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Thursday, December 14, 2006
THE FRIDAY MAGAZINE (THE OPPRESSED IN THE NEW WORLD ORDER)
THE FRIDAY MAGAZINE (THE OPPRESSED IN THE NEW WORLD ORDER)
===========================================================================
1. THE OPPRESSED IN THE NEW WORLD ORDER
[By Wahida Valiante - Special to the Friday Magazine]
===========================================================================
Since we live in a period that American policy planners have dubbed the
"New World Order," it is important that we examine U.S. foreign policy and
its influence on geopolitical affairs in the recent past. Those who tend to
become misty-eyed by the alluring words of democracy, liberty and freedom
for the people of Middle East should read Policy Planning Study 23.
George F. Kennan was one of America's major figures in shaping the world as
it recovered from World War II. In 1948, Kennan wrote Policy Planning Study
23; it is considered a key document in designing what the American
administration calls the "New World Order." Here is an example of what it
says:
"We have about 50% of the world's wealth, but only 6.3% of its population
... Our real task in the coming period is to devise a pattern of
relationships which will permit us to maintain this position of disparity.
To do so ... our attention will have to be concentrated everywhere on our
immediate national objectives ... We should cease to talk about vague and
unreal objectives such as human rights, the raising of the living
standards, and democratization. The day is not far off when we are going to
have to deal in 'straight power' concepts. The less we are then hampered by
idealistic slogans, the better."
This was, of course, a top secret document so to pacify the general public,
it was necessary to trumpet the "idealistic slogans" Kennan despised (as is
still being done constantly today), but in the pages of Policy Planning
Study 23, planners were talking only to one another. Thus, the study
continues: "Meanwhile, our own public has been grievously misled by the
sentimentalists on the significance of the area to ourselves; and we are
only beginning with the long and contentious process of re-education which
will be necessary before a realistic Far Eastern policy can receive the
popular understanding it deserves."
Obviously America wanted to maintain its economic superiority, and to do
that it was fully prepared to deal in clearly stated "straight power
concepts." In a briefing for U.S. Ambassadors to Latin American countries
in 1950, Kennan observed that a major concern of U.S. foreign policy must
be "the protection of our (i.e. Latin America's) raw materials"!
Kennan also saw a "dangerous heresy" in the idea that a government should
be held responsible for the welfare of its people. He went on to describe
the means to be used against those who fall prey to this heresy: "The final
answer may be an unpleasant one, but we should not hesitate before police
repression by the local government ..."
To ensure its economic mastery, the U.S. was advised to oppose the
distribution of national wealth among its people, and to support
governments that relegated their people's economic interests behind those
of America, even if those governments were repressive.
The repression of people's legitimate aspirations was seen as merely
incidental to the economic interests and objectives of the United States.
Interestingly, any governments that refused to buy into Kennan's "heresy"
of social welfare and sought genuine economic independence could fall into
a number of negative ideological groups; communist, socialist, nationalist,
Islamic, liberal, etc.
A careful study of post-World War II American foreign policy reveals a
ruthless pursuit of national economic goals at the expense of the lives and
economic well-being of people from various regions, including South America
and the Middle East. The total list is much longer than space permits here.
In Chile, for example, when the liberal and democratically elected
government of Salvador Allende decided to nationalize the country's mining
industry, the American CIA replaced him with the dictatorial Pinochet
regime; a government that was guilty of gross human rights violations,
political oppression, detentions without trial, and torture.
In the case of Nicaragua, American interference was so blatant and horrible
that the world court found the U.S. guilty of criminal activity and ordered
it to pay 17 million dollars in reparations.
In Vietnam, America unleashed its fury by dropping ten tons of bombs for
each Vietnamese citizen! Vietnam's "crime" was that a dedicated group of
nationalists decided to relieve rampant poverty among the people and to
undertake concrete measures for their welfare. This was considered a threat
to American interests.
Other regimes equally guilty of Study 23's heresy of social responsibility
included Cuba, Libya and Iran. Cuba defied America not only by
nationalizing its economy, but also by helping other countries to gain
their independence. Cuban troops helped defeat the South African army at
Cuito Cuanavale, leading to the independence of Namibia and Angola. Cuba
was also a major player in persuading the South African government to
negotiate with the African National Congress (ANC).
In the case of Libya, Mouamar Khaddafi's regime nationalized oil fields,
expelled British and American naval and air bases, sent 20,000 Italians out
of the country, and undertook other acts of economic protection. America
responded with destabilization measures, and an economic blockade; in 1986
the U.S. even launched direct bombing attacks.
The Shah of Iran, a notorious U.S. client, ruled through the brutal
instrument of his American-trained Savak security forces until he was
toppled and replaced by Ayatollah Khomeini's Islamic Revolution. America's
response was to impose war on Iran through Saddam Hussein's client state in
Iraq, to impose economic sanctions (including an arms embargo) and to plot
the assassination of key government figures through local agents.
In reality, any regime, whether it adopts Islam, socialism, or any other
ideology, will incur the implacable opposition of America. In fact, America
does not see it as a matter of ideology alone, since it accepts Islam in
its most shallow and regressive form -- such as it exists in many parts of
the Muslim world. This is the brand of Islam that funds America's wars
(notably the Gulf War), as well as investing in American banks and serving
American economic interests. So it would be a gross over-simplification to
assume that the so-called "New World Order" is anti-Islamic, for it is not;
it is, however, against the revolutionary aspect of Islam that demands a
nation undertake the "heresy" of assuming direct responsibility for the
welfare of its own people through the wealth of the land.
At a time when America feels it has won an incontestable victory over the
Muslim world and is brimming with arrogance and over-confidence, it is
worth remembering that revolution and economic redistribution form a
feasible model for true independence -- one which oppressed nations may try
to undertake within their own particular religious, political and socio-
economic framework. As the above examples demonstrate, the price to be paid
for this attempt may be a hefty one. But as the Qur'an says: "Verily, God
does not change the condition of a people unless they change their own
condition." (13:11)
(Wahida Valiante is a longtime professional social worker, family therapist
and author. She is also a cyber-counselor with Islamonline and national
vice-president of the Canadian Islamic Congress. She can be reached at
nvp@canadianislamiccongress.com )
===========================================================================
3. THE AMERICAN ARMY: NEVER DEADLIER THAN NOW
[By Martin Lukacs -- The McGill Daily -- October 30, 2006]
===========================================================================
"The bad news," Seymour Hersh told a Montreal audience late last month, "is
that there are 816 days left in the reign of King George II of America."
The good news? "When we wake up tomorrow morning, there will be one less
day."
Hersh, a Pulitzer-prize winning journalist and regular contributor to The
New Yorker Magazine, has been a thorn in the side of the U.S. government
for nearly 40 years. Since his 1969 exposé of the My Lai Massacre in
Vietnam -- which is widely believed to have helped turn American public
opinion against the Vietnam War -- he has broken news about the secret U.S.
bombings of Cambodia, covert C.I.A. attempts to overthrow Chilean president
Salvador Allende and, more recently, the first details about American
soldiers abusing prisoners at Abu Ghraib Prison in Iraq.
During a 90-minute lecture - given at the launch of an interdisciplinary
communications studies program called Media@McGill - Hersh described video
footage depicting U.S. atrocities in Iraq. In one video, American soldiers
massacre a group of innocent people playing soccer.
"Three U.S. armed vehicles, eight soldiers in each, are driving through a
village, passing candy out to kids," he began. "Suddenly the first vehicle
explodes, and there are soldiers screaming. Sixteen soldiers come out of
the other vehicles, and they do what they're told to do, which is [to] look
for running people ... Never mind that the bomb was detonated by remote
control," Hersh continued. "[The soldiers] open up fire; [the] cameras show
it was a soccer game; ... It was reported as 20 or 30 insurgents killed
that day."
If Americans knew the full extent of U.S. criminal conduct, they would
receive returning Iraqi veterans as they did Vietnam veterans, Hersh said.
"In Vietnam, our soldiers came back and they were reviled as baby killers,
in shame and humiliation," he said. "It isn't happening now, but I will
tell you - there has never been an [American] army as violent and murderous
as our army has been in Iraq."
Hersh also came down hard on President Bush for his aggressive involvement
in the Middle East.
"In Washington, you can't expect any rationality. I don't know if he's in
Iraq because God told him to [be], because his father didn't do it, or
because it's the next step in his 12-step Alcoholics Anonymous program," he
said.
Hersh hinted that responsibility for the invasion of Iraq lies with eight
or nine members of the administration who have a "neo- conservative agenda"
and dictate the U.S.'s post-September 11 foreign policy. "You have a
collapsed Congress, you have a collapsed press. The military is going to do
what the President wants," Hersh said. "How fragile is democracy in
America, if a president can come in with an agenda controlled by a few
cultists?"
Throughout his talk Hersh remained pessimistic, predicting that the U.S.
will initiate an attack against Iran, and that the situation in Iraq will
deteriorate further.
"There's no reason to see a change in policy about Iraq. [Bush] thinks that
in 20 years, he's going to be recognized for the leader he was - the
analogy he uses is Churchill," Hersh said. "If you read the public
statements of the leadership, they're so confident and so calm.... It's
pretty scary."
(This article was edited for the Friday Magazine.)
===========================================================================
1. THE OPPRESSED IN THE NEW WORLD ORDER
[By Wahida Valiante - Special to the Friday Magazine]
===========================================================================
Since we live in a period that American policy planners have dubbed the
"New World Order," it is important that we examine U.S. foreign policy and
its influence on geopolitical affairs in the recent past. Those who tend to
become misty-eyed by the alluring words of democracy, liberty and freedom
for the people of Middle East should read Policy Planning Study 23.
George F. Kennan was one of America's major figures in shaping the world as
it recovered from World War II. In 1948, Kennan wrote Policy Planning Study
23; it is considered a key document in designing what the American
administration calls the "New World Order." Here is an example of what it
says:
"We have about 50% of the world's wealth, but only 6.3% of its population
... Our real task in the coming period is to devise a pattern of
relationships which will permit us to maintain this position of disparity.
To do so ... our attention will have to be concentrated everywhere on our
immediate national objectives ... We should cease to talk about vague and
unreal objectives such as human rights, the raising of the living
standards, and democratization. The day is not far off when we are going to
have to deal in 'straight power' concepts. The less we are then hampered by
idealistic slogans, the better."
This was, of course, a top secret document so to pacify the general public,
it was necessary to trumpet the "idealistic slogans" Kennan despised (as is
still being done constantly today), but in the pages of Policy Planning
Study 23, planners were talking only to one another. Thus, the study
continues: "Meanwhile, our own public has been grievously misled by the
sentimentalists on the significance of the area to ourselves; and we are
only beginning with the long and contentious process of re-education which
will be necessary before a realistic Far Eastern policy can receive the
popular understanding it deserves."
Obviously America wanted to maintain its economic superiority, and to do
that it was fully prepared to deal in clearly stated "straight power
concepts." In a briefing for U.S. Ambassadors to Latin American countries
in 1950, Kennan observed that a major concern of U.S. foreign policy must
be "the protection of our (i.e. Latin America's) raw materials"!
