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Jewish illegal settlements and Obama administration
Barrister Harun ur Rashid
The US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, during her visit to Israel on 31st October, saw nothing wrong when Israel refused to freeze Jewish settlements in East Jerusalem or in the West Bank. She, after a meeting with both Israeli and Palestinian sides, called for an unconditional resumption of peace talks and welcomed Israel's offer for a slow down in settlement activity.
Right wing Prime Minister Netanyahu of Israel has been playing diplomatic hardball both with the US administration and Palestinians. The Prime Minister reportedly made it clear that he would temporarily suspend plans for future construction but insisted Israel would not limit building in East Jerusalem, which it annexed illegally after the 1967 war. He refused to call off the construction of 3,000 apartments in the West Bank.
It is interesting to note that President Obama on June 4th in his famous Cairo speech said: "The US does not accept the legitimacy of continued Israeli settlements. The construction violates previous agreements and undermines efforts to achieve peace. It is time for these settlements to stop."
It is clear from the statement that President Obama wants settlements to "stop" and not "limit" or "restrict" or "curb" settlements. But the US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton reportedly praised Israel for offering "to curb" some Jewish settlement construction.
Why does this climb down from "stopping" to "curbing" Jewish settlement in the occupied Palestinian area?
There could be many reasons for changing the policy of the Obama administration and some of them deserve mention as follows:
Jewish lobby in the US over more than a half-century have increasingly moulded how most Americans "feel" about the Middle East, and Israel and the Arab states/peoples in particular. And especially Israel as a state and Arabs as people, now terrorists, have become embedded in their cultural and emotional background.
One cannot over-emphasize the "images" aspect insofar as the general American public is concerned, and how it enables Jewish lobby to leverage Congress. And it is not only Hollywood and the New York TV industry; it is also publishing houses and major newspaper chains, all of which send images to the public.
The Jewish lobby is so powerful in the US that even anti-apartheid leaders, like Nelson Mandela and Archbishop Desmond Tutu were prevented from lecturing at American colleges and universities because of their public opposition to Israel's maltreatment of the Palestinians.
American Jewish organisations whose agendas conform to the political and ideological views of Israel's right wing think pathologically that everyone who talks about fairness in the peace process is anti-Israeli. The head of one of the America's leading Jewish organizations objected to the appointment of Senator George Mitchell as President Obama's peace envoy because Mitchell's objectivity and even handedness disqualified him for this assignment.
Israel's Prime Minister's speech in September at the UN General Assembly demonstrated that Israelis were at risk of another holocaust and discredited Judge Goldstone's Gaza fact finding report to the UN. (Judge Goldstone is a Jew). From his statement, it appears that the whole world is against Israel and he does not see any wrong in destroying hospitals, schools, and prisons in Gaza in January 2008 by bombs.
The Goldman Report, commissioned by the U.N. Human Rights Council, accuses both Israel and the Palestinian Hamas group of war crimes but presents Israel's actions as much more serious.
The Jewish lobby is so strong that on 3rd November, the U.S. House of Representatives condemned the Goldman Report that accuses Israeli forces and Palestinian militants of committing war crimes in Gaza early this year as "irredeemably biased and unworthy of further consideration or legitimacy."
All the settlements in the Palestinian occupied lands are illegal and according to the 2008 data from the Israeli Central Bureau of Statistics, approximately 484, 862 Jews live in the 120 official settlements and dozens of outposts established throughout the West Bank over the past 41 years. The successive US administrations never objected to these illegal constructions on the occupied lands.
An American President who addresses the Arab World and promises a fair approach to peacemaking is perceived by Israelis and its supporters in the US as anti-Israel.
President Obama's popularity in Israel is reportedly only 6 to 10% per cent and President's aides are worried about it. One analyst Henry Siegman is of the view that "Israelis do not oppose President's peace efforts because they dislike him; they dislike him because of his peace efforts. He will regain their affection only when he abandons these efforts." (International Herald Tribune: 2nd November 2009)
During the visit, it is not surprising that Secretary of State Hillary Clinton sought to reinforce the message of reassuring the Israelis of President Obama's friendship and unqualified commitment to Israel's interests. The Presidential envoy George Mitchell has reportedly been asked to make similar efforts during his visits to Israel.
Palestinians' hopes dashed
Palestinians were buoyed by President Obama's commitment to end Israeli-Palestinian conflict when he took office in January this year and ten months after, a Palestinian government spokesman Ghasan Khatib said : "I believe that the US condones continued settlement expansion... negotiations are about ending the occupation and settlement expansion is about entrenching the occupation."
