| Author | Message | | Guest | | Posted: Mon Nov 25, 2002 6:53 am Post subject: Why Does Israel Want A U.S. War With Iraq? |
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Why Does Israel Want A U.S. War With Iraq? - By Jaffer Ali
There is no country in the world that yearns for the US to go to
war with Iraq more than Israel. They even pay PR firms to promote
this agenda in the media. What is behind Israel's passion for
having Americans march off to war?
On first blush one might think it is because Iraq poses a threat
to Israeli security. But no military analyst believes that Iraq
could do much in the way of attacking Israel. They do not share
a border with them and Jordan is not likely to allow Iraqi tanks
to cross its border to attack Israel. Iraq does not have an air
force. What missiles they have are generally ineffective and
Israel has all the firepower to repel any attack. As one Israeli
military analyst said, "We don't lose sleep over Iraq's military
threat to us."
If Israel is not worried about Iraq's military capabilities, why
all the PR? The reason is rather simple. Israel pines for a role
in the New World Order. Trying to find a place in the New World
Order is a preoccupation for most countries in the world. Remember,
President GW Bush stated clearly "you are either with us or
against us." This has countries all over the globe trying to find
a way to be "with us."
Israel is not therefore alone in this desire. In the past, it was
easy for it to align with US interests. There is a new global
realignment taking place and Israel is having a hard time finding
a seat at the table. Plainly stated, their interests and the New
World Order are at odds. And this means that Israeli interests
and American interests are diverging. US interests and the New
World Order are interchangeable phrases.
After the collapse of the Soviet Empire, Israel no longer was
needed to be a bastion against Soviet expansion. Its service to
the US has been declining ever since. As the US forged new and
special relationships with Arab countries, Israel lost its
exclusive role of "US ally" in the Middle East. There are many
entities in the region lining up to replace Israel in this regard.
Israel's role in the Middle East was largely to help
stabilize certain regimes that served US economic interests.
To do this, they would make their vast intelligence assets
available to America. But the New World Order has a different
operative plan than the post-WW II US plan that used Israel to
promote its agenda.
The continued Occupation of the West Bank and Gaza has become
a destabilizing factor in the entire Middle East and even larger
Muslim world. Israel is now a liability in the region and truly
disrupts the New World Order. Its continued oppression of the
Palestinian people is a time bomb that can only lead to chaos,
not order.
Why is Israel at odds with the New World Order?
In 1991, when George W. Bush's father ushered in the New World
Order, Israel was the odd country out. There was no place for
it any more. The US coalition in the Gulf War did not need
Israel to accomplish its goals. In fact, Israel was an unwanted
complication to the New World Order. Israel had no role to play.
Equally problematic for Israel is its reliance on the
anachronistic ideology of Zionism. The modern intellectual roots
of Zionism are founded in ethnic nationalism. This formed the
basis of ethnic laws promoted by fascists, Nazis, segregated
countries like South Africa and of course is the basis of Israel
as a nation.
The New World Order is about globalization and internationalism,
not ideologies that confer rights based upon ethno-nationalism.
Israel's raison d'etre is therefore opposed in principle to the
New World Order.
In the New World Order, Israel HAS NO ROLE TO PLAY.
This leads to the answer as to why Israel pays certain American
journalists to call for war... and why they pay PR firms to
promote an agenda that inflames public opinion. Israel NEEDS a
role to play and what they pine for is a recurrent conflict
between the US and Islamic countries. If this can be
accomplished, then Israel can assume a role in the Middle East
as the bastion against Islamic extremism.
http://ads.pulsetv.com/al/a?aid=222&ent=1074
Even though Iraq is not considered an extremist Islamic state,
a war between the US and Iraq will undoubtedly increase the ire
and enmity between the US and Muslim world. This enmity is the
breeding ground of extremism. Israel knows this. Israel is the
beneficiary of this enmity because it can then, AND ONLY THEN,
have a role to serve US interests or its other name, the New
World Order.
Without a role serving the New World Order, Israel is in danger
of becoming irrelevant and cast aside. Most critics of Israel
have historically misunderstood how Israel served US interests
in the past. That is why most Israeli critics miss how Israel
no longer serves those interests.
Israel has understood its historic role and is frantic to find
a way to serve those interests once again. Israelis in-the-know
understand that their existence depends upon US largesse.
Alliances change. Interests always trump alliances.
Oh yes, one other thing. The US promised a $10 billion aid
package to Israel should they go to war with Iraq. No war-no
aid. Just another incentive for Israel to pine for the war.
