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Christopher
Hitchens' last battle
Salon, September 2005, Juan Cole
A further problem is that the same charges could be made against other
states. For example, Israel has launched several wars of aggression, gave refuge to
terrorists of the Jewish Defense League, defied a whole raft of U.N. resolutions, and
thumbed its nose at the Non-Proliferation Treaty far more successfully than Saddam,
producing hundreds of nuclear warheads where Iraq never produced a single bomb. Of course
Israel cannot be compared to Saddam's Iraq in the numbers of persons killed by its wars
and repression, but if the issue is crimes against international law, then the numbers are
surely less important than the fact of an infraction. HTMEnd the
charade of American 'Terrorism Experts'
The Daily Star, August 2005
There are several things seriously wrong with most of the "terrorism
experts" whom I have seen and heard on American television and radio. Their main
weakness is that they operate in the realm of the speculative rather than the factual. The
bulk of their analyses are total guesswork, and usually wrong; yet even that is flawed
because - and this is weakness number 2 - their guesswork is ideologically defined by the
prevalent White House script of the day. Weakness number 3 is that, as far as I can tell,
the vast majority of these experts have little direct knowledge of the Arab-Asian
societies they are analyzing (one give-away for that problem is that they routinely
mispronounce most of the names of people, places and organizations they are supposed to be
experts on). Major problem number 4 is that the experts tend to focus their speculation on
the symptoms of terror rather than its underlying causes. Most of them seem ignorant of -
or at least do not talk about - the full range of issues that propel young men and women
into the grizzly business of terror, and that drive political tensions and anger in many
Arab-Asian societies. Problem number 5 is that they emphasize military analyses, for a
problem that is predominantly political.
HTML
The Logic of Suicide Attacks
The American Conservative, July 2005
The central fact is that overwhelmingly suicide-terrorist attacks are not
driven by religion as much as they are by a clear strategic objective: to compel modern
democracies to withdraw military forces from the territory that the terrorists view as
their homeland. From Lebanon to Sri Lanka to Chechnya to Kashmir to the West Bank, every
major suicide-terrorist campaign—over 95 percent of all the incidents—has had as
its central objective to compel a democratic state to withdraw. HTML
Editorial: Fig leaf for war/Paper indicates U.N. was misled
Opinion, Mpls Star Tribune
This is where the plot really thickens. Perhaps readers will recall that
Bush's nominee for U.N. ambassador, John Bolton, recently was accused of orchestrating the
2002 ouster of Jose Bustani, head of the Organization for the Prevention of Chemical
Weapons, a U.N. agency. Why did Bolton want Bustani replaced? Because Bustani was
aggressively seeking to reinsert chemical weapons inspectors into Iraq. The conclusion of
many observers is that the United States did not want inspectors in Iraq because it
undercut the U.S. case for an invasion. HTML
US
Support of Israel Key Motivator of 9/11 Attack
TERRY MCDERMOTT, Los Angeles Times
Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, the man who conceived and directed the Sept. 11
terrorist attacks, was motivated by his strong disagreement with American support for
Israel, said the final report of the Sept. 11 commission.
Mohammed conceived the initial outline of the attack six years before its execution and
brought the plan to al-Qaida leader Osama bin Laden because he thought he did not have the
resources to carry it out on his own. HTML
Sharon
is a War Criminal
HUGH MEIR, The Guardian
Ken Livingstone has reignited his dispute with Britain's
Jewish leaders by launching a provocative attack on the "war criminal" Ariel
Sharon. In a riposte to criticism from the Board of Deputies of
British Jews, the London mayor accused Israel of "ethnic cleansing" and said its
prime minister should be imprisoned. He also accused Israel of demonising Muslims.
Phoney war
MAX HASTINGS, The Spectator
If the leaders of the Western world want to do our security a favour, they could
adopt a New Year resolution to economise on the use of the word ‘terrorist' in
their rhetoric. This proposal is based not upon indulgence towards al-Qa'eda or the
IRA, but upon the need to think clear-headedly about how best to protect our societies.
Through the ages, Britain has faced enemies of many creeds and nationalities. Today, a
mind-boggling weight of verbiage is addressed to the perils posed not by Spaniards or
Frenchmen, Germans or Russians, but instead by ‘terrorism'. The danger is real
enough, but the definition encourages lazy thinking. ‘Terrorist' is a woefully
inadequate identification. Like ‘infantryman' or ‘cavalryman', it
merely describes a method of engaging in combat. HTML
Forum:
Israeli hubris vs. U.S.
YOUSSEF M. IBRAHIM, United Press International
The latest Washington spy tale, involving Larry Franklin, an intelligence
analyst at the Defense Department, and some of Israel's most important lobbyists in
America, is becoming deeper by the week. HTML
Scholars debate Israel as Zionist state
By SCOTT WHIPPLE, New Britain Herald
Mezvinsky replied that the root cause of the conflict between Israelis and
Palestin-ians "has been the Zionist oppression of Palestinians. That fact cannot be
ignored. Furthermore, there has indeed been terror from Palestinians which should be
morally condemned. But we have state terror on the Israeli side that goes back before
1948, and it's gotten worse in the last four years." HTML
Galbraith
slaps Bush on Iraq war
By MIKE KALIL, Brattleboro Reformer October 2004
Galbraith didn't talk optimistically about the future of the Iraq war and
made it clear that it was not the smartest policy. He said it was classic Bush doctrine,
though it wasn't quite preemptive.