Palestinians are deeply disappointed to note that the Obama administration has abandoned the impartial stance and moved closer to Israeli position and there seems to be no hope to reverse the cycle of tension and violence in the region.
On 5th November, Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas said he did not wish to run for re-election in January, voicing disappointment at Washington for "favouring" Israel in arguments over re-launching peace talks.
The wish of Abbas not contesting the election has alarmed both Israel and the Obama administration because of the far-reaching adverse consequences because Hamas might rule the Palestinians-both in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip.
Israel's latest offer
Israel has been under heavy international pressure to halt its construction in settlements on captured lands claimed by the Palestinians. On 25th November, 2009, Netanyahu proposed a 10-month "freeze" on West Bank settlement construction in what he said was an attempt to jump-start Mideast peace talks. Palestinian presidential adviser earlier said that the proposed freeze would be unacceptable if it did not include East Jerusalem.
Some suggest that in 1978 a Democratic President Jimmy Carter was able to bring peace between Israel and Egypt and the Accords at the Camp David in 1978 led directly to the 1979 Israel-Egypt Peace Treaty. They also resulted in President Sadat and Prime Minister Begin sharing the 1978 Nobel Peace Prize.
President Obama may keep the precedent in mind in forcing both parties to do what they themselves are unable to do, namely giving up their more extreme claims and reach some kind of agreement, while security of borders between the two states may be guaranteed by the US.
The writer is a former Bangladesh Ambassador to the UN, Geneva.
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Sri Lankans worry about militarisation
of governance
Jehan Perera in colombo
The entry of former army commander General Sarath Fonseka into the political arena as the common opposition presidential candidate has set off a vigorous debate about the danger it can pose to Sri Lanka's cherished democracy. At the same time, the retired General's entry into the political contest has rejuvenated the opposition and revived public interest in the result of the elections. These are benefits to democracy that requires an active opposition and public interest that keeps the government on the alert and responsive to popular opinion.
The strength of Sri Lankan democracy over the years has been the unbroken commitment of its people and political leadership to the conduct of elections as the means of ensuring legitimacy in governance. It was President J R Jayewardene who came nearest to disrupting this tradition. He postponed general elections. But he held a referendum on the issue and submitted himself to a presidential election. The failure of President Jayewardene's second term in office can be attributed to the loss of legitimacy that accompanied his attempt to subvert the electoral process.
General Fonseka's entry into national politics at the highest level has given rise to concern about the longer term fate of Sri Lankan democracy. The General has no experience of being a politician. What he has is a forty-year record of being a professional soldier. During this time he gained the highest position in the Sri Lankan army and led it to a victory over the hitherto tenacious LTTE during his three year tenure as army commander. If he becomes President by winning the presidential elections to be held in January 26 next year, he will once again have authority over the army, as commander-in-chief of all the armed forces. It is no cause for surprise that concerns should be expressed about the possible blurring of lines between civilian and military rule in the event of General Fonseka winning the presidential election.
Military's role
Indeed, Sri Lanka is no stranger to the direct involvement of the military in governance of the north and east where the war was fought. Successive governments have appointed military commanders to oversee the governance of those areas, to whom the civilian administration had to report to. The military in those areas established Civil Liaison offices to which the civilian population had to go for various reasons, including travel. More recently retired military officers have been appointed to the most powerful administrative positions in the north and east, including those of Governors of provinces and Government Agents of districts.
The takeover of civilian administration in the north and east by former and serving military officers reached a peak in the past three years and accompanied the escalation in the government's war effort. After the end of the war the entire displaced population of the formerly LTTE-controlled areas, amounting to over a quarter of a million people, found themselves confined to welfare camps run by the military. But this military role has been regarded as legitimate because it is decreed by the elected political leadership of the country. Therefore the role of the military in the governance of the north and east cannot be considered to be a military takeover.
Nothing new
Apart from its prowess on the battlefield, the great strength of the Sri Lankan military has been its non-interference in politics. There is little reason to doubt that extralegal activities that apparently targeted LTTE members and sympathizers, and which were often attributed to the security forces, were done with the political authorization of the government.
The obedience of the military commanders to the elected political leadership was perhaps best seen when Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe signed the Ceasefire Agreement with the LTTE in 2002. The new Prime Minister ordered the immediate removal of security barriers and opened up the roads. This may have been against the better judgment of the military commanders, but they obeyed the orders of the Prime Minister and his Defence Minister.
