Are Assad’s Enemies Expecting No Reaction?
By Ibrahim al-Amin | Al-Ahkbar | November 16, 2011
As though there weren’t already enough clowns in the cast, the beloved king of Jordan took the stage to call on the Syrian president to stand down. The hawker of Jordan’s public assets – scion of a dynasty whose monthly payments from the CIA continue to this day, and whose upbringing and education is supervised by British intelligence’s finest instructors – judged that the Syrian crisis makes it necessary for Assad to go. One wonders if the man might one day face a mirror.
Whatever the case, the drama continues to unfold as scripted. To pump up the excitement, it has apparently been decided to screen more than one episode per day. Syrian film-making will be dealt a blow. Neither extra episodes of home-made TV dramas, nor the dubbing of more Turkish soap operas, can hope to compete with the rolling blockbuster being brought to us by US-Franco-Qatari Revolutions Inc.
The producers have so far made do with the blood already being shed in Syria. But later, and perhaps soon – for the production schedule is tight – some bloodier scenes may have to be loaded onto the reel. But what exactly is required? Bombings in public markets? Assassinations of regime leaders? More sectarian killings? Nobody is yet sure what pitch will have the right effect on the relevant international human rights organizations, whose executives have begun rubbing their hands in anticipation of a new boon. But give it another day or two and Nabil al-Arabi will summon them to come over immediately and without delay. The oil states will pay the expenses. Hamad bin-Jasem has assured his Arab counterparts, and informed the Arab League secretariat not to worry about the funds needed for the planned foreign intervention aimed at toppling Bashar al-Assad’s regime.
One act in the spectacle was supposed to have been wound up on Tuesday in Cairo —though there was no guarantee against hitches. This was to feature Syrian opposition figures uniting in a single organization so they can then be recognised as the sole legitimate representative of the Syrian people. The Syrians who support the regime and those who oppose foreign intervention do not count. For once, the intellectual colossus Ahmet Davetoglu will have been correct in his analysis. Assad’s supporters will be treated as irrelevant: a ‘zero problem’.
In Cairo, a special kind of adhesive tape had to be used. It is not designed to last long. It only has to stick things together for now, and hold them in place for a few weeks or months to make a structure that can be called the unifying framework of all sections of the Syrian opposition. Someone or other will then select a name and logo for it, and it will have a seat reserved at the Arab League. Many are competing to fill that seat. But while the photographers will focus on the occupant, nobody will wait to listen to his or her views, as the decisions have already been made. However, they will have the honour of reading them out. Those who cooked the decisions up think they’ll suffice to topple the Assad regime.
Meanwhile in Rabat – where Arab foreign ministers are due to discuss upping the pressure – there will also be much verbal one-upmanship about human rights and the incessant blood-letting in Syria. But everyone there, too, will be waiting for further decisions. It is unlikely that any will have an answer to Syria’s request for the convening of an emergency Arab summit.
The series will carry on until further notice. The Arab and Western capitals concerned believe that a lot can be achieved between now and the end-of-year holiday season. They’re hoping for scenes of rejoicing as Bashar al-Assad’s downfall is celebrated on the streets of Damascus, Aleppo and other Syrian cities, as well as the world’s capitals. They certainly don’t want the TV cameras to be tracking the plane flying the last American occupation troops out of Baghdad, and the accompanying celebrations in Syria as well as Iraq itself, Lebanon and Iran. The US and its Arabs want the cameras focused on Syria’s towns. They do not care what images they convey, provided they feature anguish, pain and blood. All is fair game in the service of the shared objective: for Syria’s opposition to US-Israeli hegemony to cease.
The Arab and Western players involved in this lunacy assume that the Syrian regime will be unable to bear a combination of diplomatic pressure, economic sanctions, and acts of sabotage and destabilization. They are counting on armed groups – which have been or are being put in place – to mount extensive military actions in border areas adjoining Turkey, or even Lebanon. This will then be used to move on to the ‘protected areas’ phase. Some border incident will be sufficient to trigger the creation of such enclaves, without awaiting permission from the UN Security Council or anyone else. The only impediment is that the planners are still waiting for a final decision from Turkey on whether to allow such a step to be taken.
The movie has already become tiresome, but it seems as though viewing it will be both compulsory and lucrative. All expenses paid out of the blood and sweat of the Syrians themselves, and of fellow Arabs too. But this film has yet to be completed by the production company, which is also doing the promotion and casting.
One wonders whether the shareholders in this venture have paused to consider how the other side might react. Do they really think that the fact it has avoided causing problems is a sign of weakness, and that it has no tricks of its own up its sleeve?
Let’s wait!
Ibrahim al-Amine is editor-in-chief of al-Akhbar.
Diamonds or Bombs? WaPo Is Only Skeptical on One Side
By Jim Naureckas | FAIR | November 15, 2011
Joby Warrick’s Washington Post article (11/14/11) on the new International Atomic Energy Agency report on Iran goes wrong from the first sentence:
When the Cold War abruptly ended in 1991, Vyacheslav Danilenko was a Soviet weapons scientist in need of a new line of work.
Well, no. Danilenko is allegedly a nuclear weapons scientist–but neither the IAEA or Warrick present any actual evidence that he was any such thing.
Rather, the documents disclosed so far suggest that Danilenko is what he says he is: an expert on the use of explosions to make tiny, industrial-grade diamonds known as nanodiamonds. His area of specialization goes back half a century, to the early 1960s, when the scientist was in his mid-20s (Inter Press Service, 11/9/11).
Warrick’s story is a step forward from his earlier article (11/7/11) on the IAEA report, which refers to Danilenko as a “former Soviet nuclear scientist” without mentioning the field he’s actually been publishing in for decades at all. Still, Warrick works hard to give the impression that the scientist’s career-long interest in nanodiamonds is some kind of fly-by-night cover story:
Danilenko struggled to become a businessman, traveling through Europe and even to the United States to promote an idea for using explosives to create synthetic diamonds…. The scientist’s synthetic-diamonds business provided a plausible explanation for his extensive contacts with senior Iranian scientists over half a decade…. Danilenko’s work in Iran initially centered on his diamond-making scheme. But over the course of a six-year relationship, UN investigators later concluded, he provided expertise that would help Iran achieve something of far greater value.
OK–so what’s the evidence that Danilenko was helping the Iranians make bombs, not diamonds?
