Hamas slams Abbas’s recent remarks to New York Times
Palestine Information Center – 04/02/2014
GAZA — Hamas spokesman Sami Abu Zuhri strongly denounced de facto president Mahmoud Abbas for his recent press remarks to a US newspaper and said that the views he expressed pose a threat to Palestinian cause and only represent himself.
Spokesman Abu Zuhri stated that the ideas that were voiced by Abbas in press remarks to the New York Times newspaper do not reflect the national consensus which rejects the negotiations and any solution against Palestinian rights and constants.
Abbas told the New York Times on Monday that he refuses demands made constantly by Palestinian parties to join some UN bodies or go to the international criminal court, adding that he wants to exhaust his negotiation with the Israelis before making any such move.
Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas said he would be willing to allow a US-led NATO force to patrol a Palestinian state for an indefinite amount of time, adding that the Israeli army and settlements could remain for five years rather than three years as he had told the Americans before.
Abbas also said the Palestinian state would be demilitarized and have only a police force and the NATO force, affirming that he would not allow the return of the armed struggle in the Palestinian state.
He called recognizing Israel as a Jewish state out of the question and said he would agree on extending the nine-month negotiations, which started in July last year, if progress was made.
Russia threatens to quit START as US deploys Aegis destroyer to Spain
RT | February 2, 2014
The US has deployed a ballistic missile defense destroyer to Spain to boost NATO’s anti-missile shield in Europe. The move, allegedly aimed at curbing the Iranian threat, has sparked talks about Russia possibly scrapping the START nuclear treaty.
The deployment of the Navy destroyer USS Donald Cook, equipped with the Aegis shipboard integrated combat weapons system, was announced by US Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel at the Munich Security Conference on Saturday.
“An important posture enhancement is European missile defense in response to ballistic missile threats from Iran,” Hagel said, adding that the US is committed “to deploying missile defense architecture there,” as a part of Phase 3 of the European Phased Adaptive Approach (EPAA).
Hagel also said that over the next two years, three additional Aegis-enabled missile defense-capable destroyers will join the effort to protect NATO countries on the European continent.
“Despite fiscal constraints, the budget that we will release next month fully protects our investment in European missile defense,” Hagel said, reiterating views he also expressed on a visit to Poland earlier last week.
“There are some capabilities that the United States military will continue to invest heavily in,” Hagel told the Munich conference. “We will continue to be the world leader in those kinds of capabilities.”
In his Munich speech, Hagel also mentioned that China and Russia “are rapidly modernizing their militaries and global defense industries, challenging our technological edge and defense partnerships around the world.”
The USS Donald Cook will become the first of four ballistic missile defense (BMD)-capable ships based in Europe. It will be joined by the destroyer Ross in a few months, while Carney and Porter will reach European waters in 2015.
The US Navy estimates that 1,239 military personnel will move to Spain’s port of Rota as part of the EPAA plan, according to the Congressional Research Service. The move will cost $92 million, with another $100 million being spent annually on maintaining the ships in Spain.
The Obama administration claims this deployment will serve to protect US allies in Europe from Iranian and possibly North Korean missile threats.
The movement of the four destroyers to Spain and a creation of a ground-based radar is Phase 1 of the EPAA. Phase 2 is the installation of the Aegis Ashore armed with Standard SM-3 IB interceptor missiles in Romania. Phase 3 of EPAA is the creation of Polish Aegis Ashore installation, armed with SM-3 IIA missiles. Phase 4, involving deployment of SM-3 IIB missiles, was canceled by the US in March 2013.
The destroyers in Spain are known as “forward deployed naval forces” (FDNF), as they enable the US Navy to provide more forward-based presence with fewer ships, and also cut down on the transit time when tackling a wide range of threats.
“Permanently forward-deploying four ships in Rota will enable us to be in the right place, not just at the right time, but all the time,” Navy Secretary Ray Mabus said, Defense News reported.
Russia may consider withdrawing from START treaty
In the meantime, if the US continues boosting its anti-missile capabilities through developing its missile defense system in Europe, Russia may eventually be forced to withdraw from the Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (START), the Russian Foreign Ministry’s top disarmament official, Mikhail Ulyanov, has warned.
“We are concerned that the US is continuing to build up missile defense capability without considering the interests and concerns of Russia,” Ulyanov told Interfax. “Such a policy can undermine strategic stability and lead to a situation where Russia will be forced to exercise [its] right of withdrawal from the [START] treaty.”
Ulyanov said that the legal basis for Moscow to scrap the START treaty is legislated for within the text of the agreement, which Russia says it has so far fully implemented. In certain exceptional cases, involving a known threat to national security, both Russia and the US have the option to quit the treaty.
“The statement on missile defense made by the Russian side on April 8, 2010, at the signing of the START Treaty, explicitly states that such exceptional circumstances include the build-up of missile defense systems by the United States, which threatens the potential of Russian Federation’s strategic nuclear forces,” Ulyanov said. “A similar [regulation] is contained in the Federal Law on the Ratification of the New START treaty.”
Ulyanov said that “at the current stage” Russian experts estimate that the US missile defense system “has not yet reached a level that would represent a threat to the efficiency of Russian strategic deterrence forces.”
Moscow hopes to eventually come to terms with Washington on the issue of European missile shield, Ulyanov said. “Such a chance, of course, remains, but everything depends on the political will of the US.”
The New START Treaty was signed between US and Russia in April 2010 and entered into force after ratification in February 2011. It is planned to last until at least 2021.
US-NATO War Crimes against Libya
By Ludwig Watzal | Dissident Voice | January 25, 2014
All the wars and attacks, which were started by the U. S. and its so-called allies in the wake of 9/11, have wreaked havoc. You name it, you got it: Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, Syria, Yemen, Somalia and perhaps even Iran. The Islamic Republic is not yet off the hook. There are strong forces in the U. S. and in the Middle East that prefer war to peace at the expense of the U. S. Right now, there is a war going on in Libya against the Western installed puppet government, without notice of the corporate media.
Cynthia McKinney, a former African-American Congresswoman has edited a book, The Illegal War on Libya (Clarity Press, Atlanta 2012), on the illegal war on Libya fought by NATO members with the support of the Arab League and some despotic Arab regimes. As a member of the Democratic Party, she served six terms in the House of Representatives before she was defeated by Denise Majette in the 2002 Democratic primary. McKinney’s loss was attributed to her support of Arab causes and to her suggestion that George W. Bush had advance knowledge of the 9/11 attacks.
Those whom the Western powers and their fawning media wish to destroy must first be demonised. This was exactly what happened to Libya’s leader Muammar al Gaddafi. Just before France, Great Britain and the U.S. started the war against Libya, Nikolas Sarkozy, Silvio Berlusconi and other Western politicians courted Gaddafi. When the Libyan leader visited Paris in 2007, he struck his tent in front of the guest house of the French government. His bizarre conduct and much more were accepted by Sarkozy in order to promote lucrative business with Libya. A few years later, he rewarded him with and his country with a bombing spree.
