The Real News Network – How would a US-Iran war begin? Part 5

October 12, 2009Leave a comment

Beneath the hype: Ray McGovern and Greg Thielmann on the potential causes of armed conflict in Iran

“Don’t be nonchalant about an attack on Iran, it won’t work,” claims former CIA Senior Analyst Ray McGovern. Together with Iraq WMD whistle-blower Greg Thielmann, the two intelligence experts break down the various means at Iran’s disposal of responding to US-Israeli provocations or attacks. Their conclusion is that the US government’s strategic best interest is clearly cooperation with Iran, but such a move requires a break with the Israeli government, not a commonly held position amongst politicians in the US.

Bio
Ray McGovern is a retired CIA officer. McGovern was employed under seven US presidents for over 27 years, presenting the morning intelligence briefings at the White House under Presidents Ronald Reagan and George H.W. Bush. McGovern was born and raised in the Bronx, graduated summa cum laude from Fordham University, received an M.A. in Russian Studies from Fordham, a certificate in Theological Studies from Georgetown University, and graduated from Harvard Business School’s Advanced Management Program.

Greg Thielmann is a Senior Fellow at the Arms Control Association, located in Washington, DC. Thielmann came to fame in 2003 when he quit his position as director of the Strategic, Proliferation and Military Affairs Office at the State Department’s Intelligence Bureau, citing the manufacturing of intelligence concerning the Iraqi government’s weapons program. He openly criticized the false information that was then used to gain support for launching the US-led invasion and occupation of Iraq. This brought an end to a 25-year career in the US foreign service officer.

Is Canada More pro-Israel than the U.S.? By Yves Engler

October 12, 2009Leave a comment

12 October, 2009 — Electronic Intifada

In June, Israel began barring some North Americans with Palestinian-sounding names entry through Ben Gurion Airport. Forced to reroute through a land-border crossing that connects the West Bank with Jordan, their passports were stamped ‘Palestinian Authority only,’ which prevents them from entering Israel proper.

The Obama Administration objected to the move by Israel that discriminates against American citizens of Palestinian origin. However, there has been no protest from Ottawa even though Time magazine and the Israeli daily Haaretz ran lengthy articles focusing on Palestinian Canadian businessmen harmed by this new policy. A few weeks ago the Globe and Mail reported that ‘Although some of the most high-profile cases of individuals being turned away involve Canadian citizens, the Harper government has, so far, made no protest.’

This silence bolsters claims by some commentators that under Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s Conservative government, Canada has become (at least diplomatically) the most pro-Israel country in the world. Israeli officials concur. After meeting Canada’s Foreign Affairs Minister, four other Conservative ministers and Liberal leader Michael Ignatieff in July 2009, Israeli Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman, who has openly called for the expulsion of Palestinian citizens of Israel, commented:

‘It’s hard to find a country friendlier to Israel than Canada these days. Members both of the coalition and the opposition are loyal friends to us, both with regard to their worldview and their estimation of the situation in everything related to the Middle East, North Korea, Iran, Sudan and Somalia. No other country in the world has demonstrated such full understanding of us.’

Continue reading →

Israel’s Religious Right and the Peace Process’ By Nicolas Pelham

October 12, 2009Leave a comment

12 October, 2009 — Middle East Report Online

For background on the 2008 Acre incidents, see Peter Lagerquist, “Recipe for a Riot: Parsing Israel’s Yom Kippur Upheavals,” Middle East Report Online (October 2008).

For background on the settlers and disengagement, see Peretz Kidron, “Orange Rampant,” Middle East Report Online, July 15, 2005.

It would be easy to describe the residents of the outpost of Amona as radicals. In February 2006 they led protests of 4,000 settler activists, some of them armed, against 3,000 Israeli police who were amassed to make sure that nine unauthorized structures in the West Bank were bulldozed as ordered. In the ensuing clashes, 80 security personnel and 120 settlers were wounded, more than the entirety of the casualties during the 2005 “disengagement” from settlements in Gaza, in a showdown that became the symbol of the West Bank settlers’ resolve to resist the state’s efforts to tear down encampments, like their own, that were erected without the state’s permission. “How do I explain to my children that the army that came to protect us behaves like our enemy?” laments Amona resident Irit Levinger.

