Dubai Investigation Exposes Israeli Ops in USA
By Michael Gillespie / March 11th, 2010
An ongoing investigation by the Dubai Police force into the assassination of a high-level Hamas official in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) in January has drawn back the curtains of secrecy and deception to reveal yet again the contours of Israel’s massive and ever-expanding espionage operations in the United States.
The murder of Mahmoud Al Mabhouh in his room at the Al Bustan Rotana, a 275-room five-star luxury hotel, in Dubai on January 19 has been widely perceived to be a Mossad operation involving, by the most recent count, 27 suspects traveling on fraudulently obtained and falsified European or Australian passports. In late February and early March, the plot thickened suddenly and significantly when major US media outlet reports connected the crime and many of those involved in it to the USA and to corporations based in the USA and Israel and revealed that some of the suspected assassins, apparently members of a Mossad kidon team, had entered the USA after leaving Dubai.
ABC News reported on February 24 that Dubai police had identified 15 new suspects as part of a ring that killed Al Mabhouh.
“Fourteen of the suspects purportedly used credit cards from META Bank, a regional American bank, to pay for hotel rooms and travel arrangements. … Dubai police linked META Bank to a New York-based company called Payoneer, which provided prepaid MasterCard credit cards issued by META Bank. According to its Web site, Payoneer has a research and development center in Tel Aviv,” reported ABC.
The TV network report noted that some of the additional suspects played a central role in the crime while others were accused of “‘providing prior logistical support and preparations to facilitate,’ making a series of trips to Dubai in advance” of the assassination.
The New York Times reported on March 1 that, “At least two suspects in the killing of a Hamas official in a hotel here in January traveled to the United States afterward, according to a person familiar with the investigation.”
“One suspect traveling on a British passport arrived in the United States on Feb. 14; the other used an Irish passport and arrived on Jan. 21, said the person, who spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to discuss the case. He did not say where the men entered the country, and added that there was no known record of their leaving,” wrote Robert F. Worth in a story filed from Dubai.
Worth’s report noted that if the suspected assassins who entered the U.S. presented foreign passports, they would have been photographed and finger printed upon arrival.
The Wall Street Journal’s Chip Cummins filed a similar report from Dubai on the same day attributing the information to “people familiar with the situation” and “records shared between international investigators.” In many previous news reports from Dubai information about the investigation had been attributed to Dubai’s Police Chief Lt. Gen. Dhahi Khalfan Tamim.
Neither report explored the rather remarkable news that the suspect carrying a British passport in the name Roy Allan Cannon was confident enough to travel on the falsified document more than three weeks after the assassination and to present it upon arrival in the USA, where passport controls are generally assumed to be most stringent.
“At one time it was possible to produce false identity documents with little or no regard for what is referred to as backstopping as data bases at national points of entry were unsophisticated and were generally unlinked to any central sources of information. That has all changed in the past eight years. European and American passports in particular can all be verified from central data bases that include information that is also drawn from other public record sources,” wrote former CIA officer Philip Giraldi in a February 25 column for Antiwar.com.
On March 3, Al Jazeera TV reported that Tamim, “said he would ask the Dubai prosecutor to issue arrest warrants for [Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin] Netanyahu and the head of Mossad [Meir Degan].”
Tamim’s investigation, which has been described by Interpol Secretary General Ronald Noble as “thorough,” has seriously inconvenienced and embarrassed the Israeli government and its espionage organization.
The Money Trail
The Independent Monitor contacted MetaBank’s corporate headquarters in Storm Lake, IA to ask why an Iowa bank would provide credit cards to 14 suspected members of a death squad.
MetaBank’s Lisa Binder, Vice President for Investor Relations and Corporate Communications responded via telephone and e-mail with a statement saying, in part, “The Meta cards in question were issued in conjunction with a Meta Payment Systems program, not at a retail bank location. Meta Payment Systems, which has issued more than 150 million prepaid cards, markets its payroll cards through various Program Managers─in this case, Payoneer─to offer reputable US companies network branded payroll cards with which American companies can pay expatriates, employees and contractors of their company who live in the US and in foreign countries. The cards in question were ‘loaded’ by the companies using direct deposit for payroll, disbursements, and other compensation.”
The Independent Monitor attempted to contact Payoneer offices at 410 Park Avenue in New York City but found that the only phone answered at Payoneer headquarters was a customer support line for Payoneer’s Birthright Israel customers.
Birthright Israel provides first time educational trips to Israel for Jewish young adults ages 18 to 26. The program sends “thousands of young Jewish adults from all over the world to Israel as a gift in order to diminish the growing division between Israel and Jewish communities around the world; to strengthen the sense of solidarity among world Jewry; and to strengthen participants’ personal Jewish identity and connection to the Jewish people,” according to the organization’s website.
Funding for Birthright Israel is “provided by our partners: private philanthropists through The Birthright Israel Foundation; the people of Israel through the Government of Israel; and Jewish communities around the world (North American Jewish Federations, Keren Hayesod and the Jewish Agency for Israel). …
“Taglit-Birthright Israel requires that all participants pay their deposit through Payoneer. … If you lose your Payoneer card while in Israel, it can be immediately blocked and will be replaced with a new card within 24 hours. … You will not need to contact your bank back home or worry about making many calls. One call to our Customer Support center and you are all set,” says the www.birthright.payoneer.com website.
Payoneer’s Birthright customer support center declined to provide the Independent Monitor with contact information for Payoneer founder and CEO Yuval Tal or for Payoneer corporate communications/media relations personnel.
“Since the assassination, Tal has been shielded by a wall of public relations representatives and does not respond to media requests for comments. … Tal’s public relations representatives in New York have refused to comment on his past and relations with Israel’s intelligence agency Mossad,” wrote Abbas Al Lawati, a staff reporter for Gulf News.com on March 3.
“Tal is referred to by his associates in Israel as ‘an outspoken Israeli patriot’ despite having lived in New York for over ten years. In a 2006 Fox News interview about Israel’s summer war on Lebanon, Tal was presented as a ‘special ops commando’ on Fox and Friends, and stated that ‘this is a war Israel cannot (afford to) lose,’” wrote Al Lawati.
Payoneer’s website proclaims that the company is “a registered MasterCard Merchant Service Provider (MSP), and partner with MetaBank or Choice Bank Limited to deliver our services. Privately held, our funding partners include Greylock Partners, Carmel Ventures, and Crossbar Capital.”
The Independent Monitor found that all three of Payoneer’s funding partners are venture capital firms that have offices in or strong connections to Israel.
Charlie Federman, Managing Partner of Crossbar Capital, previously co-founded BRM Capital in 1999, headed its New York office, and served as a Managing Director of the Israel and New York based fund until 2007. BRM Group, headquartered in Herzliya was founded by Nir Barkat, mayor of occupied Jerusalem.
Carmel Ventures is also headquartered Herzliya. Greylock Partners, founded in 1965, “operates in a number of global centers of innovation, including Boston, China (Beijing), India (Bangalore), Israel (Herzliya) and Silicon Valley. … Current Greylock portfolio companies include Data Robotics, Digg, Facebook, Imperva, LinkedIn, Palo Alto Networks, Pandora, Picarro, Redfin, Workday and ZipCar,” according to the firm’s website. Greylock’s investment activities in Israel were launched in 2002 by partner Moshe Mor, who “served six years in the Israeli Army as a Captain in the Military Intelligence branch.”
Tal almost certainly possess information that could be of value to U.S. law enforcement and counter-intelligence investigators, but whether their political masters, many of whom have been effectively co-opted by Israel, will allow U.S. investigators to pursue any sort of meaningful investigation is an open question. Thus far there has been little to indicate that U.S. officials are seriously interested in investigating the funding of travel expenses and hotel accommodations of suspected Israeli assassins through U.S. corporations, despite the reported entry of at least two of the suspects into the U.S. on fraudulent, falsified passports.
When the Independent Monitor contacted the Department of State (DoS) for comment about the news reports, a DoS press officer declined to comment and referred questions to the Department of Justice (DoJ) and the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) press offices. A DoJ press officer also declined to comment and referred questions to a DHS press officer who has not responded to an e-mail message sent on March 5.
The Sayanim Network
Any substantive U.S. investigation of the suspected Dubai killers’ connections to the USA would likely focus on members of the Mossad’s worldwide network of sayanim, diaspora Jews who provide a wide variety of services to the Israeli intelligence and special operations agency. In his books, By Way of Deception (1990) and The Other Side of Deception (1994), former Mossad field officer or katsa Victor Ostrovsky described the sayanim network.
“Sayanim─assistants─must be 100 percent Jewish,” wrote Ostrovsky in 1990.
The Mossad’s helpers, chosen because they are well placed, willing, and able to provide valuable assistance to Israeli agents, are businessmen, doctors, lawyers, judges, prosecutors, police officers, intelligence officers, politicians, government bureaucrats, university professors and administrators, media professionals, information technology specialists, any occupation, profession, or position in which a sayan might prove useful in support of Israeli espionage operations.
Though they do not live in Israel, their first loyalty is to Israel. They do whatever Mossad officials, field officers, or assassins ask of them in behalf of Israel against the enemies of Israel or those who are seen as opposed to Israeli policies.
