Category: Insights

Insightful Articles on Hot Issues

If sanctions on Iran haven’t worked, why bother again?
By Uriel Heilman · February 21, 2010

The United Nations Security Council, shown in session on Feb. 18, 2010, has passed sanctions legislation three times against Iran but has failed to curb the Islamic Republic’s nuclear ambitions. (UN Photo / Eskinder Debebe)

1 out of 1

Other Media
The United Nations Security Council, shown in session on Feb. 18, 2010, has passed sanctions legislation three times against Iran but has failed to curb the Islamic Republic’s nuclear ambitions. (UN Photo / Eskinder Debebe)

NEW YORK (JTA) — For years, sanctions have been the world’s answer to Iran’s suspected pursuit of nuclear weapons.

Three times already — in 2006, 2007 and 2008 — the U.N. Security Council passed sanctions legislation aimed at obstructing Iran’s nuclear capabilities and prodding the government in Tehran into cooperating.

The result: Iran moved ahead with building clandestine nuclear facilities, installing centrifuges and enriching unranium while refusing full access to international weapons inspectors and turning down deals with the West. Last week, the International Atomic Energy Agency issued a report saying it had evidence of “past or current undisclosed activities” by Iran to build a nuclear warhead.

Tehran repeatedly has made clear that its policy toward the West — on the nuclear issue and other matters, including last year’s disputed election — is defiance and obduracy, not cooperation or capitulation.

Now, in the face of mounting evidence that Iran’s pursuit of a nuclear bomb continues unabated, pro-Israel groups and U.S. and European governments again are pushing for new sanctions.

Given that sanctions haven’t worked in the past, is there any hope that things will be different this time?

“We won’t know the answer until we actually try,” said Malcolm Hoenlein, executive vice-chairman of the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations, the main U.S. Jewish umbrella group on Mideast-related issues.

“Sanctions can have an impact if they’re the right kind of sanctions, if they’re not going to be put off,” Hoenlein said. “The question is implementation. It’s not moving fast enough. The Iranians only understand one language: They have to understand this is showdown time.”

For now the approach among Jewish organizational leaders who have led the campaign to halt Iran’s pursuit of nuclear weapons is to continue to promote sanctions — both by the United Nations and by individual countries, including the United States. The thinking is that sanctions currently under consideration are considerably tougher than earlier rounds and must be tried before any other options can be explored.

“If we’re willing to put meaningful, painful sanctions in place, it can work,” said Josh Block, spokesman for the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, which has been the main lobbying group pushing Congress for sanctions on Iran.

“Do we have the ability to create significant economic pain for the Iranian government? Yes. Are they willing to change their behavior based on that impact? We don’t know,” Block acknowledged.

The new U.N. sanctions would target Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps and more severely restrict Iran’s banking industry. For enactment, nine of the U.N. Security Council’s members must vote for them, and none of the five permanent, veto-wielding members — China, Russia, the United States, Britain and France — can block them.

Russia, an early holdout, is now sending signals it favors new sanctions, but China has yet to agree. Four more yes votes would be necessary from the 10 rotating members: Austria, Bosnia-Herzegovina , Brazil, Gabon, Japan, Lebanon, Mexico, Nigeria, Turkey and Uganda. The four votes are not yet in place, insiders say, and the date for a vote on sanctions continues to be pushed back.

Meanwhile, the U.S. Congress is set to pass broad unilateral sanctions that would target Iran’s energy sector.

As the day of reckoning with a nuclear Iran fast approaches, advocates in the Jewish community are being forced to confront the question of where to go beyond sanctions.

There are no sure answers. Sanctions have not worked so far, and the U.S. administration doesn’t appear close to considering the military option.

Even if Israel were to circumvent the United States and strike Iran, it would be hard to wipe out the country’s nuclear facilities, which are thought to include sites that are hidden, underground, scattered and heavily fortified.

Some Jewish groups have begun talking about how to live with a nuclear Iran.

Jennifer Laszlo Mizrahi, the founder and president of The Israel Project, said that even if sanctions couldn’t stop Iran from going nuclear, they still could help deter a nuclear Iran from using its weapons.

“The idea that the game is over if Iran has a nuclear device is mistaken,” Mizrahi told JTA. “As long as Iran hasn’t used a nuclear device to shoot anybody or give it to terrorists, we still have to give it a full-court press.”

It’s possible, she noted, that Iran already has obtained a nuclear device from North Korea or other clandestine methods.

“Even if they were to have a nuclear device and a rocket today, it would still be useful to have sanctions,” Mizrahi said. “They can still be dissuaded from using their weapons and giving them up.”

With the time remaining for effective sanctions to have an impact on the Iranian regime dwindling, is it time to go to Plan B?

“There are plan B’s,” Hoenlein said. “We have not advocated military action. We don’t believe that’s our role. We believe all options should be on the table, including that. If they don’t believe all options are on the table, they will never move.”

Plan B, he said, could entail anything from a naval blockade to military strikes. The United States does not yet appear to be at that point, but of course Israel at any point could move to its own Plan B.

Even as they concede that serious questions remain about the efficacy of new sanctions and other options, U.S. Jewish organizational leaders are canvassing the country and holding meetings around the world to warn about the dangers of a nuclear Iran — and not just so they can feel like they’re doing something or to give their audiences a reason to lay awake at night.

