Despite international law, basic morality and international wink-wink rhetoric to the contrary, Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu has approved the construction of 25 new housing units in an Israeli occupied West Bank settlement.

Israel Constructs 25 New Units in West Bank

1 Dec 09 | Press TV

Israeli Prime Minister Binjamin Netanyahu has okayed the construction of 25 new housing units in the West Bank settlement of Keidar despite international calls to the contrary.

During a phone conversation with Defense Minister Ehud Barak on Monday, Netanyahu instructed Barak to stop preventing the construction of the new units in the West Bank, claiming the units do not fall under the cabinet’s decision to halt settlement construction activities for 10 months.

Tel Aviv had earlier agreed to freeze all settlement activities, except in Jerusalem Al-Quds, for 10 months in a bid to re-launch stalled Israeli-Palestinian peace talks.

Israeli officials hope that the official declaration of a settlement freeze in the occupied West Bank would enable the renewal of negotiations with the Palestinian Authority, which has refused to engage in peace talks until Israel implements such a measure.

Tel Aviv is, moreover, currently under intense pressure from the international community to halt the construction of illegal settlements in the West Bank. Israeli settlements are widely considered the main obstacle in the way of Israeli-Palestinian peace talks.

Under the 2002 Roadmap for Peace plan brokered by the United States, the European Union, the United Nations, and Russia, Israel has to ‘dismantle settlement outposts erected since 2001 and freeze all settlement activities’.

There are currently 121 Israeli settlements and approximately 102 Israeli outposts built on Palestinian land occupied by Israel in 1967. All of these settlements and outposts are illegal under international law and have been condemned by numerous United Nations Security Council resolutions.

These settlements and outposts are inhabited by a population of approximately 462,000 Israeli settlers. Some 191,000 Israelis are living in settlements around Jerusalem Al-Quds and an additional 271,400 are spread throughout the West Bank.

All such Jewish settlements are deemed illegal under international law because they have been erected on occupied lands that the Palestinians claim for a future state.

The ninth anniversary, on Oct 31^st, 2009, of UN Resolution 1325, dedicated to women peace and security, was marked this year by a series of events starting with open debate at the UN Security Council and leading up to adoption of the  ”Third Resolution On Women, Peace & Security, SCR 1888″.

As is usual, a report of the Secretary General, in preparation of the debate was delivered on dated Sept 16, 2009. #S/2009/465, Entitled “Report of the Secretary-General on women and peace and security”, HERE, is an 18 page document outlining events, conclusions and recommendations relating to how women last year, in various places around the globe, were affected by war, it’s aftermath, and the difficulties of finding a voice. I encourage you read it.

WomenWatch has a webpage HERE, devoted to information about this important global resolution directed toward the advancement of peace and security for women. It’s section entitled “Background to Resolution 1325, From the UN Charter to Security Council Resolution 1325” provides a wonderful synopsis of the path taken from the beginning of the UN, to the resolution’s adoption.

The geographic area of United States is not technically in a theater of war. Therefore, the events that happened last year in places like Somalia or Afghanistan do not apply to us. However, one cannot help but find resonance in some of the actions that are taken against women in our country. Deliberate destruction of medical supplies and measles vaccinations targeted for women and children strike a chord with unequal medical treatment provided here. Gang rape as an act of war, an old enemy of women, as well as men and children, is not too far off from the gang rape that occurs in our streets. Many countries around the world now have better representation of women in government than we.

The Security Council reports that there is an absence of “a clear monitoring mechanism” for implementation of 1325, therefore, it has continued to play a strong advocacy role. Part of this problem may relate to it’s own difficulty in promoting women to positions, such as higher council levels and monitoring, which in turn relates to how successful the member countries have been at providing them.

In any event, sixteen countries have thus far made an effort toward advocacy of women’s goals by developing national action plans. They are Austria, Belgium, Chile, Côte d’Ivorie, Denmark. Finland, Iceland, Liberia, the Netherlands, Norway, Portugal, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Uganda, and the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland. Plans of Afghanistan, Sierra Leone, and Nepal were reported to be under development.

So despite the fact that that we are permanent members of the Council, we have not so far produced a national action plan. Not us. Nowhere in the report are we mentioned. Yep, that’s global leadership! Now it’s true that we just had an election and we have some new blood[1] [2] staffing the upper levels of the Security Council. I take the UN’s point, however, if we want to lead, that we must do a better job of achieving gender parity. We must be willing to develop our own national action plan.  In doing so we will see the similarities.

[2] Remarks by Ambassador Rosemary A. DiCarlo, U.S. Alternate Representative for Special Political Affairs, during a Security Council Debate on Women, Peace, and Security, in the Security Council Chamber

H1N1 Swine Flu is Mutating in the Ukraine, the The World Health Organization and others noted researchers have confirmed. 

Do you really believe them?

In an official statement, the WHO insists that there is no reason to be overly concerned by this mutation and that everyone should still run out and get injected with the H1N1 swine flu vaccine…..via http://thebirdflupandemic.com/archives/who-confirms-that-the-h1n1-swine-flu-has-mutated-in-ukraine-but-that-we-should-not-worry

Do they really expect us to believe that mutations are contained to the Ukraine where China, Australia, Japan and Singapore have seen similar mutations?   How long until it comes to the U.S. or is it already here and no one is releasing any news? 

Is it really a mutation of a virus or is it a more lethal bacteria?  “SARS, Avian Flu, and Swine flu appear to have been just trials for deadlier killers such as the current pneumonic plague which is likely another weaponized strain similar to H1N1. Perhaps the pneumonic plague itself is another trial for something more lethal,” writes http://current.com/1ie524c ,

We could be seeing something of monumental importance happening in the Ukraine. An advanced biological genetically engineered killer virus has been released. Some infectious disease experts are asserting that this virus is not A/H1N1 although it may or may not have some of “Swine Flu” genetic material in it.   It is typically behaving like a hemorrhagic fever in the lungs turning them into ‘mush’ and killing the patient. Some reports from the Ukraine are indicating that figures may will be over 1000 deaths, but the numbers are not being released by the government until confirmations are made. Moreover, the virus could have the potential to recombine with those being vaccinated to create a plague that could potentially kill more than 1 million people globally per month.

Recombinomics, Inc. Founder and President, Henry L. Niman on events in Ukraine, said, “The rapid rise in reported infections, hospitalizations, and deaths in the past few days raise concerns that the virus is transmitting very efficiently…the spike in fatalities and the frequency in hemorrhagic cases in Ukraine have raised concerns.” Niman added the alarming note, “The number of infected patients has almost doubled to just under ½ million, compared to the report two days ago.”  November 20, 2009, according to the Operational Headquarters of Health of Ukraine where the tracking numbers can be found at  http://www.moz.gov.ua/ua/main/press/?docID=14096  The cases are at 1,540,514 million and rising, FAST.  The number have now TRIPLED in days.

Niman in a radio interview said the receptor binding gene D225G was in the 1918 and later the 1919 virus pandmenics in an interview with  www.pidnews.com and available at http://www.recombinomics.com/in_the_news.html.  The interview is about an hour but the last half was most interesting.  Receptor Binding Domain Change D225G confirmed in Ukraine is further outlined in more scientific terms at http://www.recombinomics.com/News/11180902/Ukraine_D225G_Confirmed.html 

The Ukraine has most of its borders closed and is under martial law with schools closed, bans on public gatherings and forecasting a delay in the presidential election.  In the U.S. President Obama declared a National Health Emergency and National Emergency opening the doors to martial law and restrictions on U.S. Soil.  President Obama is also the head of the United Nations Security Council that under a declaration from the U.N., could translate to Obama having One World Order under his dictatorship.

Niman said there is no seasonal flu and that the recombination of the H1N1 is taking major selective advantage.  Himself claiming to have had Swine Flu twice.  He also went on to sat that variations of the D225G were found in the 1918 and 1919 Pandemic which killed thousands.  In the U.S., he believes that one third to one half of the populations has already been infected. 

Tthe CDC even with its vaccine campaign debacle that is plagued with problems still wants you to get vaccinated. http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,575927,00.html

If this is a true pneumatic plague, no H1N1 vaccine is going to stave off infection.  Plague is a bacteria, H1N1 is a virus.  Can nucleotides and amino acids, RNA, DNA, etc., of various animals piggyback on viruses and bacteria?  I am no virologist, but damned it anyways my antenna are up, and your ought to be too.

Of interest, the WHO has a Special Ukraine Update at  http://www.who.int/csr/don/2009_11_16/en/.  Why is there  no special updates for each and every other country?   Advance warning to the rest of the world for the coming of Black Death? 

Related posts at : http://ahrcanum.wordpress.com/2009/11/16/ukraine-pneumonic-plague-bioterror-by-baxter/

http://ahrcanum.wordpress.com/2009/11/01/swine-flu-quarantine-in-ukraine-border-closed/

Open wide, say ahhh and check out more posts from Ahrcanum, where sometimes the conspiracy spreads as fast as the virus itself.   http://ahrcanum.wordpress.com/swine-flu-report/

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By Alan Hart

November 15, 2009

There is a case for saying that those leaders of the discredited PNA (Palestine National Authority) who are proposing to unilaterally declare an independent state on the West Bank and Gaza Strip and seek to get UN Security Council backing for it are being clever.

What they would be doing in effect is asking the Security Council not only to re-affirm its commitment to Resolution 242 of 22 November 1967 but, far more important, to confront that resolution’s fatal flaw on the matter of land for peace.

Yes, 242 did emphasize “the inadmissibility of the acquisition of territory by war”. But its call was for “Withdrawal of Israeli armed forces from territories occupied in the recent conflict”. The original draft of the resolution contained the definitive article the, so it read “Withdrawal of Israeli armed forces from the territories occupied in the recent conflict”.

If 242 had stated that Israel’s withdrawal from “the territories” was required, the meaning, with no ambiguity and no wiggle room for Zionism, would have been that, in exchange for recognition and legitimacy, Israel was required to withdraw from all the territories it occupied in the 1967 war. But that was not on so far as Zionism was concerned. It wanted the freedom to be the one, and the only one, who would determine (on a take it or leave basis backed by brute force) the extent of any Israeli withdrawals. Resolution 242 in its final form gave Zionism that freedom.

