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Biden Invokes Mystery Evil to Cover Up U.S. Criminal Responsibility

By Finian Cunningham | Strategic Culture Foundation | October 12, 2023

In a nationwide televised address, U.S. President Joe Biden did his best to sound righteous and angered by the eruption of violence in the Middle East.

“There are moments in this life − I mean this literally − when pure unadulterated evil is unleashed on this world,” Biden intoned with phony gravitas. “The people of Israel lived through one such moment this weekend.”

This American duplicity is nauseating. Slurring his words, Biden has no idea what he is talking about or how culpable he and his nation are in the violence.

Then we have White House spokesman John Kirby breaking down and crying on live TV, overcome with emotion about Israeli deaths. Meanwhile, this same person advocates pumping arms into Ukraine, killing hundreds of thousands of people, without a tear shed for those deaths.

This American disconnect is equally nauseating.

Biden promised the immediate supply of advanced weapons to Israel to defend itself against Hamas, the Palestinian militant group, even while hundreds of Palestinian civilians are being slaughtered in revenge by the Israeli military in Gaza.

A U.S. aircraft carrier, missile destroyers and squadrons of fighter jets are also being deployed to the region, in the words of Washington, “deter” any wider violence.

How sickening is this knee-jerk recourse to more militarism and inevitably more violence?

Biden’s invocation of a mysterious “pure evil” to account for the surge in deadly violence may sound righteous and indignant, but the truth is the appalling destruction of life and ongoing war is the result of something more mundane and deliberate – the failure of criminal U.S. policy.

As a long-time Senator, as well as two-time U.S. Vice President and for the past three years incumbent President, Joe Biden must take a sizable share of the blame for this systematic failure and the concomitant bloodshed.

First of all, there is the abject failure of the so-called Israeli-Palestinian peace process. Decades of neglect and indifference from Washington towards the rights of Palestinians for statehood have created a dead-end that has exploded in violence. Furthermore, successive American administrations have relentlessly and unconscionably green-lighted the illegal occupation of Palestinian lands and despicable oppression. Biden has been a particularly slavish booster for Israel’s apartheid regime, saying previously on several occasions in his smart-ass cloying way that if “Israel didn’t exist then the United States would have to have invented it”.

Washington’s cynical pretence of being a neutral peace broker between Israel and Palestinians has served to prolong the historic injustice that makes violence a recurring cycle. Western media have highlighted the deaths of over 1,000 Israelis during the past week while many more Palestinian victims over the years hardly register any coverage. That hypocritical double standard is fomented by U.S. policy.

The chronic diseased state of the Middle East, with its toxic tensions and seething conflicts largely stems from the deliberate failure of U.S. policy.

Added to this are the countless illegal wars and proxy interventions sponsored by Washington, including the covert manipulation of terror groups like Islamic State (ISIS, Daesh) for regime-change objectives.

The rampant militarism and arms dealing that underpin U.S. foreign policy and its hegemonic ambitions are further fuel for the maelstrom of violence.

The devastating attacks launched by Hamas against Israel have apparently been enabled by the acquisition of American weaponry from stockpiles abandoned in Afghanistan.

Two decades of illegal occupation in Afghanistan were brought to a chaotic end by President Biden in 2021 when he hurriedly pulled U.S. troops out, finally realizing that the endless war was a lost cause.

America’s imperialist warmongering all over the planet leaves a trail of weapons and black market vice.

Ukraine is the latest U.S. killing field along with NATO allies who have pumped that country with up to $100 billion worth of weapons in a proxy war against Russia (cynically under the pretext of “defending democracy and Europe”). The hopelessly corrupt NeoNazi regime in Kiev has siphoned off up to 70 per cent of weapons for lucrative black market business.

Russia and other observers have repeatedly warned with evidence that the American and NATO arsenals supplied to Ukraine were making their way to other continents and conflict zones.

It appears that as well as obtaining American weaponry from Afghanistan, the Hamas militants also stocked up with NATO arms sourced from Ukraine.

Yet the Ukrainian comedian President Vladimir Zelensky who is implicated in the massive Kiev corruption has the brass neck to accuse Russian leader Vladimir Putin of triggering the violence towards Israel.

The wicked absurdity of it all is that American weapons plied to supposed allies and proxies are being deployed to kill civilians in Washington’s top foreign ally Israel.

Among the victims of the latest violence are dozens of U.S. citizens, as acknowledged by Biden in his nationwide address this week. The U.S. president also admitted that several American citizens remain unaccounted for in Israel, some of them feared to have been taken hostage. Washington’s support for Israeli revenge is putting its own citizens at risk of being killed.

It is no wonder that Biden and other U.S. politicians and their news media would prefer to invoke mysterious “pure evil” when they talk about the horrific suffering in the Middle East.

Such meaningless, vacuous talk serves to obscure and mystify what is the reprehensible truth.

Washington’s criminal warmongering, reckless militarism and double-dealing foreign policy are the fountainhead for violence and the enemy of peace in the Middle East and beyond.

Sending more aircraft carriers, warplanes, troops and munitions is the wretched response of a failed policy begetting more violence, death and ultimately more failure.

Biden is a warmonger. Trump is no less a warmonger as was evident from his shameless support for Israeli state violence and oppression of Palestinians while he was in the White House. So-called “independent” presidential candidate Robert F Kennedy Jr. has also declared his fulsome support for Israel in recent days.

America’s problem is way beyond individual politicians. It is rooted in its systematic criminal policy that sows and breeds violence across the world.

October 12, 2023 Posted by | Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Militarism, Progressive Hypocrite, Timeless or most popular | , , , | Leave a comment

Unfounded US accusations against Iran could escalate war in the Middle East

By Drago Bosnic | October 11, 2023

As we all know, Iran and Israel are no friends, to say the least. Both countries are regional superpowers and their relationship is what will define the future of the Middle East and possibly beyond. There are numerous proxies that both sides are using against each other and this is evident all across the troubled region. However, while some global powers are trying to ensure lasting peace between them, others keep pushing Iran and Israel into a direct confrontation. Namely, when Hamas launched its offensive against the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF), some sources were quick to blame Iran, claiming that it was directly behind the attacks. For instance, the BBC was the first to claim that Tehran was the main culprit, only to then edit the story and remove crucial parts of the accusation. Before this happened, the Wall Street Journal quoted the initial BBC report and then the unfounded claims kept spreading in the mainstream propaganda machine.

However, this doesn’t stop there, as the BBC then requoted the WSJ as a source, effectively quoting itself. Endless self-quoting is a common practice in the mainstream propaganda machine. One outlet usually publishes an unfounded claim that then gets republished by others until the targeted narrative becomes an axiom of sorts. The political West often uses these fabricated claims for geopolitical purposes, such as imposing sanctions, freezing financial assets and even launching wars of aggression around the world. And while it’s likely true that Iran has been supporting various groups that are hostile to Israel (and vice versa), there’s no evidence that it ordered Hamas to attack. Even high-ranking Israeli officials and IDF officers stated the same. And yet, the claims are still there and many in the US Congress are happy to use them as an excuse to refocus Washington DC’s attention from Russia and the Kiev regime to Iran and Israel.