But what is disturbing about the settlers in Amona is not how distant they are from other Israelis, whether geographically or politically, but how connected. They are national-religious; that is to say, they are devout in their Judaism, but unlike many other religious Jews they believe equally fervently in the secular Zionist project. The national-religious fly Israeli flags from their lampposts and serve in front-line units in the army. Six months after the confrontation at Amona, half of the outpost’s men joined the draft for the 2006 Lebanon war, and a resident was one of the nine Israeli soldiers killed in the Gaza offensive of 2008-2009. In addition to military officers, the inhabitants’ ranks include university lecturers, a policeman, civil servants and lawyers. Levinger herself is a Hebrew lecturer at a state university. Two of the wounded in the clash with police were members of the Knesset from a larger settlement nearby. The national-religious settlers may agitate against the state, but they are directly linked to the state’s levers of power and benefit from its protection.

Continue reading →

Ska-P, “Intifada”

October 12, 2009Leave a comment

12 October, 2009 — MRZine-Monthly Review

Viva Palestina libre!

Ska-P is a ska punk band from the working-class Vallecas neighborhood in Madrid, Spain. “Intifada” is a song from the band’s fifth album: ¡¡Que Corra La Voz!! The text below is the English translation of the lyrics of “Intifada” by Yoshie Furuhashi.

http://widgets.vodpod.com/w/video_embed/Groupvideo.3629501

more about “Ska-P, “Intifada”“, posted with vodpod

Six million Jews
Annihilated in the manner most cruel,
An imperialist genocide by the fascist armies.
You must understand history.
The victims have become executioners,
Switching roles,
Colonizing Palestinian territories, against all common sense.

Dead, dead!
In whose name?
Dead, dead!
In the name of Israel.
Dead, dead!
In whose name?
Dead, dead!
In the name of Yahweh.

What would you do if someone kicked you out of home,
Giving you no right to protest,
Trampling on your culture,
And you were plunged into madness by the loss of dignity?
Palestine in exile suffers
The opulence of Israel
For an all-powerful government
Prepared for war
By you know whom.

Dead, dead!
In whose name?
Dead, dead!
In the name of Israel.
Dead, dead!
In whose name?
Dead, dead!
In the name of Yahweh.

Stones against bullets
A new intifada
In the West Bank, Gaza, or Jerusalem.
Who could imagine
That David would become Goliath?
Who could imagine
That David would become Goliath?
Intifada, intifada, intifada — liberation!

Don’t get me wrong,
I am an atheist and
Do not believe in any god.
Nor do I differentiate people
By their race, culture, or religion shit.
I only condemn oppression,
Injustice, and
The abuse of power.
Palestine is subjected to
The toughest wars,
The opulence of Israel.

Dead, dead!
In whose name?
Dead, dead!
In the name of Israel.
Dead, dead!
In whose name?
Dead, dead!
In the name of Yahweh.

Stones against bullets
A new intifada
In the West Bank, Gaza, or Jerusalem.
Who could imagine
That David would become Goliath?
Who could imagine
That David would become Goliath?
Who could imagine
That David would become Goliath?
Who could imagine
That David would become Goliath?
Intifada, intifada, intifada — liberation!
Intifada, intifada, intifada — liberation!

D'Escoto On Palestine and the UN Part 2

October 12, 2009Leave a comment

11 October, 2009 — Real News Network

Outgoing General Assembly prez tells niece, after UN inaction on Gaza, “I feel like I’m in a cesspool”

“The question of Palestine remains the most serious political and human rights problem on the agenda of the United Nations since its creation,” says outgoing General Assembly President Miguel d’Escoto. D’Escoto points to the UN’s failure to lift the two-year-old blockade on Gaza being maintained by Israel and Egypt as a clear example of the organization’s decadence. This despite the fact that all the organs of the UN have passed resolutions demanding the blockade be lifted, but none of the members with influence have done anything to force compliance, and according to d’Escoto, they are quite comfortable with this.

Part 1 | Part 3

Bio
Miguel d’Escoto Brockmann recently finished his term as president of the United Nations General Assembly. His term was notable for numerous attempts to assert the authority of the General Assembly and numerous pronouncements on current events, such as the financial crisis and the Israeli siege and war on Gaza. This was a considerable departure from the highly conservative role that the General Assembly, and in particular the president, had played over recent years.