The IAEA’s report cites “strong indications” that the unnamed “foreign expert” [apparently Danilenko] assisted Iran in developing a high-precision detonator as well as a sophisticated instrument for analyzing the shape of the explosive pulse.
Right–because creating industrial diamonds requires high-precision detonation, which you would presumably want to monitor and analyze. The evidence that this is actually a cover for nuclear weapons research boils down to a lack of proof that it is not a cover for nuclear weapons research. Or as weapons analyst David Albright puts it–who is a major source for the Post story, both directly and through his Institute for Science and International Security think tank–“It remains for Danilenko to explain his assistance to Iran.”
There’s such a degree of spin in the Post’s case for Iranian nuclear research that it really makes you want to check to be sure your wallet is still in your pocket. After relaying Danilenko’s assertions that he had nothing to do with a nuclear program, Warrick adds, “In private conversations, however, the scientist allowed that he ‘could not exclude that his information was used for other purposes,’ the ISIS report said.” Of course, no scientist can guarantee that their information was not repurposed, so the admission has zero evidentiary value–but it does function as an effective tension-raiser, like mood music in a horror movie.
The Post story concludes: “‘Synthetic diamond production is unlikely to have been a priority’ for Iran, ISIS said. ‘Although it has obvious value as a cover story.'” Actually, Iran has a serious, long-standing nanotechnology program (Moon of Alabama, 11/7/11)–and one of the chief uses for nanodiamonds is in oil drilling, an activity that provides the bulk of Iran’s exports earnings, so it’s not actually all that remarkable that the country would be interested in producing them.
Of course, the Post should be skeptical of Iranian claims–but where is the same skepticism of assertions that an official enemy state is secretly researching weapons of mass destruction–particularly given the very recent history of such claims being manufactured and distorted for political ends? It’s worth recalling that Albright, the Post’s main witness for the idea that Danilenko is not what he says he is, was taken in by the last major WMD propaganda campaign, telling CNN (10/5/02; Extra!, 7-8/03): “In terms of the chemical and biological weapons, Iraq has those now. How many, how could they deliver them? I mean, these are the big questions.”
We need the news media to be asking bigger questions this time around about the Iranian nuclear allegations.
More racist laws are on the way in Israel
Mohammed Mohsen Watad | MEMO | 15 November 2011
Israel’s Knesset (parliament) is set to discuss a number of bills in its winter session which Palestinians regard as racist, continuing a policy of “unprecedented racist legislation in 1948 Palestine” aimed at undermining the very existence of Palestinians in their own land.
As part of the “Judaisation” process, a proposed law calls for the end of Arabic as an official language of the state of Israel, a move which would marginalise ever further one-fifth of the population for whom Arabic is the mother-tongue. Indeed, Arabic was the official language of Palestine during the British Mandate period before the 1948 Nakba (Catastrophe). The former head of Israel’s internal security agency, Shin Bet, has drafted the proposed law. Avi Dichter, MK for the Kadima Party, has included the language stipulation in a bill headed “Israel as the national state of the Jewish people” in collaboration with the Strategic Institute for Zionism, and supported by one-third of the Jewish members of the Knesset.
Dichter’s law would force every citizen to pledge allegiance to “Israel as a Jewish and democratic state”; anyone refusing to do so would be “liable to punishment”. His vision of the democratic system in Israel is linked to the Jewish religion.
Massoud Ghanayem MK accused the main Israeli political parties of vying with each other to see which one can be the most “nationalist” to capture the Zionist vote. Speaking to Aljazeera, Ghanayem said, “The challenges facing Israel and the failure of the road map for peace are behind this racist legislation, especially since the Palestinians [in Israel] have exposed, through their struggle, the myth of Israeli democracy and the Jewish character of the state.”
According to Mr Ghanayem, Israel and its political parties have adopted policies for the marginalisation of the Palestinians, narrowing the scope of democracy to impose what he called “the new rules of the game” in which Israel’s Arab citizens are supposed to embrace the concept of Zionism and Jewish citizenship. Dichter’s law, Ghanyem explained, will also have an impact on the education system. “While the Education Ministry claims that it is teaching young people to respect pluralism, recognition and respect for others,” he said, “the message from the legislators tells them the opposite.”
If passed, Dichter’s law would follow a series of “racist laws”, including one which prohibits commemoration of the Nakba, pushing the Israeli narrative as the official version of what happened in 1948. Another law allows Jewish towns to vet those wishing to live there. This is to stop Palestinians from moving in, even if they have historical roots in the district. Any land which has been confiscated by the state for more than 25 years will not, according to yet another law deemed to be racist by the Palestinians, be returned to its original and lawful owners. This, of course, has a major impact on Palestinians trying to recover their family property and land.
Jamal Zahalka MK has accused Israeli politicians of inciting racism against the Palestinians in an effort to gain the trust of the wider public in Israel. He told Aljazeera that laws such as that proposed by Dichter are “like a declaration of war” on Palestinian civilians, “pouring oil on the fire of Israeli racism”. Zahalka pointed out that the parties may use different terminology to justify their case, but they all agree on the basic essence and principles behind such laws.
A Professor of Arabic who resigned his post believes that the new laws are intended to marginalise the Arabic language and its speakers. Professor Ziad Shelyot said that the latest attack on Arabic is part of a strategy to deprive Israeli-Palestinians of their identity, heritage and, ultimately, citizenship. Prof. Shelyot warned of the effect that this law will have emerging Palestinian generations and students, pointing out that if it makes it onto the statute books it will lead to the teaching of Arabic to be banned in Israel. “This,” he added, “will create a generation with no personal or national identity; one that is defeated and lives in internal conflict as a curious blend of races and cultures which have lost their uniqueness.”
Police State Tactics: Signs Point to a Coordinated National Program to Try and Unoccupy Wall Street and Other Cities
Dave Lindorff – 11/15/2011
The ugly hand of the federal government is becoming increasingly suspected behind what appears to be a nationwide attempt to repress and evict the Occupation Movement.
Across the country in recent days, ultimatums have been issues to groups occupying Portland, OR, Chicago, IL, San Francisco, Dallas, TX, Atlanta, GA, and most recently New York, NY, where the Occupation Movement began on September 17. The two most recent eviction efforts, in Oakland and New York, have been the worst.
