History of sanctions advises that Iran is far from collapse

Via FLC

 

"... The record of economic sanctions is patchy, with the evidence showing they are poor at removing governments and their outcomes dependent on factors beyond the control of those imposing the sanctions. While economies are endlessly said to be "on the verge of collapse", they never actually collapse: there is always something to trade, even if it is only some roots from the forest.... 

In Iraq a UN-supervised sanctions regime, described by its one-time administrator Denis Halliday as tantamount to "genocide", failed to unseat Saddam Hussein. The Iraq experience shows that the poor become destitute and the middle classes are wiped out: ..... 

South Africa is usually touted as an example.... But there are crucial differences. South African sanctions were supported by the then-opposition movement, the African National Congress, which enjoyed majority support. There are not many voices in Iran supporting the sanctions.

Meanwhile the United States has shown its hand. For years the exiled opposition Mujahideen-e Khalq Organisation (MEK) has been on the US list of banned terrorist groups. The Obama administration lifted this ban on September 28. This has two effects. Any internal opposition in Iran can now be cast as aiding the MEK, a force widely viewed in Iran as treacherous since it fought alongside the Iraqi army after it invaded Iran in 1980. People who protest against Iran knows they face an increased chance of being hanged as MEK members. 

The MEK is popular in Washington for the intelligence it has supplied on the Iranian nuclear programme and for rejecting clerical rule. The second effect is that Iranians will now see the MEK as playing the role of Ahmad Chalabi, the exiled politician who was favoured by the US to lead post-Saddam Iraq. Mr Chalabi filled newspaper columns around the world, but struggled to gain any popular support in Iraq. 

Supporters of sanctions see the blame game being conducted in Tehran over who is responsible for the currency crisis - Mr Ahmadinejad's opponents point to his incompetence- as a sign of fracture at the top. This may be true. But it is not as serious as it appears: it may just be politics as usual. 

Mr Ahmadinejad, whose term runs out next year, has outlived his usefulness and the battle is on to succeed him. Perhaps Iranian politics is not so different from Israeli politics: Israeli politicians are at each other's throats calling each other "Nazi" and "quisling" but the real business of the state - such as settling the West Bank - continues apace no matter which party is in power. Iran's drive to master the nuclear fuel cycle is a national enterprise supported even by the leaders of the Green movement that took to the streets after the rigged 2009 elections. 

Those who expect sanctions to bring the mullahs to their knees should watch what the Russians and Chinese are doing. China has reduced its imports of Iranian crude, proving that it no longer seeks to put a spoke in the wheels of every US policy. But it surely stands firm against allowing Washington to engineer regime change in Tehran. And the same goes for Russia. Be prepared for a less helpful stance if the US tries to tighten sanctions. 

The Iranian leadership has been given a shock. The lesson to draw from it is not that the regime of the ayatollahs is about to fall. Rather, it is that during a period of weakness, Iran will be more receptive to a compromise on the nuclear issue. It is far better for the UN Security Council to focus on this opportunity for a new start to the nuclear talks than to settle in for a decade of starving Iranian babies."

Israel says its air force shoots down unidentified drone

 

An Israeli Heron TP, also known as the IAI Eitan, unmanned reconnaissance drone (file photo)

Sat Oct 6, 2012 3:18PM GMT

 

The Israeli army says its air force has shot down an unidentified unmanned aerial vehicle near the Mediterranean Sea.

The military said in a statement on Saturday that the drone "was intercepted by the Israeli Air Force at approximately 10 a.m. (0700 GMT)".

Israeli Soldiers are currently searching the area where the drone was downed, in open areas in the northern Negev desert, to locate and identify it, the statement added.

Israel's own drones have also crashed in and around the occupied territories in recent years.

The Israeli regime conducts airstrikes and ground attacks against the besieged Palestinian territory of the Gaza Strip on an almost regular basis.

Israeli reconnaissance planes have usually violated the Lebanese airspace, despite UN Security Council Resolution 1701 which brokered a ceasefire in the war Israel launched against Lebanon in 2006.

In 2009, Lebanon filed a complaint with the United Nations, presenting over 7,000 documents pertaining to Israeli violation of the Lebanese territory.

PG/JR

Israel shoots down a mysterious drone 35 miles inside its airspace

[Haaretz] "... The Israeli Air Force shot down an unidentified aerial vehicle that penetrated Israel's airspace on Saturday. IDF forces shot down the drone over the Negev, south of Mount Hebron.
The IDF said Saturday that the drone arrived in Israel from the west after flying over the Mediterranean and the Gaza Strip. It said the incident is under investigation.
After the drone traveled east some 35 miles (56 km) across Israel's southern Negev desert, the drone was shot down above a forest in an unpopulated area near the border with the West Bank, the IDF spokesperson said....
The IDF admitted that the drone flew over Israeli territory for long minutes, but Mordechai insisted it was "much less than half an hour."...sources within the security establishment had confirmed in the past that Hezbollah is involved, ...."

