Special Tribunal for Lebanon: A Prosecutor's "Tunnel Vision"

Al Akhbar English, strong aletrnative to non Qatari non Saudi media, is out.

This is a link to the latest article on the Special UN Tribunal for Lebanon (STL) from Omar Nashabe.

The STL is the first international tribunal to indict someone for a terrorism crime. Instead of targeting suspects affiliated to internationally recognized terrorist organizations such as al-Qaeda, the first terrorism indictment is aimed at Hezbollah, a Lebanese resistance movement. This does not come as a surprise for those who monitor events in the Middle East. Hezbollah represents a threat to the security of Israel, something unacceptable to the United States and other Western powers. The investigation into the assassination of Hariri may have been a golden opportunity to undermine Hezbollah.

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).

The tribunal of discord

The killers of Lebanon, its economy and its population, before, during and after the civil war, were never brought to justice. They were freed and pardoned and elected to parliament in the name of national concord and unity.

From the beginning, the STL was a political instrument and an instrument of discord, because it accepted 'doing justice' to one man, while forgetting the many victims of those who are claiming justice for this man.

If Saad Hariri wants unity and peace for Lebanon, so he must shut disavow the tribunal. If the international community wants justice for Lebanon, so it must bring total justice, not partial and misguided justice.

Lebanon's 'unity' government falls.

Shut down this tribunal!

A web initiative to support a unilateral declaration of a Palestinian state now !

Please read this and sign for support in the comment section.

Palestinians looking for UN support to unilaterally declare state within 1967 borders

And Jerusalem for Capital.
This is excellent news. After years of dithering and bending to USrael's demands and conditions, the PA is retaking the initiative. Any respectable government will not refuse its support to this initiative which is in line with UN resolutions. I applaud the initiative and hope that the PA will be consistent in pursuing and implementing it.

Read here the early reactions...

UPDATE: somehow, as expected from Fatah and the PA, they seem to be cowing back...A pity...They don't need anybody to declare unilaterally a state of their own. Is Israel asking for permission to build settlements ?

Israel threatening the international community with war unless the Goldstone report is discarded by the UN

Zionists are quick to blame others for the lack of peace prospects in Palestine. They blamed Arabs, Palestinians, terrorists, the UN, and now they are blaming a 575 pages report for the UN on Israeli war crimes in Gaza. They wanted to bury it with the help of Mr. Nobel peace prize 09 and the collaboration of the illegitimate Mahmoud Abbas but they did not succeed. Palestinians were so angry with Abbas that he had to reverse his position in order to retain a semblance of legitimacy among his people.
Palestinians' thirst for justice can only be measured by the amount of injustice that was inflicted upon them by the zionist state and its acolytes. This time they are determined and hey want a clear condemnation from the international community of war crimes. A Jewish south african judge wrote a report for the UN on war crimes in Gaza with one concern, justice, not politics. But this is precisely what is infuriating Israel. Israel's attitude toward war and peace has become so extreme that it is alienating many in the Jewish diaspora and creating fracture lines. I can't wait to see these Israeli soldiers, commanders, politicians, judged for what they have done to the people of my region...And I don't care if Hamas has to be judged too. I have never been for any party, I am only for those who were dispossessed and are being daily oppressed by Zionists...

Israel says that if the case against it gains steam, the Jewish state will not be able to make the wide-ranging concessions necessary for any peace deal.

This is a bad argument since everybody can argue, based on the history of the Jewish state, the contrary: that Israel was never interested in peace. However, if Israel is genuinely determined to make peace, which comes with land concessions, so let them deliver first and then see what to make of the report.

The US is trying to bury a UN report accusing Israel of war crimes in Gaza

International law and justice are not for Israel. And nobody cares.

Read here the UN report.

UN: Israel must tear down West Bank fence

The United Nations demanded Wednesday that Israel implement a five-year-old ruling of its International Court of Justice (ICJ) in The Hague that deemed most of the West Bank separation fence illegal.

The fence severely restricts the movement of tens of thousands of Palestinians, the UN's Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) told a news conference in Jerusalem, marking the fifth anniversary of the ICJ advisory opinion.

Some 85 per cent of it was built inside the West Bank, and not on the Green Line.