“Often the loyalty of sayanim is abused by katsas who take advantage of the available help for their own personal use. There is no way for the sayan to check this,” wrote Ostrovsky.
“The one problem with the [sayanim] system is that the Mossad does not seem to care how devastating it could be to the status of the Jewish people in the diaspora if it was known. The answer you get if you ask is: ‘So what’s the worst that could happen to those Jews? They’d all come to Israel? Great,’” wrote Ostrovsky.
“A sayan will rent a car or pass money to a kidon with no questions asked,” said Gordon Thomas, author of Gideon’s Spies: The Secret History of the Mossad (1999) in a report by Alun Palmer of the Mirror (UK) on February 18. Thomas, who has estimated that there are at least 20,000 sayanim in the US and Great Britain, writes that all Mossad assassinations are authorized by the office of the prime minister of Israel.
The illegal use of U.S. banks and credit card companies to fund the movements and other expenses of a Mossad death squad in the Middle East indicates an alarming expansion of Israeli espionage operations on US soil and reveals to an unprecedented extent the foreign intelligence agency’s penetration of major U.S. financial institutions, developments that limn the breadth, depth, and success of the Mossad’s desperate efforts to expand and consolidate Israel’s malignant influence over the Washington foreign policy establishment and sway within a broad range of U.S. institutions, despite growing popular opposition to Israel’s the brutal and patently illegal occupation of Palestine and the punishing siege of Gaza.
The Myth, Cult, and Culture of Redemptive Violence
The supposed clash of civilizations, the conflict between the putatively modern Western Judeo-Christian tradition and radical Islam, the Bush administration’s Global War on Terrorism later rebranded by the Obama administration as Overseas Contingency Operations, and the suppurating wound that is Israel’s long-running illegal occupation and systematic ethnic cleansing of Palestine are evidence of a retrograde social and political dynamic that now threatens the continued progress and future of human civilization. That dynamic is epitomized by the myth, cult, and culture of redemptive violence.
“The myth of redemptive violence defends the belief that violence saves, that war brings peace. It is one of the oldest stories in the world. It misappropriates the language, symbols and scriptures of Christianity. Its God is the tribal God worshipped as an idol. Its offer is not forgiveness but victory. Its good news is not unconditional love of enemies but their elimination. Its salvation is not a new heart but a successful foreign policy. It is blasphemous. It is idolatrous. And it is immensely popular,” writes Dr. Walter Wink, Professor Emeritus of Biblical Interpretation at Auburn Theological Seminary in New York City.
Wink might have added that while Christian scripture is tainted by the myth of redemptive violence, the Hebrew Old Testament scriptures, attached at the spine of the Holy Bible to the New Testament, are Christianity’s primary source of the pernicious mythology of redemptive violence. Only about 10 percent of the New Testament is devoted to Jesus’ teachings about the brotherhood of man and the fatherhood of God, the kingdom of Heaven, the happiness of peacemakers, and forgiveness and mercy as moral and spiritual imperatives.
True religion opposes violence as a technique of social evolution, but many Christians have been and are today all too willing and ready to embrace Hebrew Old Testament teachings that glorify war and the wholesale slaughter of innocents and ascribe such acts to the commands of a wrathful God that is both vengeful and violent. The popularity of the myth of redemptive violence in the West and the attitudes and policies it engenders in political and economic spheres of activity severely undercuts the supposed moral superiority of Western modernity and culture in relation to other traditions and cultures.
U.S. leaders often attempt to justify their wars with self-serving declarations that they are fighting for peace.
“One day the Iraqi people will understand that we came in peace,” averred Secretary of State Colin Powell in March 2003 as U.S. troops advanced on Baghdad after a devastating and enormously destructive “Shock and Awe” air assault on the city.
If the status of a civilization can be accurately gauged by the fairness of its courts and the integrity of its judges, resort by national leaders to extra-judicial killings conducted by intelligence agency death squads is emblematic of the West’s glorification of war and ruinous reversion to militarism─autocratic, cruel, and savage. Rigidly ultranationalistic Israel, more an army and an espionage agency with a country than a country with an army and an espionage agency, clearly intends to be the West’s model and instructor in this regard.
A feature article by Associated Press reporter Matti Friedman published in the Washington Post on March 4 quoted Jonna Mendez, who worked for the CIA for 27 years and became the agency’s chief of disguise. Mendez “believes the Dubai perpetrators took the fallout into account, all of it: the TV footage, the blown aliases and the head shots. The agents, she said, clearly knew they were under surveillance─they had simply decided it was unavoidable and a price worth paying.
“‘You can be sure they knew they were being surveilled. Likewise, they would assume that the documents they were using would be made available after the fact,’ said Mendez. ‘What does this mean? It means it didn’t matter. The faces and the documents that were captured by the cameras will probably never be seen again.’
“The fact that the perpetrators had to take the identities of real people rather than simply invent false identities is a symptom of the new world facing modern-day spies, one of databases and traceable passport information, she said.
“The real agents likely don’t resemble the faces in the photos, she said … And if they do, plastic surgery, dental implants and hair grafts can ensure they are unrecognizable afterward.
“‘Steal the identity, disguise the participants, be ready on the other side with another set of identities and documents, and embrace and conceal the protagonists on their return,’ she said.
“‘With that goal in mind this may, in fact, be the operation of the future,’” wrote Friedman.
Thinking Americans have an increasingly clear choice.
They can join the cult of redemptive violence, kneel before a Zionist tribal God of vengeance, and watch their country and its culture revert to the law of nature as militarism runs amok and Israeli spies and assassins, protected by corrupt and co-opted political leaders, roam America at will.
Or they can embrace and actively support not the savagery of assassins but the rule of law. They can cultivate the wisdom, insight, and foresight that are indispensable to the endurance of nations. They can persevere in their efforts to elect honest, wise, and progressive leaders. And they can continue to strive to live up and into the noblest ideals of their religions.
Michael Gillespie, in addition to his regular freelance work for Washington Report on Middle East Affairs, is also a contributing editor and the Des Moines, IA correspondent for The Independent Monitor, the national newspaper of Arab Americans, published by Sami Mashney in Anaheim, CA.
Israel’s Lobby Imposes Crippling Sanctions on America — Again
By Grant Smith, March 12, 2010
The Israel lobby’s campaign against US and international corporations doing business with Iran is gearing up this week. The tip of the spear is the American Israel Public Affairs Committee sponsored expansion of the Iran Sanctions Act of 1996. If signed into law by president Obama, the legislation would institute onerous new monitoring to ensure exports never enter Iran, along with mandatory divestment from and penalties for any corporations discovered doing business in Iran. A new type of “office of special plans” at the Treasury Department that AIPAC and its think tank lobbied to create by executive order in 2004 is also on the warpath. Stuart Levey, the head of the office of “Terrorism and Financial Intelligence” is traveling to Switzerland, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Oman “pointing out that they face dramatic risks by doing business with Iran.” Israeli Deputy Foreign Minister Danny Ayalon finished a long set of meetings urging the US National Security Council to impose harsh sanctions on Iran.
The New York Times started the week with a list of corporations doing business in Iran and their US government procurement revenues. Most companies on this list long ago appeared on hit lists compiled by AIPAC for quiet divestment campaigns in state legislatures across the country. The New York Times ominously highlights in red any company that may be a “possible violator of the Iran Sanctions Act.” National Public Radio’s Scott Simon, after reading it, was apoplectic. He fretted aloud on the air whether US companies and subsidiaries on the target list were “betraying their country’s national security interests.”
What should Americans make of this drive to label all companies doing business with Iran unpatriotic smugglers? First, they should consider the source of the multi-tiered Iran sanctions drive. Then, they should start getting angry.
The proto Israel lobby was born in the cradle of a real arms theft and smuggling operation [pdf] that relentlessly preyed on the United States in the 1940s. Violating US arms export controls and bans on weapons transfers to the Middle East, this network certainly did “betray national security” — but managed to establish a small state in Palestine. The Director of US Central Intelligence judged that “U.S. national security is unfavorably affected by these developments and that it could be seriously jeopardized by continued illicit traffic in the implements of war.” That was an understatement, but none of the financiers of the arms smuggling network ever faced any consequences. When The Pledge, a tell-all book about the smuggling network, was published in 1970 the Department of Justice received public protests about the vast unpunished arms smuggling. The Internal Security Section duly wrote and internally circulated a 9-page book report about the people, dates, and crimes committed. The Chief of the Foreign Agents Registration Unit then responded to one protester that any arms smuggling prosecutions would be barred by the statute of limitations, though he did forward complaints to the FBI and State Department.
The Israel lobby further developed the ethos that “no crime for Israel would be punished in the US” when it allegedly stole and smuggled US weapons grade uranium from NUMEC, “an Israeli operation from the beginning” according to CIA Tel Aviv station chief John Hadden. A secret nuclear arsenal would allow Israel to initiate “The Samson Option” pulling down the entire world if it were ever threatened — a capability judged worth all the stealing and law breaking.
