ERIC MARGOLIS: OBAMA’S BEGINNING OF THE END

In 1956, Britain, France and Israel colluded to invade Egypt to overthrow its hugely popular nationalist leader, Gamal Abdel Nasser. US President Dwight Eisenhower deemed the tripartite Suez aggression immoral and damaging to American interests in the Muslim world. “Ike” ordered the British, French and Israelis to get out of Egypt at once – or else. They got out.

Fast forward to 2010. President Barack Obama demands Israel stop building illegal Jewish settlements around Jerusalem and on the West Bank. Obama rightly concludes the ongoing agony of Palestine has turned the Muslim world against the United States. It is also the primary cause of what Washington calls “terrorism.” After the Suez invasion, Israel’s American partisans set about building an influence network that would ensure no American president could ever force Israel to do anything against its will.

Their brilliant success was again confirmed this week as Benjamin Netanyahu, leader of Israel’s rightist coalition, literally spit in Obama’s face, sneeringly rejecting the president’s pleas to create a viable Palestinian state. The US Congress and right wing media actually applauded the public humiliation of their president and vice president. How the mighty have fallen. Obama has shown himself utterly without spine, and terrified of the Israel lobby at a time when his political fortunes are plummeting. The White House understands that America’s vital interests in the Mideast are being increasingly undermined by Israel’s adamant refusal to allow a workable Palestinian state instead of apartheid-style Arab Bantustans.

A triumphant Netanyahu made clear Israel would retain all of Jerusalem, settlement blocks around it, water resources, key roads, the West Bank high ground and the Jordan River valley. In short, “useful Palestine.” The rest, waterless scrub and slums, might be left to the Arabs. Nothing was said about Israel’s illegal occupation of Syria’s Golan Heights.

Even Obama’s shameful offer of a multi-billion dollar bribe to Israel of 20 F-35 warplanes and unlimited diplomatic support, in exchange for a flimsy 90-day building freeze, was contemptuously rejected by Netanyahu. He knows the US Congress would give Israel the moon if asked. The US has already given Israel at least $114 billion since its creation in 1947.

What does Obama’s humiliation mean? His chances of being defeated in the next presidential election are growing. Obama’s arch-rival, the pro-Israeli Hillary Clinton, is positioning herself to take over the Democratic Party from Obama.

The US diplomatic, intelligence and military establishment has got the message, loud and clear: don’t mess with Israel. The last US president who tried to restrain Israel’s West Bank colonisation, George H.W. Bush, failed to win re-election; his able secretary of state, James Baker, was slandered as an “anti-Semite.” By caving in to Israel’s hard right over the West Bank, Obama sends a message of profound weakness to the rest of the world. He is signaling that Israel, not the White House, really makes America’s Mideast policy. Israel also increasingly influences US policy towards Pakistan, Afghanistan, India, Iran and North Korea. The humiliated Palestinian Authority is shown as a helpless puppet of the Americans and Israelis, as rival Hamas has long charged.

Obama’s defeat suggests Israel now has “carte blanche” to move ahead and attack Lebanon’s resistance movement Hezbollah, Syria, and eventually Iran. In fact, Israel now seems to have the power to plunge the US into war against Iran whenever it decides the time is right and the risk worthwhile.

Since the US has become a helpless giant, it’s up to the rest of the world to end the suffering in Palestine. Brazil and Argentina have taken an important step forward by recognising a Palestinian state in the pre-1967 borders. The 2002 Saudi peace plan still offers all parties concerned the fairest, most practical ?road to peace.

The UN General Assembly should again endorse this plan and call for more pressure on Israel. But Netanyahu and his fellow rightwing zealots are determined to hold on to every meter of the West Bank and Golan. Some far rightists want to expand Israel into Lebanon and Syria. Israel’s refusal to compromise over Palestine is at the heart of its increasingly dangerous confrontation ?with Iran.

Obama’s shameful failure will haunt the world ?for decades.

Source: Khaleej Times online
http://www.intifada-palestine.com/2010/12/eric-margolis-obama%e2%80%99s-beginning-of-the-end/

AIPAC Ordered Bush To Attack Iran

By Gordon Duff
In a unique interview with an official at the highest policy levels of the Pentagon, White House and, eventually, CIA, we are offered a unique "behind the curtains" look at areas of policy making during the period between 1999 and 2007. Extensive notes have been taken of meetings with President Bush and all his top policy advisors. This is only a teaser.

A highly placed source within the White House and CIA confirmed, in an interview, that the invasion of Iran was sheduled for 2006 but planned in 1999. We have heard some of this before but not with so many pieces and, I am told, more to come. In an interview with a Bush administration policy official:

Q. What is the first thing that comes to mind when you think of your work at the White House? You have read my articles, what do you think of my take on things?

A. You are closer than anyone else in understanding how things worked, the only person willing to simply put it out there. You also come at things like the Pentagon people I have worked with, the ones who stood against Bush, Cheney and the AIPAC gang at the NSC (National Security Council.) I can also see that you don't have background material that you need. Some of it you have wrong, particularly the motives for Iraq. It was always Iran, Iraq was simply a door.

"The Iraq invasion was a 'done deal' in 1999, but not as you thought to steal oil and bilk billions, that was all gravy. Iraq, the entire Bush presidency, had one purpose, to remove Iran from the picture."

Q. You talk about journalists. What has your experience been?

A. I have good friends at the New York Times, Time Magazine, the Washington Post and others. They know all of this. They aren't fooled. They could write anything but it would never hit print.

Q. Back to the 2000 election. The first impediment was, I am told, removing John McCain from the picture. Was this the case?

A. "He was enemy # 1, stubborn, unpredictable and already tarnished by the Keating 5 scandal, with all his faults, he didn't have the serous skeletons in his closet that would fit the bill. McCain couldn't be blackmailed like Bush, thus McCain is a risk. Unless you can be controlled, blackmailed or bought or both, you will go nowhere in Washington.

McCain is a womanizer, the real thing. For a war hero, with McCain's charm that's nothing, he would never fall into the kind of trap Clinton did. Rove was assigned the job of getting rid of McCain. We all saw what was done in South Carolina. It was a masterful job."

Q. When you talk about McCain not being vulnerable, he certainly was in South Carolina, a few rumors and smears and he was gone. You say Bush is more vulnerable?

A. "A window into a lot of this can be found in the Rosen-AIPAC lawsuit. Bush has serious issues, let's just leave it at that.

As for Rosen, he just wasn't an AIPAC lobbyist, he sat inside the National Security Council until 2005 as the Rand Corporation's Director of Foreign Policy. When the press talks about an AIPAC employee and spying, he didn't join AIPAC until later, after his arrest.

The FBI investigation and his indictement for spying covered a time when he was at the center of the Bush administration, a key policy formulator at the highest levels of government. Rosen, indicted in 2004 for spying for Israel, was responsible for formulating American policy in the Middle East and largely responsible for the fate of the Palestinian people, a bit of a conflict of interest for an Israeli lobbyist and accused spy."

Q. Rosen has made some accusations, says AIPAC spies all the time and that they do nothing but watch pornography there. You worked with this guy, what do you know?

A. "Rosen has dirt on absolutely everyone. His divorce depositions are fascinating reading. They are sealed now but there are copies out there. I know that reporters at Time Magazine have them, others too. The FBI has tons, they were after Rosen for years. As for AIPAC, Rosen told me of their spy operations many times, but nobody needed telling, they were more than obvious to all of us.

Q. You talk about Rosen and his "black book," that he has dirt on "everyone." The news stories mentioned only porn. That doesn't sound so serious. Dirt, not just porn, what kind of dirt?

A. "Mostly sex stuff, gay bondage, clubs, expense money being spent on sex, liasons in public restrooms, that kind of thing. Many of the key people around the president are involved and there is FBI surveillance, massive amounts of it, photographs, videos, and one or more undercover informants recorded conversations with top National Security Council members. Spying, nuclear secrets passed to Israel, this was common place.

I witnessed, with two others, the top Bush counter-terrorism official, actally primary advisor to Bush on counter-terrorism, who had served Clinton and others, pass nuclear weapons plans to an Israeli agent, like it was nothing."

Q. Did the FBI know about this?

A. "For years, FBI agents, I have a list of names, worked to stop this. Then I learned that the Department of Justice killed the prosecution, Rosen's lasted into the Obama administration before it was dropped. Witnesses were threatened with prosecution and the guilty, the spies, were allowed to keep doing what they are doing. This is what Rosen knows and what he is talking about when he says AIPAC was involved in spying. It isn't just that AIPAC is said to receive information it is that it came from top administration officials."

Q. Let's get back to the sex thing. How high up does it go?

A. "One famous joke around the NSC, there was a photo of someone kissing Laura Bush on the cheek and shaking hands with President Bush. The same person had, not that long before, using those same lips and hands in a men's restroom."

Q. What do you know about 9/11?

A. "9/11 was planned as early as 1999 or before, to be executed as soon as the Bush team was in place. One meeting in April 2001, a meeting outlining the invasion of Iraq, may have been the green light.' Chalibi was in place early on, from day number one. I remember telling them he was a known crook, totally disreputable and that things in Iraq would fall apart immediately. Nobody in the National Security Council ever spoke about what they would do once Saddam was overthrown. Nobody really seemed to care.

Of course, none of those people have real experience with military issues or, in fact, much of anything else."

Q. How was the Iran invasion supposed to work?

A. "This is where so many have it wrong. In fact, there was never serous discussion about terrorism or Al Qaeda or bin Laden. These things weren't even a sideshow. The only talk about any of it was how it could be used to justify going into Iraq and then attacking Iran.

Q. The intel on Iraq, we all know it was wrong. When was that learned?

A. "The administration didn't believe false intelligence, it created it, order it in place before the election to be ready for, well I guess, 9/11. Silencing Plame and Joe Wilson, those were the same people who planned the creation of the phony intelligence. There was never a discussion of a serious terrorist threat against the United States. These guys would have fallen off their chairs laughing themselves to death. It was all a joke to them, 9/11, the Iraq invasion, all of it."