 

River to Sea Uprooted Palestinian
The views expressed in this article are the sole responsibility of the author and do not necessarily reflect those of this Blog!

Syria: The Grenades on Turkey are NATO Ammunition

 

By Jerry Dandridge

– October 6, 2012 –

Syria: NATO Ammunition was used to attack Turkish border town. FSA responsible.

This is a translation of the recent blog post by the German Blog “Alles Schall und Rauch” about the allegedly attack of a Turkish border town by the Syrian Arab Army. It seems that NATO ammunition was used in this attack.

This implies, that the Syrian Arab Army (the Syrian government) cannot be responsible for this attack because the Syrian Arab Army does not own these NATO ammunition. In addition, as several reports in recent months have already confirmed, the Western-backed radicals, terrorists and religious fanatics are supplied by several powers with weapons, money, and ammunition.

NATO ammunition is partly included in this supply for these fighters. This was already confirmed by recent pictures of seized weapon depots in Syria, but also by some Turkish reports. The translation of this article is below.

Syria: The Grenades on Turkey are NATO Ammunition
It’s just like it is so often reported to me, the NATO countries provide the terrorists of Al-CIAda (Al Qaeda) either directly or indirectly via the friendly Gulf States with weapons and ammunition that will be used against themselves later. This is what happened during the attack on the U.S. consulate in Benghazi and now at the bombardment of the Turkish border town from Syria.

Terrorists in Syria are firing 120mm mortar shells:

The Turkish daily “Yurt” writes in its latest issue, which the grenades, which were fired at the Turkish border village Akçakale, come from the NATO stocks.

NATO Ammunition

Thus, it is clear, not the Syrian military has fired them, because it has not such ammunition, but the terrorists themselves did, that were hired by NATO. Again, a staged provocation, in order to have a reason (pretext) for going to war against Syria.

According to the chief editor of the Turkish daily “Yurt”, Mr. Merdan Yanardag, the newspaper has received reliable information that Turkey has supplied the grenades to the so-called “Free Syrian Army” (FSA), which later killed five civilians in the Turkish border town of Akçakale and numerous people were injured.

“This information confirms, that the wrong policies of the Erdogan government are behind the bombardment of the city with mortar shells, which has cost the lives of five Turks,” wrote Yanardag.

That means in plain text, that Erdogan is a traitor and a murderer of his own people! He is a puppet of the U.S. and conducts its criminal policy of a “regime change” in Syria.

NATO Ammunition

I have investigated the matter and I have researched by the inscription of the mortars, 120 AE HE-TNT, of who produces them. In fact, it is NATO ammunition.

According to Jane’s Defence Weekly, this ammunition is produced by various defense firms in Europe, such as the Spanish Explosivos Alaveses SA (EXPAL), which is part of the Maxam Defence Group.

Example of a firing of these 120mm mortar shells:



The Turkish daily “Yurt” has already confirmed by documents and videos in July, how the Turkish Intelligence is involved in terror attacks in Syria, but also confirmed, how training camps (for the terrorists) are established by the Turkish government near the city of Yayladağı, near the Syrian border, in order to smuggle the terrorists from there into Syria.

In one of these videos, the Turkish daily showed how a lot of Turkish terrorists, who spoke Turkish, have attacked a police station in the Syrian village of al-Sha’abaniya.

The Turkish newspaper also has quoted some of inhabitants of this region, these inhabitants said that the armed terrorists, who are hosted in these camps, have crossed the border (to Syria) in order to carry out terror attacks and massacre at the Syrian civilian population; they were not stopped by the Turkish border guards.

Locals have stressed, that the district of Yayladağı is a refuge area for thousands of terrorists, while the Turkish (Erdogan) government is doing nothing to protect the Turkish citizens from these people. The region forms the southern part of Turkey, bordering to Syria.

This means, that the Erdogan government is operating state terrorism against its neighbor Syria, but also against their own citizens.

Source: Die Granaten auf die Türkei sind NATO-Munition

Yurt Newspaper: Erdogan's government Handed over the Mortars to armed groups in Syria which shelled Akcakale Town