Isaiah L. Kenen, a propaganda officer for the Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs office in New York in 1948, made it his business to infiltrate Israeli government mandates into US political party platforms while dodging Department of Justice orders that he register and conduct his business openly as an Israeli foreign agent. Like AIPAC this week, Kenen even used the New York Times as a trumpet in his November 2, 1961 Near East Report to deny that Dimona was a nuclear weapons plant. Six weeks after the DOJ cracked down with its final Foreign Agent order on Kenen and company in 1963 after a massive (Israeli-funded) stealth propaganda and lobbying campaign that rivaled the one currently unfurling in the US, Kenen was forced to abandon his American Zionist Council front for the Israeli government, and incorporated AIPAC in Washington, DC. AIPAC went on to stage a full assault on US governance — from attacking the sanctity of our electoral process to trafficking in classified national security information — all to acquire unprecedented power on behalf of its foreign principals.
The most relevant example of AIPAC-Israeli government tag-team law-breaking went on display this week in the form of 49 declassified FBI files. In 1984 71 major US corporations and worker organizations said “no” to an earlier AIPAC economic power grab (a demand to lower all US import barriers to Israeli products while allowing Israel to continue blocking US exports). Israeli minister of economics Dan Halpern stole [pdf] a US government document containing proprietary information and business secrets supplied by US industries most opposed to the Israel Lobby’s economic power grab. Halpern passed it to AIPAC, which made great use of it to undermine the entire advice and consent process. Douglas Bloomfield, AIPAC’s top lobbyist, even made an illicit copy of the classified document after AIPAC was explicitly ordered to return it to the US government (rather than ever do time in jail, Bloomfield now fantasizes about militarily playing the United Arab Emirates off Iran).
The aftermath of this earlier economic crime against US industry has now become clear. By locking many US products of export quantity out of Israel, the trade agreement has delivered an $80 billion dollar cumulative deficit (adjusted for inflation) to the US since enacted. In contrast, last year all other (legitimate) bilateral agreements with such countries as Singapore and Morocco actually produced a $86.33 billion total trade surplus to the US. AIPAC’s trajectory clearly indicates it is a true believer of Julius Caesar’s dictum “If you must break the law, do it to seize power, in all other cases observe it.” But does such ill-gotten might make right?
Americans should be outraged that a foreign lobby like AIPAC is actually trying to write the rules — when warranted application of the law would have abolished it years ago. AIPAC and other nodes of Israel’s lobby successfully broke important US laws to seize power in America. They now expect US private enterprise and workers — the world’s best — to open their own little “offices of special plans” to carefully track company products, profits, and investments in the name of Israel. But this new tax ignores some mighty important facts.
Iran is a signatory to the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty and there’s no evidence that it is anywhere near producing nuclear weapons. Non-signatory Israel, with its vast secret arsenal of nuclear weapons — likely built with uranium stolen (but never paid for) from the United States — suddenly demands rule of law from America. Laws drafted by AIPAC. (And by the way, it’ll cost taxpayers at least $76 million to clean up the nuclear waste at NUMEC.)
Israel and its US lobby actually think Americans will go for all of this, that we’re a forgetful and obedient lot, who don’t care much about our laws, economy, or jobs — who are just aching to get into AIPAC’s newly fabricated economic straightjacket.
Better think again.
Sending a laptop to Gaza
Ahmed Moor writing from al-Arish, Egypt, Live from Palestine, 12 March 2010
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Underground tunnels along the border with Egypt have become the main way for besieged Palestinians in Gaza to receive the most basic goods. (Hatem Omar/MaanImages) |
I sat outdoors at a cafe on the Mediterranean Sea in al-Arish, a dusty seaside town in Egypt’s northern Sinai. I drank a tea and smoked a water pipe; it gave me something to do while I waited for Ismail — that’s not his real name — an Egyptian Bedouin tunnel smuggler who was going to deliver a package for me into Gaza.
It’s been nearly ten years since I’ve been to Palestine. I vividly remember the summer of 2000 when I left Palestine with my family. We passed through the Rafah crossing into Egypt. A long Mercedes taxi — they’re ubiquitous in Egypt and Palestine — carried us from Egyptian Rafah to al-Arish and finally to Cairo. From there, we boarded a flight to New York. Most of our extended family remained — they have nothing approaching our freedom of movement because we hold the American passport.
Much has changed since I’d been there last. The second Palestinian intifada flared, raged and then died. Hamas won a majority of seats in the 2006 parliamentary elections and was nearly overthrown by Fatah a year later. When the coup didn’t go as planned the people of Gaza were shut in.
Israel imposed its siege on Gaza in June 2007, after the Fatah coup attempt. The tunnel trade between Egypt and Gaza became the chief mode of transferring commodities into the tiny coastal territory. Flour, gasoline, soda, toys, electronics and yes, small arms are moved into Gaza through hundreds of subterranean tunnels.
I went back to Egypt several weeks ago. A friend in Cairo mentioned that he had a laptop and some CDs that were intended for a friend of his in Palestinian Rafah. He knew that I planned to go to al-Arish, and if I could make it past the checkpoints, to Egyptian Rafah, and asked if I could arrange to have the items smuggled to Gaza. I agreed; the siege is an expression of moral bankruptcy and responsible human beings are compelled to undermine the regime in every way. Furthermore, the Palestinians of Gaza have very few options when it comes to receiving basic goods.
A few days later, I caught a bus to al-Arish. I arrived at about 10pm and checked into my hotel. My friend in Cairo had given me Ismail’s number after speaking to him about me and when I’d be going. So, the next morning I called Ismail and we agreed to meet at a cafe in the afternoon.
Some time later, I made my way to the beach and sat at the seaside cafe when a man approached; it was Ismail. He smiled broadly as we shook hands and introduced ourselves. The deep-brown skin in the corner of his eyes crinkled. His dark hair was short and neat and combed to the side. He reminded me of my father. I ordered a second tea as he sat down on the chair beside me so that we both had a view of the sea’s expanse.
We started talking:
“You know I’m from Gaza,” I said, “Tal al-Sultan in Rafah.”
“Oh, I’ve been there. I have family in Jabaliya.”
We chatted for some minutes about the weather and al-Arish and families we knew in common. He’d been working in the tunnel trade since the siege began. It was a natural way to earn income for him — as a Bedouin, he moved more freely than others in the Sinai, and his relatives in Gaza provided a secure trust network.
Indeed, many Palestinians from Gaza have relatives in Egypt, and vice versa. My own paternal grandmother is a Sinai Bedouin. The extensive kinship networks and intermarriage thrived until Israel occupied the territory in 1967, when it became harder for people to cross the new borders.
Ismail explained how he would deliver the package, stating that “I’ll take it back to [Egyptian] Rafah in my car and hand it over to someone who will give it to a Palestinian from the tunnel. ‘B’ [the person for whom the package is intended] will call the guy and meet up with him. He’ll pay him on that end.”
My package would cost 50 cents to $1 a kilo, but bigger loads would have a cheaper rate. It would take a day or two to deliver at a total cost of roughly $10 — not too expensive by American standards but a considerable sum in Gaza.
Ismail explained that although the tunnels were owned by Palestinians and they did all of the work to construct them — typically at night — the traffic was usually only one way: Egyptian goods into Gaza.
He was deliberately vague about whether the Egyptian army knew the locations of the tunnels and received bribes to allow them to operate. “You have to be careful,” Ismail said, referring to offering bribes to the authorities, “sometimes you can do that but sometimes no. It depends but there isn’t any way to know.”
When I asked about the new wall being constructed underground between Egypt and Gaza with the assistance of the US Army Corps of Engineers, he was dismissive. Ismail explained that it had yet to affect trade and that “some guys have already cut through it.” He noted however that “it hasn’t reached the part of the border where most of the tunnels are. And people are coming up with ways to get around it.”
As our meeting drew to a close Ismail offered me a ride back to town all the while apologizing for not offering me a ride to Rafah. Security on the main road was tough he explained and he couldn’t afford to be subjected to too much scrutiny with a foreigner in the car. He also warned me, saying, “If you make it to Rafah, don’t tell anyone that you’re a journalist — don’t talk to anyone. It’s all mukhabarat [intelligence]. Just say you’re going home.”
I did make it to Rafah later that day. What I saw wasn’t so much a town as a military encampment. Heavy equipment, likely tied to the subterranean wall, was everywhere. Dusty day laborers swarmed the tea shops. Armored personnel carriers patrolled the streets while checkpoints closed off access towards Palestine and the Mediterranean.
It wasn’t long before some men approached me and started asking questions in a non-official, but probing and intrusive way. “Who are you? Where are you from? How did you get here?” Motioning to the military, they asked, “Did they clear you?” I answered the way Ismail told me and decided to leave pretty soon after that; my paranoia got the better of me.
My trip back to al-Arish was uneventful and it gave me an opportunity to reflect about the events of the day and how my home has become a concentration camp. The pressures on the Palestinians in Gaza are immense, but they have not succumbed to the pressure.
By the time I reached Cairo the next day, my friend had confirmed that the laptop was received by his friend in Gaza. Even with billions of dollars expended and complete military siege, Palestinians choose not to die and this story is evidence of that.
Born in the Rafah refugee camp in the Gaza Strip, Ahmed Moor graduated from university in Philadelphia, after which he spent three years working in finance in New York. He is currently based in Beirut, Lebanon.
Alan Dershowitz was right about Obama
Why I support Obama and Israel
By Alan Dershowitz | Huffington Post | October – 2008
I am a strong supporter of Israel (though sometimes critical of specific policies). I am also a strong supporter of Barack Obama (though I favored Hillary Clinton during the primaries). I am now getting dozens of emails asking me how as a supporter of Israel I can vote for Barack Obama. Let me explain.
