Mideast News Digest
LaRouche's Statements Are the Only Sane Ones Coming From the U.S. to the Arab World
Lyndon LaRouche's statement "What Colin Powell Didn't Say," was published last week in several Arabic newspapers, and has been sent out via Internet to many Arab countries. Al-Arab International published the statement as a full page spread with thick banner headlines and photos of LaRouche on the top, and President Bush, Vice President Cheney, and Sen. Lieberman at the bottom with a thick caption saying "These are ruling the U.S. today: Cheney's lunatic tribe of neo-con and their allies of organized-crime-linked, pro-imperialist hard-core Democrats typified by war-monger Senator Joseph Lieberman." Al-Arab (London), Middle East Online (London), and Al-Shaab (Cairo) are among those that published LaRouche's statement on March 17 and 18.
The main headline above LaRouche's photo in Al-Arab reads: "Lyndon LaRouche, American Presidential Candidate: The Current U.S. Administration Has Declared Imperial War Against the World." Below it: "Pro-Imperialist 'Chickenhawks' inside the Bush Administration are leading the U.S. and the world to the abyss." Another blowup quote reads: "The Anglo-American unilateral war against Iraq is a pretext to launch the Clash of Civilization.... It is not a war against the Arabs alone, nor the Islamic world alone, but against China and beyond."
LaRouche's statement on U.S. Attorney General John Ashcroft's "Heinrich Himmler II" bill was also translated and sent out to Arabic news media and political and governmental organizations and individuals.
One Middle East newspaper worker was so impressed that he asked several times if it were true that LaRouche was an American. He thought that LaRouche sounded as if he were "a father for the Iraqi people." He was told that "LaRouche is a true American."
75% of Palestinian Dead Since 2000 Are Civilians
According to Palestine Chronicle of March 17, the Palestinian Initiative for the Promotion of Global Dialogue and Democracy (MIFTAH) reports that the total number of deaths of Palestinians since Sept. 28, 2000, when Ariel Sharon invaded Temple Mount, is 2,183, with "1,656 of these being innocent civilians: 429 of them children and 114 women." Of the total dead, reports MIFTAH, are 300 armed Palestinian fighters, and 119 suicide bombers19% of those killed by the Israel Defense Forces. The IDF put out a report two weeks ago, underestimating the number of Palestinians they have killed, and falsely claiming that "only 365" were innocent civilians, but admitting that 130 of the people they killed were children, the latter of whom in the height of cruelty the IDF reports as having been "brainwashed."
UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan Condemns Israel
According to a press release on the United Nations website March 17, UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan commented that "Israel appears to be flouting international law," and said he "strongly deplores Israel's continuing raids in the Gaza Strip." The raids of March 16-17 killed 12 people, including a 4-year-old girl shot in the chest, and a young American peace activist run over by a bulldozer. (Although the Bush Administration has asked the Israelis to investigate this "accident," pictures taken a moment before she was crushed show American Rachel Corrie to the side of the bulldozer trying to talk with the driver through a bullhorn moments before she was run over.)
The UN statement said that "the Secretary-General is especially troubled that Israel appears to be flouting a central tenet of international humanitarian law, which requires it to take all possible measures to protect civilian populations during military operations."
IDF Called 'Israeli Killing Forces'
The English-language Israeli daily Ha'aretz on March 17 said that the world is ignoring the Palestinian killing fields. It stated that the brutality of the Israel Defense Forces has earned them the sobriquet "Israeli Killing Forces (KF)." Early on March 17, the IDF killed eight Palestinians, when they attacked the Nusseirat refugee camp in the Gaza Strip with a force of 30 tanks and helicopter gunships. In another Warsaw Ghetto-style attack, three people were killedincluding a 13-year-old and a babywhen they did not evacuate a house, which the Israelis then blew up anyway. Ali Rabah, the chief of emergency at the hospital in the central Gaza Strip, said the death toll could rise substantially, in the very crowded refugee camp where 16,000 refugees live.