The procedure, he said, has been the single-most incompetent foreign policy he's seen in
his life. Other presidents attacked countries preemptively when there was imminent danger,
he said.
It wasn't preemptive, he said, because there was no imminent threat. He said former Iraqi
President Saddam Hussein was not about to attack the United States, though he clearly had
bad intentions. HTML
Voices
Stifled by the Battle Cry
By Adib Farha, Special to the Daily Star, October 2004
Bush went on to state: "This commitment to democratic reform is essential to
resolving the Arab-Israeli conflict." Wrong again Mr. President. You had
it backward: Resolving the Arab-Israeli conflict is essential to the institution of
democratic reform. During the past two weeks, events in Lebanon have been a sad but
revealing case in point. HTML
Agents of Influence
By Robert Dreyfuss, The Nation, October 2004
Did Ariel Sharon, the Prime Minister of Israel, run a covert program with
operatives in high-level US government positions to influence the Bush Administration's
decision to go to war in Iraq? The FBI wants to know.
That's the story behind the latest Washington spy scandal, involving Israel, the American
Israel Public Affairs Committee(AIPAC) and a mid-level civilian Pentagon employee
allegedly caught red-handed trying to deliver US secrets to the Israelis. HTML
The Impact of US Visa Policies: Implications for America's Economy
National Arab-US Chamber of Commerce, September 2004
The Travel Industry Association of America (TIA) says that over three years, the
loss of international travel to the U.S has cost the U.S. economy $15.3 billion in
expenditures. The Institute for Research: Middle Eastern Policy (IRmep) notes,
"If new procedures turn away desirable Saudi visitors, U.S. education, business
travel, and tourism industries could easily lose an estimated $4.7 billion in Saudi travel
revenue over the next decade."
During 2000-02, according to data in the U.S. Commerce Department's "Survey of
Current Business" (October 2003), total receipts from the Arab world dropped by
nearly half... PDF
The Emerging Case
for a Single State Solution
By Todd May, Counterpunch, September 2004
The two-state solution is neither moral nor realistic. The only politically
and ethically viable approach to the problem of Israel and Palestine is to support a
single democratic secular state that provides equal rights for all of its citizens.
Furthermore, the failure to recognize this has, I believe, helped underwrite some of the
most egregious of Israel's policies. The most important reason for this has not, to my
knowledge, yet been sufficiently addressed. I would like to do so here. HTML
The
Hour: Pro-Israel? Hardly.
By Leonard Fein, Forward, September 2004
As the United States now stumbles its way toward a coherent policy regarding
Iran, with the awesome dangers that an ill-chosen policy would involve, it becomes
critically important that we know for a fact that government policy has been developed
exclusively on the basis of America's perceived interests. That cannot, however, come to
mean that American Jews, presumptively pro-Israel, are inherently ineligible to
participate in such policy formulation, or even that they be subjected to more stringent
controls. Yet if, in their right-wing pro-Israel zealotry, Feith or any of the others have
in any way suggested to their aides that the sharing of classified information with Israel
is acceptable, that is a plausible outcome of this mess. Pro-Israel? Hardly. HTML
Corral the Hunting Horse
By Matt Hutaff, The Simon, August 2004
So I'd like to issue a call to all those currently serving the American
government in name, but the Israeli government (or any other, for that matter) by policy: stop.
Running around trying to see who can please the Likud party the most doesn't do your
constituents any favors. Israel's policies don't represent the world's Jewry, and neither
do you. You represent a region of one state in the Union, listen to the problems and
concerns those you do represent, and do well by them. Ultimately, that is the only
benefit you are to anyone. Seeking the approval of another government or people makes you
a traitor. HTML
The Anatomy of "Terrorist Experts"
By JAMES PETRAS Counterpunch, August 2004
Above all the Terror Experts celebrate triumphal imperialism: the defeated
colonial peoples, we are told , are "resentful" "those who feel they
can't keep up". Of course with a hood over their head and shackled legs and feet and
a cattle prod burning their genitals they can't keep up, they can't turn around and
express gratitude to their torturers.
How is a Palestinian farmer going to "keep up" with a Jewish settler who seizes
his land, water and , supported by local thugs and Israeli soldiers, blocks his access to
the market? Anything short of "resentful" would be masochistic. HTML
Michael
Moore, Richard Perle Join Forces
Tanya Hsu, AntiWar.com, July 2004
On June 25, 2004, Michael Moore's film, Fahrenheit 9/11 opened to 500 screens and
insatiable crowds. The film's message to audiences is clear and simple: the U.S.-Saudi
relationship must end. However, Americans should take time to go beyond the film, books
and talk-show pundits to reexamine the complicated history between the U.S. and Saudi
Arabia and the real motives of those pushing for war.
Americans will soon be asked to make a decision about whether invasion is the proper
course. An informed decision will serve America in a way that hidden plans, rationales and
one-sided movies cannot. HTML
CIT Seeks to Reassure Western Businessmen
Javid Hassan, Arab News, July, 2004
Meanwhile, Tanya Hsu, a senior analyst at the Institute for Research: Middle
Eastern Policy, and Hassan Elkhalil, a US immigration lawyer, have said that new US visa
procedures have created “a substantial fall-off” of Saudi visitors to the United
States.