Many of the diplomats who were engaged behind closed doors in the months of wrangling about the wording of the resolution were privately shocked and publicly embarrassed by the dropping of “the” in the final text. They saw it for what it was – a Johnson administration surrender to the Zionist state and its awesomely powerful lobby. Some came up with words to give the impression that 242 was not a disaster for all who were working for a just and lasting peace. “The full and true meaning of the resolution,” they said, “is in both its letter and spirit.” That was not a point Zionism was ever going to take because it is congenitally incapable of negotiating in good faith.

As events were to prove, 242 effectively gave Israel a power of veto over any peace process.

There’s a case for saying the prospects of overcoming that veto could be improved if the Security Council unanimously backed a unilateral declaration of Palestinian statehood on the West Bank and the Gaza Strip (as they were on 4 June 1967). On the ground nothing would be changed by such a declaration, but if the Security Council backed it, legal and moral pressure on Israel to end its 42-year-old occupation world surely intensify.

That, it seems, is the calculation of those Palestinian leaders who are proposing a unilateral declaration of independence as the only alternative to surrendering to Zionism’s will and accepting crumbs from its table. (The crumbs being two or three Bantustans which the Palestinians could call a state if they wished).

But what if the U.S., unwilling for a showdown with Zionism, blocked moves in the Security Council for a statement which, by recognizing the unilaterally declared Palestinian state, would effectively be a demand (242-plus) for Israel to end its occupation in return for a full peace with the whole Arab and wider Muslim world?

The short answer is that the Palestinian initiative would be in the same boat as President Obama’s current attempt to re-start the peace process – going nowhere. (That the U.S. would be more fully exposed as a client state of Israel on matters to do with ending the conflict is not the point).

So the clever initiative is at best a gamble. (The reason for taking it was put into words by Ghassan Khatib, head of the PNA’s media centre. “I honestly think there is no future for the peace camp in Palestine if this is not going to work.” He spoke those words to Donald Macintyre, the Independent’s correspondent in Jerusalem).

But this latest (proposed) Palestinian initiative could also be stupid.

It could tempt Netanyahu to go for broke and say to the Palestinians something like the following. “Okay. You’ve declared your state. We don’t accept its borders as defined by you, but we will recognize it inside borders defined by us (the two or three Bantustans). Now shut up. The game is over. The file is closed. And there’s nothing you or anybody else can do about it.”

And he, Netanyahu, would probably think but not say, “If you give us any trouble, we’ll have the lot of you removed to Jordan or wherever”.

Alan Hart

Alan Hart is a former ITN and BBC Panorama foreign correspondent who covered wars and conflicts wherever they were taking place in the world and specialized in the Middle East. Author of Zionism: The Real Enemy of the Jews: The False Messiah (Zionism, the Real Enemy of the Jews). He blogs on www.alanhart.net and tweets on www.twitter.com/alanauthor

See also:

President Obama’s opportunity to speak truth to power: Part 1

Open Letter to President Obama: Change the Rules of the Game

An Appeal to the American People

Zionism’s Jewish Enemy

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is in the US right now, and he has requested a meeting with President Obama. Watch this video to see Mr. Irvin Baxter explain how this meeting is prophetic in nature.

Prof. Chomsky discusses: e-media; the hypocritically selective nuclear hysteria; “sensibility” and “tragedy” within the ‘tea party movement’; cynical scapegoating, the natural inclinations of the human species; the business propaganda against government by those who embrace government; a world without war or a world without people; the evolution of the antiwar movement; the immoral elite debate on the Afghanistan occupation, campaign funding predicting policy; and the manufactured sectarian America.

Part One (9:56):

Part Two (9:56):

Part Three (9:56):

Part Four (9:56):

Part Five (9:56):

Part Six (9:56):

Part Seven (9:56):

Noam Chomsky is a libertarian socialist Institute Professor of Linguistics (Emeritus) at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, known as the ‘father of modern lingustics’, cognitive scientist, political activist, most cited living author of over 100 books on linguistics, political science and media, one of the world’s leading intellectuals and of an elite few in the history of the world to be at the top of two fields: linguistics and political science.

Professor Noam Chomsky on Obama’s Nobel Peace Prize at a time when the U.S. is drumming up false threats posed by Iran and escalating the war in Afghanistan.

5 Nov 09 | In These Times

The hopes and prospects for peace aren’t well aligned—not even close. The task is to bring them nearer. Presumably that was the intent of the Nobel Peace Prize committee in choosing President Barack Obama.

The prize “seemed a kind of prayer and encouragement by the Nobel committee for future endeavor and more consensual American leadership”, Steven Erlanger and Sheryl Gay Stolberg wrote in The New York Times.

The nature of the Bush-Obama transition bears directly on the likelihood that the prayers and encouragement might lead to progress.

The Nobel committee’s concerns were valid. They singled out Obama’s rhetoric on reducing nuclear weapons.

Right now Iran’s nuclear ambitions dominate the headlines. The warnings are that Iran may be concealing something from the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) and violating U.N. Security Council Resolution 1887, passed last month and hailed as a victory for Obama’s efforts to contain Iran.

Meanwhile, a debate continues on whether Obama’s recent decision to reconfigure missile-defense systems in Europe is a capitulation to the Russians or a pragmatic step to defend the West from Iranian nuclear attack.

Silence is often more eloquent than loud clamor, so let us attend to what is unspoken.

Amid the furor over Iranian duplicity, the IAEA passed a resolution calling on Israel to join the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (N.P.T.) and open its nuclear facilities to inspection.

The United States and Europe tried to block the IAEA resolution, but it passed anyway. The media virtually ignored the event.

The United States assured Israel that it would support Israel’s rejection of the resolution—reaffirming a secret understanding that has allowed Israel to maintain a nuclear arsenal closed to international inspections, according to officials familiar with the arrangements. Again, the media were silent.

Indian officials greeted U.N. Resolution 1887 by announcing that India “can now build nuclear weapons with the same destructive power as those in the arsenals of the world’s major nuclear powers”, the Financial Times reported.

Both India and Pakistan are expanding their nuclear weapons programs. They have twice come dangerously close to nuclear war, and the problems that almost ignited this catastrophe are very much alive.

Obama greeted Resolution 1887 differently. The day before he was awarded the Nobel Prize for his inspiring commitment to peace, the Pentagon announced it was accelerating delivery of the most lethal non-nuclear weapons in the arsenal: 13-ton bombs for B-2 and B-52 stealth bombers, designed to destroy deeply hidden bunkers shielded by 10,000 pounds of reinforced concrete.

It’s no secret the bunker busters could be deployed against Iran.

Planning for these “massive ordnance penetrators” began in the Bush years but languished until Obama called for developing them rapidly when he came into office.

Passed unanimously, Resolution 1887 calls for the end of threats of force and for all countries to join the N.P.T., as Iran did long ago. N.P.T. non-signers are India, Israel and Pakistan, all of which developed nuclear weapons with U.S. help, in violation of the N.P.T.

Iran hasn’t invaded another country for hundreds of years—unlike the United States, Israel and India (which occupies Kashmir, brutally).

The threat from Iran is minuscule. If Iran had nuclear weapons and delivery systems and prepared to use them, the country would be vaporized.

To believe Iran would use nuclear weapons to attack Israel, or anyone, “amounts to assuming that Iran’s leaders are insane” and that they look forward to being reduced to “radioactive dust,” strategic analyst Leonard Weiss observes, adding that Israel’s missile-carrying submarines are “virtually impervious to preemptive military attack,” not to speak of the immense U.S. arsenal.

In naval maneuvers in July, Israel sent its Dolphin class subs, capable of carrying nuclear missiles, through the Suez Canal and into the Red Sea, sometimes accompanied by warships, to a position from which they could attack Iran—as they have a “sovereign right” to do, according to U.S. Vice President Joe Biden.

Not for the first time, what is veiled in silence would receive front-page headlines in societies that valued their freedom and were concerned with the fate of the world.

The Iranian regime is harsh and repressive, and no humane person wants Iran—or anyone else—to have nuclear weapons. But a little honesty would not hurt in addressing these problems.

The Nobel Peace Prize, of course, is not concerned solely with reducing the threat of terminal nuclear war, but rather with war generally, and the preparation for war. In this regard, the selection of Obama raised eyebrows, not least in Iran, surrounded by U.S. occupying armies.

On Iran’s borders in Afghanistan and in Pakistan, Obama has escalated Bush’s war and is likely to proceed on that course, perhaps sharply.

Obama has made clear that the United States intends to retain a long-term major presence in the region. That much is signaled by the huge city-within-a city called “the Baghdad Embassy,” unlike any embassy in the world.

Obama has announced the construction of mega-embassies in Islamabad and Kabul, and huge consulates in Peshawar and elsewhere.

Nonpartisan budget and security monitors report in Government Executive that the “administration’s request for $538 billion for the Defense Department in fiscal 2010 and its stated intention to maintain a high level of funding in the coming years put the president on track to spend more on defense, in real dollars, than any other president has in one term of office since World War II. And that’s not counting the additional $130 billion the administration is requesting to fund the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan next year, with even more war spending slated for future years.”

The Nobel Peace Prize committee might well have made truly worthy choices, prominent among them the remarkable Afghan activist Malalai Joya.

This brave woman survived the Russians, and then the radical Islamists whose brutality was so extreme that the population welcomed the Taliban. Joya has withstood the Taliban and now the return of the warlords under the Karzai government.

Throughout, Joya worked effectively for human rights, particularly for women; she was elected to parliament and then expelled when she continued to denounce warlord atrocities. She now lives underground under heavy protection, but she continues the struggle, in word and deed. By such actions, repeated everywhere as best we can, the prospects for peace edge closer to hopes.

Noam Chomsky is a libertarian socialist Institute Professor of Linguistics (Emeritus) at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, known as the ‘father of modern lingustics’, cognitive scientist, political activist, most cited living author of over 100 books on linguistics, political science and media, one of the world’s leading intellectuals and of an elite few in the history of the world to be at the top of two fields: linguistics and political science.

