The Mendacious President

First, we found ourselves subjected to a mendacious Pope, now, we must additionally endure a mendacious President. As Alexander Cockburn trenchantly observed in regard to Obama's purportedly landmark speech in Cairo:

“I have unequivocally prohibited the use of torture by the United States, “ Obama declared in Cairo, “and I have ordered the prison at Guantanamo Bay closed by early next year.” Vivid in the minds of many Muslims listening to this passage would have been the fate at the start of this week of Muhammad Ahmad Abdallah Salih -- a 31-year old Yemeni who had been in a wire cage since February, 2002 (more than seven years) without charges and declared by his U.S. military jailers “an apparent suicide”. Salih, on hunger strike, was down to 85 pounds.

Torture is certainly the label any morally balanced person would attach to his travails and it’s quite reasonable to speculate that his end came amid yet another attempt to forcibly feed him. Air Force One headed for Cairo with one Muslim barely in the ground after having been tortured to death in a US prison. Many in Obama’s audience would have been well aware too that even if – a big “if” – Guantanamo does get shut down, its inmates will endure similar horrors in Bagram, and that Obama favors imprisonment, permanent if necessary, of enemy combatants, without charges or trial.

Obama’s talk of the evils of Al Qaida’s “violent extremism ” will have fallen ironically on the ears of Palestinians who endured Israel’s monstrous and criminal onslaught in Gaza earlier this year, or of Afghans still seething at the loss of civilians in US bombing raids. The noble pledges about economic assistance to the Muslim world sound hollow against the realities of how US aid really gets administered, starting with the huge sums filched by the “non-profit” aid agencies.

Domestically, the speech was euphorically received, except among Christian conservatives who can't abide any engagement with Arabs and Muslims that doesn't involve seizing them, detaining them, killing them and decimating the infrastructure of their societies.

Meanwhile, the contours of Obama policy in the region remain the same: covert operations and military engagement in Lebanon, Palestine, Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan. In Lebanon and Palestine, Israel, with American supplied weapons, carries out the attacks, while in Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan, the US does so directly. Recent terror attacks in Iran have been carried out by a group that receives covert US assistance.

Yet, Obama would have us believe that the real problem in the Middle East is Holocaust denial, as he said nothing to condemn the horrific conditions imposed upon the Palestinians by Israel. As As'ad Abukhalil has frequently observed, it is impermissible for anyone in a position of political responsibility in the US to attribute the suffering of the Palestinians to the acts of Israelis. Instead, one is left with the impression that the Palestinians are the victims of some sort of intergalactic conspiracy requiring the intervention of Captain Kirk and Mister Spock.

But, of course, when it comes to the Palestinians, it is very different. Unlike Israelis, Palestinians must abandon violence. His subsequent remarks to the effect that the Palestinians must seek to attain their nationalistic aspirations through non-violence were straight out offensive. Historically, whenever Palestinians have sought to do so, they have been imprisoned, deported and stripped of their land, their property and their citizenship, if not killed. And, as we all know, the US has done nothing to stop it, to do anything that would create a space for viable non-violent civil disobedience within Palestine.

Let's be blunt: If Martin Luther King had been Palestinian, and launched an action like the Montgomery bus boycott in the occupied territories in 1956, he would have been lucky if Israel had only expelled him from the country and stipped him of his citizenship. More likely, he would have been imprisoned, tortured and probably killed, as Stephen Biko was in South Africa. For the president of a country that has done nothing to protect Palestinians to lecture them on the virtues of non-violence is an embarrassment.

Meanwhile, Obama, in relation to Iraq and Afghanistan, stated that the US has no intention to retain permanent military bases in these countries. Has he not read his own plan for withdrawing from Iraq, which contemplates leaving nearly 50,000 troops behind? Perhaps, he is more sincere when he speaks of Afghanistan, but it is hard to reconcile such a statement with his decision to send more troops to the country and launch drone attacks within both Afghanistan and Pakistan. Or, is there something Machiavellian to it, a careful parsing of language designed to conceal that that the future face of the occupation will increasingly be one of death delivered by drones launched and controlled from US soil?