$10 billion is approximately 10% of its entire GNP.
This is just what the Israeli economy needs because it has
been neglected by its American sponsor. Israelis do not
view their economic woes as benign neglect. They privately
mutter about Washington not bailing their economy out. They
understand full well that without finding a way to ally with
US interests, it may not survive as presently constituted. War
between Iraq and the US remains their number one goal.
***********************************************************
Jaffer Ali is a Palestinian-American businessman who writes
on business ethics, management theory and political topics.
*********************************************************** | |  | | Guest | | Posted: Mon Nov 25, 2002 12:53 pm Post subject: |
| Hardball’ for Nov. 18
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Read the complete transcript to Monday’s show
Guests: Alan Simpson, Robert Reich, David Kay, Yossef Bodansky, Michael
Scardaville, Marc Rotenberg, Joe Scarborough, Dee Dee Myers
CHRIS MATTHEWS, HOST: I’m Chris Matthews. Let’s play HARDBALL. “The Big Story” tonight, inside the Bush White House as weapons inspectors hit the ground in Baghdad and the al Qaeda threat seems to grow.
And later the HARDBALL debate tonight. The Pentagon wants to track your Internet surfing, your credit card purchases, even your travel records. Is it a useful tool in the war on terror or simply a dangerous invasion of privacy? Plus, all the “Political Buzz” on Al Gore’s big media offensive.
First, this weekend the Bush White House tried to calm an increasingly frightened nation after the reemergence of Osama bin Laden and an FBI warning of “spectacular” attacks to come, Homeland Security Director Tom Ridge hit the Sunday shows to assure the people that the threat level hasn’t changed.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TOM RIDGE, HOMELAND SECURITY DIRECTOR: The threats are threats we’ve heard before. The conditions to avoid future terrorist acts are the conditions we’ve heard before, and we know that New York and Washington continue to be potential targets for another attack.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
MATTHEWS: While the White House insisted the war with al Qaeda is just business as usual, there’s no denying that the confrontation with Iraq has reached a new stage. Today, U.N. weapons inspectors are on the ground in Baghdad for the first time in four years. Most people assume there’s little chance to avert war now, a view supported by new revelations from “Washington Post” reporter Bob Woodward.
In his new book, Woodward describes Secretary of State Colin Powell as the lonely moderate in an administration dominated by hawks. Quote, “Bush might order go get the guns, get my horses, all the Texas Alamo macho that made Powell uncomfortable.
“But Powell believed in hope that the president knew better, that he would see the go it alone approach did not stand further analysis. The ghosts in the machine in Powell’s view were Rumsfeld and Cheney. Too often they went for the guns and the horses.”
I’m joined by “Newsweek’s” Howard Fineman, also a NBC News political analyst, Robert Reich, who was Secretary of Labor in the Clinton administration, and Alan Simpson, former United States senator from Wyoming.
Let’s go around the robin with three experts on politics. Why in hell, Howard, you first, did this administration let Bob Woodward inside with all his questions to get all his answers?
HOWARD FINEMAN, “NEWSWEEK”: Well there’s not an administration with a capital A. There are people who dealt with Bob Woodward before and if I’m a government official, I want to deal with Bob Woodward. The people who come off the best are the people who clearly dealt with him the most.
MATTHEWS: So you feed your sources.
FINEMAN: Such as Colin Powell. Colin Powell comes off as calm and shrewd and determined.
MATTHEWS: But...
FINEMAN: But they’re very careful-he’s very careful, Powell is...
MATTHEWS: But this president...
FINEMAN: ... to make sure that George Bush gets the credit.
MATTHEWS: But Howard, you know better...
FINEMAN: Yes.
MATTHEWS: ... than anybody at this table...
FINEMAN: Yes.
MATTHEWS: ... that this administration goes wild...
FINEMAN: Yes.
MATTHEWS: ... when something leaks. The president is the chief and he wants everybody...
(CROSSTALK)
MATTHEWS: ... in his administration to know it.
FINEMAN: Chris...
MATTHEWS: Why did-apparently, Powell talked to this guy...
(CROSSTALK)
MATTHEWS: ... looks like from reading it, probably...
(CROSSTALK)
FINEMAN: The president gave him a long interview.
MATTHEWS: And the president...
FINEMAN: It’s because there’s leaks and then there’s Bob Woodward. OK, Bob Woodward has a history here of 25, 30 years of this stuff. He has friends all over this town including in this administration who were in the last administration led by Colin Powell and Dick Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld and the whole crowd.