The zionist argument is that the wall protects against Palestinian suicide attacks. This argument is shallow. First because the decrease in suicide attacks was balanced by an increase in rocket fire which means that Palestinians will always take some form of action against Israel and Israel will always retaliate. This is an occupation after all. Second because if it is for security, why Israel would not follow the green line of 1967 and why Israel changed the route of the wall several times grabbing more Palestinian land on each of these occasions ?

The Gaza Holocaust: latest operation in numbers

The latest criminal Israeli offensive on Gaza that lasted 22 days:

1330 people died;
14000 homes destroyed;
68 public buildings and 38 NGO installations have been partly or totally destroyed;
600000 tons of rubble containing toxic material and unexploded bombs;
25 million dollars to clean the rubble;
200000 working days for Gazans to clean the rubble;

And all this won't even win Kadima the elections because it wasn't enough toughness for Israelis who are going to vote soon, and zionists at large...

To be continued until the last Palestinian...

UN chief demands investigation into Israeli attack on Gaza headquarters

A visibly furious Ban Ki-moon condemned as "outrageous, shocking and alarming" the destruction he had seen while touring Gaza...

Furious ? This was supposed to be the YES man for Israel and the US in the UN. To have made Ban Ki Moon furious is quite an achievement. But this does not surprise me coming from Israel. Israel is brute force, disregard for the weak, and the UN is weak. Combine brute force with disregard for the weak and you may get a feeling of what Palestinians are going through every day. The arrogance of this state has gone as far as accusing the Palestinians of their own misery in Gaza. ''You elected the wrong government, it is your fault'' says the official hasbara. And the official hasbara doesn't stop here. Palestinian children are starving in Gaza ? ''It is Hamas's fault, these people don't care about their children, they should give them food instead of sending rockets on Israel''. This line was heard yesterday on the BBC (homerun) by a certain Sara Saber-Freedman, from the Canada Israel committee. How can you answer such perverse accusations, denial of reality, lack of empathy, and outright lies ? You don't. You just switch off the radio...

You can watch Ban Ki Moon's reaction here.

300 Human Rights Organisations prepare to take Israel's War Crimes to World Court.

Israeli minister jokes about not being able to vacation in Amsterdam because of war crimes charges against Israel at the world court in the Hague.

Iran's Nuclear Program: An Illusory Threat

What is never said or written about the new imperialistic wars is that the other point of view is never heard. And this is probably the most prominent feature of imperialism. These imperialistic wars are not only presented with the cover of Humanitarianism and security (first fallacy), but they are presented to us as the most covered of wars, with embedded journalists, images, and an orgy of commentaries (the second fallacy), ignoring, however, a simple ethical principle, the voice of the other. And the western press is accomplice in this voluntary censorship. I underatnd that people may not want to listen to AhmadiNejad, but why on earth should they listen to Bush ? Moreover, if we admit that the official voice should be dismissed, on both sides, I suppose there are journalists and educated people in Afghanistan, Iraq, and Iran. Are we hearing their voices ? No. We are only hearing the voices of those of them who tell only what the West wants to hear.
The new imperialistic wars have a new weapon, their self censored information machine...Total deafness...We are only hearing our own voices. For this reason I asked my friend blogger Homeyra to translate this opinion piece on the Iranian nuclear program by the Iranian ambassador to France.


UPDATE: March 11th, 2008. Here is the translation from Homeyra, slightly edited by myself.