Time will tell, but there was nothing in this speech to suggest anything other than the continuation of US policies designed to preserve hegemonic domination. With the passage of time, and a growing awareness of the consequences of these policies, the glow surrounding this speech will fade, and it will be recognized for what it is, yet another example of an American president seeking to dress up policies of imperial expansion in the garb of idealism. The most striking aspect of it was Obama's polished invocation, through a respectful characterization of the virtues of Islam, of the allure of diversity and multiculturalism to support the enterprise.

Enemies Everywhere

From the Associated Press:

Venezuela and Bolivia are supplying Iran with uranium for its nuclear program, according to a secret Israeli government report obtained Monday by The Associated Press.

The two South American countries are known to have close ties with Iran, but this is the first allegation that they are involved in the development of Iran’s nuclear program, considered a strategic threat by Israel.

“There are reports that Venezuela supplies Iran with uranium for its nuclear program,” the Foreign Ministry document states, referring to previous Israeli intelligence conclusions.

It added, “Bolivia also supplies uranium to Iran.”

The report did not say where the uranium was from.

There was no immediate comment from officials in Venezuela or Bolivia about the report.

Perhaps, Israel can launch airstrikes against them, too, expanding any war with Iran to South America as well. All in all, it sounds remarkably similar to the Niger forgeries, documents leaked by Italian intelligence in 2002 that purportedly established that Iraq had been attempting to purchase processed uranium from Niger for nuclear weapons development.

By way of background, there is a strong belief among Venezuela leftists and some in the military that Israel was involved in the 2002 unsuccessful coup attempt against Chavez. I was also told during my trip to Venezuela in 2005 that Chavez, sometime after taking office in 1998, removed a number of Israeli operatives providing unspecified services to the Venezuela military and intelligence services. He did it because he believed that they were using these positions to gather information that could be used against him. Recently, Chavez ordered the removal of the Israeli ambassador in Caracas in protest against the assault upon the civilian populace of Gaza.

One should not dimiss the possibility that the hostility towards Israel within Venezuela is coloured by a residue of anti-semitism directed towards Jews generally. Even so, Chavez apparently had good reason to be concerned. After all, Israel supported Somoza in Nicaragua, and subsequently provided military assistance to the contras. Not surprisingly, Israel also provided provided military assistance to El Salvador and Guatemala in their armed struggles with the left during this same period. In the case of Guatemala, Israel assisted the government's brutal campaign of near extermination against its indigenous populace when the US was legally prohibited from doing so. And, as you might have guessed, Israel had good relations with Pinochet in Chile as well, selling weapons to him, despite his flirtation with a notorious neo-Nazi sect.

Closer to home, at least from a Venezuelan perspective, Israel has supplied weapons to Colombian paramilitaries since the 1980s, and continues to do so. Similarly, Israel participated in the dirty war in Argentina. Chavez, and the left throughout South America, understand what many in the US do not, that Israel has been an implacable enemy of leftist movements in South America, violent or non-violent, for decades. Furthermore, it has provided material assistance in their violent suppression by rightist governments and social movements. Such a history lends credibility to the belief of some Venezuelans that Israel, through the Mossad, was involved in the 2002 coup. No doubt the Bolivians are aware of this history as well, and wary about Israeli involvement in their country.

But are Venezuela and Bolivia supplying Iran with uranium? Hard to say, although the report comes across as embarrassingly propagandistic. The Associated Press article states that Venezuela has undertaken no action to mine its estimated uranium reserves, while Bolivia does so. It is, of course, possible that Venezuela is involved in the delivery of Bolivian uranium to Iran. If so, what is the significance? Is it illegal for them to do so? Of course, it is common for countries to sell uranium to other countries for use in nuclear power generation facilities, as Australian does in relation to China, and Russia now does in relation to the US. If Iran is merely involved in the development of nuclear power, consistent with the most recent National Intelligence Estimate and the findings of the International Atomic Energy Agency, one would assume that such purchases, if they ever happened, transgress no international laws. Oh, by the way, did I forget to mention that the report also claims that Venezuela is also a Hizbullah sanctuary?