Q. Back to Iran, how was the invasion to start?

A. "Everything was going to happen in Bahrain. Plans were to attack Americans, blow up clubs, restaurants. There were plans to stage a "Tonkin Gulf' type attack and blame it on Iranian torpedo boats. Guys in the military were aware of this and there was strong opposition. Marine Colonel Joe Molofsky was the real hero here. He did more to scramble administration plans than anyone else, Molofky and General Mattis. These were really straight shooters, how I learned to trust the Marine Corps.

The government there, their security services, I believe they were deeply involved. It would have been good to see something about this in Wikileaks."

Q. You said that war had to start by 2006. Was there a timetable?

A. "Absolutely. General Petraeus was sent to Iraq to quiet things down, not to win a war or create a lasting peace, nothing like that. His job was to shut things down so an operation against Iran could be staged from Iraq."

Q. But that never got off the ground…

A. "No kidding, and Bush was enranged. It was the only reason he was put in office in the first place, as long as Iran survived, he was a failure, no matter what happened to the US."

Q. Didn't they know that war with Iran would have driven oil to $300 a barrel and collapsed the American economy?

A. "There were never briefings on that like there were never briefings on stabilizing Iraq. Nobody cared, nobody noticed and it was never discussed. It was really all about Iran and orders came in and people did what they were told like good little soldiers."

Q. Orders? From where?

A. "All of it, all foreign policy issues, were out of AIPAC, they ran everything in the Bush adminsitration. That was the whole point of it. We never were told why we had to destroy Iran only that it had to be done. Nobody ever asked why. Nobody ever believed Iran had a credible nuclear program and, eventually, we were all very certain they never would. There was never an issue about Iran being a threat or not. There was never an issue of motive of any kind. These were orders, plain and simple, the administration that will come into office in 2001 will be tasked with destroying Iran, tasked by AIPAC who will control all key position in the administration."

Q. Was there talk about Lebanon and the threat of Hizbollah?

A. "There really weren't talks at all, only planning on how to follow policy, never on what policy should be or what was right or wrong. There was never a discussion about the United States, what was good for America or bad for America. People were generally oblivious to there being an America."
http://sabbah.biz/

Gaza Freedom March Set for Minneapolis on Dec. 30 and for Gaza on Dec. 31

By Coleen Rowley (Former FBI Special Agent)
Gandhi said that the purpose of nonviolent action is to "quicken" the conscience of humankind. Citizens of Minnesota are called upon to stand in solidarity with an expected 1,300 International Peace Activists (including a number of Minnesotans) from over 40 countries marching in Gaza-to lift the inhumane siege of Gaza and to align ourselves with International Law and on the side of human rights.

Many Minnesotans who cannot afford the actual trip to Gaza are planning a parallel march that will take place in the sky ways of downtown Minneapolis. We will meet at the Hennepin County Government Plaza (2nd floor) at 11:30 a.m. on Wednesday, December 30th and will proceed into the sky ways from there. People are encouraged to bring children as we would like the nearly 1 million children in Gaza to be symbolically represented.

No one has better explained the importance of this historic action on a human rights level than one of the Minnesotans going to Gaza, Sylvia Schwarz, in her recent commentary, excerpted below:

Human rights: not to be entrusted to governments (excerpt from MinnPost "Community Voices" by Sylvia Schwarz | Thursday, Nov. 19, 2009)

The movement is gathering steam since Operation Cast Lead beginning in December of 2008. Israel framed this as a "defensive operation," but in reality it was an offensive assault on the Palestinians in Gaza. Even before the assault Israel maintained a siege on Gaza — which, according to human-rights agencies, led to a humanitarian crisis. While Israel is not currently bombing Gaza, the siege continues to this day. Normal activities: farming, fishing, attending school, buying groceries, and earning a living, are impossible for Gazans. Construction materials are denied entry into Gaza so that no rebuilding has been possible after the massive destruction of the civilian infrastructure.

Investigations discounted; people galvanized Israel and pro-Israeli groups in the United States discounted all investigations into war crimes committed during Operation Cast Lead, including the Goldstone Report, as biased against Israel. With typical near unanimity, the House of Representatives condemned the Goldstone Report in H.R. 867, assuring that it will not be brought before the U.N. Security Council.

But rejecting investigations, rather than inflicting amnesia, has galvanized people worldwide. Many church groups, labor unions, universities, and other organizations within Europe and the United States are now calling for BDS and for further actions and demonstrations to force the end of Israeli repression and human rights abuses.

On Dec. 27, 2009, one year after the start of Operation Cast Lead, an international delegation of more than 500 people from 35 countries and 32 US states (including several people from Minnesota) will cross into Gaza on the border with Egypt. They will meet with Palestinians, U.N. agencies, and NGOs working in the Gaza Strip. On Dec. 31, the delegation, along with thousands of Palestinians, in the spirit of Gandhi and Martin Luther King, Jr., will march toward the Erez crossing in a nonviolent expression of solidarity with the Palestinian people and an effort to end the brutal siege of Gaza. Simultaneously, others will peacefully demonstrate in cities around the world.

Finally, people who have been despairing of ever seeing an end to Israeli human-rights abuses have effective grassroots tools to force governments to act morally. These actions — the Gaza Freedom March and boycott, divestment and sanctions — are the beginning of the end of the human rights abuses in the Palestinian Occupied Territories.

We are also contacting Egyptian Consulate and Embassy officials (as well as our Minnesota Senators Klobuchar and Franken) to ask for Egypt's assistance in safely allowing the 1300 international human rights activists peaceful crossing into Gaza from Rafah. (Sample letter below–contact info is: Egyptian Consulate in Chicago tel # 312 828-9162; fax # 312 828-9167; Egyptian Embassy in Washington D.C. [contact person is Omar Youssef] tel# 202 895-5400 or easier to click "Tell Egypt: Don't Block International Gaza Freedom March!" at Just Foreign Policy).

Dear Egyptian Embassy officials:

My husband and I are writing and calling to express our full support for the December 31, 2009 Gaza Freedom March. Several Minnesotans have already made travel plans and are planning on participating. So we urge the Egyptian government to allow the 1,300 international delegates to enter the Gaza Strip through Egypt.

The aim of the march is to call on Israel to lift the siege. The delegates will also take in badly needed medical aid, as well as school supplies and winter jackets for the children of Gaza.

Please, let this historic March proceed without difficulties! Thank you.

Coleen Rowley, Apple Valley, Minnesota
http://sabbah.biz/mt/archives/2009/12/27/gaza-freedom-march-set-for-minneapolis-on-dec-30-and-for-gaza-on-dec-31/

A Worse Record Than Saddam's

Bad boy Julian Assange, the pretty, blondish founder of the whistle-blowing website Wikileaks was hugely admired when he uncovered oppressors and political chicanery in places like China and Kenya, but now he takes on Western duplicity and crimes. Can't have that. This spawn of Beelzebub, say our masters, a traitor whose insolence is a crime against the secretive states of the US and UK. Disregard the pique and dyspepsia of officialdom. It is a distraction, smoke from fires deliberately started to stop us seeing what lies before us.

The audacious website first released confidential and candid material on the hellish war in Afghanistan and now opens up a new front, more than 400,000 classified US files documenting the previously untold horrors of the Iraq war. Revealed are countless atrocities and the deaths of 66,000 Iraqi civilians at the hands of US and British soldiers and Iraqi personnel who had joined the allies. Men were burnt, some had parts removed, others were killed slowly; women were shot, children too, killed before they grew. Anything goes, it seems, during a military conflict and no questions are asked. As an Israeli army trainer said, when asked about the death of Rachel Corrie, the young, pro-Palestinian activist mown down by an Israeli tank: "During war there are no civilians".

The authorities in Iraq did not investigate reports of abuse and killings. An Iraqi friend tells me the rape of girls, women, boys and men was widespread, a tool used both to intimidate and punish. Apparently, there are images from Abu Ghraib prison of these sadistic "punishments"; they were never released because of the feelings they could arouse in Muslim countries. So morally deformed are these men of war that they care more about inconvenient outrage than they do about crimes against the people they supposedly went to save. They should have heeded the words of Martin Van Creveld, an erudite Israeli war historian who compared the disastrous American Vietnam War with the Iraq adventure:

"He who fights the weak – and the rag-tag Iraqi militias are very weak indeed – and loses, loses. He who fights against the weak and wins, also loses. To kill an opponent who is much weaker than yourself is unnecessary and therefore cruel."

By this reasoning, to fight the weak who are not in any sense your enemy is extreme brutishness and totally self-defeating.

Key figures in the British Army and Government must have been privy to this information. They held their tongues and presumably sidestepped any ethical niggles. The Americans were in command and you don't get to lick the arse of the world's only superpower and then turn round and kick it. That, you understand, is the pact, the unbreakable deal behind our special relationship.

Manfred Novak, the UN special rapporteur on torture, says Obama's administration must investigate and come clean – after all, this President vowed to change the image and behaviour of the US which, for too long, has co-operated with tyrants and violated human rights across the world, including in Guantanamo Bay, which is still open and where captured, lost boys became broken men.

Fewer and fewer global citizens now believe the rapturous anthems and sombre panegyrics of God's own America. After this week, the number will have tumbled further, which, in some ways, is a pity. There is much to praise about the US, its history of perpetual resistance to unacceptable state power, its energy, creativity, business, intellectual and cultural buzz. When such a great nation does great wrong, its mirror is shattered and even if the shards are stuck back together again, the cracks will always remain. And when the custodian of the free world behaves so appallingly, how do we liberal Muslims promote democratic values across the Muslim world?

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton (sounding like a clone of Condi Rice) slammed the Wikileaks exposé and warned that lives of US civilians and forces and their allies were now in serious danger. At one level, I fear she is right. The internet traffic over the past two days has been so fast, furious and volatile, it could indeed fuel terrorism, recruitment into jihadi cells, even more violence in unstable Iraq, suicide bombers in Afghanistan and ugly attitudes towards the West, home to millions of Muslims. But keeping the stories hidden was always wrong. Innocent Iraqi people should never have been made to suffer by the allies and even the guilty should have faced due process to prove commitment to justice and decent values. When there was evidence of liberators behaving monstrously, action should have been taken and in the public eye. Clinton must know this, as a lawyer. It is a primary principle of her profession.

