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US Likely Took Course to Demolish Iran Nuclear Deal – Russia’s Deputy FM

Sputnik – January 13, 2018

Russia, as well as the European Union, remains committed to the Iran nuclear deal, despite the recent US waiver of sanctions against the country.

Moscow would oppose any attempts to undermine the existing nuclear agreement between P5+1 countries and Iran, Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov has stated.

“The JCPOA [Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action] cannot be amended and we will oppose any attempts to hamper it,” Ryabkov said.

The minister went on by saying that Trump’s move raises questions concerning his negotiability on international issues, adding that Moscow will insistently explain to Washington the viciousness of its sanction policy towards both Tehran and Pyongyang.

“We have a very negative stance on yesterday’s decisions and statements announced by Washington, our worst expectations are coming true,” Ryabkov said commenting on Trump’s words, saying that the US thus demonstrate their preference for the use of power to solve issues.

The minister underlined that statements by US President Donald Trump will be very carefully studied in the DPRK and other countries and may influence the existing tensions on the Korean peninsula.

“According to our estimates, our American colleagues act in such a way as to constantly find opportunities to increase tensions on the Korean peninsula. Despite the signs that there has been some shift in the direction toward political dialogue, here we also note intra-Korean contacts, which are very important — despite this, Washington is looking for ways to constantly remind everyone, including in Northeast Asia, that it is committed to pressuring and methods of force, and, using this same American terminology, keeping all the options on the table,” the deputy head of the Russian Foreign Ministry added.

The diplomat added that there was no sense in overestimating Trump’s decision on waiving the sanctions, as the United States was seeking to undermine the JCPOA and is reinforcing a categorical approach to Iran-related issues.

“The prospect of the US withdrawal from the Iran deal will deliver a very serious blow to the whole system of international agreements and to the enhancing of the nuclear non-proliferation regime,” Ryabkov said.

Speaking about a new deal on Iran, which the US has claimed to elaborate, the minister stressed that Moscow could hardly understand how it might look like.

“We do not understand what our American colleagues mean when they start to negotiate the development of some new agreement, which, as they think, will ‘correct the shortcomings’ of the existing agreement,” Ryabkov said.

“It has been announced in advance that Iran, Russia and China are not invited to negotiations concerning this agreement. This is the US’ decision, the content of the talks and their subject is unclear. But for us, strictly speaking, they are of little interest because the JCPOA is not subject to correction,” Ryabkov stressed.

US Sanctions

“Of course, the decisions on enlargement of the sanction list [as for Iran] by including 14 individuals and entities, including the citizens of foreign states, not only the Iranian institutions and organizations, spark concerns,” Ryabkov has commented on the US sanctions on 14 individuals and entities over Iran’s human rights abuses and ballistic missile program, including the ones from China and Malaysia.

The minister called on the international community to consolidate efforts aimed at securing the Iranian nuclear deal.

“We think that in this context, the international community should double its efforts aimed at consolidation of the approach to the protection of the JCPOA shared by Russia, the Europeans and China in favor of its strict and full implementation by all the participants,” Ryabkov said.

The statement was made in the wake of US President Donald Trump’s announcement on January 12 of his decision to waive sanctions on Iran as required by the JCPOA, also known as the Iran nuclear deal. Trump, however, specified it would be the last time he signs the waiver unless the deal is modified.

This move follows the common path the US president took in relation to the Islamic Republic ever since his election campaign. When elected, he reaffirmed opposition to the deal officially in late October 2017, refusing to re-certify it and accusing Tehran of violating the spirit of the agreement.

However, the president still does not contest Tehran’s compliance with the deal at the international level, while at the same time not excluding the possibility of withdrawing from the deal if the agreement is not improved. Other JCPOA signatories have called on the United States to comply with the agreement’s provisions, saying that the deal had yielded results and was non-negotiable.

READ MORE:

Trump Decides to Extend Iran Sanctions Waiver, But for the Last Time — WH

January 13, 2018 Posted by | Wars for Israel | , , , | Leave a comment

Trump waives Iran nuclear sanctions, but for last time: White House

Press TV – January 12, 2018

US President Donald Trump has reluctantly agreed not to reimpose nuclear sanctions on Iran, but it would be the last time he issues such a waiver, according to the White House.

Trump wants America’s European allies to use the 120 day period before sanctions relief again comes up for renewal to agree to tougher measures, a senior White House official said Friday.

The US Congress requires the president to periodically certify Iran’s compliance with the agreement and issue a waiver to allow American sanctions to remain suspended.

While Trump approved a sanctions waiver, the US Treasury Department announced that it has imposed sanctions on 14 Iranian individuals and companies, including Iranian Judiciary Chief Ayatollah Sadeq Amoli Larijani.

A senior administration official said Trump had privately expressed annoyance at having to once again waive sanctions.

Trump has argued behind the scenes that he sees Iran as a rising threat in the Middle East and the nuclear deal makes the United States look weak, a senior US official said.

The Republican president had privately expressed reluctance to heed the advice of top advisers — Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, Defense Secretary James Mattis and National Security Adviser H.R. McMaster — recommending he not reimpose the suspended sanctions.

A decision to reimpose sanctions would have effectively ended the 2015 Iran nuclear agreement, known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA).

The agreement was reached between Iran and six world powers — the US, the UK, France, China, Russia and Germany.

The deal puts limitations on parts of Iran’s peaceful nuclear program in exchange for removing all nuclear-related sanctions.

Trump had come under heavy pressure from European allies to issue the sanctions waiver.

On Thursday, the European Union’s foreign policy chief, Federica Mogherini together with foreign ministers of France, the US and Germany delivered a strong defense of the deal in separate statements, which were issued following a meeting with Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif in Brussels.

January 12, 2018 Posted by | Economics, Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Wars for Israel | , , , | Leave a comment

Trump Plans to Enforce Sanctions on Iranian State Television

Sputnik – January 8, 2018

WASHINGTON — US President Donald Trump plans to impose sanctions against Iranian state television as part of his response to Iran’s crackdown on anti-government protesters, media reported on Monday.

The Guardian reported that Trump will not sign a 180-day waiver that has previously postponed the sanctions against the Islamic Republic of Iran Broadcasting (IRIB) since 2013. The waiver on the sanctions is up for renewal at the end of January.

Several major cities in Iran, including Tehran, Mashhad, Isfahan and Rasht, have witnessed anti-government protests since December 28, 2017. Iranians have taken to the streets to protest against unemployment, poverty and the rising cost of living.

Recently, the Pentagon’s chief voiced his support for the protests, saying that the people of Iran had proven that they “aren’t buying” what Tehran is selling, claiming the protests to be the evidence.

Earlier, the Iranian Ambassador to the United Nations claimed that Tehran had “hard evidence” that the violence in the protests was incited from abroad, adding that instigators based in the United States and Europe have been seen inciting violence during the protests.

January 8, 2018 Posted by | Wars for Israel | , , | Leave a comment

Future of JCPOA In Hands of GOP Indebted To Billionaire Iran Hawks

By Eli Clifton | LobeLog | October 19, 2017

President Donald Trump’s decision to decertify the Iran nuclear deal, known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), appears to have fallen in line with the views espoused by several of his top donors. These funders believe that Iran poses an apocalyptic threat only addressable through military action, including the use of nuclear weapons.

Two years ago, every Republican in Congress opposed the JCPOA. With the future of the agreement now in the hands of a GOP-controlled House and Senate, those same billionaire Iran hawks may hold a powerful influence over any Republican lawmaker contemplating voting against legislation designed to harm the JCPOA.

Indeed, the influence of these key donors—Sheldon Adelson, Bernard Marcus, and Paul Singer—over U.S. foreign policy, particularly with regards to Iran, doesn’t stop at the White House, where combined they contributed over $40 million to various pro-Trump political groups and causes.

Those three donors also contributed $65 million at the congressional level. That represents nearly half of the individual contributions made to the Senate Leadership Fund (CLF) and Congressional Leadership Fund (CLF), Super PACs dedicated to maintaining Republican majorities in the House and Senate. Those contributions provide a considerable incentive for Hill Republicans to stake out a hawkish position on the JCPOA.

Trump’s decision to punt the decision to Congress about whether to reimpose sanctions or attempt to unilaterally rewrite the JCPOA, a multilateral agreement, threatens to unravel the nuclear deal and/or put the U.S. into noncompliance with the accord.

Republican members of Congress owe a great deal to the CLF and the SLF. In the 2016 election cycle the two GOP Super PACs were some of the biggest sources of independent expenditures in House and Senate races. The SLF was the biggest spender in the 2016 election cycle after Priorities USA Action (a Hillary Clinton-supporting Super PAC) and Right to Rise USA (a Jeb Bush-supporting Super PAC).

The CLF raised $50 million in individual contributions and the SLF raised $90 million in individual contributions in the past election cycle. That is in no small part thanks to Adelson, Marcus, and Singer, three of the Republican Party’s biggest donors. They also provide millions in funding to hawkish think tanks like the Foundation for Defense of Democracies (FDD), which regularly promotes military intervention against Iran. Adelson and Marcus, in particular, have been outspoken in their opposition to the JCPOA and expressing their extreme hostility toward Iran.