MATTHEWS: Is he the official presidential biographer now?
FINEMAN: He is like the court biographer. Now not everybody cooperates openly and fully...
MATTHEWS: They go on background.
FINEMAN: But they go on background, but the people who do get good treatment.
MATTHEWS: Senator Alan Simpson, you’ve long been a battler with the Washington Press Corp. How do you see...
(CROSSTALK)
MATTHEWS: ... this one? Is Bob Woodward pointing out-it’s almost like a Lincoln ester (ph) division between his abolitionists and his, what do you call, his wigs. I mean here you’ve got hawks, Cheney and Rumsfeld, moderates, Colin Powell, going at war with each other and the pages of a new book.
ALAN SIMPSON ®, FMR. U.S. SENATOR: Wounded ducks, but Howard is absolutely correct about Woodward. I mean here I was the assistant leader of the Senate, junior member, and he said I’d like to have lunch and my staff said oh you don’t want to do that, Al. You know...
MATTHEWS: You don’t want to meet Woodward.
(CROSSTALK)
SIMPSON: You don’t want to do it because the word was that he was the last guy to interview Bill Casey after his death, which was...
(CROSSTALK)
SIMPSON: ... a terrible thing. I didn’t say that. I didn’t, but now
so I did, and it was a very cordial lunch and he had it again, had this tuna salad sandwich and I was very guarded, which is hard for me to do anyway. The guy-you better-if he says he wants to visit with you-but I tell you, I wouldn’t take it all as gospel, that’s for sure.
MATTHEWS: Robert Reich-first of all, let’s take a look at Woodward. This is what Woodward wrote in his new book that’s just come out, “Bush At War”. Cheney was beyond hell bent for action against Hussein. It was as if nothing else existed.”
Howard-I mean let’s go to Robert Reich on that. You served with Clinton. It looks to me like that sounds exactly true from everything I’ve heard in this town.
ROBERT REICH, FMR. CLINTON LABOR SECRETARY: Well first of all let me say that I can’t imagine Alan K. Simpson guarded. I think that’s an incredible notion. Alan, how are you?
SIMPSON: Very well, Robert. It’s good to hear you, and...
REICH: It’s good to hear you...
SIMPSON: ... I know you’ve healed from your combat there.
REICH: Yes I certainly did. Now look, I think we’re making much of nothing here. the fact that there are hawks and doves in the Bush White House, well everybody knew that Colin Powell, everybody knows that he has been the moderate.
Everybody knows that Cheney and Rumsfeld have been hawkish. Look at any decent president, is going to surround himself with a lot of different voices. And the fact that there is kind of dissent in the White House is nothing new. In fact, I would be very concerned if there weren’t dissent in the White House.
MATTHEWS: Well let me bring it to a head because we’re going to hear from David Kay in just a second here. Now David Kay was one of the inspectors of ’91, who went over there, knows how the game is played by Saddam Hussein.
And the reason I think it’s important, these revelations, they confirm the fact that there’s a deep division over what to do next, not what to do last week, and how the administration responds to this weapons inspection regime will depend on the temperament of the president.
He’s got hawks around him, he’s got a moderate around him. How tough will he be in accepting Hans Blix’s report? Will he say, not tough enough Hans. These guys are trouble, and I’m going for it. Let’s take a look right now at David Kay and my interview with him just an hour or so ago. He’s a former weapons inspector. He knows what he’s talking about in Iraq.
MATTHEWS: So Howard, it doesn’t come down to a clear-cut case that we cleared him or we caught him. It comes down to these vague cases where it seems like somebody slowed down the weapons inspectors, and we can’t be sure it was Saddam. Given the fact there’s this rivalry in the administration between Cheney and Rumsfeld on one side and Powell on the other, how will the president come down?
FINEMAN: So far he’s depicted in this book by Woodward as being very cautious and methodical, having decided to go the U.N. route and the inspections route even before Powell made his impassioned plea, but it’s also clear from the book that the argument isn’t over. Cheney laid down his markers. Powell-Rumsfeld did his.
They’re going to be a lot to argue another day if this turns out the way Cheney said it would, which is that it’s a snare and a delusion, these inspections, and then there’ll come another big national Security Council meeting when Bush has to decide once again what to do and I think he’ll go in. I think he spent a lot of time with Hans Blix and the inspectors...
MATTHEWS: Right.
