Friday, January 30, 2009

Obama on the right track re Iran

Obama has appointed Professor Vali Nasr as senior advisor to special envoy for Afghanistan and Pakistan Ambassador Richard Holbrooke.


Read this interview to get a gist of Nasr's views.

He IS brilliant:
Iran secularists or middle-class Iranians or Westerners can look at Iran and see all the flaws—the veto power of the supreme leader, the Guardian Council not allowing people to run. But the majority of Iranians who are poor and religious don’t see these as problems. They don’t see a problem when the Guardian Council disqualifies secular opponents. In their eyes, it’s genuine democracy, because they have three or four choices. How those three or four choices came there doesn’t bother them, but they know that their vote makes a difference as to which of those three or four will actually win.

So, ironically, in Iran, the lower down in society you go, the more there is democracy practiced. They have been voting longer than the upper-class Iranians. It’s the reverse of the rest of the Middle East, where you might say the elite, educated abroad, have seen democracy, but the poor are completely oblivious to it. In Iran, the further down you go, the more they have been engaged, and the more they believe that this is genuine and they take it seriously.

Here are some of his books:
The Shia Revival: How Conflicts within Islam Will Shape the Future The Shia Revival: How Conflicts within Islam Will Shape the Future ($10.17)
Islamic Leviathan: Islam and the Making of...

Unlike Rush Limbaugh ...


Ayatollah Emami Kashani, in Friday Prayer after Obama's inauguration, welcomes his promise of change.

Emami Kashani is a conservative member of Iran's ruling elite (Assembly of Experts). He has lashed out at Americans as "Murderers in Iraq" and has blamed them for creating Al Quaeda:
"You talk about al-Qaeda. Have you forgotten who has bred al-Qaeda? It's the illegitimate child of America and Israel, but you name it Islam. This savagery is not Islam. It is coming from inside of you and it is now punching you".
A cursory look at Iranian media suggests that even most conservative of Iranian clerics see a promise in Obama's new tone towards the Middle East. Their only request seems to be: Stop the condescending line of threats; Stop acting like you are the boss of the world!

In Persian, we say : "The branches of a fruitful tree bow more."
I hope Obama will not lose this unique opportunity ...

Wednesday, January 28, 2009

Advice to Obama re Iran

I just read on Guardian that Obama's administration is contemplating to send a letter to Iran's leaders to respond to symbolism of Ahmadinejad's congratulatory letter sent to Obama on Nov 6th, 2008.

What worries me is this:
"One draft proposal suggests Iran should compare its relatively low standard of living with that of some of its more prosperous neighbors and contemplate the benefits of losing its pariah status in the West. Although the tone is conciliatory, it also calls on Iran to end what the US calls state sponsorship of terrorism."

Mr Obama: THIS IS A FATAL MISTAKE! If you want to make peace with Iranians, make sure to compare them to NO ONE! To attempt to allure Iranians by the wealth of, say, Saudi Arabia is just going to be OFFENSIVE to the Iranian people!

If you take time to understand the depth of Persian psychology and philosophy, you would realize that hey THRIVE on being different from the rest of their neighbors. Iranians look at the wealth of Arabs states with disdain. They consider Pakistan a backward country that is run by puppet governments. If you consider their zeal for being culturally and philosophically distinct, you would understand why America's CARROTS & STICKS policy (which I think is championed by the dumb obliterating woman Hillary Clinton,) IS NEVER GOING TO WORK. It has never worked with Persians and it never will!

What you need to know about Persians is that, irrespective of how Capitalist Iran looks, Persians are STOIC individuals. It is beaten into their psychology since almost day one of life that honor is more important than material comfort; that material comfort corrupts the soul; that prosperity is in knowledge and in spirit and not in bank accounts.

What will deliver results is if you treat them as equals; if you negotiate with them for advancement of a common cause; and if you seek in them a partner. Keep in mind Mr Obama, that for Iran, relations to China and India are attractive alternatives to having economic links to the US.

