In this issue:

Int'l Court Rules vs. Israeli Wall; Bush Rushes to Sharon's Defense

Israel Refuses Quartet Meet; Bush-Sharon Rift Widens

Early Elections or Unity Government in Israel?

Gilad in Secret Talks in Cairo

Iraqi Interim PM Offers Amnesty to Resistance Fighters

Iraqi Interim PM Gets Okay for Emergency Rule

From Volume 3, Issue Number 28 of Electronic Intelligence Weekly, Published July 13, 2004
Southwest Asia News Digest

Int'l Court Rules vs. Israeli Wall; Bush Rushes to Sharon's Defense

The Bush Administration has come out in critical support of Israel's position that the ruling by the International Court of Justice in The Hague, against Ariel Sharon's Berlin Wall on the West Bank, is wrong and will be ignored, the Israeli paper Ha'aretz reported on July 9.

"We do not believe that that's the appropriate forum to resolve what is a political issue. This is an issue that should be resolved through the process that has been put in place, specifically the Road Map," Bush's spokesman said. "We have underlined that the wall not only results in confiscation of Palestinian land and causes untold humanitarian and economic hardship, but also could prejudge future negotiations and hinder a just political solution to the conflict."

By contrast, the European Union has called for action on how Israel can comply with international law. EU foreign policy chief Javier Solana said, "After the legal picture has become clear, the international community should consider how to get Israel to abide by international law." European Commission spokesman Jean Christophe Filori said, "The European Union continues to call on Israel to remove the barrier from inside the occupied territories, including in and around East Jerusalem."

Jordan, which as an active partner with the Palestinians in bringing the issue before the ICJ, hailed the decision. "The ICJ's ruling, that was adopted with a large majority of 14 judges out of 15, represents a large legal, ethical and political weight which Israel cannot ignore," Jordanian Foreign Minister Marwan Muasher said. "The decision indicates that the tribunal has accepted all Jordanian arguments and rejected all pretexts cited by Israel, which alleged the construction of the wall was a strategic requirement necessitated by security considerations." He added that his government was "appraising the implications of the decision with a view to taking all necessary steps to urge Israel to implement the ruling."

The Arab League will bring the issue to the General Assembly. "The General Assembly now will be called upon to look into this matter," Yahya Mahmassani, UN Ambassador from the Arab League announced.

A preliminary reading of the ICJ ruling reveals that all the arguments presented by Israel, and supported by the Bush Administration, as well as by political personalities such as Senators John Kerry and Hillary Clinton, were brought before the court. This included the question of jurisdiction and so-called "appropriateness," in light of the claim by Israel that this is a political dispute. On all of these issues, the court ruled in favor of the Palestinians, citing chapter and verse of the UN Charter and previous precedents and ruling.

The most interesting is that it ruled in favor of the Palestinian claim that the General Assembly acted because the Security Council was deadlocked on the issue, because of the U.S. veto of a resolution calling for the rerouting of the wall along the 1967 borders.

Israel Refuses Quartet Meet; Bush-Sharon Rift Widens

On July 6, the Israeli government of Prime Minister Ariel Sharon refused to meet with a delegation representing the Quartet (the European Union, the United States, Russia, and UN Secretary General Kofi Annan), which had sent a team of mediators to Israel and Palestine to discuss Israel's planned withdrawal from the Gaza Strip. "We don't want to work with the Europeans on security issues. We work with the Americans on these issues," Sharon spokesman Asaf Shariv arrogantly declared.

The Quartet mediators met with Palestinian Prime Minister Ahmed Qureia in Ramallah on July 7, after which Qureia met separately with David Satterfield, the U.S. representative at the talks. Qureia remarked that "if it is true that Israeli officials would not meet with the Quartet, it means that Israel is turning its back to the entire world."

U.S. sources say that the Sharon snubbing of the Quartet has widened a rift between the Israeli leader and U.S. President George W. Bush. At the recent G-8 summit meeting in Georgia, Bush had agreed to the Quartet visit, and the Sharon rebuff is a further blow to the U.S. President's international credibility, at a point when the U.S. is attempting to win international support for the continuing Iraq occupation.

Early Elections or Unity Government in Israel?

Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon will be holding formal discussions with Israeli Labor Party chairman Shimon Peres to discuss the possibility of forming a unity government, according to Ha'aretz July 9. This is the first time that such talks have been held on a formal basis since Sharon won the elections last year. Sharon currently is heading a coalition with 59 mandates, short of a 61-mandate majority. Only last week, it faced a vote of confidence, where the vote was tied at 56-56. It requires a majority of 61 mandates to overthrow a government.

The only problem is that a unity government would have a lifespan of only 18 months, because general elections will be held in 2006. Although it appears that Peres is enthusiastic about entering such a government, others are not, especially if Sharon stalls on implementing his so-called disengagement plan. In fact, one observer told EIR that this could in fact be Sharon's intention, because it would just discredit the Labor Party even further, to the advantage of the Likud.