I wonder if some staunch supporters of the Iraq war will now think again about the purpose and execution of that illegal and vainglorious expedition. The sanctions and war killed, maimed and destroyed more civilians than Saddam did, even during the most diabolical periods of his rule. Blair, Bush and their armies have never had to face proper, international judicial interrogations. Now imagine good Muslims worldwide, who know all about universal rights, but can see that there is no universal accountability, that Third World despots are made to pay while others earn millions writing autobiographies and lecturing the world on good leadership and governance. Hundreds of savvy, smart, keenly aware young people email me from various Muslim states asking: "What's the point? They say one thing and do the opposite. They say they want to help us and kill our people. Why should we trust the British and Americans?"

What do our army commanders and American leaders advise me to tell these disenchanted Muslims? And Mr Blair, I wonder if he has some wise thoughts? He is, they tell me, still one of the greatest prime ministers this country has had. And his wife, the hot human rights lawyer, does she think these abuses her husband just might have known about should be investigated? No answers will be forthcoming. Those who took us into this
war are not obliged to explain themselves, not liable. In that they are worse than the dictator they toppled. Not comfortable that thought, but true.

(The Independent)
http://sabbah.biz/mt/archives/2010/10/27/worse-than-saddams/

Paul Balles: More Islamophobia in America

To generalize is to be an idiot. –William Blake

Xenophobia is a fear or contempt of that which is foreign or unknown, especially of strangers or foreign people. It includes hatred of persons belonging to a different race, or different ethnic or national origin.

The fear or hatred that makes up xenophobia involves a great deal of generalizing about “others”.

Unfortunately, if you develop a mindset about large numbers of people based on the actions of a few, you can treat whole populations badly.

British historian Thomas Macaulay said, “In proportion as men know more and think more they look less at individuals and more at classes.”

Generalizations involving xenophobia include thoughts like: “immigrants are not as worthy as natives,” and “women are not as capable as men.”

There are those in America who consider Barak Obama unworthy of being its president because of his colour, because his father was not American by birth, or because Obama’s middle name is Hussain.

The mental degradation as part of this generalizing applies to any and all who don’t belong to the tribe or group of the xenophobes.

Philosopher and author Eric Hoffer observed that “We are more prone to generalize the bad than the good. We assume that the bad is more potent and contagious.”

Thus, by faulty reasoning, if there is one bad black, all blacks are bad; and if one Muslim has committed a crime, therefore all Muslims must be criminals.

A special name – Islamophobia – applies to xenophobia involving Muslims; and Islamophobia has been growing alarmingly in America recently.

A knife-wielding lunatic attacked a Muslim taxi driver in New York City. Why? The driver admitted to a drunk lunatic that he (the taxi driver) was a Muslim.

The attacker reasoned from the specific (an attack attributed to Muslims on 9/11) to the general (all Muslims were responsible).

A mosque under construction in Tennessee suffered an arson attack. Why? Comments by Islamophobes like Newt Gingrich have incited a general hatred of Muslims.

Newt Gingrich, once the speaker of the US House of Representatives, would naturally have others attaching greater credence to what he says.
How many people has Gingrich fed anti-Muslim thinking with his inflammatory public remarks about Islam? The false generalization: if one Muslim is bad, all Muslims must be bad.

Florida Pastor Terry Jones’ planned to burn copies of the Quran on the anniversary of 9/11. Why? He generalized from Muslims alleged to have been responsible for 9/11 to all of Islam.

Documentary film-maker Michael Moore pointed out, “Blaming a whole group for the actions of just one of that group is anti-American. Timothy McVeigh was Catholic. Should Oklahoma City prohibit the building of a Catholic Church near the site of the former federal building that McVeigh blew up?”

Protesters have been assailing the building of an Islamic cultural centre – including a mosque – near Ground Zero in New York. The protestors disregard the fact that before Ground Zero became Ground Zero, it had two mosques.

The problem: general and increasing Islamophobia. According to a Washington Post/ABC News poll, 49 percent of all Americans say they have generally unfavourable opinions of Islam. A larger percentage opposes the cultural centre.

Poet Ezra Pound wrote “Any general statement is like a check drawn on a bank. Its value depends on what is there to meet it.” In other words, if the money isn’t in the bank the cheque is worthless.

Applied to the generalizations about Islam, if they don’t fit Muslims generally, they are worthless expressions of xenophobia and the ignorant fear called Islamophobia.
http://www.intifada-palestine.com/2010/09/paul-balles-more-islamophobia-in-america/

Photos from the New York SIOA protest

Richard Bartholomew provides a useful roundup of websites featuring photos of the Stop Islamization of America demonstration in New York yesterday.

As predicted, the threat by Geller and Spencer that only American flags would be permitted on the demonstration and that signs would be "confiscated" was widely ignored.

In addition to posters with the word "Sharia" in dripping blood and flyers reading "No Obama's Mosque", slogans included "What God Do You Kill For?", "Cordoba=Conquer, Not Here!", "Muhummad was the First Radical Muslim: Osama bin Laden is Following Directions" and "Transform Islam, Not America". One man carried a placard with the word "Toilet Paper" and a Qur'an attached to it.
http://www.islamophobia-watch.com/islamophobia-watch/category/usa

'US responsible for anti-Islam crusade'

A senior Iranian cleric says the desecration of the holy Quran is the symbol of a "crusade" by enemies of Islam, holding the US government responsible for the sacrilegious move.


“Although Church leaders say the criminal who in the name of priesthood ordered the Quran burning is a lunatic and worthless person, the question is why the White House allows lunatics to throw their weight around,” Tehran's Interim Friday Prayer Leader Ahmad Khatami said Sunday.

"This crime symbolizes a crusade that the enemies of Islam have launched for some time now," ISNA quoted him as saying.

Khatami added that the enemies will lose this war as they cannot stand up to the growing power of Islam.

He went on to say US President Barack Obama and other US statesmen should be held accountable for the blasphemous decision and the desecration of the Quran by anti-Islam protesters in the US as the crime has been committed 'within their geographical borders' and there no excuse is acceptable in this regard.

Anti-Islam protesters in the US have desecrated the Quran on the ninth anniversary of the 9/11 attacks.

One protester burned pages from the Muslim holy book in front of press photographers in New York.

Two evangelical preachers in Tennessee set copies of the Quran on fire and members of the group Operation Rescue tore pages from Islam's holy book.

In another incident, a man ripped out pages from the holy Quran and made vulgar gestures with them. The police did not try to stop any of the incidents.

This comes after a Florida preacher called off plans to burn copies of the Quran on the anniversary of the 9/11 attacks.

NN/HGH/MMN
http://www.presstv.ir/detail/142220.html

More War Lies

Lies aren’t used just to start wars, but also to escalate them, continue them, and even reduce or end them. And we got a pile of war lies from the president Tuesday evening.

Obama claimed the war on Iraq was initially a war to disarm a state. Really? And then “terrorist” Iraqis attacked our troops in their country. Yet if they had done that in our country, I suspect they would still be the terrorists. And then it became a civil war which we were innocently caught up in. Uh huh.

U.S. participants in this crime are heroes, always and everywhere. That’s sacred. The troops’ mission has involved protecting the Iraqi people, and by golly they’ve done a superb job, as long as we don’t mention the complete devastation of Iraq, the million dead, the millions of refugees, and the intense resentment of those remaining toward our country for what we’ve done to theirs.

The Iraqi people now (dead, in exile, in a ruined nation) have a chance that they supposedly didn’t have before we destroyed their country, a country that was actually a better place to live in in every way in 2003 than it is now, and in 1989 than in 2003. To hear President Obama, this war has been for the benefit of the Iraqi people, and these wars have been about al Qaeda and 9-11.

Obama slid into nonsense about al Qaeda after discussing Iraq and before mentioning Afghanistan, a Bushian maneuver if ever I saw one:

“No challenge is more essential to our security than our fight against al Qaeda.”

Never mind that al Qaeda barely existed before these wars became recruiting tools. “We will disrupt, dismantle, and defeat al Qaeda” in Afghanistan, the president promised, even though al Qaeda isn’t there. Troop reductions in Afghanistan will begin next August, he said, although the prepared transcript said July, and will be determined by conditions on the ground, even though Afghanistan is not yet as bad as Iraq is.

Obama modeled the future bloodletting in Afghanistan on the myth of the successful escalation in Iraq, ignoring factors that have contributed to the reduction of violence in Iraq, including the promise of complete withdrawal, the beginning of withdrawal, and prior to those factors the incredible level of death and displacement, negotiations and bribes. The test for a “surge” in Afghanistan failed in Marja, and Obama simply behaves as if it succeeded.

And here at home “it is time to turn the page.” Never mind the commission of the supreme international crime of aggression. Never mind the mass murder. Obama said he talked with George W. Bush earlier in the day. Obama lied that the two of them had never agreed on the war, a war Obama voted to fund repeatedly in the Senate. And he lied that Bush was committed to U.S. security, knowing full well that this war has made us all less safe.

“There were patriots who supported this war, and patriots who opposed it. And all of us are united in appreciation for our servicemen and women, and our hope for Iraq’s future.”

Except for the majority of Americans who believe the war never should have begun, that it should be immediately ended, and that its architects — starting at the top with Bush, not the bottom with the troops — must be held criminally accountable. Participation in this crime is not a service to anyone.

The most honest part of the speech was this:

“We have spent over a trillion dollars at war, often financed by borrowing from overseas. This, in turn, has short-changed investments in our own people, and contributed to record deficits. For too long, we have put off tough decisions on everything from our manufacturing base to our energy policy to education reform. As a result, too many middle class families find themselves working harder for less, while our nation’s long-term competitiveness is put at risk.”

That’s a remarkable point for the president to dare to make. But there was no mention of the hundreds of billions yet in the works to be wasted in Iraq and Afghanistan, not to mention Pakistan and numerous other countries deserving of our favors.

The big lie, of course, is that the combat mission is, once again, completed. The soldiers in Iraq and the mercenaries and contractors are there for combat. That there are fewer soldiers is movement very much in the right direction, and very much to be applauded, but pretending that those remaining are something else is not accurate. Many of them may see less combat, but I’ll believe they’re not there for combat when their weapons are taken away.