Adelson, who actually suggested firing a nuclear weapon at Iran as a negotiating tactic, alongside his wife, Miriam, are the biggest overall donors to both the CLF and SLF as well as Trump’s largest campaign donor. They contributed $20 million to the CLF and $35 million to the SLF. Adelson, via John Bolton, may have helped inject language into Trump’s speech last week decertifying the JCPOA. Politico reported (my emphasis):

The line was added to Trump’s speech after Bolton, despite Kelly’s recent edict [limiting Bolton’s access to Trump], reached the president by phone on Thursday afternoon from Las Vegas, where Bolton was visiting with Republican megadonor Sheldon Adelson. Bolton urged Trump to include a line in his remarks noting that he reserved the right to scrap the agreement entirely, according to two sources familiar with the conversation.

Trump wound up saying that the agreement “is under continuous review, and our participation can be canceled by me, as president, at any time.” Bolton declined to comment on any conversation with the president.

Singer, who was the second largest source of funds supporting Sen. Tom Cotton’s (R-AR) campaign, contributed $1.9 million to the CLF and $6 million to the SLF.

Cotton, an outspoken critic of the Iran deal and proponent of pursuing a regime-change strategy in Iran, reportedly advised the White House on decertifying the agreement. He is the cosponsor of legislation that would institute automatic reinstatement of sanctions if Iran comes within a year of a nuclear weapons capability and eliminates the JCPOA’s sunset clauses, effectively rewriting the agreement and potentially putting the U.S. in violation of the accord.

Marcus contributed $500,000 to the CLF and $2 million to the SLF. He is Trump’s second biggest campaign donor after the Adelsons and contributes tens of millions of dollars to FDD and other groups opposing the JCPOA.

In a 2015 Fox Business interview, he compared the JCPOA to “do[ing] business with the devil” and, in case he wasn’t clear about who “the devil” was in his metaphor, clarified “I think Iran is the devil.”

Adelson, Singer, and Marcus’s combined contributions account for 44% of individual contributions received by the CLF and 47% of those received by the SLF. Marcus and Singer are already spending on the SLF for the 2018 cycle. Singer contributed $1 million and Marcus contributed $2 million, providing over a quarter of the $11.13 million the Super PAC has raised for the coming election.

January 6, 2018 Posted by | Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Timeless or most popular, Wars for Israel | , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Think Tank-Addicted Media Turn to Regime Change Enthusiasts for Iran Protest Commentary

By Adam Johnson | FAIR | January 5, 2018

Since the outbreak of mass demonstrations and unrest in Iran last week, US media have mostly busied themselves with the question of not if we should “do something,” but what, exactly, that something should be. As usual, it’s simply taken for granted the United States has a divine right to intervene in the affairs of Iran, under the vague blanket of “human rights” and “democracy promotion.” (The rare exception, such as an op-ed by ex-Obama official Philip Gordon—New York Times, 12/30/17—still accepted the premise of regime change: “I, too, want to see the government in Tehran weakened, moderated or even removed.”) With this axiom firmly established in Very Serious foreign policy circles, the next question becomes the nature, degree and scope of the “something” being done.

Leading the pack in the “do something” insta-consensus was the right-wing pro-Israel think tank Foundation for Defense of Democracies (FDD), which has overwhelmed the narrative. In the past five days, FDD has had op-eds in influential US outlets like the Wall Street Journal, New York Times, New York Post and Politico, and has been quoted in a dozen more. Its punditry was marked by cynical “support” for Iranian protesters, demagoguing of the Iranian “regime” and disgust with the Obama-era Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), otherwise known as the Iran deal.

The scrapping of JCPOA has been the primary political charge of FDD for years, and it seems to see the recent unrest in Iran—and any subsequent crackdown—as the thin moral pretext it needs to justify snuffing out a treaty it’s long opposed. Thus FDD has eagerly jumped on the unrest, painting itself as the sigh of the oppressed.

Op-eds written or co-written by FDD staff in the past five days:

  • “Iran’s Theocracy Is on the Brink” (Mark Dubowitz/Ray Takeyh, Wall Street Journal, 1/1/18)
  • “Where We Can Agree on Iran” (Mark Dubowitz/Daniel Shapiro, Politico, 1/1/18)
  • “Eruption in Iran: And It’s Not Just the Economy, Stupid” (Clifford D. May, Washington Times, 1/2/18)
  • “The Worst Thing for Iran’s Protesters? US Silence” (Reuehl Marc Gerecht, New York Times, 1/2/18)
  • “What Washington Can Do to Support Iran’s Protesters” (Richard Goldberg/Jamie Fly, New York Post, 1/2/18)

A sampling of quotes by FDD staff in news reporting:

  • “Since Rouhani entered office, he has managed to inflate expectations with lofty rhetoric but has actually done little to change the reality of life on the ground in Iran,” said Behnam Ben Taleblu, an Iran expert at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies in Washington.” (Washington Post, 12/30/17)
  • “‘Western governments should make it clear that the regime will be held responsible and will pay a price for any bloodshed,’ Mr. Dubowitz said.” (Wall Street Journal, 1/1/18)
  • “‘[Trump’s] not going to want to waive sanctions and keep money flowing to dictators when there are people protesting in the streets,’ said Richard Goldberg, a former Senate Republican aide who helped design Iran sanctions and is now a senior adviser at the hawkish Foundation for Defense of Democracies.” (Politico, 1/2/18)
  • “‘If there is a bipartisan bill that is ready for congressional action, that would go a long way toward persuading the president to issue the waivers,’ said Mark Dubowitz, the chief executive of the Foundation for Defense of Democracies. ‘If there’s not, what’s happening in Iran will give the president all the more reason to say, “I’ve had it with this deal.”’” (New York Times, 1/2/18)

FDD op-eds and quotes followed a similar formula: express outrage on behalf of the protesters, applaud Trump for his hypocritical defense of the right to protest, and push for increased sanctions against Iran—often while taking a swipe at the hated Iran deal.

FDD’s pro-Iranian people posture was rarely accompanied by an explanation of their ideological project. The outfit—funded by big-name pro-Israel billionaires like casino mogul Sheldon Adelson, Home Depot founder Bernard Marcus (who’s said that “Iran is the devil”) and Wall Street speculator Paul Singer—are  largely presented as bespectacled academics calling balls and strikes without a particular agenda beyond their self-proclaimed “defense of democracies.” (The name ought to provoke some skepticism, given the group’s eagerness to enlist the hereditary dictatorship Saudi Arabia in its anti-Iranian crusade—LobeLog, 2/26/16.)

This problem is not unique to FDD; as FAIR (8/12/16) has noted before, the overreliance by the media on deeply conflicted think tanks that present as neutral but are, in reality, glorified lobbyists for a political cause or corporate cohort misleads readers on an institutional scale. (In FDD’s case, it’s Israel’s right wing; for the Center for Strategic and International Studies, it’s weapons contractors—FAIR.org, 5/8/17, 7/17/17.)

FDD, it’s worth noting, also worked closely with the Trump administration and CIA to curate documents implicating Iran in the 9/11 attacks, as part of a broader anti-Iran strategy that rogue DoJ lawyers spelled out in November in leaks to the Washington Post (11/17/17; FAIR.org, 11/24/17).

Reuel Marc Gerecht

FDD’s Reuel Marc Gerecht has had stints at PNAC, AEI and the CIA

Occasionally, editors will note they are “conservative” or “hawkish,” but FDD is mostly presented as a quasi-academic and impartial observer. The average reader, for example, would probably be surprised to find out the FDD “fellow” expressing concern for The Iranian People™ in the Times, Reuel Marc Gerecht, has long joked about wanting to bomb these same Iranians. As Eli Clifton noted in LobeLog (1/4/18), in 2010 Gerecht quipped: “Counted up the other day: I’ve written about 25,000 words about bombing Iran. Even my mom thinks I’ve gone too far.”

Shouldn’t someone so self-admittedly obsessed with killing Iranians be disqualified from posing as their protector in a major US newspaper? Failing that, shouldn’t readers be alerted that Gerecht was the director in the late ’90s of the Middle East Initiative at the Project for the New American Century—the most prominent advocacy group for the invasion of Iraq, a war that left 500,000 to a million dead?

Think tank addiction for overworked and often myopic reporters and editors has rendered such glaring questions unaskable. FDD are the “experts,” and the “experts” are needed to drive the bulk of commentary, regardless of their well-documented ulterior motives.

January 6, 2018 Posted by | Deception, Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Mainstream Media, Warmongering, Wars for Israel | , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Pro-Israel editor’s joke about Iran-Iraq War provokes response

MEMO | January 4, 2107

The editor of a prominent Jewish community newspaper has come under strong attack for making a joke about a war in which more than a million Iranians and Iraqis lost their lives.

Stephen Pollard, editor of Britain’s Jewish Chronicle, now stands accused of inciting hatred and bigotry following a tweet in which the staunchly pro-Israel and equally enthusiastic Tottenham Hotspur fan compared the Premier League game between Chelsea and Arsenal yesterday to the war between Iran and Iraq because he wanted both sides to lose.

“Time to wheel out my regular comment,” tweeted Pollard. “It’s Arsenal v Chelsea tonight, the football version of the Iran/Iraq war when you want both sides to lose.”

Tweet: https://twitter.com/stephenpollard/status/948617705351012352

Other twitter users condemned the JC editor for his insensitive and callous remarks about a war in which more than a million people were killed.

“I wonder what your reaction would of been if someone made football related jokes about the Holocaust!” one furious twitter user responded. Another said: “Wow, how callous can you be? 1 Million people died and 10s of thousand people suffer from chemical attack and you make this comment. What is next? you will compare it to Holocaust?”