Kennan also saw a "dangerous heresy" in the idea that a government should
be held responsible for the welfare of its people. He went on to describe
the means to be used against those who fall prey to this heresy: "The final
answer may be an unpleasant one, but we should not hesitate before police
repression by the local government ..."
To ensure its economic mastery, the U.S. was advised to oppose the
distribution of national wealth among its people, and to support
governments that relegated their people's economic interests behind those
of America, even if those governments were repressive.
The repression of people's legitimate aspirations was seen as merely
incidental to the economic interests and objectives of the United States.
Interestingly, any governments that refused to buy into Kennan's "heresy"
of social welfare and sought genuine economic independence could fall into
a number of negative ideological groups; communist, socialist, nationalist,
Islamic, liberal, etc.
A careful study of post-World War II American foreign policy reveals a
ruthless pursuit of national economic goals at the expense of the lives and
economic well-being of people from various regions, including South America
and the Middle East. The total list is much longer than space permits here.
In Chile, for example, when the liberal and democratically elected
government of Salvador Allende decided to nationalize the country's mining
industry, the American CIA replaced him with the dictatorial Pinochet
regime; a government that was guilty of gross human rights violations,
political oppression, detentions without trial, and torture.
In the case of Nicaragua, American interference was so blatant and horrible
that the world court found the U.S. guilty of criminal activity and ordered
it to pay 17 million dollars in reparations.
In Vietnam, America unleashed its fury by dropping ten tons of bombs for
each Vietnamese citizen! Vietnam's "crime" was that a dedicated group of
nationalists decided to relieve rampant poverty among the people and to
undertake concrete measures for their welfare. This was considered a threat
to American interests.
Other regimes equally guilty of Study 23's heresy of social responsibility
included Cuba, Libya and Iran. Cuba defied America not only by
nationalizing its economy, but also by helping other countries to gain
their independence. Cuban troops helped defeat the South African army at
Cuito Cuanavale, leading to the independence of Namibia and Angola. Cuba
was also a major player in persuading the South African government to
negotiate with the African National Congress (ANC).
In the case of Libya, Mouamar Khaddafi's regime nationalized oil fields,
expelled British and American naval and air bases, sent 20,000 Italians out
of the country, and undertook other acts of economic protection. America
responded with destabilization measures, and an economic blockade; in 1986
the U.S. even launched direct bombing attacks.
The Shah of Iran, a notorious U.S. client, ruled through the brutal
instrument of his American-trained Savak security forces until he was
toppled and replaced by Ayatollah Khomeini's Islamic Revolution. America's
response was to impose war on Iran through Saddam Hussein's client state in
Iraq, to impose economic sanctions (including an arms embargo) and to plot
the assassination of key government figures through local agents.
In reality, any regime, whether it adopts Islam, socialism, or any other
ideology, will incur the implacable opposition of America. In fact, America
does not see it as a matter of ideology alone, since it accepts Islam in
its most shallow and regressive form -- such as it exists in many parts of
the Muslim world. This is the brand of Islam that funds America's wars
(notably the Gulf War), as well as investing in American banks and serving
American economic interests. So it would be a gross over-simplification to
assume that the so-called "New World Order" is anti-Islamic, for it is not;
it is, however, against the revolutionary aspect of Islam that demands a
nation undertake the "heresy" of assuming direct responsibility for the
welfare of its own people through the wealth of the land.
At a time when America feels it has won an incontestable victory over the
Muslim world and is brimming with arrogance and over-confidence, it is
worth remembering that revolution and economic redistribution form a
feasible model for true independence -- one which oppressed nations may try
to undertake within their own particular religious, political and socio-
economic framework. As the above examples demonstrate, the price to be paid
for this attempt may be a hefty one. But as the Qur'an says: "Verily, God
does not change the condition of a people unless they change their own
condition." (13:11)
(Wahida Valiante is a longtime professional social worker, family therapist
and author. She is also a cyber-counselor with Islamonline and national
vice-president of the Canadian Islamic Congress. She can be reached at
nvp@canadianislamiccongress.com )
===========================================================================
3. THE AMERICAN ARMY: NEVER DEADLIER THAN NOW
[By Martin Lukacs -- The McGill Daily -- October 30, 2006]
===========================================================================
"The bad news," Seymour Hersh told a Montreal audience late last month, "is
that there are 816 days left in the reign of King George II of America."
The good news? "When we wake up tomorrow morning, there will be one less
day."
Hersh, a Pulitzer-prize winning journalist and regular contributor to The
New Yorker Magazine, has been a thorn in the side of the U.S. government
for nearly 40 years. Since his 1969 exposé of the My Lai Massacre in
Vietnam -- which is widely believed to have helped turn American public
opinion against the Vietnam War -- he has broken news about the secret U.S.
bombings of Cambodia, covert C.I.A. attempts to overthrow Chilean president
Salvador Allende and, more recently, the first details about American
soldiers abusing prisoners at Abu Ghraib Prison in Iraq.
During a 90-minute lecture - given at the launch of an interdisciplinary
communications studies program called Media@McGill - Hersh described video
footage depicting U.S. atrocities in Iraq. In one video, American soldiers
massacre a group of innocent people playing soccer.
"Three U.S. armed vehicles, eight soldiers in each, are driving through a
village, passing candy out to kids," he began. "Suddenly the first vehicle
explodes, and there are soldiers screaming. Sixteen soldiers come out of
the other vehicles, and they do what they're told to do, which is [to] look
for running people ... Never mind that the bomb was detonated by remote
control," Hersh continued. "[The soldiers] open up fire; [the] cameras show
it was a soccer game; ... It was reported as 20 or 30 insurgents killed
that day."
If Americans knew the full extent of U.S. criminal conduct, they would
receive returning Iraqi veterans as they did Vietnam veterans, Hersh said.
"In Vietnam, our soldiers came back and they were reviled as baby killers,
in shame and humiliation," he said. "It isn't happening now, but I will
tell you - there has never been an [American] army as violent and murderous
as our army has been in Iraq."
Hersh also came down hard on President Bush for his aggressive involvement
in the Middle East.
"In Washington, you can't expect any rationality. I don't know if he's in
Iraq because God told him to [be], because his father didn't do it, or
because it's the next step in his 12-step Alcoholics Anonymous program," he
said.
Hersh hinted that responsibility for the invasion of Iraq lies with eight
or nine members of the administration who have a "neo- conservative agenda"
and dictate the U.S.'s post-September 11 foreign policy. "You have a
collapsed Congress, you have a collapsed press. The military is going to do
what the President wants," Hersh said. "How fragile is democracy in
America, if a president can come in with an agenda controlled by a few
cultists?"
Throughout his talk Hersh remained pessimistic, predicting that the U.S.
will initiate an attack against Iran, and that the situation in Iraq will
deteriorate further.
"There's no reason to see a change in policy about Iraq. [Bush] thinks that
in 20 years, he's going to be recognized for the leader he was - the
analogy he uses is Churchill," Hersh said. "If you read the public
statements of the leadership, they're so confident and so calm.... It's
pretty scary."
(This article was edited for the Friday Magazine.)
Wednesday, December 13, 2006
ZNet Update, Chomsky, Achcar, Shalom book interview and excerpt
This mailing follows our pattern of offering information about books by our writers, in this case the book is by Noam Chomsky, Gilbert Achcar, and Stephen Shalom.
Their new book of edited dialogues came out some months ago but has yet to receive much visible attention. Hopefully this message will rectify that problem. And hopefully, in response, many ZNet users will find the book useful.
Here we offer the ZNet book interview, in which Shalom, the book's editor, answers our usual author questions, and we also include an excerpt from the book itself.
---
Perilous Power: The Middle East and U.S. Foreign Policy Dialogues on Terror, Democracy, War, and Justice
By Noam Chomsky and Gilbert Achcar.
Edited by Stephen R. Shalom.
Boulder, CO; Paradigm Publishers, 2006.
(2) Can you tell ZNet something about writing the book? Where does the content come from? What went into making the book what it is?
Noam and Gilbert decided from the outset that it would be useful to have a third person present to moderate their face-to-face conversation, and I was invited to serve in this role. This project was to be a two-way conversation, but where a third party would pose the questions, keep the discussion on track, and take care of the technical process of recording, enabling the two discussants to concentrate on their analyses and arguments. As much as possible, I tried to keep out of the conversation, just moving it along as necessary.
The procedure we followed involved several steps. We began by developing a list of questions to be addressed. The three of us got together in Noam's office at MIT in Cambridge, Massachusetts, for three days of conversation in early January 2006. The recordings were transcribed and I prepared a rough edit, eliminating redundancy and tangents, reordering some of the sections, and improving readability. Then Gilbert and Noam each went through and edited their remarks. The goal here was not to produce a faithful verbatim transcript of the conversation. Rather the idea was to allow each of them to clarify or expand on their remarks (though not to change a major argument to which the other had already responded). We took the view that oral comments made without access to sources should not serve as the last word. So we verified facts and checked and filled in quotations as necessary. And, because we believe that readers should not be expected to take what authors say on faith, we felt it important to add in documentation for all non-obvious or controversial claims. In the Summer of 2006, each of the authors wrote an Epilogue in which they commented on more recent developments.
(3) What are your hopes for Perilous Power? What do you hope it will contribute or achieve, politically? Given the effort and aspirations you have for the book, what will you deem to be a success? What would leave you happy about the whole undertaking? What would leave you wond ering if it was worth all the time and effort?
A fundamental change in United States policy toward the Middle East would make us more than happy. But the effort will have been worthwhile if it helps to make the average person in the West and especially the United States more informed about and uncomfortable with current U.S. policies in the Middle East and if it helps critics sharpen their analysis and understanding. Too often critics discuss Iraq as if the categories "collaborator" and "resistance" are sufficient to make sense of what is going on. Or that U.S. policy in the Middle East can be fully explained by reference to the Israel lobby. Or that Islamic fundamentalism must either be accepted as a justification for Washington's imperial foreign policy or dismissed as a figment of the Bush administration's imagination. With a fuller appreciation of the Middle East situation, critics should be better able to oppose U.S. policy and work for a more just and peaceful world.
[You can purchase the book at a 15% individual customer discount at http://www.paradigmpublishers.com/Books/BookDetail.aspx?productID=143446 ]
===
Excerpt:
Their new book of edited dialogues came out some months ago but has yet to receive much visible attention. Hopefully this message will rectify that problem. And hopefully, in response, many ZNet users will find the book useful.
Here we offer the ZNet book interview, in which Shalom, the book's editor, answers our usual author questions, and we also include an excerpt from the book itself.
---
Perilous Power: The Middle East and U.S. Foreign Policy Dialogues on Terror, Democracy, War, and Justice
By Noam Chomsky and Gilbert Achcar.
Edited by Stephen R. Shalom.
Boulder, CO; Paradigm Publishers, 2006.
Interview by Stephen R. Shalom
(1) Can you tell ZNet, please, what your new book, Perilous Power, is about? What is it trying to communicate?