The police attacks have had a lot in common. They have been “justified” based upon trumped up pre-textural claims that the occupiers are creating a health hazard, or a fire hazard, or a crime problem, generally on little or no evidence, or there has been a digging up of obscure and constitutionally questionable statutes, for example laws outlawing the homeless. Then the police come in, usually in dead of night, dressed in riot gear and heavily armed with mace weapons, batons, plastic cuffs and tear gas, or even assault rifles in some cases and so-called flash-bang stun grenades–all weapons to be used against peaceful demonstrators.
So violent has been the response that some returned veterans have condemned the police for using weapons and tactics that are not even permitted by occupying troops in war-torn countries.
“We definitely feel, especially in a movement like this that has arisen so quickly in a number of cities, that there will be a coordinated national effort to try and shut it down,” says Heidi Bogosian, executive director of the National Lawyers Guild, which has been playing a key role providing legal services to the new movement.
“We see the scapegoating of these movements, the attacks at night, and in general tactics designed to terrorize and to scare protesters away. I can’t see this as anything other than centrally coordinated.”
One indication of that coordination may have been a conference call among 18 city mayors which was confirmed by Oakland Mayor Jean Quan in a radio interview on San Francisco station KALW. Dan Siegel, an Oakland attorney who worked as an advisor to Quan, but who resigned in disgust after Oakland police and law enforcement personnel from a number of surrounding jurisdictions brutally drove occupiers there out of their park using tear gas, supposedly non-lethal ammunition (bean bags and rubber bullets) and flash-bang grenades in a night-time raid in the early hours of November 14, says that phone conference call took place, significantly, while Quan was in Washington, DC.
Remember this image: it’s the national police state on the march
Shortly afterwards, on Oct. 25, Quan authorized the first brutal police assault on Occupy Oakland. It led, among other things, to the critical wounding of Scott Olsen, an Iraq War veteran who was among the protesters, and was hit in the forehead by a police tear gas cannister fired at close range.
Who organized that critical conference call? Was it Quan or one of the other mayors, or was it someone in the federal government? Siegel says he doesn’t know, and Quan isn’t saying.
But both Siegel and Boghosian say they strongly suspect federal involvement in the planning of the recent spate of police violence against occupiers. Says Siegel, “It’s only logical to assume that the ‘Fusion Centers’ are involved, especially after the Oakland occupiers shut down the port in Oakland.”
Some 72 Fusion Centers, located around the US and funded by the US at a cost of half a billion dollars, are a post 9-11creation of the new Homeland Security Department. Bringing the FBI together with local law enforcement departments, they both collect and share domestic intelligence, and can serve as command centers to direct local law enforcement in helping implement national law enforcement goals. There are also many Joint Terrorism Task Forces, which directly link the FBI with urban police departments.
Says Boghosian, “What we are seeing here is the Miami model, with various levels of law enforcement, local, state and federal, all at work. It would be shocking if federal law enforcement were not seeing this occupy movement now as a national security threat.”
Mara Veheyden-Hilliard, co-chair of the National Lawyers Guild’s National Mass Defense Committee, based in Washington, agrees. “These crackdowns on the occupation movement certainly appear to be part of a national strategy to crush them,” she says. “We haven’t yet found overt evidence of federal involvement, but the fact that in rapid succession local authorities have taken action raises the specter of coordination.”
She adds, “There is absolutely no legal justification for the involvement of the Joint Terrorism Task Forces in this movement. These demonstrations are not terrorist activities, and police should not be treating them as such, yet all over the country the police are treating the protesters as if they are criminals. The similarity of the response everywhere to the movement makes it appear that there is a coordinated strategy.”
Meanwhile, Siegel, now back in private practice, says that since the riots that followed the killing of Oscar Grant by a BART transit cop, who shot Grant fatally in the head after he had been arrested, subdued and handcuffed for a turnstile jumping violation, federal law enforcement officials have been observed actively involved in police activities in the Oakland area.
Some Oakland residents have reported seeing federal vehicles and possibly also National Guard equipment during the police actions against occupation demonstrators, too, though National Guardsmen can only be legally activated by a governor, and California Gov. Jerry Brown, a former mayor of Oakland, has not publicly issued any such order.
Rick Ellis, a journalist with the Minneapolis office of the news outlet Examiner.com, is reporting that an unidentified US Justice Department official has confirmed what Boghosian, Siegel and Veheyden-Hilliard say they suspect is the case: that each of the recent brutal police evictions and attacks on occupation groups “was coordinated with help from Homeland Security, the FBI and other federal police agencies.”
Ellis writes, “According to this official, in several recent conference calls and briefings, local police agencies were advised to seek a legal reason to evict residents of tent cities, focusing on zoning laws and existing curfew rules. Agencies were also advised to demonstrate a massive show of police force, including large numbers in riot gear. In particular, the FBI reportedly advised on press relations, with one presentation suggesting that any moves to evict protesters be coordinated for a time when the press was the least likely to be present.”
According to an AP story published early Wednesday, mayors and city leaders in as many as 40 cities were communicating about coordinating an attack on the occupy movement. Again, this hardly seems like it was on their own initiative.
Given how things have played out, it certainly looks like the suspicions were correct, and that Ellis’s source is telling the truth.
President Obama has a lot to answer for. So do the mayors who have been overseeing the repressive operations locally.
Israeli bystanders react to Freedom Rides
By Mya Guarnieri for the Alternative Information Center (AIC) 16 November 2011
An off-duty Israeli soldier looks out the window, choosing to ignore the act of civil disobedience. When the Alternative Information Center asks her how she is feeling, she replies that she doesn’t have the energy to discuss it. While many Jewish Israelis were angered by the action–openly cursing the activists–a few said they were okay with it. Others stayed quiet, looking away, and refusing interviews.
As Palestinian activists stood at a bus stop in the Occupied West Bank yesterday, Jewish settlers made racist remarks. While the Israeli reaction to the Freedom Rides was overwhelmingly negative, the Freedom Riders presence on the bus sparked a debate between two young girls.
After a short press conference in Ramallah early Tuesday afternoon, journalists followed a van of six Palestinian Freedom Riders to a bus stop in the Jewish settlement of Psagot, which is located in the West Bank.
There, activists—who included Dr. Mazin Qumisyeh, a professor and the author of Popular Resistance in Palestine and Huwaida Arraf, a founder of the Free Gaza Movement—waited for a Jerusalem-bound bus. The Egged line they hoped to ride, 148, would pass through the Hizma checkpoint, entering the Jewish settlement of Pisgat Zeev, which is located in East Jerusalem, outside of the Green Line.