Others described the comment as “vile” and “disgusting”. Many were keen to point out the latent racism displayed by Pollard.

“You despicable man. A million people died & you make fun of them? Is this implicit #Islamophobia coming out? If someone had made such a hideous analogy with Israel etc you’d be crying antisemitism. Truly hideous man”.

Tweet: https://twitter.com/alihadi68/status/948847842931638272

“His hate and contempt for Arabs and Muslims is so obvious. And this is the editor of a major Jewish paper!” wrote another angry user.

One took aim at Pollard’s well-known support for Israel: “Is it a bit like the Israeli Palestinian conflict where you wish Israel would just leave after their away game with Palestine, instead of permanently making the stadium their home?”

Tweet: https://twitter.com/Vghandi/status/948669884321484800

January 4, 2018 Posted by | Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Islamophobia, Mainstream Media, Warmongering, Timeless or most popular, Wars for Israel | , , , , | Leave a comment

John Bolton: “Our Goal Should Be Regime Change In Iran”

By Hunter Wallace | Occidental Dissent | January 1, 2018

If you wondered what happened to John Bolton, the neocon throwback who advocated the disastrous Iraq War, he is back to educate normies on how tell deal with Iran.

Follow the money to President Donald Trump:

“Indeed, the influence of these key donors—Sheldon Adelson, Bernard Marcus, and Paul Singer—over U.S. foreign policy, particularly with regards to Iran, doesn’t stop at the White House, where combined they contributed over $40 million to various pro-Trump political groups and causes.

Those three donors also contributed $65 million at the congressional level. That represents nearly half of the individual contributions made to the Senate Leadership Fund (CLF) and Congressional Leadership Fund (CLF), Super PACs dedicated to maintaining Republican majorities in the House and Senate. Those contributions provide a considerable incentive for Hill Republicans to stake out a hawkish position on the JCPOA. …”

The GOP has a lot of shekels riding on this!

Bibi Netanyahu wants you to know it has nothing to do with Israel even though it came the day after the announcement of the Trump administration and Israel’s joint plan to counter Iran.

It is all just one big (((coincidence))).


January 2, 2018 Posted by | Mainstream Media, Warmongering, Timeless or most popular, Video, Wars for Israel | , , , , | Leave a comment

2018 will see US fighting three and a half wars in Middle East

By M K Bhadrakumar | Indian Punchline | December 31, 2017

At a ‘press gaggle’ at the Pentagon on Friday, US Defence Secretary James Mattis revealed that there isn’t going to be any withdrawal from the Syrian conflict. The Trump administration, on the contrary, plans to expand the presence by deploying diplomats and contractors to the north of Syria. Mattis called this a shift “from what I would call an offensive, terrain-seizing approach to a stabilizing” one.

That is to say, he explained, while the diplomats would work toward the “initial restoration of services” and to manage and administer rebuilding cities, the Pentagon will “bring in contractors” for training people on how to clear IEDs” (improvised explosive devices), etc. and alongside there will be a continuing military component to the US presence that “would move our diplomats around, protect them.” Mattis insisted that there is a “demarcation line” separating the US military zone in north and northeastern Syria, which the “Russian regime” and Syrian government are well aware of and are tacitly respecting so far.

Evidently, the US will continue its alliance with the Syrian Kurdish militia (known as YPG) in northern Syria, including the supply of weapons. The US defense spending bill for 2018 has made provision for sending weapons worth $393 million to US partners in Syria. Overall, $500 million, which is an increase of $70 million over 2016) is the allocation for Syria under ‘Train and Equip’ requirements. The budget mentions the opposition forces supported as a part of the train and equip program in Syria as 25,000 strong. The figure will now go up to 30,000 in 2018. Besides, the US and British military are training several hundred militants to create a New Syrian Army to fight the Syrian government forces in the south. (According to Russian estimates, most of the recruits are from ISIS and al-Qaeda groups.)

To be sure, the US’ ‘regime change’ agenda in Syria is back on track. But the Syrian conflict is also transforming as another template of a broader regional confrontation with Iran (and Russia) in the Middle East. The petard of Iran is useful to encourage the Sunni Arab petrodollar states to bankroll the war and overall make the US military interventions in the Middle East to be “self-financing”. (Mattis said, “We’ve got a lot of money coming from international donors for this, including Syria.”)

Meanwhile, this also means that the wars in Syria and Yemen are going to get fused at the hips, as it were. While the Obama administration was inclined to acknowledge that Iran’s interference in the war in Yemen, if at all, has been very minimal, the Trump administration has swung to the other extreme and brands the war as quintessentially a manifestation of Iran’s expansionist policies in the region. This creates the raison d’etre for more direct US intervention in the war in Yemen.

That makes it two full-bodied wars. Then, there is half a war to be added, which is in the nature of the Trump administration’s agenda to generally push back at Iran anywhere and everywhere (eg., Iraq, Lebanon), and, if possible, to bring about a ‘regime change’ in Tehran. According to a report in the Jerusalem Post last week, the US and Israel have set up 4 working groups to advance their “joint work plan” against Iran. This decision has been taken apparently at a secret meeting at the White House in Washington two weeks ago and will be put into the pipeline in 2018.

These two and a half wars become three and a half wars if we are also to add the Afghan war, which is entering its 17th year in 2018. The US has upped the ante by seeking a military solution to the Afghan war, disregarding the saner advice that a political solution is the best way out. The big question is whether 2018 will witnesses a US-Pakistani showdown.

A report in the New York Times on Friday hinted at the Trump administration “strongly considering whether to withhold $255 million in aid that it had delayed sending to Islamabad… as a show of dissatisfaction with Pakistan’s broader intransigence toward confronting the terrorist networks that operate there.” Evidently, the US’ capacity to leverage Pakistani policies is touching rock bottom. The next step could be to deliver on the threat to punish Pakistan. If that happens, there will be hell to pay.

Indeed, in the above cauldron, one hasn’t included the succession in Saudi Arabia, which can likely happen during 2018; the growing instability in Egypt; the continuing anarchy in Libya; or the Saudi-Qatar rift and the consequent unraveling of the GCC. Who says the US is about to cut loose from the Middle East and escape to the ‘Indo-Pacific’? Do not overlook that an overarching priority of the US’ Middle East strategy is also to evict Russia from the region as it managed to do in the early 1970s so as to contain the bear in its lair in Eurasia.

December 31, 2017 Posted by | Militarism, Timeless or most popular, Wars for Israel | , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

US, Israel in ‘covert’ deal to counter Iran after it defeats their extremist groups

Sputnik – December 30, 2017

A US National Security Council (NSC) source has confirmed to Sputnik that Tel Aviv and Washington have worked out a plan to counter “malign Iranian activities.” Speaking to Radio Sputnik, Mohammad Marandi, a political analyst and professor at the University of Tehran, explained why the US and Israel are so hostile towards Iran.

Sputnik: What is your take on the so-called Iranian threat that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and US President Donald Trump are looking to confront now? What could they be truly trying to achieve by demonizing Iran?

Mohammad Marandi: They have always been demonizing Iran; they have always [harbored] hostility towards the country. When the Israeli regime occupied Lebanon and the Iranians supported the national liberation movement which ultimately led to the creation of Hezbollah, that led to the ultimate defeat of the regime and its withdrawal from the country. And Iran took support for Palestinian people and Iran’s opposition from the beginning of the revolution to apartheid, whether in apartheid South Africa or in Palestine. That was also an enormous reason to show antagonism towards Iran.

I think more recently, though, Israeli support for extremist groups in Syria, this was carried out alongside countries like Saudi Arabia. Even now we see that al-Qaeda, the al-Nusra Front, is still [located alongside] the Syrian-Israeli border and the Israeli regime continues to treat their wounded militants. And on that part of the joint border we still have ISIS (Daesh) and as we all know the Israelis have never attacked the ISIS (Daesh) coalition alongside its border.

So, the Israelis have been trying to weaken Syria and I think that over the last couple of years with the help of Hezbollah, Russia, Iran and others the gradual defeat of the extremist groups both in Syria and Iraq have led to a situation where the Israelis feel weakened. But I don’t think that any meetings between the United States and Israel will come up with anything new because they have been cooperating all along alongside with Saudi Arabia for many years now.

Sputnik: The plan also aims to target Iran’s activities across the Middle East. So, if implemented, what consequences could it entail for the region in local conflicts?       

Mohammad Marandi: Yes, this is again, I think, a very important point because it’s contrary to what we see in the Western media, which is usually either silence or a very misleading representation. US allies in the region, alongside the United States, supported ISIS [Daesh]. Even though, I still speak to some Americans [and they express] outrage. If you look at the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) documents of 2012 that were partially released by Judicial Watch, they speak about US allies in the region supporting extremist groups in Syria and [they] have had the upper hand according to that document, from almost the very beginning of the fighting. And these groups were focused on the border between Syria and Iraq.

We know that later on, those groups were named ISIS, or they called themselves even after that Islamic State. And the United States, according to General [Michael] Flynn [former DIA director and former national security adviser to President Trump] who was the head of that organization [DIA] — later in an interview with Al Jazeera he admitted — that the United States took a willful decision to support its allies in the region. And there is a host of other evidence as well, such as WikiLeaks documents and emails which stated that Saudi Arabia and others supported ISIS in 2014. So then, of course, we have the admission of former US Secretary of State [John] Kerry who had a secret meeting with Syrian opposition activists admitted that the United States allowed ISIS to advance on Damascus in order to put pressure on President Assad.