“I’m not trying to suggest this as a panacea,” said Rabbi Steve Gutow, executive director of the Jewish Council for Public Affairs, a policy umbrella group. “We still have to get the sanctions thing passed.”

Talking about the dangers of a nuclear Iran can energize people to lobby their elected representatives, press the issue at consulates and embassies, and talk to associates with business interests overseas about the imperative to isolate Iran, he said.

The point, several Jewish officials said, is to not give up.

“Because of our history, because of our teachings, I think we’ve been taught that one cannot just sit by and watch evil win,” Gutow said, citing Theodor Herzl’s famous “Im Tirtzu” line – “If you will it, it is no dream.”

Mizrahi also cited Herzl.

“I’m not optimistic about any of these things, but as Golda Meir put it, Jews don’t have the option of being pessimists,” Mizrahi said. “If every time the world said it’s impossible for Israel to accomplish something, if they’d listened Israel wouldn’t have gone back to reclaim the land, drain the swamps and build the country. I believe very strongly in what Herzl said.”

To read more, click here
jta.org

Partners against Iran
By JPOST EDITORIAL
16/02/2010 23:03

Mullen’s visit underlined Washington’s intensifying effort to keep closely coordinated with Israel.
Talkbacks (1)

The visit to Israel this week by the chairman of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff, Admiral Michael Mullen, underlined the growing urgency of the Iranian nuclear challenge, and the Obama administration’s intensifying effort to keep closely coordinated with Israel while grappling with that threat.

Mullen’s visit coincided with the announcement that Vice President Joe Biden will also come to Israel in the near future, again for high-level talks largely focused on the Iranian issue.The visit also came as US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton toured Qatar and Saudi Arabia in order to shore up support for American diplomatic and military efforts in the region, ahead of visits by three of her top deputies and a reported upcoming trip by White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emmanuel.

The rhetoric from Washington is firm: Clinton declared to Iran that the US would “not stand idly by while you pursue a nuclear program that can be used to threaten your neighbors and even beyond.” Mullen was more curt still: Iran “cannot have a nuclear weapon, [or] nuclear capability,” he said here.

At the same time, however, there is profound concern in Israel that the fine words, even backed up by a new seriousness in seeking more effective economic sanctions, will prove insufficient to deter the ayatollahs.

Clearly, the flurry of visits by high-level US officials marks a heightened era of dialogue between Washington and Jerusalem, as the US steps up its campaign to resolve the Iranian crisis without a resort to force.

Mullen warned Israel tellingly of the “unintended consequences” of a military strike. Biden, the former head of the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations, will doubtless also stress the administration’s conviction that there are still effective ways, and sufficient time, to force the Islamic Republic’s hand before we arrive at the stark choice: a nuclear Iran, or military intervention to prevent it.

FOR NOW, President Barack Obama has yet to add Israel to his travel plans. And eight months after his landmark visit to Cairo, and his outreach address to the Muslim world, his absence is keenly felt here. Obama the candidate received the usual rock-star treatment when he visited – and took time to tour Sderot – in 2008. Obama the president is a more suspect commodity – a friend of Israel and guardian of the strategic partnership, to be sure, but also a leader who has been publicly at odds with ours over the dimensions of a building freeze beyond the ’67 lines and over his assessment that progress on the Palestinian front can produce leverage on Iran rather than the other way round.

A presidential visit in the near future would certainly prove reassuring to many Israelis, and would disarm those critics who assert that our well-being is not a sufficiently high priority for hisWhite House.

But whether their face-to-face meetings take place here or in Washington, there can be no doubting that further direct consultations between Obama and Prime Minister Netanyahu will be vital in the coming months – as the US president strives to force Iran to change course, and the possibility of this effort failing raises ever-greater concerns in Israel.

Israel has been publicly supportive of the American effort at engagement with Iran, even as it has privately complained about the lack of firm parameters guiding that engagement, the fudging of deadlines, the apparent capacity for Iran to exploit a well-meaning president’s desire for a diplomatic solution in order to buy time and close in on the nuclear weapons goal.

Ultimately, Israel must and will take the decisions it feels necessary to safeguard its basic security interests. Ultimately, Israel will gauge the risks, assess the consequences, and act accordingly.

Today, in mid-February 2010, the US and Israel remain shoulder-to-shoulder in seeking biting sanctions against Teheran, to obviate the recourse to the use of force. It is encouraging to see the succession of candid, straight-talking, high-level visits bolstering that coordination. It is a partnership that needs to be maintained at the very highest level as well.

To read more, click here
Partners against Iran

Profile: Organisation of the Islamic Conference

The OIC: Seeking Islamic unity
The 57-member Organisation of the Islamic Conference (OIC) is largely made up of countries whose people are mainly followers of the Islamic religion. It was established in 1969 in the wake of an arson attack by a deranged tourist on the Al-Aqsa Mosque in Jerusalem.

Its aims are, among other things, to promote all-round cooperation among its member states, to safeguard Islamic holy places and to work towards eradicating racial discrimination and colonialism.

OVERVIEW

OVERVIEW | FACTS | LEADERS | ISSUES

The OIC comprises 57 states dispersed over four continents, spanning from Albania (Europe) in the north to Mozambique (Africa) in the south, and from Guyana (Latin America) in the west to Indonesia (Asia) in the east.