Namely, members of the US Congress have been investing in war stocks. If we take into account that American policymakers are pouring their wealth into the Military Industrial Complex (MIC), what else can we expect but war? All this is being done in a very calculated manner. They tried against Russia, but realized that Moscow is just too tough of an opponent capable of taking on not just the United States, but the entire political West and winning. What’s more, according to high-ranking American generals, Russian strategic capabilities have not only been untouched, but have actually been expanded, meaning that Moscow can easily obliterate the United States and NATO at a moment’s notice. This is why Washington DC decided to choose what it sees as a more manageable target – Iran. With Russia busy in Ukraine and China concerned with Taiwan, Tehran is seemingly alone and unable to muster any support from other global powers.

However, Iran is anything but powerless. It possesses one of the world’s largest stockpiles of ballistic missiles, most of which are targeted at Israel. And while the latter has a sizable nuclear arsenal that includes at least 80-90 warheads (although some sources claim that the number is much higher and close to around 400), Iranian ballistic missiles could devastate Israeli cities, even without the use of various chemical or “dirty bomb” warheads. Israel itself has the nuclear-capable “Jericho” series of missiles, with “Jericho II” being a medium-range ballistic missile (MRBM), while “Jericho III” effectively serves as an intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM). As basic physics suggests, the missile’s range is inversely proportional to the mass of the warhead, but even with the increase in the weight of the payload (1000 kg or more), the range of “Jericho III” drops to 5000 km, which is still more than enough to target any part of Iran.

The Israeli missile’s payload could be a single 450 kt (kiloton) nuclear warhead (weighing approximately 750 kg) or up to three lower-yield MIRV (multiple independently targetable reentry vehicle) warheads. Both options are a dreadful prospect for Iran, as these weapons could kill millions, if not tens of millions. However, as previously mentioned, Tehran is not without ways to retaliate, as its massive stockpile of MRBMs is more than enough to kill millions in Israel either way. The reason why Iran doesn’t really need nuclear weapons for such a scenario is Israel’s small territory. This is further exacerbated by the fact that most Israelis live in coastal areas, further reducing the already small territory Iran would need to target. Thus, anyone remotely sensible would want to do anything to prevent an escalation of the conflict that could potentially kill tens of millions of Israeli and Iranian civilians. However, there’s sensible and then there’s the US.

Unfortunately, we can’t have both. Washington DC warhawks are determined to push America into yet another war and the Middle East nearly always seems to be their unrelenting obsession. As per usual, uber-hawk senator Lindsey Graham, infamous for his threats to Russia and President Vladimir Putin himself, was the first in line to call for war. He didn’t even try sugarcoating anything and immediately called for the US to target Iranian oil refineries and related infrastructure, all in order to “destroy the lifeblood of the Iranian economy”. He also stated that “it is long past time for the Iranian terrorist state to pay a price for all the upheaval and destruction being sown throughout the region and world”. If we didn’t know the context, we’d probably think he’s talking about the US. Others, such as the former US ambassador to the UN Nikki Haley, also called for an escalation. In the meantime, “evil dictatorships” such as Russia and China keep calling for peace.

Drago Bosnic is an independent geopolitical and military analyst.

October 11, 2023 Posted by | Fake News, Mainstream Media, Warmongering, Militarism | , , , , , | Leave a comment

The Caucasus and West Asia are joined at the hips

BY M. K. BHADRAKUMAR | INDIAN PUNCHLINE | OCTOBER 10, 2023

Frozen conflicts can only be understood through history. That is why the ‘erasure’ of Nagorno-Karabakh from the map by Azerbaijan is an incredibly tumultuous development for Transcaucasia and its surrounding regions. 

The backdrop is the breakup of the Soviet Union, which left us with a rather odd map. Consequently, conflicts in Georgia, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Moldova, Ukraine and others left us with de facto boundaries that are unrecognised in law. There is an imperative need for a peace treaty that reflects the new facts on the ground. 

At issue is the status of Nakhchivan, which still remains the landlocked exclave of Azerbaijan located near the Turkish border. Azerbaijan, emboldened by its annexation of Nagorno-Karabakh last month, is on the lookout for a direct land link to Nakhchivan, which Baku regards as unfinished business.  

To attain this audacious objective, Azerbaijan — once again, with Turkey’s support — hopes to seize control of a hefty slice of Armenia’s territory, which is also that country’s borderland with Iran to the south. Unsurprisingly, both Yerevan and Tehran oppose any such move, which would otherwise mean that Armenia and Iran cease to be neighbours and get encircled by the Azeri-Turkish strategic axis. 

Through dialogue and negotiations a mutually acceptable formula must be found for any land link — known as “Zangezur Corridor” — guaranteed under international law, which preserves Armenia’s territorial integrity and its border with Iran, even while providing Baku with free access to Nakhchivan. 

What complicates matters is the geopolitics,  involving the 3 immediate stakeholders — Armenia, Azerbaijan and Iran — and two other regional states — Russia, Turkey — as well as certain intrusive extra-regional powers and entities — the United States, European Union and NATO. 

While Russia and Iran are also stakeholders, the same cannot be said for the extra-regional powers and entities who are meddling in a highly competitive regional environment. The “butterfly effect” of the Zangezur Corridor will be profoundly consequential to the Black Sea and Caspian regions and could impact the Middle East and Central Asia as well. 

Among the regional states, Iran stands out for its anti-revisionist approach. During separate meetings last Wednesday in Tehran with visiting Armenian and Azerbaijani officials, Iranian President Ebrahim Raeisi reiterated amid persisting tensions over the Karabakh region Iran’s opposition to the opening of the Zangezur Corridor, saying Tehran is against geopolitical changes in the region. 

Raesi reportedly stated that the Zangezur corridor would be “a NATO foothold, a national security threat for countries, and is thus resolutely opposed by Iran,” as his political chief of staff Mohammad Jamshidi put it. Tehran cannot but factor in that Israel has a strong intelligence presence in Azerbaijan.  

Speculation is rife that Azerbaijan might use force to open the Zangezur Corridor, Iran’s opposition notwithstanding. Turkey, the region’s number one revisionist power is a mentor and ally of Azerbaijan with whom it claims ethnic affinities. Turkey harbours grand visions of expanding its economic reach and political influence through a land route that extends from its European border in Eastern Thrace to the Caspian Sea and over to its ancestral lands of Central Asia that border China. 

Suffice to say, the Zangezur Corridor will make Turkey a strategic hub in the geopolitics of the region if the Silk Road to Europe passes through its territory and the Soviet era land route to Russia reopens. Russia has separately promised to make Turkey an energy hub for export of its gas as well.  

Much to Iran’s discomfiture, Turkey is exploiting Moscow’s dependence on Ankara in the conditions under western sanctions and the Ukraine conflict — Turkey controls the straits leading to the Black Sea from the Mediterranean— to muscle its way into the Caucasus and the Caspian, which has been traditionally Russia’s sphere of influence. 