Perilous Power is a dialogue about U.S. policy in the Middle East between two of the most astute analysts of this part of the world: Noam Chomsky and Gilbert Achcar. Chomsky, of course, needs no introduction to ZNet readers. This is his first totally new book devoted exclusively to the Middle East since The Fateful Triangle. Achcar, whose writings on the Middle East have appeared often on ZNet, grew up and lived for many years in Lebanon. He is the author of, among other books, The Clash of Barbarisms and Eastern Cauldron, and editor of The Israeli Dilemma.
In this new book, Chomsky and Achcar bring to bear a keen understanding of the internal dynamics of the Middle East and of the role of the United States, taking up all the key questions, including such topics as terrorism, fundamentalism, conspiracies, oil, democracy, self determination, anti-Semitism, and anti-Arab racism, as well as the war in Afghanistan, the invasion and occupation of Iraq, the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, and the sources of U.S. foreign policy.
This current book is not two writers' separate essays strung together. It is based on a dialogue between them -- sometimes agreeing, sometimes complementing one another's analysis based on their own perspectives and information, and sometimes disagreeing -- and as such it represents more than the sum of its parts. Through their conversation, a richer understanding emerges from their shared commitments and their varied expertise and experiences.
The book aims to provide an introduction to U.S. policy in the Middle East for the general reader, but it also has much that will be of interest to those with some background on the region. Whether discussing the Israel lobby, the role of Saudi Arabia in U.S. policy, or the different Iraqi political forces, Perilous Power offers many useful insights. And the exchange on short-term solutions for the Palestinian-Israeli conflict should prove particularly provocative.
Perilous Power is a dialogue about U.S. policy in the Middle East between two of the most astute analysts of this part of the world: Noam Chomsky and Gilbert Achcar. Chomsky, of course, needs no introduction to ZNet readers. This is his first totally new book devoted exclusively to the Middle East since The Fateful Triangle. Achcar, whose writings on the Middle East have appeared often on ZNet, grew up and lived for many years in Lebanon. He is the author of, among other books, The Clash of Barbarisms and Eastern Cauldron, and editor of The Israeli Dilemma.
In this new book, Chomsky and Achcar bring to bear a keen understanding of the internal dynamics of the Middle East and of the role of the United States, taking up all the key questions, including such topics as terrorism, fundamentalism, conspiracies, oil, democracy, self determination, anti-Semitism, and anti-Arab racism, as well as the war in Afghanistan, the invasion and occupation of Iraq, the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, and the sources of U.S. foreign policy.
This current book is not two writers' separate essays strung together. It is based on a dialogue between them -- sometimes agreeing, sometimes complementing one another's analysis based on their own perspectives and information, and sometimes disagreeing -- and as such it represents more than the sum of its parts. Through their conversation, a richer understanding emerges from their shared commitments and their varied expertise and experiences.
The book aims to provide an introduction to U.S. policy in the Middle East for the general reader, but it also has much that will be of interest to those with some background on the region. Whether discussing the Israel lobby, the role of Saudi Arabia in U.S. policy, or the different Iraqi political forces, Perilous Power offers many useful insights. And the exchange on short-term solutions for the Palestinian-Israeli conflict should prove particularly provocative.
(2) Can you tell ZNet something about writing the book? Where does the content come from? What went into making the book what it is?
Noam and Gilbert decided from the outset that it would be useful to have a third person present to moderate their face-to-face conversation, and I was invited to serve in this role. This project was to be a two-way conversation, but where a third party would pose the questions, keep the discussion on track, and take care of the technical process of recording, enabling the two discussants to concentrate on their analyses and arguments. As much as possible, I tried to keep out of the conversation, just moving it along as necessary.
The procedure we followed involved several steps. We began by developing a list of questions to be addressed. The three of us got together in Noam's office at MIT in Cambridge, Massachusetts, for three days of conversation in early January 2006. The recordings were transcribed and I prepared a rough edit, eliminating redundancy and tangents, reordering some of the sections, and improving readability. Then Gilbert and Noam each went through and edited their remarks. The goal here was not to produce a faithful verbatim transcript of the conversation. Rather the idea was to allow each of them to clarify or expand on their remarks (though not to change a major argument to which the other had already responded). We took the view that oral comments made without access to sources should not serve as the last word. So we verified facts and checked and filled in quotations as necessary. And, because we believe that readers should not be expected to take what authors say on faith, we felt it important to add in documentation for all non-obvious or controversial claims. In the Summer of 2006, each of the authors wrote an Epilogue in which they commented on more recent developments.
(3) What are your hopes for Perilous Power? What do you hope it will contribute or achieve, politically? Given the effort and aspirations you have for the book, what will you deem to be a success? What would leave you happy about the whole undertaking? What would leave you wond ering if it was worth all the time and effort?
A fundamental change in United States policy toward the Middle East would make us more than happy. But the effort will have been worthwhile if it helps to make the average person in the West and especially the United States more informed about and uncomfortable with current U.S. policies in the Middle East and if it helps critics sharpen their analysis and understanding. Too often critics discuss Iraq as if the categories "collaborator" and "resistance" are sufficient to make sense of what is going on. Or that U.S. policy in the Middle East can be fully explained by reference to the Israel lobby. Or that Islamic fundamentalism must either be accepted as a justification for Washington's imperial foreign policy or dismissed as a figment of the Bush administration's imagination. With a fuller appreciation of the Middle East situation, critics should be better able to oppose U.S. policy and work for a more just and peaceful world.
[You can purchase the book at a 15% individual customer discount at http://www.paradigmpublishers.com/Books/BookDetail.aspx?productID=143446 ]
===
Excerpt:
Other Major Powers and Iraq
Shalom: Back in February 2003, when prowar forces in the United States were pouring out all their French wine and renaming French fries because France wasn't cooperating in the Security Council, a lot of people in the antiwar movement were sort of cheering on France and Germany and Russia, and other governments that opposed the war. How reliable are these governments in their antiwar stances?
Chomsky: Their reliability is approximately zero. Sensible antiwar activists don't ally themselves with governments. There was something important about their position -- namely, there was a reason why they were being so bitterly denounced by U.S. elites: They were meeting minimal conditions of democracy. For whatever reason -- pure cynicism, in fact -- they were acting the way a democratic government is supposed to act. In short, they were responding to the will of the overwhelming majority of their populations. The position of the antiwar movement should have been that it's fine that these governments are paying attention to their populations, whatever their reasons may be, but we certainly don't ally with them, or have any trust in them. What happened here was quite intriguing, but was basically ignored. I can't recall any display of hatred and contempt for democracy as extreme as what took place in those months in the United States, pretty much across the spectrum. There was what Rumsfeld called "Old Europe" and "New Europe." Under his definition, they are distinguished by a very sharp criterion: Old Europe consists of the countries where the governments took the same position as that of a large majority of the population; New Europe -- the "hope for democracy" -- is the governments that disregard an even larger percentage of the population. Some of it was almost comical, like Italian prime minister Silvio Berlusconi being invited to the White House as the representative of the hope for democracy. You don't know whether to laugh or cry. But the worst case was Jos� Mar�a Aznar, the Spanish prime minister. He was so lauded by Bush and by British prime minister Tony Blair as the hope for democracy that he was brought to their summit in the Azores, where they basically declared the war a couple of days before the invasion. Aznar joined in this war declaration right after polls in Spain showed that the war had the support of 2 percent of the population, so therefore he's the great hope for democracy.[1] He was willing to follow orders from Crawford, Texas, with 2 percent of the population supporting him. What does that tell you about the attitudes toward democracy?
Some of it became surreal. When the Turkish government, to everyone's surprise, including mine, went along with the opinion of 95 percent of its population and refused to allow a U.S. offensive through Turkey, the Turkish government was bitterly condemned for lacking democratic credentials -- that was the phrase that was used -- because it went along with the opinion of 95 percent of the public. That great dove, Secretary of State Colin Powell, immediately announced we're going to have to have sanctions against Turkey.[2] Most extreme was former undersecretary of defense Paul Wolfowitz. He is the person identified in the United States and, as far as I know, the European media as the leading force in democracy promotion -- the "idealist in chief," as he was called in the Washington Post.[3] He berated the Turkish military for not intervening to compel the government to overrule 95 percent of the population; he basically ordered them to apologize to the United States, and to say, "Let's figure out how we can be as helpful as possible to the Americans."[4] And this was supposed to be democracy. And this farce went on, without comment. The fact that anyone can talk about democracy promotion, after this display, is astounding.
This is what the antiwar movement should be emphasizing. And if there are a couple of governments that for their own cynical reasons happen to agree with the majority of the population and take the right position, fine, but that's the end of it; there's nothing more to say about them. Tomorrow they'll do the opposite, because they're acting out of pure cynicism -- power interests -- anyway.
Achcar: Noam's quite right to stress the importance of this feature of our times. There's a general trend at the level of the mainstream media to praise those ruling politicians who rule without considering the polls; that is deemed a great virtue. But behind it is the very elitist idea, also embedded in the very concept of "representative democracy," that, once elected, a representative is free to do whatever he or she wants, even against the unanimous will of his or her constituency. But I must also say that in the case of the three governments that we've mentioned -- France, Germany, and Russia -- it was certainly not out of any consideration for democracy that they were against the war. I don't need to elaborate on the Russian government. But even the French and German governments do not hesitate to pursue the most unpopular neoliberal policies and assaults on social gains. On the issue of Iraq, their motivation was definitely not any democratic principle: There were much more down-to-earth considerations at stake.
Iraq is a country where there was a direct clash of interests, in a very primary economic sense, between the United States and Britain, on the one hand, and France and Russia -- one could add China -- on the other hand. The Soviet Union and France were the main partners of Saddam Hussein for many years, providing him with arms. France, especially, was his main military backer in the war against Iran. And despite Russian collusion and French participation in the 1991 war on Iraq, Saddam Hussein tried to play his traditional partnership with France and Russia, during the UN embargo years, as a counterweight to the United States and Britain in the Security Council. French and Russian companies were granted important oil concessions that were conditioned on lifting the embargo. That is why at some point Paris and Moscow changed their attitude, trying to find ways to lift the embargo, and were blocked on that by Washington and London. The United States and British refusal to lift the embargo -- that is, to allow the lifting of the embargo if and when UN inspectors determined that Iraq had disarmed -- was rightly perceived by Paris and Moscow as a refusal to permit them to take advantage of the oil concessions they had been granted. And they very much saw the dedication of Washington and London to invade Iraq as a desire to snatch the prize from them. Actually one of the first proclamations after the invasion was that all contracts granted by Saddam Hussein were to be considered null and void. So that's the main reason why Paris and Moscow opposed that war. Had the Bush administration offered them a substantial slice of the cake, I'm sure they would have joined in. But the Bush administration was so arrogant that it didn't want to grant them much of anything, and that's why they kept opposing the war to the end.
In the German case, there were no direct economic interests at stake. At best, if one were generous with German chancellor Gerhard Schr�der, one could grant him some concern over superior geopolitical considerations -- for example, to say that he had some concerns about the fact that the United States should not have all the levers over Europe -- and one could link that also to the very close relationship he had nurtured with Putin, and the deals being worked out for a new gas pipeline going from Russia to Germany through the Baltic Sea. But that would be a generous assessment of Schr�der's motivation. If one wanted to be less generous, one would just stress that there's a big dose, not of democracy but of opportunist electoralism, behind his stance, because the preparation for the invasion of Iraq happened at a time when the German chancellor was projected as the loser in the forthcoming parliamentary elections, because of his neoliberal social program, which caused the traditional constituency of social democracy to be reluctant to support him; and therefore, the only popular issue he could find was opposition to the war, at a time when, indeed, the polls were showing that the overwhelming majority of German public opinion was opposed to the war.