As a candidate for the U.S. Presidency, Barack Hussein Obama had nice things to say in December 2007: “The President does not have power under the Constitution to unilaterally authorize a military attack in a situation that does not involve stopping an actual or imminent threat to the nation.” After he became U.S. President, he expanded drone attacks to an unprecedented scale. “As the U.S. fires its drones killing innocent Somalis, Pakistanis, Yemenis, Afghanis, and others around the world, it is my hope that this book will provide a rare prism of truth through which to view NATO’s illegal war in Libya, current and future events, and US foreign relations as a whole,” so McKinney in her introductory remarks.
In her book, Cynthia McKinney has gathered a large number of renowned authors who offer an alternative perspective of the events in Libya. Some authors even risked their life by reporting live during the war. Among them are Mahdi Darius Nazemroaya, Julien Teil, Stephen Lendman, Christof Lehman, Sara Flounders, Wayne Madsen, Bob Fitrakis, and many others. All of them illuminate the dark machinations of the U.S. in Libya and elsewhere. Their narrative reminds the readers of the overthrow of the Iranian, Guatemalan or Chilean democracy by the U.S. for corporate benefit. The same apparently held true for Libya.
The essays in McKinney’s anthology describe the horrors caused by the Western bombing campaign and the distorted picture of the events painted by mainstream media. Lizzie Phelan refers to a “full blown media war” and to the silence of Western journalists while Libya was “being bombed into extermination.” Although they witnessed these horrors, they found “all manner of justifications for their self and collective delusion.” Their behavior reminded the author of the riddle: “If a tree falls in a forest, and no one is around to hear it, does it still make a sound?” The Western media pundits played down the horrendous crimes against the Libyan people by cartooning Gaddafi as a “mad dog.”
Stephen Lendman designated the crimes committed by NATO against Libya as amounting to “a Nuremberg Level.” He added: “The US-led NATO war on Libya will be remembered as one of history’s greatest crimes, violating the letter and spirit of international law and America’s Constitution.” Whereas the “Third Reich criminals were hanged for their crimes. America’s are still free to commit greater ones.” Lendman invokes General Wesley Clark who was told at the Pentagon a few days after 9/11, that the Bush administration had already decided to attack seven countries in five years, starting with Iraq and finishing off with Iran. According to Lendman, the U.S. won’t tolerate democratic rule in Libya, for it needs a puppet regime that would follow the dictates of Washington. Beyond that, the U.S. generously used terror weapons in all its wars. Weapons of mass destruction, including depleted and enriched uranium munitions were widely used in the different Iraq wars, leading to miscarriages and severe deformities by newborn babies.
The anthology also reveals that Gaddafi bore no responsibility for the Lockerbie incident. Although he took the blame and had Libya pay millions of U.S. Dollars to the families of the victims in order to have sanctions lifted against his country, the west thanked him by overthrowing his regime. Mahdi Darius Nazemroaya suggests that Libya’s main “crimes” – as seen by the West – were “how (Libya L.W.) distributed and used its wealth, its lack of external debts, and the key role it was attempting to play in continental development and curtailing of external influence in Africa. Tripoli was a spoiler that effectively undermined the interests of the former colonial powers.”
Already at the International Security Conference in Munich, 2007, then President of The Russian Federation, Vladimir Putin, used the strongest possible language to warn the U.S., saying that “its aggressive expansionism has brought the world closer to a third world war than it has ever been before.” So far, Putin’s diplomacy prevented U.S. aggression against Syria and Iran.
The book contains, inter alia, a scathing speech by Gaddafi, delivered at the United Nations General Assembly on September 23, 2009. A chronology of the NATO-led assault on Libya completes the book.
This book is a must-read. It gives its readers a premonition of things that are yet to come.
Dr. Ludwig Watzal works as a journalist and editor in Bonn, Germany. He runs the bilingual blog “Between the lines.” He can be reached at: www.watzal.com.
Saudi Arabia: A Retrograde Rentier Dictatorship and Global Terrorism
By James Petras | January 10, 2014
Saudi Arabia has all the vices and none of the virtues of an oil rich state like Venezuela. The country is governed by a family dictatorship which tolerates no opposition and severely punishes human rights advocates and political dissidents. Hundreds of billions in oil revenues are controlled by the royal despotism and fuel speculative investments the world over. The ruling elite relies on the purchase of Western arms and US military bases for protection. The wealth of productive nations is syphoned to enrich the conspicuous consumption of the Saudi ruling family. The ruling elite finances the most fanatical, retrograde, misogynist version of Islam, “Wahhabi” a sect of Sunni Islam.
Faced with internal dissent from repressed subjects and religious minorities, the Saudi dictatorship perceives threats and dangers from all sides: overseas, secular, nationalists and Shia ruling governments; internally, moderate Sunni nationalists, democrats and feminists; within the royalist cliques, traditionalists and modernizers. In response it has turned toward financing, training and arming an international network of Islamic terrorists who are directed toward attacking, invading and destroying regimes opposed to the Saudi clerical-dictatorial regime.
The mastermind of the Saudi terror network is Bandar bin Sultan, who has longstanding and deep ties to high level US political, military and intelligence officials. Bandar was trained and indoctrinated at Maxwell Air Force Base and Johns Hopkins University and served as Saudi Ambassador to the US for over two decades (1983-2005). Between 2005-2011 he was Secretary of the National Security Council and in 2012 he was appointed as Director General of the Saudi Intelligence Agency. Early on, Bandar became deeply immersed in clandestine terror operations working in liaison with the CIA. Among his numerous “dirty operations” with the CIA during the 1980s, Bandar channelled $32 million dollars to the Nicaragua Contra’s engaged in a terror campaign to overthrow the revolutionary Sandinista government in Nicaragua. During his tenure as ambassador he was actively engaged in protecting Saudi royalty with ties to the 9/11/01 bombing of the Triple Towers and the Pentagon. Suspicion that Bandar and his allies in the Royal family had prior knowledge of the bombings by Saudi terrorists (11 of the 19), is suggested by the sudden flight of Saudi Royalty following the terrorist act. US intelligence documents regarding the Saudi-Bandar connection are under Congressional review.
With a wealth of experience and training in running clandestine terrorist operations, derived from his two decades of collaboration with the US intelligence agencies, Bandar was in a position to organize his own global terror network in defense of the isolated retrograde and vulnerable Saudi despotic monarchy.