Saturday, 06 October 2012 13:43

ANKARA, (SANA) October 07, 2012 Turkish Yurt Newspaper said that the government of the Development and Justice Party has to take a neutral stance on the events in Syria instead of supporting the groups of the so-called the armed opposition.   "Turkey was inevitably affected by the events in Syria… so it was very necessary for it to adopt new polices and be aware that instigating others will bring nothing but more damages.. The Turkish government was wrong at seeing the whole region through a sectarian vision," Journalist Ali Sirmen wrote in an article published by the Newspaper.   He added that the Turkish Prime Minister Erdogan was carrying out the policies of the US in Syria and the region, bearing the political and martial burden of this policy . The Newspaper also revealed that the bomber which was used to launch the mortar on the Turkish Akcakale town is only used by NATO.   In an article by its Editor-in-Chief Merdan Yanardag, Yurt clarified that it had information from a reliable source saying that Turkey was the side which sent the mortars to the members of so-called ''the free army".   "Those information affirm that the Government of Erdogan's wrong policy was behind the falling of the mortar in the town that claimed the lives of 5 Turks." Yanaradag added. Syrian army kills dozens of insurgents, including four Turks   Syrian government forces run during fighting with insurgents in the Tal al-Zarazir neighborhood of the northwestern city of Aleppo on September 29, 2012.

River to Sea Uprooted Palestinian
The views expressed in this article are the sole responsibility of the author and do not necessarily reflect those of this Blog!

Ankara's 'Hidden Agenda' in Syria

FLC

[Daily Telegraph] "...Syria might be getting all the blame for firing the first shot in the sudden eruption of hostilities on the Turko-Syrian border, but Tayyip Erdogan, the Turkish prime minister, can hardly claim to be an innocent party when it comes to stoking the fires of a conflict that retains the potential to ignite a regional conflagration.For more than a year now Turkey has been taking a lead role in the campaign to overthrow the Syrian regime of President Bashar al-Assad. Working closely with a number of Gulf states, such as Saudi Arabia and Qatar, ... In short, the Turks are doing everything in their power to achieve regime change in Damascus, a position that is not lost on Mr Assad. 

Whether forces loyal to the regime were responsible for firing the mortar round that killed five civilians – including three children – in a Turkish border village this week is unclear. If Syrian rebels were active on the Turkish side of the border, and the Turkish authorities were doing nothing to apprehend them, then Assad loyalists might have felt within their rights to attack them. The Syrian government, for what it’s worth, denies any involvement and says it is investigating the incident.

Alternatively, amid the fog of war, there is always the possibility that Syrian rebels – or those sympathetic to their cause – fired the round into Turkey as a deliberate attempt to provoke the country and its allies into retaliating....

The uncompromising tone of Nato’s statement, which denounced Syria’s “flagrant violations of international law”, will be music to Mr Erdogan’s ears, ..... But before Nato gets too carried away with committing itself to Turkey’s defence, alliance leaders would do well to consider Mr Erdogan’s less-than-altruistic reasons for seeking a change in the way Damascus is governed.

.... the Turkish leader would be happy to see the Muslim Brotherhood in Syria emerge as the eventual victors of the crisis in that country, a development which would lead to the establishment of a network of Islamist governments – a “Sunni arc” from the shores of North Africa to those of the eastern Mediterranean..."

Fall Semester brings new hope for Lebanon’s Palestinians

Franklin Lamb

Beirut
Al-Manar

As fall semester begins this week for colleges and universities, Lebanon’s 12 Palestinian camps and 12 campuses, continue to swelter under unseasonably high temperatures and heavy humidity with no early relief in sight.

 

Yet, there is finally some excellent news for college age Palestinians in Lebanon where a record number of youngsters this semester will receive post baccalaureate four year, 50% tuition scholarships with per camp enrollment rates approaching those of the days before the PLO left Lebanon in August of 1982.

The latter tragedy, it will be recalled, resulted in nearly unimaginable deprivations for the 300,000 refugees left behind who were quickly stripped of physical protection, civil rights, including the right to work and to own a home, as well as PLO jobs that numbered more than 40,000 and a PLO budget that as of early 1981exceeded that of the whole government of Lebanon.

Special thanks for the new scholarship program goes to the Palestine Embassy’s hard working staff of 50 here, themselves often months behind in receiving their meager salaries from cash strapped Ramallah, as well as for the generosity of private donors from almost entirely Palestinian sources.

Promised American contributions for Palestinian scholarships have been quickly aborted as part of the current State Department campaign to pressure and punish the Palestinian Authority for daring to demand membership from the General Assembly. The 22% of the UNESCO budget that was contributed by American taxpayers for years was recently cancelled, without any input of course from American taxpayers themselves. The reason was UNESCO’s impudence in granting Palestinian membership to this UN Specialized Agency.

European aid to Palestinians in Lebanon is also shrinking due to Washington warnings to the EU not to support the PA's bid to become an “observer state” at the UN, according to a leaked State Department memo published in part by the London Guardian on 10/1/12. The US memo urged Europeans “to support [American] efforts to block the bid.” The message was communicated to European representatives at the UN general assembly in New York last week and it warned of “significant negative consequences” for the Palestinian Authority, including financial sanctions, should it go ahead with the bid.