Iran's Nuclear Program: An Illusory Threat. By Ali Ahani
In the last years some western countries' opposition has turned the Iranian nuclear program into a challenge, and the international community, for precise reasons, is facing an important responsibility.
This responsibility of countries and international organizations to bring a solution and to strengthen the international peace becomes greater as the discussion on the Iranian nuclear program has become increasingly disproportionate.
The Iranian nuclear program isn't about confrontation with the International community. Quite the contrary, the question is to know what are the International community members' expectations regarding the current international situation in terms of rights and responsibilities as it is necessary to grant countries with their legitimate and inalienable rights.
The dual attitude of a few countries hostile to the peaceful Iranian nuclear program, brings the international community to face a difficult task. As the will of the large majority of the members of the international community is to give diplomacy a chance.
No State can decide of the limits of diplomacy. Western countries opposing the peaceful Iranian nuclear program must remain faithful to the United Nation charter and to a peaceful solution of international questions, according to the principles of justice and international law. Their opposition has two negative consequences: it is scorning the absolute rights of the Iranian people and weakening international institutions.
According to AIEA documents and proofs, as well as the recognition of the American and other countries' intelligence services conducting nuclear enrichment activities, the Iranian program is a peaceful program.
Therefore nothing justifies a vote for a binding resolution increasing sanctions against the Iranian people. A peaceful nuclear program within the NPT charter is the legitimate and undeniable right of all members of the AIEA.
A vote in favor of a resolution increasing the sanctions against Iran will, not only lead to a reduced function of the AIEA as the only valid technical and judicial body of the UN, but also limit the chances of negotiations – going against the logical demands of Iran and the expectations of the international community.
All countries are bound to protect the power of the AIEA in the fulfillment of its goals with the due respect for its prestige. The weakening of the AIEA would lead to anarchy and international disorder. Not only there would be no distinction among right and duty, but the validity of international decisions and documents would be questioned.
Flawed information and wrong interpretations of Iranian nuclear program are the basis of some countries’ discriminatory and even hostile position toward the Iranian government and people.
Some Western States' hostile rhetoric and the escalation of sanctions were born from the illusions entertained by some on the Iranian peaceful nuclear activities. Part of the NIE report proves this aspect.
According to the recent report of Mohamed Elbaradei, only realism, along with taking into account the good faith and the sincerity of the IRI in its cooperation with the AIEA, should be the core of international efforts to end the discriminatory approach to the Iranian nuclear program, to respect the Iranian peoples’ rights, and to consolidate world peace and security.
All members of the international community are responsible to maintain world peace, to respect the United Nations charter, and to use all their forces in this direction.
Occuring events after the occupation of Iraq, the admission of occupying forces of the lack of basis of their claims regarding the existence of WMD's, have proved that the Iraqi people have been victims of this kind of illusions.
This experience has convinced most of the international observers that a country cannot be threatened because of some illusions and fabrications of false pretences and be considered as a rogue state.
Considering the Iranian pacific nuclear program, nuclear powers must respect the legal and technical expertise of the AIEA and restrain from exerting pressure and creating negative impacts on the logical and lawful process of the AIEA activities.
The people of the Middle-East have a positive view of France and of its stance toward them in the past, specially in the Iraq war. The French government and people wish to maintain their position in the Middle East. Today France has precious opportunities. The Middle East conflict, the political crises in Lebanon, regional evolutions in Iraq and Afghanistan, and the Iranian nuclear question are matters of great opportunities for the French government to show its leadership in the region. With will and realism, France could play a historic and decisive role as a responsible country.
Original Source in French:

Le nucléaire iranien, une menace illusoire, par Ali Ahani
LE MONDE | 06.03.08

©

May I remind you that the visit of Israeli president Shimon Peres is meant exactly to pull France in the other direction regarding the Iranian nuclear program and Sarkozy seems to be more than willing to go Israel's way ?

CENTCOM Commander William Fallon Resigns over tensions on his opposition to the white house war plans on Iran.

The top US military commander in the Middle East is stepping down days after a magazine profile reported he was trying to block US military action against Iran.
Admiral William Fallon, the head of US Central Command, was described in an Esquire article published last week as a lone voice within the administration arguing for restraint.
The article's author, Thomas Barnett, had predicted that if Admiral Fallon was pushed out of his job "it may well mean that the president and vice-president intend to take military action against Iran before the end of this year and don't want a commander standing in their way".

Bashar to Ban Ki Moon: We are in the eye of the storm and you need to stay in contact with us

Revealed by Le Monde, a strange conversation took place last April between Syrian president Bashar El Assad (BEA) and UN secretary general Ban Ki Moon. It gives a fresh and new perspective on BEA as a head of state and politician but it also gives a clearer picture of the weakness of the new UN secretary general Ban Ki Moon, not only toward his US masters but also toward any head of state and official he meets. It is clear from the conversation that Ban Ki Moon is considered as a US puppet and everything that is said to him by officials is meant to be conveyed to his masters. Lets turn now to the conversation's minutes partially published today by Le Monde and translated here.