Meanwhile, Russia’s influence in the Caucasus suffered a setback as Armenia’s gradual drift toward Western benefactors following the colour revolution and regime change in Yerevan in 2018 has dramatically accelerated lately and taken an overt form. The Western powers are encouraging Armenia’s current leadership to leave the CSTO and seek the closure of the Russian bases on its soil where 5000 troops are garrisoned. 

However, Armenia cannot do without Russia’s help. And Russia has strategic reserves to play itself back into the centre stage of the Caucasian chessboard. Of course, an optimal Russian comeback in the Caucasus will have to wait for its victory over the US and NATO in Ukraine, possibly by next year. Thus, Moscow seems confident that its pre-eminence in the Caucasus is a given.

Russia’s trump card, ultimately, is that much as the US and/or EU may try to get a toehold in the Caucasus, they are faraway powers and pretty much exhausted today with economic anxieties and growing war fatigue in Ukraine, amidst signs of disunity within the EU itself. 

Indeed, a summit gathering close to 50 European leaders, dozens of aides and legions of journalists in Grenada, Spain, on October 5, which was billed as an opportunity to broker peace between Armenia and Azerbaijan, ended as a damp squib when Azerbaijan’s Ilham Aliyev and Turkey’s Tayyip Erdogan decided to skip the gathering and Azerbaijan accused France of bias in negotiations. 

The bottom line is that in the power dynamic in the Caucasus, Iran is Russia’s natural ally and the two regional powers can be a factor of regional security and stability. This is important, since all sorts of dangers are lurking in the shade in the geopolitics of the Black Sea and Eastern mediterranean and Central Asia, and the darkening horizon presages storms ahead. 

To flag a few ominous signs, the US has seized Israel’s escalating confrontation with Hamas and Hezbollah to resort to a major show of force in the Eastern Mediterranean — as if it is preordained. Such force projection cannot be an end in itself. Can it be coincidental that US-trained jihadi groups are also stirring up the Syrian pot lately? 

Again, last week, a series of Ukrainian attacks in the Black Sea with Western-supplied cruise missiles forced Russian vessels to relocate from their main base in Sevastopol to the port of Novorossiisk 300 km to the east. British Defence Minister James Heappey promptly called it the “functional defeat of the Black Sea Fleet.” 

Moscow is now reportedly planning to build a permanent naval base on the Black Sea coast in the breakaway Georgian region of Abkhazia.

Only a week ago, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov warned that Moscow is alarmed by “the attempts of extra-regional players to become more active in the Afghan direction.” 

Make no mistake, the US has not reconciled to the ascendance of Russian and Chinese influence in the Middle East or  the Iran-Saudi rapprochement that led to an overall easing of tensions, especially Syria’s normalisation with its Arab neighbours, all of which which has drained America’s regional influence and weakened Israel.

Equally, with the spectre of a humiliating defeat in Ukraine haunting the Biden Administration, the temptation must be there to assert American hegemony. A confrontation with Iran is just what may suit Washington as ramp to cover its retreat from Ukraine’s battlefields.  

Fundamentally, the US strategy is to get Russia bogged down on multiple fronts and prevent it from advancing Syria’s stabilisation optimally or consolidate its alliances with North African states — Egypt, Libya and Algeria — and expand its presence in the Sahel region which effectively thwarts NATO’s expansion plans in Africa.

Similarly, Iran’s surge as regional power has been to the detriment of Israel’s regional supremacy. Success of the US-Israeli strategy depends on piling pressure on Iran and Hezbollah, who were game changers in the Syrian conflict, and eroding the Russian-Iranian axis in West Asia, the Caucasus and the Caspian.

Armenia’s defection from the Russian orbit and the conflict situation currently developing in Gaza (and Lebanon) provide a window of opportunity to challenge Russia and Iran in the Levant. A vast armada of US warships is approaching the Eastern Mediterranean to intimidate Iran.

Meanwhile, the US hopes to undermine Saudi Arabia’s normalisation process with Iran and create contradictions within BRICS and OPEC Plus. 

In sum, like in the famous play by the German modernist playwright Bertolt Brecht, The Caucasian Chalk Circle, we are currently witnessing a play within a play in the great game in Transcaucasia — an extraordinary blend of high theatricality, folk storytelling, music and even dialectical inquiry. 

October 11, 2023 Posted by | Militarism | , , , , , , | Leave a comment

US Support for Israel May Set Off Total Middle East Upheaval – Former US Envoy

Sputnik – 10.10.2023

WASHINGTON – The United States will support Israel in all actions it takes against Hamas in Gaza after the killing of over 1,000 Israelis in Saturday’s incursion, but this will set off an anti-US wave across the Middle East and the wider Muslim world, former US Ambassador to Saudi Arabia Chas Freeman told Sputnik.

Israel formally declared a state of war on Sunday, a day after Hamas invaded Israeli territory and committed the greatest slaughter of civilians in the 75 year history of the Jewish state. On Monday, Israel put the Gaza Strip under full blockade, with no food, gas or electricity supplies. Both Israel and Palestine have so far reported hundreds of dead and thousands of injured as a result of the escalation.

“The United States will support Israel reflexively but this will set off a much wider anti-US reaction across the Middle East and the wider Muslim world,” Freeman, who also served as assistant secretary of defense for international security affairs in the Clinton administration, said in an interview.

The crisis is unlikely to be confined to Israel and Gaza and will metastasize to other neighboring countries, Freeman warned.

“The geopolitical dangers could very well rapidly spread to Lebanon and Syria,” he said.

The Israeli-US “pipedream” fostered by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu that relations with Saudi Arabia are going to normalize is now also “gone” for the foreseeable future, Freeman believes.

The Biden administration itself appears to have been caught off guard by the ferocious suddenness and success of Hamas’ invasion, Freeman suggested.

“National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan last week made the truly idiotic claim that the Middle East region had reached a reassuring level of stability,” he said.

October 10, 2023 Posted by | Wars for Israel | , , , , , | Leave a comment

The Israel-Palestine war is Washington’s fault

By Robert Inlakesh | RT | October 10, 2023

The administration of US President Joe Biden and decades of failed American policy decisions in West Asia set the stage for the eruption of the horrifying violence we see today in Palestine and Israel. Through sidelining the Palestinian cause for statehood and instead seeking a symbolic normalization deal between Israel and Saudi Arabia, Washington overlooked its own regional strategy.

In the early hours of Saturday morning, the armed wing of Hamas, the Qassam Brigades, launched an unprecedented military operation against Israel. Scenes instantly flooded social media of Palestinian fighters gunning down Israelis in cities such as Ashkelon, blowing up military vehicles, and killing and capturing hundreds of Israeli soldiers. It was a surprise offensive the likes of which hadn’t been seen in over 50 years. It also represented a colossal failure for the Israeli government, military, and intelligence and security services, causing Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to declare war on the Gaza Strip.

In the US, condemnation from politicians of the attack was unanimous and bipartisan, as elected officials expressed their outrage at the loss of Israeli life. However, in all of these statements, not a single one recognized their own government’s role in the attack. Washington, along with most of the collective West, has been imposing sanctions on the Palestinian Authority (PA) for nearly 17 years. The peace process between Israelis and Palestinians – aimed at reaching a ‘two-state solution’ whereby Israel and Palestine would exist side by side as independent, mutually-recognized states – has been effectively dead for around two decades, with the last failed attempt to pressure the Israeli government to negotiate coming under former US President Barack Obama.