Donors to the Palestinian scholarship program in Lebanon are motivated partly by the declining college enrollment among Palestinians here, which over the past decade has seen lower per capita college enrolment than for Palestinian refugees in any other country according to UN and UNWRA statistics and well as NGO studies in Lebanon. This incongruity is highlighted by the fact that the Palestinian revolution was born of and nurtured in institutions of higher learning in Egypt, the Gulf countries, especially Kuwait and around the world. Many of the founders of the PLO including Arafat, Khalil al Wazir, (Abu Jihad), Abu Iyad and countless others were educators. To this day the connection between the Palestinian revolution and the pursuit of education is indelibly linked.

The “President Abass Scholarship Fund,” according to Harvard University’s Graduate School of Education, is one of the best run student scholarship assistance programs around. Based on hours of interviews with students, college’s admissions offices, and meeting with the manager of the Beirut scholarship office which is part of the Palestine Embassy’s culture department, the former personal Secretary to Yassir Arafat, Maher Moshal, Harvard’s assessment appears to be accurate.

The application process and administration of the program, which last year aided 1,003 students and this year will assist 1,750, this can be briefly summarized.

Every Palestinian in Lebanon is eligible to apply. Currently discussions are being held in Ramallah to decide whether Palestinian refugees from Syria can be included this semester.

A long application and vetting process is required using a point system based on family need, cumulative Grade Point Average (GPA) and many social-economics factors including physical location in the camps, whether the family rents or “owns” one of the camp hovels, family makeup, possible parental disabilities due to service in the Palestinian resistance, survivors benefits, recommendations from camp Popular Committees and staff at UNWRA’s camp offices, detailed records from years of attendance in UNWRA elementary and secondary schools, or private schools.

In order to help as many students as possible, students receiving a scholarship from the Palestinian Fund cannot accept any other scholarship. Counseling of enrolled students and monitoring their progress regarding attendance and mid-term and final exam performance tends to encourage students to excel, the Palestine Embassy reports.

Perhaps unlike most other students, including those in Lebanon, interviews with Palestinian students from Lebanon’s camps reveal special concerns directly connected with their refugee status and lack of civil rights. For example, even though the tuition costs here are predictably higher at private colleges and universities than at the large state funded Lebanese University, Palestinians tend prefer the former including, Lebanese International University, Beirut Arabic University (BAU), American University of Culture and Education,(AUCE),Arts, Sciences & Technology University In Lebanon (AUL) and the very expensive American University of Beirut (AUB).

The reasons include the fact that the less expensive Lebanese University has many quotas and restrictions placed by Lebanese law on Palestinian refugees. Employing, “space availability”, tactics, limitations on disciplines that Palestinians can enroll in, fixed quotas, and recent disclosures that LU has become higher confessionalized like much the rest of Lebanese society has led to accusations of grade fixing, discriminations based on sect, unfair approvals by certain faculty to allow certain students credit when none is due for the simple reason of politicians contacting the professors or administrators of various departments to assert some wasta ( personal favor) on behalf of a family, tribal, or confessional member. On the other hand, in private colleges, Palestinian refugees study on a level playing field. Other special concerns expressed by some Fall Semester Palestinian students include issues such as library hours. One problem is that often Palestinian students want to be able to study late and early at campus libraries given the difficulties of studying in the camps due to lack of electricity, no internet, and a paucity of basics such as portable water, a quiet place to study, congestion due to refugees from Syria, and sometimes security issues. For example, visiting Jalil,(Wavell) camp near Baalbek last week, this observer was briefed on the typical kinds of problems students in the camps face. One such example although there are many unique to the camps that impact aspiring students. In Jalil camp, UNRWA’s technical team recently discovered serious construction violations in the camps well that cause raw sewage and other contaminants to pollute the drinking water. Contamination of the al-Jalil camp water has been a problem for years but now the Palestinian popular committees say they have been forced to shut down the well. One student explained: “We are being made to pay for this, in this scorching heat and at a time when the camp is very overcrowded because of the poor Palestinian refugees from Syria.” According to a Jalil Camp Popular Committee official, the camps only well had to be sealed “to prevent the spread of an epidemic inside the camp, which could kill 6,000 of the 10,000 residents as well as the Palestinian refugees from Syria who have come here.” Students and camp residents across Lebanon dispute the UNRWA 2011 achievement report that asserts that wells have been dug in all Palestinian camps and that all “are fit for drinking, including al-Jalil camp.” One UNRWA official, quoted on 10/3/12 by Beirut’s Al-Akhbar newspaper, on the condition of anonymity, does not deny the accusations of building violations, but insists that the well is not contaminated “all this time” and UNWRA does not see “any dereliction of duty in treating the problem.” The official claims that the people of the camp will have to “wait for the engineer in charge of resolving the problem of the well to finish his work. In the meantime, the water is worst this time of year but can be used if it is properly boiled,” adding that it is “not possible” for the agency to dig a new well in al-Jalil given the “state of emergency” in the rest of the camps in Lebanon. Against a backdrop of many such problems and challenges, more Palestinian refugees in Lebanon than in recent memory will enter university this Fall semester. Preparing for, as many insist, to take up their national resistance duties and reconstruct their country and reclaim much of their culture upon returning to Palestine.  Franklin Lamb is doing research in Lebanon. He is reachable c\o fplamb@gmail.com He is the author of The Price We Pay: A Quarter-Century of Israel’s Use of American Weapons Against Civilians in Leanon. He contribute to Uprooted Palestinians Blog Please Sign http://www.petitiononline.com/ssfpcrc/petition.html Beirut Mobile: +961-70-497-804 Office: +961-01-352-127 River to Sea Uprooted Palestinian  The views expressed in this article are the sole responsibility of the author and do not necessarily reflect those of this Blog!