The big question, of course, is what will be done about the deadline of December 31, 2011. Here’s what Obama said on this key point:

“Going forward, a transitional force of U.S. troops will remain in Iraq with a different mission: advising and assisting Iraq’s Security Forces; supporting Iraqi troops in targeted counter-terrorism missions; and protecting our civilians. Consistent with our agreement with the Iraqi government, all U.S. troops will leave by the end of next year. As our military draws down, our dedicated civilians — diplomats, aid workers, and advisors — are moving into the lead to support Iraq as it strengthens its government, resolves political disputes, resettles those displaced by war, and builds ties with the region and the world. And that is a message that Vice President Biden is delivering to the Iraqi people through his visit there today. This new approach reflects our long-term partnership with Iraq — one based upon mutual interests, and mutual respect. Of course, violence will not end with our combat mission.”

Violence will not end. We just won’t call it combat. It’ll be an overseas contingency. But what about all U.S. troops leaving by the end of next year? Obama doesn’t seem to hedge on this the way he does later in the speech on a future withdrawal from Afghanistan, saying that will be “subject to conditions on the ground.” And that’s a good thing. The same day as this speech, the war-loving Washington Post printed a column by Ryan Crocker, U.S. ambassador to Iraq from 2007 to 2009, which pushed for a longer occupation with these words:

“And it may be that a new Iraqi government will request a U.S. military presence beyond the end of 2011. If so, I hope we will listen carefully.”

Maybe we should start listening very careful right now. The president speaks of a long-term partnership with Iraq. How do you have that if you’re gone? The answer may be that you aren’t gone, that you maintain a significant military force in the country consisting of mercenaries employed by the State Department.

Here’s what the Bush-Maliki Unconstitutional Treaty says:

“All U.S. forces are to withdraw from all Iraqi territory, water and airspace no later than the 31st of December of 2011.”

However, the same document, as Raed Jarrar pointed out to me, carefully defines U.S. forces to allow exceptions:

“Definition of Terms . . .

‘U.S. Forces’ refers to the entity that includes all the personnel of the American Armed Forces, the civilian personnel connected to them and all their possessions, installations and equipment present on Iraqi territory.

‘Member of the U.S. Forces’ refers to any person that belongs to the army of the United States, its navy, air force, marine force or coast guard.

‘Civilian element member’ refers to any civilian working for the U.S. Department of Defense. And this term does not include the personnel usually resident in Iraq.”

The trick is that not all imaginable U.S. forces have to work for the so-called Department of Defense. If they work for any other department, they’re in the clear. But Iraqis are in their gun sights.
http://www.politicaltheatrics.net/2010/09/more-war-lies/

The "Peace Process" is Still Going Nowhere – by Stephen M. Walt

f you think the announcement that the Israelis and Palestinians are going to resume "direct talks" is a significant breakthrough, you haven't been paying attention for the past two decades (at least). I wish I could be more optimistic about this latest development, but I see little evidence that a meaningful deal is in the offing.

Why do I say this? Three reasons.

1. There is no sign that the Palestinians are willing to accept less than a viable, territorially contiguous state in the West Bank (and eventually, Gaza), including a capital in East Jerusalem and some sort of political formula (i.e., fig-leaf) on the refugee issue. By the way, this outcome supposedly what the Clinton and Bush adminstrations favored, and what Obama supposedly supports as well.

2. There is no sign that Israel's government is willing to accept anything more than a symbolic Palestinian "state" consisting of a set of disconnected Bantustans, with Israel in full control of the borders, air space, water supplies, electromagnetic spectrum. etc. Prime Minister Netanyahu has made it clear that this is what he means by a "two-state solution," and he has repeatedly declared that Israel intends to keep all of Jerusalem and maybe a long-term military presence in the Jordan River valley. There are now roughly 500,000 Israeli Jews living outside the 1967 borders, and it is hard to imagine any Israeli government evacuating a significant fraction of them. Even if Netanyahu wanted to be more forthcoming, his coalition wouldn't let him make any meaningful concessions. And while the talks drag on, the illegal settlements will continue to expand.

3. There is no sign that the U.S. government is willing to put meaningful pressure on Israel. We're clearly willing to twist Mahmoud Abbas' arm to the breaking point (which is why he's agreed to talks, even as Israel continues to nibble away at the territory of the future Palestinian state), but Obama and his Middle East team have long since abandoned any pretense of bringing even modest pressure to bear on Netanyahu. Absent that, why should anyone expect Bibi to change his position?

So don't fall for the hype that this announcement constitutes some sort of meaningful advance in the "peace process." George Mitchell and his team probably believe they are getting somewhere, but they are either deluding themselves, trying to fool us, or trying to hoodwink other Arab states into believing that Obama meant what he said in Cairo. At this point, I rather doubt that anyone is buying, and the only thing that will convince onlookers that U.S. policy has changed will be tangible results. Another round of inconclusive "talks" will just reinforce the growing perception that the United States cannot deliver.

The one item in all this that does give me pause is the accompanying statement by the Middle East Quartet (the United States, Russia, the EU and the U.N.), which appears at first glance to have some modest teeth in it. Among other things, it calls explicitly for "a settlement, negotiated between the parties, that ends the occupation which began in 1967 and results in the emergence of an independent, democratic, and viable Palestinian state living side by side in peace and security with Israel and its other neighbors." It also says these talks can be completed within one year. Sounds promising, but the Quartet has issued similar proclamations before (notably the 2003 "Roadmap"), and these efforts led precisely nowhere. So maybe there's a ray of hope in there somewhere, but I wouldn't bet on it.

Meanwhile, both Democrats and Republicans here in the United States will continue to make pious statements about their commitment to a two-state solution, even as it fades further and further into the realm of impossibility. Barring a miracle, we will eventually have to recognize that "two-states for two peoples" has become a pipe-dream. At that point, U.S. leaders will face a very awkward choice: they can support a democratic Israel where Jews and Arabs have equal political rights (i.e., a one-state democracy similar to the United States, where discrimination on the basis of religion or ethnicity is taboo), or they can support an apartheid state whose basic institutions are fundamentally at odds with core American values.

Equally important, an apartheid Israel will face growing international censure, and as both former Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and current Defense Minister Ehud Barak have warned, such an outcome would place Israel's own long-term future in doubt. If that happens, all those staunch "friends of Israel" who have hamstrung U.S. diplomacy for decades can explain to their grandchildren how they let that happen.

As for the Obama administration itself, I have only one comment. If you think I'm being too gloomy, then do the world a favor and prove me wrong. If you do, I'll be the first to admit it.
http://sabbah.biz/

Six Jewish Companies Own 96% of the World’s Media

The largest media conglomerate today is Walt Disney Company, whose chairman and CEO, Michael Eisner, is a Jew. The Disney Empire, headed by a man described by one media analyst as a “control freak”, includes several television production companies (Walt Disney Television, Touchstone Television, Buena Vista Television), its own cable network with 14 million subscribers, and two video production companies. As for feature films, the Walt Disney Picture Group, headed by Joe Roth (also a Jew), includes Touchstone Pictures, Hollywood Pictures, and Caravan Pictures. Disney also owns Miramax Films, run by the Weinstein brothers. When the Disney Company was run by the Gentile Disney family prior to its takeover by Eisner in 1984, it epitomized wholesome, family entertainment. While it still holds the rights to Snow White, under Eisner, thecompany has expanded into the production of graphic sex and violence. In addition, it has 225 affiliated stations in the United States and is part owner of several European TV companies. ABC’s cable subsidiary, ESPN, is headed by president and CEO Steven Bornstein, a Jew. This corporation also has a controlling share of LifetimeTelevision and the Arts & Entertainment Network cable companies. ABC Radio Network owns eleven AM and ten FM stations, again in major cities such as New York, Washington, Los Angeles, and has over 3,400 affiliates. Although primarily a telecommunicationscompany , Capital Cities/ABC earned over $1 billion in publishing in 1994. It owns seven daily newspapers, Fairchild Publications, Chilton Publications, and the Diversified Publishing Group. Time Warner, Inc, is the second of the international media leviathans. The chairman of the board and CEO, Gerald Levin, is a Jew. Time Warner’s subsidiary HBO is the country’s largest pay-TV cable network. Warner Music is by far the world’s largest record company, with 50 labels, the biggest of which is Warner Brothers Records, headed by Danny Goldberg. Stuart Hersch is president of Warnervision, Warner Music’s video production unit. Goldberg and Hersch are Jews.more here>www.pakalertpress.com/2009/03/16/six-jewish-companies-own-96-of-the-worlds-media/
http://beforeitsnews.com/story/145/302/Israeli_lobby_central,_Jewish_groups_push_US_to_attack_Iran.html

Bin Laden is Dead; Long Live “Bin Laden”

Who’s keeping the terror myth alive?

By Maidhc O’Cathail

In the trigger-happy post-9/11 world, the favoured way to instigate a war is to demand that the designated “evildoer” prove a negative.

Iraq was invaded because it couldn’t prove that it didn’t have WMDs. Iran is under constant threat of attack unless it can demonstrate that it’s not seeking nuclear weapons. And now Pakistan is being chastised for allegedly harbouring Osama bin Laden—who in all probability has been dead and buried for eight years.

Questioning Pakistan’s willingness to pursue bin Laden and other al-Qaeda leaders, U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton last year told a group of Pakistani editors, “I find it hard to believe that nobody in your government knows where they are and couldn’t get them if they really wanted to.” And in a recent interview with Fox News, Clinton charged that “elements” of the Pakistani government know where bin Laden is hiding.

But what if bin Laden is not hiding in Pakistan? What if he’s been dead since December 2001? How then does Islamabad prove that some of its government officials are not concealing his whereabouts?

While the mainstream media rarely if ever question the belief that bin Laden is still alive, some cracks have been appearing in the consensus. In a September 11, 2009 piece in Britain’s Daily Mail, Sue Reid wondered, “What if everything we have seen or heard of him on video and audio tapes since the early days after 9/11 is a fake—and that he is being kept ‘alive’ by the Western allies to stir up support for the war on terror?”

An even more prominent sceptic is UPI Editor at Large Arnaud de Borchgrave whose July 26, 2010 commentary titled “Elvis bin Laden” may herald a new consensus. Sifting much the same evidence as Reid, the “legendary journalist” stated that “some key intelligence officials are taking bin Laden’s reported demise seriously.”

Both articles cited experts who have studied the post-December 2001 audios and videos and concluded they are fakes.