So, the United States is deeply involved in allowing ISIS to rise; they were deeply involved in, of course, al-Qaeda, the al-Nusra Front, […] And, of course, Israel, as I’ve pointed out, has been involved in supporting al-Qaeda and has been silent regarding the presence of ISIS on its border. So, Iran has helped the Syrian government to defeat extremist groups. Of course, the Russians, Hezbollah, all of these countries, all of these groups together [won] this victory over extremism and if Syria had fallen, without any doubt Iraq would had fallen.

Iraq was on the verge of falling despite the fact that ISIS had a large number of troops fighting the Syrian government. If they had defeated the Syrian government, they would have sent a lot more troops into Iraq and it would have fallen. And of course Lebanon would have faced a very new and dangerous situation with these extremists. So Iran’s support for the Iraqi government and the Syrian government helped defeat these extremist groups and this is a major point of contention between Iran, Israel and Saudi Arabia and, of course, the United States. […]

 

December 30, 2017 Posted by | Timeless or most popular, War Crimes, Wars for Israel | , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Clean Break II: Iran Hawks Decide to Burn It All Down

By Derek Davison and Jim Lobe | LobeLog | December 27, 2017

The 20th century was rife with partitions, many of them involving European powers carving up colonial possessions in Africa and the Middle East with what often appears to have been little or no concern for local realities. Perhaps the most famous of these free-hand attempts at state creation is the Sykes-Picot Line, whose legacy is very much still with us (and not for the better). But Sykes-Picot is far from the only example of European colonial borders that are still causing problems decades after they were drawn.

But who cares about all of that? It doesn’t seem to be an issue for at least some of America’s anti-Iran hawks. In response to Iran’s rising profile in the Middle East, fueled mostly by a war those neocons ardently championed and the striking ineptitude of the hawks’ new favorite Persian Gulf monarchy, the intellectual heirs to the men who drew those ill-fated borders are proposing, long after it might have done any good, to re-draw them.

Writing for Fox News on December 25, Michael Makovsky—who is no fringe figure, being CEO of the neoconservative Jewish Institute for National Security Affairs (JINSA)—suggests just such a strategy for countering Iranian influence in the Middle East:

Maintaining Syria, Iraq, Lebanon and Yemen in their existing forms is unnatural and serves Iran’s interests. There is nothing sacred about these countries’ borders, which seem to have been drawn by a drunk and blindfolded mapmaker. Indeed, in totally disregarding these borders, ISIS and Iran both have already demonstrated the anachronism and irrelevance of the borders.

Syria, Iraq, Lebanon and Yemen are not nation-states as Americans understand them, but rather post-World War I artificial constructs, mostly created out of the ashes of the Ottoman Empire in a colossally failed experiment by western leaders.

With their deep ethno-sectarian fissures, these four countries have either been held together by a strong authoritarian hand or suffered sectarian carnage.

It is astonishing to read neoconservatives, who have done little else since the 1970s but lobby for exerting American hegemony in the Middle East, decry the results of the exertion of European hegemony in the Middle East. It reads like an artificial intelligence that just briefly verges on full self-awareness before pivoting and falling back to safer ground. It’s particularly rich for Makovsky, whose JINSA predecessors promoted the ouster of two of those “strong authoritarian hands” in former Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein and former Yemeni President Ali Abdullah Saleh, to bemoan one result of their ouster.

But let’s focus on the proposal Makovsky makes: redrawing borders in the Middle East, creating what he calls “loose confederations or new countries with more borders that more naturally conform along sectarian lines,” in order to counter Iran. The proposal strongly resembles recommendations found in “A Clean Break: A New Strategy for Securing the Realm,” a 1996 publication of the Jerusalem-based Institute for Advanced Strategic and Political Studies that was prepared in collaboration with several other neoconservative think tanks—including JINSA.

“A Clean Break,” the conclusion of a task force that included such Likudnik geniuses as Richard Perle, Douglas Feith, and David Wurmser, argued in part that Israel should work with friendly governments in Turkey and Jordan to contain regional threats, particularly coming from Syria. It concluded, among other things, that Israeli leaders should pursue “removing Saddam Hussein from power in Iraq-an important objective in its own right-as a means of foiling Syria’s regional ambitions.” “Syria” in this context serves as a stand-in for “Iran.” Long-term, the report envisioned the formation of a “natural axis” of Israel, Turkey, Jordan, and a “Hashemite” Iraq serving as “the prelude to a redrawing of the map of the Middle East, which could threaten Syria’s territorial integrity.”

Even a cursory glance at the state of the Middle East since the end of the Iraq War shows that ousting Saddam Hussein achieved the opposite of the report’s stated goals. The idea of a Hashemite restoration in Shia-majority Iraq was ridiculously far-fetched, and Iraq’s democratically-elected government has–justifiably–greatly improved the Baghdad-Tehran relationship. Makovsky, who wants to reverse this trend, argues that the United States should “declare our support and strong military aid for an eventual Iraqi Kurdish state, once its warring factions unify and improve governance. We could support a federation for the rest of Iraq.”

In Makovsky’s imagination, the new Kurd-less Iraqi federation would presumably wish Erbil well and send it on its way. In reality, another serious Kurdish move toward independence would probably lead to a civil war, as it nearly did in October over the status of Kirkuk. Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi’s first foreign trip after his dramatic capture of Kirkuk was… to Iran. If the United States were to come out in full support of an independent Kurdistan, it would almost certainly push the rest of Iraq more firmly into Iran’s orbit. Speaking of Kirkuk, does Makovsky imagine that independent Kurdistan would be given the city and its surrounding oil fields? If yes, then that only increases the chances of a war with Baghdad. If no, then there are serious questions about whether that hypothetical Kurdish state would be economically viable.

For Syria, Makovsky says that “we could seek a more ethnically coherent loose confederation or separate states that might balance each other – the Iranian-dominated Alawites along the coast, the Kurds in the northeast, and the Sunni Arabs in the heartland.” He might want to check a recent map of Syria, because while “heartland” is obviously a subjective term, by almost any definition Syria’s “heartland” now belongs to President Basher al-Assad and his Russian and Iranian allies. This includes the country’s five largest (pre-war) cities: Aleppo, Damascus, Homs, Latakia, and Hama. How does Makovsky propose any of that territory be taken from Assad so as to be turned over to “Sunni Arabs,” even in a confederate sense? If the answer is “war,” then his Fox News thinkpiece is burying the lede to say the least.

Makovsky then recommends that the U.S. strengthen relations with Shia-majority Azerbaijan, in order to “demonstrate we are not anti-Shia Muslim.” Yes, that should do the trick. Of course, that’s not the only reason:

An added potential benefit of this approach could be a fomenting of tensions within Iran, which has sizable Kurdish and Azeri populations, thereby weakening the radical regime in Tehran.

You might even say that it could threaten Iran’s territorial integrity. Make a Clean Break, if you will.

The dangers of the United States trying to redraw Middle Eastern borders—Makovsky graciously allows that America “cannot dictate the outcomes” but should instead “influence” them—should be obvious. For one thing, there’s the immediate likelihood that attempting to draw new borders would intensify regional instability. For another, there’s little reason to expect that the United States would get the new borders any more “right” than Britain and France did a century ago, particularly not when the process is being managed by the same people who brought us the invasion of Iraq. For still another, the most recent example of such Western “influenced” partitioning isn’t exactly a positive one.

But we can’t leave Makovsky’s piece without mentioning its most jaw-dropping paragraph (emphasis ours):

Artificial states have been divided or loosened before with some success, such as the Soviet Union, Yugoslavia and Czechoslovakia, which are all post-WWI formations. Bosnia and Herzegovina have also managed as a confederation.

Czechoslovakia divided peacefully of its own accord. The Soviet Union more or less did likewise, though that dissolution hasn’t been quite so peaceful in recent years. As for Yugoslavia—well, maybe Dr. Makovsky’s definition of “success” is a bit different from most other people’s. To be fair, though, if the breakup of Yugoslavia is his template for the future of the Middle East, this piece makes a lot more sense.

But if Makovsky believes in federalizing existing Middle Eastern states along “ethno-sectarian” lines, why not start with Israel and the Occupied Territories, a notion that would seem logical to any 21st century mapmaker? After all, occupation of one people by another via a “strong authoritarian hand”—in this case the IDF—would seem to be a prescription for a “colossally failed experiment,” no? Perhaps Makovsky’s experience as a former West Bank settler may make it difficult for him to see the relevance.

December 29, 2017 Posted by | Illegal Occupation, Timeless or most popular, War Crimes, Wars for Israel | , , , , | Leave a comment

The Danger and Challenge of Jewish-Zionist Power


Mark Weber addressing the ‘London Forum’ meeting, April 11, 2015

Text of an address given at the “London Forum” meeting at the Grosvenor Hotel in London, England, on April 11, 2015, and, slightly modified, at the “International Identitarian Congress” in Guadalajara, Mexico, on May 2, 2015. The text has been edited for posting here, and source references have been added.

By Mark Weber, Institute for Historical Review

For many years Israel has violated well established standards of international law and has defied numerous United Nations resolutions in its occupation of conquered lands, in extra-judicial killings, and in repeated acts of military aggression.

Most of the world regards Israel’s policies, and especially its oppression of Pal­estinians, as illegal and outrageous. This international consen­sus is reflected, for example, in numerous UN resolutions condemning Israel, which have been approved with overwhelming majorities.

