By Michael Gillespie, Contributing Editor

Pro-Israel neoconservatives may beat the drums for war, but dozens of antiwar activists gathered in Des Moines, Iowa’s Nollen Plaza on the evening of February 21 to urge Washington politicians to “Talk to Iran” instead.

“We’ve had way to much war in the Middle East,” declared Tony Salem of Des Moines.

“I’m out here to send a message to politicians that we don’t need another war in the Middle East,” said Ismael Hossein-zadeh, Emeritus Professor of Economics at Drake University.

Hossein-Zadeh described the situation as “quite frightening, because the constellation of forces in the region, especially in the Persian Gulf is such that a small mistake could lead to a big confrontation with unpredictable consequences.”

Furthermore, economic sanctions can be acts of war under international law, and increasingly punitive sanctions may prompt Iran to defend its people by trying to blockade the Strait of Hormuz, which could lead to hostilities, said the author of The Political Economy of U.S. Militarism.

A war against Iran would be much more destructive than the Iraq and Afghanistan wars and would have many more consequences, said Hossein-zadeh.

Israelis are the most influential and insistent proponents of an attack on Iran, while, “as far as the United States in concerned, the signals are mixed.  There are those who are supporters Israel and who are supporters of aggression against Iran, but there are some hesitant and ambivalent forces like the president himself, who I am afraid is not leading here.  When you don’t lead, then you are going to be led,” said Hossein-zadeh.

“The time is now for diplomacy,” said Jeffrey Weiss, Director of Catholic Peace Ministry and a rally organizer.

“Iran has recently made a number of overtures.  The time for talking is now, and we are here because we are concerned that a shooting war, a major catastrophe, could begin.  It is time to talk to Iran,” said Weiss.

Lewis and Winnie Pinch, who lived and worked at the American Presbyterian Hospital at Mashad from 1967 to 1970 and who visited Iran more recently, drove from Omaha to take part in the rally across from the Civic Center where Ariana Huffington was speaking.

“An attack on Iran would be a serious problem, not just for Iran but for the United States and for Israel, where we hear that most of the war talk comes from, Israel” said Lewis Pinch.

“We get a distorted picture of Iran from our media here in the United States.  The Iranian people are lovely people by and large.  Some of them agree with their government, some of them don’t, just like here in the U.S.  The people are very friendly to the United States, in contradistinction to what you might hear, and I don’t think most people here realize that,” said Pinch.

“They loved us when we went back, October a year ago.  They’d come up to us and we were the people to be celebrated.  They wanted to know where we came from and after they found out it was the United States they said, ‘Oh we’re so glad you’re here.  We love you.  We wish more of you came here.’  They’d want photos of us with them.  They’d telephone their friends to tell them that they were talking to Americans,” said Winnie Pinch.

“I’m out here tonight because I don’t want to see more homeless veterans out under the bridges and having PTSD and TBI,” said  James Marren, Treasurer of the Veterans National Recovery Center and a member of the Des Moines Chapter of Veterans for Peace.

“The money that is being wasted on war could be spent on social issues, helping out with healthcare, helping people get jobs, rebuilding our infrastructure here.  It’s time to bring that money home and help our people.  The people of Palestine, Iraq, Afghanistan, and Iran are victims of our war policy just as much as our veterans are.  We see the neocons pushing for their agenda – permanent war – and there are victims on all sides.  We don’t need more homeless veterans; they don’t need their families destroyed by our war machine.  That’s why I’m here tonight,” said Marren.

“There may be some people who wouldn’t like to hear this,” said longtime antiwar activist and member of the Des Moines Valley Friends Meeting Sherry Hutchison, “but I think Israel is permanently paranoid about Iran.  I think it would be a good idea if our government would say, ‘If you bomb them, no more aid to Israel from the U.S.’”

By Richard Falk

The latest occupation crime in Afghanistan was a shooting spree on March 11, reportedly committed by a lone American soldier in Afghanistan’s Kandahar Province.

Sixteen Afghan civilians, including women and children, were shot in the middle of the night without any pretence of combat activity in the area. Such an atrocity is one more expression of a pathological reaction, allegedly by one soldier, to an incomprehensible military reality – a reality that seems to be driving US military personnel on the ground crazy. The main criminal here is not the shooter, but the political leader who insists on continuing the mission in face of the evidence.

US soldiers urinating on dead Taliban fighters, the burning of Qurans, and troops convicted of killing Afghan civilians for sport or routinely invading the privacy of Afghan homes in the middle of the night: whatever the military commanders in Kabul might say in regret, and Washington might repeat by way of formal apology, has become essentially irrelevant.

These so-called “incidents” or “aberrations” are nothing of the sort. These happenings are pathological reactions of men and women caught up in a death trap not of their making, an alien environment that collides lethally with their sense of normality and decency. Besides the desecration of foreign lands and their cultural identities, US political leaders have, for more than a decade, unforgivably placed young Americans in intolerable situations of risk and enmity. Equally revealing are recent studies documenting historically high suicide rates in the lower ranks of the US military.

Senseless and morbid wars produce senseless and morbid behaviour. Afghanistan, like Vietnam 40 years earlier, has become an atrocity-generating killing field. In Vietnam, the White House finally accelerated the US exit when it became evident that soldiers were murdering their own officers, a pattern that became so widespread that it gave birth to the word “fragging”.

Whatever the pretext after the 9/11 attacks, the Afghanistan War was misconceived from its inception. Air warfare was relied upon to decimate the leadership ranks of al-Qaeda, but instead its top political and military commanders slipped across the border. Regime change in Kabul, with a leader anointed by Washington to help coordinate the foreign occupation of his country, was a counterinsurgency formula that had failed over and over again.