But, despite its size, which includes nearly one-third of the members of the United Nations, its numerous committees and the scope of its stated activities, the OIC is run on a shoe-string budget.

The supreme body of the OIC is the Conference of Heads of State, which convenes every three years. The first summit conference, held in Rabat in 1969, decided that member states would “consult together with a view to promoting close cooperation and mutual assistance in the economic, scientific, cultural and spiritual fields, inspired by the immortal teachings of Islam”.

In the interval between summits, OIC foreign ministers meet to oversee the implementation of decisions taken by the heads of state. The first foreign ministers’ meeting took place in 1972, when the OIC Charter was adopted.

However, the day-to-day running of the OIC is left to the Secretariat, which consists of a secretary-general and four assistant secretaries-general.

FACTS

OVERVIEW | FACTS | LEADERS | ISSUES

Founded: 1969
Membership: 57 states
Population: 650 million (21% of world population)
Members’ resources: 70% of world crude oil reserves; 50% of world natural gas reserves

LEADERS

OVERVIEW | FACTS | LEADERS | ISSUES

Secretary-general: Ekmeleddin Ihsanoglu

Pushing for internal change: Ekmeleddin Ihsanoglu
Ekmeleddin Ihsanoglu, an Egyptian-born Turkish former diplomat, succeeded Morocco’s Abdelouahed Belkeziz as the OIC leader at the end of 2004. He promised to “re-energise” the organisation by making administrative changes.

Turkey had lobbied hard on behalf of its candidate, presenting Mr Ihsanoglu as a reformer, both in terms of the OIC and the wider Islamic world.

Mr Ihsanoglu has called for collective action by Islamic countries to combat religious extremism. He wants a greater role for Muslim nations in international affairs, including permanent representation in the UN Security Council.

The secretary-general is elected by the Conference of Ministers of Foreign Affairs for a four-year term, renewable once. Mr Ihsanoglu is the first head of the OIC to have been chosen by secret ballot.

ISSUES

OVERVIEW | FACTS | LEADERS | ISSUES

Although a useful forum for discussion, the OIC lacks the means to implement its resolutions, which often remain as unheeded declarations.

Thus, despite a 1981 call to redouble efforts “for the liberation of Jerusalem and the occupied territories” and to institute an economic boycott of Israel, several members, including Indonesia, Egypt, Jordan and Arab Gulf states, maintain economic ties with Israel.

Furthermore, pledges for financial aid to member states or to Muslim communities suffering from civil war or natural disasters are often at best met only in part.

As a broad organisation whose member states are widely dispersed geographically, the effectiveness of the OIC has also been constrained by the fact that many of its members have a wide variety of political orientations, from revolutionary Iran to conservative Saudi Arabia. Members have sometimes been in bitter dispute with one another, such as Iraq and Iran and Iraq and Kuwait.

While the net effect of these differences is often weak resolutions or ones that are honoured only in breach, sometimes they result in the boycott of summit conferences altogether, such as happened in 1991, when 12 Arab heads of state failed to turn up in Senegal in protest against the presence of Jordan and the Palestine Liberation Organisation, which had taken Baghdad’s side in the war which followed Iraq’s invasion of Kuwait.

For more reading, click here
Profile: Organisation of the Islamic Conference

Think tank: Israel faces global delegitimization campaign
By Barak Ravid, Haaretz Correspondent

Israel is facing a global campaign of delegitimization, according to a report by the Reut Institute, made available to the cabinet on Thursday. The Tel Aviv-based security and socioeconomic think tank called on ministers to treat the matter as a strategic threat.

The report cites anti-Israel demonstrations on campuses, protests when Israeli athletes compete abroad, moves in Europe to boycott Israeli products, and threats of arrest warrants for Israeli leaders visiting London.

Reut says the campaign is the work of a worldwide network of private individuals and organizations. They have no hierarchy or overall commander, but work together based on a joint ideology – portraying Israel as a pariah state and denying its right to exist.

Reut lists the network’s major hubs – London, Brussels, Madrid, Toronto, San Francisco and the University of California, Berkeley. The network’s activists – “delegitimizers” the report dubs them – are relatively marginal: young people, anarchists, migrants and radical political activists. Although they are not many, they raise their profile using public campaigns and media coverage, the report says.

The “delegitimizers” cooperate with organizations engaging in legitimate criticism of Israel’s policy in the territories such as Amnesty and Human Rights Watch, blurring the line between legitimate censure and delegitimization. They also promote pro-Palestinian activities in Europe as “trendy,” the report says.

The network’s activists are not mostly Palestinian, Arab or Muslim. Many of them are European and North American left-wing activists. The Western left has changed its approach to Israel and now sees it as an occupation state, the report says. To those left-wing groups, if in the 1960s Israel was seen as a model for an egalitarian, socialist society, today it epitomizes Western evil.

The delegitimization network sees the fight against the former regime in South Africa as a success model. It believes that like the apartheid regime, the Zionist-Israeli model can be toppled and a one-state model can be established.

The Reut team says the network’s groups share symbols and heroes such as the Palestinian boy Mohammed al-Dura, American peace activist Rachel Corrie and joint events like the Durban Conference.

Israel’s diplomats overseas, meanwhile, must counter the attempts to delegitimize the country. “The combination of a large Muslim community, a radical left, influential, English-language media and an international university center make London fertile ground for Israel’s delegitimization,” says Ron Prosor, Israel’s ambassador in London.