In 2007, Switzerland’s Dalle Molle Institute for Artificial Intelligence, which does computer voice recognition for bank security, found that the voices on recordings after mid-December 2001 differed clearly from earlier recordings of bin Laden.

Professor Bruce Lawrence, head of Duke University’s religious studies’ department and the foremost bin Laden expert, noted in a 2007 book the inconsistency between the increasingly secular language of the audios and videos and bin Laden’s earlier distinctive religious speech.

Assessing the evidence, Angelo M. Codevilla, a former U.S. intelligence officer who studied Soviet disinformation techniques during the Cold War and a professor of international relations at Boston University, wryly concluded that “Elvis Presley is more alive today than Osama bin Laden.”

So, if bin Laden is as dead as Elvis, who’s been faking all those scary threats in his name?

According to U.S. and British intelligence officials, al-Qaeda’s media wing, As-Sahab Foundation for Islamic Media Publication, has been run since 2001 by Adam Gadahn, a California-born convert to radical Islam who now goes by the name Azzam al-Amriki.

Gadahn found his way to the Islamic Society of Orange County while living with his grandfather, Carl Pearlman, a board member of the Anti-Defamation League. Ostensibly a civil rights organization set up to fight anti-Semitism, the ADL is “little more than a de facto adjunct of the Israeli government” which has even been caught spying on American critics of Israel.

Adam’s parents changed their surnames to Gadahn in the mid-1970s. The name refers to the Biblical warrior Gideon who, with the aid of trumpets and clay jars, defeated Israel’s enemies.

As Antiwar.com editor Justin Raimondo put it, Adam Gadahn is “an awfully odd figure, whose sudden evolution from a nice Jewish boy into Osama bin Laden’s Goebbels is just a little hard to take.”

Equally hard to take is the means by which the public learns of bin Laden’s latest pronouncements.

“Almost every statement by Osama bin Laden published on the Internet…is first made public by SITE and IntelCenter,” according to a Spiegel Online profile of Rita Katz, Josh Devon and Ben Venzke, who founded the two companies that supposedly track al-Qaeda online.

SITE co-founder Rita Katz is an Iraqi-born Jew, whose father was publicly hanged in Iraq after the 1967 War as an Israeli spy. Katz, who served in the Israeli Defense Forces, tries to downplay the significance of her background but is not always successful. “When you grow up in a place like Iraq,” she told Spiegel, “you understand maybe a little bit about how Arabs think, and also what they are capable of.”

When Neal Krawetz, a researcher and computer security consultant, analysed a 2006 al-Qaeda video of Ayman al-Zawahiri for alterations and enhancements, he discovered that the As-Sahab and IntelCenter logos had been added at the same time.

Attempting to make light of the understandable suspicions that the “terror trackers” are working for Israeli i
ntelligence, the Spiegel article jokes: “And the conspiracy theories pontificating that SITE and IntelCenter shoot the bin Laden videos themselves will continue to exist in the future. And Katz, Venzke and Devon will continue to see the humor in such theories: Yep, this is Mossad Headquarters. Exactly!”

But with the hunt for the elusive bin Laden having already cost thousands of lives and trillions of dollars, perhaps Americans should demand conclusive proof that Israel hasn’t conned them into fighting a phoney “war on terror.”
http://www.intifada-palestine.com/2010/08/bin-laden-is-dead-long-live-%e2%80%9cbin-laden%e2%80%9d/

The truth be known, the U.S. has become isolated from the rest of the world on this lunacy!

By Peter Dyer

Though the U.S. political/media establishment remains in denial, an international consensus is building that the 2003 U.S.-led invasion of Iraq was a crime -- a profound and catastrophic violation of international law.

The crime was aggression: the waging of unprovoked war on a sovereign state.

The growing global consensus holds that not only was the invasion of Iraq illegal but that accountability should follow, that – at least in the future – such crimes should result in direct and severe personal consequences for leaders who plan for war and give the orders to start.

Two recent developments, in London and in Kampala, Uganda, highlight this movement away from impunity and toward personal responsibility for aggression -- referred to in the judgment of the first Nuremberg trial in 1946 as "the supreme international crime differing only from other war crimes in that it contains within itself the accumulated evil of the whole."

In London, the Chilcot inquiry, the official British examination of the Iraq War, has produced powerful testimony from leading ex-government figures that Operation Iraqi Freedom was illegal and was known to be so at the time by many senior officials.

Sir Michael Wood, chief Legal Adviser to the U.K. Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO), the British equivalent of the U.S. State Department, told the Chilcot Inquiry in January:

"I considered that the use of force against Iraq in March 2003 was contrary to international law. In my opinion, that use of force had not been authorized by the Security Council, and had no other legal basis in international law."

The FCO Deputy Legal Adviser, Elizabeth Wilmshurst, who resigned on the eve of the invasion of Iraq, told the inquiry: "I regarded the invasion of Iraq as illegal, and I therefore did not feel able to continue in my post."

Ms. Wilmshurst also testified that her perspective was shared unanimously among all the FCO Legal Advisers.

Testifying on July 20, Baroness Eliza Manningham-Buller, the Director General of MI-5 (Military Intelligence-5, the British Security Service) from 2002 to 2007, further undermined the "self-defense" justifications for invading Iraq, cited by President George W. Bush and Prime Minister Tony Blair.

Asked for her assessment of the possibility that Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein would have threatened western interests by combining weapons of mass destruction with international terrorism, she answered:

"It is a hypothetical theory. It certainly wasn't of concern in either the short term or the medium term to my colleagues and myself."

When asked if she gave any credence to assessments that Saddam Hussein provided support for al-Qaeda and might have been involved in 9/11, Manningham-Buller said:

"No. …there was no credible intelligence to suggest that connection and that was the judgment, I might say, of the CIA. It was not a judgment that found favour with some parts of the American machine, …which is why Donald Rumsfeld started an intelligence unit in the Pentagon to seek an alternative judgment."

When asked for her reflections on the invasion, she said: "The main one would seem to me to be the danger of over-reliance on fragmentary intelligence in deciding whether or not to go to war. If you are going to go to war, you need a pretty high threshold. … The intelligence was not substantial enough upon which to make that decision."

Only the United Nations Security Council can legally use or authorize armed force across borders (U.N. Charter Article 41) unless a country has been attacked or an attack is imminent (Article 51).

The U.N. Security Council did not authorize the March 2003 invasion of Iraq. Neither the U.S. nor the U.K. had been attacked by Iraq. Neither was there anything remotely resembling an imminent threat of Iraqi armed attack on the U.S. or the U.K.

By the numbers the invasion of Iraq was a monstrous crime, generating massive trauma for the Iraqi people.

In the resulting conflict somewhere between 100,000 and one million people lost their lives. About four million people lost their homes.

Yet, it remains highly unlikely the men and women who brought about these horrors will ever be arrested and tried. That's mostly because the superpower status of the United States and the nature of internal U.S. politics make serious accountability hard to envision, at least in the foreseeable future.

The principle of "equal justice under the law," so fundamental to the American way that the phrase is engraved on the front of the U.S. Supreme Court Building, is cast aside when U.S. authorities authorize the killing of foreigners in the name of national security, even when the justification is bogus.

Outside the U.S., though, momentum is building for equal justice under international criminal law.

This perspective was dramatically affirmed recently at the International Criminal Court Review Conference in Kampala, Uganda. On June 11, the ICC reached agreement to amend the ICC Charter, subject to a vote in 2017, to include a definition of the crime of aggression.

The ICC Charter, established in 1998, gave the court jurisdiction over genocide, crimes against humanity, war crimes and the crime of aggression.

But finding an agreement on the definition of aggression and the conditions of jurisdiction proved so difficult that the delegates finally agreed that the ICC could not actually assume jurisdiction until (Article 5 Section 2) "a provision is adopted…defining the crime and setting out the conditions under which the Court shall exercise jurisdiction with respect to this crime."

In 2002, shortly after the ICC Charter entered into force, the States Parties (countries which have ratified or acceded to the Rome Statute, the founding document of the ICC) established a special working group on the crime of aggression.

In Kampala, almost eight years later, 84 of the 111 ICC States Parties reached agreement on a definition as well as on jurisdiction.

Also participating in the discussions were 30 "observer nations:" countries such as the United States, Russia and China which are not yet States Parties and thus could not vote but which still exerted influence.

It's worth noting the Obama administration's modest concession to the international rule of law. Though the United States remains outside the ICC, the presence of an American delegation at the review conference is a repudiation of the Bush administration, which not only refused to engage the ICC but actively worked against it.

The Bush administration, by threatening reductions in aid, pressured over 100 countries to sign "Bilateral Immunity Agreements" whose purpose was to ensure that these countries would not transfer U.S. nationals to the jurisdiction of the ICC.

The Kampala agreement on aggression was based on a series of compromises, a major portion of which had to do with sorting jurisdiction, between the ICC and the U.N. Security Council, for the finding of aggression.

Not surprisingly the permanent members of the Security Council (the ones with veto power: U.S., U.K., France, Russia and China) were reluctant to share the power to determine aggression conferred by United Nations Charter (Article 39).

The Draft Resolution compromise provided that under certain conditions the ICC could exercise jurisdiction over aggression by States Parties, but the Security Council would have ultimate veto power.

Dr. Kennedy Graham, a New Zealand Member of Parliament who went to Kampala as an observer with Parliamentarians for Global Action, made some comments reflecting the mixed reaction at the conference to the United States agenda:

"At present, the U.S. is 'prepared to constructively engage' without joining. Of course it is…. [It] is quite prepared to refer [to the Security Council] any issue of crimes in bello [during war], since it can veto any of its own.

"What it is not prepared to do is cede any competence to the Court to determine aggression (crimes ad bellum). … So, more of the same from the U.S., right now. But the time will come. They cannot hold out forever.

"When the rest of the world has moved, the leader of the free world will come inside the tent. When peace and justice truly merge on the negotiating table, the U.S., with its strategic partner of the night, Israel, will turn up for dinner. They should be made welcome."

Still, despite the compromises, the Kampala agreement was remarkable. The major hurdles to including aggression as a crime that can be prosecuted in the International Criminal Court have been overcome.

The days when national leaders can wage war with impunity may be slowly coming to an end.