According to the authors, this year 124,000 US service and manufacturing jobs will be
directly related to US-Saudi trade.
The institute forecasts that the worst-case loss in
travel related services, education and tourism revenue could reach $4.7 billion between
2002-2011. HTML
Casualty of War
Wil S. Hylton, GQ Magazine, May, 2004
A person who comes immediately to mind in that regard is Richard Perle, who,
thank God, tendered his resignation and no longer will be even a semioffcial person in
this administration. Richard Perle's cavalier remarks about doing this or doing that with
regard to military force always, always troubled me. Because it just showed me that he
didn't have the appreciation, for example, that Colin Powell has for what it means ... I
call them utopians... I don't care whether utopians are Vladimir Lenin in a sealed train
going to Moscow or Paul Wolfowitz. Utopians, I don't like. You're never going to bring
utopia, and you're going to hurt a lot of people in the process of trying to do it."
HTML
"Bush's foreign policy tends to be made by a rather extremist group, which have very
extremist views, particularly regarding the Middle East."
All Things Considered, National Public Radio, 4/24/2004
NPR: "One of the things European allies and particularly now
Arab states are very worried about is the US policy shift on the Middle East. The US
once called Jewish settlements in the West Bank obstacles to peace, President Bush now
says they are realities on the ground. He made those comments when he endorsed Ariel
Sharon's plan to pull settlements out of Gaza but keep settlements in the West Bank.
John Kerry has said he supports the US position on Israel and I wonder is this just an
issue that no one wants to touch in an election year?"
Zbigniew Brzezinski: "I suspect that's largely the case. I
suspect there's no payoff in making distinctions, or in even raising alternatives.
I would guess that over time there would be a change if Kerry was elected simply because
Bush's foreign policy tends to be made by a rather extremist group, which have very
extremist views, particularly regarding the Middle East.
My guess is that if there was a change in the presidency, we would be more likely to
return to some form of bi-partisanship in foreign policy and that in itself would mean a
shift in the content of foreign policy."
Going Back Where They
Came From
by Patrick J. Buchanan, April, 2004
With the situation in Iraq deteriorating, the neocon agenda is to widen the
war into Syria, Iran and perhaps Saudi Arabia, and convert it into "World War
IV," the war of their dreams, a war of civilizations, an Armageddon, with America and
Israel on one side and Islam on the other.
Exiting Iraq with honor and avoiding the wider war for
which the neocons are even now scheming is the first duty of patriots. HTML
'Iraq Expert' Perle Shills for Chalabi at Senate Panel
by Juan Cole, April 2004
Perle also at one point said he didn't think the events of the first two
weeks of April were a "mass uprising" and said he thought Fallujah was quiet
now. (Nope).
It is indicative of the Alice in Wonderland world in which these Washington Think Tank
operators live that Perle could make such an obviously false observation with a straight
face. Even a child who has been watching CNN for the past three weeks would know that
there was a mass uprising. (Even ten percent of the American-trained police switched sides
and joined the opposition, and 40% of Iraqi security men refused to show up to fight the
insurgents.) HTML
Bush
Outsources Mideast Policy
by Patrick J. Buchanan, April 2004
What does the mini-Munich mean? The great Zionist land thief has gotten
America's blessing to keep his stolen goods. George Bush has out-sourced his Mideast
policy to Tel Aviv. The custodian of our reputation for decency and honor in an Arab world
of 22 nations is now Sharon. As for Palestinians who put their faith and trust in the
United States, they have been exposed as fools. HTML
Blame
Bush for what came After 9/11
Ciro Scotty, MSNBC, April 2004
"THE REAL THREAT"? Philip Zelikow, now the executive director of
the September 11 commission, served on the National Security Council, was on the Bush
transition team, and was a member of the President's Foreign Intelligence Advisory Board
from 2001 to 2003. According to the Inter Press Service, he said during a war-on-terror
forum at the University of Virginia Law School on Sept. 10, 2002: "I'll tell you what
the real threat [is] and actually has been since 1990 -- it's the threat against Israel.
And this is the threat that dares not speak its name because...the American government
doesn't want to lean too hard on it rhetorically because it's not a popular sell." HTML
The rise and the
fall and the rise of Coke and Pepsi
Benjamin Sutherland, Arabies Trends Magazine, April 2004
Still, damage from last year's invasion of Iraq could have been worse,
says Carline Levy, UBS's beverage analyst in New York. “We thought there would
be a big backlash,” she says. “It's been less negative than anyone
worried.” Still, two months ago Coca-Cola's Bozer took pains to call the
company's flagship beverage an “international symbol, rather than an American
one.” Coca-Cola also touts itself as an employer: in a statement written for this
article, the company notes that more than 20,000 Middle Easterners are on its payroll.
Bozer is fighting a lost cause, says IRmep's Smith. In 2003, Coca-Cola retreated from
Bahrain to Athens. “We see that retrenchment as the rise of local brands. Coca-Cola
feels they are identified with US regional policy, and there's nothing they can do
about it.” HTML
Accountability Acts Threaten US Jobs, Promote Double Standards in the Middle
East
Scott Bortot, The Daily Star, March 2004
The event titled The Accountability Acts: Implications
for US Middle East Policy, was organized by the Council for National Interest (CNI) and
the Institute for Research: Middle East Policy (IRmep), brought together former US State
Department officials, independent researchers and academics. Full Article PDF
Syrian: Help with Terror Fight Suffered
Ken Guggenheim, Guardian Unlimited, March 2004
Ambassador Imad Moustapha said the sanctions bill did not diminish Syria's
interest in cooperating with the United States, but some U.S. officials ``feel very
anxious when Syria cooperates on terrorism because their premise is that Syria is a
terrorist country.''