But with the militarist mindset prevailing in the US government, failure was once again reinterpreted as an opportunity to do it right this time. Despite the efficiency of the radical new tactic of killing targets using drones – the latest form of state terror – the outcome is no different.

What more needs to be said? It is long past time for the United States and its NATO allies to withdraw with all deliberate speed from Afghanistan, rather than to proceed on its present course: negotiating a long-term “memorandum of understanding” that transfers the formalities of the occupation to the Afghans while leaving private US military contractors – 21st century mercenaries – as an outlaw governance structure after most combat forces withdraw by the end of 2014.

As in Iraq, what has been “achieved” in Afghanistan is the very opposite of the goals set by Pentagon planners and State Department diplomacy: the country is decimated rather than reconstructed, the regional balance shifts in the direction of Islamic extremism, and the United States is ever more widely feared and resented, solidifying its geopolitical role as the great malefactor of our era.

The United States seems incapable of grasping the pathologies it has inflicted on its own citizenry. The disgusting 2004 pictures of US soldiers getting their kicks from torturing and humiliating naked Iraqi prisoners at Abu Ghraib should have made clear once and for all to the leaders and the public that it was time to bring troops home, and keep them there if we cared for their welfare. What the pattern exhibits is not only a criminal indifference to the wellbeing of “others”, but a similar disregard of the welfare of our collective selves. The current bellicose Republican presidential candidates calling for attacks on Iran favours taking a giant step along the road – a road that is heading towards an American implosion. And the Obama presidency is only a half step behind: counselling patience, but itself indulging in war-mongering – whether for its own sake, or on behalf of Israel, is unclear.

President Obama was recently quoted as saying of Afghanistan: “Now is the time for us to transition.”

No, it isn’t. “Now is the time to leave.” And not only for the sake of the Afghan people, but for the sake of the American people Obama was elected to serve.

Richard Falk is the Albert G. Milbank Professor Emeritus of International Law at Princeton University and Visiting Distinguished Professor in Global and International Studies at the University of California, Santa Barbara. He has authored and edited numerous publications spanning a period of five decades, most recently editing the volume International Law and the Third World: Reshaping Justice (Routledge, 2008).

He is currently serving his third year of a six year term as a United Nations Special Rapporteur on Palestinian human rights.

Follow him on Twitter: @rfalk13

Article Courtesy Al Jazeera.com

By Editor, The Palestine Monitor

Tuesday 13 March 2012- A series of Israeli attacks on the besieged population of the Gaza Strip that began on Friday until today have resulted in the killing of 25 Palestinians, including two 13 and 15 year old boys.

The attacks were initiated by Israel as on Friday afternoon, it broke the fragile truce negotiated by Egypt in October 2011 by firing an F-16 missile directly at a car in the neighborhood of Tal el-Hawa. 44 year old Mahmoud Hanani, who is originally from Nablus and was freed in the October prisoner deal, was immediately killed along with his father-in-law Zuhair Al Qaisi, the secretary-general of the Palestinian Resistance Committee.

The Gaza Strip was rocked with explosions throughout the night, and by Saturday morning, a further ten Palestinians, all from the Islamic Jihad’s armed wing Al-Quds Brigades were killed, bringing the number of casualties to 12. Three of the resistance fighters were killed as they were walking next to the Palestinian Legislative Council building in the neighborhood of As-Shajaiyyeh. A reported 20 people were injured.

Israeli warplanes opened fire at one of the funerals on Saturday, injuring four people. A further five Palestinians were killed in separate air strikes, four of who belong to the Islamic Jihad group, with the fifth identified as 21 year old Mansour Abu Nusaira.

Sunday morning arrived with the murder of two more civilians: 13 year old Ayyoub Asseleya in Jabalia who was torn into pieces, and 52 year old yard keeper Adel El Issi in Gaza City. More than 30 people have been injured by the non-discriminate bombings.

Evening brought about no reprieve for the Palestinians in Gaza, as Israeli air strikes shelled two houses in the Jabaliya refugee camp that were mostly full of women and children, resulting in dozens of injuries. The following day another schoolboy, 15 year old Naef Qarmout was killed near his school in Beit Lahya in northern Gaza. An elderly father and his 30 year old daughter also killed in the same area.

2 resistance fighters were killed on Monday night, bringing the death toll to 25 Palestinians killed and over 100 injuries.

The past five days have been the bloodiest since late October of last year, where Israel claimed 10 Palestinian lives in its targeted assassinations.

Dr Mustafa Barghouti strongly condemned the attacks. “The escalation of violence on Israel’s part must be stopped,” he stated. “It is simply outrageous that the international community has continued to allow Israel to act with impunity. The world must pressure Israel to cease its practice of extra-judicial assassinations, and to hold it accountable to all of its crimes it has committed against the Palestinian people.”

Egypt stepped in to broker yet another ceasefire between the resistance groups and Israel, which will be in effect at 1:00 am Wednesday morning.