Soon after the U.S. House adopted a resolution to denounce the Goldstone Report, the Israeli Army chief of staff threatened a new offensive against Gazan civilians. We can officially say that there are at least 344 Neo-Con’s in the lower house of Congress.

Tuesday, the U.S. House voted to approved a resolution denouncing the Goldstone Report, the fact-finding mission endorsed by the U.N. Human Rights Council which found the Israeli government and Hamas committed war crimes during Operation Cast Lead. The so-called “conflict”—better known as the ‘U.S.-Israeli Gaza Massacre’—resulted in over 1,400 Palestinian and 13 Israeli deaths, the ‘wanton destruction‘ of almost 40,000 Gazan homes and left tens of thousands homeless. Of the nearly 1,200 dead non-combatants, hundreds were children.

The Gaza Massacre began less than two months after Israel broke a four-month ceasefire between it and Hamas. While Americans and the rest of the world were anointing so-called “change” to lead the world, Israel Defence Forces (I.D.F.) raided Gaza in the middle of the night, killing six Hamas  forces.

H.R. 867, a resolution “calling on the president and the secretary of state to oppose unequivocally any endorsement or further consideration of the ‘Report of the United Nations Fact Finding Mission on the Gaza Conflict’”,  passed with 344 ‘yeas’ and 22 voting ‘present’.

Of the war criminal coddlers voting ‘yea’ were 179 Democrats and 130 Republicans. Of the so-called ‘liberals’ in the Congressional Progressive Caucus voting ‘yea’ included: Barney Frank (D-MA), Robert Wexler (D-FL), Alan Grayson (D-FL), Jesse Jackson, Jr. (D-IL), Jan Schakowsky (D-IL), Henry Waxman (D-CA), Charlie Rangel (D-NY), Bobby Rush (D-IL), Jerry Nadler (D-NY), Carolyn Maloney (D-NY), Jose Serrano (D-NY), Alcee Hastings (D-FL), Corrine Brown (D-FL), Phil Hare (D-IL), Danny Davis (D-IL).

(Notice the three common states shared by all but Mr. Frank. Can you say ‘in the pocket of the Israel Lobby’? Or ‘K Street whore’ for Mr. Grayson?)

Of the 36 ‘nays’ was Rep. Dennis Kucinich (D-OH), who dissented: “Almost as serious as committing war crimes is covering up war crimes, pretending that war crimes were never committed and did not exist.

“Because behind every such deception is the nullification of humanity, the destruction of human dignity, the annihilation of the human spirit, the triumph of Orwellian thinking, the eternal prison of the dark heart of the totalitarian.” (2:22):

Rep. Steny Hoyer (D-MD), the House Majority Leader, called the GoldStone Report  “unfair, unbalanced and inaccurate” in support of the resolution co-sponsored by Rep. Howard Berman (D-CA) and Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (D-FL) the two senior members of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, the Associated Press reports.

“AIPAC, in concert with every mainstream pro-Israel organization in the United States, supports this important resolution,” said Josh Block, a spokesman for the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, Glenn Kessler reported at The Washington Post last week.

Rep. Keith Ellison (D-MN), who headed the opposition to the resolution, said it should’ve been opposed because “it suppresses inquiry” which he says is a “hallmark of democratic societies”. This is true as a truly democratic society is one where individuals have a role in the decision-making processes in process to the degree to which the decision affects them. For such processes to exist, people must have the freedom to effectively scrutinize—through “inquiry”—all individuals and bodies of authority which assert power and use force. Democracy does not exist in U.S. politics. Nor does it exist in Israel’s.

Mr. Ellison called on his colleagues to read the Report—D.C.-talk for ‘you’re voting based on lobbyists, not facts’. The Israel Lobby is among the strongest in Washington, D.C.

He stated the resolution “goes against President Obama’s foreign policy direction”, but facts prove the contrary. On top of an overt willingness to enable Israel’s war crimes, Mr. Obama has actively covered-up violations of international law by the Bush Administration to not hinder his own.

Covering up U.S.-Israel war crimes

While taking a stand on future uses of torture by the U.S., Mr. Obama refuses to invalidate the “torture memos” used by the Bush Administration to justify its violations of the Convention Against Torture and the Geneva Conventions. An inspector general’s report recently found the Central Intelligence Agency (C.I.A.) covered up murder, performed mock executions on detainees, and threatened to rape and kill their wives and children on top of using the “Enhanced Interrogation Techniques”—called “torture” and “illegal” any place away from the memos of the White House Office of Legal Counsel.

Today, the Obama Administration was “disappointed” with an Italian court convicting 23 Americans—including 22 C.I.A. agents—tried in absentia for the 2003 illegal kidnapping of Osama Mustafa Hassan, a Muslim cleric, in Milan. The agents shipped the imam off to be tortured repeatedly until 2007 in Egypt—a loyal client-state of the U.S., whose 28-year dictator Mr. Obama  recently called a “force for stability and good“.

The day after banning torture, Mr. Obama ordered airstrikes in Pakistan using unmanned drones without a declaration of war from Congress—airstrikes with U.N. human rights investigators say “may violate international law”. Citing Jane Mayer at The New Yorker on October 19, Kelley B. Vlahos wrote that the Obama Administration has taken the Bush Administration’s Predator drone program and “jacked it up with steroids” as “the number of Obama-authorized strikes in Pakistan equals the sum launched by the Bush Administration—in the last three years of his tenure”.

Over the last three years, only 14 of the nearly 700 killed by U.S. drones have been militants. For every terrorist killed, nearly 49 civilians are murdered. Knowing this, “only six of the forty-one C.I.A. drone strikes conducted by the Obama Administration in Pakistan have targeted al-Qa’ida”. Ms. Mayer reported.  Targeting non-combatants is exactly what international humanitarian law focuses on condemning.

In the two wars Mr. Obama has been leading in 2009, 886 civilians were killed in Afghanistan from February to July [.pdf] and 2,629 in Iraq from February to August, Brian Doherty posted at the Reason blog. (h/t: Angela Keaton)

Ha’aretz, a mainstream Israel daily publication, reported Mr. Obama “surprised” Israeli President Shimon Peres’ recent gala with a recorded message calling the U.S.-Israel relationship “a bond that is much more than a strategic alliance”—calling Israel an “extraordinary example how courage and perseverance help shape the future”.

Susan Rice, U.S. ambassador to the U.N., “promised that the United States will continue to stand by Israel as a loyal friend in the fight against the Goldstone Report”, Johnathan Lis reported at Ha’aretz.

The watered-down 575-page report found Israel “terrorized” Palestinians during the Gaza Massacre earlier this year. Israel “used disproportionate force, deliberately targeted civilians and used Palestinian civilians as human shields”, the fact-finding mission concluded.

The Report is the result of a fact-finding mission sponsored by the U.N. Human Rights Council that was headed by self-proclaimed Zionist Judge Richard Goldstone of South Africa. The Report that if the government of Israel and the Palestinian Authority don’t conduct independent investigations into war crimes committed by the (I.D.F.) and Hamas during Israel 22-day massacre of Gazans, facts found should move to international bodies—the U.N. Security Council, the International Criminal Court at The Hague.

Enabling new unlawful threats of force

Gabi Ashkenazi, chief of staff of the Israeli Army “threatened a new offensive against the Hamas-run Gaza Strip, suggesting attacks on civilian targets”, Press TV reports, adding: “He said the Israeli army could be fighting in cities, mosques, hospitals, schools and even kindergartens, blaming the indiscriminate warfare and a likely targeting of civilians on Palestinian resistance fighters.” The manufactured cause pushed is that Hamas is “hiding weaponry in public buildings and residential areas”.

The U.S.-Israel-Egypt blockade on Gaza has transformed it in a de facto concentration camp. “Most food products and other goods, including construction material desperately needed to rebuild Gaza’s infrastructure devastated by Israeli bombing during the war in January, are forbidden,” as Mel Frykberg regularly reports at Inter Press Service.

Barely able to access food, water, goods to make a living that is most regularly of what’s smuggled through tunnels, Israel acts as if Gazans are ignoring their hunger and poverty to build up a force to challenge Israel—with whom Mr. Obama, in continuity with decades-old U.S. rejectionist policy to supply and blindly throw full support behind the I.D.F., has “a bond that is much more than a strategic alliance”.

Ms. Rice is leading the push by the Obama Administration and Israel for the U.N. General Assembly to block a hearing on the Goldstone Report to reach the U.N. Security Council (UNSC), al Jazeera reports (2:32):

‘Neo-Con’ is a bipartisan word

The Report will most likely reach the UNSC and the U.S. knows this. The Administration is just displaying continuity reinforced by Congress in preparation for the inevitable veto of any resolution to condemn Israel’s war crimes—as the U.S. has done routinely for decades, being a permament member with such power on the UNSC.

Given Mr. Obama’s support for the Gaza Massacre, denouncement of the Goldstone Report and continued military welfare to Israel larger than that to any other nation-state in the world, it would be no surprise were the U.S. to support Israel once again “fighting in cities, mosques, hospitals, schools and even kindergartens” and using legal and illegal weaponery from the U.S. to do so.

Gideon Levy, Ha’aretz columnist, wrote an article last weekend titled, “America, Stop Sucking Up to Israel,” saying of Mr. Obama’s rhetoric—parallel to all prior U.S. presidents who never cut back on coddling or military welfare for Israel—that “a persuasive speech won’t persuade anyone to end the occupation” of Palestine, adding:

Before no other country on the planet does the United States kneel and plead like this. In other trouble spots, America takes a different tone. It bombs in Afghanistan, invades Iraq and threatens sanctions against Iran and North Korea. Did anyone in Washington consider begging Saddam Hussein to withdraw from occupied territory in Kuwait?

But Israel the occupier, the stubborn contrarian that continues to mock America and the world by building settlements and abusing the Palestinians, receives different treatment. Another massage to the national ego in one video, more embarrassing praise in another.

Now is the time to say to the United States: Enough flattery. If you don’t change the tone, nothing will change. As long as Israel feels the United States is in its pocket, and that America’s automatic veto will save it from condemnations and sanctions, that it will receive massive aid unconditionally, and that it can continue waging punitive, lethal campaigns without a word from Washington, killing, destroying and imprisoning without the world’s policeman making a sound, it will continue in its ways.