Moustapha made his comments during and after a forum on whether Israel also should be
subjected to a sanctions bill. The event was sponsored by two groups critical of U.S.
Middle East policies: the Council for the National Interest and Institute for Research:
Middle Eastern Policy. HTML
Businesses decide to tackle problems of being American
Carl Weiser, Gannett News Service, February 2004
American companies are trusted less because of mistrust of the U.S.
government -- a "trust discount," according to Edelman Public Relations, which
conducts an annual survey on brand images. Nearly two-thirds of French and Germans claimed
they were less likely to buy American products because of their dislike for U.S. foreign
policies.
In the Arab world alone, anti-Americanism costs U.S. companies an estimated $ 9.4 billion
a year in lost sales, according to the Institute for Research: Middle Eastern Policy, a
Washington research group.
No
End to War
Patrick Buchanan, The American Conservative, February 2004
But here is the rub: The neocons do not want to narrow our list of enemies.
They do not want to confine America's war to those who attacked us. They want to
expand our list of enemies to include Israel's enemies. They want to escalate and
widen what Chris Matthews calls “the Firemen's War” into a war for hegemony
in the Middle East. They had hoped to exploit 9/11 to erect an empire, and as they see the
vision vanish, their desperation knows no bounds. HTML
A Clean Break with the Roadmap and
with Longstanding Middle East Policy:
A foreign policy serving Israel
William James Martin, CounterPunch, February, 2004
Indeed, Perle, Wurmser, and Feith are on record as being committed to
policies
which are radically at variance with long standing American policy and are also
radically at variance with President Bush's Roadmap. HTML
And the United States wonders: “Why do they hate us?”
Adib F. Farha, The Daily Star, January
2004
"It is amazing how some people never learn. The
United States launched its pre-emptive war in Iraq under the pretext that the regime of
the Iraqi tyrant Saddam Hussein possessed weapons of mass destruction (WMD). Yet no such
weapons have turned up and the senior inspector has come out declaring that WMDs were
simply not there. The implication is that if the threat of WMDs was the motive for the
war, it was an unsubstantiated reason and that the war had other motives." HTML
A Tabloid Version of Islam
Qamar-ul Huda, The Boston Globe, January 2004
The impact of actual knowledge of Muslims and Islam versus the influence of
media constructions of them is important because defining the other moves us beyond
superficial accounts and racialized impressions of the other.
If the other, Muslims, become objects defined not by their own discourses but by those
imposed by outside, then we will settle with undifferentiated, naive, hegemonic, and
self-serving ideas of Muslims. HTML
Stand Up to
Sharon
Patrick Buchanan, The American Conservative, December 2003
Israel is free to choose her course. But America needs a Middle East policy
Made in the USA, not in Tel Aviv—or at AIPAC or AEI. HTML
Time for Clarity
Opinion, Financial Times of London December 2003
There is clearly something to the argument made by Mr Perle that if the US
government wants unpaid and expert advice, it must expect the advisers to pursue their own
business interests, and that these will tend to be in the security field. Mr Perle himself
was last month cleared by an internal Pentagon investigation of any impropriety in
representing the interests of the Loral satellite company and of the Global Crossing
telecommunications company in negotiations with the US government, including the Pentagon.
But board members are only required to disclose their interests to the
Pentagon itself, not to the public or Congress. Propriety has to be public if it is to be
credible. If it cannot be so reformed, the board should be scrapped. HTML
The
hallmarks of an al-Qaeda attack
By Syed Saleem Shahzad, Asia Times, November 2003
The terror attacks also aim to segregate the Muslim world from the rest of
the world, if nothing else in economic terms.
According to the Institute for Research: Middle Eastern Policy (IRMEP) July-August
policy brief, the US share of world merchandise exports to the Arab Middle East slid from
18 percent in 1997 to 13 percent in 2001. This occurred during import demand growth
averaging 1 percent per year and voracious demand for high value-added capital goods among
Arab economies. The hardest-hit US export sectors include civilian aircraft, agriculture,
heavy transportation, as well as telecommunications and industrial equipment. HTML
Loss of
Feith in Douglas
Jim Lobe, Interpress, November 2003
A protege of Richard Perle, the former chairman of Rumsfeld's Defense Policy
Board (DPB) who stands at the center of the neo-conservative foreign policy network in
Washington, Feith has long opposed territorial compromise by Israel.
He was an outspoken foe of the Oslo process and even the Camp David peace agreement
mediated by former president Jimmy Carter between Egypt and Israel. His former law
partner, L Marc Zell, is a spokesman for the Jewish settlers' movement on the occupied
West Bank.