Rulers like Chirac, Putin, or Schr�der should definitely not be regarded as allies by the antiwar movement, especially since they are themselves hawkish warmongers when their interests are at stake. Russian forces are waging a terrible quasi-genocidal war in Chechnya. The French government still considers itself a colonial power in Africa, and behaves as such. Not to mention the fact that both France and Germany are involved in Afghanistan, along with the U.S. troops. To that we should add that although Paris and Berlin did not support the invasion of Iraq politically, technically speaking they did everything they could to facilitate it: the Germans, of course, by letting the whole U.S. military infrastructure on their territory be used for that purpose,[5] the French by opening their airspace to U.S. warplanes. So we should not be fooled by such governments. The antiwar movement, at least its most dynamic sectors, is closely linked with the global justice movement, and I believe that's a very good combination because these are two facets of the same reality: opposition to imperial wars and to neoliberalism.
Chomsky: I could add an analogous comment about U.S. attitudes. I don't think it's just arrogance; the United States has a real interest in undermining France and Germany, because they are the industrial, commercial, and financial center of Europe. The rest is a kind of periphery. The United States has had a deep concern back through the 1940s that Europe might strike out on an independent path. That's one of the reasons they were so concerned about French president Charles de Gaulle, with his call for a Europe from the Atlantic to the Urals. And the forces that might impel Europe that way today are "Old Europe." That's one of the reasons the United States was so much in favor of expanding the European Union (EU) to include the former Soviet satellites, which it plausibly assumes it can control. And it's one of the reasons also why U.S. policymakers are so supportive of getting Turkey into the EU -- not because they love Turkey, but because that's another way of diluting the influence of the powerful sectors in Europe and ensuring, they hope, that Europe will remain under U.S. control. Whatever position Germany and France had taken on the Iraq war, that would remain constant.
It's also what happened in 1990 when Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev agreed to allow Germany to be unified, which from the Russian point of view was an enormous threat. Unlike the United States, Russia has real security concerns. Germany alone practically destroyed Russia twice in the first half of the twentieth century. For a unified Germany to be incorporated into a Western military alliance was a tremendous threat. So Gorbachev agreed to German unification, but on one condition: that he get a firm pledge from Bush Sr. that NATO would not expand to the east. Within a couple of years, however, Clinton just reneged on the commitment, and expanded NATO to the east, right to the borders of Russia. Russia responded, as you'd expect, by beginning to increase its offensive military capacity. Russia had been pressing very hard for the elimination of nuclear weapons, and it had declared -- as the United States and NATO had not -- that it would not be the first to use nuclear weapons. After Clinton's backing down on the NATO pledge, Russia backed down on its moves and moved toward a more militaristic, offensive posture, extended more under Bush Jr. These are really important developments that are part of the background of the hysteria about Old Europe and New Europe. New Europe is important for the United States as a way of undermining European independence.
Achcar: I quite agree. But we should also stress the fact that in New Europe public opinion was overwhelmingly against the war, even more so than in Old Europe!
Chomsky: The only place prowar sentiment reached 10 percent was Romania.[6]
Achcar: So it was in New Europe that governments most disdained the opinions of their own populations.
Chomsky: But they are obedient to the United States when they dilute European independence.
Shalom: Back in February 2003, when prowar forces in the United States were pouring out all their French wine and renaming French fries because France wasn't cooperating in the Security Council, a lot of people in the antiwar movement were sort of cheering on France and Germany and Russia, and other governments that opposed the war. How reliable are these governments in their antiwar stances?
Chomsky: Their reliability is approximately zero. Sensible antiwar activists don't ally themselves with governments. There was something important about their position -- namely, there was a reason why they were being so bitterly denounced by U.S. elites: They were meeting minimal conditions of democracy. For whatever reason -- pure cynicism, in fact -- they were acting the way a democratic government is supposed to act. In short, they were responding to the will of the overwhelming majority of their populations. The position of the antiwar movement should have been that it's fine that these governments are paying attention to their populations, whatever their reasons may be, but we certainly don't ally with them, or have any trust in them. What happened here was quite intriguing, but was basically ignored. I can't recall any display of hatred and contempt for democracy as extreme as what took place in those months in the United States, pretty much across the spectrum. There was what Rumsfeld called "Old Europe" and "New Europe." Under his definition, they are distinguished by a very sharp criterion: Old Europe consists of the countries where the governments took the same position as that of a large majority of the population; New Europe -- the "hope for democracy" -- is the governments that disregard an even larger percentage of the population. Some of it was almost comical, like Italian prime minister Silvio Berlusconi being invited to the White House as the representative of the hope for democracy. You don't know whether to laugh or cry. But the worst case was Jos� Mar�a Aznar, the Spanish prime minister. He was so lauded by Bush and by British prime minister Tony Blair as the hope for democracy that he was brought to their summit in the Azores, where they basically declared the war a couple of days before the invasion. Aznar joined in this war declaration right after polls in Spain showed that the war had the support of 2 percent of the population, so therefore he's the great hope for democracy.[1] He was willing to follow orders from Crawford, Texas, with 2 percent of the population supporting him. What does that tell you about the attitudes toward democracy?
Some of it became surreal. When the Turkish government, to everyone's surprise, including mine, went along with the opinion of 95 percent of its population and refused to allow a U.S. offensive through Turkey, the Turkish government was bitterly condemned for lacking democratic credentials -- that was the phrase that was used -- because it went along with the opinion of 95 percent of the public. That great dove, Secretary of State Colin Powell, immediately announced we're going to have to have sanctions against Turkey.[2] Most extreme was former undersecretary of defense Paul Wolfowitz. He is the person identified in the United States and, as far as I know, the European media as the leading force in democracy promotion -- the "idealist in chief," as he was called in the Washington Post.[3] He berated the Turkish military for not intervening to compel the government to overrule 95 percent of the population; he basically ordered them to apologize to the United States, and to say, "Let's figure out how we can be as helpful as possible to the Americans."[4] And this was supposed to be democracy. And this farce went on, without comment. The fact that anyone can talk about democracy promotion, after this display, is astounding.
This is what the antiwar movement should be emphasizing. And if there are a couple of governments that for their own cynical reasons happen to agree with the majority of the population and take the right position, fine, but that's the end of it; there's nothing more to say about them. Tomorrow they'll do the opposite, because they're acting out of pure cynicism -- power interests -- anyway.
Achcar: Noam's quite right to stress the importance of this feature of our times. There's a general trend at the level of the mainstream media to praise those ruling politicians who rule without considering the polls; that is deemed a great virtue. But behind it is the very elitist idea, also embedded in the very concept of "representative democracy," that, once elected, a representative is free to do whatever he or she wants, even against the unanimous will of his or her constituency. But I must also say that in the case of the three governments that we've mentioned -- France, Germany, and Russia -- it was certainly not out of any consideration for democracy that they were against the war. I don't need to elaborate on the Russian government. But even the French and German governments do not hesitate to pursue the most unpopular neoliberal policies and assaults on social gains. On the issue of Iraq, their motivation was definitely not any democratic principle: There were much more down-to-earth considerations at stake.
Iraq is a country where there was a direct clash of interests, in a very primary economic sense, between the United States and Britain, on the one hand, and France and Russia -- one could add China -- on the other hand. The Soviet Union and France were the main partners of Saddam Hussein for many years, providing him with arms. France, especially, was his main military backer in the war against Iran. And despite Russian collusion and French participation in the 1991 war on Iraq, Saddam Hussein tried to play his traditional partnership with France and Russia, during the UN embargo years, as a counterweight to the United States and Britain in the Security Council. French and Russian companies were granted important oil concessions that were conditioned on lifting the embargo. That is why at some point Paris and Moscow changed their attitude, trying to find ways to lift the embargo, and were blocked on that by Washington and London. The United States and British refusal to lift the embargo -- that is, to allow the lifting of the embargo if and when UN inspectors determined that Iraq had disarmed -- was rightly perceived by Paris and Moscow as a refusal to permit them to take advantage of the oil concessions they had been granted. And they very much saw the dedication of Washington and London to invade Iraq as a desire to snatch the prize from them. Actually one of the first proclamations after the invasion was that all contracts granted by Saddam Hussein were to be considered null and void. So that's the main reason why Paris and Moscow opposed that war. Had the Bush administration offered them a substantial slice of the cake, I'm sure they would have joined in. But the Bush administration was so arrogant that it didn't want to grant them much of anything, and that's why they kept opposing the war to the end.
In the German case, there were no direct economic interests at stake. At best, if one were generous with German chancellor Gerhard Schr�der, one could grant him some concern over superior geopolitical considerations -- for example, to say that he had some concerns about the fact that the United States should not have all the levers over Europe -- and one could link that also to the very close relationship he had nurtured with Putin, and the deals being worked out for a new gas pipeline going from Russia to Germany through the Baltic Sea. But that would be a generous assessment of Schr�der's motivation. If one wanted to be less generous, one would just stress that there's a big dose, not of democracy but of opportunist electoralism, behind his stance, because the preparation for the invasion of Iraq happened at a time when the German chancellor was projected as the loser in the forthcoming parliamentary elections, because of his neoliberal social program, which caused the traditional constituency of social democracy to be reluctant to support him; and therefore, the only popular issue he could find was opposition to the war, at a time when, indeed, the polls were showing that the overwhelming majority of German public opinion was opposed to the war.
Rulers like Chirac, Putin, or Schr�der should definitely not be regarded as allies by the antiwar movement, especially since they are themselves hawkish warmongers when their interests are at stake. Russian forces are waging a terrible quasi-genocidal war in Chechnya. The French government still considers itself a colonial power in Africa, and behaves as such. Not to mention the fact that both France and Germany are involved in Afghanistan, along with the U.S. troops. To that we should add that although Paris and Berlin did not support the invasion of Iraq politically, technically speaking they did everything they could to facilitate it: the Germans, of course, by letting the whole U.S. military infrastructure on their territory be used for that purpose,[5] the French by opening their airspace to U.S. warplanes. So we should not be fooled by such governments. The antiwar movement, at least its most dynamic sectors, is closely linked with the global justice movement, and I believe that's a very good combination because these are two facets of the same reality: opposition to imperial wars and to neoliberalism.
Chomsky: I could add an analogous comment about U.S. attitudes. I don't think it's just arrogance; the United States has a real interest in undermining France and Germany, because they are the industrial, commercial, and financial center of Europe. The rest is a kind of periphery. The United States has had a deep concern back through the 1940s that Europe might strike out on an independent path. That's one of the reasons they were so concerned about French president Charles de Gaulle, with his call for a Europe from the Atlantic to the Urals. And the forces that might impel Europe that way today are "Old Europe." That's one of the reasons the United States was so much in favor of expanding the European Union (EU) to include the former Soviet satellites, which it plausibly assumes it can control. And it's one of the reasons also why U.S. policymakers are so supportive of getting Turkey into the EU -- not because they love Turkey, but because that's another way of diluting the influence of the powerful sectors in Europe and ensuring, they hope, that Europe will remain under U.S. control. Whatever position Germany and France had taken on the Iraq war, that would remain constant.