How al-Aqsa Mosque Became a Refugee from Jerusalem

    
by Paul Larudee
Saturday, October 6th, 2012

Once upon a time, some people wanted to destroy al-Aqsa mosque in Jerusalem. So the mosque asked its friends, “Will you help save al-Aqsa?” We’re over a thousand years old and need your help.

“Not us,” said the Palestinians still living in Jerusalem. “We’re trying to keep our own houses and land.”

“Not us,” said the Palestinians with Israeli citizenship. “We’re already a persecuted minority in Israel.”

“Not us,” said the West Bank Palestinians. “We’re trying to save what we still have.”

“Not us,” said the Gaza residents. “We don’t want another Israeli pogrom.”

“Not us,” said the Palestinian Muslims. (HAMAS) “We don’t want to be called terrorists.” (WE ARE TRYING TO SAVE OUR HAMSTAN BY RESITING THE RESITANCE)
“Not us,” said the Palestinian Christians. “Our churches are being defaced and burned by the same people. We have our own problems.”

“Not us,” said the NGOs. “We only provide (REGIME CHANGE SERVICES) social services.”

“Not us,” said the (SOME) diaspora Palestinians. “We have a hard enough time keeping people from noticing that we’re Palestinian.”

“Not us,” said the Western liberals. “We’re more concerned about keeping anti-Semites out of the movement.”

“Not us,” said the Western churches. “We have to keep good relations with our Jewish brothers and sisters.”

“Not us,” said the Arabs. (ARAB REGIMES) “We’re busy with our own liberation movements.” (OUR PRIORITY IS LBERATING SYRIA< LEBANON AND IRAQ)
“Not us,” said the Muslim communities in non-Muslim countries. “We want our countries to think of us as good citizens.”

“Not us,” said the Muslims in Muslim countries. “We will denounce your persecutors but remain good Muslims by fasting, praying, doing pilgrimage, giving to the poor and declaring our faith, not by defending you.”

“Not us,” said the rest of the world. “We have to atone for the Holocaust.”

So al-Aqsa mosque waited for something to happen. And it did.

First, Israel expelled more than half of the people in Palestine and Jerusalem. Then Israel captured the rest of Palestine and Jerusalem. Then Israel began to expel more Muslim and Christian Palestinians. Then it began to prevent the remaining Palestinians from coming to Jerusalem.

Soon, fewer and fewer Palestinian Muslims could come to al-Aqsa and fewer Palestinian Christians to the Church of the Holy Sepulchre. And Israel sent Jews to start using al-Aqsa as their own.

Finally, Israel said, “The al-Aqsa mosque is empty and this is now a Jewish community, thanks to our Judaisation program. We don’t need a mosque, so we’re going to demolish al-Aqsa and replace it with a nice new Jewish temple. We don’t want any harm to come to you, so please pack your things and leave now, along with the rest of the Palestinians.

And that is how al-Aqsa mosque became a refugee like other Palestinians.

 

EDITOR's NOTE

 

 

-------------

 

"Not me" said Saaod Al-faisal: "I told Qadoumi للبيت رب يحميه (Aqsa has a LORD and its his duty to prectect his properties), so get it or get help" 

 

-------

 

 

 

 

"Not me" said Mohamad Mursi Mubarak. "athough I am stuck in Sinai trying to save international treaties, I am considering sending 100,000 troops to Jordan Borders with Syria, who knows, our Jordan brothers may need HELP."

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"Not me"  siad Edrogan " I  have Hagia Sophia, besides I also need help, to defeat the Lion of Damascus and face the internal threat of Deviants (ALLAWIS), and Saladin's terrorists (PKK), Nato betrayed me, therefore, I called Mursi, Ghanoushi, and Mishaal to help"

 

-------

 

“Not us,” said NATO BROTHERS. “We have to trying to save what we achieved, by deception, in Egypt and Tunis and may achieve in Jordan, Morroco and the Gulf. besisdes we are stuck in Syria”

River to Sea Uprooted Palestinian
The views expressed in this article are the sole responsibility of the author and do not necessarily reflect those of this Blog!