You want Iran's cooperation with uranium enrichment, help them build their reactors. Iran is not pursuing the bomb. But if you want to avoid nuclear weapons race in the Middle East, disarm Israel of its nuclear arsenal.

If you want Iran's cooperation, hail their scientists and praise their technological achievements under economic sanctions.

If you want Iran's friendship, APOLOGIZE not only for American Coup of 1953; but also for sitting by watching Saddam drop chemical bombs on Iranians.

If you want Iran's friendship stop this stupid "sponsorship of terror" charge, while you are supporting Israeli terrorism, and evidence of which just unfolded in front of our eyes.

If you want to make amends with Iran, thank them for helping you against Al-Quaeda and apologize for branding them "axis of evil".

If you want Iran's unclenched fist, then praise the FACT that this nation has not launched an aggressive war against anyone in its modern (or even ancient) history!

If you want peace with Iran, stand up and look them in the eye and tell the Iranian people that you commend them for being the most stable country in the region, despite all havoc previous administrations have been wreaking in Iran!

If you want peace with Iran, CONTRAST THEM with their neighbors! Iranians had a bloody revolution to make sure they are NOT LIKE THEIR PROSPEROUS NEIGHBORS! So ... fix your paradigm correctly.

Dixies come to mind ... "I'm not ready to make nice ..."
Okey I will be ready to make nice if you play it nice and keep that Clinton and her Zionist bosses away from the letter writing desk!

P.S. I just realized that Ahmadinejad's requested and American apology too! This is to declare that in my opinion, Ahmadinejad is a liar; who is trying to gain political capital, which he will later use to gamble with the economy and the democracy of Iran. I am not ready to make nice with him either!

Thursday, January 22, 2009

Obama on Iran!

Three positive point to Obama's diplomatic strategy re Iran:

1) He did not mention Iran in his State Department speech, neither positively nor negatively;
2) Focused on necessity of Israel PEACE with it's "Arab neighbors", indirectly implying that Iran and Israel are in no "fight"
3) Focused on Afghanistan and Pakistan with emphasizing a NEED to engage their neighboring countries.

This man is clever!

Also, Iranians have been repeatedly saying that "they are open to negotiations", if "old colonizing mentality is put aside".

Monday, January 19, 2009

Bravo! Israel left this one alive!

This is proof that they (Israeli rightists--an adverb I keep hearing on the radio) are not genocidal!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Wednesday, January 14, 2009

There is really nothing new to be said: read older posts.
I shall remain silent until guns silence in Gaza.

GAZA: neocons' trap for Iran-Obama

Click on the title to read the article.

GAZA: More facts omitted from the media conscience

I came across this article via pulsemedia.org.
Time's short so I have cropped out the rhetoric and just present a summary of facts:

"[...]on the Israeli website, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs website[:]
  • Israel broke the ceasefire by going into the Gaza and killing six or seven Palestinian militants. At that point—quoting the official Israeli website—Hamas retaliated or, in retaliation for the Israeli attack, then launched the missiles."
[...]
  • According to Ha’aretz, Defense Minister Barak began plans for this invasion before the ceasefire even began. In fact, according to yesterday’s Ha’aretz, the plans for the invasion began in March.
[...]
Israel doesn’t want Gaza to develop, and Israel doesn’t want to resolve diplomatically the conflict,
  • both the leadership in Damascus and the leadership in the Gaza have repeatedly made statements they’re willing to settle the conflict in the June 1967 border.
[...]
Every year, the United Nations General Assembly votes on a resolution entitled “Peaceful Settlement of the Palestine Question.” And every year the vote is the same:
it’s the whole world on one side; Israel, the United States and some South Sea atolls and Australia on the other side.
  • The vote this past year was 164-to-7.
  • Every year since 1989—in 1989, the vote was 151-to-3
  • All twenty-two members of the Arab League, favoring a two-state settlement on the June 1967 border.
  • The Palestinian Authority favoring that two-state settlement on the June 1967 border.
  • Hamas favoring that two-state settlement on the June 1967 border.
  • The one and only obstacle is Israel, backed by the United States. That’s the problem.
[...]
the record shows that
Hamas wanted to continue the ceasefire, but only on condition that Israel eases the blockade.
  • Long before Hamas began the retaliatory rocket attacks on Israel, Palestinians were facing a humanitarian crisis in Gaza because of the blockade.
  • The former High Commissioner for Human Rights, Mary Robinson, described what was going on in Gaza [during the ceasefire] as a destruction of a civilization.
[...]
The record shows that in every crucial issue raised at
  • Camp David,
  • then under the Clinton parameters,
  • and then in Taba,
all the concessions came from the Palestinians. The Palestinians have repeatedly expressed a willingness to settle the conflict in accordance with international law.