But, more to the point, virtually everything that has gone wrong in Iraq - especially
those matters that Congress is either investigating or is poised to probe - is linked
directly to his office. "All roads lead to Feith," noted one knowledgeable
administration official this week. HTML
FOX News Misinforming American Public about Iraq
PIPA/Knowledge Networks Poll, October 2003
Those receiving most of their news from Fox News are more likely than average to
have misperceptions. Those who receive most of their news from NPR or PBS are less
likely to have misperceptions. These variations cannot simply be explained as a
result of demographic characteristics of each audience, because these variations can also
be found when comparing the demographic subgroups in each audience. PDF
This war on
terrorism is bogus
Michael Meacher, Guardian Unlimited, September 2003
We now know that a blueprint for the creation of a global
Pax Americana was drawn up for Dick Cheney (now vice-president), Donald Rumsfeld (defence
secretary), Paul Wolfowitz (Rumsfeld's deputy), Jeb Bush (George Bush's younger brother)
and Lewis Libby (Cheney's chief of staff). The document, entitled Rebuilding America's
Defences, was written in September 2000 by the neoconservative think tank, Project for the
New American Century (PNAC).
The plan shows Bush's cabinet intended to take military control of the Gulf region whether
or not Saddam Hussein was in power. It says "while the unresolved conflict with Iraq
provides the immediate justification, the need for a substantial American force presence
in the Gulf transcends the issue of the regime of Saddam Hussein." HTML
Outlook:
Iraq and Terrorism
Robert Baer, Washington Post, August 2003
Robert Baer: I agree completely. (By the way, my sense always was that we
should have found an Iraqi general to do the job -- anything to keep our troops out of the
Middle East.) The problem was that this war was concocted in Washington think tanks, by
people who haven't spent time in the Middle East. As for the average American, as much as
I can tell, he or she was shocked by 9/11. And in times of crisis, people tend to defer to
the White House, in spite of the evidence. If Iraq spins out of control, I think we'll see
the polls change. HTML
Bait and switch / The neocon case for war in Iraq
Minneapolis Tribune, July 2003
The neocon foreign policy agenda got neither a thorough vetting nor public
explication -- because its authors apparently thought the American people wouldn't
understand it or wouldn't buy it. Instead, the neocons pulled a classic, and very
arrogant, bait and switch. Sooner or later, they're going to pay for it. HTML
Dealing with Iraq: Is U.S. Policy Working?
C-Span Transcript of Senator Joseph R. Biden, Jr.
Right now, the neo-conservatives in this Administration are winning that
war. They seem to have captured the heart and mind of the President, and they're
controlling the foreign policy agenda. They put a premium on the use of unilateral power
and have a set of basic prescriptions with which I fundamentally disagree. Just as I
disagree with those in my own Party who have not yet faced the reality of the post-9-11
world, and believe we can only exercise power if we act multilaterally.
I don't question the motives of either the neo-conservatives or the pure multilateralists.
They genuinely view the world differently than I do. Suffice it to say, in my view the
neo-cons and the pure multilateralists are both wrong. What we need isn't the death of
internationalism or the denial of stark national interest, but a more enlightened
nationalism - one that understands the value of institutions but allows us to use military
force, without apology or apprehension if we have to, but does not allow us to be so
blinded by the overwhelming power of our armed forces that we fail to see the benefit of
sharing the risks and the costs with others. HTML
ZOA Blasts
State Dept. Advisers as Anti-Israel
Forward, July 2003
The ZOA letter singled out Djerejian, who it said is "closely tied to former
Secretary of State James Baker — widely regarded as the most anti-Israel secretary of
state in U.S. history." It also cited a series of articles and interviews in which it
said Djerejian "opposed 'unilateral' U.S. action against Saddam Hussein" and
"rationalized Arab terror against Israel." The first was based on a 1998 article
in which Djerejian urged the Clinton administration to take actions "consistent with
keeping the Gulf War coalition together." The second, which "rationalized Arab
terror against Israel," was a 1997 radio interview in which Djerejian said that a
slowdown in the peace process "has usually been a formula for increased violence and
acts of terrorism on the ground from either party." HTML
War on words deception
SMH Australia, July, 2003
Rendon heads the public relations Rendon Group, whose clients include the Pentagon
and the CIA. He calls himself an "information warrior and a perception manager".
It was Rendon who provided the US flags for hundreds of Kuwaitis to wave when American
troops rolled into Kuwait City at the end of the first Gulf War, signalling to the world
that the Americans were liberating heroes.
And when President George Bush snr ordered the CIA in 1991 to run a covert operation to
unseat Saddam Hussein, the CIA hired Rendon to organise anti-Saddam propaganda inside
Iraq. HTML
Media's
War Boosters Unlikely to Voice Regret
Media Beat, Norman Solomon July, 2003
To use George Will's inadvertently apt words, it was prescient to
foresee that “the president -- presumably with Cheney, Powell, Rumsfeld, Rice and
others as accomplices -- would use deceit to satisfy his craving to send young Americans
into an unnecessary war.”