In October 2003, for example, the UN General Assembly approved a resolution condemning Israel’s so-called “security barrier,” a grotesque thing, parts of it much larger and more formidable than the Berlin Wall, that Israel has built on occupied Palestinian territory. Supporting the resolution were 144 countries, representing nearly the entire world’s population. Twelve countries abstained. Just four countries opposed the resolution. They were: Israel, the United States, the Marshall Islands and Micronesia. The latter two member states are small island countries in the Pacific Ocean, with a combined population of 180,000, that are utterly dependent on the US. / 1

In December 2003, to take another example, the members of the UN General Assembly considered a resolution re-affirming the principle of Palestinian sovereignty. It received the backing of 142 states, including all the nations of Europe and South America. In this case as well, just four countries voted against the resolution: Israel, the US, the Marshall Islands and Micronesia. / 2

“The whole world,” said United Nations Secretary General Kofi Annan some years ago, “is demanding that Israel withdraw [from occupied Palestinian territories]. I don’t think the whole world … can be wrong.” / 3

Why is it that the United States stands out among the world’s nations in such matchless support of the Zionist state?

With very few exceptions, even those American politicians and media figures who might sometimes criticize a particular Israeli policy are, nonetheless, all but unanimous in their enthusiastic support for Israel — and not just as a country, but as an emphatically Jewish ethnic-religious state. In spite of occasional disputes over specific policies, the US continues, as it has for years, to provide Israel with crucial military, diplo­matic and financial backing, including more than $3 billion each year in aid.

Why is it that support for Israel by politicians and in the media is more vehement and unquestioning in the United States than anywhere else? Well, one possible explanation for this unparalleled level of support is that Americans are vastly more aware, enlightened or principled than people anywhere else in the world.

One person who has spoken candidly about the real reason is Bishop Desmond Tutu of South Africa, who was awarded the 1984 Nobel Peace Prize. Addressing an audience in Boston, he said: “But you know as well as I do that, somehow, the Israeli government is placed on a pedestal [in the US], and to criticize it is to be immediately dubbed anti-Semitic … People are scared in this country, to say wrong is wrong because the Jewish lobby is powerful — very powerful.” / 4

Bishop Tutu spoke the truth. Although Jews make up only two or three percent of the US population, they wield immense power and influ­ence – much more than any other ethnic or religious group.

As Jewish author and political science professor Benjamin Ginsberg has pointed out: / 5

“Since the 1960s, Jews have come to wield considerable influence in American economic, cultural, intellectual and political life. Jews played a central role in American finance during the 1980s, and they were among the chief beneficiaries of that decade’s corporate mergers and reorganizations. Today, though barely two percent of the nation’s population is Jewish, close to half its billionaires are Jews. The chief executive officers of the three major television networks and the four largest film studios are Jews, as are the owners of the nation’s larg­est newspaper chain and the most influential single newspaper, the New York Times … The role and influence of Jews in Ameri­can politics is equally marked…

“Jews are only three percent of the nation’s population and com­prise eleven percent of what this study defines as the nation’s elite. However, Jews constitute more than 25 percent of the elite journalists and publishers, more than 17 percent of the leaders of important voluntary and public interest organiza­tions, and more than 15 percent of the top ranking civil ser­vants.”

Stephen Steinlight, one-time Director of National Affairs of the American Jewish Committee, has likewise noted what he calls the “disproportionate political power” of Jews, which, as he puts it, is “pound for pound the greatest of any ethnic/ cultural group in America.” He goes on to explain that “Jewish economic influence and power are disproportionately concentrated in Hollywood, television, and in the news industry.” / 6

Two well-known Jewish writers, Seymour Lipset and Earl Raab, point­ed out in their 1995 book, Jews and the New American Scene: / 7

“During the last three decades Jews [in the United States] have made up 50 percent of the top two hundred intellectu­als … 20 percent of professors at the leading universities … 40 percent of partners in the leading law firms in New York and Washington … 59 percent of the directors, writ­ers, and producers of the 50 top-grossing motion pictures from 1965 to 1982, and 58 percent of directors, writers, and producers in two or more primetime television series.”

Vanity Fair magazine in 2007 published a list of what it calls “the world’s most powerful people” – a lineup of the one hundred most influential media bosses, bankers, publishers, image makers, and so forth, who determine how we view ourselves and the world, and who – directly and indirectly — shape our lives and our futures. Jews made up more than half of the powerful men and women on the Vanity Fair list, reported a leading Israeli newspaper, The Jerusalem Post. / 8

The Jewish role in American political life is similarly formidable and lopsided. One member of the influential Conference of Presidents of Major Amer­ican Jewish Organizations “estimated Jews alone had contributed 50 percent of the funds for [President Bill] Clinton’s 1996 re-elec­tion campaign.” / 9 The American magazine Mother Jones compiled a listing of the 400 leading contributors to the 2000 US national elections. Seven of the first ten were Jewish, as were twelve of the top 20, and 125 of the top 250. / 10

In recent years the single biggest donor to American politicians, by far, has been Sheldon Adelson, a vehemently pro-Zionist Jewish billionaire. In the 2012 US election campaign, the gambling casino magnate and his wife gave tens of millions of dollars to Republican presidential contender Mitt Romney and other pro-Israel candidates, groups and organizations. As The New York Times reported: “Mr. Adelson, whose $38 billion fortune makes him among the richest men in the world, poured roughly $100 million into Republican campaigns in 2012 …” / 11

The biggest donor to Democratic Party candidates in recent years has been Haim Saban, an Israeli billionaire and global media mogul. Taking note of Saban’s ardent devotion to the Jewish state, The New York Times reported: “He has since emerged as perhaps the most politically connected mogul in Hollywood, throwing his weight and money around Washington, and increasingly, the world, trying to influence all things Israeli. ‘I’m a one-issue guy and my issue is Israel,’ he said.” / 12 M. J. Rosenberg, a political affairs analyst for The Nation observed: “Adelson and Saban are top funders, respectively, of the Republican and Democratic parties, although as Adelson points out, ‘when it comes to Israel we’re on the same side’.” / 13

Michael Medved, a well-known Jewish author and film critic, has written: “It makes no sense at all to try to deny the reality of Jewish power and prominence in popular culture … Any list of the most influential production executives at each of the major movie stu­dios will produce a heavy majority of recognizably Jewish names.” / 14

One person who has carefully studied this subject is Jonathan J. Goldberg, editor of the influential Jewish community weekly Forward. In his 1996 book, Jewish Power, he wrote: / 15 “In a few key sectors of the media, notably among Hollywood stu­dio executives, Jews are so numerically dominant that calling these businesses Jewish-controlled is little more than a sta­tistical observation …”

Goldberg went on to point out:

“Hollywood at the end of the twentieth century is still an industry with a pronounced ethnic tinge. Virtually all the senior executives at the major studios are Jews. Writers, pro­ducers, and to a lesser degree directors are disproportionately Jewish — one recent study showed the figure as high as 59 per­cent among top-grossing films.

“The combined weight of so many Jews in one of America’s most lucrative and important industries gives the Jews of Hollywood a great deal of political power. They are a major source of money for Democratic candidates.”

Joel Stein, a columnist for the Los Angeles Times, has written: “As a proud Jew, I want America to know about our accomplishment. Yes, we control Hollywood … I don’t care if Americans think we’re running the news media, Hollywood, Wall Street or the government. I just care that we get to keep running them.” / 16

Over the years, this clout has had a profound impact on how Americans feel, think and act. One prominent political figure who has publicly acknowledged this reality is Vice President Joe Biden. In a remarkable address in May 2013, he said that what he called the “immense” and “outsized” Jewish role in the US mass media and cultural life is the single most important factor in shaping American attitudes over the past century, and in driving major cultural- political changes. / 17 Vice President Biden said: “I bet you 85 percent of those [social-political] changes, whether it’s in Hollywood or social media, are a consequence of Jewish leaders in the industry. The influence is immense.” He went on to say: “Jewish heritage has shaped who we are – all of us, us, me – as much or more than any other factor in the last 223 years. And that’s a fact.”

As Biden mentions, this is by no means a new phenom­enon. Forty-three years ago — during a private White House meeting that was secretly recorded, President Richard Nixon and the Rev. Billy Graham — the nation’s best-known Christian evangelist — spoke frankly about the Jewish grip on the media. Graham said: “This stranglehold has got to be broken or the country’s going down the drain.” To which the president responded: “You believe that?” “Yes, sir,” said Graham. “Oh, boy,” replied Nixon. “So do I. I can’t ever say that [publicly, that is], but I believe it.” / 18

How could all this have happened? Jewish American scholar Alfred M. Lilienthal provided an answer in his detailed 1978 study, The Zionist Connection. He wrote: / 19

“How has the Zionist will been imposed on the American people? … It is the Jewish connection, the tribal solidarity among themselves and the amazing pull on non-Jews, that has molded this unprecedented power … The Jewish connection covers all areas and reaches every level. Most Americans may not even sense this gigantic effort, but there is scarcely a Jew who is not touched by its tentacles …

“The extent and depth to which organized Jewry reached – and reaches – in the U.S. is indeed awesome … The most effective component of the Jewish connection is probably that of media control … Jews, toughened by centuries of persecution, have risen to places of prime importance in the business and financial world … Jewish wealth and acumen wields unprecedented power in the area of finance and investment banking, playing an important role in influencing U.S. policy toward the Middle East … In the larger metropolitan areas, the Jewish-Zionist connection thoroughly pervades affluent financial, commercial, social, entertainment, and art circles.”