The Jewish Israelis who had been standing at the bus stop—a middle aged woman and an off-duty soldier—quickly distanced themselves from the activists, who were wearing keffiyeh and t-shirts bearing the words Freedom, Justice, and Dignity in Arabic and English.
Magi Amir, a resident of Rimonim, explained to the Alternative Information Center (AIC) that she moved away from the crowd because she heard people speaking Arabic.
“I don’t think they need to be here,” Amir continued. “They can be in their villages and their houses, why are they in our area? Can we go to Ramallah? If we go into Ramallah, they’ll kill us. Can we go into their villages or their areas? We can’t enter.”
Amir added that, in her opinion, Jewish Israelis can’t trust Palestinians or believe in them. “They’ll do terror attacks,” she said.
Other Jewish settlers who came and waited for the bus echoed Amir’s sentiment, remarking that they feared for their safety.
A 16-year-old Jewish Israeli, who wished to remain anonymous, said that the Freedom Riders shouldn’t be able to board the bus because, “It’s an Israeli bus.”
“We live here, this is our land,” he said.
When asked about those who feel differently, the boy replied, “Those who say this is Palestinian land don’t have proof.”
He added that Palestinians enjoy a lot of freedom. “We give them identity cards and they can do whatever they want.”
AIC asked the boy, a resident of Maale Adumim who wished to remain anonymous, if Palestinians can do whatever they want, then why can’t they ride a bus to Jerusalem?
“Okay,” he said. “They can do what they need to… I don’t want them boarding the bus.”
Two Egged buses slowed but passed. When the third stopped and opened its doors, the six activists boarded, as did an Israeli policeman and some two dozen journalists.
A teenage girl with long, curly, blonde hair talked to a friend as she watched the activists get on the bus. “What are they doing? They have their own [buses]?” she said. She moved the phone away from her mouth and yelled at the male activists, “You sons of bitches!”
“You whore,” she said shouted at Arraf, the only female Freedom Rider.
On board, the Palestinians’ presence sparked an argument between two young Jewish Israelis girls, aged 13 and 17.
“They’re animals,” the younger said.
“No, not everyone,” the older answered.
When the younger mentioned that a family member had been injured in a terror attack, the older girl said that a friend of hers had been, as well.
The younger insisted that violence is “Arabs; it’s the people.”
“So you’re Jewish and you also have your people. What’s the connection?” the older said, rolling her eyes.
The bus was stopped at Hizma and was not allowed to continue through the checkpoint. Israeli forces took the activists’ identity cards and tried to remove Badia Dweik, an activist who was arrested during the First Intifada when he was15 years old. Dweik resisted nonviolently and ended up lying on the stairs of the rear exit for awhile.
After remaining at the checkpoint for some time, the vehicle was directed towards a parking lot.
As the sun set outside, Israeli forces boarded and told the six activists that they had been arrested and that they could choose to go quietly or they would be forcefully removed from the bus. Each of the activists refused to leave the bus. Police and border patrol carried them off. There was an audible thumping sound as one activist’s head hit the stairs as Israeli forces him dragged him out.
The six activists were put in a military jeep and were taken to Atarot prison.
Mohamed Jaradat, a Palestinian journalist based in Ramallah who holds a green ID card, was detained by Israeli police. As they walked to the car, the AIC reminded police that Jaradat is a journalist and a member of the media.
A policeman replied, “So?”
Jaradat said that the police were going to take him to the checkpoint and drop him off. Later that evening, however, Hurriyah Ziada told the AIC that Jaradat had been arrested.
Filipinos pelt Clinton car with paintballs
Press TV – November 16, 2011
Filipino demonstrators attacked US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s convoy with paint bombs to show their opposition to her visit to the Philippines.
About 50 protesters hurled red paint at Clinton’s security detail near the presidential palace in Manila on Wednesday, forcing her convoy to detour. The demonstrators also threw their placards at the vehicles, AFP reported.
Filipino security officers and at least one American jumped out with automatic rifles drawn. However, no shots were fired.
Protesters in the Philippines urge the annulment of the Visiting Forces Agreement. Under the military pact, US troops are given legal safeguards when they visit the Philippines.
The pact has been contentious in the Philippines. There have been cases of crimes committed by US troops in the Southeast Asian country, and some Filipino groups are opposed to the presence of any US troops in their country.
Filipino anti-US protesters also marched towards the US Embassy on Wednesday to protest the visit.
The US military presence is a sensitive topic in the Philippines due to colonial legacy.
Clinton arrived in the Philippines on Tuesday to shore up military cooperation with the Filipino defense officials.
Last week, the US Secretary of State said that the United States was “updating” relationships with its five treaty-bound regional allies – Australia, Japan, the Philippines, South Korea and Thailand.
UK: Matthew Gould and the Plot to Attack Iran
By Craig Murray on November 14, 2011
This is Matthew Gould, second from right, British Ambassador to Israel, who was pictured speaking at a meeting of the Leeds Zionist Federation that was also the opening of the Leeds Hasbarah Centre. The Leeds Zionist Federation is part of the Zionist Federation of Great Britain and Ireland, motto “Speaking Up for Israel.” A collection was made at the meeting to send packages to members of the Israeli Defence Force.
On 29 May 2011 The Jerusalem Post reported: “British Ambassador Matthew Gould declared his commitment to Israel and the principles of Zionism on Thursday”.
Remember this background, it is unusual behaviour for a diplomat, and it is important.
The six meetings between British Ambassador to Israel Matthew Gould and Minister of Defence Liam Fox and Adam Werritty together – only two of which were revealed by Cabinet Secretary Gus O’Donnell in his “investigation” into Werritty’s unauthorised role in the Ministry of Defence – raise vital concerns about a secret agenda for war at the core of government, comparable to Blair’s determination to drive through a war on Iraq..
This is a detective story. It begins a few weeks ago, when the Fox-Werritty scandal was first breaking in the media. I had a contact from an old friend from my Foreign Office days. This friend had access to the Gus O’Donnell investigation. He had given a message for me to a trusted third party.
Whistleblowing in the surveillance state is a difficult activity. I left through a neighbour’s garden, not carrying a mobile phone, puffed and panted by bicycle to an unmonitored but busy stretch of road, hitched a lift much of the way, then ordered a minicab on a payphone from a country pub to my final destination, a farm far from CCTV. There the intermediary gave me the message: what really was worrying senior civil servants in the Cabinet Office was that the Fox-Werritty link related to plans involving Mossad and the British Ambassador to Israel, Matthew Gould.