“It’s simply impossible to imagine that sort of harsh and blunt critique being voiced by any establishment political commentator or national politician in the U.S.,” Glenn Greenwald writes at Salon. “In fact, one finds the exact opposite trend of the one Levy advocates.”

“The U.S. is unwilling merely to demand from Israel a cessation of activity which is illegal in the eyes of the entire world and destructive to American interests,” he adds:

Any decent human being would react with horror and disgust at such a report [as the Goldstone Report] and demand a full investigation and accountability. But the members of Congress in both parties—predictably—are doing the opposite:  they’re condemning the report itself, demonizing those who prepared it, and demanding that investigations be suppressed.  As Levy says, why would Israel ever feel constrained to stop any of its behavior when it knows that the U.S. Government is unwilling and/or unable to do anything but subserviently cheer it on?…

As this highly revealing exchange between Hillary Clinton and Pakistani journalists over the meaning of “terrorism” reflects, nothing destroys our efforts to improve our image in the Muslim world as these blatant double standards do (blatant, that is, to virtually everyone outside of the U.S. and much of Western Europe).  Even Iran’s dissident leaders point to America’s double standards on Israel to justify their own government’s conduct.  It’s so obvious as to require no explanation that we cannot and will not be taken seriously in our campaigns against “terrorism” and “war crimes” when we are not only willing, but eager, to exempt ourselves and Israel from those sermons.  But after some initial, impressive steps from Obama, we are continuing to do that as much as ever, probably to Israel’s detriment and certainly to our own.

Alexander Cockburn, editor and publisher of Counterpunch, tells the story of then-U.S. President George W. Bush asking his father, Fmr. U.S. President George H.W. Bush, in August 2006,”Dad, what’s a ‘Neo-Con’?”

Asked whether or not he wanted “names or a description”, the sitting president asked for a description.

“I’ll give it to you in one word,” Mr. Bush, the father, replied to his son. “Israel.”

This week, we received a head-count of at least 344 Neo-Con’s in the U.S. House of Representatives to go along with the war criminal in the Oval Office.

RELATED:

• Chomsky’s Lectern: Palestine and the Region in the Obama Era—The Emerging Framework (Video)
• U.S. to ‘Continue Standing By Israel’ War Crimes ‘as Loyal Friend’
• Norman Finkelstein on the U.S.-Israel Relationship (Video)
• Norman Finkelstein on the U.N. Report Finding Israel ‘Terrorized’ Palestinians and Committed War Crimes in Gaza Massacre (Video)
• Nobel Committee: War is Peace
• Obama Agrees to Continue Covering Up Israel Nukes
• VIDEO: Citizens Arrest Attempt of Former Israeli PM Ehud Olmert in San Francisco
• Amnesty Int’l Report: U.S.-Israel Gaza Massacre — 22 Days of Death and Destruction
• Israel and the US (Video)

Historian and writer Tariq Ali and Professor Noam Chomsky speak in London 29 October 2009 on U.S. hypocrisy toward Iran,  U.S. occupation of Iraq and Afghanistan, the Israeli occupation of Palestine, the U.S. role as Israel’s enabler and ‘mafia godfather’, Palestinian leadership’s ‘collaboration’ with the U.S. and Israel against a ’solution’, international law, the hopes for peace in the near future and the double game the Obama Administration plays with its rhetoric and contrary actions. Mr. Ali begins speaking around the 7:00 mark, Prof Chomsky around the 21:00 mark and a Q&A follows where he suggests a “no-state solution” as “the best solution for the whole world”. (1:57:40):

Noam Chomsky: No Change in U.S. ‘Mafia Principle’

by Mamoon Alabbasi

1 Nov 09 | Middle East Online

As civilised people across the world breathed a sigh of relief to see the back of former U.S. president George W. Bush, top American intellectual Noam Chomsky warned against assuming or expecting significant changes in the basis of Washington’s foreign policy under President Barack Obama.

During two lectures organised by the School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS) in London, Chomsky cited numerous examples of the driving doctrines behind U.S. foreign policy since the end of World War II.

“As Obama came into office, Condoleezza Rice predicted that he would follow the policies of Bush’s second term, and that is pretty much what happened, apart from a different rhetorical style,” said

“But it is wise to attend to deeds, not rhetoric. Deeds commonly tell a different story,” he added.

“There is basically no significant change in the fundamental traditional conception that we if can control Middle East energy resources, then we can control the world,” explained Chomsky.

Chomsky said that a leading doctrine of U.S. foreign policy during the period of its global dominance is what he termed as “the Mafia principle.”

“The Godfather does not tolerate ’successful defiance’. It is too dangerous. It must therefore be stamped out so that others understand that disobedience is not an option,” said Chomsky.

Because the U.S. sees “successful defiance” of Washington as a “virus” that will “spread contagion,” he explained.

Iran

The U.S. had feared this “virus” of independent thought from Washington by Tehran and therefore acted to overthrow the Iranian parliamentary democracy in 1953.

“The goal in 1953 was to retain control of Iranian resources,” said Chomsky.

However, “in 1979 the [Iranian] virus emerged again. The U.S. at first sought to sponsor a military coup; when that failed, it turned to support Saddam Hussein’s merciless invasion [of Iran].”

“The torture of Iran continued without a break and still does, with sanctions and other means,” said Chomsky.

“The U.S. continued, without a break, its torture of Iranians,” he stressed.

Nuclear attack

Chomsky mocked the idea presented by mainstream media that a future-nuclear-armed Iran may attack already-nuclear-armed Israel.

“The chance of Iran launching a missile attack, nuclear or not, is about at the level of an asteroid hitting the earth—unless, of course, the ruling clerics have a fanatic death wish and want to see Iran instantly incinerated along with them,” said Chomsky, stressing that this is not the case.

Chomsky further explained that the presence of U.S. anti-missile weapons in Israel are really meant for preparing a possible attack on Iran, and not for self-defence, as it is often presented.

“The systems are advertised as defense against an Iranian attack. But …the purpose of the U.S. interception systems, if they ever work, is to prevent any retaliation to a U.S. or Israeli attack on Iran—that is, to eliminate any Iranian deterrent,” said Chomsky.

Iraq

Chomsky reminded the audience of America’s backing of former Iraqi President Saddam Hussein during and even after Iraq’s war with Iran.

“The Reaganite love affair with Saddam did not end after the [Iran-Iraq] war. In 1989, Iraqi nuclear engineers were invited to the United States, then under Gorge Bush I, to receive advanced weapons’ training,” said Chomsky.

This support continued while Saddam was committing atrocities against his own people, until he fell out of U.S. favour when in 1990 he invaded Kuwait, an even closer alley of Washington.

“In 1990, Saddam defied, or more likely misunderstood orders, and he quickly shifted from favourite friend to the reincarnation of Hitler,” Chomsky added.

Then the people of Iraq were subjected to “genocidal” U.S.-backed sanctions.

Chomsky explained that although the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq in 2003, which was launched under many false pretexts and lies, was a ” major crime”, many critics of the invasion—including Obama—viewed it as merely as “a mistake” or a “strategic blunder”.

“It’s probably what the German general staff was telling Hitler after Stalingrad,” he said

“There’s nothing principled about it. It wasn’t a strategic blunder: it was a major crime,” he added.

Chomsky credited the holding of elections in Iraq in 2005 to popular Iraqi demand, despite initial U.S. objection.

The US military, he argued, could kill as many Iraqi insurgents as it wished, but it was more difficult to shoot at non-violent protesters in the streets out on the open, which meant Washington at times had to give in to public Iraqi pressure.

But despite being pressured to announce a withdrawal from Iraq, the U.S. continues to seek a long term presence in the country.

The U.S. mega-embassy in Baghdad is to be expanded under Obama, noted Chomsky.

Optimism

Chomsky stressed that public pressure in the ‘West’ can make a positive difference for people suffering from the aggression of ‘Western’ governments.

“There is a lot of comparison between opposition to the Iraq war with opposition to the Vietnam war, but people tend to forget that at first there was almost no opposition to the Vietnam war,” said Chomsky.

“In the Iraq war, there were massive international protests before it officially stated… and it had an effect. The United Sates could not use the tactics used in Vietnam: there was no saturation bombing by B-52s, so there was no chemical warfare—[the Iraq war was] horrible enough, but it could have been a lot worse,” he said.

“And furthermore, the Bush administration had to back down on its war aims, step by step,” he added.

“It had to allow elections, which it did not want to do: mainly a victory for non-Iraqi protests. They could kill insurgents; they couldn’t deal hundreds of thousands of people in the streets. Their hands were tied by the domestic constraints. They finally had to abandon—officially at least—virtually all the war aims,” said Chomsky.

“As late as November 2007, the U.S. was still insisting that the ‘Status of Forces Agreement’ allow for an indefinite U.S. military presence and privileged access to Iraq’s resources by U.S. investors—well they didn’t get that on paper at least. They had to back down. OK, Iraq is a horror story but it could have been a lot worse,” he said

“So yes, protests can do something. When there is no protest and no attention, a power just goes wild, just like in Cambodia and northern Louse,” he added.

Turkey

Chomsky said that Turkey could become a “significant independent actor” in the region, if it chooses to.

“Turkey has to make some internal decisions: is it going to face west and try to get accepted by the European Union or is it going to face reality and recognise that Europeans are so racist that they are never going to allow it in?,” said Chomsky.

The Europeans “keep raising the barrier on Turkish entry to the E.U.,” he explained.

But Chomsky said Turkey did become an independent actor in March 2003 when it followed its public opinion and did not take part in the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq.

Turkey took notice of the wishes of the overwhelming majority of its population, which opposed the invasion.

But ‘New Europe’ was led by Berlusconi of Italy and Aznar of Spain, who rejected the views of their populations—which strongly objected to the Iraq war—and preferred to follow Bush, noted Chomsky.

So, in that sense Turkey was more democratic than states that took part in the war, which in turn infuriated the U.S..

Today, Chomsky added, Turkey is also acting independently by refusing to take part in the U.S.-Israeli military exercises.