The list of Palestinians killed in Gaza is below:

Zuhair Al-Qaisi, 49
Mahmoud Hanani, 44
Yahya Dahshan, 27
Mohammad Haraha, 24
Obeid Al-Gharabli, 22
Hazem Qureqi, 22
Shadi Seqeeli, 27
Fayeq Samir, 28
Motasem Hajjaj, 22
Ahmad Hajjaj, 22
Mohammad Al-Mogari, 25
Mahmoud Al-Ghamri, 26
Husain Barham Hammad, 51
Mansour Abu Nusaira, 21
Mahdi Abu Shweish, 24
Ayyoub Asseyela, 13
Adel El Issi, 52
Hamada Abu Mutlaq, 24
Raafat Abu Eid, 24
Hamadah Salman Abu Mutlaq, 24
Muhammad al-Hasoumi, 65
Faiza al-Hasumi, 30
Naef Qarmout, 15
Bassam al-Ajla, 32
Muhammad Thaher, 25

Article and Image: The Palestine Monitor

By Brian Terrell

On the long flight to the Gulf Kingdom of Bahrain on February 10, I had been studying the Lonely Planet guide to the region in order to be able to explain at the airport, if needed, that I had come as a tourist. As it happened, while most passengers on our plane sailed through passport control, my travel companion Linda Sartor and I were pulled from the line and subjected to a closer examination. My sketchy knowledge of the historic and cultural sights that I had come to see was good enough to satisfy official scrutiny. We were granted tourist visas and sent on our way.

That we had come as tourists was true. We had intentionally neglected to mention, though, that we had been invited to Bahrain along with a few other international activists to monitor the government’s response to demonstrations marking the one year anniversary of Bahrain’s “Arab Spring” pro-democracy uprising on February 14. This demand for basic rights was brutally suppressed by Bahrain’s police and military backed by the army of Saudi Arabia.

We certainly would have been barred entry to the country had our full intent been told—but, as Daniel Berrigan once mused, “How much truth do we owe them?” In fact, our invitation from Nabeel Rajab, president of the Bahrain Center for Human Rights, came because the government had made it known that observers from established human rights organizations would not be granted visas until the next month and that access to the country by the international media was to be severely limited during that period. The regime’s resolve that there be no witnesses to the events surrounding the anniversary made our presence for those days all the more crucial.

The morning after our arrival, we met with local activists and the small group of U.S. citizens who had come before us. Before long we were in the streets of Manama, the capital city, accompanying a march to the Pearl Roundabout, the focal point of last year’s demonstration. This peaceful march of men, women and children was quickly set upon by police in full riot gear and dispersed with tear gas and percussion grenades. Our first encounter with the Bahraini police appeared to be vicious, but our local friends assured us that our presence was a restraining factor. Two of the Americans we had just met, Huwaida Arraf and Radhika Sainath, were taken into custody at this march and later that evening deported, the government said, for activities not consistent with their status as tourists.

Our small group, called Witness Bahrain, grew over the next days, even as several friends who traveled to join us were turned away at the airport by a regime made even more hyper-vigilant after deporting Huwaida and Radhika. While being careful to remain at large at least until the events of the 14th, we toured Manama and the villages over the next couple of days, hearing testimony of government abuses and accompanying demonstrations and marches.

On February 13, Tighe Barry and Medea Benjamin of the peace group Code Pink joined us, and our Bahraini guide Wafa took some of us on a tour of the zoo and the National Museum. In the afternoon we witnessed a march of tens of thousands through the main thoroughfares of Manama.

This march was tolerated by the authorities until a large group split off to walk to the Pearl Roundabout. The police response was immediate and appalling. Tear gas in Bahrain is not used as a means of crowd control so much as collective punishment—crowds dispersed by gas are not allowed to escape but are pursued, cornered and gassed again. Many are injured by direct hits from gas canisters and percussion grenades.

We witnessed beatings and heard reports of injuries by birdshot and rubber bullets.

On the actual anniversary, the police had the country locked down. Patrols of armored cars sped through the streets of Manama and the roads out of the villages were blocked by tanks. Many hundreds still made it to the streets, many were injured, many arrested. Six more of us were taken by the authorities.

In my case, finally getting pinched by the Bahraini police was anticlimactic. Four of us Americans with a Bahraini friend were taking a back way along a quiet street to catch up with others to attempt reaching the roundabout when a passing police patrol stopped us and asked for identification. One more time, we explained that we were there as tourists. “If you are tourists,” we were asked, “why do you have gas masks?”

A few hours later we were in a police station where we met two more from our group who had been captured under more dramatic circumstances. One by one, we were summoned to talk with representatives from the Ministry of Information and were told that we would be put on a flight to London at 2 a.m. as our visas had been cancelled. Our claim to be tourists was regarded as a deception by the authorities. My protestations to the contrary were to no avail.

Bahrain is a tiny island kingdom that is home to about a million people—half of whom are not citizens—that is visited by 8 million tourists a year. Many of these, we were told, are Saudis drawn there by the night life and legal alcohol. Others visit the museums and beaches. In the brochures produced by the government, tourists are encouraged to meet the friendly people of Bahrain. This is what we did and it was for this that we were deported.

We were privileged to tour this beautiful and afflicted country and to live the reality of its people, if only for a little while. Not content with having our photos taken with camels, we spoke with emergency room doctors who, after treating victims of last year’s crackdown, were themselves tortured and charged with sedition. We met with mothers mourning their children who were killed or imprisoned, and workers barred from practicing their professions for being in favor of freedom.

We were in Bahrain as tourists, not of the malls and golf courses and museums but of the streets and villages where real people live and struggle. Anyone who visits Bahrain and never gets a whiff of tear gas is a poor tourist, indeed. To the police who arrested us, a tourist with a gas mask is a hopeless contradiction and proof of culpability. For the tourist who wants to learn the present reality of Bahrain, a gas mask is more indispensable than sunscreen.

The faithfulness and solidarity of the people of Bahrain will prevail over the perfidity and cruelty of its backward and crude monarchy, supported as it is only by the brute force of its sponsors, the governments of the U.S. and Saudi Arabia. “Sumoud,” meaning be strong, hold fast, is the Arabic word by which the resisters in Bahrain greet and encourage one another. Their peaceful strength is a challenge and an inspiration as we continue our common struggle on the far ends of the globe.