Perhaps someday, as Kennedy Graham envisions, all countries will come inside the tent. If and when that happens even the leaders of the world's most powerful countries, when contemplating slaughter of the citizens of another country for political gain, will want to pause to consider the prospect of arrest, trial and imprisonment.
Humanity will then have taken a giant step toward the founding goal of the United Nations: a world without war.
http://windowintopalestine.blogspot.com

Action Alert = DEFEND WIKILEAKS!!

DEFEND WIKILEAKS -
END THE SECRET WARS

We believe that WikiLeaks and those whistleblowers who declassify documents in a time of secret war should be welcomed as defenders of democracy, not demonized as criminals.

We support their First Amendment rights and welcome their continued disobedience in response to a long train of official deception.

Our government and its allies in Afghanistan and Pakistan have stretched the labels "national security" and "secrecy" beyond all reasonable definitions, because they wish to keep the realities of these wars hidden from the American people. "National security" is becoming the last refuge of scoundrels. Only consider -

- Our government prohibited the media from photographing the returning remains of our dead soldiers, until public pressure forced a change in policy;

- The Abu Ghraib torture scandal only came to public attention when photographs were leaked by an MP;

- The war in Pakistan is shrouded in secrecy because it violates that country's sovereignty, results in the killing of innocent civilians, and is deeply unpopular;

- According to the new information from WikiLeaks, our Special Operations Task Force 373 operates outside the ISAF mandate to kidnap and kill targeted insurgents in a repeat of the discredited Phoenix program of the Vietnam era.

- Gen. Stanley McChrystal was forced to resign after a Rolling Stone reporter uncovered attitudes hostile to civilian authority;

- The same Rolling Stone article quoted a top official saying if the truth about these wars was known by the American people, they would be even more unpopular.

Given this context of cover-ups, whistleblowers have been a last resort in keeping democracy alive.

We understand the embarrassment of high officials when exposed, but it is Orwellian for the Pentagon to accuse the WikiLeaks of having "blood on their hands." We are in the tenth year of a war which has claimed over 1,100 American lives, and where Afghan and Pakistan casualties are obscured deliberately. Many of America's killed and wounded are listed as non-combat, minimizing the actual toll. WikiLeaks has been careful to delete information which might expose individuals to lethal risk. Those who really have blood on their hands are the authors of this war. We stand with those who expose them.
. . . .

WHAT YOU CAN DO: 1. End the silence in the face of government threats against WikiLeaks. 2. Circulate the petition online, in your community and organizational circles. 3. Forward the petition to decision-makers in your community. 4. Turn the petition into letters to the editor, leaflets and creative forms of public protest. Sign the petition here.

Oppose Afghan Funding, Support the McGovern/ Feingold Legislation (HR 5015/S. 3197) View text of the legislation here. View list of current co-sponsors here. Contact your representative and urge them to co-sponsor the bill here.

Rethink Afghanistan Wathch Rethink Afghanistan's: We're f*#!ing losing this thing. Tom Hayden serves on the board of Brave New Foundation and contributes to its Rethink Afghanistan outreach campaign.

Just the Facts Find out what the war is costing your community here. Quick facts on Afghanistan here.

Join a Local Network! To add your name to our regional activist lists, please write us at: contacthayden@gmail.com with your e-mail and location.

9th Annual National Organizers' Conference, Kansas City, MO, July 23-25

http://www.endtheoccupation.org/article.php?list=type&type=340

Bibi Back at the White House – The Consistency of Israeli Duplicity Comes Ever More Clearly into Focus – by Jeff Gates

With Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu visiting the White House July 6th, it's time to recall how Tel Aviv deceived Washington throughout the entirety of the U.S.-Israeli relationship.

U.S. military leaders will be watching this meeting very closely, as will the veterans community.

For me, confirmation of Israel's strategic duplicity came in a meeting with Harry McPherson who served as counsel and speechwriter for Lyndon B. Johnson. LBJ entered the Senate in 1948 with Louisiana Senator Russell Long for whom I served as counsel and speechwriter.

At his law offices in Washington, Harry described his arrival in Tel Aviv the night that the 1967 War began. That war typifies the consistency of this ongoing deceit.

He flew in the night before from Vietnam through Hong Kong. He knew on arrival that something was amiss because the airport lights were off. He checked into his hotel and was awakened early on June 5th by Wally Barbour, the U.S. ambassador to Israel.

A pear-shaped diplomat with a penchant for yellowing Palm Beach suits, Barbour called to tell Harry that the war had just broken out-to which he replied, "But I just come from the war."

Barbour picked him up at the hotel and they hurried to the foreign ministry for a brief meeting before conferring with the Israeli chief of military intelligence. In response to their repeated question, "Did the Egyptians attack?" McPherson and Barbour received only evasive answers. As air raid sirens wailed, McPherson recalls in A Political Education:

Barbour suggested that we might continue the discussion in the underground bunker. The general studied his watch. "No, that won't be necessary. We can stay here." Barbour and I looked at each other. If it wasn't necessary, the Egyptian air force had been destroyed. That could only have happened so quickly if it had been surprised on the ground. We did not need to ask for confirmation, but left at once to cable the news to Washington.

Israel was neither under attack nor under threat of attack as its leadership has since conceded. Air raid sirens were just props in the stagecraft of waging war by way of deception.

The Israel-as-victim storyline was stage-managed by Zionist extremists to make both Israeli citizens and foreign observers believe that the Jewish state was endangered. As with the phony intelligence that induced the U.S. to war in Iraq in March 2003, the facts in June 1967 differed dramatically from the geopolitical narrative.

Under cover of that false attack, Tel Aviv occupied land belonging to its neighbors. The bulk of that property is still held by force 43 years later with the support of the U.S. as its oft-duped ally.

Servicing the Commander-in-Chief

In the lead-up to Israel's Six-Day Land Grab, Johnson was lobbied by U.N. Ambassador Arthur Goldberg. LBJ had moved Goldberg from the Supreme Court to the U.N. so he could be replaced with Abe Fortas, Johnson's personal lawyer. Fortas was a senior operative in a network of Zionists who helped produce the Johnson presidency and shaped its policies.

When Goldberg used heart-rending rhetoric to weave for Johnson a storyline about Israeli vulnerability and the pending victimization of hapless Jews at the hostile hands of an Arab "ring of steel," LBJ waved a Central Intelligence Agency report predicting that Israel could win any war in the region in two weeks.

When Goldberg persisted, Johnson ordered the CIA to revisit their analysis. The agency returned with a revised report concluding that Israel could win any war in the region in one week.

On June 4th, at a Fortas-hosted dinner for Johnson, Defense Secretary Robert McNamara and New York investment banker John Loeb, Fortas cautioned Johnson that war might soon erupt in the Middle East.

When the president turned to McNamara for his opinion, the Pentagon chief agreed with Johnson that there would be no war. Johnson then confirmed that U.S. intelligence agencies agreed with McNamara's assessment. Johnson left for the White House at 10:58 p.m.

Less than six hours later, at 4:30 a.m. on June 5th, National Security Adviser Walt Rostow called LBJ to announce that Israel had attacked Egypt. Mathilde Krim, a former Irgun operative, was Johnson's guest at the White House that night. Before informing anyone else, LBJ stopped by the blonde beauty's bedroom to tell her, "The war has started."

Not until 7:45 a.m. did Johnson speak with Soviet Premier Aleksi Kosygin who expressed his hope and expectation that the U.S., as Israel's closest ally, would restrain Tel Aviv.

Mathilde Krim was the wife of Arthur Krim, chairman of the Finance Committee for the Democratic Party and president of United Artists. While Johnson was in the Senate, Krim bought land near the LBJ Ranch in Texas where he built "Mathilde's House." When Arthur was away on business, Johnson routinely took Marine One, the presidential helicopter, to visit Mathilde.

An Inside Job

In the war's first few hours, the "victimized" Israelis destroyed the Egyptian Air Force while its aircraft were still on the ground. Walt Rostow sent Johnson a memo describing the success of Tel Aviv's "vulnerable" military as "the first day's turkey shoot." By evening, the Jordanian air force was also largely destroyed.

Johnson also received a memo from Arthur Krim that read, "Many arms shipments are packed and ready to go to Israel, but are being held up. It would be helpful if these could be released." Johnson ordered them released.

By evening of the second day, two-thirds of the Syrian air force had been destroyed. The glee in the State Department Operations Room was palpable, leading Under Secretary of State Eugene Rostow to caution, "Gentlemen, gentlemen, do not forget that we are neutral in word, thought and deed."

At the State Department's mid-day press briefing, spokesman Robert McCloskey repeated Rostow's official "neutrality" lie. Zionist advisers surrounded Johnson in the decision-making that lent U.S. support to the 1967 war. "Everyone around me, without exception was pro-Israel," recalls Johnson speechwriter Grace Halsell. She identified more than a dozen close advisers to Johnson, including Walt Rostow, his brother Eugene and Arthur Goldberg.

White House counsels Leo White and Jake Jacobsen were likewise pro-Israel as were two key speechwriters: Richard Goodwin, husband of biographer Doris Kearns Goodwin, and Ben Wattenberg whose parents moved to the U.S. from Palestine. Likewise domestic affairs adviser Larry Levinson and John Roche, an avid Zionist and Johnson's intellectual-in-residence.

The Non-Separation of Powers

In the lead-up to this Israeli aggression, Fortas served as an enabling back channel between the Israeli embassy and the White House. Fortas had known Israeli Ambassador Avraham Harman since the ambassador's arrival in Washington in 1959. During the March 1960 visit to Washngton of Prime Minister David Ben-Gurion, Fortas sponsored a breakfast at his home attended by Harman and Johnson who was then Senate Majority Leader.

Fortas' biographer conceded: "For several weeks before the crisis erupted into war, the Israeli ambassador was ‘in very frequent contact' with Fortas and regularly visited the justice at his chambers or his house." An outspoken Zionist, Fortas also attended a critical White House strategy meeting on the Middle East on May 26th, ten days before the land grab began.

When it came to Israel, Fortas was never neutral. "When they get back from Egypt," a law clerk in his Supreme Court chambers overheard Justice Fortas say, "I'm going to decorate my office with Arab foreskins."