In 2006, the legislative elections held in the Occupied Palestinian Territories (OPT) resulted in a landslide victory for Hamas. Failed US presidential candidate Hillary Clinton was recorded as having stated at the time that “we [the US] should have made sure that we did something to determine who was going to win.” While the US did not interfere, the American government decided it would sanction Gaza and cut off the flow of aid to the PA after the elections did not favor the Fatah Party it was financing.

Former US President Jimmy Carter, who brokered the 1979 Camp David Accords, an agreement that normalized relations between Egypt and Israel, said the following about the approach of the US government at the time: “If you sponsor an election or promote democracy and freedom around the world, then when people make their own decision about their leaders, I think that all the governments should recognize that administration and let them form their government.”

Not only did Washington actively oppose the democratic elections in the OPT, it went a step further and provided arms to Palestinians from the Fatah Party, plotting a coup that would use them to overthrow the Hamas government that was formed inside Gaza. The plan failed dramatically and Hamas kicked Fatah out of Gaza after a bloody civil war, completely taking over the territory, to which the Israeli government responded by imposing an all-inclusive military blockade.

Unlike other global powers such as Russia and China, the US never entertained the idea of giving Hamas the chance to govern as Carter had suggested. Instead, every American government has refused to engage with Hamas, deeming it a terrorist organization, but then ignoring the Palestinian political party completely and not formulating any solution to the situation that has been ongoing inside Gaza. In fact, the US government considers every single major Palestinian political party or movement as a terrorist organization, other than the mainstream branch of Fatah that partially controls the West Bank.

The Declaration of Principles, the first agreement in the Oslo Accords, was signed on the White House lawn over 30 years ago. The accords were supposed to solve the conflict in a span of five years, but failed due to America’s inability to function as a truly neutral peace broker. During the administration of US President Donald Trump, Washington abandoned the two-state solution altogether, through the pursuance of normalization deals between Arab nations and Israel. The issue of Palestinian statehood, which the UN agrees should be solved through a two-state solution, was sidelined as a non-issue and the one bargaining chip possessed by the Palestinians, Arab-Israeli normalization, began to be taken off of the table.

How did the Palestinian political parties respond to normalization in 2018? They overwhelmingly chose non-violent struggle, including in Gaza, where Hamas endorsed the ‘Great March of Return’, a mass protest movement which lasted around a year. Most of the protesters were peaceful, but it was the relatively small groups of Palestinians committing sabotage and anti-Israeli aggression at the border fence that made the news. In response, Israeli forces killed hundreds of Palestinians and injured almost 10,000. On the Israeli side, there was not a single dead soldier or civilian, while Israeli snipers targeted women, children, journalists, disabled people, and medical workers, according to a UN human rights report on the demonstrations. How did the US react to hundreds of thousands of unarmed Palestinian protesters marching on the separation fence between Gaza and Israel? It ignored them and continued to pursue Arab-Israeli normalization.

Under the Biden administration, the two-state solution was also sidelined and the plight of Palestinians was ignored as insignificant. Instead of seeking a solution to the violence which has been steadily escalating to levels not seen in 20 years, during the course of the past two years – especially in the West Bank – Biden has chosen to look the other way and has pursued Saudi-Israeli normalization instead. A deal between Saudi Arabia and Israel would also have the potential to collapse the Iranian-Saudi rapprochement, brokered earlier this year by China, in addition to potentially dragging Washington into an open confrontation with Yemen. Instead of seeking to fulfill the foreign policy pledges made at the start of his term in office, Biden has abandoned the idea of reviving the Iran nuclear deal and of ending the war in Yemen. He also decided to try and inflict a death blow on the Palestinian cause for statehood.

What Hamas just did from Gaza would never have happened if the US had pursued a somewhat rational approach to the region. It could even have been prevented if the US had presented a political plan to de-escalate rising tensions in the occupied territories. Instead, the American government decided to overlook the armed groups in Gaza while attempting to completely dismantle their cause. And all of this for what? A fancy photo op that Biden can use to steer the Democratic Party to victory in the presidential election in 2024, by claiming that he brought peace to the Middle East. Due to the current conflict, normalization doesn’t seem to be on the table anytime soon anyway, which would mean Hamas’ offensive has not only dealt a blow to Israel, but also to the US.

Now that Israel is at war with Gaza, what is the US doing? It is condemning one side, while arming Israel and greenlighting any action it takes. Initially, Washington even refused to urge a ceasefire, in contrast to the push for one from Moscow and Beijing. The White House refuses to acknowledge its role in creating the current violence and carries on with the exact same rhetoric and policy decisions that led to the horrifying war we see today.

Robert Inlakesh is a political analyst, journalist and documentary filmmaker currently based in London, UK. He has reported from and lived in the Palestinian territories and currently works with Quds News. Director of ‘Steal of the Century: Trump’s Palestine-Israel Catastrophe’.

October 10, 2023 Posted by | Aletho News | , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Who Do Middle Eastern Countries Support in Israel-Hamas Conflict?

© AFP 2023 / Mahmud Hams
By Christina Malyk – Sputnik – 09.10.2023

Hostilities have been raging around the Gaza Strip after Hamas units’ invasion to surrounding lands. The current escalation is projected to become one of the largest in the history of the Palestinian-Israeli conflict.

Both Israel and the Gaza Strip have found themselves in the middle of a complex conflict, in which different countries support different sides.

For his part, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken has reportedly spoken to several foreign ministers from Arab countries, asking them to condemn the Hamas actions.
The majority of Arab countries, especially the monarchies of Persian Gulf, have close political and financial ties with the US.

In September, Blinken and foreign ministers of the Gulf Cooperation Council agreed to strengthen ties in defense and security. The US and Gulf foreign ministers also reaffirmed their “commitment to free navigation and maritime security in the Gulf region” in a move against what Washington believes to be an “Iranian threat” in the region.

Sputnik tracked how regional countries have reacted to the latest developments in Israel and Palestine, and whether this connects with its US relations.

UAE

The UAE became the first Arab country to condemn Hamas’ actions.

“The [Foreign] Ministry stressed that attacks by Hamas against Israeli towns and villages near the Gaza strip, including the firing of thousands of rockets at population centers, are a serious and grave escalation. The Ministry is appalled by reports that Israeli civilians have been abducted as hostages from their homes. Civilians on both sides must always have full protection under international humanitarian law and must never be a target of conflict,” wrote the official ministry press release.

It also noted, “The Ministry deeply mourns the loss of Israeli and Palestinian lives as a result of the outbreak of violence, and calls on both parties to de-escalate and avoid an expansion of the heinous violence with tragic consequences affecting civilian lives and facilities.”

The statement was announced right after UAE Foreign Minister Sheikh Abdullah bin Zayed Al Nahyan’s call with Blinken.

Bahrain

An official statement made by Bahrain stressed the need for de-escalation between Palestinians and Israelis. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Bahrain is “supporting the peace process and establishing the Palestinian state according to the two-state solution and other international legitimacy resolutions.”