Prosor gives many interviews to the British media and lectures at university campuses throughout the country. Although he says he has encountered anti-Israel demonstrations on almost every campus, Prosor has told his people to increase their campus activity.

“What is now happening in London universities will happen, at most, in five years at all the large universities in the United States,” he says.

The Reut report says Israel is not prepared at all to deal with the threat of delegitimization. The cabinet has not defined the issue as a threat and sees the diplomatic arena as marginal compared to the military one.

“The Foreign Ministry is built for the challenges of the ’60s, not the 2000s,” the report says. “There are no budgets, not enough diplomats and no appropriate diplomatic doctrine.”

Reut recommends setting up a counter-network, in which Israel’s embassies in centers of delegitimization activity would serve as “front positions.”

The report says the intelligence service should monitor the organizations’ activities and study their methods. The cabinet should also confront groups trying to delegitimize Israel but embrace those engaged in legitimate criticism.

The report adds that Israel should not boycott these groups, as Israel’s embassy in Washington does with the left-wing lobby J Street. Boycotting critics merely pushes them toward joining the delegitimizers, Reut says.

For read more click here
Think tank: Israel faces global delegitimization campaign

Analysis: Iran, West deceiving each other about nuke program

Iran under the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty advances step by step toward military nuclear status, disguising its intentions all along the way.

In a January 31 television interview, President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad announced out of the blue that Iran had agreed to the uranium exchange deal that it had rejected repeatedly since October 2009. This announcement came several days after it was reported that the US was deploying missile defense systems in the Gulf.

However, on Sunday, Ahmadinejad announced that Iran would begin to enrich uranium by itself, to a level of 20 percent, and that it had attained laser technology for uranium enrichment.

The Iranian daily Kayhan, which is close to Iranian Leader Ali Khamenei, even declared that once Teheran enriches uranium to 20%, the West will not be able to stop it at that level of enrichment, and would have to negotiate with Iran over higher levels of enrichment.

These developments reveal deception by both parties – Iran and the West – vis-à-vis the Islamic Republic’s nuclear program. Iran under the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty advanced step by step toward military nuclear status, disguising its intentions all along the way.

As for the West, it is presenting its policy as aimed at helping Iran, while its diplomatic measures, and especially the uraniumexchange deal, are really aimed at hampering Teheran’s nuclear progress. This deepens Iran’s distrust, for it understands the proposal’s real purpose.

Why won’t Iran hand over its uranium?

In the past months, Iran has adamantly rejected the proposal that the West presents as aimed at helping it by providing it with 20% enriched uranium for its research reactor in Teheran.

The reason for this refusal is that, according to the West’s intention, the uranium handed over would indeed be enriched to a higher level, but at the same time would be altered so that it could not be enriched further for military use – and this is a deal that Iran refused to accept.

In their public statements, Iran’s spokesmen do not bring up this point, but they have stated repeatedly that they do not trust the West. For example, Majlis speaker Ali Larijani warned at a February 6 conference in Teheran that the West was trying to deceive Iran with the nuclear deal but that the West should know that his country is not falling for it: “The truth is that you [Westerners] are conducting a sort of political deceit in order to separate Iran from [its] enriched uranium… But you need to know… that the Iranians are not naive.”

It should be further noted that Iran has no need for 1,200 kg. of 20%-enriched uranium, which is the quantity arbitrarily set by the West in the deal. The Teheran research reactor requires only 30 kg. of 20%-enriched uranium for its operations, and this quantity is equal to about 400 kg. of 5%-enriched uranium; furthermore, this quantity will last it until the reactor ceases to be operational, in about a decade.

Iran’s position is that if the West does indeed want only to help Iran, as it says, then Teheran does not need to enrich more than 400 kg., but the West is demanding that Iran hand over 1,200 kg., which constitutes 75% of its enriched uranium stock. This demand proves that the West wants to maintain its nuclear military hegemony and to prevent Iran from attaining military nuclear status. For this reason, Iran is adamant that it will not hand over its strategic reservesto the West.

The position presented in recent days by Iranian Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki focuses on the ongoing dispute between Iran and the superpowers vis-à-vis the quantity of lower-level enriched uranium that Teheran would hand over for enrichment.

At the 46th Munich Security Conference (February 5-7), Mottaki portrayed as likely Iran’s acceptance of a deal, and said that it and the IAEA had already agreed to the nuclear deal with a third country and that all that remained was to set the time, place, and quantity of uranium that Iran would hand over. However, he stressed that “it is the Iranian side that will set the scope [of the uranium]exchange [deal], with attention to its own needs” and that “the quantity of nuclear fuel [enriched to 3.5% that Iran will agree to transport from its territory] will be in accordance with Iran’s needs, and the moment that Iran announces what this quantity is, the deal will be able to go ahead.”

Nevertheless, an Iranian official told the Iranian news agency Fars that Teheran had not changed its position toward the deal proposed at the Vienna conference, on October 19-21, 2009, despite reports in recent days about a “softer” stance being adopted vis-à-vis the proposal.

In addition, Ahmadinejad announced in an interview on Iranian television that Teheran does not oppose an uranium exchange deal outside Iranian soil, adding that circles in Iran had raised an unnecessary stink over the issue; however, he ignored the issue on which Iran and the West disagree – that is, the quantity of enriched uranium that Teheran is willing to hand over.