It's also what happened in 1990 when Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev agreed to allow Germany to be unified, which from the Russian point of view was an enormous threat. Unlike the United States, Russia has real security concerns. Germany alone practically destroyed Russia twice in the first half of the twentieth century. For a unified Germany to be incorporated into a Western military alliance was a tremendous threat. So Gorbachev agreed to German unification, but on one condition: that he get a firm pledge from Bush Sr. that NATO would not expand to the east. Within a couple of years, however, Clinton just reneged on the commitment, and expanded NATO to the east, right to the borders of Russia. Russia responded, as you'd expect, by beginning to increase its offensive military capacity. Russia had been pressing very hard for the elimination of nuclear weapons, and it had declared -- as the United States and NATO had not -- that it would not be the first to use nuclear weapons. After Clinton's backing down on the NATO pledge, Russia backed down on its moves and moved toward a more militaristic, offensive posture, extended more under Bush Jr. These are really important developments that are part of the background of the hysteria about Old Europe and New Europe. New Europe is important for the United States as a way of undermining European independence.
Achcar: I quite agree. But we should also stress the fact that in New Europe public opinion was overwhelmingly against the war, even more so than in Old Europe!
Chomsky: The only place prowar sentiment reached 10 percent was Romania.[6]
Achcar: So it was in New Europe that governments most disdained the opinions of their own populations.
Chomsky: But they are obedient to the United States when they dilute European independence.
Notes
1. Agence France Presse, "Majority of Spanish Against War on Iraq," February 22, 2003. According to this article, 2.3 percent supported a war waged by the United States and its allies without UN authorization (the actual war that was waged), 11.8 percent opposed war unless there was UN authorization, and 84.7 percent opposed war in all circumstances.
2. Richard Boudreaux and John Hendren, "U.S. Drops Its Bid to Base Troops in Turkey," Los Angeles Times, March 15, 2003, p. A5.
3. David Ignatius, "A War of Choice, and One Who Chose It," Washington Post, November 2, 2003, p. B1.
4. Mark Lacey, "Turkey Rejects Criticism by U.S. Official over Iraq," New York Times, May 8, 2003, p. A15. Wolfowitz said: "Let's have a Turkey that steps up and says: 'We made a mistake. We should have known how bad things were in Iraq, but we know now. Let's figure out how we can be as helpful as possible to the Americans.'" Wolfowitz "singled out the Turkish military for criticism. 'I think for whatever reason, they did not play the strong leadership role that we would have expected.'" For Turkish poll data, see Philip P. Pan, "Turkey Plans for 62,000 U.S. Troops," Washington Post, February 26, 2003, p. A17.
5. This is apart from the allegations that German intelligence helped the American military during its invasion. See, for example, Richard Bernstein, "2 German Roles: Opposing War and Aiding U.S.," New York Times, March 3, 2006, p. A12.
6. See Gallup International, Iraq Poll, conducted 2003, available online at http://www.gallup-international.com/ContentFiles/survey.asp?id=10 .
1. Agence France Presse, "Majority of Spanish Against War on Iraq," February 22, 2003. According to this article, 2.3 percent supported a war waged by the United States and its allies without UN authorization (the actual war that was waged), 11.8 percent opposed war unless there was UN authorization, and 84.7 percent opposed war in all circumstances.
2. Richard Boudreaux and John Hendren, "U.S. Drops Its Bid to Base Troops in Turkey," Los Angeles Times, March 15, 2003, p. A5.
3. David Ignatius, "A War of Choice, and One Who Chose It," Washington Post, November 2, 2003, p. B1.
4. Mark Lacey, "Turkey Rejects Criticism by U.S. Official over Iraq," New York Times, May 8, 2003, p. A15. Wolfowitz said: "Let's have a Turkey that steps up and says: 'We made a mistake. We should have known how bad things were in Iraq, but we know now. Let's figure out how we can be as helpful as possible to the Americans.'" Wolfowitz "singled out the Turkish military for criticism. 'I think for whatever reason, they did not play the strong leadership role that we would have expected.'" For Turkish poll data, see Philip P. Pan, "Turkey Plans for 62,000 U.S. Troops," Washington Post, February 26, 2003, p. A17.
5. This is apart from the allegations that German intelligence helped the American military during its invasion. See, for example, Richard Bernstein, "2 German Roles: Opposing War and Aiding U.S.," New York Times, March 3, 2006, p. A12.
6. See Gallup International, Iraq Poll, conducted 2003, available online at http://www.gallup-international.com/ContentFiles/survey.asp?id=10 .
[Excerpted from Perilous Power: The Middle East and U.S. Foreign Policy, by Noam Chomsky & Gilbert Achcar, edited with a Preface by Stephen R. Shalom, published by Paradigm Publishers, pp. 90-95. To purchase the book at a 15% individual customer discount, go to http://www.paradigmpublishers.com/Books/BookDetail.aspx?productID=143446 .]
FW: 5M incentive offered to African leaders
$5m incentive offered to African leaders
LONDON, Oct. 26 (UPI) -- A British billionaire in London announced Thursday he will award Africa's most progressive leaders with a $5 million reward and a lifelong pension.
Egyptian-born Mo Ibrahim said the performance of Africa's 53 leaders would be reviewed and ranked annually by Harvard University.
The best performing leader who steps down in a democratic process will receive $5 million over 10 years, plus $200,000 a year for life, the BBC reported.
The 60-year-old who sold Cel Tel, his pan-African mobile phone company, to MTC in Kuwait for $3.4 billion last year, told the Financial Times leaders feared losing everything when they leave office.
"That incites corruption -- it incites people to cling to power," he said. "The prize will offer essentially good people, who may be wavering, the chance to opt for the good life after office."
The ranking criteria include security, health, education and economic development to their constituents, the BBC said.
Copyright Political Gateway 2006©
Copyright United Press International 2006
The Good News Behind the Bad for Middle Eastern Women: An Interview with Nikki Keddie
The Good News Behind the Bad for Middle Eastern Women
http://www.truthdig.com/interview/item/20061202_the_good_news_behind_the_bad_for_middle_eastern_women/
Posted on Nov 30, 2006
By Joshua Scheer
Nikki Keddie, one of the nation's leading Middle East scholars, argues that despite Western stereotypes, women in many Middle Eastern countries are making great strides in terms of civil liberties and legal rights. But America's disastrous occupations of Iraq and Afghanistan threaten to undo much of the progress.
Editor's note: The following is a lightly edited transcript of a conversation between Truthdig contributing editor Joshua Scheer and Nikki Keddie, professor emerita of Middle Eastern and Iranian history at the University of California, Los Angeles, whose most recent book is "Women in the Middle East: Past and Present," a comprehensive history of women and their role in the Middle East (Princeton University Press, 2006).
TRUTHDIG: What was women's role in shaping the Middle East, historically, and how have they been treated, historically, in the Middle East?
KEDDIE: Women were evidently quite important in the very early days of Islam. The Koran is addressed equally to men and women, and most of its suras, which are the revelations to the Prophet Muhammad, treat them with the same respect and the same general way ... as men. And there are laws in the Koran regarding women—not all of which are egalitarian, but they were similar to what existed in many other societies at the time—allowing polygamy, and saying that husbands were to be obeyed, and things of that sort.
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Related Links
· Read the book's introduction or read the entire first chapter (.pdf file)
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On the other hand we know that women were very active in some of the early battles and the councils of Muhammad.... However, in the first couple of centuries there was a lowering of the position of women, which was partly reflecting the society around them. The idea of stoning to death for adultery, for example, clearly came in through Jewish [law], even though it was very seldom enforced, either in Jewish law or in Muslim law.
TRUTHDIG: All that many people see [about women's current status in the Middle East] is what the media portrays, and I think it's pretty simplistic. It seems that women there have no rights, that they don't have a role—except to be covered up. Do you think the media does a poor job here?
KEDDIE: Yes, I do think they do a poor job. Now there are some people of course who want to point out repression of women everywhere, and in all societies there remain inequalities, but there have been great advances in the last couple of centuries for women in the Middle East. For example, women in every Middle Eastern country—and technically there are about 22 of them, if you count the small Gulf states— now vote. There are women [governmental] ministers in several Muslim countries and Middle Eastern countries. And if you're talking about the Islamic world in general, it's striking that Pakistan, Bangladesh and Turkey ... have all had women prime ministers, which is quite striking, certainly as compared to the United States. There are also laws in most of these Middle Eastern countries that provide for equal pay for equal work, for certain kinds of maternity leave, for child care, pay and no discrimination for part-time work. These are things that women have fought for in Middle Eastern countries, and [that] some of the liberal men or more modernizing men have also fought for. They are advancing in education; ... in the country of Iran, where they're really advancing between the adult education and the regular education program, they're getting very close to universal literacy. Family planning is present in most Middle Eastern countries. In Iran the birthrate has fallen with a fantastic voluntary birth control program—has fallen from a very high level previously to replacement levels, and the government has gotten the clergy behind this program, which is one reason for its success. So there are many aspects about women in the Middle East that we don't hear about very much; we tend to hear just about the negatives.
TRUTHDIG: Why do you think that is? Do you think [the media] lumps all these countries together, and assumes that if it's a Middle Eastern country that it has to be like the Taliban?
KEDDIE: I think that's part of it. They take the dramatic cases, like Saudi Arabia and the Taliban, and generalize to all of the Middle East. It's also unfortunately true that mistreatment of women has been used as an excuse, as it was in Afghanistan, ... for U.S. intervention. And this in Iraq has resulted in women's positions being much worse than [they were] before, under Saddam Hussein. And in Afghanistan, it's better in some ways, but it looks in danger of going back to many of the pre-invasion practices, with the rise of the Taliban again. So intervention certainly doesn't help.
I think one point that should be made is that the various secularist nationalist governments, partly for their own reasons, generally have been behind more egalitarian reforms for women in their record for the past half-century. And that's true in Syria, in Iraq, in Egypt, in Iran [earlier], certainly in Turkey under Ataturk and since Ataturk. And we don't hear much about the positives about the secularist, nationalist governments, because in the cases of Syria and Iraq they were regarded as our enemies, so we wanted to make them sound as bad as possible.
TRUTHDIG: Anecdotally, I've heard from people from Syria or Lebanon that the new prime minister is very friendly toward women, increasing their role in society. It's interesting that we go to war with these countries, and they are secular nationalists, and then we get involved with people who may be worse towards women.
The United Nations has rated Afghanistan [with the resurgence of the Taliban] as one of the worst places for women to live. How bad do you think it's going to be in Iraq and Afghanistan now that we've knocked out whatever government they had?