I think that on the important issues relating to Israel, both Senator McCain and Senator Obama score very high. During the debates each candidate has gone out of his and her way to emphasize strong support for Israel as an American ally and a bastion of democracy in a dangerous neighborhood. They have also expressed support for Israel’s right to defend itself against the nuclear threat posed by Iran which has sworn to wipe Israel off the map [sic] and the need to prevent another Holocaust.
There may be some difference in nuance among the candidates, especially with regard to negotiations with Iran, but supporters of Israel should not base their voting decision on which party or which candidates support Israel more enthusiastically. In the United States, Israel is not a divisive issue, and voting for President is not a referendum on support for Israel, at least among the major parties.
I want to keep it that way. I want to make sure that support for Israel remains strong both among liberals and conservatives. It is clear that extremists on both sides of the political spectrum hate Israel, because they hate liberal democracies, because they tend to have a special place in their heart for tyrannical regimes, and because they often have strange views with regard to anything Jewish. The extreme left, as represented by Noam Chomsky, Ralph Nader, Cynthia McKinney, Norman Finkelstein and, most recently, Jimmy Carter has little good to say about the Jewish state. But nor does the extreme right, as represented by Pat Buchanan, Robert Novak, Joseph Sobran and David Duke. When it comes to Israel there is little difference between the extreme right and the extreme left. Nor is there much of a difference between the centrist political left and the centrist political right: both generally support Israel. Among Israel’s strongest supporters have always been Ted Kennedy, Harry Reed, Nancy Pelosi, Barney Frank, Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama. The same is true of the centrist political right, as represented by Mitt Romney, George W. Bush, Oren Hatch and John McCain.
Why then do I favor Obama over McCain? First, because I support him on policies unrelated to Israel, such as the Supreme Court, women’s rights, separation of church and state and the economy. But I also prefer Obama to McCain on the issue of Israel. How can I say that if I have just acknowledged that on the issues they both seem to support Israel to an equal degree? The reason is because I think it is better for Israel to have a liberal supporter in the White House than to have a conservative supporter in the oval office. Obama’s views on Israel will have greater impact on young people, on Europe, on the media and on others who tend to identify with the liberal perspective. Although I believe that centrists liberals in general tend to support Israel, I acknowledge that support from the left seems to be weakening as support from the right strengthens. The election of Barack Obama — a liberal supporter of Israel — will enhance Israel’s position among wavering liberals.
As I travel around university campuses both in the United States and abroad, I see radical academics trying to present Israel as the darling of the right and anathema to the left. As a liberal supporter of Israel, I try to combat that false image. Nothing could help more in this important effort to shore up liberal support for Israel than the election of a liberal president who strongly supports Israel and who is admired by liberals throughout the world. That is among the important reasons why I support Barack Obama for president.
Alan M. Dershowitz is a Professor of Law at Harvard. His most recent book The Case Against Israel’s Enemies: Exposing Jimmy Carter and Others Who Stand In The Way of Peace which has recently been published by Wiley.
AIPAC seeks ‘crippling’ sanctions against Iran
Middle East Online | March 10, 2010
WASHINGTON – Powerful pro-Israel US lobby group AIPAC, in a rare letter to every member of the US Congress, called Tuesday for “crippling new sanctions on Iran” over Tehran’s suspect nuclear program.
“Iran has pursued a nuclear weapons capability… the United States must take action now,” it said.
The American Israel Public Affairs Committee also pressed Congress to look into why companies that do business with Iran’s energy sector have never been punished under a 1996 US law aimed at discouraging such investments.
In the letter, signed by executive director Howard Kohr and president David Victor, AIPAC expressed “outrage” over a recent New York Times report charging that Washington gave billions of dollars to firms that do business in Iran.
They called on lawmakers to enact “without delay” legislation that would punish firms engaged in Tehran’s energy sector or that provide technology to Tehran by denying them US government contracts.
AIPAC urged the Congress to “demand” that President Barack Obama’s administration “enforce existing sanctions law and impose crippling new sanctions on Iran.”
“In addition to these actions, we hope you will join with us in urging the administration to impose tough new multilateral sanctions with like-minded states without delay while continuing to pursue the widest possible sanctions through the UN Security Council,” it said.
The letter came as US lawmakers stepped up calls for new sanctions on Iran ahead of November US mid-term elections.
But the US faces an uphill battle in its bid to forge consensus in the UN Security Council for new, tougher sanctions on Iran, diplomats say.
Israeli, US military leaders discuss using ‘force’
Israel’s UN Ambassador Gabriela Shalev said Tuesday that prospects were poor for adoption by the 15-member council of “crippling” punitive measures against Iran.
“The chances now seem grim regarding sanctions that will be crippling,” Shalev told reporters, in large part because veto-wielding council members Russia and China, appear reluctant to back a new round of tough sanctions proposed by Washington.
“The Chinese and the Russians still hope that diplomacy will work. They do not want to inflict any harm on the Iranian people,” she added.
Adoption of a resolution requires at least nine votes from the council and no veto from its five permanent members: Britain, China, France, Russia and the United States.
As with previous resolutions, they fully expect to tone down their sanctions to make them more palatable to China, Russia and other council members concerned about the impact tough penalties might have on the Iranian people.
Diplomats here say a new sanctions resolution was still being negotiated in capitals by the six powers — the five permanent council members plus Germany — engaged in the nuclear bargaining with Tehran.
Shalev said that if the council was unable to agree on strong sanctions, then Israel “will look to the countries themselves” to slap additional bilateral sanctions. She was referring to the United States and members of the European Union.
On Monday, Israeli Vice Prime Minister Silvan Shalom said that it was time for the Security Council to impose “crippling” sanctions on Iran..
Shalev said the world was edging closer to “two bad options”: Iran continuing to race towards nuclear capacity or Tehran being stopped only “by force.”
She said the second possibility was currently being discussed by senior US and Israeli political and military leaders, but declined to provide further details.
Diplomats said Brazil, Turkey and Lebanon, three non-permanent members of the Council, also have misgivings about new sanctions and may abstain in a vote.
Iran insists it has the right to develop nuclear technology, which it says is aimed at generating energy for its growing population which is already dependant on importing 40% of its gasoline needs.
Iran also cites the need to develop nuclear technology for medical purposes to treat its cancer patients.
Israel is the only country in the Middle East that actually has nuclear weapons.
Peres to Biden: Expel Iran from UN
“There is absolutely no space between the United States and Israel when it comes to Israel’s security — none at all” – Joe Biden
Al-Manar TV – 09/03/2010
US Vice President Joe Biden began his round of talks with senior Israeli officials on Tuesday at the Israeli President’s Residence in occupied Jerusalem.
Biden told Israeli President Shimon Peres that the Iranian regime is isolated more than ever before, both domestically and internationally, claiming that the Iranian people are imposing what he called “moral sanctions” against it.
The Israeli president said imposing moral sanctions on Iran, including its expulsion from the UN, were no less important than taking economic measures. According to Peres, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad cannot be a UN member and at the same time call for Israel’s annihilation and hang people in the streets.
Peres, who said Ahmadinejad was trying to delegitimize Israel and the US, said the West should surround Iran with anti-missile batteries.
The American vice president, who is the senior-most Obama administration official to visit the Zionist entity, said he hoped the Israel-Palestinian talks would help the sides overcome the mistrust between them, adding that he believed the points of agreement outnumber the disagreements.
Biden also signed Peres’ guest book. He wrote that the bond between the US and Israel is unshakable, adding that only a joint effort can lead to lasting peace.
The US vice president later met with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. Biden shook hands with the Israeli PM and signed his guest book as well. He wrote that Israel is lucky to have Netanyahu, and the US is lucky to have Israel as a friend. The two are slated to meet one-on-one with their entourages. After the meeting, they will issue a joint statement.
Later in the day Biden is scheduled to meet with Opposition leader Tzipi Livni. On Wednesday he is scheduled to meet with Mideast Quartet envoy Tony Blair, and then head to Ramallah for talks with Abbas and Palestinian Prime Minister Salam Fayyad. On Thursday the vice president will speak at Tel Aviv University.
Congressional Junket Front-Page News Unless It’s a Trip to Israel
Washington Report on Middle East Affairs
The ongoing controversy regarding Representative Charles Rangel (D, NY-15) and trips to the Caribbean in 2007 and 2008 has refreshed the discourse on privately funded congressional travel. Following the Jack Abramoff scandal of 2006 stricter limits were adopted by the House in order to expose and prevent corporate-sponsored junkets. The new ethics rules stipulated that members could not accept trip funding from non-profits that had received corporate donations, which would constitute lobbying.
Rep. Rangel was investigated for having violated these rules by attending conferences in St. Maarten sponsored by the Carib News Foundation. Major corporations, including Citigroup and Pfizer, however, appear to have earmarked donations to Carib News specifically for the trips. Rep. Rangel’s staff was apparently aware of the connection between the corporations and Carib News, whereas Rep. Rangel maintains that he was never informed of such a link. Therein lies the debate: Is Rep. Rangel to be held accountable for the improper conduct of his staff?