Ahmadinejad: I ordered 20% enrichment

At the same time, in a step typical of Iran’s nuclear policy, Ahmadinejad launched a new phase in Teheran’s struggle against the superpowers with his defiant February 7 declaration that he had already ordered the start of 20% uranium enrichment – thus obviating the need for dialogue with the West or for compliance with the nuclear deal.

At the same venue, a conference titled “Iran’s Laser Technology Achievements,” Ahmadinejad said: “I ordered the head of the Iranian Atomic Energy Organization [Ali Akbar Salehi] to begin enriching uranium to 20%, but the path of dialogue remains open.”

He added: “Iran has attained the ability to enrich uranium using laser technology, and with this method it is possible to perform enrichment faster and more accurately, and to any [enrichment] level – but actually we do not plan to use this method.”

He continued, “Of course, if these countries [i.e. the 5+1] come to us without preconditions, the way to an exchange deal is still open.”

The next day, Salehi said that on February 9, Iran would begin to enrich uranium at 20% at the Natanz facility, and that despite its ability to enrich uranium to any level it desires, Iran preferred the option of acquiring the nuclear fuel plates from a foreign country. In addition, he declared that Iran would construct, within the year (i.e., by March 2011), 10 uranium enrichment centers.

The conservative daily Kayhan, which is close to Khamenei, even stated in a February 9 editorial that the West had missed the opportunity to stop Iran at 5% enrichment, and that the minute Iran enriches uranium to 20%, the West will not be able to stop it from advancing further. At that point, Iran will not agree to stop at 20%, and the negotiations will be over enrichment to a higher level.

It should be noted that Iran possesses 1,600 kg of 5%-enriched uranium (5% is the level permitted under IAEA regulations for generating power; the country must announce that it will be enriching it and must obtain advance approval). However, it is continuing its intensive work to enrich more uranium, even though it has no plant or nuclear reactor that requires such quantities of enriched uranium for operation. Furthermore, the Bushehr reactor, which has not yet begun operating, does not require locally enriched uranium, because under the agreement that Iran signed with Moscow in 2005, Moscow is providing the fuel rods to operate it, and Iran has been receiving them since 2007.

In these circumstances, it is very peculiar that Salehi announced that Iran will construct 10 additional uranium enrichment centers; it means that Iran can be suspected of enriching uranium for military purposes.

The West’s weakness

Again and again, the West has called on Iran to accept its ultimatums, which Iran knows are toothless; this approach exposes the West’s, and particularly the US’s and Europe’s, inability to deal with Iran on vital issues of global security and stability.

The West’s unwillingness to publicly acknowledge that the “deal” that it proposed is not really aimed at helping Iran, as it claims, but rather at preventing Iran from using the enriched uranium for military purposes, strips the West of its credibility vis-à-vis Teheran.

To read more, click here
Iran, West deceiving each other about nuke program

By Abukar Arman

Indonesian Muslims take part in an anti U.S.-Israel-Egypt protest in front of the Egyptian embassy in Jakarta on Jan. 17, demonstrating against an underground wall being built to block a network of tunnels crossing Egypt’s border with the Gaza Strip. (Photo: Bay Ismoyo/ AFP-Getty Images)

The recent Egyptian government’s decision to seal the few “tunnels of life” that allowed people of Gaza to bypass the ongoing inhumane economic strangulation—along with its harassment and cruel treatment of the participants of Gaza Freedom March and the Viva Palestina humanitarian convoy—earned it a prominent position in history’s page of shame. A page crowded by wealthy Arab nations who failed the Palestinian people and abandoned them at their most vulnerable time.

However, by no means should that sideline drama veil or in any way divert attention away from the root cause of the problem—the over six decades of oppression imposed upon the Palestinian people.

In that period, the state of Israel has occupied Palestine with an iron fist, denying Palestinians the right to self-determination and coercing part of their “elite” to surrender to what seems like a condition of eternal subjugation. However, the gravest of the Palestinian sufferings is embodied in the suffering of the people of Gaza as they endure a vicious economic strangulation unilaterally imposed by Israel. And despite worldwide condemnation of that egregious draconian policy, Israel continues to operate with impunity, devoid of conscience.

In their 575-page report released last September, the fact-finding mission on Israel’s disproportionate use of force in Gaza appointed by the U.N. Human Rights Commission has confirmed the ugly truth that most of the Western media were inoculated to under-report or outright ignore. The mission was led by Judge Richard Goldstone, former member of the South African Constitutional Court and former Chief Prosecutor of the United Nations International Criminal Tribunals for the former Yugoslavia and Rwanda. While the report also blamed Hamas, it highlighted that “there was strong evidence to establish that numerous serious violations of international law, both humanitarian law and human rights law, were committed by Israel during the military operations in Gaza. … Actions amounting to war crimes and possibly, in some respects, crimes against humanity, were committed by the Israel Defense Force.”

According to Article 39 of the report, the Israeli forces intentionally targeted and attacked Al Quds Hospital in the adjacent ambulance depot in Gaza with white phosphorous shells, an internationally banned chemical substance that, among other things, instantaneously burns the human being into skeleton.

Although the key recommendation of Goldstone was for the U.N. Security Council to pass a resolution mandating a credible investigation into the war-crimes allegations by the International Criminal Court, no such action has been taken.