Bandar’s Terror Network
Bandar bin Sultan has transformed Saudi Arabia from an inward-looking, tribal based regime totally dependent on US military power for its survival, to a major regional center of a vast terror network, an active financial backer of right-wing military dictatorships (Egypt) and client regimes (Yemen) and military intervenor in the Gulf region (Bahrain). Bandar has financed and armed a vast array of clandestine terror operations, utilizing Islamic affiliates of Al Qaeda, the Saudi controlled Wahhabi sect as well as numerous other Sunni armed groups. Bandar is a “pragmatic” terrorist operator: repressing Al Qaeda adversaries in Saudi Arabia and financing Al Qaeda terrorists in Iraq, Syria, Afghanistan and elsewhere. While Bandar was a long-term asset of the US intelligence services, he has, more recently, taken an ‘independent course’ where the regional interests of the despotic state diverge from those of the US. In the same vein, while Saudi Arabia has a longstanding enmity toward Israel, Bandar has developed a “covert understanding” and working relationship with the Netanyahu regime, around their common enmity toward Iran and more specifically in opposition to the interim agreement between the Obama-Rohani regime.
Bandar has intervened directly or via proxies in reshaping political alignments, destabilizing adversaries and bolstering and expanding the political reach of the Saudi dictatorship from North Africa to South Asia, from the Russian Caucuses to the Horn of Africa, sometimes in concert with Western imperialism, other times projecting Saudi hegemonic aspirations.
North Africa: Tunisia, Morocco, Libya, and Egypt
Bandar has poured billions of dollars to bolster the right-wing pro-Islamic regimes in Tunisia and Morocco, ensuring that the mass pro-democracy movements would be repressed, marginalized and demobilized. Islamic extremists receiving Saudi financial support are encouraged to back the “moderate” Islamists in government by assassinating secular democratic leaders and socialist trade union leaders in opposition. Bandar’s policies largely coincide with those of the US and France in Tunisia and Morocco; but not in Libya and Egypt.
Saudi financial backing for Islamist terrorists and Al Qaeda affiliates against Libyan President Gadhafi were in-line with the NATO air war. However divergences emerged in the aftermath: the NATO backed client regime made up of neo-liberal ex-pats faced off against Saudi backed Al Qaeda and Islamist terror gangs and assorted tribal gunmen and marauders. Bandar funded Islamic extremists in Libya were bankrolled to extend their military operations to Syria, where the Saudi regime was organizing a vast military operation to overthrow the Assad regime. The internecine conflict between NATO and Saudi armed groups in Libya, spilled over and led to the Islamist murder of the US Ambassador and CIA operatives in Benghazi. Having overthrown Gadhafi, Bandar virtually abandoned interest in the ensuing blood bath and chaos provoked by his armed assets. They in turn, became self-financing – robbing banks, pilfering oil and emptying local treasuries – relatively “independent” of Bandar’s control.
In Egypt, Bandar developed, in coordination with Israel (but for different reasons), a strategy of undermining the relatively independent, democratically elected Muslim Brotherhood regime of Mohammed Morsi. Bandar and the Saudi dictatorship financially backed the military coup and dictatorship of General Sisi. The US strategy of a power-sharing agreement between the Muslim Brotherhood and the military regime, combining popular electoral legitimacy and the pro-Israel-pro NATO military was sabotaged. With a $15 billion aid package and promises of more to come, Bandar provided the Egyptian military a financial lifeline and economic immunity from any international financial reprisals. None were taken of any consequences. The military crushed the Brotherhood, jailed and threatened to execute its elected leaders. It outlawed sectors of the liberal-left opposition which it had used as cannon fodder to justify its seizure of power. In backing the military coup, Bandar eliminated a rival, democratically elected Islamic regime which stood in contrast to the Saudi despotism. He secured a like-minded dictatorial regime in a key Arab country, even though the military rulers are more secular, pro-Western, pro-Israel and less anti-Assad than the Brotherhood regime. Bandar’s success in greasing the wheels for the Egyptian coup secured a political ally but faces an uncertain future.
The revival of a new anti-dictatorial mass movement would also target the Saudi connection. Moreover Bandar undercut and weakened Gulf State unity: Qatar had financed the Morsi regime and was out $5 billion dollars it had extended to the previous regime.
Bandar’s terror network is most evident in his long-term large scale financing, arming, training and transport of tens of thousands of Islamic terrorist “volunteers” from the US, Europe, the Middle East, the Caucuses, North Africa and elsewhere. Al Qaeda terrorists in Saudi Arabia became “martyrs of Islam” in Syria. Dozens of Islamic armed gangs in Syria competed for Saudi arms and funds. Training bases with US and European instructors and Saudi financing were established in Jordan, Pakistan and Turkey. Bandar financed the major ‘rebel’ Islamic terrorist armed group, the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant, for cross border operations.
With Hezbollah supporting Assad, Bandar directed money and arms to the Abdullah Azzam Brigades in Lebanon to bomb South Beirut, the Iranian embassy and Tripoli. Bandar directed $3 billion to the Lebanese military with the idea of fomenting a new civil war between it and Hezbollah. In co-ordination with France and the US, but with far greater funding and greater latitude to recruit Islamic terrorist, Bandar assumed the leading role and became the principle director of a three front military and diplomatic offensive against Syria, Hezbollah and Iran. For Bandar, an Islamic takeover in Syria would lead to an Islamic Syrian invasion in support of Al Qaeda in Lebanon to defeat Hezbollah in hopes of isolating Iran. Teheran would then become the target of a Saudi-Israeli-US offensive. Bandar’s strategy is more fantasy then reality.
Bandar Diverges from Washington: the Offensive in Iraq and Iran
Saudi Arabia has been an extremely useful but sometimes out of control client of Washington. This is especially the case since Bandar has taken over as Intelligence chief: a long-time asset of the CIA he has also, at times, taken the liberty to extract “favors” for his services, especially when those “favors” enhance his upward advance within the Saudi power structure. Hence, for example, his ability to secure AWACs despite AIPAC opposition earned him merit points. As did Bandar’s ability to secure the departure of several hundred Saudi ‘royalty’ with ties to the 9/11 bombers, despite a high level national security lockdown in the aftermath of the bombing.
While there were episodic transgressions in the past, Bandar moved on to more serious divergences from US policy. He went ahead, building his own terror network, directed toward maximizing Saudi hegemony – even where it conflicted with US proxies, clients and clandestine operatives.
While the US is committed to backing the right-wing Maliki regime in Iraq, Bandar is providing political, military and financial backing to the Sunni terrorist “Islamic State of Iraq and Syria”. When the US negotiated the “interim agreement” with Iran Bandar voiced his opposition and “bought” support. Saudi signed off on a billion dollar arms agreement during French President Hollande’s visit, in exchange for greater sanctions on Iran. Bandar also expressed support for Israel’s use of the Zionist power configuration to influence the Congress, to sabotage US negotiations with Iran.