KEDDIE: Well, in Iraq of course it's terrible for everyone. But the worsening position for women—and many of these things are discussed in the book—already began with the sanctions for 10 years, in which all sorts of services which had been supplied by the government were cut back. Whether it was education or health or child care—if the family could only afford to educate one or some of its children, it would tend to go for the boys rather than the girls. So we have this beginning already. Also, Saddam Hussein cut back under this pressure on his secularism and began to favor former opponents like tribal and religious forces. That already began under the sanctions program. In addition, you have what happened since the war, in which one way to dishonor a family—and of course many Americans have done a lot of the dishonoring by coming into homes and private spaces and dealing with men and women badly—but one way to dishonor them would be to kidnap, rape them [the women]; things of that sort would dishonor the whole family. And so there's far more of that going on; so girls often don't dare even go out to school. That's partly true in Afghanistan, too.
TRUTHDIG: Do you think there's any hope for these countries? Is there a government you can see that you think can help them? Or is it going to be bad for some time?
KEDDIE: Well, it'll be bad for some time, but there's hope in the distant future. Obviously the kinds of policies that the U.S. has been following have been harmful to women, perhaps even [more] than men, although they've been very harmful to men, too.
TRUTHDIG: Thanks so much.
From UCLA
UCLA professor emerita Nikki Keddie
| A Progressive Journal of News and Opinion. Editor, Robert Scheer. Publisher, Zuade Kaufman. Web site development by Hop Studios | Hosted by NEXCESS.NET |
THE FRIDAY MAGAZINE (OH, THE MIND GAMES THEY PLAY!)
===========================================================================
1. OH, THE MIND GAMES THEY PLAY!
[By Wahida Valiante -- Special to the Friday Magazine]
===========================================================================
Remember what George Bush said in 2002, just prior to destroying Iraq? His
words were: "Success in Iraq could also begin a new stage for Middle
Eastern peace, and set in motion progress towards a truly democratic
Palestinian state. And the United States and other nations are working on a
road map for peace. We are setting out the necessary conditions for
progress toward the goal of two states, Israel and Palestine, living side
by side in peace and security. It is the commitment of our government --
and my personal commitment -- to implement the road map and to reach that
goal."
Mr. Bush proposed two states living side by side in peace. This was during
the intense bombing of Afghanistan that triggered so much anguish in the
Muslim world; it was also during the planning of America's illegal war
against Iraq, which inevitably would generate more anger against the West.
And then there was the dispatch of 20,000 Israeli troops into the Occupied
Territories to search villages, refugee camps and cities in the West Bank
and Gaza, resulting in much bloodshed.
If there was ever a better time to propose Palestinian statehood, it was
then. But Bush's rhetoric was no more than an exercise in mind games with
two objectives: first, to playact for the Palestinian and Muslim masses
while America illegally bombed Iraq; second, to provide a fig leaf covering
the impotence of neighboring Arab rulers, as well as the criminal, racist
and inhumane indifference of the international community toward the intense
sufferings of the Palestinian people.
So on June 24, 2002 President George Bush strode into the White House Rose
Garden and declared that the U.S. will "support the creation of a
provisional state of Palestine" if Palestinians "embrace democracy,
confront corruption and firmly reject terror." For their part, the
Palestinians embraced democracy and elected a truly democratic Hamas
government; but instead of gaining freedom, liberty and democracy, they are
being starved by the international community.
Now it is 2006 -- a full four years later -- and nothing has changed. In
fact, things are even worse for Palestinians. On Feb.18 2005, shortly after
the Sharm al-Sheikh summit between Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon and
Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas, Barbara Plett of the BBC wrote in her
summit analysis that "according to the Israeli human rights group B'tselem,
some 80% of the 4,100 Palestinian homes demolished during the past four
years have been destroyed in Israeli operations to create buffer zones
around army posts, roads and Jewish settlements in the Occupied
Territories."
Israel is obsessed with eliminating legitimate Palestinian leaders and has
unilaterally forged ahead with illegal settlement building on the West
Bank. They are confronted daily by state-sanctioned terrorism; the threat
of the Israeli army has not diminished one iota. In three- and- a-half
years, the "road map to peace" has led nowhere. Despite Israel's pullout
from Gaza, the territory's 1.4 million Palestinians remain hemmed inside a
prison by an Israeli blockade backed by tanks and warplanes. International
sanctions have inflicted further hardship on government employees whose
wages have been unpaid for months. Oh yes, let us not forget the road map
to nowhere!
In his Guardian article of Feb. 22, 2003 Chris McGreal wrote: "Israel is
demanding more than 100 changes to the United States 'road map' towards the
establishment of a Palestinian state, deepening the fears of skeptics on
both sides who say Ariel Sharon is not serious about peace. The revelation
of the demands in the Israeli newspaper Ha'aretz, came as a senior U.S.
state department official, William Burns, met Palestinian leaders in London
to tell them there was no prospect of the Palestinian peace process moving
forward until after any conflict in Iraq [is resolved]."
The truth is that Bush's two-state declaration prior to his Iraq attack had
no significance. It was just a mind game.
Ironically, the international "shock and awe" aroused by the Lebanon and
Iraq wars, have sparked new pressure on both the U.S. and the apartheid
state of Israel to renew serious efforts toward Middle East peace.
Interestingly, while Dick Cheney and George Bush spent their recent good
will tour meeting with long term supporters of America's Middle East
policy, Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert was reaching out to
Palestinians.
On Nov. 27, 2006 Amy Teibel of Associated Press wrote that Olmert, in one
of his most conciliatory speeches yet, said "...'he was prepared to grant
them [Palestinians] a state, release desperately needed funds and free
prisoners if they choose the path of peace.' Olmert appealed to the
Palestinians to form a new, moderate Cabinet ... Once such a government was
established, Olmert said, he would call for an immediate meeting with the
moderate Palestinian president, Mahmoud Abbas, 'to have a real, open,
honest, serious dialogue between us'."
Then there is Britain's PM Tony Blair, who has pledged to make reviving the
peace process a personal priority during his remaining months in office. He
was singing the same tune before attacking Iraq for its so-called "weapons
of mass destruction" -- or perhaps it was to effect regime change; or
maybe, to make Israel safe; or perhaps for oil. Or, it could have been to
support a Palestinian State. It is so difficult to know the truth with
these politicians!
Oh yes -- let us not forget that since the end of Israeli-Hezbollah
fighting in Lebanon on Aug. 14, the leaders of Egypt, Jordan, Saudi Arabia
and Syria have been saying that in order to prevent further conflicts, the
time for a new push in the peace process is now.
On Sept. 22, 2006 an Associated Press report said that "Arab countries have
reached a 'very significant' consensus after the recent war in Lebanon that
there must be a new start with fresh ideas to the Middle East peace
process, Saudi Arabia's foreign minister said Thursday." The report added
further that "Washington is increasingly adopting the view that peace
between Palestinians and Israelis will help its other interests in the
region, including fighting terrorism." This astounding revelation seems to
have come quite a bit too late!
The stark reality is that the Palestinians -- abandoned by the Arab-
Islamic world and the international community alike -- have been putting up
a brave fight against overwhelming odds. Given the long- accustomed
passivity of the Muslim countries, Israel has no reason to engage in a
meaningful peace dialogue with the Palestinian Authority. The only
realistic possibility of this happening lies in persuading the U.S. and
E.U. to pressure Israel into starting talks with the democratically elected
Hamas government, led by Prime Minister Ismail Haniye. As long as the
Western "axis of evil" on Middle East affairs - the Jewish Lobby, the Neo-
cons and the conservative Christian right (especially the "end times"
people) -- rule U.S. foreign policy, the only thing Arabs can talk about is
a "strong consensus."
There is something breathtakingly arrogant about Israel (with the continual
help of the pro-Zionist media) wanting so single-mindedly to lay waste to
Gaza, destroy its infrastructure, and kill and maim hundreds of innocent
civilians with its bombs, bullets, tanks, and lie-filled propaganda. In
another seven months, the occupation will be 40 years old. Israel today is
the only so called democratic country in the world that continues to rule
over the land of another people. Enough is enough. Let's make Bush and
Olmert keep their word. Palestinians need to know one thing and one thing
only -- when the Jewish State is ending its illegal occupation of their
lands.
(Wahida Valiante is a longtime professional social worker, family therapist
and author. She is also a cyber-counselor with Islamonline and national
vice-president of the Canadian Islamic Congress. She can be reached at
nvp@canadianislamiccongress.com)
===========================================================================
5. SAIDA OUMALKHAIRY: EDUCATOR & LITERACY ADVOCATE IN NIGER
[Special to the Friday Magazine]
===========================================================================
Since her arrival in Kiota, Saida Oumalkhairy's primary concern was always
to share her knowledge with other women. She began by opening a Qur'anic
school in Kiota which welcomed more than 600 girls and young women. As this
school succeeded well, she decided to modernize it and also to establish a
cluster of French-Arabic schools.
1. Sheikh al Islam French-Arabic Complex at Kiota:
The first was The Sheikh al Islam French-Arabic Complex at Kiota, which
began with the opening of a kindergarten in 1993 through an order of the
Ministry of Education; it accommodated 150 students aged 4 to 6.
In October 1994, the Sheikh al Islam Primary School program was recognized
by the Ministry of Education; it began with 110 students. Of the first
class of 20 who wrote their primary school leaving exams, 11 of them (or
55%) passed and received their certificates. As the years went on, the
success rate kept increasing, until by 2004 the number of passing students
had reached nearly 98%.
Because of the students' consistent successes, in 2002 permission was
granted to open a semi-private French-Arabic Junior High School, which
started with Grade 6 and 7 classes. By 2004, 19 students tried the BEPC
(Niger's junior High School leaving certificate) exams and 10 of them
passed.
Today, what is now known as the Rawdat Sheikh Al Islam cluster of schools
comprises four sections: a kindergarten with 42 children; a primary school
with 326 children; a semi-boarding school with 106 students; and a junior
high school with 199 students.
2. Rawdat Sheikh Al Islam of Niamey - Literacy Programs:
This is another branch of the Kiota complex, which opened in October 2001.
It is located on a plot of land granted by the Government of Niger in the
Banifandou II neighbourhood.
Although the local children benefited greatly from the educational
opportunities provided by the Sheikh Al Islam schools, founder Saida
Oumalkhairy did not leave out their mothers. In cooperation with UNICEF,
she opened three women's literacy centers, where women could take courses
in the Hausa, Zarma, and French languages. To supplement this literacy
campaign, she also helped establish women's Qur'anic schools to serve the
surrounding villages of Kiota.
3. Women's Groups in Niger:
i) The Jamiyat Nassirat Dine: In 1993 Saida Oumalkhairy brought together a
number of Islamic women to form the Jamiyat Nassirat Dine. This association
was officially recognized by the Niger government in October, 1994. Today,
the Jamiyat Nassirat Dine has representatives throughout Niger, with a
total membership of more than one million women. Some of the association's
main objectives include: propagation of religious precepts; liberation of
Muslim women through their religion; and preserving family unity.
ii) Several other women's groups, all established through the efforts of
Saida Oumalkhairy, also flourish in Niger, including: Margoun Ka Zaama in
Kiota; Bourkintary, a women's savings and micro-credit mutual benefit
society; and an artisan workshop where women can learn sewing, fine leather
crafts, weaving, basketry, etc.