Fear factor

Chomsky explained that although ‘Western’ government use “the maxim of Thucydides” (‘the strong do as they wish, and the weak suffer as they must’), their peoples are hurled via the “fear factor”.

Via cooperate media and complicit intellectuals, the public is led to believe that all the crimes and atrocities committed by their governments is either “self defence” or “humanitarian intervention”.

NATO

Chomsky noted that Obama has escalated Bush’s war in Afghanistan, using NATO.

NATO is also seen as reinforcing U.S. control over energy supplies.

But the U.S. also used NATO to keep Europe under control.

“From the earliest post-World War days, it was understood that Western Europe might choose to follow an independent course,” said Chomsky.”NATO was partially intended to counter this serious threat,” he added.

Middle East oil

Chomsky explained that Middle East oil reserves were understood to be “a stupendous source of strategic power” and “one of the greatest material prizes in world history,” the most “strategically important area in the world,” in Eisenhower’s words.

Control of Middle East oil would provide the United States with “substantial control of the world.”

This meant that the U.S. “must support harsh and brutal regimes and block democracy and development” in the Middle East.

Somalia

Chomsky tackled the origins of the Somali piracy issue.

“Piracy is not nice, but where did it come from?”

Chomsky explained that one of the immediate reasons for piracy is European counties and others are simply “destroying Somalia’s territorial waters by dumping toxic waste—probably nuclear waste—and also by overfishing.”

“What happens to the fishermen in Somalia? They become pirates. And then we’re all upset about the piracy, not about having created the situation,” said Chomsky.

Chomsky went on to cite another example of harming Somalia.

“One of the great achievements of the war on terror, which was greatly hailed in the press when it was announced, was closing down an Islamic charity—Barakat—which was identified as supporting terrorists.

“A couple of months later… the [U.S.] government quietly recognised that they were wrong, and the press may have had a couple of lines about it—but meanwhile, it was a major blow against Somalia. Somalia doesn’t have much of an economy but a lot of it was supported by this charity: not just giving money but running banks and businesses, and so on.

“It was a significant part of the economy of Somalia…closing it down… was another contributing factor to the breaking down of a very weak society…and there are other examples.”

Darfur

Chomsky also touched on Sudan’s Darfur region.

“There are terrible things going on in Darfur, but in comparison with the region they don’t amount to a lot unfortunately—like what’s going on in eastern Congo is incomparably worse than in Darfur.

“But Darfur is a very popular topic for Western humanists because you can blame it on an enemy – you have to distort a lot but you can blame it on ‘Arabs’, ‘bad guys’,” he explained.

“What about saving eastern Cong where maybe 20 times as many people have been killed? Well, that gets kind of tricky… for people who… are using minerals from eastern Congo that obtained by multinationals sponsoring militias which slaughter and kill and get the minerals,” he said.

Or the fact that Rwanda is simply the worst of the many agents and it is a U.S. alley, he added.

Goldstone’s Gaza report

Chomsky appeared to have agreed with Israel that the Goldstone report on the Gaza war was bias, only he saw it as biased in favour of Israel.

The Goldstone report had acknowledged Israel’s right to self-defence, although it denounced the method this was conducted.

Chomsky stressed that the right to self-defence does not mean resorting to military force before “exhausting peaceful means”, something Israel did not even contemplate doing.

In fact, Chomsky points out, it was Israel who broke the ceasefire with Hamas and refused to extend it, as continuing the siege of Gaza itself is an act of war.

As for the current stalled Mideast peace process, Chomsky said that despite adopting a tougher tone towards Israel than that of Bush, Obama made no real effort to pressure Israel to live up to its obligations.

In the absence of the threat of cutting U.S. aid for Israel, there is no compelling reason why Tel Aviv should listen to Washington.

What can be done?

Chomsky stressed that despite all the obstacles, public pressure can and does make a difference for the better, urging people to continue activism and spreading knowledge.

“There is no reason to be pessimistic, just realistic.”

Chomsky noted that public opinion in the U.S. and Britain is increasingly becoming more aware of the crimes committed by Israel.

“Public opinion is shifting substantially.”

And this is where a difference can be made, because Israel will not change its policies without pressure from the ‘West’.

“There is a lot to do in Western countries… primarily in the U.S.”

Chomsky also stressed the importance of taking legal action in ‘Western’ countries against companies breaking international law via illegitimate dealings with Israel, citing the possible involvement of British Gas in Israeli theft of natural gas off the coast of Gaza, as one example that should be investigated.

In conclusion of one of the lectures, Chomsky quoted Antonio Gramsci who famously called for “pessimism of the intellect, optimism of the will.”

The United Nations Security Council voted unanimously on Thursday to extend the arms embargo on the Ivory Coast (otherwise known as Côte d’Ivoire) for a year.
In addition, the 15-member council renewed a ban on exporting diamonds and foreign travel, as well as an asset freeze for persons who are discovered to have violated human rights or disrupting the peace. “[...] the situation in the Ivory Coast continues to pose a threat to international peace and security in the region,” the council said.
The largest producer of cocoa in the world, Ivory Coast has been in turmoil ever since rebels attempted to overthrow president Laurent Gbagboin 2002, which soon escalated into a civil war. The UN implemented an arms embargo against the country in 2004, after a ceasefire between rebels and government forces was violated.
The Security Council said that the sanctions would remain in place until October 31 of next year, but that it would review its measures three months after presidential elections are held. Elections in Ivory Coast are scheduled for November 29; however, authorities said that it is unlikely that the polls will be held at that date, citing preparation delays.
Ilahiri Djedje, the Ivory Coast’s ambassador to the UN, expressed his disappointment at the council’s decision. “[We] had expected to today obtain a clear commitment by the Security Council in favor of a lifting of sanctions following the presidential elections,” he said. “There is no reason why individual sanctions should be maintained. The resolution adopted today is not tailored to assist Ivorians in their process of reconciliation.”

By Faisal Assegaf

In fact US President Barack Hussein Obama surprised, absolutely for global society. Most likely no one in this universe has previously predicted on October 9 he will receive the Nobel Prize for Peace at his nine months in power. Nobel committee in Oslo, Norway, argued that he has done great efforts to create a world free of nuclear weapons and a better situation of international relations, especially in term of relationship between his country and the Muslim world.

It is a hasty assessment to conclude that Obama’s policy on world peace will be successful. There’s no one of those two great ideas has been emerged. Five permanent members of the United Nations Security Council added with India, Pakistan, Israel, Iran, and North Korea still have nuclear power. The relationship between the US and Islam is not harmonic yet. So, definitely he also upset and the controversy of his Nobel sparked.

Both ambitions are like a dream. How come this first US black president call for free nuclear weapons but they still have its stock. Obviously, the US has to be a good sample thus other nuclear countries can trust his good plan. But it must be sure Washington has no willingness to be the first country to dispel their nuclear weapons.

It’s quiet funny that the US has prohibited Iran and North Korea from having nuclear technology. Since the first period of former president George Walker Bush regime, they have strongly campaigned to urge international community to repress both countries. The White House viewed anti-communist Pyongyang and anti-Zionist Tehran as threat against world peace because was believed to have nuclear weapons.

In the case of India and Pakistan, the problem is so complicated to be resolved. Both neighbouring countries have fought three times in war since Pakistan separated from India in 1947. The prolong conflict caused by claim of Kashmir has implicated on the suspicious relationship between them. Therefore, nuclear power are needed to prevent from they strike each other.

Also, Obama’s call will be underestimated because their doubled standard on Israel. They White House has never condemned or expressed their suspicion that the Zionist state has nuclear weapons. The world has been shown strong evidences. Mordechai Vanunu, a nuclear expert had worked at Dimona reactor in Negev desert revealed that Israel has 200 nuclear heads. Because of his actions, Vanunu has been in jail for 18 years and now banned to go out of East Jerusalem. Israel surely will not destroy their nuclear weapons because live rounded by Arabian countries which become their enemies.

Also, second d dream is quiet hard to be achieved as long as Palestinians don’t gain their independence. This is issue in the only key to pass into a harmonic situation of the relationship between the US and its allies with Muslim countries and the creation of peace in the Middle East. In a meeting with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in the White House last May, this US 44th president proposed a plan to create an independent Palestinian state at last in the next three years.

Full support and special relationship between the US and Israel has triggered emergence of groups that oppose both countries, like Hamas in Palestine, Hizbullah in Libanon, also Al-Qaidah and Taliban in Afghanistan and Pakistan. Obama should be ready to face drop popularity among Muslim countries because he would move the battle field from Iraq to Afghanistan.

But Obama’s strong efforts to reconcile the two sides that fought in more than six decade conflict failed. Several visits by US envoy for Middle East George Mitcheel and US Foreign Minister Hillary Rodham Clinton to Middle East have no result. Otherwise, he has been ashamed because Netanyahu rejected his demand to suspend Jewish settlement building in East Jerusalem. Obama thought this issue is very important because it has become final condition back to negotiation process as requested by President of Palestinian Authority and also Fatah leader Mahmud Rida Abbas.

Jewish settlement is a Tel Aviv strategy to expel Palestinians from East Jerusalem, a holy city for three religions – Islam, Jewish, and Christian – was dreamed to be capital city of future Palestinian state. Though breaking international law, the David Star state has stated Jerusalem as their eternal and undivided capital city through Jerusalem Basic Law was passed by Knesset (parliament of Israel) in 1980. All government offices, including Netanyahu’s official residents have moved to Jerusalem. As substitution, Israel has offered Abu Dis in East Jerusalem suburb to be capital city of future Palestinian state.

The issue should not be his top priority. Obama earlier has to establish the unity between Hamas and Fatah. Their division has been triggered by the rejection of the US and Israel against Hamas regime that won election in 25 January 2006. They labeled Hamas as a terrorist organization. Reconciliation of those two biggest factions in Palestine is so necessary to negotiate with the Jewish state.

Also, this mission is restraint by Israeli aggressiveness against Palestinians. Obama must immediately end the isolation on Gaza Strip has caused about 1.5 million residents died slowly. It caused by shortages of food, electricity, water, fuels, medicines, and other materials. Their bad situation becomes worse after Israel has bombed the region for 22 days and killed more than 1,400 people, a half of children and women. Israel argued that military aggression as a conviction for rocket attacks fired by Hamas and Islamic Jihad fighters to southern Israel. Definitely, their impacts and destructions are not level.