The meeting, which lasted more than an hour, was held on April 24th in the presidential palace in Damascus, before the UN took the decision for the Hariri international tribunal.
The situation in Iraq is mentioned but most of the conversation turns around Lebanon. BKM insists on the important role that Syria must play in order to supress Lebanon's internal divisions. He thinks Damascus must encourage the creation of the international tribunal to judge the assassins of Rafiq Hariri, and not the contrary.

The answer of BEA is pungent: "Sectarian and ethnic divisions have been deeply rooted in Lebanese society for more than 300 years. Lebanese society is very fragile and it stabilised only during the Syrian presence between 1976 and 2005 after which Lebanon entered a new period of political instability again."
"The political instability in Lebanon, added BEA, will be aggravated by the special tribunal, especially if it is under chapter seven of the UN convention, which is binding, reinforcing the constraining aspect of the tribunal. That may easily initiate a conflict and can potentially degenerate into a civil war, provoking divisions between sunnis and shias from the Meditterranean to the Caspian seas. This might have grave consequences extending beyond the Lebanese frontier.

"In the eye of the storm"
Syria, said BEA, has always played a constructive role in Lebanon, contrary to the roles played by France and the US. The influence of these two last countries is destructive to Lebanon.
Syrian foreign minister, Walid Mouallem, intervenes at that point to harshly criticize the US ambassador to Lebanon, Jeff Feltman. "Feltman must leave the country. I am ready to offer him a vacation in Hawaï."
BKM, unable to react, continues to recite his well learned lesson, and pleads for a reestablishment of diplomatic relations between Lebanon and Syria. "The present lebanese government is illegal'', replies BEA. ''The Syrian people hate the March 14th movement led by Fouad Siniora. I tried to talk to Siniora, but it is now impossible. However, if a unity government including the opposition is formed, Syria will revise its stance."
BKM continues to recite his lesson and expresses his fears concerning Iran's nuclear ambitions. "As an oriental, you must understand, replies BEA. Iran is a regional power and must be recognised as such. They have the capacity to derail the entire Middle east and beyond. (…) There will be no positive evolution on this question as long as the West does not recognise to Iran the right to be a nuclear power."

The meeeting ends with the usual thanks from BKM to BEA who then says to him: "We are in the eye of the storm. You will need to stay in contact with us."

I am not sure BKM understood the metaphor.

You can hate BEA, you can call him names, you can despise him, but you cannot deny that he is right in what he says. Arrogant yes, but right. Speaking about facts might also look arrogant for an international community which is increasingly neglecting facts, building foreign policies only on the fantasies of the neocon new world order.

The source article in French

P.S and Update: An anonymous reader protested (in an impolite way, go my Néthique's Icon at the top of the blog page if you want to understand what impoliteness) that there might be some translations problems because to plead for ''the reestablishment of diplomatic relations between Syria and Lebanon'' is to ignore that there was never official representation in the first place between Syria and Lebanon.
I am sorry to tell this reader that I had to rely on the article of Le Monde, which, in turn, relied on the minutes of the meeting. The article states: ''M. Ban enchaîne, plaidant pour le rétablissement des relations diplomatiques entre le Liban et la Syrie.'' I doubt Le Monde's journalist mistranslated from the minutes, which might have been in English. However, I believe BKM, or those who wrote the script for him, are totally ignorant of the historic of the situation, which might explain the absence of historic perspective to the words he used in the meeting. As for myself I have to stick to my source, which is le Monde's article.

Louise Arbour Appeals the Next Hangings Sentences in Iraq

I saw the story on Canadian CTV news this morning and wasn't able to find the page when I returned to copy the link. However, it is mentioned by this article from Le Monde on the New UN chief.
With the backing of the new UN chief who was recently criticised by Human Rights groups for not condemning the death sentence, leaving it as a matter to be decided by states, UN high commissioner for Human Rights, Canadian Louise Arbour, has filed a formal appeal to the sentences of Saddam's half-brother Barzan al-Tikriti and Iraq's former chief judge Awad Hamed al-Bandar. It seems that Arbour did the same with Saddam's own sentence. UN high commissioner for Human Rights website features statements voicing concerns for the way justice is being delivered in Iraq.

