Prospects for the sectarian terrain in the middle east

By Nir Rosen.

Part 1

Part 2

My comment on this later.

The Syrian Muslim Brotherhood: Now and Then

Is this what Lebanese want?

Their kind of Islam has just executed an activist in Gaza who was helping Gaza fishermen since 2008.

And they have many more crimes on their conscience.

Now

Then_1: The Muslim Brotherhood according to Saad Hariri

Then_2 (please see video below on Memri TV, a zionist outlet).  Since I posted yesterday,  the video embedded code hasn't been working well, but you can still click on the link to the page just above.



The Muslim brotherhood were always agents of the kings of Arabia, allies of western powers and oppressors of Arabs. Their interests lie, not in the liberation and freedom of the people, but in subduing individual consciences to their brand of Islam, violent, intolerant, and racist.
Since the dawn of modern postcolonial history in the Arab world, the kings of Arabia were agents of colonial powers, foiling many attempts for progress and change across all Arab countries.

Faisal-Weizmann agreement

The Hussein-McMahon correspondance

See also: Al Qaida roots itself in Lebanon.

Ciao Vittorio

Vittorio Arrigoni contacted me as a blogger to exchange links few months after I entered what he called the alliance of bloggers against the Israeli occupation.  This was late 2006.  He was blogging in Italian and I was blogging in English but he didn't see a problem, he said that through pictures, videos, we can communicate emotions about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

He was a man without frontiers. I am deeply sad to hear about his killing at the hands of Salafi groups in Gaza. Salafism is a cancer among us Arabs and a cancer for the world. It is eating at our development, our freedoms and at the future of our Palestinian brothers. I hope his killers will be known and tried.

Reading about him today, I wouldn't say, like many, that he was an activist, neither an idealist, Vittorio was after all an innocent and we forgot what it means to be an innocent. Vittorio, by his words and deeds, reminded us what innocence of the heart and mind means. Because we live comfortably with the fact that there is nothing to do against the great injustice that is being done to Palestinians , we have lost our innocence.

May he rest in peace. His memory must stay alive in our minds and our hearts.

Links:

Palestinians mourn Vittorio Arrigoni

Palestinians pay their last homage to Vittorio (video)

Portrait of an innocent

Statement of Vittorio's mother.



Restiamo umani.

Hariri in Wikileaks: ''The Syrian Muslim Brotherhood supports peace with Israel''

Here, Saad Hariri, who is trying to convince the US to get rid of Bashar El Assad by replacing his rule with a sunni Muslim brotherhood rule, paints a rosy picture of the worst brotherhood in the history of the ME (after Saudi Arabia):

They would accept a woman as a president in Syria

They would accept civil government

They would accept a christian as a president of Syria

They would support peace with Israel

YNET NEWS (as of today): Saudi Arabia is a natural ally to Israel.

Opposition and conspiracy in Syria

When I listened to Bashar El-Assad's speech, I first thought that his outside conspiracy accusations were exaggerated. I thought this is classic talk by leaders when they are challenged by their own people.

After all, Mubarak also claimed that the Egypt uprising was also an outside conspiracy. But in his case, he could hardly blame anyone from the outside, Mubarak was like a violent man who beats his wife but is absolutely charming and docile with everybody else except of course his own people and Hezbollah whom he sees as challenging Saudi hegemony. But how could Hezbollah mobilize women and children and millions to protest against him? What we saw in Tahrir square was a genuine popular movement by all classes and age range of the Egyptian society, men and women.

I was thinking recently that this is what is exactly missing in the protests in Syria. The protests in Syria are not reaching a critical mass and are not comprised of men, women, children, and all classes of the Syrian society, from the whole age range. And they are sparse...

Moreover, when I heard recently that Syrian security were shooting at the army because the army refused to shoot at protesters, I thought this is gross propaganda. If you want to intimidate a group, you kill one of them, not in the back, but in the front, and one, not 9! And on Joshua Landis blog, there is a picture of a document supposed to be an order to shoot at the army. The document was sent to the blog's author and it has blood stain. The staging and the fabrications were becoming more and more ridiculous.

There are also the videos circulating on the web and propagated by 'protesters'. I devoted a night watching all of them. I could not believe what I saw, few agitated men shouting and very little information. Most of these videos seem staged.

I believe there is indeed an outside conspiracy in Syria and it is not difficult to imagine who is behind. There are the classic enemies of Bashar himself, Rif'at and Khaddam. There are also enemies in Lebanon who are experienced in sowing sectarian discord and financing militias to spread rumors and kill in the streets. There is also the regional context. The regional context, since the fall of Mubarak is unfavorable to the Saudi-US-Israel axis and tipping in favor of the Hezbollah-Syria-Iran axis. An overthrow of the Syrian regime might give the former axis some gains.