In reaction to the report, the U.S. Congress—while succumbing to the “Israel Lobby”—has passed a non-binding resolution condemning the Goldstone Report. The resolution was intended to express unequivocal blind loyalty to Israel, and to pressure the Obama administration to use its veto power (as a permanent member of the Security Council) against any resolution that might expose Israel. Apparently, the strategy worked; the report is now piling dust in the oblivion.

For whatever it’s worth, it is this kind of culture of impunity that, according to Goldstone, “emboldens Israel and her conviction of being untouchable.” This concern was immediately dismissed as anti-Semitic by loyalists and supporters of oppressive Zionism. Never mind that Judge Goldstone is Jewish and is a supporter of Israel’s right to exist.

Make no mistake, anti-Semitism is a real racist phenomenon; however, the politically motivated excessive use of the term to character-assassinate and silence legitimate critics and peace and justice advocates, such as former President Jimmy Carter and Archbishop Desmond Tutu, simply defeats the purpose.

Meanwhile, though the Obama administration is showing signs of discomfort with the current Israeli government, the U.S. foreign policy toward Middle East is still driven by unconditional loyalty.

As the Obama administration tries to reduce the post-9/11tension between the United States and the Islamic world and rein in the rapid growth of extremism, the Palestine issue remains an open sore that is festering in America’s foreign policy. While the current administration has attempted to demonstrate its intention of becoming an honest broker by appointing a credible diplomat—former Senator George Mitchell—as the Middle East envoy, Israel continues its belligerent oppression and expansionist policy by defiantly building new settlements.

Led by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman, Israel is adamant to continue the ever-expanding land grab driven by illegal home demolitions and confiscations, daily dreadful human rights abuses at check points, random imprisonment and assassinations, suppression of independent media, and systematic ethnic cleansing of Palestinians. This, needless to say, has frustrated the Obama administration, whose out-of-the-ordinary reaction to Netanyahu’s visit to the United States has caused Israel a big embarrassment.

In an article intended to rally the troops against Obama, Jerusalem Post’s hawkish columnist, Caroline Glick, wrote, “It isn’t every day that a visiting leader from a strategically vital U.S. ally is brought into the White House in an unmarked van in the middle of the night rather than greeted like a friend at the front door; is forbidden to have his picture taken with the president; is forced to leave the White House alone, through a side exit.”

Though this was not a decision to stop or even suspend the roughly $3 billion of unrestricted aid given to Israel every year, it still turned many heads and galvanized the usual suspects to come after Obama with all sorts of accusations.

Not since 1990 when then Secretary of State James Baker sent a blunt public message to then Israeli Prime Minister Ytsakh Shamir, telling him “call us when you are serious about peace … the telephone number is 1-202-546-1414,’ has U.S. leadership sent Israel a stern message that its actions are unacceptable.

At the end of the day, convincing Israel to do the right thing and stop establishing new facts on the ground to further complicate an already complex political issue will require more than symbolism. And nothing substantive is likely to happen until the United States modifies its one-sided Middle East policy. Meanwhile, Israel will continue business as usual. It might invade Gaza again. Some opinion makers in Israel are already boasting about what “Operation Cast Lead 2″ would look like with the use of “advanced Israeli-made Marakava 4 tanks.”

Nothing equates to oppression more than the inaction of an apathetic witness.

To read more please click below…
Muffled Screams of Gaza

How to save the Obama presidency – bomb Iran
BY DANIEL PIPES
02/02/2010 23:50

Article from JPost
President needs dramatic gesture to change perception of him as lightweight ideologue.
Talkbacks (61)
I do not customarily offer advice to a president whose election I opposed, whose goals I fear and whose policies I work against. But here is a way for Barack Obama to salvage his tottering administration by taking a step that protects the US and its allies.

If Obama’s personality, identity and celebrity captivated a majority of the American electorate in 2008, those qualities proved ruefully deficient in 2009. He failed to deliver on employment and health care, he failed in foreign policy forays small (e.g., landing the 2016 Olympics) and large (relations with China and Japan). His counterterrorism record barely passes the laugh test.

This poor performance has caused an unprecedented collapse in the polls and the loss of three major by-elections, culminating two weeks ago in an astonishing senatorial defeat in Massachusetts. Obama’s attempts to “reset” his presidency will likely fail if he focuses on economics, where he is just one of many players.

He needs a dramatic gesture to change the public perception of him as a lightweight, bumbling ideologue, preferably in an arena where the stakes are high, where he can take charge and where he can trump expectations.

Such an opportunity does exist: Obama can order the US military to destroy Iran’s nuclear weapons capacity.

Circumstances are propitious. First, US intelligence agencies have reversed the preposterous 2007 National Intelligence Estimate that claimed with “high confidence” that Teheran had “halted its nuclear weapons program.” No one (other than the Iranian rulers and their agents) denies that the regime is rushing headlong to build a nuclear arsenal.

Second, if the apocalyptic-minded leaders in Teheran get the Bomb, they render the Middle East yet more volatile and dangerous. They might deploy these weapons in the region, leading to massive death and destruction. Or they could launch an electromagnetic pulse attack on the US, devastating the country. By eliminating the Iranian nuclear threat, Obama protects the homeland and sends a message to America’s friends and enemies.

THIRD, POLLING shows long-standing American backing for an attack on the Iranian nuclear infrastructure.