Bandar has moved beyond his original submission to US intelligence handlers. His close ties with past and present US and EU presidents and political influence have encouraged him to engage in “Big Power adventures.” He met with Russian President Putin to convince him to drop his support for Syria, offering a carrot or a stick: a multi-billion dollar arms sale for compliance and a threat to unleash Chechen terrorists to undermine the Sochi Olympics. He has turned Erdogan from a NATO ally supporting ‘moderate’ armed opponents to Bashar Assad, into embracing the Saudi backed ‘Islamic State of Iraq and Syria”, a terrorist Al Qaeda affiliate. Bandar has “overlooked” Erdogan’s “opportunist” efforts to sign off oil deals with Iran and Iraq, his continuing military arrangements with NATO and his past backing of the defunct Morsi regime in Egypt, in order to secure Erdogan’s support for the easy transit of large numbers of Saudi trained terrorists to Syria and probably Lebanon.
Bandar has strengthened ties with the armed Taliban in Afghanistan and Pakistan, arming and financing their armed resistance against the US, as well as offering the US a site for a ‘negotiated departure’.
Bandar is probably supporting and arming Uighur Muslim terrorists in western China, and Chechens and Caucasian Islamic terrorists in Russia, even as the Saudi’s expand their oil agreements with China and cooperate with Russia’s Gazprom.
The only region where the Saudi’s have exercised direct military intervention is in the Gulf min-state of Bahrain, where Saudi troops crushed the pro-democracy movement challenging the local despot.
Bandar: Global Terror on Dubious Domestic Foundations
Bandar has embarked on an extraordinary transformation of Saudi foreign policy and enhanced its global influence. All to the worst. Like Israel, when a reactionary ruler comes to power and overturns the democratic order, Saudi arrives on the scene with bags of dollars to buttress the regime. Whenever an Islamic terror network emerges to subvert a nationalist, secular or Shia regime, it can count on Saudi funds and arms. What some Western scribes euphemistically describe as “tenuous effort to liberalize and modernize” the retrograde Saudi regime, is really a military upgrade of its overseas terrorist activity. Bandar uses modern techniques of terror to impose the Saudi model of reactionary rule on neighboring and distant regimes with Muslim populations.
The problem is that Bandar’s “adventurous” large scale overseas operations conflict with some of the ruling Royal family’s “introspective” style of rule. They want to be left alone to accrue hundreds of billions collecting petrol rents, to invest in high-end properties around the world, and to quietly patronize high end call girls in Washington, London and Beirut while posing as pious guardians of Medina, Mecca, and the Holy sites. So far Bandar has not been challenged, because he has been careful to pay his respects to the ruling monarch and his inner circle. He has bought and brought Western and Eastern prime ministers, presidents, and other respectable notables to Riyadh to sign deals and pay compliments to the delight of the reigning despot. Yet his solicitous behavior to overseas Al Qaeda operations, his encouraging Saudi extremists to go overseas and engage in terrorist wars, disturbs monarchical circles. They worry that Saudi trained, armed and knowledgeable terrorists — dubbed as “holy warriors” — may return from Syria, Russia, and Iraq and bomb the King’s palaces. Moreover, overseas regimes targeted by Bandar’s terror network may retaliate: Russia or Iran, Syrians, Egyptians, Pakistanis, Iraqis may just sponsor their own instruments of retaliation. Despite the hundreds of billions spent on arms purchases, the Saudi regime is very vulnerable on all levels. Apart from tribal legions, the billionaire elite have little popular support and even less legitimacy. It depends on overseas migrant labor, foreign “experts” and US military forces. The Saudi elite is also despised by the most religious of the Wahhabi clergy for allowing “infidels” on sacred terrain. While Bandar extends Saudi power abroad, the domestic foundations of rule are narrowing. While he defies US policymakers in Syria, Iran and Afghanistan, the regime depends on the US Air Force and Seventh Fleet to protect it from a growing array of adversarial regimes.
Bandar, with his inflated ego, may believe that he is a “Saladin” building a new Islamic empire, but in reality, by waving one finger his patron monarch can lead to his rapid dismissal. One too many provocative civilian bombings by his Islamic terrorist beneficiaries can lead to an international crises leading to Saudi Arabia becoming the target of world opprobrium.
In reality, Bandar bin Sultan is the protégé and successor of Bin Laden; he has deepened and systematized global terrorism. Bandar’s terror network has murdered far more innocent victims than Bin Laden. That, of course, is to be expected; after all he has billions of dollars from the Saudi treasury, training from the CIA and the handshake of Netanyahu!
The Unwelcome Return of Navi Pillay
By Daniel McAdams | Ron Paul Institute | December 3, 2013
You could very well say that Navi Pillay was more than anyone else the person responsible for NATO’s disastrous invasion of Libya. As UN Human Rights Commissioner she chaired that fateful meeting in February, 2011 where Libyan NGO leader Soliman Bouchuiguir was allowed to repeat incredible tales about the “massacres” taking place in Libya – tales he openly admitted after the NATO invasion he had just made up. “There is no evidence,” he exclaimed when asked after the invasion to back up his claims, which were the basis of the chain of events that led to NATO bombing.
The first link in that chain was the UN Human Rights Commission hearing chaired by Pillay, where Bouchuiguir’s lies led to the suspension of Libya from that body and the referral of the Libya issue to the UN Security Council. At the hearing, Pillay took her cue from the falsifier Bouchuiguir, exclaiming that, “The Libyan leader must stop the violence now.” Eventually the Security Council passed Resolution 1973, cracking the interventionist door to Libya, which NATO very soon kicked open.
Commissioner Pillay wasted no time setting her “humanitarian interventionist” sights on another crisis just waiting for a military solution. As early as August, 2011 she began urging the International Criminal Court to take up the case against the Syrian government, which was fighting against a foreign-sponsored insurgency seeking its overthrow. Never mind the illegality of her position urging the overthrow of a sovereign state, Pillay has argued relentlessly from the beginning in favor of a Libya-style NATO invasion of Syria.
Now Pillay is back in the news, releasing an incredibly dubious “report” concluding that the Syria government is guilty of war crimes in its fight against a foreign-sponsored insurgency. Pillay’s methodology would be laughed out of any courtroom except perhaps those of Stalin’s show trials. Her “investigators” had no access to Syria, conducted no on-the-ground investigations, but instead conducted their interviews in neighboring countries or via Skype. As with her previously discredited Libya claims, there is no independent verification of her findings, no way of even knowing who she talked to in the collection of this “evidence.” In fact, she would not even reveal the names of the accused, a list of perpetrators which she claims was secretly handed to her. No, she prefers to keep her information secret in hopes that the International Criminal Court would finally take up her case against the Syrian government.
Pillay’s fanaticism and the religious fervor of her devotion to the doctrine of “humanitarian interventionism” harkens back to an earlier era where the murder of millions was justified in pursuit of the historical inevitability of utopia on earth. It is a dangerous and deadly philosophy, which justifies all manner of death and destruction. The oft-cited C.S. Lewis quote comes most often to mind when thoughts wander to the Navi Pillays of the world:
Of all tyrannies, a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It would be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron’s cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end for they do so with the approval of their own conscience.