FINEMAN: ... he said you better find stuff. If you don’t find stuff, we’re going in.
MATTHEWS: You know Dick Cheney very well. You served with him (UNITELLIGIBLE) years. Do you think Dick Cheney would advise the president if he sees and smells trouble and he senses that they’re going slo-mo on us and playing games with us, we’re going to war?
SIMPSON: That is evident in the book, or the excerpts I’ve read, but Dick Cheney is a steady guy. He’s not-and this great schism between Powell and Cheney and Bush, I thought the best part of the excerpts I read was where Bush just looked around the room and said are you in here or not, went around eyeball-to-eyeball, and that’s the way George Bush is.
I think the things I’ve read come off very positive as to the fact he listens. He wants to know. He’s asking people for their views. The more yeast you can throw into the bread in this...
MATTHEWS: So Cheney is not calling the shots?
SIMPSON: No, no, indeed not, but-and if the president said you know, Dick, I’m overriding you right Ace is high, forget it, old Dick would say yes sir.
(CROSSTALK)
REICH: He certainly comes off as commander-in-chief. I guess the question I have and this goes back to what the president said this past weekend in his radio address when he was quite critical of Daschle for criticizing the White House. Is he not only commander-in-chief, not only in charge, but is he a little bristly when it comes to any criticism? Is he going to criticize and continue to criticize the Democrats for finding any fault, for raising any questions? After all, this war could go on for 20 years.
MATTHEWS: I know and we’re worried this weekend about the spectacular attacks to come, according to the FBI. | | | | Guest | | Posted: Mon Nov 25, 2002 1:28 pm Post subject: Cheney Obsessed with Invading Iraq |
| MATTHEWS: Back with the heavyweights, Howard Fineman, Alan Simpson and Robert Reich. You know most people argue that Iraq was a distraction from catching bin Laden. Is catching bin Laden now a distraction from our campaign against Iraq?
FINEMAN: Well, I think the administration’s problem is that they haven’t quite convinced everybody that there’s a unity of those two goals, that the war...
MATTHEWS: Maybe there isn’t.
FINEMAN: Well I’m just saying they haven’t made the case...
MATTHEWS: Right.
FINEMAN: ... if there is with everybody that the war on terrorism and the war in Iraq are the same thing. They just haven’t done...
MATTHEWS: But if there was a case to be made, they would have been making it by now. Senator Simpson, do you think this is the problem right now, that the administration will now go off on a goose chase to try to catch bin Laden and lose track of their focus on Iraq?
SIMPSON: No. Does that answer your question?
MATTHEWS: Because Dick Cheney’s obsessed with Iraq.
SIMPSON: No. No.
MATTHEWS: Bob Woodward is right.
SIMPSON: No. No. No. No. The great engines are all in place, and they’re not going to divert them because of an exhaust pipe of a guy that we really don’t know. This gentleman says that is, but it could not-it might not be-it might not be...
MATTHEWS: What if the fireworks start going off on our way to Baghdad and our allies start getting hit? Kuwait starts getting hit, Qatar starts getting hit. Our friends in the region start getting nailed. What happens to our campaign against Iraq if we’re killed along the way-our allies are killed?
SIMPSON: That’s all in the plan and the longer it takes to put the plan into effect...
MATTHEWS: Robert Reich...
(CROSSTALK)
REICH: Alan let me, let me, let me...
MATTHEWS: No, I want to ask you a question.
(CROSSTALK)
MATTHEWS: What is the biggest target of the American people right now? Is it bin laden or Saddam Hussein? What are the most...
(CROSSTALK)
REICH: Oh it’s bin Laden. Terrorism, we have felt the extraordinary tragedy of terrorism. Everybody is worried about terrorism. That was the great alarm last week and over the weekend. But the fact that bin Laden is free, the fact that he is out there, that he can make another tape, that he can rail against the United States and our allies, that has people...
MATTHEWS: OK, thank you.
REICH: ... spooked and it also means that we are not...
MATTHEWS: Thank you.
REICH: ... winning the war on terrorism.
MATTHEWS: You’re great. Robert Reich, thank you for joining us. It’s good to have you back. Howard Fineman, as always, Senator Alan Simpson, good to have you with you back. | | | | Guest | | Posted: Mon Nov 25, 2002 1:36 pm Post subject: Powell vs. Cheney, Rumsfeld, Wolfowitz, Feith.. |
| MATTHEWS: Joe Scarborough is a former Republican congressman from Florida and Dee Dee Myers was White House press secretary to President Clinton.