• A Los Angeles Times/Bloomberg poll in January 2006 found that 57% of Americans favored military intervention if Teheran pursues a program that could enable it to build nuclear arms.

• A Zogby International poll in October 2007 found that 52% of likely voters supported a US military strike to prevent Iran from building a nuclear weapon; 29% opposed such a step.

• McLaughlin & Associates in May 2009 asked whether people would support “using the [US] military to attack and destroy the facilities in Iran which are necessary to produce a nuclear weapon”; 58% of 600 likely voters supported the use of force and 30% opposed it.

• Fox News in September 2009 asked: “Do you support or oppose the United States taking military action to keep Iran from getting nuclear weapons?” Sixty-one percent of 900 registered voters supported military action and 28% opposed it.

• Pew Research Center in October 2009 asked which is more important, “to prevent Iran from developing nuclear weapons, even if it means taking military action” or “to avoid a military conflict with Iran, even if it means they may develop nuclear weapons”; of 1,500 respondents, 61% favored the first reply and 24% the second.

Not only does a strong majority – 57%, 52%, 58%, 61% and 61% – already favor using force, but after a strike Americans will presumably rally around the flag, pushing that number much higher.

Fourth, were the US strike limited to taking out Iran’s nuclear facilities, and not aspiring to regime change, it would require few “boots on the ground” and entail relatively few casualties, making an attack politically more palatable.

Just as 9/11 caused voters to forget George W. Bush’s meandering early months, a strike on the Iranian facilities would dispatch Obama’s feckless first year down the memory hole and transform the domestic political scene. It would sideline health care, prompt Republicans to work with Democrats, make netroots squeal, independents reconsider and conservatives swoon.

But the chance to do good and do well is fleeting. As the Iranians improve their defenses and approach weaponization, the window of opportunity is closing. The time to act is now or, on Obama’s watch, the world will soon become a much more dangerous place.

The writer (www.DanielPipes.org) is director of the Middle East Forum and Taube distinguished visiting fellow at the Hoover Institution of Stanford University.

UN officials say that the use of white phosphorus caused millions of dollars in damage and could have led to a ‘great loss of life’

(Mohammed Abed/AFP/Getty Images)
Sheera Frenkel in Jerusalem

Israel has reprimanded two senior army officers who were responsible for firing white phosphorus artillery shells at a UN compound during last year’s offensive in Gaza.

In the first admission of any wrongdoing the Israeli military found that Brigadier-General Eyal Eisenberg and Colonel Ilan Malka were guilty “of exceeding their authority in a manner that jeopardised the lives of others”.

The Israeli report was in response to a damning UN investigation into the Gaza war, which concluded that both Israel and Hamas, the Palestinian group, had committed war crimes and possible crimes against humanity and which called on both sides to investigate the conduct of their forces.

An Israeli defence official said that its internal investigation could lead to further disciplinary action against soldiers involved in the 22-day offensive. The two officers disciplined yesterday were served a mild reprimand and had a “note” placed in their personal files noting their involvement. One defence official described the punishment as a “slap on the wrist.”

The Times first revealed that Israeli artillery was firing white phosphorus rounds into the heavily populated Palestinian enclave.

The reports were at first denied by the Israel Defence Forces (IDF), which admitted later that the munitions had been used to provide smoke and tracer illumination during the incursion. International law prohibits the use of white phosphorus in heavily populated civilian areas, but allows it in open areas to be used as cover for troops. The incident in the IDF report occurred on January 15 when General Eisenberg and Colonel Malka were responsible for bombarding the UN compound. During the incident, near the Tel al-Hawa neighbourhood south of Gaza City, Israeli forces from the Givati unit were exchanging fire with Hamas fighters.

Hamas held a position with a commanding view of advancing Israeli troops, with the UN’s headquarters directly between the two forces. The artillery attack by 155mm cannon, which took place while more than 700 Palestinian civilians were taking refuge inside, set light to a warehouse storing millions of dollars’ worth of aid for more than a million Gazans and destroyed tonnes of food and supplies.

A high-ranking UN official told The Times that half a dozen unexploded IDF shells were found in the UN compound and their serial numbers were traced to US factories. “The burning down of the UN compound in Gaza is massively symbolic,” said Chris Gunness, a UN spokesman.

Human rights groups have accused Israel of violating the rules of warfare in Gaza.

Although white phosphorus is not mentioned in the officers’ reprimands, the Israeli report reveals elsewhere that the munitions were in use. The shells disperse hundreds of pieces of felt soaked in the incendiary chemical, which continues to burn for as long as it is exposed to oxygen.

The IDF report said: “The primary rationale for deploying smoke screening munitions containing white phosphorus was to produce a smokescreen to protect Israeli forces from the Hamas anti-tank crews operating adjacent to the UNRWA headquarters. Such a smokescreen has proven an effective response to the anti-tank threat, since it effectively blocks the enemy’s field of view . . . The smokescreen created during the fighting in Tel al-Hawa was effective in achieving its military objective.” It concluded: “In the absence of the smokescreen, the fight would have continued in this area, and the IDF would have had to use reactive fire to engage anti-tank units, with the likelihood of greater civilian harm.”

UN officials argue that the use of white phosphorus caused millions of dollars in damage and could have led to a “great loss of life”.
For more news… timesonline.co.uk

Reuel S. Amdur

Jewish settlers’ attacks on Palestinians and destruction of their crops and other property are justified according to Jewish law, says Rabbi Yitzhak Shapira.