“The Kingdom of Bahrain is closely following the developments taking place between Palestinian groups and Israeli forces, leading to an increase in violence and armed attacks that claimed the lives of a number of people and injured others,” noted the Foreign Ministry.

Saudi Arabia

The Saudi Arabia Ministry of Foreign Affairs through an official statement on Twitter “calls for an immediate halt to the escalation between the two sides, the protection of civilians, and restraint.” Nevertheless, the Saudi Foreign Ministry reminded “the deprivation of the Palestinian people and their legitimate rights.” But Saudi Arabia did not blame Israel for the escalation.

On Saturday, in a phone call with Saudi Foreign Minister Prince Faisal bin Farhan, Blinken said the Kingdom should clearly condemn the attack, State Department officially said.
Nevertheless, the Saudi Foreign Ministry did not include any criticism of the attack or of Hamas. So, Saudi officials appear to be taking a wait-and-see stance.

Qatar

The Qatari Ministry of Foreign Affairs officially stated that Israel is “solely responsible for the ongoing escalation due to its ongoing violations of the rights of the Palestinian people.” Doha also expressed deep concern over the developments in the region and called for de-escalation as quickly as possible.

Earlier on Monday, Western outlets reported that Doha is mediating talks to swap Hamas-held hostages in coordination with the United States. But neither Israel, Qatar nor Palestine has confirmed this information. Later in the day, Hamas spokesman Husam Badran denied to Sputnik that any negotiations with Israel on prisoners exchange are taking place.

Kuwait

Kuwait officially expressed its “grave concern” over developments between Israel and the Palestinians, blaming Israel for what it called its “blatant attacks.”

Its Ministry of Foreign Affairs called for the international community, especially the Security Council, “to take responsibility and stop the ongoing violence, protect the Palestinian people and put an end to the provocative actions of the occupation authorities.”

Kuwait is one of the countries that strictly denies any contact with Israel.

Oman

The Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Oman called on Palestinians and Israelis to exercise restraint. Oman also highlighted “strategic necessity to find a just, comprehensive and lasting solution to the Palestinian cause on the basis of the two-state solution.”

Yemen

The Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Yemen officially blamed Israel for the current escalation. The ministry “called for the protection of civilians and an end to the provocations of the Israeli occupation forces and their repeated attacks on the Palestinian people and their sanctities.”

Iraq

Iraqi Foreign Minister Fuad Hussein expressed his full support for the Palestinian people “to act against the aggressive actions of the Zionist regime” during telephone conversation with his Iranian counterpart Hossein Amirabdollahian on Sunday.

However, the Foreign Ministry of Iraq has not issued any official statement yet. This may be connected with close ties with both the US and Iran at the same time.

Syria

Syria’s Foreign Ministry issued an official statement expressing support for the Palestinian people and the forces “fighting against Zionist terrorism.”

Moreover, Damascus described Hamas’ actions as “honourable achievement that proves the only way for Palestinians to obtain their legitimate rights is resistance in all its forms.”

Lebanon

The Lebanon’s Foreign Ministry issued no official statements on the Israeli-Hamas conflict. That said, Lebanon’s Hezbollah, which operates on Southern Lebanon near the Israeli border, praised Hamas for its “heroic operation” in a statement. Hezbollah also claimed responsibility for shelling Israeli territory during the escalation.

Jordan

Jordan’s King Abdullah said on Sunday there was a need to intensify diplomatic efforts to prevent escalating Israel-Palestinian violence with “dangerous repercussions” for the region’s security.

He also called for “urgent international action to avoid an escalation and prevent the region from the consequences of a new round of violence.”

In turn, Jordan’s Foreign Minister Ayman Safadi warned both Palestinian and Israeli sides of the “volatility”’ of the escalation.

Egypt

Egypt warned of the “severe dangers” posed by current escalation between the Gaza Strip and Israel.

“Egypt calls for international actors involved in backing the efforts of resuming the peace process to intervene immediately to halt the ongoing escalation,” Egypt’s Foreign Ministry noted.

Egypt has always been a peace process mediator between Israel and Hamas, working with the US. According to media outlets, both Western and local, Egypt tried to bring the parties to the negotiating table, but did not manage to do it.

Iran

Iran’s Foreign Ministry has strongly condemned “the usurping Zionist regime’s attacks against civilian targets in southern Lebanon and the Gaza Strip.” Foreign Ministry spokesperson Nasser Kanaani also stated that Hamas’ attacks showed increased confidence by the Palestinians against Israel.

Iran regards both Israel and the US as its own enemy.

October 9, 2023 Posted by | Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Solidarity and Activism | , , | Leave a comment

Palestinian operation puts Netanyahu between rock and hard place: Ex-diplomat

By Alireza Hashemi | Press TV | October 9, 2023

The military operation by the Palestinian resistance movement Hamas has placed the embattled Israeli premier Benjamin Netanyahu in a dilemma of whether to save his own political future or the illegitimate regime itself, says a former Iranian diplomat.

In an interview with the Press TV website, Abolfazl Zohrevand, a former Iranian ambassador to Afghanistan and Italy, said the Al-Aqsa Storm (also known as Al-Aqsa Flood) operation has put Netanyahu and his far-right cabinet between a rock and a hard place.

Hamas stunned the regime in Tel Aviv with a multi-pronged attack early Saturday, launching thousands of missiles into the occupied territories within a span of 20 minutes and at the same time launching a ground attack against Israeli settlements and military bases near the coastal strip.

The Israeli death toll is staggering, with some reports putting it at above 1,000, besides hundreds of others – soldiers and settlers – who are held as prisoners of war by Hamas in the Gaza Strip.

Zohrevand said the Israeli regime can opt for a very tough response to the Palestinian resistance operation but such a response might lead to an existential threat to the regime.

“Israel can’t do much to punish the Palestinians through air strikes. Such strikes usually fail to hit Hamas’s underground infrastructure and only leave high civilian casualties,” he stated.

“Netanyahu has to start a ground invasion of Gaza, like what he did recently with the Jenin camp in the occupied West Bank,” the former diplomat said, referring to the July Israeli raid into the Jenin camp.

However, he hastened to add that such an operation could end in a humiliating defeat for the regime.

“If Israel decides to engage in a major operation, we should expect weeks-long clashes in the region. Israel isn’t made for long battles. Also, its military is not well prepared as the whole regime is in a state of chaos. The fact that it was caught completely off guard by the operation is a testimony to this,” Zohrevand stressed in a conversation with the Press TV website.

“On the other hand, Palestinians are prepared for such an invasion and they hold the upper hand as Gaza is their home. Palestinians are now sending a message that enough is enough. They’re highly motivated to fight the regime. So the odds for Israel’s success are not high.”

He said the Israeli military action would put the existence of the regime at risk.

“This war can easily spread to the West Bank and other regions. Also, there’s a real possibility that the regime might face a major operation by Lebanon’s Hezbollah. It’s really hard for the regime to handle two fronts. I personally believe the regime won’t start such an operation,” Zohrevand said.

Hamas has already said the operation will be extended to the West Bank.

