Category: Middle East

The case against war: Ten years later

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By Stephen Zunes

Ten years ago, I wrote a series of articles for the Foreign Policy in Focus website in which I put forth a series of arguments against the Bush administration’s push for a U.S. invasion of Iraq prior to the fateful congressional vote authorizing the illegal, unnecessary, and ultimately disastrous war. At the request of the editors of The Nation – the oldest continually published weekly magazine in the United States – I wrote a version entitled “The Case Against War,” which appeared on their website September 12, 2002 and as the cover story of the September 30 issue. It became one of the most widely circulated articles in the magazine’s 147-year old history. Every congressional office received multiple copies.Read More »

The Democratic Convention – Soviet-style and denial

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By Johan Galtung
From Charlotte, NC-USA – 5 September 2012 [i]

The Democratic National Convention, DNC, floated into oblivion with no debate – Soviet style, hallelujah, amen – with no mention of overt wars with 5-6 Muslim countries; of covert wars by drones and SEALs-US Navy’s Sea, Air and Land Teams with many others; and the war on terror. Like the Republican National Convention, RNC, squeezing out Ron Paul, who argued for no bases, no wars, no support to Israel.Read More »

Attacking Iran: Disaster for the region and the whole world

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By Johan Galtung

The Israeli attack seems imminent. Richard Silverstein circulates a leaked “shock and awe” strategy of Benjamin Netanyahu / Ehud Barak hard zionism to decapitate, paralyze Iran; and Alon Ben‑Meir (an expert on Middle East politics specializing in peace negotiations between Israel and Arab states) says Israel is not bluffing. Israel may prefer an attack with the USA (Romney? Obama after elections?), but may go alone. Some people believe the nuclear bomb story, others believe that the purpose is Israel as a Jewish state from the Nile to the Euphrates, also promoted by Netanyahu’s late father. The two stories do not exclude each other.

Iran is a Shanghai Cooperation Organization-SCO observer. An attack will trigger responses from the Russia‑China core. What Israel may gain in Saudi Sunni support they may lose in more important parts of the world, in diplomatic and economic relations. The SCO is huge.

There is also the real danger of a world war of NATO against SCO, with nuclear powers divided 4‑4; USA‑Israel being indivisible as they came into being in the same way: by taking somebody else’s land.

Iranian devastating responses will come before decapitation. Read More »

U.S. shares responsibility for Rachel Corrie’s death

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By Stephen Zunes

On August 28, an Israeli court rejected a civil lawsuit against Israeli occupation forces for the 2003 murder of Rachel Corrie, a 23-year old American peace activist killed in the Gaza Strip, upholding a severely flawed internal Israeli military investigation.

Amnesty International strongly condemned the decision, noting how “the verdict continues the pattern of impunity for Israeli military violations against civilians and human rights defenders in the Occupied Palestinian Territories (OPT). The verdict shields Israeli military personnel from accountability and ignores deep flaws in the Israeli military’s internal investigation of Corrie’s death.”Read More »

California State Assembly seeks to stifle debate on Israel

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By Stephen Zunes

A new resolution casts such a wide net over anti-Semitism that it includes legitimate opposition to Israeli policies.

The California State Assembly has just passed a bipartisan resolution (HR 35) by voice vote which constitutes a serious attack on academic freedom and the rights of students and faculty to raise awareness about human rights abuses by U.S.-backed governments. While purporting to put the legislature on record in opposition of anti-Semitism on state university campuses, it defines anti-Semitism so widely as to include legitimate political activities in opposition to Israeli government policies. Read More »

Ten Years of AKP Leadership in Turkey

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By Richard Falk

Nothing better epitomizes the great political changes in Turkey over the course of the last decade than a seemingly minor media item reporting that Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan and his wife Emine Erdogan attended a private iftar dinner (the ritual meal breaking the Ramadan fast each evening) by the invitation of the current Turkish Chief of Staff, General Necdet Özel, at his official residence. It was only a few years earlier that the military leadership came hair trigger close to pulling off a coup to get rid of the AKP leadership. Of course, such a military intrusion on Turkish political life would have been nothing new. Turkey experienced a series of coups during its republican life that started in 1923.