In the event of General Fonseka becoming President after winning the forthcoming presidential election, he may utilize the military to ensure governance in the manner of his predecessors. If he does so, he will not be doing something new but what the political leaders who have come before him also have done.
President Rajapaksa's utilization of the services of retired and serving military commanders has been legitimate and is not considered to be military rule because it is at the elected President's request. So long as the President can obtain the majority support of the electorate he may believe that he can do what he likes. But a democratic leader also needs to uphold democratic values.
As a former army commander, General Fonseka will always need to be especially sensitive to the charge that he will militarise governance in society if he is elected President. What he says and the commitments he makes during the course of the election campaign will be important in reassuring the national electorate on this score. President Rajapaksa on the other hand needs to reconsider the role of the military in governance, whether at security barriers or in the administrative offices of the north and east, if he is to obtain the electoral support of the ethnic minorities in particular.
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ISLAMABAD DIARY
West has no info about Osama's whereabouts: Gilani
Jonaid Iqbal
In a blunt rebuttal, Pakistani Prime Minister Yusuf Raza Gilani told Gordon Brown that Al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden was not in Pakistan as suggested by the British Prime Minister in a strongly-worded statement last week.
Reacting sharply to Mr. Brown's remarks, Mr. Gilani said: "I doubt the information which you are giving is correct because I don't think Osama bin Laden is in Pakistan." Prime Minister Gordon Brown and his Pakistan counterpart Yusuf Raza Gilani held a joint news conference in London.
Mr. Gilani, who was speaking to reporters after meeting Mr. Brown in Downing Street, reiterated that the West had provided no "actionable" or "credible" information about Osama's whereabouts.
Mr. Brown, who had previously accused Pakistan of not doing enough to track down Osama, chose not to repeat the accusation and instead praised Pakistan's anti-terror military campaign saying that the country had made "huge sacrifices" in fighting extremism.
Another invasion to get Osama
Soviet invasion of Afghanistan lasted 10 years, from 1979 to 1989. Osama was then a foot soldier fighting against the Russians. After an interlude of two years the Americans launched one more invasion of the territory in Oct. 2009, ostensibly to get Osama, without success.
Two weeks ago, Times online published a story 'Donald Rumsfeld blamed for failing to kill cornered Osama bin Laden, informing its readers that Osama was within their reach at Tora Bora in 2001.
However, their poetically inclined defence Minister Donald Rumsfeld let the opportunity go. He gave a smart ruling: "Capturing Osama would create a commotion that the United States could not manage." Was it damage control at its worst? Arguably so, since their ally Pakistan in the war against terror, has taken the severest damage in lives and about $70 billion cost in destruction on account of this conflict after 2001. During the last five days more than 100 people have been killed in suicide bomb attacks at Lahore, Multan, Peshawar, Rawalpindi and Quetta. The one at Rawalpindi was the most audacious. Last Friday Taliban mobsters attacked a mosque deep in military area at Rawalpindi, killing a Major General, a Brig., two Lt. Col., Majors as well as children of military officers.
Still, the West wants Pakistan to do more the magic job of pulling Osama out of a sorcerer's hat. Why is every one so sure in the U.S about where he is at the moment?
He is supposed to be in Pakistan, according to Secretary of State Hilary Clinton, who without mincing words said during her official visit here.
Now we have US's next poodle (Tony Blair was called a poodle of the US by many Britons!) British Prime Minister Gordon Brown repeated the same command to Pakistan to take on Al-Qaeda. ''We have got to ask ourselves why, eight years after September 11, nobody has been able to spot or detain or get close to Osama bin Laden."
Surely, they would have heard US Defence Secretary, Robert Gates, speak the other day, that there is no credible intelligence of Osama's presence anywhere. The US lost trace of him years ago and the US intelligence does not know where he is. Pakistan has always made it plain that he is not in Pakistan. But if he were here, and then tell us where the man with $25 million on his head could be located, and we will capture him. There is mistrust on this vital matter between Pakistan and the Western allied troops, including ISAF operators in Afghanistan. And President Obama is worried only about the recent death of 300 US soldiers and has responded to General McChrystal'scall for surge and 30,000 more troops. Gilani says that while Pakistan has no wish for the US troops to leave plunging the area into chaos, but it would do everybody some good that before US made a new policy for Afghanistan it should be done with prior consultation with Pakistan, otherwise there was a danger that the action of Western troops in Afghanistan would result in spill over of Afghan militants in Pakistan territory, at a time when Pakistan has almost capped the militants in Swat and South Waziristan.