Since I became a notorious whistleblower, several of my ex-friends and contacts have used me to get out information they wanted to leak, via my blog. A good recent example was a senior friend at the UN who tipped me off in advance on the deal by which the US agreed to the Saudi attack on pro-democracy demonstrators in Bahrain, in return for Arab League support for the NATO attack on Libya. But this was rather different, not least in the apparent implication that our Ambassador to Israel, Matthew Gould, was engaged in something with Werritty which went beyond official FCO policy.
I was particularly concerned by this because I knew slightly and liked Matthew Gould, from the time he wrote speeches for Robin Cook. I hoped there was nothing much in it. But then Gould’s name started to come up as professional journalists dug into the story, and reported Werritty’s funding by pro-Israeli lobby groups.
I decided that the best approach was for me to write to Matthew Gould. I did so, asking him when he had first met Werritty, how many times he had met him, and how many communications of every kind there had been between them. I received the reply that these questions would be answered in Gus O’Donnell’s report.
But Gus O’Donnell’s report in fact answered none of these questions. It only mentioned two meetings at which Fox, Gould and Werritty were all three present. It did not mention Gould-Werritty bilateral meetings and contacts at all. To an ex-Ambassador like me, there was also something very fishy about the two trilateral meetings O’Donnell did mention and his characterisation of them.
This led me to dig further, and I was shocked to find that O’Donnell was, at the most charitable interpretation, economical with the truth. In fact there were at least six Fox-Werritty-Gould meetings, not the two given by O’Donnell. Why did GOD lie? I now had no doubt that my informant had pointed me towards something very real and very important indeed.
Matthew Gould was the only British Ambassador who Fox and Werrity met together. They met him six times. Why?
The first meeting to which O’Donnell admits, took place in September 2010. O’Donnell says this was
“a general discussion of international defence and security matters to enable Mr Gould better to understand MOD’s perspective.”
O’Donnell says Werritty should not have been present. An FCO spokesman told me on 21 October that
“Mr Gould’s meeting with the Defence Secretary was arranged by his office as part of his pre-posting briefing calls.”
All Ambassadors make pre-posting briefing calls around Whitehall before taking up their job, as you would expect. But even for our most senior Ambassadors, outside the Foreign Office those calls are not at Secretary of State level. Senior officials are quite capable of explaining policy to outgoing Ambassadors; Secretaries of State have many other things to do.
For this meeting to happen at all was not routine, and Werritty’s presence made it still more strange. Why was this meeting happening? I dug further, and learnt from a senior MOD source that there were two more very strange things about this meeting, neither noted by O’Donnell. There was no private secretary or MOD official present to take note of action points, and the meeting took place not in Fox’s office, but in the MOD dining room.
O’Donnell may have been able to fox the media, but to a former Ambassador this whole meeting stunk. I bombarded the FCO with more questions, and discovered an amazing fact left out by O’Donnell. The FCO spokesman replied to me on 21 October 2011 that:
“Mr Werritty was also present at an earlier meeting Mr Gould had with Dr Fox in the latter’s capacity as shadow Defence Secretary.”
So Gould, Fox and Werritty had got together before Gould was Ambassador, while Fox was still in opposition and while Werritty was – what, exactly? This opened far more questions than it answered. I put them to the FCO. When, where and why had this meeting happened? We only knew it was before May 2010, when Fox took office. What was discussed? There are very strict protocols for senior officials briefing opposition front bench spokesman. Had they been followed?
The FCO refused point blank to answer any further questions. I turned to an independent-minded MP, Jeremy Corbyn, who put down a parliamentary question to William Hague. The reply quite deliberately ignored almost all of Corbyn’s question, but it did throw up an extraordinary bit of information – yet another meeting between Fox, Werritty and Gould, which had not been previously admitted.
Hague replied to Corbyn that:
“Our ambassador to Israel was also invited by the former Defence Secretary to a private social engagement in summer 2010 at which Adam Werritty was present.”
Getting to the truth was like drawing teeth, but the picture was building. O’Donnell had completely mischaracterised the “Briefing meeting” between Fox, Werritty and O’Donnell by hiding the fact that the three had met up at least twice before – once for a meeting when Fox was in opposition, and once for “a social engagement.” The FCO did not answer Corbyn’s question as to who else was present at this “social engagement”.
This was also key because Gould’s other meetings with Fox and Werritty were being characterised – albeit falsely – as simply routine, something Gould had to do in the course of his ambassadorial duties. But this attendance at “a private social engagement” was a voluntary act by Gould, indubitable proof that, at the least, the three were happy in each other’s company, but given that all three were very active in Zionist causes, it was a definite indication of something more than that.
That furtive meeting between Fox, Werritty and Gould in the MOD dining room, deliberately held away from Fox’s office where it should have taken place, and away from the MOD officials who should have been there, now looks less like briefing and more like plotting.
My existing doubts about the second and only other meeting to which O’Donnell does admit make plain why that question is very important.
O’Donnell had said that Gould, Fox and Werritty had met on 6 February 2011:
“in Tel Aviv. This was a general discussion of international affairs over a private dinner with senior Israelis. The UK Ambassador was present.”
There was something very wrong here. Any ex-Ambassador knows that any dinner with senior figures from your host country, at which the British Ambassador to that country and a British Secretary of State are both present, and at which international affairs are discussed, can never be “private”. You are always representing the UK government in that circumstance. The only explanation I could think of for O’Donnell’s astonishing description of this as a “private” dinner was that the discussion was far from being official UK policy.
I therefore asked the FCO who was at this dinner, what was discussed, and who was paying for it? I viewed the last as my trump card – if either Gould or Fox was receiving hospitality, they are obliged to declare it. To my astonishment the FCO refused to say who was present or who paid. Corbyn’s parliamentary question also covered the issue of who was at this dinner, to which he received no reply.
Plainly something was very wrong. I therefore again asked how often Gould had met or communicated with Werritty without Fox being present. Again the FCO refused to reply. But one piece of information that had been found by other journalists was that, prior to the Tel Aviv dinner, Fox, Gould and Werritty had together attended the Herzilya conference in Israel. The programme of this is freely available. It is an unabashedly staunch Zionist annual conference on “Israel’s security”, which makes no pretence at a balanced approach to Palestinian questions and attracts a strong US neo-conservative following. Fox, Gould and Werritty sat together at this event.