Sumoud.

By DR. ARTHUR B. KEYS, JR.
Guest Writer

As Egypt marks the first anniversary of the January 25 revolution, we must remember that the primary driving force in Egyptian electoral politics has not changed. The same energy that propelled hundreds of thousands to peacefully demonstrate for weeks against Hosni Mubarak, and later against the military council, fuels the hopes of Egypt’s young people, especially working people.

Every poll and survey indicates that Egyptians want equitable and honest social and economic development. And real, sustainable development begins with young people. They have the energy, the openness, and the hope to turn ideas into reality.

Nowhere is this truer than in Egypt and other countries in the Middle East and North Africa whose underdevelopment squanders talent, restrains ambition, and fosters instability. Nearly one in five people living in the Middle East and North Africa is between ages 15 and 24. It is this group that will build the next generation of businesses and civic institutions, infusing them with their own attitudes and expectations.

Investment in the youth of Egypt and the Middle East has the greatest potential return. However, a large and sustained commitment by governments and nongovernmental organizations will be needed to initiate, program, and monitor this public investment—a challenge in today’s fiscal environment. But my organization believes it is a reasonable, even self-evident, investment compared to what we might have to spend should the hopes and expectations of today’s demonstrators again be frustrated. More than just a voice, youth in the Middle East need resources to forge their own futures.

In Egypt and other countries, investment in social and economic development can accelerate the transformation into a more democratic, civilian-dominated state that at the same time can be influenced and shaped by Islamist groups and shared religious attitudes. Such a state may be less pro-Western in the narrow sense of that term. It will pursue an independent foreign policy and may challenge US priorities on occasion. But it will be much more able to participate in and contribute to the social, political, and economic development of the international community. Turkey has successfully made this transformation and, like Turkey, Egypt is a culturally and religiously rich society driven by youthful energy. If Western values are about representative and accountable institutions that release and effectively channel the pursuit of universally shared values, a democratic Egypt infused with the great values of Islam is sure to be a friend of the United States.

Engaging Middle East youth, and the political parties and religious groups they join, is a tremendous opportunity for all of us. These are active citizens and creative workers. Their energy, whether motivated by religious or secular hopes, will create and sustain change for the long term. As a nation and a member of the international community, we must do what we can to eliminate roadblocks to the legitimate desires and energies of Egypt’s young citizens.

Dr. Arthur B. Keys is President and CEO of International Relief & Development, a global development organization based in Arlington, Virginia. He is the recipient of the William Sloane Coffin Award for Justice and Peace from Yale Divinity School.

Suzanne Manneh
Guest Writer
San Francisco, CA

Tareq, a Syrian American graphic designer living in Silicon Valley, says his life has “completely changed 100 percent over the past year,” a change he credits to protests in Egypt’s Tahrir Square exactly one year ago today. That date has since been enshrined as a pivotal moment in the evolution of the Arab Spring.

The toppling of Tunisia’s Zine Al-Abidine Ben Ali and Egyptian leader Hosni Mubarak, followed by the fall of Libyan strongman Moammar Ghaddafi have defined what Tareq, who requested that his last name be withheld because of safety concerns for relatives in Syria, calls “the most important time of the region’s history.”

“[These events] have broken the barriers of fear for Arab Americans and Arabs abroad against oppression and reinforced pride in being Arab,” says Tareq, before striking a note of caution.

The road ahead, he says, is long and unpredictable. Events in his native Syria, where an ongoing struggle to oust President Bashar Al-Assad has claimed over 5,000 lives, checks his optimism.

Mohammed Bouazizi was not unlike many young Tunisians. A recent college graduate, he was reduced to selling fruit to support himself and his family. On December 17, 2010, Bouazizi immolated himself to protest policies blamed for rising unemployment and poverty.

That singular event launched a wave of protests, beginning in Tunisia and rapidly spreading across the region, culminating in an 18-day rally that drew on Egyptians of all stripes and from all corners who descended on Tahrir and eventually succeeded in ending Mubarak’s 30-year rule.

Egyptians have since celebrated their gains, recently holding the country’s first, if controversial, democratic elections, with the moderate Egyptian Brotherhood sweeping into power ahead of secular and more religiously conservative rivals.
Tunisia also held elections in October 2011, with the moderate Islamist Ennahda Movement winning a majority of the vote.

But for others in the region — including Bahrain, Yemen, and Syria — the ripple effects of the Arab Spring continues to make waves.

“These uprisings toppled the whole idea of Arab equals terrorist, backwards, or illiterate,” said Momen El-Husseiny, an Egyptian and currently a Ph.D. candidate at the University of California, Berkeley in Architecture and Global Metropolitan Studies. “All these notions that had been so potent were no longer so. We are now in communication with the entire world,” he said.

El-Husseiny, who spent the past year in Egypt and recently returned to Berkeley to complete his dissertation, said he immediately saw those changes within himself and in others.
Mokhtar Alkhanshali, of Yemeni descent, says the Arab Spring has altered the way Arabs are seen globally, dispelling widespread notions including that of Arab women being absent from the realm of civic engagement.

Nobel Peace Prize winner and head of the Yemeni organization Women Journalists Without Chains, Tawakkol Karaman, he noted, was “one of the first voices that came out in this movement in Yemen,” having “led the first protests in front of the University of Sanaa.”

Women also played an active and prominent role in Egypt’s Tahrir protests. Such actions, broadcast for a global audience thanks to the proliferation of mobile technology and social media, “changed the face of Arabs,” says Alkhanshali.