The case, moreover, exposes the inconsistencies of the ethics rules constraining congressional behavior. The rules intend to restrict the influence of lobbyists; however, they do nothing to constrain so-called “educational” organizations. Under the current rules, a non-profit like the American Israel Education Foundation (AIEF) is considered an independent entity from its parent group the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), which self-identifies as “America’s Pro-Israel Lobby.”
Under this arrangement we are to assume that AIPAC’s hard-line, rightist views of the Arab-Israeli conflict have not once influenced the “education” imparted on the 480 trips (at a cost of $4,024,845) sponsored by AIEF since Jan. 2000. Unfortunately, the link between AIEF’s “educational” efforts and AIPAC’s lobbying are as obvious as they appear. Members and staffers participating in the trips are bombarded by a one-sided distortion of reality. The perspectives generated by these “educational” sojourns rarely include moderate or left-leaning voices in Israel. When, if ever, was B’Tselem or Peace Now involved in the “education” process? Furthermore, the trips neglect the Palestinian perspective altogether.
A spade will always be a spade and a lobby will always be a lobby, whether or not it markets itself as an “educational” organization. Clearly, the ethics rules in place do not do enough to prevent the undue influence of lobbies on the legislative process.
For further information regarding trips sponsored by AIEF and similar groups please consult the following table:
Top Ten Members in Terms of Approved Trips Sponsored by Pro-Israel Groups Pro-Israel Groups Funded Travel*
1 Hoyer, Steny H (D, Maryland District 5 ) $142,426.02 17
2 Berkley, Shelley (D, Nevada District 1 ) $102,910.67 14
3 Blunt, Roy (R, Missouri District 7 ) $69,356.98 10
4 Kirk, Mark (R, Illinois District 10 ) $64,503.09 9
5 Green, Gene (D, Texas District 29 ) $50,527.94 4
6 Wexler, Robert (D, Florida District 19 ) $46,171.94 5
7 Pence, Mike (R, Indiana District 6 ) $45,288.05 5
8 Gohmert, Louis B Jr (R, Texas District 1 ) $44,753.60 3
9 Bachmann, Michele (R, Minnesota District 6 ) $44,381.14 3
10 Langevin, Jim (D, Rhode Island District 2 ) $43,302.15 7
Member Pro-Israel Groups Funded Travel*
* – Trips are those approved, which includes all trips from office both by members and by staffers…
Abercrombie, Neil (D, Hawaii District 1 ) $0.00 0
Ackerman, Gary (D, New York District 5 ) $13,504.03 7
Aderholt, Robert B (R, Alabama District 4 ) $0.00 0
Adler, John H (D, New Jersey District 3 ) $18,235.00 1
Akaka, Daniel K (D, Hawaii Senate) $4,610.00 1
Akin, Todd (R, Missouri District 2 ) $0.00 0
Alexander, Lamar (R, Tennessee Senate) $3,650.85 1
Alexander, Rodney (R, Louisiana District 5 ) $15,763.13 2
Altmire, Jason (D, Pennsylvania District 4 ) $13,656.90 1
Andrews, Robert E (D, New Jersey District 1 ) $0.00 0
Arcuri, Michael (D, New York District 24 ) $16,811.00 1
Austria, Steve C (R, Ohio District 7 ) $7,325.84 1
Baca, Joe (D, California District 43 ) $0.00 0
Bachmann, Michele (R, Minnesota District 6 ) $44,381.14 3
Bachus, Spencer (R, Alabama District 6 ) $2,588.40 1
Baird, Brian (D, Washington District 3 ) $2,694.94 1
Baldwin, Tammy (D, Wisconsin District 2 ) $23,918.83 2
Barrasso, John A (R, Wyoming Senate) $36,555.99 2
Barrett, Gresham (R, South Carolina District 3 ) $4,850.00 1
Barrow, John (D, Georgia District 12 ) $12,484.35 2
Bartlett, Roscoe G (R, Maryland District 6 ) $0.00 0
Barton, Joe (R, Texas District 6 ) $0.00 0
Baucus, Max (D, Montana Senate) $0.00 0
Bayh, Evan (D, Indiana Senate) $5,435.23 2
Bean, Melissa (D, Illinois District 8 ) $25,755.16 3
Becerra, Xavier (D, California District 31 ) $13,234.49 2
Begich, Mark (D, Alaska Senate) $0.00 0
Bennet, Michael F (D, Colorado Senate) $0.00 0
Bennett, Robert F (R, Utah Senate) $5,201.99 3
Berkley, Shelley (D, Nevada District 1 ) $102,910.67 14
Berman, Howard L (D, California District 28 ) $7,595.58 7
Berry, Marion (D, Arkansas District 1 ) $0.00 0
Biden, Joseph R Jr (D, Delaware Senate) $2,500.00 3
Biggert, Judy (R, Illinois District 13 ) $18,853.62 2
Bilbray, Brian P (R, California District 50 ) $0.00 0
Bilirakis, Gus (R, Florida District 9 ) $10,391.01 1
Bingaman, Jeff (D, New Mexico Senate) $0.00 0
Bishop, Rob (R, Utah District 1 ) $14,376.98 1
Bishop, Sanford D Jr (D, Georgia District 2 ) $7,639.28 2
Bishop, Timothy H (D, New York District 1 ) $5,669.82 1
Blackburn, Marsha (R, Tennessee District 7 ) $0.00 0
Blumenauer, Earl (D, Oregon District 3 ) $0.00 0
Blunt, Roy (R, Missouri District 7 ) $69,356.98 10
Boccieri, John A (D, Ohio District 16 ) $0.00 0
Boehner, John (R, Ohio District 8 ) $17,096.91 2
Bond, Christopher “Kit” (R, Missouri Senate) $13,043.19 2
Bonner, Jo (R, Alabama District 1 ) $17,297.85 2
Bono Mack, Mary (R, California District 45 ) $0.00 0
Boozman, John (R, Arkansas District 3 ) $13,746.69 2
Bordallo, Madeleine Z (D, Guam At Large) $6,599.15 1
Boren, Dan (D, Oklahoma District 2 ) $0.00 0
Boswell, Leonard L (D, Iowa District 3 ) $8,690.55 1
Boucher, Rick (D, Virginia District 9 ) $0.00 0
Boustany, Charles W Jr (R, Louisiana District 7 ) $5,258.27 1
Boxer, Barbara (D, California Senate) $5,422.96 2
Boyd, Allen (D, Florida District 2 ) $14,682.09 3
Brady, Kevin (R, Texas District 8 ) $0.00 0
Brady, Robert A (D, Pennsylvania District 1 ) $0.00 0
Braley, Bruce (D, Iowa District 1 ) $0.00 0
Bright, Bobby (D, Alabama District 2 ) $16,249.04 1
Broun, Paul Jr (R, Georgia District 10 ) $0.00 0
Brown, Corrine (D, Florida District 3 ) $2,823.98 1
Brown, Henry (R, South Carolina District 1 ) $0.00 0
Brown, Scott (R, Massachusetts Senate) $0.00 0
Brown, Sherrod (D, Ohio Senate) $0.00 0
Brown-Waite, Ginny (R, Florida District 5 ) $28,533.14 2
Brownback, Sam (R, Kansas Senate) $15,275.43 4
Buchanan, Vernon (R, Florida District 13 ) $21,329.00 1
Bunning, Jim (R, Kentucky Senate) $4,973.51 1
Burgess, Michael (R, Texas District 26 ) $0.00 0
Burr, Richard (R, North Carolina Senate) $0.00 0
Burris, Roland (D, Illinois Senate) $0.00 0
Burton, Dan (R, Indiana District 5 ) $3,161.50 1
Butterfield, G K (D, North Carolina District 1 ) $0.00 0
Buyer, Steve (R, Indiana District 4 ) $0.00 0
Byrd, Robert C (D, West Virginia Senate) $0.00 0
Calvert, Ken (R, California District 44 ) $0.00 0
Camp, Dave (R, Michigan District 4 ) $5,537.60 1
Campbell, John (R, California District 48 ) $0.00 0
Cantor, Eric (R, Virginia District 7 ) $129,054.90 17
Cantwell, Maria (D, Washington Senate) $7,493.74 2
Cao, Joseph (R, Louisiana District 2 ) $0.00 0
Capito, Shelley Moore (R, West Virginia District 2 ) $13,791.22 1
Capps, Lois (D, California District 23 ) $0.00 0
Capuano, Michael E (D, Massachusetts District 8 ) $9,271.80 2
Cardin, Ben (D, Maryland Senate) $0.00 0
Cardoza, Dennis (D, California District 18 ) $13,849.45 3
Carnahan, Russ (D, Missouri District 3 ) $21,278.41 2
Carney, Chris (D, Pennsylvania District 10 ) $5,258.27 1
Carper, Tom (D, Delaware Senate) $11,046.74 2
Carson, Andre (D, Indiana District 7 ) $0.00 0
Carter, John (R, Texas District 31 ) $20,859.13 2
Casey, Bob (D, Pennsylvania Senate) $5,816.00 1
Cassidy, Bill (R, Louisiana District 6 ) $0.00 0
Castle, Michael N (R, Delaware District 1 ) $0.00 0
Castor, Kathy (D, Florida District 11 ) $0.00 0
Chaffetz, Jason (R, Utah District 3 ) $15,813.47 1