Yet again, the liar O’Donnell does not mention it.
I then learnt of yet another, a sixth meeting between Fox, Gould and Werritty. This time my informant was another old friend, a Jewish diplomat for another country, based at an Embassy in London. They had met Gould, Fox and Werritty together at the “We believe in Israel” conference in London in May 2011. Here is a photo of Gould and Fox together at that conference.
I had no doubt about the direction this information was leading, but I now needed to go back to my original source. Sometimes the best way to hide something is to put it right under the noses of those looking for it, and on Wednesday I picked up the information in a tent at the Occupy London camp outside St Paul’s cathedral.
This is the story I was given.
Matthew Gould was Deputy Head of Mission at the British Embassy in Iran, a country which Werritty frequently visited, and where Werritty claimed to have British government support for plots against Ahmadinejad. Gould worked at the British Embassy in Washington; the Fox-Werritty Atlantic Bridge fake charity was active in building links between British and American neo-conservatives and particularly ultra-Zionists. Gould’s responsibilities at the Embassy included co-ordination on US policy towards Iran. The first meeting of all three, which the FCO refuses to date, probably stems from this period.
According to my source, there is a long history of contact between Gould and Werritty. The FCO refuse to give any information on Gould-Werritty meetings or communications except those meetings where Fox was present – and those have only been admitted gradually, one by one. We may not have them all even yet.
My source says that co-ordinating with Israel and the US on diplomatic preparation for an attack on Iran was the subject of all these meetings. That absolutely fits with the jobs Gould held at the relevant times. The FCO refuses to say what was discussed. My source says that, most crucially, Iran was discussed at the Tel Aviv dinner, and the others present represented Mossad. The FCO again refuses to say who was present or what was discussed.
On Wednesday 2 November it was revealed in the press that under Fox the MOD had prepared secret and detailed contingency plans for British participation in an attack on Iran.
There are very important questions here. Was Gould really discussing neo-con plans for attacking Iran with Werritty and eventually with Fox before the Conservatives were even in government? Why did O’Donnell’s report so carefully mislead on the Fox-Gould-Werritty axis? How far was the FCO aware of MOD preparations for attacking Iran? Is there a neo-con cell of senior ministers and officials, co-ordinating with Israel and the United States, and keeping their designs hidden from the Conservative’s coalition partners?
The government could clear up these matters if it answered some of the questions it refuses to answer, even when asked formally by a member of parliament. The media have largely moved on from the Fox-Werritty affair, but have barely skimmed the surface of the key questions it raises. They relate to secrecy, democratic accountability and preparations to launch a war, preparations which bypass the safeguards of good government. The refusal to give straight answers to simple questions by a member of parliament strikes at the very root of our democracy.
Is this not precisely the situation we were in with Blair and Iraq? Have no lessons been learnt?
There is a further question which arises. Ever since the creation of the state of Israel, the UK had a policy of not appointing a jewish Briton as Ambassador, for fear of conflict of interest. As a similar policy of not appointing a catholic Ambassador to the Vatican. New Labour overturned both longstanding policies as discriminatory. Matthew Gould is therefore the first Jewish British Ambassador to Israel.
Matthew Gould does not see his race or religion as irrelevant. He has chosen to give numerous interviews to both British and Israeli media on the subject of being a Jewish ambassador, and has been at pains to be photographed by the Israeli media participating in jewish religious festivals. Israeli newspaper Haaretz described him as “Not just an ambassador who is Jewish, but a Jewish ambassador”. That rather peculiar phrase appears directly to indicate that the potential conflict of interest for a British ambassador in Israel has indeed arisen.
It is thus most unfortunate that it is Gould who is the only British Ambassador to have met Fox and Werritty together, who met them six times, and who now stands suspected of long term participation with them in a scheme to forward war with Iran, in cooperation with Israel. This makes it even more imperative that the FCO answers now the numerous outstanding questions about the Gould/Werritty relationship and the purpose of all those meetings with Fox.
There is no doubt that the O’Donnell report’s deceitful non-reporting of so many Fox-Gould-Werritty meetings, the FCO’s blunt refusal to list Gould-Werritty, meetings and contacts without Fox, and the refusal to say who else was present at any of these occasions, amounts to irrefutable evidence that something very important is being hidden right at the heart of government. I have no doubt that my informant is telling the truth, and the secret is the plan to attack Iran. It fits all the above facts. What else does?
UPDATE: A commenter has already pointed me to this bit of invaluable evidence:
“My government absolutely agrees with your conception of the Iranian threat and the importance of your determination to battle it.” Dealing with the Iranian threat will be a large part of my work here.” Gould said.
From Israel National News. It also says that he will be trying to promote a positive atmosphere between Israel and the Palestinian National Authority, but the shallowest or the deepest search shows the same picture; an entirely biased indeed fanatical zionist who must give no confidence at all to the Palestinian Authority. He must be recalled.
~
Simple Questions A Real Democracy Would Answer
November 15, 2011
The government could clear up the issue of Fox Gould and Werritty if it answered these very simple questions. They are questions to which in any real democracy we would be entitled to expect an answer, concerning officials paid by us. I have put these questions to them. Consider why the government refuses to answer these simple and obvious questions.
But the truly terrifying thing is not just that the government refuses to answer these questions from me, it is that the mainstream media refuses even to ask them:
How many times in total did Gould, Werritty and Fox meet?
How many of these are listed in O’Donnell’s official investigation?
Why the discrepancy?
Did the meeting between Fox, Gould and Werritty while Fox was Shadow Defence Secretary follow official rules concerning briefing of opposition front bench spokesmen by officials?
Where did it take place?
When did Gould first meet Werritty?
How many times did Gould meet Werritty without Fox present?
How many communications of all sorts have there ever been between Gould and Werritty?
Where precisely was the “Pre-posting briefing meeting” for Gould with Werritty and Fox held?
Why was it not held in the Secretary of State’s office?
Why was no MOD official present?
Who paid for the “Private dinner” between Fox, Gould and Werritty and “Senior Israelis” in Tel Aviv in February 2011?
Who was present?
Was any note subsequently made of the discussion?
Who paid for the “social engagement” to which Fox invited Gould and Werritty in summer 2010?
Who was present?