Lavrov: No need for European missile defense shield if Iran deal a success
RT | November 25, 2013
Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov says the US will no longer have a reason to build the long-touted missile defense shield in Europe, if Iran fulfills its obligations in the recently-signed nuclear program deal.
“If the Iran deal is put into practice, the stated reason for the construction of the defense shield will no longer apply,” Lavrov told journalists in Rome.
NATO is currently rolling out its new Europe-wide missile defense shield, which will include two interceptor bases close to the Russian border in Romania and Poland, with the first of the first ground missiles becoming operational in 2015. The bases will be able to shoot down short and medium-range ballistic missiles.
Russia has long protested at the placement of such bases on its borders, but during both, the Bush era and Obama’s terms, Washington has insisted that the bases are primarily directed against a potential threat from Iran, and are too close to Russia to stop any of its nuclear warheads.
On Sunday, Iran agreed to curtail its nuclear program in exchange for a loosening of substantial EU and US sanctions that have crippled its economy.
The initial term of the deal is six months, though both sides hope this will lead to a permanent rapprochement after a stand-off that lasted a decade, during which the West accused Iran of attempting to acquire a nuclear weapon, while Iran denied this, insisting that it was entitled to enrich uranium.
US Secretary of State John Kerry, while visiting Europe earlier this month, said that the deployment of the missile shield was not likely to be contingent on improving relations with Iran.
“Nothing has changed at this point and I don’t foresee it changing,” he said.
The current European Phased Adaptive Approach (EPAA) missile defense system was adopted by the White House in 2009. It generally uses more established technologies than President George W. Bush’s expensive and ambitious system that first aroused Russia’s ire over five years ago. The most ambitious phase of the program, initially scheduled to begin next decade, was also canceled earlier this year.
Nonetheless, negotiations about Moscow’s potential involvement in the defense shield have broken down over a lack of trust, and the recent groundbreaking ceremony at NATO’s base in Romania was swiftly followed by an unannounced test of Russia’s newest ballistic missiles as well as international patrols by its strategic bombers.
Lavrov recently called missile defense a “burning issue” in Moscow-Washington relations, and said that Russia will soften its stance on the Eastern European bases only if NATO provides written assurances that they will never be used to shoot down Russian missiles, a request it has repeatedly rejected.
Related article
- NATO building anti-missile shield in Romania (voiceofrussia.com)
Thousands block NATO convoy route to protest US drone strikes in Pakistan
RT | November 23, 2013
Thousands of demonstrators protesting US drone strikes in Pakistan blocked a main road Saturday in the Peshawar province used to transport NATO supplies to and from Afghanistan.
The protests was led by the Pakistan Tehrik-e-Insaf (PTI) party, which is led by Imran Khan, a former international cricketer now turned politician.
They were supported by their allies in the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa provincial government and they were also joined by the Jamaat -i-Islami (JI) and the Awami Jamhoori Ittehad (AJIP) political parties.
“We will put pressure on America, and our protest will continue if drone attacks are not stopped,” Khan told reporters.
“We are here to give a clear message that now Pakistanis cannot remain silent over drone attacks,” said Shah Mehmood Qureshi, a senior member of the PTI, addressing the protesters.
Imran Khan has been a fierce critic of US drone attacks, arguing that they violate Pakistan’s sovereignty. Khan said that the Pakistani government is doing nothing to stop drone attacks except for issuing statements of condemnation and that the protest would continue indefinitely.
Khan stressed that NATO supplies would not be allowed to pass through Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, formerly called North-West Frontier Province, and added that the province’s PTI-led government had the mandate to block NATO trucks from passing through its territory.
Earlier Imran Khan had warned that NATO supply routes will be blocked if continuing US drone strikes in Pakistan threaten the country’s peace talks with the Taliban.
An attack on November 1 killed the former leader of the Pakistan Taliban, a day before the Pakistani government said it was going to invite him to peace talks. Officials said they were enraged by the attacks, although the Pakistani government is known to have supported some of the drone attacks in the past.
Party workers from the PTI and the JI travelled to Peshawar from across Pakistan and an estimated 10,000 people participated in Saturday’s protests. The protesters shouted anti US slogans such as “Stop drone attacks” and “Down with America”.
“I am participating in today’s sit-in to convey a message to America that we hate them since they are killing our people in drone attacks. America must stop drone attacks for peace in our country,” Hussain Shah, a 21 year old university student, told Dawn, Pakistan’s oldest and most widely read English-language newspaper.
American drones are performing regular extrajudicial killings of Islamist leaders, accompanied by the collateral damage of many civilian casualties.
Strict security measures were in place Saturday, with 500 police personnel on duty. Trucks were directed to use an alternative route, although Tahir Khan, a government official, said there was normally little NATO traffic Saturday as most of the trucks arrive by Friday night to clear the border crossing.
However, protesters said that they would begin to stop trucks carrying NATO supplies through Khyber Pakhtunkhwa from Sunday night, which could spark conflict with the federal government in Pakistan.
The US embassy in Islamabad declined to comment.
On common causes and ethical compromises
Interventions Watch | November 23, 2013
Pulse Media have recently released an open letter, apparently authored and circulated by people associated with the Syrian opposition, addressing why they feel the inclusion of Mother Agnes Mariam at the upcoming Stop the War Conference should be ‘a “red line” for opponents of conflict’ (emphasis mine).
The letter is signed by 55 activists, journalists, politicians and academics, and I just want to review how ‘opposed’ to ‘conflict’ some of them actually are.
There’s no point in beating around the bush, so let’s get straight into it:
- 1. Prof. Gilbert Achcar, SOAS
In March 2011, as the NATO bombing campaign against Libya was in full swing, Achcar wrote an article for Znet expressing how he thought ‘it was just morally and politically wrong for anyone on the left to oppose the no-fly zone’ – that is, the NATO bombing of Libya, given enforcing a ‘no-fly zone’ always entails bombing, because that is basic military doctrine for this kind of operation. Achcar continues to strenuously deny supporting the ‘no-fly zone’, but I’ll leave it for others to decide whether there is a great deal of difference between him supporting it, and calling on others not to oppose it/try and stop it. He wasn’t, in any case, an ‘opponent’ of that aspect of the ‘conflict’ in Libya.
Achcar also supports sending arms to the Syrian rebels, writing that ‘it is the duty of all those who claim to support the right of peoples to self-determination to help the Syrian people get the means of defending themselves’ (aid agencies, meanwhile, have argued that the further provision of arms will deepen the humanitarian disaster).
- 2. Assaad al-Achi, Local Coordination Committees in Syria
The Local Coordination Committees have in the recent past issued press releases basically welcoming Western military intervention – as long as it’s not too limited, warning that ‘A limited strike to merely warn Assad will lead to nothing but increase in his violence’, and then arguing that ‘Any strike to the regime must aim to paralyze, with attention and precision, its Air Forces, artillery, and missiles arsenal’. Regardless of the rights and wrongs of their position, it is not one that is ‘opposed’ to ‘conflict’, but rather supports the escalation and further internationalization of the conflict.