The law is very clear.
July 2004, the highest judicial body in the world, the International Court of Justice, ruled
  • Israel has no title to any of the West Bank and any of Gaza.
  • They have no title to Jerusalem.
  • Arab East Jerusalem, according to the highest judicial body in the world, is occupied Palestinian territory.
  • the settlements, all the settlements in the West Bank, are illegal under international law.
[...] Read the rest of Finkelstein's article

GAZA: Whose fault is it really? Statistics show!

The original report is published here.
Study conducted by: Nancy Kanwisher (MIT, professor), Johannes Haushofer, & Anat Biletzki (Tel Aviv University, professor)

Introduction:
"The mainstream media in the US and Israel places the blame squarely on Hamas. Indeed, a massive barrage of Palestinian rockets were fired into Israel in November and December, and ending this rocket fire is the stated goal of the current Israeli invasion of Gaza. However, this account leaves out crucial facts."

Methods and Materials
The authors asked two questions:
1) How did the current ceasefire broke into the current violence?
Studied # of Palestinian rockets fired in 2008, and looked for the time point at which the rocket attack began.

2) What are the historical precedences for disruption of ceasefire?
Tallied the data from September 2000 to October 2008 and analyzed the entire timeline of killings of Palestinians by Israelis, and killings of Israelis by Palestinians, in the Second Intifada, based on the data from the widely-respected Israeli Human Rights group B'Tselem.
Results and Discussion

1) Who started the current war?
This figure shows the number of palestinian rockets fired in each month of 2008. This figure shows an escalation of rockets fired from Palestine in November. On November 4th, Israel killed a Palestinian, an event that was followed by a volley of mortars fired from Gaza. Immediately after that, an Israeli air strike killed six more Palestinians. Then a massive barrage of rockets was unleashed, leading to the end of the ceasefire.


2) Which side kills first after conflict pauses of different durations?
In the above figure, "conflict pauses" is defined as periods of one or more days when no one is killed on either side. Horizontal axis: durations of conflict pause.Vertical axis: the percentage of times from the Second Intifada. Black: when Israelis ended the period of nonviolence by killing one or more Palestinians; Gray: the percentage of times that Palestinians ended the period of nonviolence by killing Israelis; White: the percentage of times that both sides killed on the same day. Virtually all periods of nonviolence lasting more than a week were ended when the Israelis killed Palestinians first. We include here the data from all pause durations that actually occurred.

Their analysis shows:

79% of all conflict pauses were interrupted when Israel killed a Palestinian,
8% were interrupted by Palestinian attacks
13% were interrupted by both sides on the same day.
This means that Israel is overwhelmingly in charge of escalating violence.

In addition:
Israel unilaterally interrupted 24/25 (96%) periods of peace lasting more than a week.
Israel unilaterally interrupted 100% of the 14 periods of nonviolence lasting longer than 9 days.
This means that Israel's been more likely to interrupt longer peace periods, without provocation.

Conclusion
A systematic pattern does exist: it is overwhelmingly Israel, not Palestine, that kills first following a lull. Indeed, it is virtually always Israel that kills first after a lull lasting more than a week.

The lessons from these data are clear:

First, Hamas can indeed control the rockets, when it is in their interest. The data shows that ceasefires can work, reducing the violence to nearly zero for months at a time. (Thus nulling the myth that Hamas is under Syrian and Iranian influence.)