Chambliss, Saxby (R, Georgia Senate) $6,999.91 2
Chandler, Ben (D, Kentucky District 6 ) $0.00 0
Childers, Travis W (D, Mississippi District 1 ) $15,449.04 1
Christian-Christensen, Donna (D, Virgin Islands At Large) $0.00 0
Chu, Judy (D, California District 32 ) $0.00 0
Clarke, Yvette D (D, New York District 11 ) $0.00 0
Clay, William L Jr (D, Missouri District 1 ) $2,694.94 1
Cleaver, Emanuel (D, Missouri District 5 ) $0.00 0
Clyburn, James E (D, South Carolina District 6 ) $25,065.52 4
Coble, Howard (R, North Carolina District 6 ) $0.00 0
Coburn, Tom (R, Oklahoma Senate) $0.00 0
Cochran, Thad (R, Mississippi Senate) $8,364.76 2
Coffman, Mike (R, Colorado District 6 ) $14,624.33
Cohen, Stephen Ira (D, Tennessee District 9 ) $10,444.86 1
Cole, Tom (R, Oklahoma District 4 ) $7,705.02 2
Collins, Susan M (R, Maine Senate) $8,387.92 3
Conaway, Mike (R, Texas District 11 ) $21,495.70 1
Connolly, Gerry (D, Virginia District 11 )
Conrad, Kent (D, North Dakota Senate) $0.00 0
Conyers, John Jr (D, Michigan District 14 ) $0.00 0
Cooper, Jim (D, Tennessee District 5 ) $0.00 0
Corker, Bob (R, Tennessee Senate) $0.00 0
Cornyn, John (R, Texas Senate) $11,922.83 4
Costa, Jim (D, California District 20 ) $14,623.94 2
Costello, Jerry F (D, Illinois District 12 ) $3,877.00 2
Courtney, Joe (D, Connecticut District 2 ) $0.00 0
Crapo, Mike (R, Idaho Senate) $8,690.62 1
Crenshaw, Ander (R, Florida District 4 ) $0.00 0
Crowley, Joseph (D, New York District 7 ) $37,670.20 10
Cuellar, Henry (D, Texas District 28 ) $0.00 0
Culberson, John (R, Texas District 7 ) $0.00 0
Cummings, Elijah E (D, Maryland District 7 ) $3,151.25 1
Dahlkemper, Kathleen (D, Pennsylvania District 3 ) $0.00 0
Davis, Artur (D, Alabama District 7 ) $12,499.46 10
Davis, Danny K (D, Illinois District 7 ) $14,838.20 3
Davis, Geoff (R, Kentucky District 4 ) $24,626.40 1
Davis, Lincoln (D, Tennessee District 4 ) $15,446.04 1
Davis, Susan A (D, California District 53 ) $14,039.70 2
Deal, Nathan (R, Georgia District 9 ) $0.00 0
DeFazio, Peter (D, Oregon District 4 ) $0.00 0
DeGette, Diana (D, Colorado District 1 ) $8,646.81 1
Delahunt, Bill (D, Massachusetts District 10 ) $2,587.90 1
DeLauro, Rosa L (D, Connecticut District 3 ) $3,292.00 1
DeMint, James W (R, South Carolina Senate) $18,324.36 2
Dent, Charlie (R, Pennsylvania District 15 ) $17,112.40 1
Diaz-Balart, Lincoln (R, Florida District 21 ) $0.00 0
Diaz-Balart, Mario (R, Florida District 25 ) $3,761.56 1
Dicks, Norm (D, Washington District 6 ) $2,131.06 1
Dingell, John D (D, Michigan District 15 ) $0.00 0
Dodd, Chris (D, Connecticut Senate) $2,323.04 2
Doggett, Lloyd (D, Texas District 25 ) $0.00 0
Donnelly, Joe (D, Indiana District 2 ) $0.00 0
Dorgan, Byron L (D, North Dakota Senate) $0.00 0
Doyle, Mike (D, Pennsylvania District 14 ) $2,131.00 1
Dreier, David (R, California District 26 ) $7,680.99 1
Driehaus, Steve (D, Ohio District 1 ) $9,401.02 1
Duncan, John J (Jimmy) Jr (R, Tennessee District 2 ) $0.00 0
Durbin, Dick (D, Illinois Senate) $5,459.45 3
Edwards, Chet (D, Texas District 17 ) $0.00 0
Edwards, Donna (D, Maryland District 4 ) $0.00 0
Ehlers, Vernon J (R, Michigan District 3 ) $0.00 0
Ellison, Keith (D, Minnesota District 5 ) $22,023.89 2
Ellsworth, Brad (D, Indiana District 8 ) $15,437.04 1
Emerson, Jo Ann (R, Missouri District 8 ) $0.00 0
Engel, Eliot L (D, New York District 17 ) $28,854.98 9
Ensign, John (R, Nevada Senate) $2,828.98 1
Enzi, Mike (R, Wyoming Senate) $0.00 0
Eshoo, Anna (D, California District 14 ) $0.00 0
Etheridge, Bob (D, North Carolina District 2 ) $0.00 0
Faleomavaega, Eni F H (D, American Samoa At Large) $32,598.15 2
Fallin, Mary (R, Oklahoma District 5 ) $23,937.93 2
Farr, Sam (D, California District 17 ) $6,340.72 1
Fattah, Chaka (D, Pennsylvania District 2 ) $4,973.84 1
Feingold, Russ (D, Wisconsin Senate) $0.00 0
Feinstein, Dianne (D, California Senate) $2,694.95 1
Filner, Bob (D, California District 51 ) $0.00 0
Flake, Jeff (R, Arizona District 6 ) $11,584.20 1
Fleming, John Calvin Jr (R, Louisiana District 4 ) $21,134.56 2
Forbes, J Randy (R, Virginia District 4 ) $11,780.00 1
Fortenberry, Jeffrey Lane (R, Nebraska District 1 ) $0.00 0
Foster, Bill (D, Illinois District 14 ) $18,955.50 1
Foxx, Virginia (R, North Carolina District 5 ) $18,291.52 2
Frank, Barney (D, Massachusetts District 4 ) $7,146.82 5
Franken, Al (D, Minnesota Senate)
Franks, Trent (R, Arizona District 2 ) $21,359.70 1
Frelinghuysen, Rodney (R, New Jersey District 11 ) $0.00 0
Fudge, Marcia L (D, Ohio District 11 ) $0.00 0
Gallegly, Elton (R, California District 24 ) $0.00 0
Garamendi, John (D, California District 10 )
Garrett, Scott (R, New Jersey District 5 ) $9,559.62 1
Gerlach, Jim (R, Pennsylvania District 6 ) $7,942.00 1
Giffords, Gabrielle (D, Arizona District 8 ) $15,049.12 2
Gillibrand, Kirsten (D, New York Senate)
Gingrey, Phil (R, Georgia District 11 ) $9,716.84 1
Gohmert, Louis B Jr (R, Texas District 1 ) $44,753.60 3
Gonzalez, Charlie A (D, Texas District 20 ) $3,570.29 1
Goodlatte, Bob (R, Virginia District 6 ) $14,589.49 1
Gordon, Bart (D, Tennessee District 6 ) $0.00 0
Graham, Lindsey (R, South Carolina Senate) $14,360.74 2
Granger, Kay (R, Texas District 12 ) $0.00 0
Grassley, Chuck (R, Iowa Senate) $4,352.28 1
Graves, Sam (R, Missouri District 6 ) $0.00 0
Grayson, Alan (D, Florida District 8 ) $0.00 0
Green, Al (D, Texas District 9 ) $5,452.47 1
Green, Gene (D, Texas District 29 ) $50,527.94 4
Gregg, Judd (R, New Hampshire Senate) $0.00 0
Griffith, Parker (D, Alabama District 5 ) $15,449.04 1
Grijalva, Raul M (D, Arizona District 7 ) $0.00 0
Guthrie, Steven Brett (R, Kentucky District 2 ) $0.00 0
Gutierrez, Luis V (D, Illinois District 4 ) $10,906.00 1
Hagan, Kay R (D, North Carolina Senate) $0.00 0
Hall, John (D, New York District 19 ) $3,200.00 1
Hall, Ralph M (R, Texas District 4 ) $0.00 0
Halvorson, Deborah (D, Illinois District 11 ) $24,850.27 2
Hare, Phil (D, Illinois District 17 ) $15,586.41 2
Harkin, Tom (D, Iowa Senate) $0.00 0
Harman, Jane (D, California District 36 ) $5,293.60 1
Harper, Gregg (R, Mississippi District 3 ) $22,230.53 2
Hastings, Alcee L (D, Florida District 23 ) $4,490.28 1
Hastings, Doc (R, Washington District 4 ) $24,753.40 2
Hatch, Orrin G (R, Utah Senate) $0.00 0
Heinrich, Martin (D, New Mexico District 1 ) $0.00 0
Heller, Dean (R, Nevada District 2 ) $0.00 0
Hensarling, Jeb (R, Texas District 5 ) $7,358.99 1
Herger, Wally (R, California District 2 ) $0.00 0
Herseth Sandlin, Stephanie (D, South Dakota District 1 ) $0.00 0
Higgins, Brian M (D, New York District 27 ) $7,607.37 2
Hill, Baron (D, Indiana District 9 ) $12,077.03 3
Himes, Jim (D, Connecticut District 4 ) $18,131.04 1
Hinchey, Maurice (D, New York District 22 ) $9,219.00 3
Hinojosa, Ruben (D, Texas District 15 ) $0.00 0
Hirono, Mazie K (D, Hawaii District 2 ) $12,258.26 1
Hodes, Paul W (D, New Hampshire District 2 ) $19,159.40 1
Hoekstra, Peter (R, Michigan District 2 ) $10,214.00 1
Holden, Tim (D, Pennsylvania District 17 ) $0.00 0
Holt, Rush (D, New Jersey District 12 ) $0.00 0
Honda, Mike (D, California District 15 ) $9,185.43 2
Hoyer, Steny H (D, Maryland District 5 ) $142,426.02 17
Hunter, Duncan D (R, California District 52 )
Hutchison, Kay Bailey (R, Texas Senate) $0.00 0
Inglis, Bob (R, South Carolina District 4 ) $0.00 0