The Lebanese movement Hezbollah has also staged attacks in solidarity with Palestinians, firing artillery shells and guided missiles at Israeli positions in the occupied Shebaa farms on Sunday.

The former Iranian diplomat noted that Netanyahu might want to accept mediation efforts by Turkey or Egypt and halt its ongoing operation, but that will put his political future in real danger.

“If he decides to stop the Israeli operation, his cabinet won’t last long as it is filled with extremist elements that came to power on a promise of crushing Palestinian resistance and annexing all the Palestinian lands once and forever,” he remarked.

“For Netanyahu, it boils down to a decision whether to save the regime or save his own cabinet or save the regime. He’s in a no-win situation.”

October 9, 2023 Posted by | Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Militarism | , , , , , | Leave a comment

Debunking The Conspiracy Theory That Netanyahu Wanted Last Weekend’s Attacks To Happen

BY ANDREW KORYBKO | OCTOBER 9, 2023

Hamas’ sneak attack on Israel over the weekend prompted speculation among some on social media that the latter knew about these plans in advance but allegedly had an interest in letting them happen. According to proponents of this conspiracy theory, embattled Prime Minister Netanyahu wanted to unite his politically divided people and/or establish the pretext for destroying Hamas, ergo why he supposedly let these attacks unfold. That doesn’t make much sense though if one really thinks about it.

It’s fashionable nowadays to claim that leaders sometimes provoke foreign conflicts to distract from domestic political problems, but that’s arguably not the case with the latest Israeli-Hamas war. In fact, Netanyahu was pursuing the exact opposite approach up until last weekend as suggested by credible reports over the months that he was engaged in secret talks with Saudi Arabia over recognizing Israel. This was aimed at uniting Israelis around him and unlocking their country’s geo-economic potential.

Had these efforts borne fruit, then not only would his fiercest opponents have been forced to praise him for this diplomatic achievement, but Israel could then have profited from its central role in the India-Middle East-Europe Economic Corridor (IMEC) that was unveiled last month. Both goals required Saudi recognition of Israel, which Netanyahu hoped to obtain without recognizing Palestine’s independence, but that’s now in doubt since Riyadh might freeze these talks after Israel’s bombing of Gaza.

Those who claim that he knew about Hamas’ plans in advance but still let them happen are either unaware of his secret talks with Saudi Arabia, downplay their grand strategic importance, or think that they were all a ruse in preparation of this convoluted plot to establish the pretext for destroying Hamas. About that dimension of their conspiracy theory, it’s difficult to imagine that security-obsessed Netanyahu would let his country’s enemies inflict such unprecedented damage to Israel for that purpose.

He could always have simply exploited comparatively minor rocket fire to justify a disproportionate bombing campaign against that group without having to first lose literally hundreds of civilians and soldiers. Hamas’ breaching of the border barrier was also a strong blow to the Israeli psyche from which its people might never recover after having assumed that its construction would forever protect them. The same goes for that group doubling the territory under its control during the climax of its attacks.

Observers can still be opposed to the border barrier in particular, Israeli policy towards Palestine in general, and Netanyahu personally while also acknowledging that he’s such a security-obsessed leader that it doesn’t make sense to claim that he’d let Hamas powerfully undermine all three for any reason. He looks extremely weak after what happened, Israeli policy towards Palestine is now questioned from both sides like never before, and the border barrier is no longer deemed to be a credible defense.

These three outcomes represent the sum of Netanyahu’s worst nightmares, not to mention the likely failure of his plans to obtain Saudi recognition of Israel that would in turn unlock his country’s geo-economic potential via IMEC, all of which indisputably contradict Israeli interests. It remains unclear exactly how all of Israel’s security systems failed at the same time during last weekend’s attacks, nor has anyone explained the intelligence failures up until then either, but that’s indeed what happened.

The conspiracy theory speculating that Netanyahu knew about all this in advance but still let it happen doesn’t stand up to scrutiny as proven in this piece and is pretty much only predicated on the false perception that Israel’s intelligence services are omnipotent. They’re run by humans though and are therefore naturally imperfect, yet those who claim otherwise impart godlike power to the Mossad. This gives Israel too much credit while denying Hamas’ independent ability to organize attacks of this scale.

October 9, 2023 Posted by | Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism | , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Hamas Attacks, What Does It Mean?

By Ian Welsh | October 7, 2023

For once I was taken by surprise. I didn’t expect this attack and despite my low opinion of the Israeli military, would not have expected it to be so successful.

Hamas actually captured the Israeli southern command base briefly. It was retaken with massive air strikes (meaning Israel was willing to hit its own people.) In the initial 12 hours or so they wiped the floor with local Israeli forces.

This is the most successful Palestinian military operation I can think of.

Hamas could not, of course, hold the ground it took and is retreating to Gaza. Israel has declared war and stated that they will invade Gaza.

A ground invasion will be extremely bloody, Gaza is one of the most densely populated places on Earth, and Hamas has had plenty of time to prepare. Bombing and shelling urban areas does not make invasion significantly easier.

Let’s draw out some specific points:

Complete Mossad Intelligence Failure

Mossad, the Israeli intelligence agency, has a fearsome reputation, but they either wanted the attack to happen (which is unlikely) or they were caught completely by surprise. This is an embarrassment, to vastly understate the case.

Israeli Military Weakness

As I have said repeatedly, and as the last war with Hezbollah showed, the Israeli army, no matter how many weapons or men or planes it has, is weak and incompetent. This is not the military of 1967 or even 1980, when the legend of Israeli military brilliance was created.

This is due to serving primarily as an occupation army. All occupation armies, fighting against the weak, become weak, brutal bullies incompetent at fighting real opposition.

The Israeli army was slow to respond, a general was captured and a command base. This is, again, humiliating.

Humiliation

Humiliation is the word of the day. Just as a bully whose victim manages to get in a few good punches has to be brutal in response, so Israel will lash out massively.

Context

This is one reason why Hamas lashed out. No one could be expected to endure this, year on year, and not want to strike back. It is also why, while I have sympathy for anyone hurt or killed, I have no patience with crocodile tears from Israeli supporters, acting as if they haven’t been doing worse to Palestinians for years.

The Hezbollah Question

is whether they’ll attack. The answer seems to be “probably” as Hezbollah has said that if there is a ground invasion of Gaza, they will declare war. Hezbollah is no joke, they are battle hardened, have between 40K and 150K missiles, a drone force, and their own private comms system.

Israel is moving forces to the Lebanese border as we speak. Militarily speaking, if I were Hezbollah, I might attack sooner rather than later.

The Iran Question

Iran is Hamas and Hezbollah’s sponsor. It is VERY unlikely Hamas did this without Iranian greenlighting and if that’s so, the plan isn’t “do one attack, then get hammered.”

The “Iron” Dome

Israel’s missile defenses cracked under Hamas’s missile barrage. There is no question, if Hezbollah attacks, the Iron Dome will not shoot down most missiles. This time it won’t be Lebanon’s heartland being bombed mercilessly while Tel Aviv is spared, there will be carnage in both homelands.