“For a Yemeni woman to be the first Arab woman and youngest person to win a Nobel Peace Prize, and play such a role…I feel very proud of that,” he added.
Alkhanshali shared another experience, one closer to home, that spoke to the new light under which Arabs are now being seen. It was last Halloween, he explained, when he encountered a stranger dressed in military fatigues and a Kiffyeh, a traditional unisex headscarf.

“He told me he was a Libyan revolutionary,” Alkhanshali recalled, saying it was then he realized that mainstream society was beginning to replace the image of Arabs as “riding camels and oppressing women” to “fighters for democracy.”

“I take my daughter to a (private) Arabic school,” says Hany Elhak, originally from Egypt and now living in San Jose. Recalling the events of the past year, he says that when the revolution first swept through Tunisia, students and parents with roots spanning the entire Arab world celebrated.

“People were bringing in food… We never felt that close,” he says, adding that a resurgent pride in Arab American identity and culture, long overshadowed by conflict in the region and fears of terrorism at home, were evident in recent protests in San Francisco.

“During demonstrations in support of the Syrian struggle, there have been Yemeni’s, Egyptians, everyone there in solidarity. There has definitely been a renewed sense of Pan Arabism, a sense of Arab pride,” noted Tareq.

And inspiration. For if nothing else, the Arab Spring helped precipitate what has become the largest protest movement to hit America since the Vietnam War.

At a recent Occupy Oakland rally, Tareq remembers hearing protestors chanting “The people want to topple Wall Street.” That chant, he says, found its precedent in Tahrir and Tunis, where protestors cried, Asha’ab ureed isqaat anizaam. “The people want to topple the regime.”

“Of course we can’t take the credit, but I do believe that if the Arab revolutions were not this powerful, the Occupy movement would not have been (as powerful) either,” he notes.
Arabs across San Francisco and the Bay Area are preparing to commemorate the anniversary of the Arab Spring with an event that organizers say will “bring the community together… to reflect on this last year of revolution in Egypt and honor all Arab struggles.”

Janaan Attia, a community organizer and one of the individuals responsible for putting on Wednesday’s event in the city’s Mission District, says it is “vital that Arabs gather and connect” with one another.

Discussions are sure to touch on issues of democracy and the continuing violence in countries like Syria, though many are hopeful and say they’d like to return when conditions improve.
Others are more cautious.

“I’m sure we will see democratic states,” said Tareq in reference to Syria, “but unfortunately (the violence) will continue. We won’t get democracy for free.”

By M K Bhadrakumar

We don’t miss out on David Ignatius, because he is believed to be wired into the US security establishment. He can go seriously wrong – for example, on Pakistan’s ISI or the Afghan war – but we should still read him so that we can read between his lines. Indeed, DI’s column in today’s WaPo weighing the prospects of an Israeli military strike on Iran makes strange reading.

Ignatius’ opinion piece keeps upfront the possibility of an Israeli military strike on Iran in the coming 3-month period. He speculates that Iran may not retaliate, but may simply roll over like the Ugandans did in 1976 or the Syrians in 2007 when the valorous Israeli jets appeared on their skies.

Even more curious is Ignatius’ outline of the US thinking. As per DI, Barack Obama will bestir himself only if Iran attacks US military assets or targets American interests or threatens Israel’s security! That is, Obama will remain stand-offish so long as Iran lumps the Israeli strike.

The most hilarious part in DI’s column is that Israel too knows it is not possible to substantially damage Iran’s nuclear programme and so it may have to return for “another strike in a few years.” That is to say, Israelis (and Obama) would expect the Iranians to be like sitting ducks for the Israelis to come and bomb the daylights out of them every now and then!

And, why would Iran be so very afraid? Because, according to DI, Iranians are nervous that any retaliation might trigger US retribution which would cause a collapse of the feeble Islamic regime!

Why is DI allowing his byline to be trifled with? Evidently, all this is a bit of ‘coercive diplomacy’, whilst the Obama administration really hopes is to cajole Tehran to “finally open serious negotiations for a formula to verifiably guarantee that its nuclear program will remain a civilian one.”

But then, it is crystal clear by now that coercive diplomacy won’t work with Iran. Whereas, constructive engagement can, as the recent back channel contacts during the fracas over the Strait of Hormuz testifies. Iran is past the point of being militarily threatened. In fact, a military option doesn’t really exist.

Divested of western propaganda, Iranian revolution enjoys a substantial social base. Also, the Islamic revolution represents national aspirations which are embedded deep in Iran’s social and political history. The great social mobility that the revolution generated makes its foundations virtually unshakeable. The self-styled Iran analysts and pro-Israeli polemists in the US who are a dime a dozen today cannot comprehend this.

The Belfer Centre for Science and International Affairs in Harvard recently published a masterly policy brief titled “Attacking Iran: Lessons from the Iran-Iraq War”. In sum, Iran is probably one of  a handful of countries today which have the capacity to switch back and forth from a conventional war to a “people’s war”. If Saddam Hussein were alive, he could have advised the Americans and the Israelis about the hazards of getting entangled in Iran’s “people’s war”.

Israeli professionals who know what war is about and the surprises that wars can hold and ultimately, what wars could turn out to be (despite meticulous planning), are capable of grasping this grim reality. Israel can’t win this war of attrition with Iran. Diplomacy is the only alternative available.

Courtesy M K Bhadrakumar

By Michael Gillespie, Contributing Editor

Fifteen delegates of a coalition of Iowa peace and social justice organizations visited the Des Moines office of Senator Tom Harkin (D-IA) on January 18 to ask the senator to take a firm stand against a war with Iran.