Second, if Israel wants to reduce rocket fire from Gaza, it should cherish and preserve the peace when it starts to break out, not be the first to kill.

Saturday, January 10, 2009

Bush Stopped Israel from Bombing Iran!!

Is it the fear of international indictment for war crime that is making Cheney say things like Israel didn't have permission from the US to attack Gaza or that NYT is coming up with report of interviews conducted over the past 15 months to say: "Bush saved Iran from Israel"!
Read on ...

New Yourk Times : U.S. Rejected Aid for Israeli Raid on Iranian Nuclear Site
By DAVID E. SANGER

Published: January 10, 2009

WASHINGTON — President Bush deflected a secret request by Israel last year for specialized bunker-busting bombs it wanted for an attack on Iran’s main nuclear complex and told the Israelis that he had authorized new covert action intended to sabotage Iran’s suspected effort to develop nuclear weapons, according to senior American and foreign officials.
[...]

The White House denied that request outright, American officials said, and the Israelis backed off their plans, at least temporarily. But the tense exchanges also prompted the White House to step up intelligence-sharing with Israel and brief Israeli officials on new American efforts to subtly sabotage Iran’s nuclear infrastructure, a major covert program that Mr. Bush is about to hand off to President-elect Barack Obama.

This account of the expanded American covert program and the Bush administration’s efforts to dissuade Israel from an aerial attack on Iran emerged in interviews over the past 15 months with current and former American officials, outside experts, international nuclear inspectors and European and Israeli officials. None would speak on the record because of the great secrecy surrounding the intelligence developed on Iran.

Several details of the covert effort have been omitted from this account, at the request of senior United States intelligence and administration officials, to avoid harming continuing operations.

The interviews also suggest that while Mr. Bush was extensively briefed on options for an overt American attack on Iran’s facilities, he never instructed the Pentagon to move beyond contingency planning, even during the final year of his presidency, contrary to what some critics have suggested.

The interviews also indicate that Mr. Bush was convinced by top administration officials, led by Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates, that any overt attack on Iran would probably prove ineffective, lead to the expulsion of international inspectors and drive Iran’s nuclear effort further out of view. Mr. Bush and his aides also discussed the possibility that an airstrike could ignite a broad Middle East war in which America’s 140,000 troops in Iraq would inevitably become involved.

Instead, Mr. Bush embraced more intensive covert operations actions aimed at Iran, the interviews show, having concluded that the sanctions imposed by the United States and its allies were failing to slow the uranium enrichment efforts. Those covert operations, and the question of whether Israel will settle for something less than a conventional attack on Iran, pose immediate and wrenching decisions for Mr. Obama.

The covert American program, started in early 2008, includes renewed American efforts to penetrate Iran’s nuclear supply chain abroad, along with new efforts, some of them experimental, to undermine electrical systems, computer systems and other networks on which Iran relies. It is aimed at delaying the day that Iran can produce the weapons-grade fuel and designs it needs to produce a workable nuclear weapon.

Knowledge of the program has been closely held, yet inside the Bush administration some officials are skeptical about its chances of success, arguing that past efforts to undermine Iran’s nuclear program have been detected by the Iranians and have only delayed, not derailed, their drive to unlock the secrets of uranium enrichment.

[...]

Early in his presidency, Mr. Obama must decide whether the covert actions begun by Mr. Bush are worth the risks of disrupting what he has pledged will be a more active diplomatic effort to engage with Iran.

[...]

Israel’s effort to obtain the weapons, refueling capacity and permission to fly over Iraq for an attack on Iran grew out of its disbelief and anger at an American intelligence assessment completed in late 2007 that concluded that Iran had effectively suspended its development of nuclear weapons four years earlier.

That conclusion also stunned Mr. Bush’s national security team — and Mr. Bush himself, who was deeply suspicious of the conclusion, according to officials who discussed it with him.

[...]