4. Profile-Building and Means of Action:
Through Saida Oumalkhairy's efforts a number of high-profile national and
international personalities have visited Kiota, including: the UNICEF
representative in Niger; the wives of several Presidents of the Republic of
Niger; Niger's Minister of Social Development; Prince Albert of Monaco; and
the U.S. Ambassador to Niger.
For more than a decade, the greater part of all Mrs. Oumalkhairy's
achievements were funded from her own personal resources -- everything from
classroom supplies, to paying the salaries of school staff, and the ongoing
maintenance of school buildings. However, after visiting Kiota and noticing
the many benefits of the local school system, a number of generous donors
emerged to support and encourage her work.
Among the chief supporters in recent years have been: UNICEF, which
provided tables, benches, mattresses, and the salaries of literacy
trainers; the Saudi Ikhra Project; Monaco Aid, which equipped the Kiota
schools with additional classrooms, dormitories, dinning halls, and
washrooms; the governments of Libya, Egypt and Niger, which together helped
by providing nine more trained school teachers.
These and other donors recognized that the contributions and efforts of
Saida Oumalkhairy have been numerous, but her means are limited. Today, all
the schools and programs founded by this remarkable woman still rely on the
generosity of volunteers of good will.
(This report was edited, abridged and paraphrased for the Friday Magazine.)
===========================================================================
6. HISTORY COULD AFFIRM THAT SOLDIERS DIED IN VAIN IN IRAQ
[By Timothy Garton Ash -- The Guardian -- October 26, 2006]
===========================================================================
'They died in vain." Four words that are unbearable for the mother of a
dead soldier and shaming for the politicians who sent them to their deaths.
So our leaders say "they did not die in vain." But who now believes them?
Contemplating the scale of the American-British failure in Iraq, I have
been struggling to see if there are any future circumstances, any lines of
long-term strategic action, which would one day enable us honestly and
credibly to say to the mother of a soldier who died in Iraq: "Your son did
not die in vain." At the moment, that seems nearly impossible.
Yes, our troops removed a very nasty tyranny, to widespread initial
rejoicing among the people of Iraq. For some Iraqis -- especially Kurds and
Shia -- some things about their lives have improved. People who were in
prison or in exile are now at home. Millions of Iraqis turned out to vote
for political parties of their choice, despite intimidation. They have
incomparably more free media than before and less reason to fear repression
from the central state. A few have prospered. In places, the occupying
powers have done major reconstruction work. But that's about all one can
say on the plus side; the minus list is so much longer.
As Patrick Cockburn, a writer with rare in-depth knowledge of Iraq,
chronicles in his new book The Occupation, the dimensions of our failure
over more than 40 months of occupation are breathtaking. It starts with the
most basic services. Despite the expenditure of hundreds of billions of
dollars, U.S. government witnesses told the Senate foreign relations
committee earlier this year that the performance of the Iraqi electricity,
water, sewage and oil sectors is still below pre-invasion levels. The
economy is worse in many respects than it was before. Instead of going in
fear of Saddam's secret police and torturers, people go in fear of gangs,
militias, criminals and fanatics.
To exchange tyranny for anarchy is merely to move from one circle of hell
to another. As one Iraqi recently commented: "under Saddam we had a state,
a bad state, but to have no state is even worse." Even if the Johns Hopkins
University estimate of some 600,000 Iraqi civilian deaths since the
invasion is inaccurate, the number of Iraqi civilian deaths is still
horrendous. The country is already in civil war. As foreign troops leave,
that's almost certain to get worse. And that's only the story inside Iraq.
In the world at large, the balance-sheet is even worse. An intervention
that was intended to make the world safer for democracy has made the world
more dangerous for all democracies. The United States' own recently
released National Intelligence Estimate confirmed that Iraq has become a
"cause celebre" for terrorists. It has infuriated Muslims in our own
countries, including the London bombers of July 7. By distracting forces
and attention from our original, legitimate mission to extirpate al-Qaeda's
bases in Afghanistan, it has allowed the Taliban to regroup and come back
in force there. It has turned a militant, Islamist Iran into a regional
influence, increasing the likelihood that it will try to develop nuclear
weapons. It has made the United States more unpopular around the world than
at any time since reliable polling began and dramatically decreased the
United States' capacity to get its way. North Korea, for example, cocks a
nuclear snook at Washington. So much for "the world's only hyperpower."
Oh yes, and there's the cost. Nobel prize-winning economist Joseph Stiglitz
has estimated that the total eventual costs of the Iraq war, "including the
budgetary, social and macroeconomic costs, are likely to exceed $2
trillion" -- that's 2, followed by 12 zeroes!! -- or $2,000 a head for each
of the world's poorest billion people, who live (and die) on less than $1 a
day.
It's not too soon to suggest that the American-British invasion and
occupation of Iraq has proved to be the greatest strategic blunder of our
time. So what can we honestly say to that grieving mother or father? "Your
son (or daughter) died in vain?" Brooding on this, my thoughts have strayed
to the Hungarian revolution of 1956.
Both stories started with joyous crowds celebrating round the toppled
statue of a tyrant (Stalin in Budapest, Saddam in Baghdad). In both places,
celebration turned within weeks to bloodshed and misery. Virtually all
Hungarians would have acknowledged three years later that the revolution
ended in defeat. Many said it had ended in disaster and subsequently
embraced the course of pragmatic "realism" steered by Janos Kadar, who
authorized the execution of the revolution's leader, Imre Nagy.
Of course the cases of Hungary and Iraq are quite different. Unlike British
and American soldiers in Iraq, the Hungarians were fighting directly for
the freedom of their own country. But the point of comparison is simply
that our judgment of such dramatic events will change over decades,
depending on their long-term consequences and also on our own policies.
Given a fortunate turn of history -- if democracies can learn from their
mistakes -- even a defeat can be a milestone on the path to victory.
Fifty years on, after what is -- let's call a spade a spade -- a major
defeat in Iraq, can we again learn from our mistakes? Can we accept that
this "war" against terrorism, like the Cold War, will never be won by
military means? Do we have the confidence to engage diplomatically with
everyone in the region, including Iran and Syria? Can we work with Arab and
Iranian dissidents and intellectuals to craft policies of "offensive
detente" toward both the states and societies of the Muslim world and
sustain those policies over a generation? Or will the United States simply
cut and run, retreating into its own vast carelessness? If the former, we
may yet in decades to come have some honest words of comfort for the still-
grieving soldier's mother. If the latter, there will be no honest
consolation.
(For more information, see the author's website at:
www.timothygartonash.com This article was edited and abridged for the
Friday Magazine.)
===========================================================================
7. BOOK REVIEW: AMERICA'S "WAR ON TERRORISM" by Michel Chossudovsky
[Global Research -- 2005]
===========================================================================
AMERICA'S "WAR ON TERRORISM" by Michel Chossudovsky
ISBN 0-9737147-1-9 (2005) 387 pages.
(This book is now available in PDF format for U.S. $8.25)
In this new and expanded edition of Michel Chossudovsky's 2002 best seller,
the author blows away the smokescreen put up by the mainstream media, that
9/11 was an attack on America by "Islamic terrorists."
Through meticulous research, the author uncovers a military- intelligence
ploy behind the September 11/01 attacks, and the cover-up and complicity of
key members of the Bush Administration. The expanded edition, which
includes 12 new chapters, focuses on the use of 9/11 as a pretext for the
invasion and illegal occupation of Iraq, the militarization of justice and
law enforcement and the repeal of democracy.
According to Chossudovsky, the "war on terrorism" is a complete fabrication
based on the illusion that one man, Osama bin Laden, outwitted the $40
billion-a-year American intelligence apparatus. The "war on terrorism" is a
war of conquest. Globalization is the final march to the New World Order,
dominated by Wall Street and the U.S. military-industrial complex.
September 11, 2001 provides a justification for waging a war without
borders. Washington's agenda consists in extending the frontiers of the
American Empire to facilitate complete U.S. corporate control, while
installing within America the institutions of the Homeland Security State.
Chossudovsky peels back layers of rhetoric to reveal a complex web of
deceit aimed at luring the American people and the rest of the world into
accepting a military solution which threatens the future of humanity. The
last chapter includes an analysis of the London 7/7 Bomb Attacks.
An excerpt reads: "Millions of people have been misled regarding the causes
and consequences of September 11. When people across the U.S. and around
the world find out that Al-Qaeda is not an outside enemy, but a creation of
U.S. foreign policy and the CIA, the legitimacy of the bipartisan war
agenda will tumble like a deck of cards."
Across the land, the image of an "outside enemy" is instilled into the
consciousness of Americans. Al-Qaeda is threatening America and the world.
The repeal of democracy under the Patriot legislation is portrayed as a
means to providing "domestic security" and upholding civil liberties.
The 9/11 Commission Report destroys the historical record of U.S. covert
support to international terrorism, while creating the illusion that
America and "Western Civilization" are threatened. In turn, the various
terrorist warnings and code orange alerts have created across America an
atmosphere of fear and intimidation.
1. OH, THE MIND GAMES THEY PLAY!
[By Wahida Valiante -- Special to the Friday Magazine]
===========================================================================
Remember what George Bush said in 2002, just prior to destroying Iraq? His
words were: "Success in Iraq could also begin a new stage for Middle
Eastern peace, and set in motion progress towards a truly democratic
Palestinian state. And the United States and other nations are working on a
road map for peace. We are setting out the necessary conditions for
progress toward the goal of two states, Israel and Palestine, living side
by side in peace and security. It is the commitment of our government --
and my personal commitment -- to implement the road map and to reach that
goal."
Mr. Bush proposed two states living side by side in peace. This was during
the intense bombing of Afghanistan that triggered so much anguish in the
Muslim world; it was also during the planning of America's illegal war
against Iraq, which inevitably would generate more anger against the West.
And then there was the dispatch of 20,000 Israeli troops into the Occupied
Territories to search villages, refugee camps and cities in the West Bank
and Gaza, resulting in much bloodshed.
If there was ever a better time to propose Palestinian statehood, it was
then. But Bush's rhetoric was no more than an exercise in mind games with
two objectives: first, to playact for the Palestinian and Muslim masses
while America illegally bombed Iraq; second, to provide a fig leaf covering
the impotence of neighboring Arab rulers, as well as the criminal, racist
and inhumane indifference of the international community toward the intense
sufferings of the Palestinian people.
So on June 24, 2002 President George Bush strode into the White House Rose
Garden and declared that the U.S. will "support the creation of a
provisional state of Palestine" if Palestinians "embrace democracy,
confront corruption and firmly reject terror." For their part, the
Palestinians embraced democracy and elected a truly democratic Hamas
government; but instead of gaining freedom, liberty and democracy, they are
being starved by the international community.
Now it is 2006 -- a full four years later -- and nothing has changed. In
fact, things are even worse for Palestinians. On Feb.18 2005, shortly after
the Sharm al-Sheikh summit between Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon and
Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas, Barbara Plett of the BBC wrote in her
summit analysis that "according to the Israeli human rights group B'tselem,
some 80% of the 4,100 Palestinian homes demolished during the past four
years have been destroyed in Israeli operations to create buffer zones
around army posts, roads and Jewish settlements in the Occupied
Territories."