“Frankly, sir, we are alarmed,” Jeff Weiss, executive director of the Catholic Peace Ministry, told Harkin aide Tom Buttry during a telephone conference call.

Weiss expressed deep concern that Harkin had joined his 99 US Senate colleagues in voting for a punitive sanctions bill that targets Iran’s oil exports and the country’s central bank.  Weiss pointed out to Buttry that that former National Security Council analyst and principal White House aide on Iran Gary Sick has described the new sanctions as “an act of war.”

The National Defense Authorization Act of 2012, which President Obama signed into law on December 31, included an amendment authored by Sens. Robert Menendez (D-NJ) and Mark Kirk (R-IL) that would place crippling economic sanctions on financial institutions that do business with the Iran Central Bank. The amendment unanimously passed the U.S. Senate in December by a vote of 100-0.

Weiss also noted that the Senate voted in favor of the harsher sanctions legislation in defiance of the Obama administration’s desire for latitude in negotiations.

“We are here to ask Senator Harkin to speak publicly about the need for diplomacy with Iran and to support the Obama administration’s position as much as it is about diplomacy,” said Weiss.

Dr. David Drake, representing Iowa Physicians for Social Responsibility (IPSR), read from a letter authored by the organization.

“Dear Senator, in the name of sanity – economic, psychological, and environmental – please speak out against the current war mongering against Iran.  The USA cannot afford to risk a war with Iran.  The US citizenry is war weary and economically frustrated.  The potential costs and consequences of a war far outweigh any imagined benefits.  We all know full well that Iran is not a nuclear threat.

IPSR called on Harkin to work to de-escalate tensions and promote peace in the Middle East and Southwest Asia and to work toward resolving the very real economic and environmental challenges confronting Americans at home.

Eloise Cranke of the Methodist Federation for Social Action called on Harkin and all members of the US Senate and other government officials “to immediately work with all deliberate speed toward a peaceful resolution of nuclear issues,” “to reject any first strike action by US armed forces anywhere,” and to, “pursue these peacemaking strategies with particular regard toward Iran.”

MFSA called on Harkin to “exercise your leadership in creating avenues of communication between the US and Iran in order to prevent a dangerous escalation of the current tensions.”

Mark Rosenbury of Plymouth Congregational Church Peace and Social Justice Committee told Harkin’s aide that he his wife Janet, “have seen the futility of the Vietnam War and the most recent Iraq War and we just hope that it doesn’t get repeated.”

Author and retired Drake University economics professor, Ismael Hossein-zada, a native of Iran who has lived and worked in the USA all of his adult life, read portions of a memo to President Obama authored by Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity (VIPS), a group of military, intelligence and foreign service officers: “We are seeing a replay of the ‘Iraq WMD threat.’ … The Israel lobby has been beating the drums for us to attack Iran for years. … Another long war is not in America’s or Israel’s interests, whatever Israel’s apologists claim.”

“I must just add one personal note.  Senator Harkin, because of your position on the [Appropriations Defense and State Foreign Operations] sub-committees, you have a unique opportunity to help prevent another calamitous war, probably regional and perhaps even global, and I hope and pray that you will not miss that opportunity,” said Hossein-zadeh.

Bob Brammer of the Catholic Peace Ministry and STAR*PAC noted that Harkin has often in the past been “a drum major for peace and human rights.”

Brammer called on Harkin to speak against war with Iran and to push for diplomacy.

“We need you now, Senator Harkin,” said Brammer.

Gilbert Landolt of the Des Moines Chapter 163 of Veterans for Peace called on Harkin, “a veteran himself, to stand with us on this and do whatever you can” to prevent a war with Iran.

Sherry Hutchison of the Des Moines Valley Friends Meeting criticized the recent sanctions provision passed by the Senate on the grounds that it violates the separation of powers doctrine.

“There are so many hawks in Congress.  I don’t know why they think perpetual war is something we ought to be doing,” said Hutchison, who also called on Harkin to speak out publicly against war with Iran.

Carolyn Uhlenhake-Walker of Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom (WILPF)’s Des Moines chapter called on Harkin to ask the Senate to work to open a channel of communication with Iran.

“Not since 1979 have we had direct communication with Iran, and its time that we started talking about ways to work this out diplomatically,” said Uhlenhake-Walker.

Ed Bloomer represented the Des Moines Catholic Worker and Chapter 163 of Veterans for Peace.

“We believe it’s a rich man’s war and a poor man’s fight.  The money spent on arms that kill and maim could be used to rehab infrastructure here in the US and to address the problems we have here in inner cities.  We don’t want a war with Iran,” said Bloomer.

Buttry responded to the concerns expressed saying, in part, “As far as the Iran sanctions vote goes, let me say that Sen. Harkin did vote for the Iran sanctions amendment to the defense bill.  He ended up voting against the defense bill for different reasons.  While he is not particularly enthusiastic about Iran sanctions, I think the Senate vote was a function of, there had to be some kind of reaction to the increasing belligerence of Iran.”

Buttry mentioned a “violent crackdown by Iran’s leadership in the wake of an openly questionable election,” said Iran had “kicked IAEA inspectors out of Iran,” and spoke of Iranian nuclear facilities, “that aren’t under IAEA inspection.”

“While they’re not refining uranium up to a level for nuclear weapons yet, they’re refining it well beyond what one needs for a civilian facility,” said Buttry.

“The logical explanation is that they are working toward weaponizing uranium, not to mention the assassination plot of a Saudi diplomat in the United States.  They were planning to use force in the United States,” said Buttry.

“We have the international community on our side this time,” said Buttry.