Inhofe, James M (R, Oklahoma Senate) $0.00 0
Inouye, Daniel K (D, Hawaii Senate) $0.00 0
Inslee, Jay R (D, Washington District 1 ) $0.00 0
Isakson, Johnny (R, Georgia Senate) $20,156.06 2
Israel, Steve (D, New York District 2 ) $40,263.08 10
Issa, Darrell (R, California District 49 ) $4,217.20 1
Jackson Lee, Sheila (D, Texas District 18 )
Jackson, Jesse Jr (D, Illinois District 2 ) $24,218.37 4
Jenkins, Lynn (R, Kansas District 2 ) $0.00 0
Johanns, Michael O (R, Nebraska Senate) $0.00 0
Johnson, Eddie Bernice (D, Texas District 30 ) $0.00 0
Johnson, Hank (D, Georgia District 4 ) $5,452.47 1
Johnson, Sam (R, Texas District 3 ) $0.00 0
Johnson, Tim (D, South Dakota Senate) $6,840.00 2
Johnson, Timothy V (R, Illinois District 15 ) $8,241.29 2
Jones, Walter B Jr (R, North Carolina District 3 ) $0.00 0
Jordan, James D (R, Ohio District 4 ) $14,757.74 1
Kagen, Steve (D, Wisconsin District 8 ) $0.00 0
Kanjorski, Paul E (D, Pennsylvania District 11 ) $0.00 0
Kaptur, Marcy (D, Ohio District 9 ) $0.00 0
Kennedy, Patrick J (D, Rhode Island District 1 ) $5,452.47 1
Kerry, John (D, Massachusetts Senate) $0.00 0
Kildee, Dale E (D, Michigan District 5 ) $0.00 0
Kilpatrick, Carolyn Cheeks (D, Michigan District 13 ) $0.00 0
Kilroy, Mary Jo (D, Ohio District 15 )
Kind, Ron (D, Wisconsin District 3 ) $0.00 0
King, Pete (R, New York District 3 ) $11,156.84 2
King, Steven A (R, Iowa District 5 ) $14,140.69 2
Kingston, Jack (R, Georgia District 1 ) $20,347.00 1
Kirk, Mark (R, Illinois District 10 ) $64,503.09 9
Kirk, Paul (D, Massachusetts Senate) $0.00 0
Kirkpatrick, Ann (D, Arizona District 1 ) $18,919.44 1
Kissell, Larry (D, North Carolina District 8 ) $0.00 0
Klein, Ron (D, Florida District 22 ) $0.00 0
Kline, John (R, Minnesota District 2 ) $8,378.65 2
Klobuchar, Amy (D, Minnesota Senate)
Kohl, Herb (D, Wisconsin Senate) $0.00 0
Kosmas, Suzanne (D, Florida District 24 ) $10,075.72 1
Kratovil, Frank M Jr (D, Maryland District 1 ) $16,019.44 1
Kucinich, Dennis J (D, Ohio District 10 ) $0.00 0
Kyl, Jon (R, Arizona Senate) $15,866.15 7
Lamborn, Douglas L (R, Colorado District 5 ) $22,394.72 1
Lance, Leonard (R, New Jersey District 7 ) $18,375.74 1
Landrieu, Mary L (D, Louisiana Senate) $0.00 0
Langevin, Jim (D, Rhode Island District 2 ) $43,302.15 7
Larsen, Rick (D, Washington District 2 ) $6,598.55 1
Larson, John B (D, Connecticut District 1 ) $8,690.92 1
Latham, Tom (R, Iowa District 4 ) $0.00 0
LaTourette, Steven C (R, Ohio District 14 ) $0.00 0
Latta, Robert E (R, Ohio District 5 ) $19,003.74 1
Lautenberg, Frank R (D, New Jersey Senate) $11,919.83 3
Leahy, Patrick (D, Vermont Senate) $0.00 0
Lee, Barbara (D, California District 9 ) $5,968.63 2
Lee, Christopher J (R, New York District 26 ) $15,024.74 1
LeMieux, George S (R, Florida Senate)
Levin, Carl (D, Michigan Senate) $0.00 0
Levin, Sander (D, Michigan District 12 ) $0.00 0
Lewis, Jerry (R, California District 41 ) $0.00 0
Lewis, John (D, Georgia District 5 ) $3,287.00 1
Lieberman, Joe (I, Connecticut Senate) $32,443.97 9
Lincoln, Blanche (D, Arkansas Senate) $3,657.00 1
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$4,079,240.58
Israeli Official: West Has 4-8 Weeks Left for Iran Diplomacy
Deputy FM Advises China to Look for Energy Deals With Saudi Arabia
By Jason Ditz | March 08, 2010
Adding to the harsh rhetoric coming out of the nation in recent days, Israel’s Deputy Foreign Minister Danny Ayalon today announced that the nation was giving the West another 4-8 weeks to attempt diplomacy with Iran, and that after that they would have to impose crippling sanctions on the nation.
In his speech, Ayalon cautioned that Iran might try to inflate international oil prices to “sabotage” the sanctions against its petroleum industry, and urged China, a nation with economic interests in Iran, to seek alternative sources of energy in Saudi Arabia.
He urged international unity in the move against Iran’s civilian nuclear program, adding that “Iran is a big and vulnerable country… calling their bluff is the only way.” Israel has repeatedly threatened military strikes against Iran.
Israel’s threats against Iran are not new, but the growing number of US official visits in recent days are seen as being at least in part based on fear that an Israeli attack could be in the offing.
Though the US has been pressing for the “crippling sanctions” demanded by Israel for quite some time, Chinese officials have repeatedly reiterated their opposition to further sanctions. Russia has also said it will only accept very limited sanctions, and will oppose the “crippling” sanctions sought by Western nations.
Iran ‘Ready’ for Third-Party Enrichment With New Countries
By Jason Ditz | March 07, 2010
The prospects of finalizing the draft third party enrichment deal at this late hour, after Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s acceptance was met with feigned outrage by Western powers, and after Iran has backed off that acceptance to a stance calling for direct exchange, seems slim to none. This does not, however, mean the prospect of third party enrichment itself is dead.
Rather, according to Iran’s Foreign Ministry, they have taken the advice of the IAEA and are now looking for some new third parties with which to reach a comparable enrichment deal.
The initial deal stalled over Iranian concerns of the use of France as a partner in the deal, as France previously reneged on a nuclear deal with Iran and there was concern that, if Iran shipped a large portion of its uranium stockpile abroad, it would simply disappear into France, with nary a trace but some harsh rhetoric from the Sarkozy government.
Western officials have not commented yet on Iran’s latest tack, but they will likely take a dim view of some other nuclear power doing the enrichment after spending months trying to convince the world that the “draft” agreement they submitted to the IAEA was an all-or-nothing proposition, which could never be revised or even clarified publicly.
Japan is seen as a likely partner in such an effort, however. The Japanese government is keen to see the situation resolved amicably, as they stand to lose greatly from rising anti-Iran sanctions. Iranian Parliament speaker Ali Larijani visited Japan late last month, and reportedly came out of it with an early proposal for Japan to enrich uranium for Iran’s medical research reactor.
Liberal Richard Cohen Advocates Craziness in an Israel First War Policy
By Stephen Sniegoski
While we are explicitly told by anti-war commentators such as Juan Cole that the only type of American Jews pushing for war on Iran are right-wing ones, it is apparent that Jewish liberals such as Richard Cohen are also in the pro-war camp. (See: http://tinyurl.com/JuanColeonIsraelLobby )
Now Cohen, just like a number of rightist neocons, does not directly call for an attack on Iran, but rather advocates a policy that certainly would lead in that direction. Specifically, he says that it is time for Obama to start acting “crazy” toward Iran because of the alleged failure of diplomacy. (Iran and the Crazy Factor, Washington Post, February 23, 2010)
Such a recommendation of craziness is predicated on Cohen’s belief that Ahmadinejad and the Iranian leadership in general are crazy and that the only way to fight crazy people is by likewise acting crazy: “fight crazy with crazy.”