Was the possibility of an attack on Iran discussed in any of the above meetings, events or communications?
These really are very simple questions and I will happily report any answer in full. Every media outlet should be asking these questions. Remember Werritty had no security clearance. It is therefore not possible that the answers to these questions is classified information.
If the explanations are innocent, why should these questions not be answered?
The answer to these questions would not be hidden in a democracy.
~
Please feel free to re-use and republish this article anywhere, commercially or otherwise. It has been blocked by the mainstream media. I write regularly for the mainstream media and this is the first article of mine I have ever been unable to publish. People have risked a huge amount by leaking me information in an effort to stop the government machinery from ramping up a war with Iran. There are many good people in government who do not want to see another Iraq. Please do all you can to publish and redistribute this information.
Israeli army steps up attacks on Palestinian water
By Ben Lorber | Alternative Information Center | 15 November 2011
Speaking to the American Congress in May, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu remarked that Israel would maintain a long-term presence in the West Bank’s Jordan Valley. In the months that followed, the Israeli army stepped up its attacks on the water wells of the Palestinians who live there.
The last two months have seen a steady stream of Israeli army attacks on Palestinian Bedouin water wells in the West Bank and the Jordan Valley.
On October 13, farmers received demolition orders on several water wells in Kufr al-Deek, a village in the town of Salfit near Nablus. On the 8th of September, 50 military jeeps, trucks and bulldozers sealed off Al Nasarayah as a closed military zone, and proceeded to illegally destroy 3 water wells and confiscate the attached water systems, the pumps of which cost $40,000 each to install. Five days later, the IOF returned to Al Nasarayah to demolish 2 more wells, stopping along the way to destroy another well east of Tamoun. The next day, IDF soldiers entered the village of Al- Fa’ara, near Nablus, to photograph and record the GPS coordinates of 6 more wells intended for demolition.
These water wells had permits from the Palestinian Authority, and were operating in the 5% of the Jordan Valley designated after the 1993 Oslo Accords Area A, under full Palestinian civil and military control.
Since the beginning of Israel’s colonization of the Jordan Valley in 1967, local Bedouin have seen the steady drying-up of the once-flowing springs around which they built their villages. They are unable to dig sufficient wells of their own because of crippling Israeli regulations, and have become dependent on the Israelis for access to a basic human right.
According to Ma’an Development Center’s 2010 report ‘Draining Away- the Water and Sanitation Crisis in the Jordan Valley’, 40% of Palestinians in the Jordan Valley consume less water than the minimum global standard set by the World Health Organization, which is set at 100 liters cubed per day. In a striking disparity, 56,000 Palestinians in the Jordan Valley consume an average of 37 Million Cubic Meters (MCM) of water per year, as compared to an average of 41 MCM for only 9,400 settlers.
According to Ma’an Development Center’s 2010 report ‘Draining Away- the Water and Sanitation Crisis in the Jordan Valley’, 40% of Palestinians in the Jordan Valley consume less water than the minimum global standard set by the World Health Organization, which is set at 100 liters cubed per day. In a striking disparity, 56,000 Palestinians in the Jordan Valley consume an average of 37 Million Cubic Meters (MCM) of water per year, as compared to an average of 41 MCM for only 9,400 settlers.
Because of post-Oslo Accords regulations, Jordan Valley Bedouins living in Area C (95% of the Valley) cannot build, or improve, the smallest animal pen, much less a water well, without a permit, which is almost impossible to obtain. The Oslo Accords set up a Joint Water Committee (JWC), composed of Israelis and Palestinians, to grant construction permits.
However, ‘Draining Away’ reports that “around 150 Palestinian water and sanitation projects are still pending JWC approval for ‘technical and security reasons’, while only one new Palestinian well project for the [West Bank] Western aquifer has been approved since 1993. In contrast, Israel is able to construct pipelines to its illegal settlements without going through the mechanism of the JWC. Thus Israel effectively has full control of water resources in the West Bank and Gaza Strip.”
Even if a project is approved by the JWC, it must then be approved by the Israeli Civil Administration, where, according to Deeb Abdelghafar, Director of Water Resources for the Palestinian Water Authority, “there are more than 14 departments, and each department must approve on the project. So we can never get a project through”.
The 2009 World Bank report ‘Assessment of Restrictions on Palestinian Water Development: West Bank and Gaza’ quotes an anonymous NGO donor: “the first thing we request is a letter from PWA approving the project. Then we go to the JWC. But then we have to go to the Civil Administration – and there delays of 2-3 years are normal. In fact, we have no positive outcomes for Area C.”
Because of the impossibility of laying infrastructure, NGOs focus, says Abdelghafar, on “civil emergency intervention- by delivering small water tankers, by supplying them with water tanks, by constructing rainwater cisterns- it’s emergency humanitarian relief.” While important, this aid is temporary, able only to alleviate the symptoms, not cure the disease.
The Israelis, Abdhelgafar makes clear, “are trying to establish control over the Valley, by preventing or destroying permanent water infrastructure…they want to clear Area C of Palestinians”.
Why I want Mike Mann’s Emails
By Dr. David Schnare | Watts Up With That | November 14, 2011
N.B., Dr. Schnare is the lead attorney in the UVA-Mann email case.
This week Nature Magazine published an editorial suggesting that “access to personal correspondence is a freedom too far” and that Michael Mann, whom they favorably compare to Galileo, should have his emails, written and received while he was a young professor at the University of Virginia, protected from public release on the core basis that to do otherwise would “chill” the work of scientists and academics. I note Galileo was forced to keep his work private. Had he the opportunity, he would have published it far and wide. Mann is quite the opposite. He wants to keep secrets and let no one know what he did and how he did it.
Nature, unfamiliar with the facts, law and both academic and university policy as applies in this case, conflates too many issues and misunderstands the transparency questions we raise.
The facts of the case include that these emails are more than five years old; that they contain none of the email attachments, no computer code, no data, no draft papers, no draft reports; that the university has already released over 2,000 of them, some academic and some not; that when they were written Mann knew there was no expectation of privacy; that all emails sent or received by a federal addressee are subject to the federal FOIA, and many have already been released; and that nearly 200 of the emails the University refuses to release were released by a whistleblower in England.
That latter group of emails, part of the “Climategate” release, do more than merely suggest Mann engaged in academic improprieties. They show he was a willing participant in efforts to “discriminate against or harass colleagues” and a failure to “respect and defend the free inquiry of associates, even when it leads to findings and conclusions that differ from their own.” Other emails document Mann’s communications were not “conducted professionally and with civility.”