The President from Democrat Party must stop and demolish the project of Separation Wall in West Bank. The apartheid wall building has robbed Palestinian lands. Palestinians freedom has been restraint by around 650 Israeli military checkpoints becomes tighter. The 750 kilometer long wall has only one gate in every town and city passed. Also, they would be monitored by 24 hours towers and surveillance aircrafts.

So, with no achievements, Obama should not be chosen for the Nobel Prize. If excellent ideas and great efforts were considered, Richard Goldstone heading a UN fact finding team in Gaza is a suitable nominee. It’s the first time the United Nations investigated a war involving Israel that should be praised.

The result is so surprisingly. The 575 pages report was arranged by Goldstone and his four member team concluded that Israel and Hamas committed war crimes in the war. The report recommended to the UN Security Council to order Israeli government and Palestinian Authority conducting an independent investigation about the report. If no results in six months, the case should be referred to the International Criminal Tribunal in Den Haag, Netherland. A week after announcement of the report, Obama regime said it’s unjust report because more highlighted Israeli war crimes than Hamas ones.

The second nominee might be Egyptian Presiden Husni Mubarak. In the last three years, he has done what Obama not yet done is mediation of negotiations between Palestine-Israel, Hamas-Israel, and Hamas-Fatah, though no results. He sometimes allows supplies of necessities brought into Gaza through Rafah border. The US always takes Egypt as their counterpart to revive peace process between Palestine and Israel. Because of its much importance, Obama has chosen Cairo as a place to convey his messages about a new relationship with Muslim world, a speech praised by many sides.

International community may put so high hopes on Obama. But the Nobel Prize for him in his first year with no achievements is too premature.

Published on Koran Tempo daily, October 26, 2009.

Creative commons - owned by Daniella Zalcman

The news that Iran may renege on its agreement to transfer its uranium stockpile overseas for refinement has put the imminent talks in Geneva on October 25th in jeopardy of failing.

The announcement comes as opposition mounts inside Iran towards the abandonment of domestic processing, with many viewing it as a concession to Western demands.

The most vociferous opponents of the nuclear deal are those in powerful positions in the government, such as Ali Larijani, Speaker of the Iranian Parliament, who many perceive as Ahmadinejad’s right-hand man.

Other sections of Iranian society also condemned the talks as a Western plot to pacify the ‘Iranian Spirit’  such as the late General Shoustari, Deputy Commander of the The Revolutionary Guards Ground Forces, who was killed in the recent suicide bombing orchestrated by the Jundullah movement.

It is therefore clear that the proposed nuclear deal is in danger of collapse, a supposition reinforced by the emergence of a counter-offer proposed by Ali Asghar Soltanieh, Iran’s Envoy to the UN Nuclear Watchdog.

Yet more negotiations

The new agreement would entail Iran purchasing and importing highly enriched uranium from other nuclear powers and utilising it in Tehran’s Medical Reactor. This measure would not only fail to reduce Iran’s existing low-enriched uranium, but it would also require the annulment of several existing UN sanctions on imports.

Such a situation will test the resolve of Obama and his allies that seek to remove the threat of a Iranian nuclear deterrent, a move which may require their acquiescence to Ahmadinejad’s new demands. Any reluctance or hesitation on the part of the Western powers will be surely induce the immediate collapse of negotiations regarding the ‘nuclearisation’ of Iran.

It seems prudent, therefore, to speculate on the alternative options available to Western powers should Iran abrogate on the inital proposition presented by the E3 +3:

1) A Military Strike – This option would be vehemently supported by Israel, who have openly declared that an Iran with nuclear weapons would represent a ‘lethal entity in their midst that would require immediate extinguishing’.

The success of a military strike seems limited seeing that the nuclear plant at Qom is housed 600m inside a mountain and other nuclear sites are heavily reinforced with anti-aircraft and anti-missile technology (The latter supplied by China and Russia).

Secondly, any air strike that does not entirely destroy Iran’s missile compliment - Israeli intelligence indicates that Iran may have up to 12 concealed missile silos- will result in severe and relentless retaliation from missile launch sites throughout the country, some of which may be nuclear. An effective military strategy would also require the support of America, which may not be forthcoming given their precarious position in both Iraq and Afghanistan.

A final caveat in this plan would be the fallout with other Arabian nations in the region. Israel is all ready despised by the vast majority of the Middle-East and a military manoeuvre against Iran now would surely alienate them further. Israel would also require permission to cross international air-space to commence an attack, which many countries would refuse.

2) Further Sanctions –  Another potential option is to implement further economic, financial and military sanctions. This idea was presented to the UN Security Council as the best way to deal with a belligerent Iran, before the outsourcing uranium enrichment to a European country was proposed.

This approach was criticised by China and Russia as ‘harsh’ and ‘disproportionate’ as it would directly affect Iranian civilians and not the government. Moreover, previous rafts of sanctions have had no discernable effect on Iran’s economy, military or regional influence. By administering new sanctions, Iran will have achieved a crucial victory by dividing the UN Security Council, which would also veto any notion of a military strike.

3) Full-Scale Invasion – This option was tabled by several members of the Senate Defence Committee under the presidency of George Bush. Several of these key individuals still reside on this panel, so the threat of an invasion by ground forces is still on the table.

This approach, however, is extremely unlikely given the prediction that it would take 900,000 infantry alone to capture Tehran and secure major cities throughout the country. Iran is a completely different entity to Iraq; They have a large, highly trained regular army, which would swell with conscripts on the news of an invasion by foreign forces – 500,000 regulars increasing to over 4,000,000 with initial conscription.

They also have the notorious Revolutionary Guard, as feared as they are revered. This coupled with a reliable, effective airforce and fervent support from the majority of the public would make any attempt at invasion disastrous and costly. Not a realistic option.

This is what invasion forces would have to contend with:

4) Appeasement - A policy of appeasement and acquiescence would save time and reduce the need for political rhetoric, but it will potentially result in a significant victory for Ahmadinejad.

This is a dangerous path to tread as history has taught us that no matter how innocuous and docile a formerly aggressive country appears, any weakness on your part will be seized upon. A lesson learnt so dearly by Neville Chamberlain and his stance towards Nazi Germany. We all know the outcome of that debacle, but the connotations of a conflict with Iran in 5, 10, 20 years time will not be confined to a select few countries, the entire world will be engulfed.

Conclusions

These four options are the most plausible at the current time, but it is hard to predict which would be the most effective. My personal opinion is that there is no definitive panacea to this problem, an anathema inherent to international relations.

The most feasible directive is to strike Iran now, while their military is disarray following the death of General Shoustari and several other key members of the Revolutionary Guard. Dissent is fomenting rebellion in certain quarters of the country, which could be exploited by covert operations in the build up to an air-strike on strategic targets.

In summary, any approach taken by the E3 + 3 will require considerable negotiation, discussion and thought as the consequences could not only jeopardise the impending talks in Geneva, but ignite a firestorm in an all ready volatile region.

The Electronic Intifada (ei): “Bay Area residents attempted a citizen’s arrest of former Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, while he gave a speech to the World Affairs Council in San Francisco on 22 October 2009. Twenty-two people were arrested for challenging Olmert directly and demanding he be tried for war crimes and crimes against humanity in the Gaza Strip and Lebanon.” (8:59):

Text of the arrest warrant here. From the press release supplied by Northern California Palestine justice groups (via ei):

Olmert ordered Israel’s brutal attacks on Gaza beginning in late December 2008, code-named Operation Cast Lead. Last week, the UN Human Rights Council passed a resolution endorsing the Goldstone report, an independent investigation into the Gaza operation, which found that Israel violated international law and possibly committed crimes against humanity.

“Israel is an apartheid state guilty of war crimes and its leaders should not be welcome in San Francisco,” said Lisa Nessan, a Jewish resident of Oakland, who has traveled several times to Israel and Palestine, most recently in May. “For the past 60 years, under leadership like Olmert’s, Israel has denied Palestinians their basic human rights, built settlements on their lands, and killed civilians—all to force them from their homeland.”

A lively protest also gathered across from the hotel in Union Square, where about 150 persons carried signs bearing the names and pictures of children killed during Operation Cast Lead. Olmert is making several appearances in the U.S. this month, and has been met with strong protests at locations including the University of Chicago and Tulane University in New Orleans. “We join with people around the world who believe that Israel and its leaders must be held accountable for their actions. Israel killed 1,400 people during its attacks on Gaza last winter alone, and many more have died or suffered from the effects of siege, occupation, and apartheid on their daily lives,” said Monadel Herzallah, a Palestinian activist who lives in Fairfield and whose 21-year-old cousin was killed in Gaza in January.

Organizers also expressed outrage that U.S. President Barack Obama has ignored the findings of the Goldstone report. The U.S. has pledged more than $3 billion each year in unrestricted aid to Israel. “Israel’s use of US aid and military equipment violates our own laws,” said Rae Abileah, an organizer with CODEPINK whose father is Israeli. “Why are we giving aid to a country that is destroying people’s homes and attacking civilians, while our own nation is struggling with unemployment and underfunded social services?”

Ali Abunimah, co-founder of ei, wrote at The Chicago Maroon—student newspaper at the University of Chicago—days after protesting the former prime minister’s speech at the university:

The killings of more than 3,000 Palestinians and Lebanese during Olmert’s three years in office are not mere differences of opinion to be challenged with a polite question written on a pre-screened note card. They are crimes for which Olmert is accountable before international law and public opinion….

When I and others verbally confronted Olmert, we stood for academic freedom, human rights, and justice, especially for hundreds of thousands of students deprived of those same rights by Olmert’s actions.

During Israel’s attack on Gaza last winter, schools and universities were among the primary targets. According to the Goldstone report, Israeli military attacks destroyed or damaged at least 280 schools and kindergartens. In total, 164 pupils and 12 teachers were killed, and 454 pupils and five teachers injured.