- 3. Rime Allaf, Syrian writer
Allaf recently wrote an article for The Guardian calling for ‘real friends of Syria’ to ‘break Assad’s siege’ and ‘neutralise his air power’. Which they could only do via a military strike, obviously, so her words are a non-too-subtle call for military intervention.
- 4. Omar al-Assil, Syrian Non-Violence Movement
I could find nothing to indicate the above is pro-military intervention.
- 5. Hussam Ayloush, Chairman, Syrian American Council
In September 2013, Ayloush re-posted an article calling for military intervention in Syria on his blog, writing that ‘I agree with the message and decided to share it too’.
- 6. Noor Barotchi, Bradford Syria Solidarity
When Israel bombed Syria in May 2013, Barotchi wrote that ‘I shall not condemn it’, and that she was ‘bothered by . . . people condemning the act’.
7. Mark Boothroyd, International Socialist Network
8. Kat Burdon-Manley, International Socialist Network
9. Clara Connolly, Human Rights lawyer
I could find nothing to indicate the three people above are pro-military intervention.
- 10. Paul Conroy, photojournalist
Conroy has been calling for ‘no-fly zones and safe havens’ within Syria which, the Orwellian language aside, are both forms of military intervention.
- 11. Donnacha DeLong, National Union of Journalists
In November 2011, DeLong wrote in Ceasefire magazine of the NATO bombing of Libya: ‘what was the alternative? . . . It was NATO or nothing and I’m glad it wasn’t the latter’, while decrying ‘The knee-jerk condemnation of NATO intervention’.
- 12.Hannah Elsisi, Egyptian Revolutionary Socialist
I could find nothing to indicate the above is pro-military intervention.
- 13. Raed Fares, Head of Kafranabel Media Centre
As reported by The New York Times, in September, when U.S. airstrikes against Syria were being seriously discussed, Fares sent a video to U.S. members of Congress to let them know ‘what the Syrian people inside Syria feel and think about the strike’. The article goes on to say that the video ‘aims directly at American skepticism about another war and recent protests that featured antiwar slogans’. From the context, it’s clear that the video was designed to drum up support among U.S. lawmakers for a U.S. military strike on Syria.
- 14. Naomi Foyle, writer and co-ordinator of British Writers in Support of Palestine
I could find nothing to indicate the above is pro-military intervention.
- 15. Razan Ghazzawi, Syrian blogger and activist
I could find nothing to indicate the above is pro-military intervention.
- 16. Christine Gilmore, Leeds Friends of Syria
Here’s Christine Gilmore speaking in favour of military intervention in Syria on the BBC in August.
- 17. Golan Haji, poet and translator
I could find nothing to indicate the above is pro-military intervention.
- 18. Marcus Halaby, staff writer, Workers Power
In August, Halaby – while renouncing overt military intervention – wrote that ‘we should be demanding aid without strings to the Syrian people’, including ‘the sort of heavy weaponry the fighters need’.
- 19. Sam Charles Hamad, activist
I could find nothing to indicate the above is pro-military intervention.
- 20. Nebal Istanbouly, Office Manager of the National Coalition for Syrian Revolutionary and Opposition Forces (SOC) in the UK
When asked by The Egypt Independent whether the NCSROF supported military strikes against Syria, the head of the organisation, Ahmad Jarba, replied ‘Yes, but on the condition to preserve the lives of civilians whether supporters or opponents. This strike will be certain and directed against military sites under the control of the regime. We bless this strike as it will destroy the vehicles which kill the Syrian people mercilessly’.
- 21. Tehmina Kazi, human rights activist
I could find nothing to indicate the two people above are pro-military intervention.
- 22. Ghalia Kabbani, Syrian journalist and writer
I could find nothing to indicate the two people above are pro-military intervention.
- 23. Khaled Khalifa, Syrian writer
I could find nothing to indicate the above is pro-military intervention.
- 24. Malik Little, blogger
When the threat of U.S. lead military action against Syria began to subside in October, Little wrote a blog post lamenting what he called the ‘victory’ of the anti-war movement, describing the U.S. military as ‘the only force capable of ending the bloody stalemate’, and ending with ‘The movement to stop U.S. military action failed in 2003 and succeeded in 2013. In both cases, the result was needless bloodshed and brutality borne by people far from our shores’.
- 25. Amer Scott Masri, Scotland4Syria
On 5th September, at the height of the debate over whether the U.S. et al should bomb Syria, the Scotland4Syria Facebook page published a post arguing that ‘War is an evil thing, BUT it becomes necessary when a fascist and criminal dictator like Assad of Syria commits genocide on innocent men, women and children’.
- 26. Margaret McAdam, Unite Casa Branch NW567 (pc)
I could find nothing to indicate the above is pro-military intervention.
- 27. Yassir Munif, sociologist and activist
I could find nothing to indicate the above is pro-military intervention.
- 28. Tom Mycock, Unite shop steward (pc)
I could find nothing to indicate the above is pro-military intervention.
- 29. Maryam Namazie, Spokesperson, Council of Ex-Muslims of Britain and Fitnah – Movement for Women’s Liberation
I could find nothing to indicate the above is pro-military intervention.
- 30. Tim Nelson, Unison Shop Steward (pc)
I could find nothing to indicate the above is pro-military intervention.
- 31. Louis Proyect, Counterpunch contributor
Wrote in June 2013 that he was ‘buoyed by the knowledge that most Arabs and Muslims are sickened by Bashar al-Assad and would like to see him overthrown by any means necessary, even with weapons procured from Satan’s grandmother’. Which implies that he wouldn’t be too bothered to see the U.S. et all supplying weapons to the opposition. Polls published at roughly the same time, incidentally, showed majority opposition in the middle east to ‘the West’ supplying arms.
- 32. Martin Ralph, VP Liverpool TUC (pc)
I could find nothing to indicate the above is pro-military intervention.
- 33. Ruth Riegler, co-founder of Radio Free Syria, Syrian International Media Alliance
I could find nothing to indicate the above is pro-military intervention, but she has been extremely critical of the anti-war movement since long before this Agnes controversy.
- 34. Mary Rizzo, activist, translator and blogger
I could find nothing to indicate the above is pro-military intervention. [Aletho News – Mary Rizzo maintains a blog dedicated to western military interventions. The blog was initiated during the campaign for bombing Libya. Mary writes original content promoting R2P as well as aggregating and disseminating the work of others.]
- 35. Christopher Roche and Dima Albadra, Bath Solidarity
Around about the time that the British parliament voted not to military intervene in Syria, Roche re-tweeted a number of things which strongly suggested he was in favour of the intervention.