Because US military might is the most formidable and intrusive in the world, by far, the Jewish-Zionist role in setting American policy has consequences for people far beyond the borders of the United States. In the administration of President George W. Bush a group — a cabal — of high-level, so-called “neoconservative” Jews played a key role in prodding the United States into war in Iraq. They included: Paul Wolfowitz, Deputy Secretary of Defense; Richard Perle of the Pentagon’s Defense Policy Board; David Wurmser in the State Department; and, Douglas Feith, the Pentagon’s Undersecretary for Policy. These men acted in accord with Zionist plans to overthrow the Iraqi regime that were already in place well before Bush became president in early 2001. / 20

For well-informed people, this reality is no secret. In Britain, a veteran member of the House of Commons candidly declared in May 2003 that pro-Israel Jews had taken control of America’s foreign policy, and had succeeded in pushing the US and Britain into war in Iraq. Tam Dalyell, a Labour party deputy known as “Father of the House” because he was the longest-serving Member of Parliament, said: “A Jewish cabal have taken over the government in the United States and formed an unholy alliance with fundamentalist Christians …”, and, he added: “There is far too much Jewish influence in the United States.” / 21

In Washington, Senator Ernest Hollings was moved to declare that Iraq was invaded, as he put it, to “secure Israel,” and that “everybody” knows it. Referring to the reluctance of his Congressional colleagues to openly acknowledge this reality, Hollings said that “nobody is willing to stand up and say what is going on.” Members of Congress, with few exceptions, uncritically support Israel and its policies due to what Hollings called, “the pressures that we get politically.” / 22

Americans have paid a high price for the US alliance with Israel. This includes tens of billions of dollars in economic and military aid to the Jewish state, the hundreds of billions of dollars that the Iraq war and occupation have cost, and the deaths there of more than four thousand American military personnel. Directly and indirectly, America’s so-called “special relationship” with Israel has also generated unprecedented distrust, fear and loathing of the United States around the world. By supporting Israel and its policies, the United States betrays not only its own national interests, but the principles it claims to embody and defend.

In truth, if the United States held Israel to the same standards that it has applied to Iraq, Serbia, and other countries, American bombers and missiles would be blasting Tel Aviv, and American officials would be putting Israeli leaders behind bars for war crimes and crimes against humanity.

With Zionist leaders now prodding the United States into new wars against Israel’s adversaries, the cost of the US alliance with the Zionist state is likely to rise much higher in the years to come. / 23

Israeli and Jewish- Zionist leaders affirm that Jews constitute a “people” or a “nation” – that is, a distinct nationality group to which Jews everywhere are supposed to feel and express a primary loyalty. / 24 Some American Jewish leaders have been explicit about this. Louis Brandeis, a US Supreme Court justice and a leading American Zionist, said: “Let us all recognize that we Jews are a distinctive nationality of which every Jew, whatever his country, his station or shade of belief, is necessarily a member.” / 25

While Zionist Jews routinely speak of the “Jewish people” as a distinct ethic-religious group, and often affirm that Jews are members of a separate nationality to which they must be loyal, Zionists simultaneously insist that Jews must be welcomed as full and equal citizens in whatever country they may wish to live – with no social, legal or institutional obstacles to Jewish power and influence in public life. In short, Jewish-Zionist leaders and organizations (such as the World Jewish Congress and the American Jewish Committee) demand full citizen rights for Zionist Jews not only in “their country,” Israel, but everywhere.

Major Jewish-Zionist organizations, and, more broadly, the organized Jewish community, also promote so-called “pluralism,” “tolerance” and “diversity” in the United States and other countries. They believe this is useful for Jews. Abraham Foxman, director of the Anti-Defamation League, one of the world’s most influential Jewish- Zionist organizations, puts it this way: “America’s pluralistic society … is at the heart of Jewish security … In the long run, what has made American Jewish life a uniquely positive experience in Diaspora history and which has enabled us to be such important allies for the State of Israel, is the health of a pluralistic, tolerant and inclusive American society.” / 26

Consistent with this outlook, the ADL has for years promoted the slogan “Diversity is Our Strength.” In keeping with this motto, which it claims to have invented, the ADL has devoted great effort and resources to persuading Americans — especially younger Americans — to welcome and embrace ever more social, cultural and racial “diversity.” / 27

This campaign has been very successful. American politicians and educators, and virtually the entire US mass media, promote “diversity,” “multiculturalism” and “pluralism,” and portray those who do not embrace these objectives as hateful and ignorant. At the same time, influential Jewish-Zionist organizations such as the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, or AIPAC, insist that the US must recognize and defend Israel as a specifically Jewish ethnic-religious state. Pluralism and diversity, it seems, are only for non-Jews. What’s good for Jews in their own homeland, Jewish-Zionist leaders seem to say, is not diversity and multiculturalism, but a tribalistic nationalism.

There are some people who object to the power of the so-called “Jewish lobby” because it supports and makes possible Israel’s oppression of Palestinians. Others object because they are unhappy with this or that aspect of the lobby’s agenda. But to me this is beside the point. Apart from the harmful consequences of any particular policy that the Jewish community makes possible, is the injustice and danger inherent in permitting any distinct minority group or interest to wield immense, disproportionate power and influence — and especially in the country that is the world’s foremost military and financial power, and most important cultural factor.

Imagine the response, for example, if evangelical Christians, or Muslims, or African-Americans, were to secure a grip on the American media and on America’s political life comparable to that held by Jews. In reality, the Jewish hold on American life is far more dangerous than one that, in theory, might be held by any of those other groups I’ve mentioned.

There are two main reasons for this:

First, Jews in America have, manifestly, a strong loyalty to a foreign country, Israel, that since its founding in 1948 has been embroiled in seemingly endless crises and conflicts with its neighbors, and which is now a formidable military power with a large nuclear arsenal.

Second, the Jewish grip is especially dangerous because of the distrustful and sometimes even adversarial way that Jews view the rest of us.

Over the centuries, the Jewish community, more than any other single group, has demonstrated a pronounced sense of separateness from the rest of humanity, and, accordingly, views its interests as quite distinct from those of everyone else. This “chosen people” mindset – this “Us vs. Them” attitude – is anchored in centuries of Jewish history and heritage, and is deeply rooted in the collective Jewish psyche.

The ancient Jewish sense of alienation from, and abiding distrust of, non-Jews is manifest in a remarkable essay published in the Forward, the prominent Jewish community weekly. Entitled “We’re Right, the Whole World’s Wrong,” it is written by Rabbi Dov Fischer, an attorney and a member of the Jewish Community Relations Committee of the Jewish Federation of Los Angeles. Rabbi Fischer is also national vice president of the Zionist Organization of America. / 28

So this essay was written not by an obscure scribbler, but rather by a prominent Jewish community figure. And it did not appear in the some marginal periodical, but rather in what is perhaps the most literate and thoughtful Jewish weekly in America, and certainly one of the most influential.

In his essay, Rabbi Fischer tells readers: “If we Jews are anything, we are a people of history … Our history provides the strength to know that we can be right and the whole world wrong.”

He goes on: “We were right, and the whole world was wrong. The Crusades. The blood libels and the Talmud burnings in England and France, leading those nations to expel Jews for centuries. The Spanish and Portuguese Inquisition. The ghettos and the Mortara case in Italy. Dreyfus in France. Beilis in Russia and a century’s persecution of Soviet Jewry.

“The Holocaust. Kurt Waldheim in Austria. Each time, Europe stood by silently — or actively participated in murdering us — and we alone were right, and the whole world was wrong.

“Today, once again, we alone are right and the whole world is wrong. The Arabs, the Russians, the Africans, the Vatican proffer their aggregated insights into and accumulated knowledge of the ethics of massacre. And the Europeans. Although we appreciate the half-century of West European democracy more than we appreciated the prior millennia of European brutality, we recognize who they are, what they have done — and what’s what. …

“We remember that the food they [Europeans] eat is grown from soil fertilized by 2,000 years of Jewish blood they have sprinkled onto it. Atavistic Jew-hatred lingers in the air into which the ashes rose from the crematoria …

“Yes, once again, we are right and the whole world is wrong. It doesn’t change a thing, but after 25 centuries it’s nice to know.”

I want to emphasize here that to deal candidly with the reality of Jewish-Zionist power is not, as we so often hear, “hate” or bigoted “anti-Semitism.” We wish no harm to any individual, Jewish or not, because of his or her ancestry, religion or background. At the same time, we must not permit intimidation, malicious smears or threats to keep us from affirming what is true, and doing what is right.

The most direct and obvious victims of Jewish-Zionist power are, of course, the Palestinians who live under Israel’s harsh rule. But we Americans are also victims. Through the Jewish-Zionist grip on the media, and the organized Jewish-Zionist corruption of our political system, we are pressured, seduced, cajoled, and deceived into propping up the Jewish state, providing it with billions of dollars yearly and state-of-the-art weaponry, and even sacrificing American lives.

But it is also the truth that we Americans share some responsibility for all this. We have allowed immense power, affecting every aspect of our lives and our future, to be wielded by members of an ethnic-religious minority group that views the American people with suspicion as potential enemies. Put another way, Americans have permitted people who regard them with wariness and distrust to play a major role in determining how we live our lives, and in determining our future both as individuals and as a nation. To permit such power to pass into the hands of people who clearly do not have our best interests at heart — indeed, do not even trust us — is, to put it mildly, irresponsible.

