000 a year for an individual.

The number of people earning less than twice the poverty rate (about $44,000 for a family of four) stood at 103 million in 2010, or about 34 percent of the population.

The percentage of children under 18 living in poverty increased from 20.7 percent to 22.0 percent. A total of 16.4 million children live in poverty, equivalent to the population of New York City, Los Angeles, Chicago and Houston combined.

The total number of people in poverty is equivalent to the combined population of the 50 largest cities in the United States. There are more people in poverty in the US in 2010 than during any year on record going back to 1959.

Since 2007, the poverty rate has increased from 12.5 percent to 15.1 percent, or 2.6 percentage points.

The poverty rate for African-Americans increased at a particularly rapid rate, from 25.8 percent in 2009 to 27.4 percent in 2010.

Millions of people live in what is known as “deep poverty,” with incomes less than 50 percent of the official poverty level (or less than about $11,000 a year for a family of four). The deep poverty rate increased from 6.3 percent in 2009 to 6.7 percent in 2010, an increase of 1.5 million to a total of 20.5 million people.

While children under 18 represent 24.4 percent of the overall population, they make up 36 percent of the population (7.5 million individuals) living in deep poverty.

The absolute number of people living in deep poverty and the deep poverty rate are both at the highest level since the government began tabulating these figures in 1975.

The Census report also documented a continued decline in income for working people, with the real median household income falling to $49,445 in 2010, down 2.3 percent ($1,154) from 2009. Since 2007, the report notes, “real median income has declined 6.4 percent and is 7.1 percent below the median household income peak that occurred in 1999.”

These averages mask the enormous inequality that has become the central feature of American society. The lowest 20 percent of households, with incomes of $20,000 or less, saw their share of total income fall from 3.4 percent to 3.3 percent. The top 20 percent took home more than 50 percent of all money income.

A report by the Center for Budget and Policy Priorities notes that since 1999, real income “has fallen 12.1 percent for those at the 10th income percentile but only 1.5 percent for those at the 90th percentile. The income gap between those at the 10th and 90th percentile was this highest on record.”

Since 1999, real household income has fallen 5.5 percent for non-Hispanic whites, 14.6 percent for African Americans, 8.9 percent for Asians and 10.1 percent for Hispanics, according to the Census report.

For men with full-time, year-round jobs, the real median income is about the same today as it was in 1973, having remained largely flat for three decades.

Mass unemployment is a major driving force behind the decline in living standards, as corporations utilize the jobs crisis to push through wage and benefit cuts for those who are able to find work. Since 2007, the number of year-round, full-time workers fell by 9.4 million, a fall without parallel since the Great Depression.

These conditions have continued into 2011. Official unemployment stands at 9.1 percent, with the most recent jobs report from the Labor Department showing zero net job growth last month. The level of long-term unemployment is at a historic high. The percent of the population unemployed increased from 16.1 percent to 16.3 percent.

The number of people without health insurance in the United States was 49.9 million in 2010, an increase of nearly one million over 2009. The rise in the uninsured is a particularly damning exposure of the fraud of Obama’s health care “reform,” which was in fact an opening shot in a drive to reduce health care costs for corporations and the government.

The rise in poverty is a product of the long-term decline of American capitalism, combined with the ferocious class war waged by the ruling class, now led by the Obama administration. Mass impoverishment is the outcome of a deliberate policy that has resulted in a vast transfer of wealth into the hands of a small corporate and financial aristocracy.

These indices of mass social distress come at a time of record profits, with corporations sitting on a cash hoard estimated at more than $2 trillion. The government has handed over trillions of dollars to the banks, inflating the stock market while bailing out the wealthy. Far from leading to an economic revival, the conditions for the vast majority of the population have suffered a catastrophic decline.

Amidst clear signs of a world economy sinking into a depression, the response of the ruling class is to push for massive austerity. States and local governments throughout the country are implementing cuts in the most basic programs to prevent poverty. The Michigan state government, for example, passed a measure this month that will cut 41,000 people from welfare assistance, including nearly 30,000 children, beginning October 1.

Meanwhile, after outlining a phony jobs proposal that will do nothing to address the unemployment crisis, the Obama administration is set to propose trillions of dollars in cuts to health care and retirement programs.

The administration has made a point of insisting that a proposal being worked on by a bipartisan budget deficit committee must include deep cuts in Medicare and Medicaid, the main federal health care programs.

To fight against these conditions, the working class must enter into industrial and political struggle.

The Socialist Equality Party calls for emergency measures to eliminate poverty, including a multi-trillion dollar public works program to employ tens of millions of workers in high-paying, productive jobs rebuilding infrastructure and meeting other critical social needs. A livable income to meet all basic needs is a social right that must be guaranteed to everyone.

To pay for this program, the SEP fights for a radical redistribution of wealth, including a 90 percent tax on all incomes over $500,000. Corporations, currently engaged in a hiring strike, must be taken over by the working class and run democratically in the interests of social need.

The implementation of these measures is impossible outside of a direct attack on the interests of the wealthy and on the capitalist two-party system, through the building of a mass socialist political movement of the working class.

By Joseph Kishore

14 September 2011

@ WSWS.org