Nukes

In some ways this is the bottom line. Israel has nukes. If they did not, I would expect Iran to join in and if I were Egypt, I might invade. Israel is weak and humiliated. But as long as they have nukes, other countries will shy off from direct war unless they think they have a way of taking out those nukes.

Diplomatic Damage

Israeli-Saudi Arabia negotiations are dead for the time being and other Arab allies will not be able to do anything but condemn Israel. There are massive demonstrations in support of Hamas in Turkey, Egypt and many other Muslim countries.

Ethnic Cleansing and Occupation

Israel has a huge problem, in that it has a massive population of non-citizens, and those non-citizens are out-breeding the citizenry, except for the ultra-orthodox Jews who do not serve in the military. This is an ulcer, and many Israeli politicians have been clear they want to just get rid of the Palestinians. They can’t genocide them, because it would destroy the Holocaust trump card, but many would love ethnic cleanse them. This may be an opportunity.

This is also an issue because if Israel wants to directly run Gaza, the occupation will be a bloody guerilla war, an endless bleeding ulcer.

If they don’t want to run it, they have to find a friendly quisling force, like the Palestinian authority, to do it for them, and at least right now, there’s no one to take that role. Hamas are more moderate than the other main Gaza factions.

The Ukraine Connection

Of significant amusement is that it appears that much of the weaponry used by Hamas is from stockpiles sent to Ukraine and sold on the black market. This spread of weaponry was predicted and lo.

Imperial Overstretch

Usually when Israel is in trouble the US airlifts in massive arms and munitions to help them, as they did in the 2006 war. But right now the shelves are almost bare because of Ukraine.

Balance of Forces

Hamas is obviously still the massive underdog. They are praying for Hezbollah to join in, and perhaps they want Israel to invade so they can fight a ground war against Israel on their own ground. The smart money is still on Israel.

But do not underestimate Hezbollah, and don’t underestimate how nasty this could get if Hezbollah does intervene. As noted above, they will be able to strike Israel’s heartland. If Israel attacks into Lebanon in response, with ground assets, my money is Hezbollah and if I were Hezbollah I would want that. Defeat the attack, then counter-attack into Israel.

If Hezbollah has to attack on the ground because Israel won’t oblige them I honestly don’t know how it will go.

But, while smaller and less well equipped, Hezbollah is the superior military with higher morale. If I were Israeli, I would not be sanguine.

Concluding Remarks

I won’t cavil, I think Hamas is justified in this attack. I also think the argument that settlers are civilians is weak (though by settlers I do not mean all Israelis.) Israel is an apartheid religious-ethnic state which stole another people’s land and continues to brutalize them.

The only humane solution, one which allows Israel to continue to exist, is a single state with everyone as full citizens.

Alas, that is not on the table.

In the long run, Israel as an ethic religious state, like the Crusader States, is doomed.

The only question is how many people have to suffer before Israel becomes a nation whose very basis is not completely unjust.

(Oh, and if Iran joins in.)

October 8, 2023 Posted by | Illegal Occupation | , , , , , | Leave a comment

What’s behind the sudden US good will towards Iran?

By Robert Inlakesh | RT | October 2, 2023

In what proved to be a domestically controversial move, the US government approved the release of five prisoners held in Iran in return for releasing five Iranian detainees and billions of previously frozen assets. However, in the aftermath of the agreement between Tehran and Washington, the White House’s primary focus seems to be centered around securing a Saudi-Israeli deal rather than working on reviving the 2015 Iran nuclear deal, known formally as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA).

As revealed by the anonymous diplomatic sources of The Cradle, in addition to other tidbits released in US media, the US-Iran prisoner swap appears to have been much more than meets the eye. The informal agreement, according to these anonymous sources, encompassed freezing Iranian uranium enrichment at 60% and permitting the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) to install cameras at several nuclear sites. On the other hand, the US’ concessions included disregarding Iranian oil sales – in essence, refraining from enforcing sanctions – and allowing all Iranian assets to be released, reportedly amounting to roughly $20 billion. This is well over the widely reported $6 billion touted in the international press.

What makes this agreement so intriguing is that it was non-formal, including no known signed documents, and was contrived over several months and under the auspices of Qatar and Oman as intermediaries. From leaked information, citing unnamed sources, what we can gather – regardless of what claims are true or false – is that the prisoner swap was more than a simple exchange of prisoners and $6 billion in frozen assets. According to a report released in May by Axios, secret indirect talks between the US and Iran had been conducted in Oman, which three sources close to the news outlet claimed Iran’s top nuclear negotiator, Ali Bagheri Kan, was part of. Later, in June, the New York Times released a report claiming that secret negotiations were going on, aimed at concluding an informal agreement to replace the need to revive the 2015 nuclear deal.

To begin with, if we are to assume that the official US narrative on the agreement is correct, despite Iranian officials having contradicted it, then the most apparent objective in mind from Washington’s perspective would be to cause a thaw in America’s relationship with the Islamic Republic. As various analysts have suggested, this could have also signaled hope for a revival of the nuclear deal, which fell apart after the administration of former President Donald Trump unilaterally withdrew from it in 2018. Hope had largely faded that the administration of President Joe Biden could bring the deal back to life after Biden was revealed to have said that it was officially “dead” in November of 2022.

However, given the information we have at hand, what is most likely here is that this represents a massive de-escalation following ship seizures and the beefing up of America’s troop presence in the Persian Gulf back in August. Why a de-escalation now? Is it to revive nuclear deal talks? This appears highly unlikely. Instead, the prisoner exchange agreement comes simultaneously with, and is somewhat overshadowed by, developments in the ongoing discussions to reach an American-brokered normalization deal between Saudi Arabia and Israel.

The two nations, both powerful partners of the US in the Middle East, have never had formal diplomatic relations with each other. Saudi Arabia does not recognize Israel as a sovereign country and has been at loggerheads with it over its treatment of Arabs in Palestine, which Riyadh ostensibly wants to see as an independent nation. Negotiations to finally normalize diplomatic relations have been ongoing for months now, with the US being a highly invested middleman, given that achieving such a deal would help consolidate its power base in the region. As for Iran, while Israel sees it as an existential enemy, Saudi Arabia has had a complicated relationship with it, only having re-established diplomatic ties earlier this year in a deal brokered by China.

When Biden met with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in New York on the sidelines of the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA)’s 78th session, they publicly discussed the high hopes of concluding Saudi-Israeli normalization. This was followed by two Fox News interviews, one with Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed Bin Salman and the other with the Israeli PM, during which both said that the deal grows closer by the day. At Benjamin Netanyahu’s address to the UNGA, he spoke at length on Iran; however, there was no mention of the recent US-Iranian prisoner exchange.

In fact, Israel has remained silent on the informal deal. This is especially interesting, considering that Tel Aviv routinely attacks the prospect of any agreement with Iran, let alone one that allows for tens of billions in funds to be transferred back into the hands of Tehran. In June, Netanyahu spoke over the phone with US Secretary of State Antony Blinken, during which he discussed Iran at length and proclaimed that he opposes and will not be bound by any agreement struck between Washington and Tehran.