As long as the power of what Desmond Tutu calls “the very powerful” Jewish lobby remains entrenched, there will be no end to the systematic Jewish distortion of history and current affairs, the Jewish-Zionist domination of the US political system and the American media, Zionist oppression of Palestinians, the bloody conflict between Jews and non-Jews in the Middle East, and the Israeli threat to peace.

That’s why no task is more important or pressing than to identify, counter and break this power.

Today, we are engaged in a great, global struggle — in which two distinct and irreconcilable sides confront each other: A struggle that pits a self-assured and diabolical power which feels ordained to rule over others, on one side, and all other nations and societies — indeed, humanity itself — on the other.

This struggle is not a new one. It is the latest enactment of a great drama that has played itself out again and again, over centuries, and in many different societies, cultures and historical eras. In the past this drama has played itself out on a local, national, regional, or, sometimes, continental stage. Today this is a global drama, and a global clash.

It is a struggle for the welfare and future not merely of the Middle East, or of America, but a great historical battle for our global well-being — a struggle that calls all of us who share a sense of responsibility for the future of our own nation and of humankind.


Source Notes

1. “General Assembly, in Resumed Emergency Session, Demands Israel Stop Construction of Wall, Calls on Both Parties to Fulfill Road Map Obligations.” United Nations Press Release, Oct. 21, 2003. ( http://unispal.un.org/unispal.nsf/1ce874ab1832a53e852570bb006dfaf6/c4963112ac76556d85256dc7005047aa )

2. UN General Assembly vote on Dec. 23, 2003, on draft resolution 58/ 229.
( http://unispal.un.org/UNISPAL.NSF/0/77660E5C1B79EF8C85256EA90068A58B )

3. On April 8, 2002, in Madrid. J. Brinkley, “Israel Starts Leaving … ,” The New York Times’, April 9, 2002.
( http://www.nytimes.com/2002/04/08/international/08CND-MIDE.html )

4. D. Tutu, “Apartheid in the Holy Land,” The Guardian (Britain), April 29, 2002.
( http://www.guardian.co.uk/israel/comment/0,10551,706911,00.html )

5. Benjamin Ginsberg, The Fatal Embrace: Jews and the State (University of Chicago, 1993), pp. 1, 103.

6. S. Steinlight, “The Jewish Stake in America’s Changing Demography: Reconsidering a Misguided Immigration Policy,” Center for Immigration Studies, Nov. 2001.
( http://www.cis.org/articles/2001/back1301.html )

7. Seymour Martin Lipset and Earl Raab, Jews and the New American Scene (Harvard Univ. Press, 1995), pp. 26-27.

8. N. Burstein, “Jewish power dominates at ‘Vanity Fair’,” The Jerusalem Post (Israel), Oct.11 (12?), 2007.
( http://www.jpost.com/Jewish-World/Jewish-News/Jewish-power-dominates-at-Vanity-Fair )

9. Janine Zacharia, “The Unofficial Ambassadors of the Jewish State,” The Jerusalem Post (Israel), April 2, 2000. Reprinted in “Other Voices,” June 2000, p. OV-4, a supplement to The Washington Report on Middle East Affairs.

10. A. Cockburn, “The Row Over the Israel Lobby,” May 8 (or 5?), 2006.
( http://www.counterpunch.org/cockburn05082006.html )

11. N. Confessore, E. Lipton, “Seeking to Ban Online Betting, G.O.P. Donor Tests Influence,” The New York Times, March 27, 2014
( http://www.nytimes.com/2014/03/28/us/politics/major-gop-donor-tests-his-influence-in-push-to-ban-online-gambling.html ); J. Horowitz, “Republican Contenders Reach Out to Sheldon Adelson, Palms Up,” The New York Times, April 26, 2015
( http://www.nytimes.com/2015/04/27/us/politics/republican-contenders-reach-out-to-sheldon-adelson-palms-up.html ) ; E. Lipton, “G.O.P.’s Israel Support Deepens as Political Contributions Shift,” The New York Times, April 4, 2015
( http://www.nytimes.com/2015/04/05/us/politics/gops-israel-support-deepens-as-political-contributions-shift.html ) ;
See also: M. Gold, P. Rucker, “Billionaire mogul Sheldon Adelson looks for mainstream Republican who can win in 2016,” The Washington Post, March 25, 2015
( http://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/billionaire-mogul-sheldon-adelson-looks-for-mainstream-republican-who-can-win-in-2016/2014/03/25/e2f47bb0-b3c2-11e3-8cb6-284052554d74_story.html ); P. Stone, “Sheldon Adelson Spent Far More On Campaign Than Previously Known,” The Huffington Post, Dec. 12, 2012 ( http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/12/03/sheldon-adelson-2012-election_n_2223589.html )

12. A. R. Sorkin, “Schlepping to Moguldom,” The New York Times, Sept. 5, 2004.
( http://www.nytimes.com/2004/09/05/business/yourmoney/05sab.html ) ;

13. M. J. Rosenberg, “Sheldon Adelson and Haim Saban: Billionaire Funders for Israel,” The Nation, Dec. 8, 2014
( http://www.thenation.com/article/192065/sheldon-adelson-and-haim-saban-want-be-koch-brothers-israel )

14. M. Medved, “Is Hollywood Too Jewish?,” Moment, Vol. 21, No. 4 (1996), p. 37.

15. Jonathan Jeremy Goldberg, Jewish Power: Inside the American Jewish Establishment/ (Addison-Wesley, 1996), pp. 280, 287-288. See also pp. 39-40, 290-291.

16. J. Stein, “How Jewish Is Hollywood?,” Los Angeles Times, Dec. 19, 2008.
( http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/commentary/la-oe-stein19-2008dec19,0,4676183.column )

17. Jennifer Epstein, “Biden: ‘Jewish heritage is American heritage’,” Politico, May 21, 2013.
( http://www.politico.com/politico44/2013/05/biden-jewish-heritage-is-american-heritage-164525.html ); Daniel Halper, “Biden Talks of ‘Outsized Influence’ of Jews: ‘The Influence Is Immense’,” The Weekly Standard, May 22, 2013.
( http://www.weeklystandard.com/blogs/biden-talks-outsized-influence-jews-influence-immense_728765.html ) See also: M. Weber , “Vice President Biden Acknowledges ‘Immense’ Jewish Role in American Mass Media and Cultural Life,” July 2013.
( http://ihr.org/other/biden_jewish_role )

18. “Nixon, Billy Graham Make Derogatory Comments About Jews on Tapes,” Chicago Tribune, March 1, 2002 (or Feb. 28, 2002)
( http://www.fpp.co.uk/online/02/02/Graham_Nixon.html );
“Billy Graham Apologizes for ’72 Remarks,” Associated Press, Los Angeles Times, March 2, 2002. “Graham Regrets Jewish Slur,” BBC News, March 2, 2002.
( http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/1850077.stm ) The conversation apparently took place on Feb. 1, 1972.

19. A. Lilienthal, The Zionist Connection (New York: Dodd, Mead, 1978), pp. 206, 209, 212, 218, 228, 229.

20. See: John J. Mearsheimer and Stephen M. Walt, The Israel Lobby and US Foreign Policy. New York: Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 2007.

21. F. Nelson, “Anger Over Dalyell’s ‘Jewish Cabal’ Slur,” The Scotsman (Edinburgh), May 5, 2003 ( http://www.highbeam.com/doc/1P2-13027250.html ) ; M. White, “Dalyell Steps Up Attack On Levy,” The Guardian (London), May 6, 2003. ( http://www.theguardian.com/uk/2003/may/06/race.politics ).

22. M. Weber, “`Iraq Was Invaded to Secure Israel,’ Says Senator Hollings,” July 16, 2004
( http://www.ihr.org/news/040716_hollings.shtml )

23. See, for example: M. Weber, “Behind the Campaign for War Against Iran,” April 2013.
( http://www.ihr.org/other/behindwarcampaign )

24. See: Kevin MacDonald, The Culture of Critique. Praeger, 1998 (Softcover edition, 2002); Review by S. Hornbeck of The Culture of Critique in a 1999 issue of American Renaissance (http://www.csulb.edu/~kmacd/review-AR.html) ; M. Weber, “The Weight of Tradition: Why Judaism is Not Like Other Religions.” Oct. 2010
( http://www.ihr.org/judaism0709.html ) ; M. Weber, “Jews: A Religious Community, a People, or a Race?,” March-April 2000 ( http://www.ihr.org/jhr/v19/v19n2p63_Weber.html ) ; Israel even claims to speak on behalf of Jews who lived and died before the state was established. “Holocaust Victims Given Posthumous Citizenship by Israel,” The Associated Press, Los Angeles Times, May 9, 1985.
( http://articles.latimes.com/1985-05-09/news/mn-6754_1_posthumous-citizenship ) ;

25. Louis D. Brandeis, “The Jewish Problem and How to Solve It.” Speech of April 25, 1915. ( http://www.pbs.org/wnet/supremecourt/personality/sources_document11.html )

26. Foxman letter of Nov. 11, 2005. Published in The Jerusalem Post, Nov. 18, 2005.
( http://archive.adl.org/media_watch/newspapers/20051111-JPost.htm )

27. ADLOn the Frontline (New York), Summer 1997, p. 8. This issue of the ADL bulletin also noted with some pride that President Clinton, in his Feb. 1997 “State of the Union” address, had given an unexpected boost to what it called the “ADL tag line.” In that address, Clinton said: “My fellow Americans, we must never, ever believe that our diversity is a weakness. It is our greatest strength.”