These incidents followed only a few days after the IDF killed two Israeli security guards, using the same brutality they always employ in "targetted assassinations." This "accidental" assassination of their own people show how arbitrary the so-called "targetting" is. One of the Israelis was killed in a hail of 200 bullets and the other was killed by an anti-tank rocket fired from a IDF helicopter gunship, when he tried to aid the first man.
On Tuesday, March 18, the Israeli military killed three more Palestinians, two of whom they claim were militants. One Israeli soldier was killed in one of the operations. As usual, the military gave a long story on how one of the individuals killed was responsible for killing more than 50 Israelis. While these stories may or may not be true, one Israeli journalist who followed the stories in detail over a period of time, discovered that in one case no less than 14 "targetted assassinations" hit individuals all of whom seem to have been responsible for the same suicide bombing!
Eleventh-Hour Bid To Halt War with Iraq at UN
On March 14, according to the London Independent, leading British Middle East commentator Robert Fish called for invoking an extraordinary "uniting for peace" resolution at the UN. Fisk wrote that what could be done to undermine the Bush Administration war policy toward Iraq, and to remind it of "its obligations to the rest of the world," was to utilize "a forgotten UN General Assembly resolution that could stop an invasion of Iraq.... It was, ironically, pushed through by the U.S., to prevent a Soviet veto at the time of the Korean conflict, and actually used at the time of Suez."
This UN resolution, numbered 377, allows the UN General Assembly to recommend collective action, "if the Security Council, because of lack of unanimity of the permanent members, fails to exercise its primary responsibility for the maintenance of international peace and security."
Fisk went on: "This arcane but intriguing piece of UN legislationpassed in 1950 and originally known as the 'Uniting for Peace' resolutionmight just be used to prevent Messrs Bush and Blair going to war, if their plans are vetoed in the Security Council by France or Russia. Fundamentally, it makes clear that the UN General Assembly can step inas it has ten times in the pastif the Security Council is not unanimous."
Fisk concluded: "Today the General Assemblydead dog as we have all come to regard itmight just be the place for the world to cry: Stop. Enough."
Prior to Fisk's commentary, top JFK/Lyndon Johnson Administration official William van den Heuvel had called for invoking the "United for Peace" resolution, to stop the Iraq war. The March 14 Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung also ran an article by a legal expert, supporting the idea, and explaining how it would work.
Will Kurds Attack Turks over Kirkuk and Oil?
Reuters reported on March 14 that there were thousands of refugees from the Iraqi oil city of Kirkuk, who were heading for the northern Kurdish region in the "no-fly zone," that is effectively controlled by the U.S.-U.K. The Kurdish refugees said they believed that "many strategic locations, including oilfields, oil pipelines, and a bridge had been mined" by the Iraqi government in preparation for defending against a U.S. invasion.
Kirkuk is coveted by many different players in the U.S. war plans: opposition Kurdish groups working with the U.S. want it to be the center of an independent Kurdish homeland because of its rich oil resources; Turkish factions that want a piece of Iraq from the U.S. want Kirkuk included because of the oil, and will not accept a Kurdish homeland; and some of the U.S. imperial war plans cooked up by the U.S./U.K.-run Iraqi National Congress (INC) want the U.S. military to invade Kirkuk and run the oil fields. Kirkuk is under Iraqi control, and will be defended by Baghdad since it accounts for over half the oil produced per day by Iraq under the UN sanctions.
On March 17, The Washington Post reported that Kurdish officials revealed that U.S. special forces are working with and blending in with their troops, and that many more were expected soon. With their help, the Kurds expect to occupy former Kurdish areas, forcing their Arab occupants to flee.
Additionally, Kurdish Democratic Party head Massoud Barzani was quoted as saying, "Having Turkish troops in Kurdistan means war. It will be a major war." But Turkish-Kurdish talks were scheduled for March 17 in Ankara, under Zalmay Khalilzad, Bush's so-called Ambassador to Free Iraqis.