Both of you, thank you for joining us tonight. Big story blasting across the airwaves right now is the inside scoop on the White House and how it’s actually a divided castle between the forces of the hawks and the forces of the moderates, with Colin Powell all alone in the moderate side up against two super hawks, Cheney and Rumsfeld. What do you make of that Joe Scarborough as a Republican?
JOE SCARBOROUGH ®, FMR U.S. CONGRESSMAN: I think that the lone moderate probably is not going to fair so well against Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld and I would suspect Karl Rove also, who Rove I would think is the king of the hill right now after the mid-term elections. He helped orchestrate all of that.
MATTHEWS: Why is eventual war with Iraq good politics because that’s Rove’s portfolio, politics? Why would the political guy advise war?
SCARBOROUGH: Well, I don’t think the political guy is going to be sitting there talking about, you know, taking reckless actions in Iraq. I think though they think it’s good policy. I think George W. Bush and Dick Cheney think it’s good policy to go in there and take out the threat of Saddam Hussein.
You know, there was a great “New York Times” story a month or two back, if you want to just talk about pure politics involved in this, talking about how the Democrats’ soft spot has always been in the post Vietnam era has been foreign policy, because they misread the Vietnam experience.
They saw all these polls that showed the majority of Americans opposed what we were doing in Vietnam, but as a Democratic pollster said to the “New York Times” in that story, what they missed was the fact that the majority of those people opposing our actions in Vietnam didn’t think we were doing enough. I believe that Bush has sold to most Americans the fact that Saddam Hussein is a dangerous man who needs to be removed.
MATTHEWS: In other words, to turn it into a parking lot crowd really didn’t have their way in Vietnam. Let me ask Dee Dee Myers about this question. You’ve worked in the White House. You know what it’s like inside. Was there anything like this under Clinton or anybody, you worked there, there’s always rivalries, personal rivalries, but we had a major faction that said go this way and a major faction go the other way.
DEE DEE MYERS, FMR CLINTON PRESS SECRETARY: I think that exists almost all the time inside a White House. I don’t think, not around the issues of war and peace. I mean certainly if you look at an issue like health care, there are people saying we have to go with the single payer plan, all of it right now.
There are other people saying no. We should go more cautious incremental direction. Obviously the sort of more bigger plan, people won that war, but that’s a very typical situation inside a White House. You have people with different points of view fighting for the president’s endorsement. | | | | Guest | | Posted: Mon Nov 25, 2002 9:38 pm Post subject: Full Text on JINSA Zionist War Hawk Richard Perle |
| James, please find below full text of the story on Perle... his words are
very interesting.
EXCLUSIVE
By Paul Gilfeather, Whitehall Editor
GEORGE W. Bush's top security adviser admitted last night the US would
blitz Iraq - even if no weapons were found by UN inspectors.
Dr Richard Perle stunned MPs at Westminster by insisting that even a "clean
bill of health" from UN chief weapons inspector Hans Blix could not halt
President Bush's war machine.
And he declared that evidence from just ONE witness claiming to have seen
Saddam Hussein's weapons programme was enough to trigger a fresh military
onslaught.
Last night furious Labour MPs lined up to blast Washington as the news cast
another dark cloud over the tense process.
Former defence minister and Labour backbencher, Peter Kilfoyle, told the
Daily Mirror: "What we have heard from Dr Perle is absolutely astonishing.
"America is duping the world into believing that it supports these
inspections. President Bush intends to go to war even if the inspectors
find nothing.
"This make a mockery of the whole process and exposes America's real
determination to bomb Iraq no matter what the outcome of these inspections
are."
Right-winger Perle dropped his bombshell during an all-party meeting of MPs
on global security.
The Pentagon adviser made clear the White House's total contempt for the
inspection process, which got underway on Monday.
The global community held its breath as inspectors landed in Baghdad,
believing that the results of the search could end in peace.
But last night Dr Perle made clear that nothing the 74-year-old Swede
reports would be enough to satisfy America's lust for war.
Dr Perle said: "I would not say that I don't believe what Hans Blix says.
"But I cannot see how Hans Blix can state more than he can know.
"All he can know is the results of his own investigations. And that does
not prove Saddam does not have weapons of mass destruction."
Tory backbencher Peter Tapsell sought clarification, adding: "If no weapons
of mass destruction are found, what does Dr Perle think the actions of the
United States will be?"
The chairman of America's Defence Policy Board responded: "The
circumstances in which the weapons are not found matters.