Thus, emails already available to the public demonstrate that Michael Mann failed to comply with the University of Virginia Code of Ethics and the American Association of University Professors Statement on Professional Ethics.
A question, not mine, but asked by many who are interested in the history of this period, is not whether Mann failed to live up to the professional code expected of him. It is to what degree he failed to do so and to what lengths the university will go to hide this misbehavior. If we merely sought to expose Mann’s failure to display full academic professionalism, we would not need these emails. Those already in the public eye are more than sufficient for any such purposes.
I want those emails for a very different reason. Our law center seeks to defend good science and proper governmental behavior, and conversely to expose the converse. Without access to those kinds of emails, and, notably, research records themselves, it is not possible for anyone to adequately credit good behavior and expose bad behavior. This is one of two reasons we prosecute this case. It is the core purpose of a freedom of information act. Because the public paid for this work and owns this university, it has not merely a right to determine whether the faculty are doing their jobs properly; it has a duty to do so. This is not about peer review; it is about citizens’ acting as the sovereign and taking any appropriate step necessary to ensure those given stewardship over an arm of the Commonwealth are faithfully performing.
The second reason we bring this case is to defend science and the scientific process. Anyone who has taken a high school science laboratory course knows that the research or experimental process begins with recording what was done and what was observed. As UVA explains in its Research Policy RES-002, “The retention of accurately recorded and retrievable results is of the utmost importance in the conduct of research.” Why? “To enable an investigator to reproduce the steps taken.”
Currently public emails show Mann was unable to provide even his close colleagues data he used in some of his papers and could not remember which data sets he used. A query to UVA shows the university, who owns “the data and notebooks resulting from sponsored research,” had no copy of Mann’s logbooks and never gave him permission to take them with him when he left UVA. The university refused to inquire within Mann’s department as to whether anyone there knew whether he even kept a research logbook, so it’s impossible for me to know whether he stole the logbook or just never prepared one in the first place.
The emails ATI seeks are all that appears to be left of a history of what he did and how. Absent access to those emails, anyone seeking to duplicate his work, using the exact same data and methods, has no way to do so. That is in direct conflict with both good science and the UVA research policy.
Nor should access to these kind of emails “chill” the academic process.
As a former academic scientist, I understand the need and desire to keep close the research work while it is underway. Both I and the university have a proprietary interest in that work, while it is ongoing. Once completed, however, I have a duty to share not only the data and methods with the academic community, I also have a duty to share the mistakes, the blind alleys, the bad guesses and the work and theories abandoned.
Science advances knowledge by demonstrating that a theory is wrong. All the mistakes, blind alleys and bad guesses are valuable, not just to the scientist himself, but to his colleagues. By knowing what did not work, one does more than simply save time. One gains direction. One mistake revealed often opens a vista of other ideas and opportunities. The communications between scientists during a period of research are the grist for the next generation of work. Ask any doctoral candidate or post-doc how important being part of the process is on the direction of their future research. They will tell you that these unpublished communications are as much an important scientific contribution as the final papers themselves. Anyone who wishes to hide those thoughtful discussions hides knowledge.
If anything is “chilling” it is the thought that a neo-Galileo is hiding knowledge.
Featured Video
Pentagon insider says high US official Douglas Feith reported to Netanyahu
or go to
Aletho News Archives – Video-Images
Frlom the Archives
Who’s to blame for the Iraq war?
A not-so-trivial quiz
By Maidhc Ó Cathail | 14 March 2010
Maidhc Ó Cathail names and shames the top 19 politicians, academics and policy makers – all con men and all Zionist Jews – who lied and conspired to steer the US toward aggression against the Iraqi people. … continue
Blog Roll
Aletho News- Moscow issues warning over Trump’s Golden Dome plan
- Brussels wants ‘our sons to die for Ukraine’ – Orban
- Where in the World Is Benjamin Netanyahu? On the Move or Out of Sight?
- Pentagon insider says high US official Douglas Feith reported to Netanyahu
- The Sludging of Rural America
- Lawyers’ groups demand end to British military bases in Cyprus
- CIA Assessment: The Resistance Cannot Be Crushed
- Hezbollah Returns: It Didn’t Start a War, It Is Ending One
- EU states seek ‘talks’ with Iran for access to Strait of Hormuz: Report
- Trump on Hormuz: “Others must take care of it” after US falters
- If Americans Knew
- Predictions of another 9/11, amid Israel-US killing spree – Not a ceasefire Day 157
- As US-Israel war on Iran rages, Gaza faces massive dust storm – Not a ceasefire Day 156
- No let-up in attacks on Gaza as Israel takes on Iran, Lebanon – Not a ceasefire Day 155
- ‘Of Course’: IDF Drops Case Against Soldiers Accused of Raping Palestinian Prisoner
- Don’t Fall for the Regime Change Talk. Israel Is ‘Mowing the Lawn’ in Iran
- Will Israel and the US wreck the Gulf States along with Iran?
- US so far burned through ‘years’ of munitions in Iran war: Report
- How the Israeli Tail Wags the American Dog
- Outdated intel likely led to deadly U.S. strike on Iranian elementary school, sources say
- Pentagon insider says high U.S official Douglas Feith reported to Netanyahu
- No Tricks Zone
- Storing Green Energy To Last Germany 10 Days Would Require A 60-Million Tonne Battery
- New Studies: UK Sea Levels Were 4 Meters Higher Than Today During The Mid-Holocene
- Destructive Green New Deal: German Energy And Metal Group Warns Of Drastic Crisis
- New Study Documents A 20-Year Pause In Arctic Sea Ice Decline – Driven By Internal Variability
- Wake-up Call: Survey Shows Majority Of Germans Now Favor Postponing Climate Targets!
- Televised! Leading German Political Candidate Tells Schoolchildren CO2 Makes Sun Hotter!
- New Study: A Century Warming Of 1.1°C Is ‘Commonplace’ And ‘Not Unusual’ During This Interglacial
- New Study: ‘Internal Noise’ And Volcanic Forcing Can Trigger 10-15°C Warming Within Decades
- Glaciers Worldwide Are Suddendly Surging, Experts Blame Warming!
- Surprising Discovery: Sahara Is Greening…Billions Of Trees Where Once Thought To Be Barren
Aletho News 