Henry Siegman: ‘The end of Israel is near’

Posted on October 3, 2012 |

 

German-born Professor Henry Siegman 82 (University of London) is a journalist, writer and author specializing in the international policy towards the Zionist entity. He is also an ordained Rabbi and former head of the powerful American Jewish Congress (1978-1994). Siegman had been supporter of the so-called ‘two-state’ solution for the Occupied Palestine for decades. However, after watching the mushrooming of new illegal Jewish settlements in the West Bank and East Jerusalem – Siegman has changed his views to the ‘one state’ solution in digust. He has called the so-called ‘peace process’ as a “scam” because Israeli leaders had decided long time ago that the Zionist regime will never allow the emergence of an independent Palestinian state.

In an Op-Ed in ‘The National Interest’ (September 6, 2012), Siegman predicted that Israel is doomed within the next 50 years. I must say, Siegman is more generous than Henry Kissinger who gave only ten years to Israel to live.

“It is highly doubtful that Israel can survive another half century of its subjugation of the Palestinians. The region has been radically transformed by the emergence of Islamic regimes that, unlike their predecessors, will not suppress Arab furies provoked by Israel’s permanent disenfranchisement of the Palestinians. America’s ability to impose its own political order on the region is in decline. Even Arab royals in Saudi Arabia, Jordan and the Emirates will be pressed to prove their legitimacy by joining efforts to deepen the ring of Arab hostility that surrounds and threatens the Jewish state. America’s fading influence and Israel’s growing vulnerability in this emerging regional order have already been exposed by Egyptian president Mohamed Morsi’s decision, in defiance of American objections, to attend a conference of nonaligned nations hosted by Iran. The heightened sense of isolation and insecurity that Israelis will experience as Arab countries join the nuclear club, which in time they surely will, is bound to lead to an exodus of Israel’s best and brightest, and in time it could spell the end of the Zionist dream. As reported in Israel’s press, the search in certain sectors of Israeli society for foreign passports and second homes abroad has already begun,” wrote Siegman. Read the entire article here.

Siegman has been exposing the disloyalty and evilness of Israel lobby groups in the US for a while now. He hass also criticized Barack Obama for not challenging Israel Lobby’s (AIPAC) anti-US activities and he said that if Obama had done that, a great majority of American Jews would have supported him.

On September 17, 2011 – at the Zioconservative mouthpiece, the Foreign Policy, Siegman called the Jewish settlements “colonialism, land grabs, consensus of thieves,” and the Israel lobby’s collusion. He suggested that a genuine solution to Israel-Palestinian problem will be a fair partition of the historical Palestine on the original 1947 lines (54% to the foreign Jews and 46% to the native Muslims and Christians).

Naturally, the Israel lobby groups were not letting Siegman, a turn-coat, without character assassignation. Nathan Guttman, writing in the Jewish daily Forward (October 2, 2012) said that Siegman being a senior member of the Council on Foreign Relations had made him a “statesman” within the pro-Israel Lobby. However, since he started criticizing Israel’s policies, many pro-Israel lobby activists believe Siegman has lost his Jewish communal credentials, which Siegman uses as a cover to “get credibility to views otherwise seen beyond any concensus“.

In a September 24 interview with Eorward, Siegman said: “If Israel believes that in this part of the world it can permanently deprive millions of Palestinians of their rights, that is absurd. Israel is signing its own death warrants,” he said, calling the policy of Netanyahu’s government “suicidal”.

In a previous interview with the New York Times, Siegman said that he understansd Palestinian fear (of Jewish occupation) from his own childhood experience under Nazi occupation.

 

When the Iranians under the leadership of Imam Khomeini got rid of US-Israeli puppet Reza Shah in 1979 – Iran terminated its diplomatic relation with the US and Israel due to their anti-democratic activities and military support for the Shah’s dictorial rule. This was the begining of US-Israel’s efforts to bring a regime change in Tehran by all means.

In 1980, Imam Khomeini put a plug on Reza Shah’s nuclear weapon program, calling it anti-Islam. The semi-finished reactors at Bushehr and two further reactors were immediately scrapped. However, after the end of the disastrous 8-year war with Iraq and the death of Imam Khomein, the Iranian leadership reactivated the abandoned civilian nuclear program to meet the icreasing energy demand and to achieve ‘nuclear capability (enrichment) as a deterrent against the Zionist bullies.

Like the Holocaust, keeping the Iran’s imaginery ‘existential threat’ – serves political agenda of the Zionist entity.