"If Hans Blix issues his full authority and is able to invite Iraqis to
safety and they say there are programmes, we will have to take that very
seriously."
Dr Perle repeated that evidence from Iraqis could be enough evidence to
trigger a full-scale attack on Iraq.
"Suppose we are able to find someone who has been involved in the
development of weapons and he says there are stores of nerve agents?," he
added.
"But you cannot find them because they are so well hidden. Do you actually
have to take possession of the nerve agents to convince?
"We are not dealing with a situation where you can expect co-operation."
Mr Kilfoyle said last night that MPs would be horrified to learn that the
"say-so" of an Iraqi witness would be enough to overshadow the inspectors'
work.
He added: "Because Saddam is so hated in Iraq it would be easy to find
someone to say they witnessed weapons building.
"Perle says the American's would be satisfied with such claims even if no
real evidence was produced. That's a terrifying prospect."
ends | | | | Guest | | | | Guest | | | | *Mutt American | | Posted: Sun Dec 29, 2002 6:12 am Post subject: |
|  | | | | Guest | | Posted: Sat Jan 04, 2003 10:15 am Post subject: Return of Zionist Extremist Elliott Abrams |
| The Return Of Elliott Abrams
Israel's Likud Scores Big With White House Appointment
Jim Lobe writes for Inter Press Service, an international newswire, and for Foreign Policy in Focus, a joint project of the Washington-based Institute for Policy Studies and the New Mexico-based Interhemispheric Resource Center.
Neo-conservative hawks in the administration of President George W. Bush have won a major battle against the State Department in the fight for control of United States Mideast policy with the surprise appointment of Iran-Contra figure Elliott Abrams to the region's top policy spot in the National Security Council (NSC).
The appointment, leaked to reporters by the White House, would for the first time place someone in a top Mideast policy spot who has publicly assailed the "land-for-peace" formula that has guided U.S. policy in the Arab-Israeli conflict since the 1967 war.
Abrams, who first came to national prominence as a controversial political appointee in the Reagan administration who later pleaded guilty to lying to Congress regarding the Iran-Contra scandal, has also opposed the Oslo peace process and called for Washington to "stand by Israel," rather than act as a neutral mediator between Israel and the Palestinians.
"Yet another American Likudnik is moving to a position where they control Washington's agenda in the Mideast," said Rashid Khalidi, a Mideast historian at the University of Chicago. "This is a tragedy for the Israeli and American people." Likud is the rightwing Israeli party headed by Prime Minister Ariel Sharon.
Currently the NSC staff chief for Democracy, Human Rights, and International Operations, Abrams will become Special Assistant to the President and Senior Director on the NSC for Southwest Asia, Near East and North African Affairs.
As such, he will be in charge of presenting policy papers and options for National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice, whose own opinions have proven decisive in cases where the president receives conflicting views from hawks, represented by Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and Vice President Dick Cheney, and the more-dovish Secretary of State, Colin Powell, who is often backed by the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) and the uniformed military. Rice, a Russia specialist, had no experience with Mideast issues until her current job. Abrams will replace Zalmay Khalilzad, a prominent foreign-policy strategist whose views on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict are considered much more neutral than Abrams'. Khalilzad succeeded Clinton holdover Bruce Reidel early last year but was quickly consumed with his native-borne Afghanistan after being named special envoy to the interim president, Hamid Karzai. Khalilzad will now become "ambassador-at-large for free Iraqis" and is expected to play a key role in sorting out internal conflicts among the Iraqi opposition.
Beloved by right-wingers who hail him as both a hero for his championship of the Nicaraguan contras during the 1980s, Abrams first gained prominence as a leading neo-conservative when he served as Reagan's Assistant Secretary of State for Human Rights in the early 1980s and then as Assistant Secretary for Inter-American Affairs.
In both positions, he clashed frequently and angrily with mainstream church groups and human rights organisations, including Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International, who often accused him of covering up horrendous abuses committed by U.S.-backed governments, such as El Salvador and Guatemala, and rebel forces, such as the Contras and Angola's Unita, while, at the same time, exaggerating abuses by U.S. foes.
He was indicted by the Iran-Contra special prosecutor for giving false testimony about his role in illicitly raising money for the Contras but pleaded guilty to two lesser offenses of withholding information to Congress in order to avoid a trial and a possible jail term. He was pardoned by President George H.W. Bush along with a number of other Iran-Contra defendants in 1992.