Buttry characterized the situation as “a multilateral effort to deal with a country that is being openly belligerent to the entire international community.”

Buttry noted that Rick Santorum and other Republican primary candidates have engaged in heated campaign rhetoric, but, he said he could not think of a single circumstance in which Harkin would support a full on invasion of Iran.

His listeners in Harkin’s Des Moines office seemed to be unimpressed by his response.

“Even if everything you said had a kernel of truth to it, we are still in a situation where it is necessary for the United States of America to talk to Iran, because we are in a situation where there could be an incident and a shooting war, just like that,” responded Weiss.

“The Leon Panettas and the Robert Gates of the world are warning us against this, but it could be too late,” said Weiss.

Buttry was noncommittal regarding Harkin speaking or writing publicly or working in the Senate to counter the hawkish efforts of Senate Homeland Security Committee Chairman Joe Lieberman (I-CT) and Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) who have announced plans for additional punitive legislation against Iran, but he agreed to relay the delegation’s concerns to Harkin.

Also participating in the delegation were Charles Day of Des Moines, Bill and Karen Stansbery of Ames, Karla Hansen of Clive, and John De Mott of Des Moines.

BY GHASSAN RUBEIZ, Ph.D.
Columnist, Palm Beach Gardens, FL

Israel’s tolerance for “Palestine” is diminishing.  Some of Israel’s extra-conservative leaders think of war leading to the expulsion of Palestinians into neighboring Jordan as a solution.

Overt and direct ethnic cleansing of Palestinians is not likely to happen, but it may be achieved indirectly as a byproduct of a future regional war.

Eleven million people live in Israel and its occupied, annexed or controlled territories.  The population under Israeli authority is now half Arab and half Jewish. One of every five Israeli citizens is Palestinian. Half a million Israeli settlers live in the occupied West Bank and in East Jerusalem.  Gaza’s 1.6 million people live under the rule of Hamas, an Islamic resistance. But Gaza’s air space is closed and its borders are under siege.

Naturally, this mix of sovereignty and identities has always been tense and volatile. Demography is rapidly changing among the Palestinians and the Ultra Orthodox and Mizrahi Israeli Jews. Ideology is shifting to the right.  The Arab Spring is introducing reform as well as uncertainty. Israel is alarmed by the rise of political Islam emerging from successive regime change in the Arab world. The simultaneous ascendancy of political Islam and radical conservative Jewish politics is not a coincidence: one side reinforces the other.
Extreme elements in the Israeli cabinet wish to see Palestinians of the West Bank transferred to neighboring Jordan. Starting with the displaced refugees after the 1948 war, about three million Palestinians – constituting half the population -  now live in Jordan. Currently, a special committee in the Knesset discusses a new bill which identifies Jordan as the Nation State of the Palestinian People.

Discussions of the so called “Jordanian Option” for a future Palestinian state are already active in the US, Europe and Israel.  The outrageous claim that Palestine is historically absent or invented emanates from the fact that the victor often dictates history. The idea of “justified” ethnic cleansing of Palestinians within the occupied territories and Israel sounds immoral to most Israelis. But for those who have no interest in a two-state solution – or in a bi-national state scenario with equality for Arab and Jews- reducing Palestinian presence in Eretz (Greater) Israel may look feasible in a pretext, such as a regional war.

Question: what pretext could be created to rationalize the driving of Palestinians out of the West Bank and into Jordan? To transfer Palestinians to Jordan requires a battle involving Palestinians. Although Palestinians are militarily exhausted, it would not take too much to provoke Hamas and Hezbollah to return to military confrontation.
For Israel, Iran appears to be a convenient setting to start a new wave of military intervention in the region. For warmongers, Iran today looks like Iraq nine years ago. The Persian state also serves as a conduit to a battle with armed Palestinians and their Lebanese allies on Israel’s border. Iran’s inflammatory rhetoric on the Holocaust, its regional alliances and nuclear adventures, provide a “perfect” enemy for those seeking an international crisis to induce the intended Palestinian population transfer. A swift Israeli air attack on Iran may not necessarily generate the conditions of ethnic transfer.  However, if the attack were to turn into a protracted war, Hamas and Hezbollah would likely be involved. If Israel were to win this protracted war, it would most likely arrange to push Palestinians across the Jordan River. But Israel’s victory in this scenario is not certain. Neither in 2006, nor in 2009, did Israel succeed in wiping out Hezbollah in Lebanon or Hamas in Gaza. The outcome of such wars is often inconclusive: No side wins; hatred rise and opinions shift to the extreme.

President Obama is not a fool to risk the creation of a regional war with Iran as a starting point.  Unlike his opponents, President Obama, stays firm on his Iran policy of sanction-based diplomacy. Today, compared to Newt Gingrich – who lately referred to Palestinians as an “invention”- and other GOP presidential hopefuls, Obama is starting again to look moderate on the Palestine question. Furthermore, the leaders of the American Jewish community are not yet sold on the idea of a war with Iran, and on a Jordanian option for peace. Finally, most Israelis know well that they cannot risk losing a single war. Should Obama win a second term, he will hopefully find a solution in dealing with an economically exhausted Iran and deal with the Arab-Israeli conflict with a firm hand. An Iranian Spring is in the background. War delays it.

Over the last four decades, the strongest means of Palestinian resistance has been their territoriality, their adherence to their land. They have learned from 1948 and 1967 wars that once they leave their land, homeland becomes a mirage. To the extent that the Palestinians avoid military confrontation with Israel, it will be difficult for Israel to find a pretext to deport masses of people. Moral restraint, anticipation of rage of 1.5 million Muslims, and world opinion will not allow unprovoked ethnic cleansing. Force should not be used to draw borders, displace people and forge national identity.