1. It has successfully diverted world’s attention from the new illegal Jewish settlements in the West Bank and East Jerusalem- something Moshe Ya’alon bragged about not long ago.
2. A nuclear Iran will make very difficult for the Jewish army to defeat Islamic resistance militias, such as, Hamas and Hizbullah. This fact was admitted by Maj. Gen. Amir Eshel, head of the Israel Occupation Force (IOF) planning department while talking to reporters on January 17, 2012 in Jerusalem.

”If we are forced to do things in Gaza or in Lebanon – under the Iranian nuclear umbrella it might be different,” said Amir Eshel.

River to Sea Uprooted Palestinian
The views expressed in this article are the sole responsibility of the author and do not necessarily reflect those of this Blog!
 

Palestine: One, Two or Three State Solution



The Three States 
"Israel", Abbastan, and Hamastan

Palestine: One or Two State Solution

by Stephen Lendman

Opinions vary. Why isn’t clear. Years ago, two states were possible. No longer. Israel controls over half the West Bank and much of East Jerusalem. More is added daily.

When completed, the apartheid wall will control over 10% of Palestine. Isolated ghettoized bantustans on worthless scrubland won’t work. Under those conditions, sovereign viability is impossible.

The Palestinian Authority (PA) claims otherwise. Its report titled “Moving Beyond the Status Quo: Safeguarding the Two-State Solution” endorses it.

Its action plan hopes to save it. It says the political and economic status quo isn’t sustainable. At the same time, a “new reality is being created on the ground by Israel, which is destroying” the possibility.

The PA is institutionally ready for statehood, it stresses. In fact, it was ready over a generation ago.

In 1987, in his capacity as PLO legal advisor, Law Professor Francis Boyle drafted its 1988 Declaration of Independence. He predicted it would be an “instantaneous success.” De jure UN membership would be achieved.

Palestine then met basic requirements needed for statehood. They include:
A determinable (not necessarily fixed) territory. Its borders are negotiable. The new state is comprised of Gaza, the West Bank and East Jerusalem. Palestinians have lived there for millennia. They rightfully deserve universally recognized sovereignty.

They have a fixed population. They’re a legitimate state with a functioning government. It’s peace loving. It accepts UN Charter provisions and can administer them. It’s willing to do so. In 1988, Arafat declared the PLO as Palestine’s Provisional Government.
It has the capacity to enter into relations with other states. On December 15, 1988, The General Assembly recognized Palestine’s legitimacy. It gave it observer status.

Then and now, Palestine satisfies essential criteria. All UN Charter states (including America and Israel) provisionally recognized Palestinians as independent in accordance with UN Charter article 80(1) and League Covenant article 22(4).
As the League of Nations’ successor, the General Assembly has exclusive legal authority to designate the PLO as the Palestinian peoples’ legitimate representative.
 
The Palestine National Council (PNC) is the PLO’s legislative body. It’s empowered to proclaim the existence of Palestine.
 
According to the binding 1925 Palestine Citizenship Order in Council, Palestinians, their children and grandchildren automatically become citizens. So do diaspora Palestinians.
 
Those living in Israel and Jordan have dual nationalities. Occupied Territory residents remain protected persons until a final peace agreement is reached.
 
If a new Palestinian state consisted of the West Bank, East Jerusalem and Gaza in their entirety (22% of original Palestine), a two-state solution would work.
 
Over half a million Israelis live in the West Bank and East Jerusalem. They’re not leaving. Israel controls most of the land. It won’t relinquish it.
 
The only solution is one state comprised of Israel and the Territories. At this time, nothing else will work.
 
PA leaders call current conditions unsustainable. They right. They identified the problem, not the solution. “The international community and Palestinians together need to exercise all possible efforts to preserve the viability of the two-state solution – or consider the alternatives,” they say.
 
How? They’re right saying “the only viable solution….is bringing an end to Israel’s (45 year) occupation.” They stop short of a viable way to do it.
 
Abbas won’t seek full UN membership. He talks the talk but doesn’t walk it. He’s a traitor and a fraud. He’s more for Israel than Palestine. He’ll accept less than what Palestinians have deserved for decades.
 
He’s comfortable with defeat, not victory. Full UN membership is dependent solely on the General Assembly, not the Security Council. It’s irrelevant. It can’t prevent membership if Abbas seeks it.
Palestine already is a state. What’s left is getting official recognition and full de jure UN membership. Nothing prevents it. It hasn’t so far happened because Abbas won’t go for the gold. He’s more beholden to Israel and Washington than his own people.
 
That aside, reality on the ground dictates a one-state solution. Ali Abunimah endorsed it in his book titled “One Country: A Bold Proposal to End the Israeli-Palestinian Impasse.”
 
He explained the impracticality of partition. It doesn’t work. He presented another way that will – one nation for all its people at peace with equal rights. At this stage, it’s the only viable alternative if pursued and given a chance.
 