But beside all this, there is clear malaise in Syria and real need for reforms. I am not sure what started first, the opposition expressing this malaise or the agitators. But I believe that given the regional context for a possible sectarian flare that will certainly spread to Lebanon, the real Syrian opposition, the one that vies for reforms and not destruction, has a responsibility. It cannot sit and watch hopping for the balance to tip in their favor. This is destructive not only for Syria and the region but also for the Syrian opposition. If the true opposition in Syria makes itself passively accomplice with conspirators, it discredits itself as a movement representative of the true aspirations of the Syrian people.

The daughter of a Bahraini human rights activist on hunger strike

Zainab Al-Khawadja announced her strike to president Obama to hold him responsible for what is happening to human rights in Bahrain where the US has a military base.

She is also tweeting her hunger strike.

Zainab spoke with Amy Goodman on Democracy Now


Amy Goodman: Bahrainis are suffering the same oppression as Lybians so why does Obama have nothing to say?

The Guardian has an article on Zainab Al Khawadja today.

US mired in policy hypocrisy as interests outweigh protesters lives

Whom are they fooling with their talk on human rights?

Bahrain opposition figure dies in custody.

Saudi Arabia and the counter revolution in the middle east: Part 2

It is not only Israel that is freaking out at the thought of the Arab spring. The rulers of Saudi Arabia are in a state of panic. They invaded Bahraïn, they are maneuvering to influence the Egyptian revolution, and they are fomenting trouble through their proxy March 14 in Lebanon and they are trying their best in Syria. Saudi Arabia is leading the counter revolution in the middle east and there is so much to write about this (you can read here Part 1). However, Syria and Lebanon, because of their religious mosaics, are the sensitive part of this counter revolution. I think Saudis are playing with fire here. The fire that was ignited in Iraq will find fertile ground in Syria and Lebanon.

I don't mean here to diminish the true aspirations of the syrian people to freedom, democracy, prosperity, and more importantly, a corruption free country. However, one has to be aware that the gloves are off between Saudi Arabia and its Israel ally on one side and Syria, Hezbollah and Iran on the other side. This is very dangerous terrain that SA is willing to take in order to reign in on the aspirations of the Arab people. Remembering the king's words from the Wikileaks cable asking the US to bomb Iran and to cut the 'head of the snake', I am inclined to consider that Saudi Arabia's moves resemble a suicide mission that will bring with it the entire middle east.

Here are some links on the subject:

The Arab Spring And The Saudi Counter Revolution

From Jadaliyya: Saudi Hegemony Versus The Arab Spring

Angry Arab about the Syrian Muslim Brotherhood and its subserviance to Saudi Arabia

Angry Arab about Saudi's takeover of the Egypt revolution

And finally, from Syria Comment, the story of the tragic death of the author's wife's cousin in Banyas shot by protesters in Banyas: The revolution strikes home. Nobody knows for sure who is shooting military personnel watching and monitoring the protests in Syria but this is not typical of freedom loving people, this is an indication of a civil war fomented by Saudi proxies in Jordan, Lebanon, and Syria through the Syrian muslim brotherhood and through Saudi national Saad Hariri as well as the Syrian brotherhood ally in opposition to Bashar el Assad, Abdel-Halim Khaddam, and their kooks.

Wikileaks: 'King of Bahrain has links with Mossad'

How long will we continue to ignore the close and secret collaboration of some Arab states with those who butcher Arab children and steel their land and their livelihood?

4. (C) The King spoke at some length on Israeli-Palestinian developments, expressing satisfaction at the positive turn of events. This is a good moment, he said, that can be important for stability in the region. He said that he had instructed newly-appointed Minister of Information Dr. Mohammed Abdul-Ghaffar to make sure that official announcements or statements coming out of the Ministry of Information do not refer to Israel as the "enemy" or "Zionist entity." He revealed that Bahrain already has contacts with Israel at the intelligence/security level (i.e., with Mossad), and indicated that Bahrain will be willing to move forward in other areas, although it will be difficult for Bahrain to be the first.

The cable: I had to omit the term 'friendly' which was originally in the title because although the Guardian article cited below refers to the ties between the king and the Mossad as 'friendly', the term is not found in the cable. But it doesn't change the fact that the conversation recounted in the cable confirms Arab monarchies' friendly stance toward Israel and shed a crude light on the current events in Bahrain.

Another cable seen by the Guardian reveals that the King of Bahrain, whose Arab state has recently been shaken by protests, has had friendly links with the Mossad, the Israeli intelligence agency.

The cables report a private talk between the then US ambassador, William Monroe, and King Hamad of Bahrain in the king's palace on 15 February 2005. Monroe reported back to Washington: "He [the king] revealed that Bahrain already has contacts with Israel at the intelligence/security level (ie with Mossad) and indicated that Bahrain will be willing to move forward in other areas."

Arab dictators and USrael: some thoughts on the Arab spring

Some argue that Arab dictators who are against US policies in the ME, which is mainly safeguarding Israel's interests first, seem to be more immune to popular uprisings against them because they have the approval of the people who are sympathetic to the Palestinian cause which they perceive as being the product of an injustice perpetuated by Israel and the US.

I think the argument has no basis because it alludes that Arabs can be totally distracted by the Palestinian issue and that the Palestinian issue was used by Arab dictators to divert the public attention from reforms. This is absolutely false because revolutions are happening in both USrael friendly and USrael hostile regimes.