On the other hand, elections could be held even sooner than expected, with many of the major players positioning themselves for just such an eventuality. One development that points in this direction, is a scandal that has hit the Shinui Party, one of Sharon's coalition partners. Its number-two leader, Infrastructure Minister Yosef Paritzsky, has been accused of an attempt to criminally entrap the number-three leader in the party. It was then revealed that one of his assistants was arrested attempting to purchase illegal drugs for him. The whole murky affair discredits the party, since it is supposed to be an "anti-corruption" party. If elections are held, this party, which is now the third-largest, could lose quite a few seats, which would change the political landscape.

Gilad in Secret Talks in Cairo

The Israeli paper Ma'ariv reported on July 5 that Gen. Amos Gilad, who heads the Israeli Defense Ministry's Diplomatic-Political Branch, was in Egypt meeting with intelligence chief Omar Suleiman, in what were described as "secretive" talks on various aspects of Ariel Sharon's so-called disengagement plan. Gilad is one of the top hardliners in the Israeli military.

Iraqi Interim PM Offers Amnesty to Resistance Fighters

Iraq's interim Prime Minister Iyad Allawi may offer an amnesty to resistance fighters, Associated Press reported July 4. One of his spokesmen made a statement indicating that Allawi is trying to profile himself as against the occupation, and representing Iraq's national interests. "If he [a guerrilla] was in opposition against the Americans, that will be justified because it was an occupation force," the spokesman, Georges Sada, said July 3. "We will give them freedom."

Sada said that Allawi would announce several measures related to security, including the restoration of the death penalty and a declaration of martial law.

Regarding a possible amnesty, Sada said a full pardon for insurgents who killed Americans is not a certainty. Allawi's main goal, he said, is to "start everything from new" by giving resistance forces the option of handing over their weapons and supporting the new government.

"There is still heavy discussion about this," said Sada, interviewed in the Prime Minister's office.

The idea is being discussed also with the U.S. embassy, which suggested "creative" ideas for ending the armed resistance. Most analysts believe Allawi must try to absorb some of the resistance. Clearly, there is no military solution, from the government's standpoint. "It's hard to imagine any way forward other than coopting people who had previously fought against the United States, either as part of Saddam's army, part of the insurgency, or both," said Jon Alterman, a Middle East expert at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington. "Allawi needs to split the opposition into two groups: those he can coopt and those he must confront."

Whether or not resistance fighters would accept the amnesty offer, is a big question. One former army officer who described himself as a "helper to the resistance" in Fallujah said Allawi's plan would have little traction, because his government is seen as illegitimate. "I do not want to return to the new Iraqi army and be put in a situation where I have to open fire on my countrymen in order to defend the Americans," said Mohammed al-Janabi, a former colonel in the disbanded Iraqi army. He went on: "The goal of this offer is to divide the resistance. They want to isolate the honest patriots from the Islamic Mujahideen—in other words, divide and rule—and this is not going to happen," al-Janabi said. "As for Allawi and [President Ghazi] al-Yawer, they are taking orders from the new American ambassador after the departure of their former master, Bremer. They are helping the Americans steal our oil, and they will be punished."

Meanwhile, a delegation representing the radical Shi'ite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr told the interim government that he was willing to disarm his militia, Allawi said on U.S. television. Sadr "is looking for an amnesty. He is looking to be part of the political process. He is willing ... to dismantle the Jaysh al-Mahdi army ... or the militias that he has formed," Allawi told ABC News in an interview to be broadcast July 11.

Iraqi Interim PM Gets Okay for Emergency Rule

The Iraqi Interim Prime Minister's decree on emergency rule was passed July 7 by the interim Iraqi government. The decree gives Ayad Allawi the ability to declare martial law, with such provisions as imposing a curfew, tapping phones, seizing assets, restricting civil associations, and assuming direct command of the security forces in areas deemed to be emergency zones. In these zones, the police and military can search and detain people without judicial approval.

The Iraqi Human Rights Minister, Bakhtyar Amin, insisted that the decree was approved by Allawi's 32-member Cabinet. He compared it to the U.S. Patriot Act.

A New York Times editorial July 8, entitled "Shades of the Old Iraq," notes that it is less than two weeks since Allawi took the office, yet his government method already carries a whiff of the old-style Arab authoritarianism. Dr. Allawi heads an unelected, caretaker government whose main responsibility is guiding Iraq toward free elections in January. Preparing to impose martial law is not an encouraging way to start.

Children Were Targets of Torture

Torture methods have not only been applied to adults, but also to children, according to dossiers compiled by the International Committee of the Red Cross. The Red Cross states that more than 100 children have been in Iraqi prisons, including in Abu Ghraib, according to reports by the Swiss daily Neue Zuercher Zeitung. According to the official speaker from the Red Cross in Geneva, who was interviewed by German TV ARD, 107 children were registered during 19 visits which the Red Cross made to different prisons. Various testimony speaks about children and youth having been mistreated by soldiers in prison. UNICEF (the children's aid organization of the UN) confirmed in a report published in June 2004 that "children who have been arrested in Basra and Kerbala for activities which were supposedly directed against the occupying powers, were, in routine fashion, transferred to the internment facilities in Umm Qasr. The internment of these children is worrisome given that they are interned without having contact with their families."

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