Patrick Seale:
The intimate alliance that caused America and Israel to be reviled
Gulf News, July 2003
It is now widely suspected that the war was a fraud, but who perpetuated the
fraud and on whom? Were Bush and Blair fed fabricated intelligence or did they knowingly
massage and doctor the intelligence to exaggerate the threat from Iraq so as to justify an
attack? HTML
US Changes reason for Invading Iraq
Globe and Mail, July 2003
"It's bad enough that such a glaring blunder became part of the
President's case for war," Senator Edward Kennedy said. "It's far worse if the
case for war was made by deliberate deception. ... We cannot risk American lives based on
shoddy intelligence or outright lies." HTML
Bush Claim on Iraq Had Flawed Origin, White House Says
New York Times, July 2003
The White House acknowledged for the first time today that President Bush was
relying on incomplete and perhaps inaccurate information from American intelligence
agencies when he declared, in his State of the Union speech, that Saddam Hussein had tried
to purchase uranium from Africa. HTML
US Exports to the
Middle East
The Todd Feinburg Show, June, 2003
TFS: "Well this is certainly a troubling situation,
but I think one that is unexpected when you are making the sort of aggressive moves we are
to control events in the Middle East. Would
you agree with that, and if so, what can be done about it?"
IRMEP: "Well, I think one of the things that we need
to start thinking about in terms of our own government is that businesses can only do so
much in the region. What we really need to do,
and I like this fact about your show, Todd, is look behind the scenes. Really look at who is promoting the policies and
whether we've got it right. A lot of the
“pre-emptive military” approaches to the region are bad for business, quite
frankly. And if we look at the stake that
Americans have, there are many industries that have double digit (market share)
commitments to this region that are certainly going to bear the brunt of these
policies." HTML PDF Real Audio
Road Map To
Nowhere
Charley Reese
The basic facts of the conflict are that the Israeli occupation of the West Bank,
East Jerusalem and the Gaza Strip is illegal. Israel was ordered to withdraw from those
territories by the United Nations Security Council in 1967, when Israeli forces in the
Six-Day War captured them. There is nothing to negotiate. Israel must simply withdraw.
HTML
Delusions of Empire - How is
Paul Wolfowitz keeping a straight face these days?
Slate.com By Fred Kaplan June 2003
And yet, as David Fromkin points out in A Peace to End All Peace—his
ceaselessly fascinating (and, at this moment, vital) book about Britain's attempt to
remake the map of the Middle East before and during the First World War—they still
bungled the whole enterprise, badly misreading major events, and allowing themselves to be
led disastrously down primrose paths by local, power-hungry charlatans. Sound familiar? HTML
Khameni Calls for Restraint Against Protesters
Voice of America, June 2003
Iran's supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei is urging hard-line vigilantes not to
intervene after two nights of protests against the country's unelected Muslim clerical
regime. HTML
Perle to Present Iraq Opportunities
San Francisco Indymedia, May 2003
Richard Perle will present an investor summit for corporations interested in Iraq
opportunities. Although major U.S. corporations continue to face plummeting exports to the
Arab Middle East, this summit may show whether regime change, as opposed to normal trade
and engagement, can be profitable for U.S. companies.. HTML
U.S. Losing $100 million per year to Drug Counterfeiting
San Francisco Indymedia, May 2003
Israel has a strong generic pharmaceutical industry that would benefit
commercially, at the expense of PhRMA members, from a change in law to allow unauthorized
production for export of patented products. If this were to come to pass, damages to PhRMA
members could easily exceed $100 million dollars from this alone, but the damage would be
felt in other markets. HTML
CIA
Politics
Larry Johnson, former CIA and State Department intelligence analyst sees
"politicization of intelligence" efforts not seen since the Contra war.
Analysts not beleving that Iraq was a threat were thwarted - and the Pentagon office of
special plans went forward without dissent.
"...these people operating out of the pentagon office of special plans represent a
clear and present danger to the United States" (Real
Audio)
AIPAC Hijacks
the Roadmap
CounterPunch, May 2003
It would be a mistake to view the Israeli cabinet's narrow approval of the Bush
administration's "road map" on Sunday, (or Sharon's use of the word
"occupation") as steps towards resolving the Israel-Palestine conflict or as a
victory for President Bush. If there is any gloating to be done, it will be by Israel's
domestic US lobby and it will largely be done in private. HTML
Amnesty:
"War on Terror" has made the world worse
Reuters News, May 2003
LONDON (Reuters) - Washington's "war on
terror" has made the world more dangerous by curbing human rights, undermining
international law and shielding governments from scrutiny, Amnesty International said on
Wednesday. HTML
Our September 11
Arab News, May 2003
In 1977, Israel elected for the first time a religious party to form its
government, namely the Likud Party headed by Menachem Begin. Begin — a wanted killer
who had been the leader of the terrorist group “Stern Gang,” which killed many
people in massacres in Palestine — became Israel's prime minister and began a
new criminal wave of Jewish terrorism which continues today under Ariel Sharon. HTML
The Exit That Isn't on Bush's 'Road
Map'
The New York Times May 2003
Benyamin Elon, a minister in the Israeli
government of Ariel Sharon, agrees. But, reviving a vision long cherished by Israel's
religious and secular hawks, he argues that the new Palestinian state must be Jordan.