After the bombing, Olmert and Israel continued their attack on academic freedom, blocking educational supplies from reaching Gaza. Textbooks, notebooks, stationery, and computers are among the forbidden items. In September, Chris Gunness, spokesman for [U.N. Relief and Works Agency], the U.N. agency for Palestine refugees, publicly appealed to Israel to lift its ban on books and other supplies from reaching Gaza’s traumatized students.

Israel destroyed buildings at the Islamic University and other universities. According to the Goldstone report, these “were civilian, educational buildings and the Mission did not find any information about their use as a military facility or their contribution to a military effort that might have made them a legitimate target in the eyes of the Israeli armed forces.”…

Crimes against humanity are defined as “crimes that shock the conscience.” When the institutions with the moral and legal responsibility to punish and prevent the crimes choose complicit silence—-or, worse, harbor a suspected war criminal, already on trial for corruption in Israel, and present him to students as a paragon of “leadership”—then disobedience, if that is what it takes to break the silence, is an ethical duty. Instead of condemning them, the University should be proud that its students were among those who had the courage to stand up.

The editors of Little Alex in Wonderland, Alex and Sayyid, were in Hyde Park to protest at U. Chicago in solidarity against the Israel government’s crimes against humanity and its collaborators, the Obama Administration.

Recording and photography were banned at the prime minister’s request by U. Chicago. ei got footage anyway (7:32):

RELATED:

• Norman Finkelstein on the U.N. Report Finding Israel ‘Terrorized’ Palestinians and Committed War Crimes in Gaza Massacre (Video)
• U.S. to ‘Continue Standing By Israel’ War Crimes ‘as Loyal Friend’
• Gaza: A Prison by the Sea (Video)
• Amnesty Int’l Report: U.S.-Israel Gaza Massacre—22 Days of Death and Destruction
• Israel’s Credibility in Rejecting War Crimes Allegations Following Gaza Massacre (VIDEO)

The U.S. ambassador to the U.N. vowed to continue fighting the Goldstone Report which condemned Israel’s war crimes in the Gaza Massacre.

Ambassador Susan Rice “promised that the United States will continue to stand by Israel as a loyal friend in the fight against the Goldstone Report”, Johnathan Lis reports at Ha’aretz. The watered-down 575-page report found Israel “terrorized” Palestinians during the Gaza Massacre earlier this year.

“The U.N. Human Rights Council formally endorsed the report last week, with the U.S. one of the few nations to vote in opposition to it,” Jason Ditz, news editor at AntiWar.com, adds. “It has been referred to the Security Council [U.N.S.C.], but the U.S. is expected to use its veto power to prevent it from going any farther.”

Two of the other five permanent members of the U.N.S.C. with veto power, Russia and China, endorsed the Goldstone Report at the Human Rights Council, but are opposing further discussion, Mr. Lis reports.

The Goldstone Report found Israel and Hamas violated international law. Israel “used disproportionate force, deliberately targeted civilians and used Palestinian civilians as human shields”, the fact-finding mission concluded and recommended Israel and Hamas launch investigations within six months of recommendations would be sent to the International Criminal Court at The Hague.

Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu’s office released a statement pushing for a “worldwide campaign” to—instead—change the international laws of war, al Jazeera reports, adding the prime minister “has promised a lengthy fight to ‘delegitimize’ the findings by the U.N. commission” which concedes the current laws of war do not legitimize the terror inflicted by Israel on Gaza.

Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch (H.R.W.) are among the many non-governmental organizations which have compiled studies condemning Israel’s criminal conduct of ‘wanton destruction’ during its massacre of 1,200 Palestinian civilians—including police officers and hundreds of children—in Gaza over three weeks last December and January that left thousands homeless.

What the Israeli government termed, “Operation Cast Lead,” was condemned by Amnesty as “22 days of death and destruction”, finding:

The scale and intensity of the attacks on Gaza were unprecedented. Some 300 children and hundreds of other unarmed civilians who took no part in the conflict were among the 1,400 Palestinians killed by Israeli forces.

Most were killed with high-precision weapons, relying on surveillance drones which have exceptionally good optics, allowing those observing to see their targets in detail. Others were killed with imprecise weapons, including artillery shells carrying white phosphorus – not previously used in Gaza – which should never be used in densely populated areas.

Most were killed with high-precision weapons, relying on surveillance drones which have exceptionally good optics, allowing those observing to see their targets in detail. Others were killed with imprecise weapons, including artillery shells carrying white phosphorus – not previously used in Gaza – which should never be used in densely populated areas….

More than 3,000 homes were destroyed and some 20,000 damaged in Israeli attacks which reduced entire neighbourhoods of Gaza to rubble and left an already dire economic situation in ruins. Much of the destruction was wanton and could not be justified on grounds of “military necessity”.

H.R.W. reported of numerous unlawful abuses of white phosphorus and drones on the Gazan people. “The failure of the United States and European Union governments to endorse the report of the Gaza fact-finding mission sends a message that serious laws-of-war violations will be treated with kid gloves when committed by an ally,” H.R.W. said in a September press release.

The white phosphorus and drones illegally used are as manufactured in Israel as Israel’s F-16’s and Apache’s; they aren’t. Israel’s war machine is a direct product of U.S. welfare to the regime. Voting against a House Resolution supporting Israel during Operation Cast lead, Rep. Ron Paul (R-TX) said on the floor of Congress: “I am concerned that the weapons currently being used by Israel against the Palestinians in Gaza are made in America and paid for by American taxpayers…. What moral responsibility do we have for the violence in Israel and Gaza after having provided so much military support to one side?… Many innocent children are among the dead…. Such collective punishment is immoral. At the very least, the U.S. Congress should not be loudly proclaiming its support for the Israeli government’s actions in Gaza.”

al Jazeera and H.R.W. did a program on the “human cost of white phosphorus” looking into this, its unlawful usage during the Gaza Massacre and its lasting effects that will cause the civilian death toll to continue rising—especially among children.

Judge Richard Goldstone, the self-proclaimed Zionist who headed the U.N. fact-finding mission, is facing hatred from Likudnik sociopaths. Professor Norman Finkelstein, a Palestine-Israel scholar of Jewish heritage, discussed the Goldstone Report at Democracy Now!, but it’s more fitting to repost his interview at Russia Today from last February on the criticism he faces from Jews, what ended the Gaza Massacre and what motivates the Obama Administration to collaborate with Israel’s crimes (4:02):

Covering up this “Satanic client-state’s” crimes is another action on the long list of America’s history of rejectionism in—what Professor Noam Chomsky calls—its “mafia relationship” with Israel. Then-President-elect Obama asserted his rejectionist stance during the Gaza Massacre, asserting only “Israel’s right to defend itself” as a justification for its crimes against humanity.

“During the murderous assault, Obama remained silent apart from a few platitudes, because, he said, there is only one president—a fact that did not silence him on many other issues,” Prof Chomsky wrote, days after the president’s inagu-coronation. “His campaign did, however, repeat his statement that ‘if missiles were falling where my two daughters sleep, I would do everything in order to stop that’. He was referring to Israeli children, not the hundreds of Palestinian children being butchered by U.S. arms, about whom he could not speak, because there was only one president.”

Mr. Obama never mentioned Israel’s use of U.S. arms “in violation not only of international, but also U.S. law. Or Washington’s shipment of new arms to Israel right at the peak of the U.S.-Israeli attack, surely not unknown to Obama’s Middle East advisers.”

The torture did not stop in January. Israel continues a forceful blockade on Gaza under the guise of preventing arms smuggling. The truth is that Israel is enhancing the policy recommendation laid out in 1967 by its then-defence minister, Moshe Dayan—directed at the Palestinians: “You shall continue to live like dogs, and whoever wishes may leave, and we will see where this process leads.”

The Gazans can’t even leave now. A minute, insignificant number of people, journalists, food, medicine or other aid can get in and out because the American guns of Israel say so. “It’s a prison by the sea,” Scott Horton, host of AntiWar Radio says.

On the House floor that January day, Dr. Paul also expressed he was “appalled by the long-standing Israeli blockade of Gaza—a cruel act of war” with “the tremendous loss of life that has resulted from the latest Israeli attack that started last month”.

Mel Fryberg of Inter Press Service is one of the leading journalists on the blockade and reported in June: Forty international aid agencies and non-governmental organizations released a joint statement in condemnation of the blockade that are a result of “indiscriminate sanctions are affecting the entire 1.5 million population of Gaza, and ordinary women, children and the elderly are the first victims”, the statement says.

“Most food products and other goods, including construction material desperately needed to rebuild Gaza’s infrastructure devastated by Israeli bombing during the war in January, are forbidden,” Mr. Frykberg adds.

“The situation is desperate, devastating and unbearable. Each day that passes brings more misery and suffering,” John Ging, head of Gaza’s U.N. Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA), told Mr. Frykberg. When asked about the statement, he added: “We will not give up telling the truth. We have a responsibility to innocent civilians.

“We are convinced that if the policy and decision makers behind the blockade could witness the situation in Gaza first-hand, they would change their minds. Those who don’t believe what we are saying, we invite them to come to Gaza and see the situation for themselves first hand.”

The U.N. reports nearly a quarter of the humanitarian goods are able to get through the blockade compared to before, in 2007. Since then, Israel’s assaults have also exponentially increased the need.

UNRWA officials told Sen. John Kerry (D-MA) during his visit to Israel in February that pasta was on the list of banned items to enter the Gaza Strip with nuts, coffee, clothing, school textbooks, agricultural products—including seedlings, fertilizer and piping. “Fuel supplies and spare parts for Gaza’s sewage and water treatment plants and hospitals have also been severely restricted. This has forced tonnes of untreated sewage to be pumped into the sea on a daily basis thereby threatening Gaza’s underground drinking water supply,” Mr. Frykberg added.

Of the “critical water situation in Gaza“, he reported:

The UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) says 150,000 Gazans still remain affected by inadequate and unsafe water supply. Of these, about 50,000 remain without any water, while the remainder receive water only every five to six days.

The OCHA adds that approximately 28,000 children in the Gaza Strip have no access to piped water. An additional 56,000 children have access to water only every week or so.

Gaza’s Coast Municipalities Water Utility (CMWU), which handles water and sewage treatment, says the water crisis will continue until Israel allows sufficient spare parts and repair materials into Gaza.