Rabbi Yitzhak Shapira released his book The King’s Torah on November 9. In it he goes into great detail on when it is permissible to kill gentiles.

When a gentile has sinned or violated the laws handed down by God to Noah (idolatry, theft, male homosexuality, blasphemy, etc.) and is killed by a Jew, “there is nothing wrong with the murder.”

While at one point the book says that the killing must be ordered by a court, it also says that “Even individuals from the nation being attacked may harm them,” referring to an attacking “evil kingdom.”

The role of a court becomes somewhat ambiguous, as many of the Ultra-Orthodox Jews do not recognize the state of Israel as legitimate. They await the messiah to bring in a legitimate government. That leaves the question of the legitimacy of Israeli courts in question.

Where Jews are endangered, the book tells us that “It is permissible to Kill the Righteous Among Nations even if they are not responsible for the threatening situation” that Jews face.

What’s more, “One must consider killing even babies. . . because of the future danger that will be caused if they are allowed to grow up to be as wicked as their parents.” And, “If hurting an evil king’s children will pressure him to stop acting maliciously, you can hurt them.”

The practical implications of this religious perspective are evident. If it is acceptable to kill babies who might otherwise grow up to be as wicked as their parents, who might want to protect their land, and if you can hurt the children of “the wicked king”, it follows that it is appropriate to attack Palestinian children going to school.

Since God has decreed all of the West Bank and more to the Jews, it becomes clear that Palestinians are of the “evil kingdom” trying to prevent settlers from taking possession of land that is rightly Jewish.

An Israeli colonel who was stationed in the West Bank called upon his superiors and on Israeli legal authorities to take action against “provocateurs”, including Rabbi Shapira.

He called attention to students from Shapira’s yeshiva (religious school) who were committing crimes against Palestinians in the area.

The Israeli newspaper Ha’aretz noted that “Shapira is among the rabbis who signed a manifesto in support of the suspects in a brutal attack on two Arab youths on Holocaust Remembrance Day in May.”

The book has been endorsed by other “prominent rabbis” (Ha’aretz) in Israel.

Two, Yitzhak Ginzburg and Yaakaov Yosef, wrote their endorsements in the book itself.

Ginzburg was earlier jailed for inciting racism against Arabs. He is the author of a book praising Baruch Goldstein, the settler who entered a mosque during prayer and opened fire at random, killing 29 worshippers before he was overcome and killed himself.

Shapira’s book was released at a memorial event for Rabbi Meier Kahane, a man who advocated expulsion of all Arabs from Israel.

However, the book never mentions Arabs or Palestinians by name. Probably Shapira wanted to avoid Ginzburg’s fate of conviction for racism.

Shapira’s world view is being acted out in Israel and Palestine. We have mentioned something of the behavior of the settlers, but there is more.

Not long before the release of Shapira’s book, Yaakov Teitel was arrested for the 1997 murder of a Palestinian shepherd in the West Bank and an Arab taxi driver in Jerusalem.

He is also accused of bomb attacks, one during a gay pride parade. Before his arrest, an unknown person entered a gay community center in Tel Aviv and opened fire, killing two people, undoubtedly justified by the laws of Noah.

All of this must be put in perspective.

The views of Shapira and his supportive colleagues are in fact the views of an extremist fringe, with even some settler rabbis expressing disagreement.

And many settlers live in the West Bank for economic reasons. Israel has made it very advantageous financially to take up residence in West Bank communities.

When the report about the book appeared in Ha’aretz, almost all the blogs expressed horror and outrage.

Yet, the situation in the West Bank, with the ongoing attacks on Palestinians and their property, demonstrates that, especially among some of the settlers, the book has its resonance.

The Israeli program of settlement expansion at the expense of the Palestinians, while not inspired by Shapira, nevertheless serves to reinforce that outlook. It becomes acceptable to treat Palestinians as obstacles to be overcome.

Unfortunately, the kind of thinking displayed by Shapra and his associates is not restricted to the Middle East.

In an issue of the American Jewish magazine Moment, a number of rabbis were asked how Jews’ Arab neighbors should be treated. Almost to a man, they took the position that they should be treated fairly and their rights protected. I said “almost”.

Rabbi Manis Friedman, of the Ultra-Orthodox Chabad sect, had a different take: “I don’t believe in western morality, i.e., don’t kill civilians or children, don’t destroy holy sites, don’t fight during holiday seasons, don’t bomb cemeteries, don’t shoot until they shoot first because it is immoral. The only way to fight a moral war is the Jewish way: Destroy their holy sites. Kill men, women and children (and cattle).”

Reuel S. Amdur is a freelance writer living near Ottawa.

To read more please click below..
It’s permissible to kill Palestinians

Hi Readers,

Well, we posted many articles from the open source (Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia) related to the following topics:

1. Terror

2. Terrorism

3. Islamic Terrorism

4. Motivations and Islamic Terrorism

We posted this article under the following categories: Terrorism and What-do-you-think

You can read those articles and get more details from (Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia) on this and other topics.

We would like to invite our readers to propose the solutions to the Terrorism and Islamic Terrorism, solutions which are meaningful, intelligent and thought provoking.

Your solution should be free from Hate,  terrorism for terrorism, kill-all type of solutions.

We are looking forward to your posts and comments.

~Muslims Voice of America