This is the "window of
opportunity," he says, for Israel to annex at last the occupied territories of the
West Bank and Gaza Strip. If the Bush administration has the courage to abandon
"clichés" about land for peace, he argues, it can now achieve a
"long-term, spiritual earthquake" in the Middle East. HTML
Bush
Vetoes Syria War Plan
The Guardian, April, 2003
Meanwhile, his undersecretary for policy, Doug Feith, and William Luti, the
head of the Pentagon's office of special plans, were asked to put together a briefing
paper on the case for war against Syria, outlining its role in supplying weapons to Saddam
Hussein, its links with Middle East terrorist groups and its allegedly advanced chemical
weapons programme. Mr Feith and Mr Luti were both instrumental in persuading the White
House to go to war in Iraq. HTML
U.S. Think
Tanks and Post-War Iraq
Al-Jazeerah April 2003
Al-Jazeerah: "Do
you think it is ironic that so much public sentiment is not being represented at a
political level in the governments that want to ‘democratize' Iraq?“
American
Enterprise Institute: "Come on, forgive me, that is an incredibly
stupid question. Democracy is not rule of the people, first of all. Rule of the people is
mob rule. Democracy is the rule of law, and because of the rule of law we have elections
every four years, every six years in the senate and every two years in the Representatives.." HTML PDF
US Trade with
Arabs Down 5%, Trade with Israel Up 25%
San Francisco Independent Media April 2003
"...A general downturn in total U.S. exports is not the cause. Over the time
period, total exports grew a healthy 6%. And not all countries in the region were losers.
One, in particular, enjoyed a peculiar spurt of growth. Israel imports of U.S. products
grew 25%. However, it is problematic to count this growth. As one analyst put it, due to
the massive U.S. foreign aid to Israel, when the U.S. plays the game of exports to Israel,
it is really playing with itself."
HTML
U.S. Department of
Defense Advances to Derail Israeli Palestinian Roadmap
San Francisco Independent Media April 2003
"...Think of the legislative and executive branches and defense department as
having suffered an attack of Israeli cowbirds. They have pushed the eggs of U.S. interests
and policies out of those nests. Now their young have hatched, and they are flying toward
State...." HTML
Senator: Criticize
Israel and Cut School Funding
San Francisco Independent Media April 2003
"...The third-ranking Republican member of the U.S. Senate,
conservative Rick Santorum (Pa.), plans to introduce so-called "ideological
diversity" legislation that would cut federal funding for thousands of American
colleges and universities if those institutions are found to be permitting professors,
students and student organizations to openly criticize Israel,..." HTML
Perle Maneuvers
U.S. into Syrian Phase of "A Clean Break"
San Francisco Independent Media April 2003
"...Richard Perle, member of the study group that authored the"A Clean
Break: A New Strategy for Securing the Realm" (ACB) strategic plan for Israel, has
increased efforts to fully implement the Syrian phase with U.S. armed forces. Perle and
other ACB operatives and allied administration officials have intensified the volume and
repetition of scathing criticism against Syria to sell this portion of the plan to the
American public..." HTML
Terrorist
Abbas Captured in Baghdad, Bosch still at Large in Miami
Academics for Justice April
2003
"..Under protection of the first Bush
administration and heralded as an anti-Castro freedom fighter by conservatives such as
Otto Reich, Elliot Abrams, and John Negroponte, Bosch is not expected to be tried for
terrorism in the U.S. After his last acquittal in Venezuela, Bosch returned to Miami
without a visa in 1988. Although U.S. authorities then jailed him because he was wanted
for violating parole in 1974 in connection with his conviction for a 1968 bazooka attack
on a Havana-bound Polish freighter at the Port of Miami, he now has a clean slate. Amid
lobbying from Cuban-American political leaders, the first Bush administration released
Bosch in 1990 after he renounced violence and agreed to be monitored by federal agents.
Abu Abbas is unlikely to face such clemency on the part of the second Bush administration.
Abbas is also not known to have the support of any currently identifiable organized
political lobby in the United States...." HTML
Claims
that Jewish cabal driving Iraq war stir debate
The News Tribune - Tacoma April 2003
..."I wouldn't feel any differently if this memo were drafted for the government
of Sri Lanka," he said. "It has nothing specifically to do with the fact that
this is Israel and with the fact that these people are Jewish. It has to do with the fact
that a policy crafted with the interests of a foreign government in mind is now being
pursued by our own government, even though this policy is not entirely in our best
interests as a country...."HTML
Foreign Aid and AIPAC:
Embezzlement as Public Policy
CounterPunch April 2003
"...Why does Washington loan
money to countries, and then absolve those countries of any obligation to repay their
debt? It seems silly to keep track of debt at all if the debts end up written off....HTML
Pro-Israel Hawks and the Second
Gulf War
Amin April 2003
."...e
pro-Israel lobby, whose principal Jewish component is the American Israel Public Affairs
Committee (AIPAC), became a significant force in shaping public opinion and US Middle East
policy after the 1967 Arab-Israeli war. Its power was simultaneously enabled and enhanced
by Israel's emergence as a regional surrogate for US military power in the Middle East in
the terms outlined by the 1969 Nixon Doctrine. In the 1970s and 1980s, the lobby was able
to unseat representatives and senators who could not be counted on to support Israel
without qualification, such as Sen. Charles Percy (R-IL), Rep. Paul Findley (R-OH) and
Rep. Pete McCloskey (R-CA)...HTML
Who's War?