Change of Pattern in Political Assassinations in Lebanon related to Brammertz's Progress on the Initial Ones

Brian Whitaker from The Guardian is to my knowledge the only one who pointed out in his article 'The Smoking Gun' the relevance of the recent change in the method of political assassinations in Lebanon to the 'Who Did It' question:

''Spot the odd one out. Gemayel's killing was the only one that involved a gun. All the other attacks used explosives. In a report to the UN on June 10, Brammertz explained why, in his view, the first 15 cases were connected: there was linkage by motive and linkage by modus operandi.''
...''The modus operandi is much more problematic. Gemayel was followed, his car was rammed, then he and his bodyguard were shot at close range, apparently with silenced guns. The killer, or killers, then vanished. In most countries we would assume it was a professional hit job."

Then Whitaker examines under this perspective the links between the change of method and the progress UN commissioner Serge Brammertz has been making in the Hariri investigation recently" See Brammertz June and September reports.

The reports were not much publicised, contrary to the previous commissioner Mehlis reports, because they are based mostly on technical progress in the investigation rather than on empty accusations as Mehlis used to do when releasing his reports. Brammertz has been conducting his investigation like a maestro, in an real independant manner, unhampered by paid for lies, pressures, passions, attempts of blockades and acquaintances with high profile people from the March 14th movement. Is it because Brammertz comes from the country of Hercule Poirot ? Reading the reports one senses immediately that the man is into something.

''On reading the report, anyone involved in the earlier attacks might easily have concluded they were too complex for safety, giving far too many clues away in the planning stages. A straightforward shooting (almost impossible in the case of a highly protected figure like Hariri but practicable in the case of Gemayel) might therefore be a wiser option.''

And Whitaker concludes...nothing, merely that even if we should not exclude Syria we should also look at other possibilities.

I conclude that self protection might not have been the sole motive for a change of strategy. The other motive for a change of strategy might have been to confuse in two main ways, one internal, and the other external. Indeed by including in the mandate of the UN commission an additional assassination different in its planning and execution from the others , and the March 14th movement was quick in asking to inlcude the latest one, one can produce two or more intended or non intended effects on the Lebanese and international political scenes:

1- The change in the pattern of the killings, from planned bombings involving a group to what appears to be a hit job, signals a desire to continue to kill without giving further evidence to the continuing UN investigation by ending the initial trail followed by Brammertz , at least for this new assassination. Also, as Brammertz was pursuing two hypothseses, the group hypothesis and the isolated individuals hypothesis, the killers this time appear as if trying to avoid consolidating the group hypothesis. The group hypothesis means ramifications not only horizontal but also vertical in the planning of the assassinations.

2-Another effect of the new method used to assassinate Pierre Gemmayel is to point the accusation this time to parties inside Lebanon within the Christian camp. Indeed, this time the assassination took place in the heart of the Christian area. The fact that all the pressure was this time on Aoun confirms some shift of focus inside the March 14th movement from the outside, us against them, to the inside, 'Are you with them or with us ?'. People from March 14th are angry about Aoun because they feel that without him Hezbollah would be weaker.

3- By adding other paths of investigation to the initial one in which all assassinations were connected and the connections producing valuable informations like in a serial killer case, the other effect is not only to stop the trail of the initial investigation but also to weaken it by distributing its internal resources on a wider and less coherent network. Brammertz's team was not sufficient for the job he was asked to do even after the UN consented to add personnel to the team recently. There was and still acute shortage of personnel to conduct the UN investigation. Another close objective would be to slow the investigation on the initial assassinations in order to gain time.

From the above and within this context of analysis, it is easy to draw conclusions on who the perpetrators of Pierre Gemmayel might be:

-They are probably the same as those who started the recent (since Rafiq Hariri) political assassinations in lebanon;
-They have extensive knowledge of the inner workings of the UN investigation and are close to the evidence Brammertz has been gathering and know probably where it will be leading.

I will let you draw the conclusions but I really fear where this ugly political game might lead.