At the same time, no Israeli leader ever proposed it. Decades of peace negotiations have been entirely one-sided. Israel’s solution is take what we give you or no deal. Its most generous offer stopped short of sovereign viability.
 
Israel won’t relinquish Palestinian territory it controls. “It is not credible that a society would invest billions of dollars in road and housing that it truly intended to give up,” said Abunimah.
 
He’s right. He also said even the most liberal Israeli leaders “came to embrace Palestinian statehood in theory while undermining it in practice.” For decades, expropriation of Palestinian land and dispossessing its residents have been official policy. It still is.
 
Doves and hardliners concur. Only their rhetoric differs. “Creating a single state for Israeli Jews and Palestinians could in theory resolve the most intractable issues – the fare of Israeli settlements….the rights of Palestinian refugees, and the status of Jerusalem.”
 
The alternative assures occupation, continued conflict, land theft, dispossessions, inequality, a permanent non-Jewish underclass, instability, and avoidance of within reach justice. Abunimah is right saying:

“The main attraction of a single-state democracy is that it allows all the people to live in and enjoy the entire country while preserving their distinctive communities and addressing their particular needs.”

“It offers the potential to de-territorialize the conflict and neutralize demography and ethnicity as a source of political power and legitimacy.”

“The moment Israelis and Palestinians commit themselves to full equality, there is no rationale for separate states.”

Most Palestinians want it. Israel remains the stumbling block. Changing its decades-long mindset won’t be easy. It’s up to resolved internal and external resistance to nudge it.
 
Jeff Halper and Itay Epshtain co-direct the Israeli Committee Against House Demolitions (ICAHD). Together they addressed the same issue. They co-wrote “In the Name of Justice: ICAHD Raises Key Issues Around a Single State as a Step Towards Resolving the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict.”
 
Although not fair and just, they don’t reject a two-state solution in principle, especially if Palestinians prefer it. At the same time, conflict resolution must involve the entire region. One state “may represent only a stage, albeit an unavoidable stage, towards a more comprehensive solution.”
 
“If the state is to be inclusive, should it be a unitary democratic state, a bi-national one or a combination? Will the solution be one defined purely by politics, or will the rights and obligations of all parties be guided indeed by international law and human rights treaties?”

Israel wants occupation legalized and permanent. Palestinians want and deserve sovereign freedom. Democratic legitimacy requires one nation for all its people, irrespective of race, religion, ethnicity, or other differentiating characteristics.

It requires institutionalized equal rights, observance of international law principles, and ending decades of occupation, colonization and apartheid.

It requires ending what’s no longer tolerable and never was. It requires treating Arabs and Jews equally. It requires establishing binding statutes mandating it. It requires enforcing them. It requires commitment to do the right thing.

According to Halper and Epshtain:

“With the end of the two-state solution, only three options remain: apartheid, warehousing or a one-state solution.”

Israel is comfortable with the first. Under international law, it’s illegal. The second normalizes the status quo. It helps make the Palestinian issue disappear. So does focusing on Iran, other manufactured threats, and/or bread and circus distractions.

Resistance alone isn’t enough, say both writers.

“We must see ourselves as political actors, and following the lead of our Palestinian partners we must formulate and pursue solutions that will provide justice, peace and the full range of human rights – civil, political, social, economic and cultural – guaranteed by international law.”

ICAHD promotes a “rights-based approach.” It’s based on five fundamental principles, including:

(1) “A just peace and process leading up to it,” according to international law principles.
(2) It must be inclusive for Arabs and Jews alike – one nation with equal rights for all its people.
(3) It must equitably resolve the refugee issue. Under international law, the right of return is inviolable.
(4) “A just peace must address the security concerns of all in the region.”
(5) “A just peace must be regional in scope.” Otherwise it won’t work.

ICAHD endorses a one-state solution, “while still promoting the eventual emergence of a regional economic confederation.” Begin “with the idea that two peoples share the country.” A common political space must be created. Doing it won’t be easy.

For sure it won’t happen unless both sides try. At issue is turning around past failures. Palestinian, Israeli, and international civil societies “will play a decisive role in achieving justice, equality, peace, and reconciliation….” There’s no other way.

Stephen Lendman lives in Chicago and can be reached at lendmanstephen@sbcglobal.net.

 

His new book is titled "How Wall Street Fleeces America: Privatized Banking, Government Collusion and Class War"

 

http://www.claritypress.com/Lendman.html

 

Visit his blog site at sjlendman.blogspot.com and listen to cutting-edge discussions with distinguished guests on the Progressive Radio News Hour on the Progressive Radio Network Thursdays at 10AM US Central time and Saturdays and Sundays at noon. All programs are archived for easy listening.

 

http://www.progressiveradionetwork.com/the-progressive-news-hour

 

posted by Steve Lendman @ 11:52 PM

River to Sea Uprooted Palestinian
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