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BRAZIL-IRAN TIES
New boost to South-South diplomacy
Beatriz Bissio in Rio De Janeiro
Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's controversial visit to Brazil further underscored the independence of this country's diplomacy, and gave Tehran a chance to defend its points of view on the construction of a lasting peace in the Middle East.
Ahmadinejad's one-day trip to Brasilia was the third visit to Brazil by a Middle Eastern leader in two weeks. Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva met with Israeli President Shimon Peres, and a few days ago he hosted Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas.
The flurry of high-level visits was one more show of Brazil's growing role in international diplomacy.
But unlike the first two visits, which drew little attention from the media and scant interest from the public, Ahmadinejad's has sparked controversy both in and outside Brazil, and was closely tracked by the international press.
Protests were held in Rio de Janeiro by representatives of the Jewish community, women's groups and organisations of gays complaining about the lack of respect for human rights in Iran and Tehran's policy towards Israel.
And during the Iranian leader's visit to Brasilia, the Brazilian Jewish Community held a march protesting his presence, while the Brazilian Palestinian Society and the Direct Democracy Movement held demonstrations in support of his trip.
The controversy and the interest with which every detail of Ahmadinejad's meetings with Brazilian officials - including a three-hour talk behind closed doors with Lula, and a visit to Congress - was followed confirm the importance that both countries have on the regional and global fronts.
The most concrete result of the visit was the signing of eight cooperation agreements in areas like science, technology, agriculture and industry, which reflect the desire of both Brazil and Iran to strengthen South-South cooperation and increase bilateral trade, which currently stands at around two billion dollars, while the goal is to raise that amount to 10 billion dollars in the near future.
Some 200 business leaders accompanied Ahmadinejad on his visit.
But the less tangible results of the Iranian leader's visit to Brazil may be the most significant.
In first place, the visit made it clear that both Brazil and Iran are keen on playing a more active role on the world stage, based on each nation's clout in their specific areas of influence.
The heir to the Persian empire, Iran enjoys significant territorial, linguistic and cultural cohesion, added to its abundant natural resources and considerable technological development - it launched a domestically made satellite in 2008, and 48 percent of the population has access to the internet - all of which give it a strong sense of national pride and a central role in Middle Eastern geopolitics.
Latin America's giant
Brazil, for its part, buoyed up by strong economic indicators, besides its position as Latin America's giant, has expanded its influence on the international scene.
In South America, in particular, it has consolidated its leadership, fuelling the regional integration process by means of political, economic and infrastructure initiatives during Lula's nearly seven years in office.
Despite criticism of the visit by several major local media outlets and opposition leaders and lawmakers, the Brazilian government went ahead with the invitation to Ahmadinejad, thus reinforcing the independence that has marked its diplomacy on earlier occasions.
The president himself repeatedly defended the visit saying that peace cannot be built in the Middle East without talking with all political and religious factions. In his opinion, if dialogue only took place between politically aligned countries, the conversation would be restricted to a "club of friends" which would fail to lay the foundations for real peace in the region.
During the recent visits by Middle Eastern leaders, Lula took the opportunity to state that he believed that key to peace in the region was the emergence of a viable and dignified sovereign Palestinian state co-existing alongside Israel, and recognising its right to exist.
He also emphasised nuclear non-proliferation and disarmament, and said he backed Iran's right to develop the peaceful use of nuclear energy, just as Brazil has done.
For his part, Ahmadinejad declared his support for Brazil's aspiration to becoming a permanent member of the United Nations Security Council.
He expressed that support during a visit to the Brazilian Congress, where he explicitly acknowledged the Holocaust, placing controversial earlier remarks on the subject in a broader context.
The Iranian leader said Palestinians should not have to pay for an error that occurred on European soil, and asked whether Brazilians would give up their territory for crimes committed in another part of the world.
According to Ahmadinejad, the Palestinian question has not yet been solved because the peace proposals formulated by the U.N. Security Council for the region have not been based on a sense of justice.
That was another reason, he said, for Iran's backing for Brazil's aspiration to a permanent seat on the Security Council, where - he argued - China, France, Russia, the United Kingdom and the United States should be stripped of their veto power.
From that key position in the global body, Brazilian diplomacy could play a positive role in peace initiatives, he said.
Only the future will tell whether the results that both governments hope for from the heightened cooperation will be forthcoming. If they are, not only the economic ties between Brazil and Iran will be strengthened, but the Lula administration will begin to play a more decisive role in peace efforts in the Middle East.
That would be welcomed by both Israeli and Palestinian authorities, as indicated by the recent visits by Peres and Abbas.
- Inter Press Service
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