Cohen writes: “I have no idea whether Ahmadinejad merely acts crazy or is crazy. I do know, though, that Iran seems intent on getting nuclear weapons and the missiles to deliver them. I also know that nothing the United States and its allies have done has dissuaded Ahmadinejad (or the mullahs or the Revolutionary Guard Corps) from his goal. It may be time for Barack Obama, ever the soul of moderation, to borrow a tactic from Richard Nixon and fight crazy with crazy. The way things are going, it would be crazy not to.”
It is rather odd that Cohen would pick Nixon’s advocacy of madness as a model for emulation, since Nixon, and especially his bellicosity, were hardly admired by liberals such as Cohen during his presidency. Moreover, Cohen acknowledges that Nixon’s crazy strategy “while cunning, didn’t work on the North Vietnamese.” Desiring the adoption of a previously failed strategy is hard to fathom.
Furthermore, Nixon’s rationale for acting crazy would not seem to apply in the milieu depicted by Cohen. Nixon actually predicated his madman strategy on the rationality of his adversaries. The rational person, presumably, would make some concessions to the madman to avoid destruction. However, Cohen claims that the Iranians are irrational. There is no reason to think that acting crazy would cause them to turn rational, but rather that it would cause them to act out their craziness, which in the particular situation that exists in the Middle East today would mean an all-out war.
To try to put Cohen’s argument in a rational context, this must mean that he sees a war with Iran at the current time to be preferable to one in the future when Iran would have nuclear weapons and which would likely involve Israel.
The reasons Cohen gives for taking a “crazy” stance toward Iran have little to do with any threat Iran poses to the United States, but actually seem to revolve around Israel and Jews. Cohen cites Ahmadinejad’s “Holocaust denial” and his call for Zionism to be “wiped out.” Cohen acknowledges that these words might have nothing to do with the launching of war-” On the face of it, these statements could be nothing more than the ranting of a demagogue intent on appeasing the mob.” But then he points out that Israel, having experienced Hitler’s anti-Semitic words leading to the Holocaust, would naturally think otherwise. “Israel, of all countries,” he asserts, “has little faith in the rationality of mankind. It simply knows better. So the question of whether Ahmadinejad is playing the madman or really is a madman is not an academic exercise. It has a real and frightening immediacy that too often, in too many precincts, gets belittled as a form of paranoia.”
So it might be understandable for Israel to be terrified of a nuclear Iran, at least according to Cohen, but what about a threat to the United States?
“An Iranian bomb,” Cohen contends, “is not a matter that concerns only Israel. It would upend the balance of power throughout the Middle East and encourage radical/terrorist organizations such as Hezbollah and Hamas to ratchet up their war against Israel. Other Middle East nations, not content to rely on an American nuclear umbrella, would seek their own bombs. An unstable region would go nuclear.” It is telling that even in purportedly dealing with threats to countries other than Israel, Cohen almost immediately gets back to threats to Israel by writing that a nuclear Iran would “encourage radical/terrorist organizations such as Hezbollah and Hamas to ratchet up their war against Israel.” For Cohen, Israel’s safety is certainly on his mind, first and foremost.
But regarding the US, the dangers presumably consist of countries in the unstable Middle East obtaining nuclear weapons. These developments, while undesirable, are hardly dire threats to American national security. And we are only dealing with the chance of Iran developing actual nuclear weapons, though it is more likely that it will develop nuclear capability. And in the most extreme case with all major countries in the Middle East obtaining nuclear weapons, it is not even clear whether such a development would lead to a terrible war or whether it might actually enhance regional stability.
Certainly, the existence of nuclear weapons served to prevent a major war between the US and the Soviet Union during the Cold War. And the possession of nuclear weapons have not caused India and Pakistan to be more aggressive toward each other. Of course, the loss of its nuclear monopoly would weaken Israel’s position in the Middle East.
What Cohen does not even make an attempt to show is that in regard to American security the danger of not attacking Iran outweighs the terrible impact of a war in the Middle East, which would be a likely result from his recommendation that Obama act crazy. It would seem to be a general consensus that a war on Iran at the present time would have terrible consequences for the already-battered world economy, which would certainly affect the US. It should be pointed out that the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Admiral Michael Mullen, reflecting what has been the consensus view of the American military leadership, has expressed strong opposition to any military strike on Iran and desires the continuation of peaceful diplomacy.
In sum, it would appear that the liberal Richard Cohen does not differ substantially from his co-religionists on the Right in his militant position toward Iran. And there is nothing particularly new about this. Cohen had supported the war on Iraq and only later recanted, after the war had become unpopular, but included Israel in his explanation for his earlier pro-war position: “Saddam Hussein was a beast who had twice invaded his neighbors, had killed his own people with abandon and posed a threat – and not just a theoretical one – to Israel.” (“The Lingo Of Vietnam,” Washington Post, November 21, 2006, p. A-27) It would seem therefore that the safety of Israel always looms very large in the minds of even liberal Jews.
West Softens Stance on Iran Nuclear Sanctions
Al-Manar – 06/03/2010
A Western proposal for fresh UN sanctions on Iran includes a call for restricting new Iranian banks abroad and urges “vigilance” against the Islamic Republic’s central bank, diplomats told Reuters on Friday.
Speaking on condition of anonymity, Western diplomats familiar with negotiations on the draft proposal – which Washington worked on with Britain, France and Germany – said they were no longer pushing for an official UN blacklisting of the central bank. The draft also calls for restrictions on new Iranian banks abroad.
“We will be looking for a tightening of restrictions of new Iranian bank activity overseas,” Reuters quoted one diplomat as saying.
The UN Security Council has imposed three rounds of sanctions on Iran. Tehran rejects Western charges that its nuclear program is aimed at developing bombs and says it will only be used to generate electricity.
Another diplomat said urging vigilance about Iran’s central bank in the U.S.-drafted proposal should be more acceptable to Russia and China than blacklisting it, which would have made it difficult for anyone to invest in Iran.
“The idea is to call for strengthened vigilance regarding transactions linked to the Iranian central bank, which the European Union and United States and others can then use as the basis for implementing their own tougher restrictions on (such) transactions,” a second diplomat said.
Only one Iranian bank — Bank Sepah — is blacklisted under an array of UN sanctions spelled out in three resolutions adopted by the Security Council in 2006, 2007 and 2008.
The council has issued warnings about two others — Bank Melli and Bank Saderat — but has not blacklisted them.
The new draft also targets Iranian shipping firms and the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps and firms linked to it. The measures would restrict insurance and reinsurance coverage of cargo shipments in and out of Iran, diplomats said.
The diplomats said Russia’s initial reaction was negative. “Russia says the draft does not correspond to their idea of what the sanctions should be and they reject many of the measures in the latest draft,” a diplomat said.
China has not reacted and has so far refused to engage in “substantive negotiations” on a fourth round of UN sanctions against Tehran. The four Western powers hope to organize a conference call with officials from all six countries to discuss the draft but have been unable to do so due to China’s refusal.
Russia and China, like the United States, Britain and France, have veto powers on the UN Security Council. Western diplomats hope to present a formal draft resolution to the full 15-nation Security Council in the coming weeks so it can be adopted sometime next month at the latest.
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Sanctions, War and the Policy of Dual Containment
By SASAN FAYAZMANESH | March 17, 2008
It is now nearly three decades since the Unites States adopted the policy of dual containment of Iran and Iraq. While much has been written about the containment of Iraq, there has been very little in-depth analysis of this policy when it comes to Iran. In a book that is going to be released on March 31, 2008, entitled The United States and Iran: Sanctions, Wars and the Policy of Dual Containment (Routledge), I attempt to address this shortcoming by investigating when and why the US policy of containment of Iran came about, how it evolved, and where it stands today.[1] To the extent that Israel has been involved in US policy making, the study will also include the role that Israel has played in the containment of Iran. Also, since the fate of Iran has been inextricably linked to that of Iraq, occasionally the investigation will overlap with the containment of Iraq.
The policy of dual containment of Iran and Iraq originated during the Carter Administration, but it was not until the Clinton Administration that the expression “dual containment” became popular. … continue
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- Massacre at Minab: The School That Became a Grave
- Israeli media: The IDF Shows It Doesn’t Turn a Blind Eye; It Actively Emboldens Settler Havoc
- No Tricks Zone
- Green Energy Debacle: German Expert Professor Fritz Vahrenholt Warns Of Severe Economic And Social Consequences
- Two More Paleo Reconstructions Affirm Meters-Higher Sea Levels Across Ireland, Brazil 7000-6000 Years Ago
- New Study: Earth And Venus Surface Warmth Largely Explained By Convection And Lapse Rate, Not CO2 Or Radiation
- 2025 Nature Paper Claiming Worsening Global Drought Gets RETRACTED …Heavily Flawed
- New Study: ‘Global Drought Shows No Detectable Recent Acceleration Under Climate Warming’
- Economic Masterminds: German Socialists Suggest Taxing Productivity Gains Stemming From Using AI
- The South China Sea Has Not Been Cooperating With The Climate Change Narrative
- Energy Crisis: Germany Enters Heating Season With Historically Low Gas Reserve Fill Levels
- New Study: The Antarctic Ice Sheet Gained Mass From 2020-2024 Due To Staggering Snow And Ice Accumulation
- Study: Ocean Heating Rates From Thousands Of Years Ago ‘Dwarf’ Modern Ocean Heating Rates