- 36. Walid Saffour, Representative of the National Coalition for Syrian Revolutionary and Opposition Forces (SOC) in the UK
When asked by The Egypt Independent whether the NCSROF supported military strikes against Syria, the head of the organisation, Ahmad Jarba, replied ‘Yes, but on the condition to preserve the lives of civilians whether supporters or opponents. This strike will be certain and directed against military sites under the control of the regime. We bless this strike as it will destroy the vehicles which kill the Syrian people mercilessly’.
- 37. Gita Sahgal, Centre for Secular Space
I could find nothing to indicate the above is pro-military intervention.
- 38. David St Vincent, contributing writer and editor, National Geographic Books
I could find nothing to indicate the above is pro-military intervention.
- 39. Reem Salahi, civil rights lawyer
Has written that while she is ‘ambivalent about U.S. intervention’ in Syria given the U.S. track record, she thinks ‘There is something to be said when Syrians in Syria are calling for the U.S. to intervene’.
- 40. Salim Salamah, Palestinian blogger
I could find nothing to indicate the above is pro-military intervention.
- 41. Yassin al-Haj Saleh, Syrian writer
Wrote in a New York Times editorial in September, when the debate over whether to directly militarily intervene in Syria or not was raging, that ‘A half-hearted intervention will not be enough. The United States and those who join it must not simply “discipline” the regime for its use of chemical weapons alone, without making a decisive impact on events in Syria. To do so would be a waste of effort and send the wrong message’.
- 42. Richard Seymour, author
I could find nothing to indicate the above is pro-military intervention.
- 43. Bina Shah, author and contributor to the International New York Times
I could find nothing to indicate the above is pro-military intervention.
- 44. Leila Shrooms, founding member of Tahrir-ICN
I could find nothing to indicate the above is pro-military intervention.
- 45. Luke Staunton, International Socialist Network
I could find nothing to indicate the above is pro-military intervention.
- 46. KD Tait, National Secretary, Workers Power
Has written that her organisation is calling ‘for weapons for the revolutionaries’ (see 6th comment down).
- 47. Peter Tatchell, human rights campaigner
Tatchell has been calling for a ‘no-fly zone’ over Syria for months, including at anti-war demos. He denies that he is pro-war in regards to Syria, but the imposition of a ‘no-fly zone’ is an inescapably pro-war demand.
- 48. Paris Thompson, International Socialist Network
I could find nothing to indicate the above is pro-military intervention.
- 49. Hassan Walid, Anas el-Khani and Abdulwahab Sayyed Omar, British Solidarity for Syria
When the U.K. Parliament voted against taking military action against Syria, Sayed Omar, spokesman for BBS, described it as ‘a celebration of brutal dictatorship’. He attacked the ‘excuses’ that some MPs used to justify voting against the the the intervention, and described calls for a diplomatic solution as ‘naive’. He goes on to lament that ‘when Syrians ask you for arms in order to fight him you refuse’. He finishes by saying that ‘Your vote last night means that this nation cannot call itself “Great” any longer’. Which is all strongly indicative that he was in favour of military intervention (see post dated August 31st).
- 50. Robin Yassin-Kassab, author and co-editor of Critical Muslim
Yassin-Kassab was an outspoken supporter of the NATO intervention in Libya. He has also written in regards to Syria that ‘At some point . . . key sections of the military and the Alawi community will realize they have no hope of victory, and will either flee or switch sides. I would prefer this moment to come in a year’s time or sooner, not in another decade. Arming Syria’s guerrillas is the only way to bring about that result’.
- 51. Qusai Zakariya, activist from Moadamiyeh, Syria
I could find nothing to indicate the above is pro-military intervention.
- 52. Nisreen al-Zaraee and Wisam al-Hamoui, Freedom Days
I could find nothing to indicate the above are pro-military intervention.
- 53. Tasneem al-Zeer, activist
I could find nothing to indicate the above is pro-military intervention.
- 54. Razan Zeitouneh, human rights lawyer
Has lamented the fact that the West is refusing ‘to do what it should do under the pretext of not turning Syria into a second Iraq’, and their refusal to ‘to deliver effective weapons or to create a no-fly zone and safe areas for civilians’.
- 55. Ziauddin Sardar, writer, journalist and editor of the Critical Muslim
I could find nothing to indicate the above is pro-military intervention.
So of the 55 signatories, I’d say around 20 of them either openly favour direct or indirect military intervention in Syria; have made comments strongly suggesting they do; or are on the fence somewhat.
My intention here absolutely isn’t to ‘name and shame’.
I’m sure many of the people on the list above who are in favour of military intervention in Syria – direct or indirect, overt or covert, arms or airstrikes – are so because they sincerely believe that it is the best way to ease the suffering in the country, and bring about a freer and more just political order. Especially those who are Syrian themselves.
I disagree with them that this is the best way, of course, given the track records of those who would likely be doing the ‘intervening’ (it’s 99.99% certain that it’d be U.S. lead) – they’ve tended to leave a trail of corpses and carnage behind them wherever they’ve bombed, invaded or subverted, rather than flourishing, peaceful democracies. Perhaps because encouraging peace and democracy isn’t their aim. I also don’t believe there is any such thing as a ‘humanitarian’ bomb or bullet, and am of the opinion that the attempt to re-brand predatory war as a humanitarian endeavor is one of the Big Lies of the age.
But I do think there’s a double standard in play when supporters of military intervention in Syria are accusing others of ‘greasing the skids of the regime’s war machine’, while they grease the skids of the U.S. et al war machine, and implicitly present themselves as ‘opponents of conflict’. Clearly, many of them aren’t.
And are not the supporters of military intervention in Syria in effect playing a role in minimising the dangers posed by the U.S./et al, by arguing like the aforementioned’s predatory, self-interested militarism and ultra violence – which has historically killed far more people than the Assad regime’s – is somehow more acceptable, more morally and politically tolerable, than Assad’s is, even if they recognise the dangers?
I also think there’s somewhat of a double standard in play when opponents of any military intervention can come together with supporters of such an intervention to, despite their differences, denounce the fact that Mother Agnes was invited to speak at the Stop the War conference.
Are we to believe that it’s fine for opponents and supporters of military intervention to put their differences to one side to pursue a common goal (in this case, trying to get Mother Agnes removed from the Stop the War platform), but not fine for opponents of the Assad regime to put aside their differences with an with alleged supporter of the Assad regime to pursue theirs (in this case, preventing a U.S. lead military strike on Syria, a far worse scenario than Mother Agnes being allowed to speak)?
Because that appears to be the message.
Ultimately, if the question is ‘Should Agnes have been invited to address the Stop the War conference?’, then I can see that there is a principled argument against it.
But if the question is ‘Should people be withdrawing just because she was?’, then not in my book. Not unless they’re going to be consistent in applying those principles, by refusing to participate in any campaign or on any platform that might be patronised by any person whose views they otherwise don’t like or approve of.