It is not the Palestinian cause that is at issue here, it is rather the reliance of some of these dictators on outside protection from the US and Israel that paved the way to revolutions and rapid change in leadership. The US sponsoring of these dictators generated internal tyrannies backed by outside powers and worked efficiently to keep the Arab street silent by doubling the power of the internal tyranny by an external one. But it also made these dictators vulnerable from the decline of the external powers who backed them. And I think it is the decline of the US power and credibility in the ME*, as well as the decline of Israel's war capabilities following the 2000 and 2006 defeats by Hezbollah in Lebanon, and the rise of a new power represented by Iran and Turkey, that made the uprisings possible. Revolutions rise when what prevent them from happening does actually decline or disappear. Revolutions size on a vacuum or a shift in the power balance. And that's what I believe is happening in the Arab world.

That's why I believe, even though there are common features to the aspirations of the Arab people, be it in Syria, Bahrain, Tunisia, Lybia, SA, Egypt, Yemen, etc...the leaderships who are most vulnerable right now are the ones who are backed by the declining powers that are the US and Israel.

There are also geopolitical considerations to predict the success of the revolutions.

Thanks to the US and its war on Iraq, a new geopolitical bloc and power center formed by Iran, Iraq, Turkey, and Syria, is emerging in the region. This bloc of countries is preparing an agreement for the free circulation of merchandise and citizens in an area that will extend from the Meditterranean to the Perisan gulf, to the Black and Caspian seas. Should countries to the west of this bloc like Egypt and countries in the east like Pakistan and Afghanistan, wish to join, Israel and the US will see their regional power severely diminished, despite Saudi backing.

What strikes me is that, contrary to what is being written or said in the US, these revolutions are not the vindication of the neo-con doctrine. What the neo-cons did, in my opinion, with their war in Iraq, resulted in the creation of a local power shift and power vacuum, which reverberated across the region and made possible the revolutions in their puppet regimes, revolutions they could not expect nor prevent...

For the time being, revolutions in countries whose leadership is backed by the US and Israel have a better chance of succeeding. Other revolutions might have to wait...

From the NYTimes, The larger game in the middle east: Iran

* I think Wikileaks had an enormous impact by showing the emperor without clothes. The cables from US embassies across the world and especially across the ME demonstrated that the empire does not have the moral authority nor the means to lead the world. The perception that stemmed from the cables on the Arab world is of servile Arab dictators serving a declining and weak empire. Arab revolutions vindicated Wikileaks as a powerful democracy tool (not Facebook please...)

Israel buries the Goldstone report with Goldstone's approval

The Goldstone report has infuriated Israel who launched a sustained attack on the report and on the south African judge (read also 'Anatomy of a smear campaign').

Finally, this sustained attack has come to bear fruit and make Goldstone discredit his own report by retracting some of his most damaging accusations against Israel.

Goldstone has caved to pressure and he should not have been appointed in the first place but we know that his appointment must have been decided because as a Jew and a lifelong zionist Goldstone might have spared the UN the accusation of anti-semitism or anti-Israel bias. And because he is a south African Jew, and south African Jews and Israel are known to have collaborated with the Apartheid regime, the UN has introduced, intentionally or unintentionally, the possibility for the report to be questioned based on the moral grounds of his main author.

Israel can now dream of restoring its credibility through a PR campaign but I am not anxious about that because the only purpose of the backtracking of the report is to make Israel's leaders and soldiers immune to international prosecution, not to change the image of Israel.

Angry Arab has commented this news item and he makes two interesting points:
- Goldstone as a man is different from the Goldstone report who was made by a team. And so even if Goldstone retracts, its does not mean that the report should be retracted. It only tell you that Goldstone is morally corrupt, hence his initial appointment by the UN with the full knowledge of his ambiguous moral status: Jew to be credible and south African Jew to become less credible when time comes
- Israel has come to exist because of war crimes committed by zionists and Israel continues to commit war crimes. It is not only in this instance covered by the report that Israel committed war crimes.

UPDATE: The NYTimes refused to publish Goldstone's retraction which he submitted to the Times before publishing it in the washington post.

UPDATE: Goldstone's Gaza report stands according to a UN lawyer who sat with Goldstone on the committee investigating war crimes in Gaza.

More on Goldstone:
Paving the way for more Cast lead style operations by Israel: but will they find another Apartheid era judge to endorse the Israeli Apartheid state in its crimes?

Alain Gresh on Goldstone (in French).

Stalemate in Lybia

By Peter Beaumont and Chris McGreal, The Guardian.

It is not the first time western powers are willingly conned into going to war. Remember Curveball? This time, it is the entire revolutionary council of the Lybian revolution + Sarkozy and his consiglieri pseudo philosopher BHL + a would be Thatcherite hoping an impact of the Lybian intervention on his political career similar to what the Falkland war did to Thatcher's, who are dragging us into a dirty war between a dictator and his exes.

''Duty to protect'' civilians... sorted by oil field.