President Peres - Norooz Message

Peres wishes Iranians happy new year
By JPOST.COM STAFF AND AP
http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satelli...cle%2FShowFull


President Shimon Peres issued an audio greeting to the Iranian people, urging them to shake off the rule of "an oppressive and fanatical regime" and return to relations of peace and harmony with Israel, which, he recalled, the two countries enjoyed when the Shah was in power, until 1979. He called on the "noble Iranian people" to eschew the rhetoric of hate and even offered a greeting for Nowruz, the Iranian New Year, in Persian.

Israel Radio, which operates a channel in Persian, aired the message, also conducting an interview with Peres where he recalled a visit to Iran in the 1970s and recounted his visits to Iranian military bases and praised the "gracious" demeanor of the Shah.

Peres heaped praise on the Iranian people and expressed his belief that they would eventually topple the regime because "leaders who do not serve their constituents are eventually removed."

He dismissed the apparent hordes of supporters seen in televised speeches given by Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad as "sycophants or people who are afraid [of the regime]."

Regarding the future of relations between Israel and Iran, Peres replied he was more interested in "relations between Iran and itself. They will not destroy us. They will only destroy themselves [if they continue on their current path]." Alluding to several vitriolic speeches Ahmadinejad made against the Jewish State, a relaxed-sounding president said "so we hear another speech and another speech... we have been hearing these speeches for 4,000 years."



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Full text of President Peres' New Years message to the people of Iran:


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Dear citizens of Iran,

IRANIAN-EH AZIZ, RUZ-EH NOV VANORUZE BASTANT BEH SHOMA KHOSH BAD

With great happiness I would like to wish you, on the occasion of your holiday of Nowruz, a holiday of renewal that brings joy and hope for a new day, for better days, and for a new and blessed year. What a joy it is, this, your historical holiday that you have celebrated and kept for
generations.

The people of Israel have lofty historical memories from the period in which Iran thrived in a variety of fields and contributed to the world, among other things, Cyrus's ancient Bill of Rights, and to the Jewish people, our right to return to our land from the Babylonian Exile in order to establish the Temple in Jerusalem. Iran and its people therefore have a special place
in our heritage.

Our relations with the Iranian people have also known good times in the modern period. We shared our experience in agriculture, industry, and scientific and medical development, and we cultivated the best possible relations.

To our great sadness, relations between our countries are at their lowest point. This derives from the leaders of your country, who are driven to act in every way possible against the State of Israel and its people, and even to threaten us with their intention to destroy us. I ask myself how a noble people like you can be caught up in a blind hatred like this, how you chose a leader who scorns the people who were murdered by the Nazis, and who wants to destroy and kill another country. You believe in God, and we believe in God, but in a God of life and respect, not a God of death and hate. I am sure that the day is not far when we will return to good neighborly relations, and effective cooperation will blossom once again, in every arena, for the benefit of our people and our shared futures.

At this time, when the current regime in Iran is calling for the destruction of Israel, we call for Iran to prosper. We remember Cyrus the Great, who is noted in the Bible as the liberating king, and we remember that our people lived in Iran for many generations, sharing in the building of the land and contributing to to its welfare and culture. We are certain and hopeful that the darkness and the evil will disappear from the world for the good of all of humanity.

On the occasion of the new year, I turn to the noble Iranian people in the name of the ancient Jewish people, and I wish that they will return to reclaim their rightful place amongst the enlightened nations of the world. They will be respected and not hated, and just as they have in the past, I am certain that they will make great cultural contributions in the future.