The American Conservative March, 2003
"...We charge
that a cabal of polemicists and public officials seek to ensnare our country in a series
of wars that are not in America's interests. We charge them with colluding with
Israel to ignite those wars and destroy the Oslo Accords. We charge them with deliberately
damaging U.S. relations with every state in the Arab world that defies Israel or supports
the Palestinian people's right to a homeland of their own. We charge that they have
alienated friends and allies all over the Islamic and Western world through their
arrogance, hubris, and bellicosity..." HTML
How Israel is Wrapped up in Iraq
Time Magazine February, 2003
"... Bush Administration hasn't done very much to bring about peace
in the Middle East; in fact, it has allowed a bad situation to grow worse. And it was
misleading because a stronger Israel is very much embedded in the rationale for war with
Iraq. It is a part of the argument that dare not speak its name, a fantasy quietly
cherished by the neo-conservative faction in the Bush Administration and by many leaders
of the American Jewish community..." HTML
People of Conscience Can Change
History
CounterPunch February, 2003
."...First, after Sept. 11, 2001, everyone sees that foreign policy
directly affects us at home; there is no denying that U.S. actions in the Middle East have
helped fertilize the soil in which terrorism grows. People realize it is a mistake to
leave such issues to foreign-policy 'experts'."....HTML
Liberating America From Israel
January, 2003
.."...Nine-eleven would not have occurred if the
U.S. government had refused to help Israel humiliate and destroy Palestinian society. Few
express this conclusion publicly, but many believe it is the truth. I believe the
catastrophe could have been prevented if any U.S. president during the past 35 years had
had the courage and wisdom to suspend all U.S. aid until Israel withdrew from the Arab
land seized in the 1967 Arab-Israeli war.."...HTML
The US Gameplan
for Iraq
The American Conservative January 13, 2003
"...On October 1, 2002, Akiva Eldar, a leading commentator in the Israeli
daily Ha'aretz, who opposes the almost 36-year-old occupation of Palestinian
territories, wrote an article detailing the activities in Israel in 1996--that's more than
half a dozen years ago--of two Americans who now hold very senior positions in the Bush
administration, Richard Perle and Douglas Feith. These two "joined a small group of
researchers who were asked to help Benjamin Netanyahu in his first steps as prime
minister" after his election in 1996. The document they prepared for Netanyahu,
according to Eldar, "presents an ambitious plan for a U.S.-Israeli partnership --not
one focused narrowly on territorial disputes...." HTML
Ariel Sharon's Shakedown
The American Conservative January 13, 2003
"...What should Bush do? Tell Sharon the loan guarantees will not even be
taken up until he begins to dismantle all the settlements he has begun to build since
George W. took office. And if Sharon attempts to roll him in Congress, he, Bush, will go
to the country and roll Sharon..."HTML
The Mideast
Road Map
New York Times December 24, 2002
"...No one expects an instant solution. But by waiting to unveil the road map
until after a new Israeli government is formed, which could be several months, Washington
seems to be hoping to wrap this problem into a broader recasting of the region after
regime change in Iraq. That is a dangerous gamble..." HTML
Drain the Swamp, and there will be
no more Mosquitos
The Guardian September 9, 2002
Noam Chomsky
"....September 11 shocked many Americans into an awareness that they had
better pay much closer attention to what the US government does in the world and how it is
perceived. Many issues have been opened for discussion that were not on the agenda before.
That's all to the good.
It is also the merest sanity, if we hope to reduce the likelihood of future
atrocities. It may be comforting to pretend that our enemies "hate our
freedoms," as President Bush stated, but it is hardly wise to ignore the real world,
which conveys different lessons..." HTML
American
Views of the Mideast Conflict
New York Times May 2002
Andrew Kohut
.."...Much more than in the past, Americans now think what happens in the
Mideast has important consequences for the United States. Nearly two-thirds say that
achieving peace in the Mideast should be an important goal of our foreign policy. And most
think the United States should try to be a neutral broker...". HTML
The Op-Ed
Echo Chamber: Little or no space for dissent from the military line
FAIR November/December 2001
Whether the mainstream daily op-ed page was ever a true forum for debate or
for "non-traditional voices" is questionable. But during the weeks following
September's terrorist attacks, two leading dailies mostly used these pages as an echo
chamber for the government's official policy of military response, while mostly ignoring
dissenters and policy critics. HTML
Israel Shows United States How Not
To Fight Terrorism
The Columbia Daily Tribune October 2001
Charley Reese
.."....So, every time an Israeli shows up purporting to be an
expert on terrorism, we ought to laugh the person right back home.
The Israelis are pretty good terrorists themselves, but as anti-terrorists, they are a
bunch of goofs.." HTML
On Foreign Entaglements
Farewell Address, 1796
George Washington
"....so likewise, a passionate attachment of one nation for another produces a
variety of evils. Sympathy for the favorite nation, facilitating the illusion of an
imaginary common interest in cases where no real common interest exists, and infusing into
one the enmities of the other, betrays the former into a participation in the quarrels and
wars of the latter, without adequate inducement or justification. It leads also to
concessions to the favorite nation of privileges denied to others, which is apt doubly to
injure the nation making the concessions, by unnecessarily parting with what ought to have
been retained, and by exciting jealousy, ill-will, and a disposition to retaliate, in the
parties from whom equal privileges are withheld. And it gives to ambitious, corrupted, or
deluged citizens (who devote themselves to the favorite nation), facility to betray or
sacrifice the interests of their own country, without odium, sometimes even with
popularity; gilding with the appearances of a virtuous sense of obligation, a commendable
deference for public opinion, or a laudable zeal for public good, the base or foolish
compliances of ambition, corruption, or infatuation..." HTML |
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