D’Escoto is an ordained Roman Catholic priest for the Maryknoll congregation, serving in 1970 as an official with the World Council of Churches. As an adherent of liberation theology, he secretly joined Nicaragua’s revolutionary Sandinista independence movement. In 1979, he was appointed foreign minister of the new revolutionary government following the Sandinistas’ overthrow of the Somoza dictatorship. He served as foreign minister under President Daniel Ortega from 1979 until their electoral defeat in 1990. He was one of a group of Latin American priests who were denounced and eventually suspended during the 1980s by the Vatican of Pope John Paul II, after their dedication to liberation theology compelled them to become involved in revolutionary politics.

In 2008, he was selected by the countries of Latin America and the Caribbean to as their choice to fill the presidency of the General Assembly.

Iran: What's intelligence got to do with it? Part 4

October 12, 2009Leave a comment

11 October, 2009 — Real News Network

Ray McGovern and Greg Thielmann discuss disconnect between intel community, government and public, Pt.4

Intelligence work is a “fool’s errand” says former CIA senior analyst, Ray McGovern, referring to the tendency of politicians and the press to neglect or manipulate one’s work. Greg Thielmann notes that it isn’t only US intelligence officers that are neglected, adding that the threat assessments of intelligence services around the world indicate their belief that developing a nuclear weapon is one of the best ways to avoid being attacked by the United States.

Part 4 – Part 3 – Part 2 – Part 1

Norse Code

October 12, 2009Leave a comment

10 October, 2009 — Middle East Report Online

For background on the Mitchell mission, see Mouin Rabbani and Chris Toensing, “The Continuity of Obama’s Change,” Middle East Report Online, January 27, 2009.
For more on the “trigger line” in northern Iraq, see Quil Lawrence, “A Precarious Peace in Northern Iraq,” Middle East Report Online, October 1, 2009.

A Minnesota farm boy gets accepted to Yale. On his first day on campus, ambling down the oak-shaded lanes, he meets a toothy young swell whose blood matches his navy blazer. The two exchange words of praise for the pleasant autumn afternoon, and then the Minnesotan ventures a query.

“So,” he says, with rounded vowel, “could you tell me where the library is, then?”

The Yankee’s smile fades. “Here at Yale,” he remarks, with clipped consonant, “we do not end our sentences with conjunctions.”

“Oh,” the Minnesotan replies, pausing briefly before continuing. “Well, let me rephrase that. So, could you tell me where the library is, then, asshole?”

In the great white north, such yarns are spun as commentary upon the noxious haughtiness of the Mayflower set, but also upon the knack of those of Scandinavian heritage for what might be called over-understatement. This delicate art, passed down from one generation of phlegmatic Norwegian and stoic Swede to the next, is employed to put the priggish in their place. Over-understatement is drawn from the sub-Arctic folk wisdom that revenge is best served, well, not cold, exactly, but chilled.

Continue reading →

Obama and the Nobel Prize: When War becomes Peace, When the Lie becomes the Truth By Michel Chossudovsky

October 12, 2009Leave a comment

11 October, 2009 — Global Research

When war becomes peace,
When concepts and realities are turned upside down,
When fiction becomes truth and truth becomes fiction.
When a global military agenda is heralded as a humanitarian endeavor,
When the killing of civilians is upheld as “collateral damage”,
When those who resist the US-NATO led invasion of their homeland are categorized as “insurgents” or “terrorists”.
When preemptive nuclear war is upheld as self defense.
When advanced torture and “interrogation” techniques are routinely used to “protect peacekeeping operations”,
When tactical nuclear weapons are heralded by the Pentagon as “harmless to the surrounding civilian population”
When three quarters of US personal federal income tax revenues are allocated to financing what is euphemistically referred to as “national defense”
When the Commander in Chief of the largest military force on planet earth is presented as a global peace-maker,
When the Lie becomes the Truth.

Obama’s “War Without Borders”

We are the crossroads of the most serious crisis in modern history. The US in partnership with NATO and Israel has launched a global military adventure which, in a very real sense, threatens the future of humanity.

At this critical juncture in our history, the Norwegian Nobel Committee’s decision to award the Nobel Peace Prize to President and Commander in Chief Barack Obama constitutes an unmitigated tool of propaganda and distortion, which unreservedly supports the Pentagon’s “Long War”: “A War without Borders” in the true sense of the word, characterised by the Worlwide deployment of US military might.

Continue reading →