I will conclude with the traditional blessing:

NORUZETAN PIRUZ HAR RUZETAN NORUZ BAD


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In contrast to this message of support from the Israeli President, who clearly distinguishes between the Iranian people and their OPPRESSORS (Islamic Republic) please find HERE the full text of President Obama who makes no distinction between the people of Iran and their tyrannical oppressors (Islamic Republic) but only seeks to officialize economical relations at the expense of Iranian lives that are being lost at the hands of this terrorist regime each day.

Towards a democratic Syria!

In 1998, only 219 Syrians voted against Hafez Assad's government. One of them was Ammar Abdulhamid. Now exiled and awaiting political asylum in US, Syrian opposition leader talks to Ynet in exclusive interview.

Yitzhak Benhorin

WASHINGTON – In a national referendum held by late Syrian President Hafez Assad in 1998, only 219 people voted against the government. One of them was Ammar Abdulhamid, 40, a Syrian opposition activist, exiled from Damascus in 2005 and currently awaiting political asylum in the United States.

"The security agents give you a paper with a circle saying 'yes' and a circle saying 'no.' I voted 'no', and the person in front of me was shocked. He said, 'Look, you made a mistake. You said 'no' to the president.' He thought I had made a mistake. We expected for some time that somebody would come and say, 'Come with me', but it didn't happen. For 219 people, they didn't give a damn."

In his first interview with an Israeli news agency, Abdulhamid tells Ynet how he frequently took risks, wrote articles against the president and generally pissed off the Syrian administration, until they got tired of him and showed him the door.

In Washington he serves as representative of the National Salvation Front (NSF), a Syrian reform group operating abroad against President Bashar Assad’s regime.

So why didn’t they show him to a prison cell instead of deporting him? Abdulhamid believes it is because his mother was superstar actress Muna Wassef, one of Syrian’s most famous TV celebrities.

“It wasn’t easy to arrest the son of such a famous and popular actress,” he says.

Enemy of the regime

With long brown hair tied back in a ponytail and an easygoing demeanor, Abdulhamid isn’t exactly how one might imagine a Syrian reformist. His English is refined and he demonstrates impressive knowledge. He declares that he doesn’t believe in God and he has no qualms about talking with Israelis.

The first time he left Syria’s borders was in 1986, when he came to the United States to study at the University of Wisconsin. He returned to Damascus in 1994, but after a decade relocated to the US again, this time on a research fellowship at the Brookings Institute in Washington, DC. At the end of the fellowship, he returned to Syria – a rather surprising move considering the vehemently anti-Syrian articles he published while in Washington.

How did you become an enemy of the Syrian regime?

"They told me to leave, over a variety of issues. Apparently the project I was doing was a main issue. It was on majority-minority relations. So I am basically trying to create grassroots dialogue between different sects. I started in 2001, but officially in 2003."

So what did you do that was so wrong that they told you to leave?

"We were accused of fomenting the very thing we were trying to combat, which is sensitivities between the majority and minority. But I think what they are afraid of is these issues being raised at the popular level and being resolved at the popular level because our regime survives by exploiting the fears between the sects."

In 2004 he left for Washington, where he wrote for the English-language Lebanese newspaper the Daily Star. He wrote a joint article with Israeli professor Moshe Maoz on the need to renew the Israeli-Syrian peace process. It was the first time a Syrian and an Israel had written something together which appeared publicly.

Hariri murder was last straw

Despite his severely critical writings, Abdulhamid returned to Syria. He said he didn’t want to make trouble, and even made a commitment to hold his pen and stop writing against the regime. The quiet lasted until the regime arrested a group of Syrian intellectuals, followed shortly thereafter by the assassination of former Prime Minister Rafik Hariri, and Abdulhamid could no longer keep quiet.

“I was a loud-mouth, I couldn't control my tongue. When Hariri was assassinated a lot of people started pouring into Syria and asking questions, 'Who did it?' and whatever, I was very clear that I thought the the president was behind it. And I was very clear in calling him a moron in a number of interviews, and I think that was always not a good move. I was in Damascus calling the president of my country, which is a dictatorship basically, a moron.

Why didn't they arrest you?

