Peace and Justice Post

Not one of the three leaders is still dreaming of an achievement. All they hope for now is to minimize the damage – but how to get out of a situation like this?

By Uri Avnery
PalestineChronicle.com | Tuesaday, November 20, 2007

The Annapolis conference is a joke. Though not in the least funny.

Like quite a lot of political initiatives, this one too, according to all the indications, started more or less by accident. George Bush was due to make a speech. He was looking for a theme that would give it some substance. Something that would divert attention away from his fiascos in Iraq and Afghanistan. Something simple, optimistic, easy to swallow.

Somehow, the idea of a “meeting” of leaders to promote the Israeli-Palestinian “process” came up. An international meeting is always nice – it looks good on television, it provides plenty of photo-opportunities, it radiates optimism. We meet, ergo we exist.

So Bush voiced the idea: a “meeting” for the promotion of peace between Israel and the Palestinians.

Without any preceding strategic planning, any careful preparations, anything much at all.

That’s why Bush did not go into any details: no clear aim, no agenda, no location, no date, no list of invitees. Just an ethereal meeting. This fact by itself testifies to the lack of seriousness of the entire enterprise.

Keep reading . . .

voltairenet.org

By Michael Salla |November 19, 2007

The U.S. plans for an attack on Iran envision to sacrifice the Fifth Fleet in order to justify a nuclear retaliation. This is not a hypothetical scenario, but a real option being discussed within the U.S. Joint Chief of Staff cabinet. According to our sources, admiral William Fallon made clear that if such an order was given, he would refuse to follow it and would hand in his resignation along with the entire Centcom headquarter’s. So far only the Navy and Army’s superior officers’ resistance has prevented the neoconservatives and the Air Force to launch the operations.

Keep reading . . .

Uruknet.info

Deception as Truth

By William A. Cook |November 23, 2007

“A voice was heard upon the high places, weeping and supplications of the children of Israel; for they have perverted their way, and they have forgotten the Lord their God.” Jeremiah 2:21

This week the forces of good will assemble in the city of Ann, the Queen who presided over her colonies, an apt gesture as the Israeli colonialist state meets to consider the fate of its Palestine colony, the one carefully preserved behind its apartheid wall of infamy, to attempt once again the fraud perpetrated on the American people and the United Nations that Israel is sincere in wanting peace. The moguls that control our press and TV channels sing the praises of Ehud Olmert and the Israeli Knesset as custodians of peace seeking to bring justice to the war weary peoples of Palestine. Thus are sown the seeds of discord that will reap the whirlwind of bitter disappointment, followed by the weeping and gnashing of teeth by these perpetrators of deceit.

Keep reading . . .

globeandmail.com

A bombing campaign has been in the works for months – a blistering air war that would last anywhere from one day to two weeks

PAUL KORING

From Thursday’s Globe and Mail

November 22, 2007 at 5:11 AM EST

WASHINGTON — Massive, devastating air strikes, a full dose of “shock and awe” with hundreds of bunker-busting bombs slicing through concrete at more than a dozen nuclear sites across Iran is no longer just the idle musing of military planners and uber-hawks.

Although air strikes don’t seem imminent as the U.S.-Iranian drama unfolds, planning for a bombing campaign and preparing for the geopolitical blowback has preoccupied military and political councils for months.

No one is predicting a full-blown ground war with Iran. The likeliest scenario, a blistering air war that could last as little as one night or as long as two weeks, would be designed to avoid the quagmire of invasion and regime change that now characterizes Iraq. But skepticism remains about whether any amount of bombing can substantially delay Iran’s entry into the nuclear-weapons club.

Keep reading . . .

The Nation |comment | posted November 21, 2007 (December 10, 2007 issue)

By Chris Hedges

I will not pay my income tax if we go to war with Iran. I realize this is a desperate and perhaps futile gesture. But an attack on Iran–which appears increasingly likely before the coming presidential election–will unleash a regional conflict of catastrophic proportions. This war, and especially Iranian retaliatory strikes on American targets, will be used to silence domestic dissent and abolish what is left of our civil liberties. It will solidify the slow-motion coup d’état that has been under way since the 9/11 attacks. It could mean the death of the Republic.

Let us hope sanity prevails. But sanity is a rare commodity in a White House that has twisted Trotsky’s concept of permanent revolution into a policy of permanent war with nefarious aims–to intimidate and destroy all those classified as foreign opponents, to create permanent instability and fear and to strip citizens of their constitutional rights.

Keep reading . . .