How High Will Oil Prices Climb?
According to the Malaysia Star in London on March 16, former Saudi Oil Minister Sheikh Yamani warned that oil might soar to $50 per barrel. Although with the initial start of the war, oil prices dropped, Sheikh Yamani said it would ruin the world economy if Iraqi crude output were severely hit by a U.S. military strike. Yamani rejected arguments for intervention in the region, saying it would breed another generation of terrorists, and expressed fears that the relatively low-pressure oil wells in Iraq could be rendered useless forever if Saddam Hussein chose to set them on fire, to stop the U.S. from gaining anything.
Asked whether the whole U.S. campaign in Iraq were misguided and would cause more insecurity, he said: "That's what I believe, what I am afraid of. They are creating terrorists. This policy [is] now antagonizing the whole people in the Arab and Muslim world."
Former U.S. Ambassador to Saudis during 1991 Persian Gulf War Speaks Out
At a March 17 luncheon meeting of the Association of Former Intelligence Officers (AFIO), Charles Freeman, former U.S. Ambassador to Saudi Arabia during the first Persian Gulf War, said en route to testify against the latest war before the British Parliament that:
*9/11 gave a victory to Osama bin Laden, as it undermined U.S. relations with Saudi Arabia. A second invasion of Iraq would give bin Laden "a second victory by breaking relations with all Muslim nations in the Middle East."
*If a second Gulf War is carried to its conclusion, the U.S. will lose hundreds of allies and "geographic basing rights essential to project its power."
*One of the functions of the UN Security Council is similar to that of a "court," since, after deliberation, it "can issue a mandate." And, if that mandate is not carried out, then "it can launch a multilateral force to enforce the mandate." The U.S.-U.K. clearly did not even have a majoritydespite the question of veto by members of the Permanent Five of a second resolution authorizing forcethe current action against Iraq is similar "to a Texas lynching party."
*Finally, Freeman responded to a question by agreeing that the majority of U.S. military and intelligence leaders opposed the war and had been "blackmailed" into support for it. However, while his words brought evident relief to the former and current intelligence officers present, one former intelligence officer condemned Freeman's speech as being "one of the most pompous speeches I have heard at AFIO in 20 years," and some AFIO members then walked out, indicating the degree of tension within the bureaucracy.
Former U.S. Diplomat to Iraq Condemns U.S. Reasons for War
On March 18 , Edward Peck, who had been U.S. Chief of Mission to Iraq during the U.S. "tilt toward Iraq" in the 1980s, condemned the U.S. position that (in his words) "In order to prove to Saddam Hussein that he can't ignore the UN Security Council, we [the U.S.] are going to ignore the Security Council." Peck made this statement while giving a briefing in Washington, D.C. on Middle East policy at Georgetown University. Peck further ridiculed the changing rationales for war with Iraq being presented by the Bush Administration, and pointed out that "no one has given the United States of America the right to decide who rules Iraq."
As to President Bush's statements about terroriststhat "they hate us because of our freedom"Peck said, no, they hate us because we are killing people in Iraq with our sanctions, and we are indirectly helping Israel kill Palestinians in the occupied territories. But if you believe what Bush says, Peck noted, then you should strongly support John Ashcroft's drive to eliminate the cause of that hatred, by removing our freedom.
Poking fun at Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld's statements about France and Germany "blocking the will of NATO," Peck said that the U.S. has vetoed 40 UN Security Council resolutions, mostly to protect Israel. One case where the U.S. didn't veto such a resolution was in 1982, when the Security Council voted unanimously that Israel should immediately withdraw from Lebanon, adding that: "And in 18 years, they were gone."
Peck made frequent references to Chairman of the Defense Policy Board Richard Perle, and the Project for a New American Century crowd, who have been pushing for a war with Iraq for years, and he concluded by saying that he still thinks there is a slight possibility of stopping the war, but if the Administration goes ahead, he warned, "we are making a ghastly, costly mistake."
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