Israel’s continuing blockade of the strip means that construction material, most spare parts and repair materials have been prevented from entering. This has made it impossible to rebuild the thousands of destroyed and damaged buildings. It has also severely restricted repair of vital infrastructure such as waste and water treatment plants.

Continual electricity blackouts have further limited the treatment plants’ operating capacity, while severe restrictions on the import of fuel have limited the ability of emergency generators.

The CMWU has been forced to pump tons of untreated sewage directly into the sea, which then seeps back into Gaza’s underground water supply, further threatening safe drinking water supplies.

Recent water tests indicate that piped water in Gaza is not safe for human consumption. Forty-five of 248 water samples tested were found to be contaminated, primarily in the North Gaza and Gaza City districts.

Israel shelled Gaza’s biggest wastewater treatment plant in Sheikh Ajleen, southeast of Gaza City, which usually treats raw sewage from approximately 400,000 people. The torrent of raw, untreated sewage flowing into residential areas, agricultural land, and the sea was visible from outer space, according to satellite images released by the UN….

The fishing sector was estimated to have suffered direct and indirect losses of $2.2 million, due to destruction of fishing boats and related materials. And even those who are employed and earning are struggling. According to the International Monetary Fund (IMF), Israeli restrictions on the entry of cash into Gaza has affected the livelihoods of up to half a million Gazans, in a population of 1.5 million.

The Obama and Netanyahu Administrations are now collaborating to take this ‘prison by the sea’ closer to being Hell on Earth. “Loyal friend” is taking on a new meaning.

[Note that the African Union has expressed concern about the the UN "interferring" in the internal affairs of Guinea.  See article here.]

UN says Guinea’s leader eager for killing probe
By EDITH M. LEDERER
Associated Press
2009-10-22 03:58 AM  

Guinea’s military ruler has promised to cooperate with an international commission to investigate last month’s attack on unarmed pro-democracy demonstrators that left dozens dead and many injured in the West African nation, a senior U.N. official said Wednesday.

Assistant Secretary-General for Political Affairs Haile Menkerios, who led a mission to Guinea to assess prospects for an independent investigation, said Capt. Moussa “Dadis” Camara welcomed Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon’s decision to establish a commission to determine who was responsible for the attack.

“We met with President Dadis Camara who said himself he’s eager to have this commission come, and his government will fully cooperate with it _ and we have it in writing,” Menkerios told reporters after briefing the U.N. Security Council behind closed doors.

Camara seized power hours after longtime dictator Lansana Conte died last December. He initially said he would not run in elections scheduled for January, but recently indicated that he may have changed his mind.

On Sept. 28, presidential guard troops opened fire on tens of thousands of demonstrators attending a peaceful pro-democracy rally in the capital, Conakry. A Guinean human rights group said 157 people were killed but the government put the death toll at 57. After the deadly protest, Camara banned all gatherings and demonstrations.

Menkerios said he believes it will take about a month to choose members of the commission, finalize its terms of reference and carry out a security assessment in Guinea.

“I think the commission could finish its work within one month once it’s deployed,” he said.

Menkerios said victims, opposition members and members of the public have “tremendous” expectations for the commission’s independent investigation. He said members of civil society and human rights groups indicated they would share information they have about the attack with the commission.

France’s U.N. Ambassador Gerard Araud said he would circulate a draft presidential statement to Security Council members later Wednesday that would strongly support the establishment of the commission and African efforts to resolve the crisis in Guinea.

He said council members “expressed very wide support to the establishment of the commission” though some questions were raised, including who will pay for it.

France wants the majority of commission members to be African, including women because of allegations of sexual violence during the Sept. 28 attack, Araud said.

West African leaders said Saturday they were imposing an arms embargo on Guinea and would try to stop Camara from running in January’s presidential election.

Asked whether the Security Council would also impose an arms embargo, Araud said “for the moment” the council will let the regional group take responsibility for solving the crisis.

Menkerios stressed that security remains critical, not just for the commission but most importantly for the people of Guinea, the victims of the attack and potential witnesses.

“We have confirmation that the government welcomes and will cooperate with the commission,” he said. “Will it? That is a question that has to be seen.

Chinese profiteers are reaping benefits from the Iraq War in the early auction of the stolen spoils and the country is necessary for U.N. actions to escalate economic war on Iranian civilians based on President Obama’s false, hypocritical claim Iran’s nuclear program “breaks rules all nations must follow”.

‘U.S. Uses Oil to Change China’s Stance on Iran’

20 Oct 09 | Press TV

The U.S. administration is pressing key Arab states to export more oil to China to gain Beijing’s support for sanctions on Iran, The Wall Street Journal has reported.

According to an article appearing in The Wall Street Journal on Tuesday, the initiative aims to lessen China’s dependence on Iranian energy and trim Chinese resistance to tougher sanctions over Tehran’s nuclear program.

The newspaper claims U.S. President Barack Obama hopes to get Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates (U.A.E.) to boost their oil exports to China in order to convince Beijing to distance itself from Tehran both politically and economically.

The Wall Street Journal has quoted unnamed U.S. and Emirati officials as saying that the U.A.E. has recently agreed, in a move coordinated with Washington, to boost its oil exports to China to between 150,000 and 200,000 barrels a day, while Saudi Arabia is apparently prepared to offer China more oil.

Meanwhile, the newspaper says many diplomats and Middle East analysts are doubtful that the U.S. and the Arab states will succeed over the long term in breaking Beijing’s dependence on Iranian oil and gas.

The experts argue that Saudi Arabia and the U.A.E. are both obliged to export oil by quotas established by the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC). They question how the two countries could significantly boost exports to China without surpassing the set quotas.

Beijing is the second-largest buyer of Iranian oil. The Asian giant has pledged tens of billions of dollars in new investment in Iran’s oil and gas infrastructure in coming years.

Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao scaled down U.S. hopes for broad cooperation on Iran last week following a meeting last week with Iranian First Vice President Reza Rahimi.

China is willing “to maintain high-level contacts with Iran, encourage mutual understanding and confidence, promote practical cooperation between the two sides and close coordination in international affairs,” Wen said in Beijing on Thursday.

The Islamic Republic has repeatedly rejected Western allegations that it has a secret nuclear weapons program.

Roger Cohen wrote today in the NY Times about an ordinary Israel, as opposed to an exceptional Israel.

I found this column significant in many ways. It captured something that had been the subtext of almost every international discussion of Israel and its actions beyond its legal borders in the last few years.

 As human beings, we usually have clearly defined perceptions of ourselves. In most cases, we are unaware or choose to be unaware of how we are perceived by the world around us. So unfortunately, we end up interacting with the world on the basis of how we see ourselves or how we wish to be seen. Nations do the same. They have national narratives that are sometimes manufactured for social cohesion, sometimes over-idealized versions of real events, sometimes just plain bogus. And unfortunately any external messages directed at them have to get through the thick fabricated glass windows.

Israel, Roger Cohen says in his piece “does not see itself as normal. Rather it lives in a perpetual state of exceptionalism”. So it can have nuclear weapons while demanding that the US help prevent Iran from getting them. It can refrain from signing the Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) while demanding that NPT signatories like Iran live up to their obligations. Basic notions such as fairness do not factor in these types of talks because there is the view of “we are rational, THEY are not!” and therefore it follows that “we can be allowed to do things THEY can never be forgiven for doing.”  Now, Israel unlike many other nations on this earth was born out of a tragedy. A great tragedy. But as Cohen rightfully observes, that does not mean it should refrain from  ”deal[ing] with the world as it is, however discomfiting, not the world of yesterday.”

As Cohen quotes in the piece, US Defence Secretary Robert Gates has often said that the only way to stop Iran from developing nuclear weapons is “for the Iranian government to decide that their security is diminished by having those weapons as opposed to strengthened .” So what if the US as part of its Iran Strategy tried to convince Israel to go the way of South Africa and get rid of its nuclear weapons as a way of persuading the iranians that their security will not be compromised by not developing a bomb?

The Israelis would never agree to it, of course, but let’s imagine that they did for a second.
Because one important way and I believe the most important way to look at this Iran Nukes conundrum is through the lens of regional control and regional security. Israel has been the “Big Boy” of the Middle-East for the past forty years or so. Egypt reared its head for a bit in the days of Nasser and Sadat. But they were quickly smacked in the Six-Day War and in the Yom Kippur War. They then decided it was best to sign a peace treaty, get a Nobel Peace Prize for Sadat in the bargain and move on. Then Iraq rose slightly with a little help from the Reagan and George H. Bush administrations. They quickly lost their power when Saddam picked a fight with the Ayatollas to start the 8-year long Iran-Iraq war that drained them financially and otherwise. The American invasion of 2003 took care of whatever power was not erased by the UN sanctions that preceded it. The Gulf states (Bahrain, Koweit, Qatar, UAE, Oman) have as much military strength as five African bees.  Yet Israel with a lot of US financial and military help has remained strong.

So now the Iranians look to be on the rise again, paranoid and fearful. They do have valid reasons to be fearful. From Tehran, the Mullahs look to the east and they see NATO troops in Afghanistan (including nuclear armed nations like the US and the UK) and further east, they see Pakistanis with nukes. Indians with nukes. Further west, they see Israelis with nukes. In addition to being in Afghanistan and Iraq, the US has a presence in the Gulf States. If you couple this with the constant threats of bombardments as enunciated by both US and Israeli officials, it is no wonder the Iranians want to get nuclear weapons as a way of preventing an externally-imposed regime change.

Some will argue that Iran is not governed by ”rational leaders” and therefore cannot be held to the same standard as other nations. I disagree. And I am not alone in this view. Many decades of Iranian peaceful co-existence with its neighbours back me up on this. So does the NY Times’ Roger Cohen in the piece I quoted at the start of this post. “Iran makes rational decisions,” he writes. “Rather than invoking the Holocaust — a distraction — Israel should view Iran coolly [and] understand the hesitancy of Tehran’s nuclear brinksmanship.”

So in many ways, the road towards Obama’s nuclear-free world and therefrore a nuclear-free Middle-East, goes through Tehran as much as it goes through Tel Aviv.