Source: BlackBallot Weekly
By C.B. Forde

While watching President Bush make a speech during his surprise visit to Iraq last week, I thought to myself, America will never leave Iraq. One of the many conspiracy theories about the war in Iraq is that the primary reason for the American invasion was to seize Iraq’s oil reserves and keep America one step ahead of the Chinese in the global scramble to secure energy resources. So I decided to do some research and came up with three very concrete reasons why in spite of the noise the Democratic Party is trying to raise, the United States will not be leaving Iraq anytime soon:

1. Iraq’s Vast Oil Wealth
2. The New U.S. Embassy/Fortress
3. The ‘non-permanent’ Military Bases currently being constructed

Keep reading . . .

Socialist Viewpoint, Nov/Dec 2007, Vol. 7, No. 6

By Bonnie Weinstein

An article appeared in The New York Times on September 13, 2007, entitled “Compromise on Oil Law in Iraq Seems to Be Collapsing,” by James Glanz. This piece could have been a chapter in the book Seizing Destiny: How America Grew from Sea to Shining Sea,by Pulitzer Prize winner Richard Kluger. It’s a painstaking historical breakdown of the wheeling and dealing between the commanders of capital in England, France, Spain, even Mexico, and the commanders of U.S. financial and business interests in their pursuit of the acquisition of the land that now makes up the United States of America. By any means necessary—through war, occupation, slavery, and extermination of the indigenous peoples of America—U.S. commanders of capital got most of what they wanted. But it is still not enough of what they need—an unending supply of capital.

U.S. big business wheeling and dealing

The Times article by Glanz details the financial machinations going on in the Iraqi oil fields. The pivotal thorn in the U.S. occupying paw is the Iraqi Oil Law, which includes, according to Glanz, “Article 111 of the Iraqi Constitution…oil and natural resources are properties of Iraqi people….” It is worth a closer look at this article.

Complete article . . .

Published on Wednesday, November 21, 2007 by Inter Press Service

by Thalif Deen

UNITED NATIONS – The Permanent Observer Mission of Palestine to the United Nations has lodged a formal protest against the continued “misrepresentation” of facts in recent U.N. reports on the Israeli-occupied territories.

“There has been a tendency in several reports to portray the prevailing situation (in the occupied territories) as more of a conflict between two equal sides — the Israeli and Palestinian — rather than actually one of occupation,” says Ambassador Riyad Mansour, in a letter to Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon.

The “skewed” reporting, including “certain language usage that overlooks the existence of this occupation, is unacceptable,” he says, virtually accusing the U.N. Secretariat of trying to undermine the Palestinians by its misreporting.

Mansour’s letter to the secretary-general also says: “For sometime now, the delegation of Palestine has been troubled by misrepresentations in several U.N. reports in the recent period, including some issued by the secretary-general, that have had the effect of skewing the context of the situation in the occupied Palestinian territory, including East Jerusalem.”

He points out that Palestinian territories are under an “occupying power”, namely Israel, which is bound by clear obligations under international law, including humanitarian and human rights law.

Keep reading . . .

Rootless Cosmopolitan

By Tony Karon

The rather silly media narrative in which Washington supposedly suddenly faces a dilemma between backing the decrepit dictatorship of General Musharraf, or the Jeanne D’Arc pretensions (Winnie Mandela may be a closer analogy) of the kleptocratic Benazir Bhutto, has mercifully been laid to rest. That narrative’s connection to reality has always been somewhat tenuous, and the visit last weekend of Deputy U.S. Secretary of State John Negroponte — the man you send when there’s fixing to be done among unsavory clients in the troubled provinces, as his track record in Central America reminds us — made clear that business will continue as usual in the U.S.-Pakistan relationship, notwithstanding some ritual scolding of Musharraf for the limits he sets on civilian participation in government.

Continued . . .

AlterNet

By Paul Staniland, MIT Center for International Studies. Posted November 23, 2007.

The conflicts on the Afghan border and within Musharraf’s dictatorship could have a large rippling effect in neighboring countries and abroad.

South Asia has emerged as a strategically pivotal region, from the counter-terrorism and counter-insurgency campaign in Afghanistan to the emergence of India as an economic and military power. The current political crisis in Pakistan — with President Pervez Musharraf suspending the constitution and declaring an emergency on November 3 — threatens core interests of South Asia’s major political actors, including the United States.

There are two distinct conflicts within Pakistan’s polity. The first is between rebels along the Afghan border and the Pakistani state, and the second is between pro-democracy forces and Musharraf’s military dictatorship. The outcomes of both struggles will affect the rest of the region, with some implications potentially being felt globally. Who is affected by Pakistan’s turmoil, and why?

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