By PHOEBE GREENWOOD
The Guardian

If Joseph and Mary were making their way to Bethlehem today, the Christmas story would be a little different, says Father Ibrahim Shomali, a parish priest in the town. The couple would struggle to get into the city, let alone find a hotel room.
“If Jesus were to come this year, Bethlehem would be closed,” says the priest of Bethlehem’s Beit Jala parish. “He would either have to be born at a checkpoint or at the separation wall. Mary and Joseph would have needed Israeli permission – or to have been tourists.
“This really is the big problem for Palestinians in Bethlehem: what will happen when they close us off completely?”
Bethlehem is the heart of Christian Palestine and it swells with pride every Christmas. Manger Square is transformed into a grotto of lights and stalls crowned by a towering Christmas tree. Strings of illuminated angels, stars and bells festoon the streets. But just a few minutes’ drive to the north, the festive atmosphere stops abruptly.
A strip of Israeli settlements built on 18 sq km of what was once northern Bethlehem threatens to cut the city off from its historic twin, Jerusalem. To the Israeli authorities, these have been neighbourhoods of Jerusalem since 1967. One of the settlements, Har Homa, is built on land where angels are said to have announced the birth of Christ to local shepherds. A narrow corridor of land between Har Homa and another settlement, Gilo, still connects Bethlehem to Jerusalem but the construction of Givat Hamatos, a new settlement announced in October, will fill this in a matter of years.
The European Union and United Nations routinely denounce Israel’s unilateral settlement expansion but in October, EU high commissioner Baroness Catherine Ashton warned the construction of Givat Hamatos was “of particular concern as [it] would cut the geographic contiguity between Jerusalem and Bethlehem”.
European concern is not slowing Israel’s progress. Last week, 500 new units were approved for Har Homa and a further 348 in Betar Illit, on Bethlehem’s western boundary. Earlier this month, an additional 267 units were sanctioned for settlements running up to the edge of the city’s southern suburbs, where the Ministry of Defence also gave settlers permission to start a farm on Palestinian land. This is in addition to the 6,782 new apartments already slated for Har Homa, Gilo and Givat Hamatos.
In the short term, the closure won’t make a big difference to everyday life in Bethlehem: the separation wall already prevents Palestinians from entering Jerusalem from the town without an Israeli permit.
But this ring of settlements will permanently change the geography of the biblical landscape: if a peace agreement razes the separation wall, the two cities will remain divided.
Israeli activist Hargit Ofram, director of Peace Now, reads a clear political intention in Israel’s plans: “These efforts are being made to prevent a possible two-state solution because in order for that to work, you would need a viable Palestinian state with its capital in East Jerusalem.
“If that capital is going to be surrounded by settlements, Israel would have to remove them. The more Israel is building, the higher the price of a Palestinian state is becoming.”
A coalition of 20 rights organisations including Oxfam and Amnesty International warned this month that the number of Palestinian homes demolished in the West Bank and East Jerusalem by Israeli authorities had doubled in the past year.

Under the terms of the Oslo Accords, 13% of Bethlehem now falls within Areas A and B controlled by the Palestinian Authority. This area houses 87.6% of the Palestinian population. The rest falls in Area C, where Israel controls who builds what.
The al-Makour valley is Bethlehem’s last green space and one of few areas left for urban expansion. It is in Area C and overlooked by Gilo checkpoint at one end and Har Homa settlement on the other. Israel’s separation wall is slated to run through the middle of the valley. No Palestinian has been given a permit to build here since 1967.
Despite Israel’s building restrictions, Miranda Nasry Qasasfeh spent every weekend of the past year renovating a stone storehouse owned by her husband’s family for 150 years. She built a new iron roof and had planted almond, plum and eskadinia trees, which were about to bear their first fruit. Hers was one of four Palestinian structures in al-Makour demolished on 12 December. Most of the trees were uprooted.
Qasasfeh’s 75-year-old father rushed to the site of the demolition, where he found his daughter in deep distress. Hours later, he suffered a stroke and is now paralysed down his left side. Given the events of the past week, Qasasfeh has postponed putting up Christmas decorations.
“The Israeli commander told me that I have nothing here, that it is not my land. But it is and we need to live and expand. What other choice do we have? Should I go an build on someone else’s land?” she asks.
But despite the destruction of her property, Miranda Qasasfeh still has hope that the political situation will change. She has threatened to disown her eldest son if he carries out his threat of leaving Bethlehem to find work elsewhere.
“I keep telling my children, planting it in their minds, there is nowhere else in the world like this. We cannot leave.” She adds: “And we have Christmas. For a few days at least we can forget, or try to forget, what is happening here.”
Father Shomali’s outlook is more glum: “When I look down my church register, many of the historic family names from the area have already gone. In 20 years, I think we will have no more Christians in Bethlehem.”
Dr Jad Isaac, an expert in Bethlehem’s demographics and a consultant to the Palestinian president, Mahmoud Abbas, says aside from the physical restrictions on development, Bethlehem’s economy is being strangled by the loss of land and restrictions on Palestinian movement.
With work in Jerusalem now impossible to all but the 6,000 granted permits to work inside Israel, unemployment in Bethlehem sits at 23%, poverty levels simmer at 18%. Many have little option but to work illegally for £25 a day building the nearby settlements. Dr Isaac’s forecast is bleak.
“The little town of Bethlehem? It will soon be the little ghetto surrounded in all directions by Israeli settlements,” he predicts. “We’ve already passed the stage where Bethlehem can be saved. Frankly, that’s why I don’t celebrate Christmas any more.”