And for a start, that certainly hasn’t been the case in regards to the literary platform that Pulses’ letter provides.
Related articles
Western logic on Syria: ‘We need to bomb it to save it’
RT | August 27, 2013
The military buildup in the Mediterranean indicates that Assad’s opponents intend to militarily intervene in Syria under cover of ‘humanitarian intervention’, a disingenuous narrative that could not be further from the truth.
Pictures and videos that have surfaced following the alleged use of chemical agents in the eastern suburbs of Damascus are profoundly disturbing and a thorough and substantial investigation into what took place there is absolutely essential. However, it is conversely disturbing that those Western governments who have staunchly supported anti-government militants are using this opportunity to legitimize the use of force against the government in Damascus.
The United States, Britain, and France are unwavering in their assertions that the Assad government and the Syrian Arab army were the perpetrators of the chemical weapon attack, despite no evidence to substantiate these claims. These governments seem to be sure that Damascus is guilty on the basis of it preventing a UN investigation team from visiting the site, and when investigators eventually did reach the area, it didn’t matter to them because they argued that the Syrian government had destroyed all evidence of wrongdoing.
Assad’s opponents have constructed a deeply cynical and hysterical political narrative that Western leaders are now parroting in unison.
There are several reasons why Damascus showed hesitation in allowing UN inspectors to access the site, the most apparent being that this attack allegedly took place in rebel-held strongholds on the outskirts of the capital, and that the security of the UN team could not be guaranteed if rebels attacked them or launched more chemical weapons during their visit.
Syrian rebels have demonstrated their hostility to UN forces on previous occasions; anti-government groups kidnapped 21 UN peacekeepers in the Golan Heights in March, and another four peacekeepers later in May. That the UN convoy was fired upon by unidentified snipers is hardly surprising in that it is another stunt in a series of moves to escalate the situation to provoke an international response.
The UN team eventually made it to the site to collect evidence and, contrary to Western assertions, the UN claimed that it was still possible for the team of experts to gather necessary evidence despite the time elapsed since the alleged attack.
Who benefits from using chemical weapons?
The narrative that the Assad government used chemical weapons, specifically while a UN team was in Damascus to investigate previous uses of chemical weapons, is tactically and politically illogical and in no way serves the interests of the Syrian government.
These attacks transparently serve the interests of anti-government militias who have long called for NATO intervention, as well as the Syrian political opposition who are now refusing to take part in any planned Geneva negotiations. Furthermore, allegations that the regime used chemical weapons benefits the international opponents of Assad, who have materially and financially aided and armed non-state actors and foreign fighters on an unprecedented scale.
Above all, the use of chemical weapons benefits the arms industry, as four US warships with ballistic missiles are moving into position in the eastern Mediterranean Sea, ready to shower Damascus with Tomahawk cruise missiles – all under the auspices of protecting civilians. Lockheed Martin’s stock prices have dramatically shot up since news of the chemical weapons attack.
There are numerous revelations that would suggest that anti-government militias have access to these weapons and are in fact guilty of using them. Carla Del Ponte, head of a UN commission of inquiry that looked into the use of chemical weapons in northern Syria in late March suggested that the evidence was stronger to implicate anti-government militants in using chemical weapons, not the Syrian government.
In May, Turkish police found cylinders of sarin nerve gas in the homes of Syrian militants from the Al-Qaeda-linked Al-Nusra Front who were detained in the south near Syria’s northern border. In July, Russian experts submitted reports to the UN detailing how the missiles used in previous chemical weapon attacks were crude and not factory made, and that the chemical components found were not consistent with what the Syrian military has.
The Syrian military has just recently discovered chemical weapons in a rebel tunnel in the Jobar suburb of Damascus, including shells, gasmasks manufactured in the United States, chemical substances of Saudi Arabian origin. Arabic language reports also indicate that a former high-ranking Saudi Arabian member of Al-Nusra Front claimed that the group possessed chemical weapons in a tweet.
NATO intervention replicating the Kosovo model?
The speeches and statements from John Kerry, Laurent Fabius, or William Hague all imply that military action will be taken against Damascus despite lacking a legal basis of action. If ‘humanitarian intervention’ were to be undertaken, it would need approval from the UNSC in the form of a resolution, but such a resolution would not be passed because countries such as Russia believe that this kind of intervention would be used as a pretext to remove the legal government of Syria, as it has been used in the recent past in the former Yugoslavia, Iraq and Libya – all with undeniable abuses of force that have resulted in substantial civilian casualties.
Reports indicate that Obama’s team is now studying the NATO mission in Kosovo as a “possible blueprint for acting without a mandate from the United Nations.” It is ominous, alarming and bizarre how NATO’s intervention in the former Yugoslavia could be used a positive reference point for anything. NATO rained down bombs for 78 straight days, effectively smashing civilian infrastructure in Serbia and Montenegro while hospitals, schools, and public utilities were damaged beyond repair, killing over 1,200 civilians and injuring 4,500 more.
Despite Obama’s cautious tone in recent interviews, all indications point to military intervention already being decided. Carla Del Ponte’s assessment was whitewashed, and any other evidence provided by the UN that does not fit conveniently into the Western narrative will be suppressed – the US position is that it is already “too late” for any evidence to be credible.
The huge military buildup of US and British ships and warplanes in the Mediterranean comes while the Pentagon is reportedly making the initial preparations for a cruise missile attack on Syrian government forces.
The intransigence and cynical duplicity of Assad’s opponents is unparalleled, and their media outlets are complicit in pulling the heart strings of their audiences while offering a totally one-sided perspective in support of R2P, the ‘right to protect.’
The US, Britain, and France see themselves as righteous protectors, and rationality and evidence will not be enough to break their dangerous and ridiculous delusions; these states are the vanguards of militant corporatism and have demonstrated that they seek only their private economic and geopolitical objectives in the region.
Those countries that represent a balanced approach to this crisis should not stand idly by while the West ‘comes to the aid’ of the Syrian people with cruise missiles and airstrikes – they should not allow intervention under ‘humanitarian’ auspices to harm civilians and topple the legal authorities in Damascus.
Related articles
- Hysteria around chemical attack suits those who want military intervention in Syria – Lavrov (rt.com)
- Russia ‘regrets’ US decision to shelve Syria talks (alethonews.wordpress.com)
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From the Archives
Secret document reveals plans for civil war in Lebanon, Israeli false flags, and invasion
By Randi Nord | Geopolitics Alert | April 5, 2019
Beirut – During his visit with US Secretary of State, Mike Pompeo, Lebanese President Michael Aoun reportedly received a US-Israeli document detailing plans for creating a civil war in Lebanon with covert false flag operations and possible Israeli invasion.
Although the source of the document is Israeli and created in partnership with Washington, no one knows who presented it to Aoun. The Lebanese TV station, Al-Jadeed, initially reported the document on Lebanese TV and a video on its website. Geopolitics Alert translated the report for this article. … continue
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