His credibility for truth-telling was so low that at one point he was required to take an oath before testifying before Congressional committees. Most analysts here believe that he was given an NSC post by the new Bush administration because any other position would have required Senate confirmation.
After Reagan left office in 1989, Abrams, like a number of other prominent neo-conservatives, was not invited to serve in the Bush Sr. administration. Instead, he worked for a number of think tanks and eventually became head of the Ethics and Public Policy Center (EPPC) where he wrote widely on foreign-policy issues, including the Middle East, and the threats posed by U.S. secular society to Jewish identity. He also remained an integral part of the tight-knit neo-conservative foreign-policy community in Washington that revolved around one of his early mentors, Richard Perle and former UN Ambassador Jeane Kirkpatrick at the American Enterprise Institute (AEI).
Then-House of Representatives Speaker Newt Gingrich furthered his public rehabilitation by appointing him to the new U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom in 1999 for which he also served as chairman in 2000-01. Muslim groups here have complained about his refusal to criticise Israeli practices in the occupied territories and Jerusalem, such as sealing off Muslim holy sites, as violations of religious freedom.
He is not known as an Arab-Israeli specialist but has long favoured Likud positions on the Palestinian-Israeli conflict and even assailed former Likud Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu for caving into U.S. pressure to respect the Oslo peace process. Shortly after the outbreak of the al-Aqsa intifida at the end of September 2000, he criticised mainstream Jewish groups for calling for a resumption of peace talks between the Palestinian Authority and Israel, as well as a halt to the violence.
Like Perle, as well as Rumsfeld's civilian advisers like Undersecretary of Defense for Policy Douglas Feith and Cheney's top deputy, I. Lewis Libby, he has favoured a Mideast strategy based on the overwhelming military power of both the United States and Israel and on a military alliance between Israel and Turkey against hostile Arab states, particularly Syria and Iraq, in order to create a "broader strategic context" that would ensure whatever state might emerge on Palestinian territory would be friendly to United States and Israeli interests and that could force Syria to withdraw from Lebanon. He has long favoured forceful action to oust Saddam Hussein in Iraq.
He has accused Palestinian Authority leader Yassir Arafat of being an untrustworthy partner under the Oslo process and is believed to have used his previous NSC Democracy position to push for his ouster from power as part of a thorough reform process. That view, which was strongly backed by Rumsfeld and Cheney's offices, was eventually accepted by Bush last June, over strenuous objections by the State Department and senior aides for Bush's father, notably his former national security adviser, Brent Scowcroft.
In his new position, according to John Prados, a historian who has written about the National Security Council, Abrams should be in an excellent position to influence U.S. policy on the Mideast, particularly in "delaying and/or halting policy on the 'roadmap'" that is being developed by the "Quartet" -- the United States, European Union, Russia, and the United Nations -- on resuming political negotiations between Israel and the Palestinians.
Indeed, it already appears that British hopes for a major meeting of the Quartet on the roadmap before the end of the year are fading quickly.
Abrams is expected to support Israel's recent requests both to put off discussion of the 'roadmap' until after Israel's elections at the end of next month and for some 14 billion dollars in military aid and loan guarantees to help the country cope with economic hard times.
Abrams' influence on policy is already clear. For the first time ever the Bush administration voted against a U.N. General Assembly resolution last week that called on Israel to repeal the Jerusalem law that declares that "Jerusalem, complete and united, is the capital of Israel."
In the past, Washington has abstained on the issue, insisting that the the status of Jerusalem must be determined by negotiations between Israelis and Palestinians. Abrams has in the past assailed that vote, as well as Washington's refusal to recogize Jerusalem as Israel's capital, on the grounds that that such a position "tantalizes the Palestinians with the prospect of forcing the Jews to abandon Jerusalem."
As you might expect, Arab-Americans responded to the appointment with a mix of resignation and foreboding.
James Zogby, the director of the Arab-American Institute (AAI) here said Abrams' appointment sends "a very dangerous message to the Arab world" and adds to the "lock that the neo-con set now has on all the major instruments of decision-making except for the State Department."
Khalidi also pointed to Abrams' history as being less than forthcoming with information that may contradict his own views. "He will be yet another filter blocking reality from reaching the president," he said. | | | | Alpha | | Posted: Thu Jan 09, 2003 1:03 am Post subject: Iraq: 'Devastating' War Planned by Warmongering Bush & B |
| Subj: Iraq: 'Devastating' War Planned by Warmongering Bush & Blair
Date: 1/8/03 3:35:17 PM Pacific Standard Time
BAGHDAD, Iraq (Jan. 8) - Coalition warplanes struck air defense targets in southern Iraq on Wednesday for the second time this week, and a key Iraqi official said the United States and Britain were bent on war with Baghdad to subjugate the Middle East.