Throughout the six days of carnage that Israel inflicted on its neighbors, Near East experts met daily with Johnson in the Cabinet Room. Fortas attended each meeting. Reflecting on comments by Fortas to Johnson at their June 4th dinner party, John Loeb wrote to Fortas on June 6th: "You were prophetic about the Middle East. Thank the Lord the President has you as a friend and counselor."

In 1968, Johnson failed in his attempt to elevate Fortas to Chief Justice of the Supreme Court. Fortas resigned in May 1969 in the wake of a series of scandals. In the summer of 1970, The New York Times reported his registration as a lobbyist for Kuhn, Loeb & Company.

Fortas cemented his relationship with Johnson in 1948 when, in LBJ's first Senate race in Texas, the Washington lawyer finessed the extensive vote fraud apparent in the Democratic primary in which Johnson claimed an 87-vote victory, including 200 votes tallied in alphabetical order.

A Fortas-devised legal strategy led to Johnson's name appearing on the November ballot as the Democratic Party nominee. In a strongly Democratic state, that primary victory assured the ambitious Texan a victory in the general election and a seat in the U.S. Senate. Decades later, those familiar with this political history continued to refer to him as "Landslide Lyndon."

A Strategic Provocation

The Six-Day Slaughter of 1967 pre-staged the geopolitical dynamics for all that has followed-not only in the Middle East but also in the U.S. as Israel's violent taking of land outraged everyone in the region and set American foreign policy on today's ruinous course.

The periodic carnage visited on Palestinians ensures that this strategic provocation remains fresh in the minds of Muslims worldwide. Reactions to these serial provocations, in turn, fuel the plausibility of the latest storyline, The Clash of Civilizations and its corrosive counterpart: the Global War on Terrorism with "Islamo fascism" the essential Evil Doer branding.

Israel has performed with reliable consistency every act required to provoke and sustain extremism in the Muslim world. Only by duplicity has the Zionist state sustained a U.S. alliance whose main effect has been to make America appear guilty by association.

On August 9, 2000 in a White House ceremony, President Bill Clinton presented Johnson paramour Mathilde Krim with the Medal of Freedom. By then this former Irgun terrorist had been rebranded as a high-profile medical researcher and AIDS activist adored and promoted to political prominence by her pro-Israeli supporters in Hollywood.

It's not expected that Israeli-American Rahm Israel Emanuel, White House Chief of Staff to Barack Obama, will urge that Monica Lewinsky receive the nation's highest civilian honor. It's not yet known what role Emanuel and White House political strategist David Axelrod have played in sustaining our costly "special relationship" with the Jewish state.

As yet another Israeli Prime Minister arrives in Washington with yet another rationalization for continuing this entangled alliance, a nomination is pending for the appointment to our highest court of a third Jewish Zionist for a court with just nine jurists. In time, historians will identify the role played by the Israel lobby (and Emanuel/Axelrod) in the nomination of Elena Kagan.

Based on the consistency of "Bibi" Netanyahu's duplicitous conduct over decades, Barack Obama needs to know when an Israeli Prime Minister is once again deceiving a U.S. president. History suggests a reliable test: are his lips moving?

The End of History

Though the U.S. has been deceived with stunning consistency for more than six decades, a mid-course correction remains possible. If this latest president can concede to himself that his political career is a product of those complicit at this deceit, he may yet emerge as the transformative leader that his supporters once hoped he could be.

If Barack Obama can be honest with himself, he will speak candidly to the American people and explain why this long-running deceit must be brought to a speedy close. If on July 6th he announces support for a one state solution, that will start to unwind this perilous alliance.

Senior military leaders have confirmed the common source undermining U.S. national security. Should the current commander-in-chief fail to act consistent with the known facts, this latest political product of the Chicago Outfit may risk their continued allegiance.

To advance peace, he needs only declare U.S. support for the designation of Jerusalem as an international cultural site under the protection of U.N. troops. To end the multi-decade cycle of provocation/reaction, he needs only reassign 30,000 U.S. troops to Palestine to rebuild a destroyed society, resettle its ousted people on occupied land and secure Israel's nuclear arsenal.

The Zionist experiment was a failure before it began. An overdue end to this apartheid regime can begin July 6th. Or this perilous alliance can continue-at untold cost in blood and treasure.

July 6th could be a defining moment for a president in need of such a moment. That date could also mark the restoration of American values to U.S. foreign policy and grant solace to those moderate and secular Jews long appalled at the conduct of Zionists who in 1948 deceived a U.S. president to recognize as a legitimate state their extremist enclave in the Middle East.
http://sabbah.biz/mt/archives/2010/07/06/bibi-back-at-the-white-house/

FLOTILLA Cover-up: The New York Times Accused

by David Morris
For the past month, the alternative media have sought concrete evidence that the mainstream U.S. media, including the New York Times, willfully aided Israel’s cover-up of information about their Gaza flotilla attack.

Prima facie evidence of their complicity is abundant.

The Times’ role in the cover-up ranged from suppression of facts and failure to follow leads that might (and did) contradict Israel’s version of the massacre, to serving as a shameless conduit for Israeli propaganda. The Times persisted in publishing and republishing the official line of Israel and became a virtual bulletin board for crackpot opinions and commentary. A prime example is Michael Oren’s “An Assault on Israel, Cloaked in Peace,” arguing delusionally that this humanitarian effort was an “act of aggression” that threatened the very nation of Israel.

The news we Americans received on the massacre seemed written by an Israeli propaganda minister — in fact, some of it was. The Israeli army generously provided our media with a carefully edited video of their attack, which major news outlets dutifully broadcasted.

Long-distance images of civilians defending themselves against commando killers (including a woman brandishing a deck chair) were presented as evidence of armed resistance. The imprisonment in Gaza of an Israeli soldier four years ago was cited as justification for executing nine peace activists, two shot in the back of the head at point-blank range.

Alternative media journalists like Philip Weiss (Mondoweiss), Glenn Greenwald (Salon), and yours truly (USMediaAndIsrael.com) provide examples of the Times’ stonewalling and disinformation. James North on Mondoweiss, for example, writes about the aftermath of Israel’s illegal detainment of hundreds of peace activists and their video evidence. As Israel began releasing the prisoners, the Times’ legion of reporters failed to interview a single flotilla member to get their version of the atrocity. As North wrote, this unconscionable delay gave “Israel’s version of the deadly raid time to harden.”

The May 31 Times reported “Israeli officials said that international law allows for the capture of naval vessels in international waters…” Israeli officials said. Exactly. With convenient unprofessionalism, the Times published Israel’s claim at face value, offering no comment or analysis by experts in international law. In fact (and as the Times must have known), independent experts call the attack “flagrantly illegal.”

When the Times finally did report something not fed to them by Israel, their front page story lamented the public relations catastrophe for Israel, not the murder of nine peace activists nor the immense suffering caused by the illegal siege of Gaza.

On the contrary, Times reporter Isabel Kershner writes, “Israel says it allows enough basic supplies through crossings to prevent an acute humanitarian crisis.” Again, the paper reported this cruel lie citing only Israeli propaganda as their source (“Israel says…”). No editor of the NY Times would allow such sloppy journalism — unless directed to do so by top management.

The NY Times has a long history of pro-Israel reporting of events in the Middle East. One notable illustration is their coverage of Israel’s 1967 attack on the USS Liberty that killed and wounded over 200 American sailors. The Times’ only account of this deliberate, hour-long assault on a U.S. ship — a brief summary buried on page 19 of the paper.

The question is who within the New York Times ordered the most recent journalistic stonewalling and submission to Israeli interests. Might it be publisher/owner Arthur Sulzberger, Jr.? Rank-and-file employees and journalists at the Times must be truly embarrassed, even shamed by their employer’s willful deception of American readers.

We ask that someone come forward.
http://intifada-palestine.com/2010/07/flotilla-cover-up-the-new-york-times-accused/

The United States and the Muslim World: Has Obama reneged on his Cairo promise?

By Khaled Hroub
Director of the Cambridge Arab Media Project, United Kingdom

Responding to a student's question in his landmark visit to Istanbul in April 2009, Barack Obama said, "States are like big tankers, they're not like speedboats. You can't whip them around and go in another direction ... you turn them slowly, and eventually you end up in a very different place." Obama has begun to turn the American tanker, but this gradual change does not satisfy the expectations that swept the Muslim world upon his election. The image of the United States, badly damaged in recent years, requires a speedier overhaul than the one currently underway. Many Muslims and mainstream Islamists around the world wonder whether the turning of the tanker will be permanent. A policy reversal is more than likely when Obama leaves office, and the burst of fresh air that Obama's election brought to U.S.-Muslim relations could easily run out.

This article discusses the impact of Obama's presidency on improving U.S.-Muslim relations, with particular focus on Islamists and political Islamic movements. Obama's policy towards the Muslim world and the Middle East will hinge on two topics: the Palestinian- Israeli issue and support for democratization. While George W. Bush gave priority to democracy promotion in the Middle East and ignored Palestine, Obama seems to have taken the opposite approach, concentrating on Palestine and ignoring democratization. If Obama cannot fulfil the high hopes pinned upon him by many Muslims, their compounded frustration could be more damaging than the anger they experienced during the Bush years, and lead to more radicalization. Underneath this fatalistic resignation would lie the sentiment, "If Obama cannot not mend fences with Muslims, no one can."

‘Obamania' has had a significant effect on U.S.-Muslim relations. According to Gallup polls, in most Arab countries, the approval rate of American leadership doubled, and in some cases, tripled during the first year of Obama's presidency. From 2008 to 2009, approval of U.S. leadership increased from 14% to 37% in Tunisia , 25% to 47% in Algeria, 6% to 25% in Egypt, 12% to 29% in Saudi Arabia, and 4% to 15% in Syria. (Lebanon and Palestine are the outliers; approval of American leadership fell from 25% to 22% in Lebanon, and 13% to 7% in Palestine.Overall, this positive upswing corresponds to the new language and tone that Obama brought to international relations. Confrontational policies have been replaced by cooperation, unilateralism by multilateralism, war-mongering by engagement and dialogue.