28. Dov Fischer, “We’re Right, the Whole World’s Wrong,” Forward (New York), April 19, 2002, p. 11.
( http://ravfischer.blogspot.com/2008/05/april-19-2002-forward-were-right-whole.html )

Some of Fischer’s remarks here are gross distortions of history. For example, his mention of “a century’s persecution of Soviet Jewry” is a breathtaking falsehood. For one thing, the entire Soviet period lasted 74 years, not 100. And during at least some of that period, above all during the first ten years of the Soviet era, Jews wielded tremendous, if not dominant power. Rabbi Fischer seems to have forgotten such figures as Leon Trotsky, com­mander in chief of the young Soviet state’s Red Army, Grigori Zinoviev, head of the Communist International, and Yakov Sverdlov, the first Soviet president. (See: M. Weber, “The Jewish Role in the Bolshevik Revolution and Russia’s Early Soviet Regime,” The Journal of Historical Review, Jan.-Feb. 1994.[ (http://www.ihr.org/jhr/v14/v14n1p-4_Weber.html ]. )

For Further Reading

Norman F. Cantor. The Sacred Chain: A History of the Jews. New York: Harper, 1994.

Benjamin Ginsberg. The Fatal Embrace: Jews and the State. The Univ. of Chicago Press, 1993.

Peter Harrison, “What Causes Anti-Semitism?” Review of Macdonald’s Separation and Its Discontents. The Journal of Historical Review, May-June 1998.
( http://ihr.org/jhr/v17/v17n3p28_Harrison )

Alfred M. Lilienthal, The Zionist Connection. New York: Dodd, Mead, 1978.

Seymour Martin Lipset and Earl Raab. Jews and the New American Scene. Harvard University Press, 1995.

Kevin MacDonald, A People That Shall Dwell Alone: Judaism as a Group Evolutionary Strategy. Praeger, 1994.

Kevin MacDonald, Separation and Its Discontents: Toward an Evolutionary Theory of Anti-Semitism. Praeger,1998

Kevin MacDonald, The Culture of Critique: An Evolutionary Analysis of Jewish Involvement in Twentieth-Century Intellectual and Political Movements. Praeger, 1998 (Softcover edition, 2002).

John J. Mearsheimer and Stephen M. Walt, The Israel Lobby and US Foreign Policy. New York: Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 2007.

W. D. Rubinstein. The Left, The Right and the Jews. New York: Universe Books, 1982.

Israel Shahak. Jewish History, Jewish Religion. London: Pluto Press, 1994

Goldwin Smith. “The Jewish Question.” From: Essays on Questions of the Day. New York: Macmillan, 1894.
( http://www.ihr.org/jhr/v17/v17n1p16_Smith.html )

Mark Weber, “Anti-Semitism: Why Does It Exist? And Why Does it Persist?,” Jan. 2014.
( http://ihr.org/other/anti-semitism-why-does-it-exist-dec-2013 ).

M. Weber, “Behind the Campaign for War Against Iran,” April 2013.
( http://www.ihr.org/other/behindwarcampaign )

M. Weber, “Iraq: A War for Israel.” March 2008
(http://www.ihr.org/leaflets/iraqwar.shtml)

Mark Weber, “Jews: A Religious Community, a People, or a Race?,” March-April 2000.
( http://www.ihr.org/jhr/v19/v19n2p63_Weber.html )

M. Weber, “A Straight Look at the Jewish Lobby,” August 2012.
( http://ihr.org/leaflets/jewishlobby.shtml )

M. Weber, “Straight Talk About Zionism: What Jewish Nationalism Means,” April 2009.
( http://www.ihr.org/zionism0409.html )

M. Weber, “Vice President Biden Acknowledges `Immense’ Jewish Role in American Mass Media and Cultural Life,” July 2013.
( http://ihr.org/other/biden_jewish_role )

M. Weber, “The Weight of Tradition: Why Judaism is Not Like Other Religions.” Oct. 2010.
( http://www.ihr.org/judaism0709.html )

December 26, 2017 Posted by | Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Timeless or most popular, Wars for Israel | , , | Leave a comment

New details emerge of Saudi Arabia’s treatment of Hariri

Press TV – December 25, 2017

A leading US daily has revealed new details of Saudi Arabia’s degrading treatment of Lebanese Prime Minister Saad Hariri during a recent trip to Riyadh, where the Lebanese leader was coerced into reading a prepared resignation speech under conditions similar to that of a captive.

Prime Minister Hariri abruptly declared his resignation from a then-unknown location in Saudi Arabia and from Saudi-owned television on November 4, accusing Iran and Hezbollah of interfering in the region and signaling that that was his reason to quit.

But Lebanese President Michel Aoun, who suspected early on that Hariri hadn’t resigned of his free will, refused to accept his resignation and demanded his return from Saudi Arabia first. Lebanese intelligence sources soon concluded that Hariri was under restrictions in Riyadh.

That drama ended when Hariri returned to Lebanon on November 22 — partially after a diplomatic intervention by France — and rescinded his resignation on December 5.

While some details had already emerged of the circumstances of Hariri’s three-week stay in Saudi Arabia, more appeared in a Sunday report by The New York Times, which used information from “a dozen Western, Lebanese and regional officials and associates of Mr. Hariri” to draw a better picture of what happened to him in Riyadh.

Hariri, who reached a power-sharing deal with Hezbollah in 2016 and who had formerly attempted to convince Riyadh of the need to work with Hezbollah, met with Ali Akbar Velayati, a senior Iranian adviser to Leader of the Islamic Revolution Ayatollah Seyyed Ali Khamenei, on November 3.

“That may have been the last straw for the Saudis,” the report said, adding, ” Within hours, Mr. Hariri received a message from the Saudi king — come now — ahead of a meeting that had been scheduled days later.”

A well-connected Lebanese analyst was cited as saying that Hariri was also invited to spend a day in the desert with the prince.

“But when he (Hariri) landed in Riyadh, Saudi officials took Mr. Hariri to his house and told him to wait — not for the king, but for the prince. He waited, from 6 p.m. to 1 a.m. No one came,” it said.

The next morning, he was “summoned at 8:30 a.m. to the Saudi royal offices — unseemly early, by the kingdom’s standards.”

Thinking that he would go camping with the prince, Hariri wore jeans and a T-shirt to the Saudi royal offices.

“But instead he was stripped of his cellphones, separated from all but one of his usual cluster of bodyguards, and shoved and insulted by Saudi security officers,” the report said. “Then came the ultimate indignity: He was handed a pre-written resignation speech and forced to read it on Saudi television.”

“Before going on TV, he was not even allowed to go to the house he owns there; he had to ask guards to bring him a suit.”

‘Down the hall from the prince’s office’

Information on what happened between Hariri’s arrival in Riyadh and the resignation is missing. The Times cited Lebanese officials as describing that interval as the “black box.”

“They (the Lebanese officials) said they were reluctant to press Mr. Hariri for details. When asked, one of them said, Mr. Hariri just looked down at the table and said it was worse than they knew.”

Hariri, who runs a private business in Saudi Arabia, was “manhandled” by Saudi officials and was also threatened that he would face “corruption charges,” according to one official.

He read the resignation speech he had been given “from a room an official said was down the hall from the prince’s office.”

‘Our prime minister has been detained’

“Lebanese officials,” the report said, “began making the rounds to puzzled Western diplomats with an unusual message: We have reason to believe our prime minister has been detained.”

Hariri “was eventually placed with Saudi guards in a guesthouse on his own property, forbidden to see his wife and children.”

Some Western diplomats were allowed to meet with the Lebanese prime minister there. “There were two Saudi guards in the room [during those meetings]… and when the diplomats asked if the guards could leave, Mr. Hariri said no, they could stay.”

Opposite effect

The drama was seen as a Saudi attempt to disrupt the political balance in Lebanon to the disadvantage of Hezbollah, which shared power both in the parliament and Hariri’s government with other Lebanese factions.

The Times report pointed to how Mohammed bin Salman was looking to use Hariri as a “pawn” against Iran, “as if he were an employee [of Riyadh] and not a sovereign leader.”

But instead, the Lebanese people of all political inclinations soon came out with massive support for their prime minister, demanding that he safely return and continue work. Hezbollah’s Secretary General Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah also voiced support for Hariri.

The report said Western officials were wondering what Saudi Arabia “hoped to accomplish with all this intrigue.”

“Several do not rule out the possibility that they aimed to foment internal unrest in Lebanon, or even war.”

Mohammed bin Salman has orchestrated a war on Yemen already. Since 2015, Saudi Arabia has been leading a number of its allies in pounding Yemen — already the Arab world’s poorest state — causing famine and a cholera epidemic there.

The report said Saudi [Persian] Gulf Affairs Minister Thaber al-Sabhan, who is believed to have been a key figure in the Hariri scheme, “got a withering reception” on a visit later to Washington, where US officials “demanded that Mr. Sabhan explain why Riyadh was destabilizing Lebanon.”

Prime Minister Hariri, in the meantime, has been continuing work with renewed support and stronger unity among Lebanese people and political groups.

“Now, Mr. Hariri remains in office with new popularity, and Hezbollah is stronger than before,” the Times said.

December 25, 2017 Posted by | Deception, Wars for Israel | , , | Leave a comment