On September 5, Antony Blinken spoke with the Israeli premier again, allegedly discussing Iran as the primary subject of the call. While the precise details of the calls are impossible to apprehend, there had to be a good chance that the prisoner swap agreement was mentioned, as reports had publicly been leaked to the press regarding Iran-US talks. With so much focus placed upon Iran by Israel, it makes no sense that Tel Aviv would remain silent on the prisoner exchange, especially given the release of Iran’s formerly frozen funds.

Not silent on the unfreezing of Tehran’s billions were Republican politicians in the US Congress. If the Biden administration were to have accepted a renewal of the 2015 nuclear deal, one of its major hurdles would have been passing the deal in Congress, including the deeply opposed Republican-led House of Representatives. In fact, any attempt to try and pass a deal, at this point, could reflect negatively on the Biden White House, which matters more now as we head towards the 2024 presidential election.

Therefore, by striking an informal agreement with Tehran, the US de-escalates and addresses some of its worries surrounding Iran’s nuclear program. More importantly, however, the US government could be trying to create a fertile environment for the conclusion of an Israeli-Saudi normalization agreement, both by calming Iran down to de-escalate regional tensions and, possibly, leveraging concessions to ease Tehran’s pushback against the normalization directly. Whether this strategy will work or not is yet to be seen. Still, it is clear that the key foreign policy goal for Joe Biden is securing the normalization agreement, which is why it makes sense that the most powerful nation that opposes it – Iran – should be addressed and taken seriously.

Robert Inlakesh is a political analyst, journalist and documentary filmmaker currently based in London, UK. He has reported from and lived in the Palestinian territories and currently works with Quds News. Director of ‘Steal of the Century: Trump’s Palestine-Israel Catastrophe’.

October 2, 2023 Posted by | Aletho News | , , , , | Leave a comment

Saudi FM calls for Palestinian state in UN speech

The Cradle | September 24, 2023

The Saudi foreign minister addressed the UN General Assembly on 24 September in a speech calling for the establishment of a Palestinian state and a “just, comprehensive solution to the Palestinian issue” while criticizing Israel for its ongoing illegal building of Jewish settlements in the occupied West Bank.

Saudi Foreign Minister Prince Faisal bin Farhan’s comments come as Saudi Arabia and Israel appeared to make progress in negotiations to normalize relations.

“Security in the Middle East region requires the acceleration of … a just, comprehensive solution to the Palestinian issue; the solution must be based on resolutions in the international arena and must bring about a peace that allows [the] Palestinian people to have an independent state based on the 1967 borders with East Jerusalem as its capital,” said Saudi Foreign Minister said.

He added that Saudi Arabia also “rejects and condemns all the unilateral steps that constitute a flagrant violation of international law and which contribute to the collapse of regional and international peace efforts and are hindering the path of diplomatic solutions,” an apparent reference to Israeli approval of West Bank settlement construction and the legalization of some outposts in recent months.

Saudi Arabia has previously demanded that Israel allow the establishment of a Palestinian state in exchange for normalizing relations. The Saudis have also asked the US to provide the kingdom with security guarantees, help to establish a civilian nuclear program, and permission to buy more advanced US weapons.

It is unclear if Saudi officials will stick to the demand that Israel end its over 60-year occupation of the West Bank and allow a Palestinian state or whether they are using the Palestinian issue as leverage to achieve their other stated demands for a normalization deal.

Earlier this week, Saudi Crown Prince Mohammad bin Salman (MbS) stated in an interview with Fox News that “every day we get closer” to normalizing ties with Israel. He did not mention the demand for a Palestinian state, saying only, “We hope that will reach a place that will ease the life of the Palestinians.”

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu devoted much of his UN address to touting the possible deal with Riyadh and its effects on the region.

In his speech on Friday, Netanyahu said Israel was on “the cusp” of a historic peace agreement with the Saudis, a deal he said would transform West Asia, “encourage other Arab states to normalize their relations with Israel,” as well as “enhance the prospects of peace with the Palestinians.”

He stated that the Palestinians should be part of the peace deal but should not have a veto over any agreement between Israel and Saudi Arabia or other Arab states.

At the same time, far-right members of Netanyahu’s governing coalition have warned that they will not support any concessions to Palestinians as part of a deal with Saudi Arabia.

“If there will be concessions for the Palestinians, we will not remain in the government — and not just us, but the Religious Zionism party as well,” National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir, head of the far-right Oztma Yehedit party, said in a statement on 23 September.

During his UN speech, Netanyahu held up a map that placed the West Bank and Gaza within the boundaries of Israel, suggesting he does not plan to agree to the establishment of a Palestinian state.

There is “No greater insult to every foundational principle of the UN than seeing Netanyahu display before the UNGA a ‘map of Israel’ that straddles the entire land from the river to the sea,” the Palestinian Authority’s representative to Germany Laith Arafeh posted on X, formerly Twitter.

With this map, Netanyahu negates “Palestine and its people” while “attempting to spin the audience with rhetoric about ‘peace’ in the region, all the while entrenching the longest ongoing belligerent occupation in today’s world,” Arafeh said.

September 24, 2023 Posted by | Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism | , , , , , | Leave a comment

Brussels should buy Ukrainian grain for Africa – Lavrov

RT | September 24, 2023

The European Commission should buy the Ukrainian agricultural produce that the bloc says it doesn’t need and ship it to African countries, Russia’s foreign minister Sergey Lavrov has said at the UN General Assembly (UNGA).

Western allies have repeatedly accused Moscow of trapping millions of tons of grain in Ukrainian Black Sea ports and of exacerbating a global food crisis, particularly across the African continent.

“Since the European Commission is wasting tens of billions of dollars on Ukraine… it can buy the grain that Ukraine wants to sell and EU countries don’t want [to buy] for reasons of competitiveness, and send it to Africa,” Lavrov told the UNGA.

According to Russia’s top diplomat, Ukrainian agricultural produce is “being supplied to European countries in abundance” but many of them don’t want to buy it, because “they have their own farmers and don’t want them to go bust due to competition.”

He also questioned the integrity of last year’s grain deal, pointing out during his speech at the UN that only 3% of the grain that was moved under this deal had reached the poorest countries in Africa.

In addition, Lavrov said that some 260,000 metric tons of Russian fertilizers have been impounded in EU ports since 2022 and that Moscow was ready to ship these fertilizers to African nations for free.

Russian fertilisers became the crucial point in talks over resuming the Black Sea Grain Deal that was clinched last year between Russia and Ukraine and brokered by the UN and Türkiye. The deal was aimed at allowing Ukraine to export grain from its ports to countries in Asia, the Middle East and Africa, in exchange for lifting Western sanctions that prevented Russian agricultural exports.

However, Moscow withdrew from the agreement in July, saying that the West was still making it impossible for Russia to ship food and fertilizer.

Lavrov said that the Deputy Foreign Minister of Russia, Sergey Vershinin, is currently discussing the key issues related to the deal with UN representatives. He stressed also that Western states would be misleading UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres by saying that the grain deal was about to resume.

According to the minister, the deal can resume once Russia’s demands regarding its agricultural exports are fulfilled.

September 24, 2023 Posted by | Economics | , , , , | Leave a comment

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