In Moscow, meanwhile, Iraq's ambassador to Russia dismissed rumors Saddam Hussein might go into exile to avoid war and said the Iraqi leader would ''fight to the last drop of blood'' to defend his country.
Concerns war is imminent have mounted, with the United States and Britain announcing the dispatch of thousands more troops and weapons to the Persian Gulf region because of misgivings about Iraq's commitment to abandon weapons of mass destruction.
Iraq insists it has no such weapons and maintains that claims to the contrary by Washington and London are simply a pretext for war.
''The aggressors in Washington and London are preparing for a devastating aggression against ... the people of Iraq, and they would like once again to destroy the City of Peace (Baghdad) as they did in 1991,'' Deputy Prime Minister Tariq Aziz told a visiting South African delegation Wednesday.
Aziz said U.N. arms inspectors, who returned to Iraq in November after a four-year hiatus, had strayed beyond the search for weapons of mass destruction.
''They are searching for other information about Iraq's conventional military capabilities, the Iraqi scientific and industrial capability in the civilian area, and also espionage questions,'' Aziz said.
U.N. spokesman Hiro Ueki denied those allegations and said U.N. officials had received no formal complaint from Iraqi authorities about alleged espionage.
The United States has accused Saddam of stockpiling weapons of mass destruction and says it will use force if necessary to disarm him. Iraq insists it has destroyed its biological and chemical weapons and halted its nuclear program and the making of banned missiles. There have been no known instances of serious problems encountered by the inspectors since they began work Nov. 27.
Nevertheless, the pace of the U.S.-British buildup has accelerated. The American battle staff that would run a military campaign against Iraq is beginning to assemble at a command post in the small gulf state of Qatar, U.S. officials said.
Tens of thousands more combat forces are scheduled to flow into the region over the next few weeks. Some U.S. soldiers landed Wednesday in neighboring Kuwait, but U.S. officials refused to say how many or identify their units.
Among the other forces expected to deploy from U.S. bases in the next several days are F-15E and F-15C fighters and B-1B bombers. Still, U.S. and British officials insist war is neither imminent nor inevitable.
As the buildup continues, U.S. warplanes struck Wednesday against air defense communication sites between the cities of Al Kut and An Nasiriyah. The U.S. Central Command said the attacks occurred after Iraqi air defense forces fired anti-aircraft artillery at U.S. planes patrolling the southern ''no fly'' zone and Iraqi military aircraft entered the zone.
On Monday, U.S. planes targeted two Iraqi military radars near the city of Al Amarah. Iraqi officials said two people were killed and 13 were injured in Monday's attacks.
Meanwhile, the official Iraqi News Agency said Saddam held a third day of meetings Wednesday with military and militia commanders, encouraging them not to fear a technologically superior foe.
''In aerial combat, there is a disparity in weapons, but on the ground, men fight with their guns and it's enough for the men to have bombs, bullets, a loaf of bread, water and a gun,'' Saddam was quoted as saying. As long as Iraqi forces receive the support of the people, ''the enemy will be defeated,'' Saddam added.
With tensions rising, Philippine Foreign Minister Blas Ople said Arab governments were trying to convince Saddam to step down and go into exile. Ople, speaking to reporters in Manila, said he learned of those efforts by Arab ambassadors whom he refused to identify.
The German newspaper Tageszeitung said Russian officials had been in Baghdad since November evaluating chances of Saddam stepping down. In a report for publication Thursday, the newspaper said Russian President Vladimir Putin would send a special envoy to Baghdad to finalize details if Saddam appeared willing to accept the Russian offer of exile.
Russia's ITAR-Tass news agency quoted an unidentified ''high-ranking Russian official'' as denying that Moscow was working toward Saddam's departure, saying there were ''no grounds for the Iraqi leader to request political asylum anywhere, including in Russia.''
Iraq's ambassador to Russia, Abbas Khalaf, told the Interfax news agency that Saddam will not leave his country and will ''fight to the last drop of blood.''
Khalaf called reports that Saddam might leave the country ''absolute nonsense'' and ''part of Washington and London's psychological war against Iraq,'' Interfax said.
AP-NY-01-08-03 1508EST | | | | | ©2002-2009 WarWithoutEnd.co.uk |