“Arresting me would have really been problematic, I think. The person who made the decision not to arrest me was Assef Shawkat, head of the Syrian intelligence. You have two problems. One, you are arresting the son of a very famous actress who is very respected in Syria, and who said very clearly at one point, 'I may not necessarily agree politically with what he's saying the whole time, but if anything happens to him, you know, he's my son.'”

After that meeting, Abdulhamid was invited to meet Shawkat, Assad’s brother-in-law, who is suspected to have been thickly involved in Hariri’s murder.

“I had a meeting with Shawkat - my wife insisted on coming with me, so instead of having an interrogation you have a social event, and he tries to sort of contain the situation. I was under a travel ban at the time, so they lifted the travel ban and I promised to stop writing and simply to work quietly.”

But Abdulhamid didn’t keep his mouth shut for long, and the regime started getting tired of him. Soon he found himself on a plane from Damascus with a one-way ticket.

That was probably Syria’s biggest mistake: Back in the US, Abdulhamid became the opposition’s intermediary between the Syrian opposition and the American administration.

“There are about a 100 active dissidents in Syria. The ones who are well known are 15-20 maybe. And I was never one of them… My strategy was, 'Look, I can get you the funding and support your activity so you wouldn't have to deal with the Americans directly or the Europeans or whoever.'”

Together with his colleagues from the Muslim Brotherhood, Abdulhamid founded the National Salvation Front, an umbrella organization of opposition groups working for the democratization of Syria. Former Syrian vice president Abd Al-Halim Khaddam is apparently closely associated with the Front.

What relation do you have with Khaddam, who was part of the corrupt dictatorship?

"He knows a lot of secrets and they are afraid of him. He meets with King Abdullah, he has access to people in the region. He has contacts with people inside the regime as well. Khaddam’s joining is also meant to signal to the regime that we aren’t here for revenge. We aren’t involved in vengeance or in the past. We want to operate like (Nelson) Mandela: We’ll forgive, but we won’t forget. Our faces are to the future.”

What is your stance on Israel?

"The Muslim Brotherhood, by the way, said they prefer a negotiated settlement with Israel. They are not calling for Jihad to return the Golan (Heights). They went public on it, and I was very surprised nobody in the media picked up on it. And the head of the Muslim Brotherhood, Sadr Al-Din al-Banouni, said it very clearly in an interview on al-Jazeera. This is exactly why we decided we can talk to the Muslim Brotherhood.

"We simply cannot ignore the Islamists. We are talking about change, about democracy, about elections at one point in time. So it's really good to sit down to realize with whom we can talk and how much they can moderate their language, and what sort of deals we can arrive at. Because either we do this or we have two other options: Either we talk to the Islamists and find moderates and work together for change at the risk of being betrayed. The other options are to stick to the status quo but then the status quo cannot hold a lot with the Assads.

"The final analysis is that they are a minority regime, they are dictators, and they are not addressing any of the country's problems … and had they been good, slightly enlightened, I would never be in the opposition. It is much better to work with a slightly enlightened regime than to risk the chaos that comes with change. So we either continue to cooperate with a regime that will continue to abuse the system or we resort to violence ... All we want is support were do not want someone to do the work for us … As long as we are building networks, and we know we are creating realities on the ground, I don't care if it takes ten years.

Why did you agree to do an interview for the Israeli media?

"Many Israelis are wondering whether they should talk to Assad or not. I said at one point they cannot deliver what he wants because sooner or later this regime is going to fall. Because it represents a very small group of people, because it is corrupt, because the economy in Syria is imploding, poverty is rising, the Kurdish-Arab divide is widening, the Sunni-Alawit divide is widening. So sooner or later it is going to pass either peacefully or violently.

"I hope for peace and if it is going to be violent I don't want to have anything to do with it. I really want Bashar to become a genius overnight, I really do. Even if he killed Hariri, I believe that, I am willing to forgive so many things, just to save us a violent solution for the country and to have some sense of reform. We do need to begin tackling the Sunni-Alawit divide because the more they postpone it the more it is going to get violent."