The most recent example of interference by the military with the elected leadership in Turkey took place in 1997 when Prime Minister Necmettin Erbakan sheepishly left office under pressure amounting to an ultimatum, outlawed his political party, and accepted a withdrawal from political activity for a period of five years in what amounted to a bloodless coup prompted by his alleged Islamic agenda. Unlike the prior coups of 1960, 1971, and 1980 when the military seized power for a period of time, the 1997 bloodless coup was followed by allowing politicians to form a new civilian government. Really, looking back on the period shortly after the AKP came to power in 2002 the big surprise is that a coup did not occur. Read More »

The Palestinian hunger strikes: Why still invisible?

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By Richard Falk

– Month after month professor Richard Falk who is also the UN Secretary-General’s Rapporteur for the Occupied Territories, urges you to be aware of this rampant but invisible human rights violation by Israeli authorities. Please speak up, share with your friends and alert your media and politicians wherever you are.
Zionist lobbies throw around accusations of ‘anti-semitism’ which could be seen as a psycho-political projection of what might be appropriately be termed ‘anti-Palestinianism’, says blog editor Jan Oberg

When it is realized that Mahatma Gandhi shook the British Empire with a series of hunger strikes, none lasting more than 21 days, it is shameful that Palestinian hunger strikers ever since last December continue to exhibit their extreme courage by refusing food for periods ranging between 40 and over 90 days, and yet these exploits are unreported by the media and generally ignored by relevant international institutions.

The latest Palestinians who have aroused emergency concerns among Palestinians, because their hunger strikes have brought them to death’s door, are Hassan Safadi and Samer Al-Barq. Both had ended long earlier strikes because they were promised releases under an Egyptian brokered deal that was announced on May 14, 2012, and not consistently implemented by Israel.

Three respected human rights organizations that have a long and honorable record of investigating Israeli prison conditions have issued a statement in the last several days expressing their ‘grave concern’ about the medical condition of these two men and their ‘utmost outrage’ at the treatment that they have been receiving from the Israeli Prison Service.

For instance, Hassan Safadi, now on the 59th day of a second hunger strike, having previously ended a 71 day fast after the release agreement was signed, is reported by Addameer and Physicians for Human Rights-Israel, to be suffering from kidney problems, extreme weakness, severe weight loss, headaches, dizziness, and has difficulty standing. It is well established in medical circles that there exists a serious and risk of cardio-vascular failure for a hunger strike that lasts beyond 45 days.Read More »

Western Sahara – Divesting from all occupations

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By Stephen Zunes

In response to ongoing violations of international law and basic human rights by the rightist Israeli government of Benyamin Netanyahu in the occupied West Bank and elsewhere, there has been a growing call for divestment of stocks in corporations supporting the occupation.

Modeled after the largely successful divestment campaign in the 1980s against corporations doing business in apartheid South Africa, the movement targets companies that support the Israeli occupation by providing weapons or other instruments of repression to Israeli occupation forces, investing in or trading with enterprises in illegal Israeli settlements, and in other ways. Read More »

More and more nukes: Why Waltz is wrong

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By David Krieger

The lead article in the July/August 2012 issue of Foreign Affairs is titled “Why Iran Should Get the Bomb.” The author, Kenneth Waltz, a former president of the American Political Science Association, argues that the world should stop worrying about Iran getting the bomb. He sums up his basic argument this way: “If Iran goes nuclear, Israel and Iran will deter each other, as nuclear powers always have. There has never been a full-scale war between two nuclear-armed states. Once Iran crosses the nuclear threshold, deterrence will apply, even if the Iranian arsenal is relatively small.”

In essence, Waltz puts his faith in nuclear deterrence and justifies this in historical terms. But the history is short and there have been many close calls. Read More »