Perhaps the most striking dimension of the new administration's foreign policy, as repeatedly stated by Obama himself, is America's new approach to the Muslim world, and the Muslim Middle East in particular. Obama's major developments in this field include reinstating Palestinian issue at the top of the foreign policy agenda, scheduling a deadline for the removal of American troops in Iraq (whose presence is seen by many Muslims as a proof of American imperial hegemony over Muslim land), announcing that the infamous Guantanamo Bay detainment facility will close, and combating the disrespect towards and fear of Muslim-American and Arab-American citizens that emerged after 9/11.

Determined to deliver a clear message to the Muslim world about this new approach, Obama gave his first televised interview just one week after taking office to the Saudi-owned, Dubai-based Al Arabiya satellite station. In the interview, he stressed that Muslims should know that the U.S. is not their enemy. Obama said that his job is "to communicate the fact that the United States has a stake in the wellbeing of the Muslim world, that the language we use has to be a language of respect. I have Muslim members of my family. I have lived in Muslim countries."

Obama's reconciliatory approach to the Muslim world continued with his two historic speeches in Istanbul and Cairo in April and June of 2009, respectively. In both speeches, he reiterated the themes of coexistence and common values, dismissing the notion of a clash of civilizations. Obama made clear distinctions between the peaceful Muslim majority and the small, violent radical groups hijacking Islam and claiming to act in its name. The Cairo speech was praised around the world as an oratorical masterpiece, and several books analyzing its significance and impact have already been published.

Islamist Ambivalence
Preceding Obama's visit to Cairo, the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood issued a statement titled "The Brothers' Opinion on the American President's Visit to Egypt" on June 4th, 2009.The strangeness, and perhaps the significance, of the statement is that it did not pronounce any clear position on Obama's visit. The Brothers' reiterted their stance on Israel, attacked Western policies, and confirmed the right of the Egyptian people to defend their country and change their internal authoritarian regime. At the end, the Brothers declared they would assess Obama's visit after it had taken place, and avoided making any prior judgement. Short and vague--but not condemning the visit altogether--it reflected the conflicted mood among Arab Islamists toward Obama's visit. After Obama's speech, the Brothers issued no followup message as they had promised, and posted nothing about the Cairo visit on their homepage. This reflects a continuing ambivalence among the Brotherhood, and among mainstream Islamist groups, about how to respond to Barack Obama, no longer a pet presidential candidate but the leader of the United States.

Reactions to President Obama by Islamist groups and intellectuals have been varied and conflicting. A range of these reactions, spanning several movements, will be surveyed here. Isam Al-Aryan, a leader of the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt, wrote an article in Beirut's Al-Akhbar daily titled "A Letter to Barak Obama." In the article, Al-Aryan warned Obama against supporting authoritarian regimes in the region, lamenting that these regimes have surrendered their sovereignty and interest to outsiders. Al-Aryan also expressed bitterness that global American military outreach often operates against the essence of American values.

It is a matter of allegiance to your country when you promote principles that are called upon by the American Constitution, the values of freedom, respect of human rights, democracy, and respect for the will of people. By contrast, it is not a matter of allegiance to your country to keep your armies ... occupying all corners of the world. It is not a matter of faithfulness to your principles to keep those detainees in jail without conviction and extract false confessions from them by torture; and to use tyrants and autocrats who remain in power because of your support...

Among the strongest Islamist endorsements for Obama, Mustapha Ikhlaif's article in Al Jazeera called upon Obama to convert to Islam and become the worldwide Caliph of Muslims. The author, a Moroccan academic who writes with Islamist undertones, argues that the race and ethnicity of a Muslim leader is of no importance as long as he embodies the message of Islam. Ikhalif contends that Persians, Turks, Seljuks and other ethnicities have ruled over the Arab region - why could not Barak Hussein Obama be one of them? Obama has been received warmly, even hailed by Muslims, and the only major step he must take before reigning over Muslim countries is simply to convert to Islam.

Al Jazeera also featured work by Muhanna Al-Habeel, a staunch critic of Obama and his Arab and Muslim fans. Al-Habeel, a Saudi writer, wonders how Obama "can explain to us the meaning of justice and tolerance in Islamic values at the same time that his forces strike against tens of innocent people in Afghanistan and Pakistan, and those American-occupied areas [are drowned] in rivers of blood." Al-Habeel went on to exclaim, "How nice Mr. President looked while he was sending his greetings to the victims in their graves..."

Between these extremes, another Islamist writer, Nabil Shabib, a Syrian living in Germany, is skeptical. He believes Obama's choice to visit Turkey first among Muslim countries was a loaded move. Shabib contends that Turkey is the type of majority-Muslim state the West wants to see--a secular Muslim country. More importantly, Obama wants to exploit the respected position of Recep Tayyip Erdugan's Turkey in order to implement American policies in the Muslim world. Obama wants Turkey to adopt a more active role in Afghanistan, in Pakistan, and in the Arab/Israeli conflict. For Shabib, this amounts to "Turkey becoming a Trojan horse for American policy in two components: soft political discourse; and political substance that is based on the continuation of hegemony in a new transformed ‘soft hegemony' after military failures."
Hamas and Obama
Hamas, after greeting Obama's candidacy with such enthusiasm, has been frustrated by the first year of his Presidency. Hamas followed the American presidential race closely and supported Obama to the point of harming his campaign. In April 2008, Ahmad Yousef, political advisor to the Hamas government in the Gaza Strip, praised Obama during a WABC radio interview. The statement was widely used by Obama's opponents, who denounced him as Hamas' favorite candidate.

Khaled Meshaal, Hamas' chief political leader, has expressed that his organization is more willing to enagage with American policymakers since Obama came to office. Hailing Obama's victory, Meshaal said, "It's a big change--politically and psychologically and it is noteworthy and I congratulate President Obama ... yes, we are ready for dialogue with President Obama and with the new American administration, on the basis that the American administration respects our rights and our options."

Since his election, Obama holds a very delicate position regarding Palestine and Hamas, a litmus test for many Muslims concerning Western credibility in promoting human values and justice. In his Cairo speech, Obama introduced a new approach to Hamas. "Hamas does have support among some Palestinians, but they also have to recognize they have responsibilities. To play a role in fulfilling Palestinian aspirations, to unify the Palestinian people, Hamas must put an end to violence, recognize past agreements, recognize Israel's right to exist."[

In an interview, Meshaal responded by saying
Undoubtedly Obama speaks a new language. His speech was cleverly designed... The essence of the speech was to improve the U.S. image and to placate the Muslims. We don't mind either objective, but we are looking for more than just mere words. If the United States wishes to open a new page, we definitely would welcome this. We are keen to contribute to this. But we [believe that cannot happen] merely with words. It must be with deeds, by changing the policy on the ground'.

However, despite early signs in January 2009 that the Obama administration was ready to engage with Hamas,[16] putting an end to American isolation of the party and the 1.5 million Palestinians under its jurisdiction in the Gaza Strip, nothing tangible took place.

The greatest challenge for the Obama administration is how to translate rhetoric and well-intentioned statements into concrete change. After a year, Obama's presidency has a mixed balance sheet, and frustration is gathering rapidly. On the Palestinian issue, Obama failed to pressure Israel to put a freeze on settlement building in the West Bank and East Jerusalem. Withdrawing troops from Iraq in January 2010 has been postponed until August 2010. Obama's dialogue and enagement approach has not been particularly successful in confronting Iran about its nuclear program. Both Republican and Democratic Congressmen stalled Obama's plan to close Guantanamo by voting down measures to relocate the detainees. Turning the hefty tanker is a strenuous job indeed.

Democratization Deficit
The second level of challenges Obama faces with regard to the Muslim world, and Islamists in particular, centers around democracy promotion. Islamists in the Arab world were dismayed that Obama did not use Cairo as an opportunity to address democratisation or the need for political reform in Egypt. Furthermore, he praised President Hosni Mubarak of Egypt, an autocrat determined to hand over power to his son, Gamal. Downplaying the issue of democracy advancement is a notable shortcoming of "Obama-ism". As new realism becomes a cornerstone in Obama's foreign policy, his speeches about American involvement in the world have almost completely dropped the previous (Bush-style) emphasis on democratization.

There is a debate raging in Muslim countries on whether it's beneficial to invite external powers to promote democracy. There are concerns about a double standard, since the United States has been famously uneven in its application of democracy. The U.S. desires and fights for democracy in Iraq, but completely ignores Saudi Arabia, for example. The U.S. praises elections in Lebanon when they bring victory to Western-supported coalitions but lambasts elections that empower Hamas in the West Bank or the Gaza Strip.

Among Islamists (and other opposition forces) in the Arab world there is a great dilemma surrounding what to demand from the West. If Muslims ask the United States to pressure their authoritarian regimes for democratization, they must relinquish sovereignty. Advocates of democracy also understand that explicit American support can be the kiss of death for a popular movement in the Middle East. On the other hand, if the U.S. does not intervene, autocrats will remain in power, citizens will still be denied free speech and political participation, and America will appear complicit.

The onus lies on both sides. If Obama truly believes that a stable Muslim world is in the best interest of the United States, then he must adopt a more consistent approach on democracy promotion, one that is less focused on immediate gain. This is necessary to establish a long-lasting, healthy relationship between the U.S. and Muslim states.

Islamists must develop vision of what they desire from the West, and the U.S. in particular, in terms of democracy promotion. If Islamists pragmatically engage with the U.S. to pursue democratic reforms, they can broaden their own support, and counteract the belief that democratization is a Western conspiracy to infiltrate Muslim countries. It is equally important that the Islamist movement continues its trend toward politicization and secularization, as demonstrated by the successful Justice and Development Party (AKP) in Turkey. Focusing on public service and pushing ideological rhetoric and identity politics to the background will encourage external actors to deal more seriously, and less fearfully, with Islamist parties.

The ‘Obamania' that swept the Muslim world has evaporated and harsh realities have resurfaced. Obama's tanker-speedboat analogy is frustratingly realistic, Many Arab observers have insisted that no matter how much goodwill Obama gained upon election, rhetoric must be proven by deeds. It is unfortunate that Obama has found himself in the middle of several intractable issues: two wars; the global financial crisis; domestic disputes about Healthcare. This limits the time and effort that he has allocated for U.S.-Muslims relations, especially the Palestinian cause and democratization, which ought to be top priorities.
http://www.alzaytouna.net/arabic/print.php?a=118091