Attack Planning

Early in 2008, the Israeli government signaled that it might be preparing to take matters into its own hands. In a series of meetings, Israeli officials asked Washington for a new generation of powerful bunker-busters, far more capable of blowing up a deep underground plant than anything in Israel’s arsenal of conventional weapons. They asked for refueling equipment that would allow their aircraft to reach Iran and return to Israel. And they asked for the right to fly over Iraq.

Mr. Bush deflected the first two requests, pushing the issue off, but “we said ‘hell no’ to the overflights,” one of his top aides said. At the White House and the Pentagon, there was widespread concern that a political uproar in Iraq about the use of its American-controlled airspace could result in the expulsion of American forces from the country.

The Israeli ambassador to the United States, Sallai Meridor, declined several requests over the past four weeks to be interviewed about Israel’s efforts to obtain the weapons from Washington, saying through aides that he was too busy.

Last June, the Israelis conducted an exercise over the Mediterranean Sea that appeared to be a dry run for an attack on the enrichment plant at Natanz. When the exercise was analyzed at the Pentagon, officials concluded that the distances flown almost exactly equaled the distance between Israel and the Iranian nuclear site.

“This really spooked a lot of people,” one White House official said. White House officials discussed the possibility that the Israelis would fly over Iraq without American permission. In that case, would the American military be ordered to shoot them down? If the United States did not interfere to stop an Israeli attack, would the Bush administration be accused of being complicit in it?

Admiral Mullen, traveling to Israel in early July on a previously scheduled trip, questioned Israeli officials about their intentions. His Israeli counterpart, Lt. Gen. Gabi Ashkenazi, argued that an aerial attack could set Iran’s program back by two or three years, according to officials familiar with the exchange. The American estimates at the time were far more conservative.

Yet by the time Admiral Mullen made his visit, Israeli officials appear to have concluded that without American help, they were not yet capable of hitting the site effectively enough to strike a decisive blow against the Iranian program.

The United States did give Israel one item on its shopping list: high-powered radar, called the X-Band, to detect any Iranian missile launchings. It was the only element in the Israeli request that could be used solely for defense, not offense.

Mr. Gates’s spokesman, Geoff Morrell, said last week that Mr. Gates — whom Mr. Obama is retaining as defense secretary — believed that “a potential strike on the Iranian facilities is not something that we or anyone else should be pursuing at this time.”

A New Covert Push

[...]
There were two specific objectives: to slow progress at Natanz and other known and suspected nuclear facilities, and keep the pressure on a little-known Iranian professor named Mohsen Fakrizadeh, a scientist described in classified portions of American intelligence reports as deeply involved in an effort to design a nuclear warhead for Iran.
[...]

In the end, success or failure may come down to how much pressure can be brought to bear on Mr. Fakrizadeh, whom the 2007 National Intelligence Estimate identifies, in its classified sections, as the manager of Project 110 and Project 111. According to a presentation by the chief inspector of the International Atomic Energy Agency, those were the names for two Iranian efforts that appeared to be dedicated to designing a warhead and making it work with an Iranian missile. Iranian officials say the projects are a fiction, made up by the United States.

[...]

The exact status of Mr. Fakrizadeh’s projects today is unclear. While the National Intelligence Estimate reported that activity on Projects 110 and 111 had been halted, the fear among intelligence agencies is that if the weapons design projects are turned back on, will they know?

To make the New Year Happy:

Jewish Women Occupy Israeli Consulate in Toronto, Canada!

A Palestinian woman blocks an Israeli soldier's shot on protesting youth.

Boycott Israeli Goods

Call for UN resolution 337

Sing a Song

Encourage the MainStreamMedia's baby steps

(If it was Iran, Iraq, North Korea, Russia, or Cuba acting in not quite as savage "self-defense", would the world have tolerated the onslaught for this long?!! What the HELL are we doing with our complicit silence? I am particularly ashamed of Canada's stance! But then again, we have a government that was about to be overthrown while they prorogued the parliament, cheating us of our democratic coalition ... people of earth, Canada is not a democracy at this moment!)