Israel is obsessed with eliminating legitimate Palestinian leaders and has
unilaterally forged ahead with illegal settlement building on the West
Bank. They are confronted daily by state-sanctioned terrorism; the threat
of the Israeli army has not diminished one iota. In three- and- a-half
years, the "road map to peace" has led nowhere. Despite Israel's pullout
from Gaza, the territory's 1.4 million Palestinians remain hemmed inside a
prison by an Israeli blockade backed by tanks and warplanes. International
sanctions have inflicted further hardship on government employees whose
wages have been unpaid for months. Oh yes, let us not forget the road map
to nowhere!
In his Guardian article of Feb. 22, 2003 Chris McGreal wrote: "Israel is
demanding more than 100 changes to the United States 'road map' towards the
establishment of a Palestinian state, deepening the fears of skeptics on
both sides who say Ariel Sharon is not serious about peace. The revelation
of the demands in the Israeli newspaper Ha'aretz, came as a senior U.S.
state department official, William Burns, met Palestinian leaders in London
to tell them there was no prospect of the Palestinian peace process moving
forward until after any conflict in Iraq [is resolved]."
The truth is that Bush's two-state declaration prior to his Iraq attack had
no significance. It was just a mind game.
Ironically, the international "shock and awe" aroused by the Lebanon and
Iraq wars, have sparked new pressure on both the U.S. and the apartheid
state of Israel to renew serious efforts toward Middle East peace.
Interestingly, while Dick Cheney and George Bush spent their recent good
will tour meeting with long term supporters of America's Middle East
policy, Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert was reaching out to
Palestinians.
On Nov. 27, 2006 Amy Teibel of Associated Press wrote that Olmert, in one
of his most conciliatory speeches yet, said "...'he was prepared to grant
them [Palestinians] a state, release desperately needed funds and free
prisoners if they choose the path of peace.' Olmert appealed to the
Palestinians to form a new, moderate Cabinet ... Once such a government was
established, Olmert said, he would call for an immediate meeting with the
moderate Palestinian president, Mahmoud Abbas, 'to have a real, open,
honest, serious dialogue between us'."
Then there is Britain's PM Tony Blair, who has pledged to make reviving the
peace process a personal priority during his remaining months in office. He
was singing the same tune before attacking Iraq for its so-called "weapons
of mass destruction" -- or perhaps it was to effect regime change; or
maybe, to make Israel safe; or perhaps for oil. Or, it could have been to
support a Palestinian State. It is so difficult to know the truth with
these politicians!
Oh yes -- let us not forget that since the end of Israeli-Hezbollah
fighting in Lebanon on Aug. 14, the leaders of Egypt, Jordan, Saudi Arabia
and Syria have been saying that in order to prevent further conflicts, the
time for a new push in the peace process is now.
On Sept. 22, 2006 an Associated Press report said that "Arab countries have
reached a 'very significant' consensus after the recent war in Lebanon that
there must be a new start with fresh ideas to the Middle East peace
process, Saudi Arabia's foreign minister said Thursday." The report added
further that "Washington is increasingly adopting the view that peace
between Palestinians and Israelis will help its other interests in the
region, including fighting terrorism." This astounding revelation seems to
have come quite a bit too late!
The stark reality is that the Palestinians -- abandoned by the Arab-
Islamic world and the international community alike -- have been putting up
a brave fight against overwhelming odds. Given the long- accustomed
passivity of the Muslim countries, Israel has no reason to engage in a
meaningful peace dialogue with the Palestinian Authority. The only
realistic possibility of this happening lies in persuading the U.S. and
E.U. to pressure Israel into starting talks with the democratically elected
Hamas government, led by Prime Minister Ismail Haniye. As long as the
Western "axis of evil" on Middle East affairs - the Jewish Lobby, the Neo-
cons and the conservative Christian right (especially the "end times"
people) -- rule U.S. foreign policy, the only thing Arabs can talk about is
a "strong consensus."
There is something breathtakingly arrogant about Israel (with the continual
help of the pro-Zionist media) wanting so single-mindedly to lay waste to
Gaza, destroy its infrastructure, and kill and maim hundreds of innocent
civilians with its bombs, bullets, tanks, and lie-filled propaganda. In
another seven months, the occupation will be 40 years old. Israel today is
the only so called democratic country in the world that continues to rule
over the land of another people. Enough is enough. Let's make Bush and
Olmert keep their word. Palestinians need to know one thing and one thing
only -- when the Jewish State is ending its illegal occupation of their
lands.
(Wahida Valiante is a longtime professional social worker, family therapist
and author. She is also a cyber-counselor with Islamonline and national
vice-president of the Canadian Islamic Congress. She can be reached at
nvp@canadianislamiccongress.com)
===========================================================================
5. SAIDA OUMALKHAIRY: EDUCATOR & LITERACY ADVOCATE IN NIGER
[Special to the Friday Magazine]
===========================================================================
Since her arrival in Kiota, Saida Oumalkhairy's primary concern was always
to share her knowledge with other women. She began by opening a Qur'anic
school in Kiota which welcomed more than 600 girls and young women. As this
school succeeded well, she decided to modernize it and also to establish a
cluster of French-Arabic schools.
1. Sheikh al Islam French-Arabic Complex at Kiota:
The first was The Sheikh al Islam French-Arabic Complex at Kiota, which
began with the opening of a kindergarten in 1993 through an order of the
Ministry of Education; it accommodated 150 students aged 4 to 6.
In October 1994, the Sheikh al Islam Primary School program was recognized
by the Ministry of Education; it began with 110 students. Of the first
class of 20 who wrote their primary school leaving exams, 11 of them (or
55%) passed and received their certificates. As the years went on, the
success rate kept increasing, until by 2004 the number of passing students
had reached nearly 98%.
Because of the students' consistent successes, in 2002 permission was
granted to open a semi-private French-Arabic Junior High School, which
started with Grade 6 and 7 classes. By 2004, 19 students tried the BEPC
(Niger's junior High School leaving certificate) exams and 10 of them
passed.
Today, what is now known as the Rawdat Sheikh Al Islam cluster of schools
comprises four sections: a kindergarten with 42 children; a primary school
with 326 children; a semi-boarding school with 106 students; and a junior
high school with 199 students.
2. Rawdat Sheikh Al Islam of Niamey - Literacy Programs:
This is another branch of the Kiota complex, which opened in October 2001.
It is located on a plot of land granted by the Government of Niger in the
Banifandou II neighbourhood.
Although the local children benefited greatly from the educational
opportunities provided by the Sheikh Al Islam schools, founder Saida
Oumalkhairy did not leave out their mothers. In cooperation with UNICEF,
she opened three women's literacy centers, where women could take courses
in the Hausa, Zarma, and French languages. To supplement this literacy
campaign, she also helped establish women's Qur'anic schools to serve the
surrounding villages of Kiota.
3. Women's Groups in Niger:
i) The Jamiyat Nassirat Dine: In 1993 Saida Oumalkhairy brought together a
number of Islamic women to form the Jamiyat Nassirat Dine. This association
was officially recognized by the Niger government in October, 1994. Today,
the Jamiyat Nassirat Dine has representatives throughout Niger, with a
total membership of more than one million women. Some of the association's
main objectives include: propagation of religious precepts; liberation of
Muslim women through their religion; and preserving family unity.
ii) Several other women's groups, all established through the efforts of
Saida Oumalkhairy, also flourish in Niger, including: Margoun Ka Zaama in
Kiota; Bourkintary, a women's savings and micro-credit mutual benefit
society; and an artisan workshop where women can learn sewing, fine leather
crafts, weaving, basketry, etc.
4. Profile-Building and Means of Action:
Through Saida Oumalkhairy's efforts a number of high-profile national and
international personalities have visited Kiota, including: the UNICEF
representative in Niger; the wives of several Presidents of the Republic of
Niger; Niger's Minister of Social Development; Prince Albert of Monaco; and
the U.S. Ambassador to Niger.
For more than a decade, the greater part of all Mrs. Oumalkhairy's
achievements were funded from her own personal resources -- everything from
classroom supplies, to paying the salaries of school staff, and the ongoing
maintenance of school buildings. However, after visiting Kiota and noticing
the many benefits of the local school system, a number of generous donors
emerged to support and encourage her work.
Among the chief supporters in recent years have been: UNICEF, which
provided tables, benches, mattresses, and the salaries of literacy
trainers; the Saudi Ikhra Project; Monaco Aid, which equipped the Kiota
schools with additional classrooms, dormitories, dinning halls, and
washrooms; the governments of Libya, Egypt and Niger, which together helped
by providing nine more trained school teachers.
These and other donors recognized that the contributions and efforts of
Saida Oumalkhairy have been numerous, but her means are limited. Today, all
the schools and programs founded by this remarkable woman still rely on the
generosity of volunteers of good will.
(This report was edited, abridged and paraphrased for the Friday Magazine.)
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6. HISTORY COULD AFFIRM THAT SOLDIERS DIED IN VAIN IN IRAQ
[By Timothy Garton Ash -- The Guardian -- October 26, 2006]
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'They died in vain." Four words that are unbearable for the mother of a
dead soldier and shaming for the politicians who sent them to their deaths.
So our leaders say "they did not die in vain." But who now believes them?
Contemplating the scale of the American-British failure in Iraq, I have
been struggling to see if there are any future circumstances, any lines of
long-term strategic action, which would one day enable us honestly and
credibly to say to the mother of a soldier who died in Iraq: "Your son did
not die in vain." At the moment, that seems nearly impossible.
Yes, our troops removed a very nasty tyranny, to widespread initial
rejoicing among the people of Iraq. For some Iraqis -- especially Kurds and
Shia -- some things about their lives have improved. People who were in
prison or in exile are now at home. Millions of Iraqis turned out to vote
for political parties of their choice, despite intimidation. They have
incomparably more free media than before and less reason to fear repression
from the central state. A few have prospered. In places, the occupying
powers have done major reconstruction work. But that's about all one can
say on the plus side; the minus list is so much longer.
As Patrick Cockburn, a writer with rare in-depth knowledge of Iraq,
chronicles in his new book The Occupation, the dimensions of our failure
over more than 40 months of occupation are breathtaking. It starts with the
most basic services. Despite the expenditure of hundreds of billions of
dollars, U.S. government witnesses told the Senate foreign relations
committee earlier this year that the performance of the Iraqi electricity,
water, sewage and oil sectors is still below pre-invasion levels. The
economy is worse in many respects than it was before. Instead of going in
fear of Saddam's secret police and torturers, people go in fear of gangs,
militias, criminals and fanatics.
To exchange tyranny for anarchy is merely to move from one circle of hell
to another. As one Iraqi recently commented: "under Saddam we had a state,
a bad state, but to have no state is even worse." Even if the Johns Hopkins
University estimate of some 600,000 Iraqi civilian deaths since the
invasion is inaccurate, the number of Iraqi civilian deaths is still
horrendous. The country is already in civil war. As foreign troops leave,
that's almost certain to get worse. And that's only the story inside Iraq.
In the world at large, the balance-sheet is even worse. An intervention
that was intended to make the world safer for democracy has made the world
more dangerous for all democracies. The United States' own recently
released National Intelligence Estimate confirmed that Iraq has become a
"cause celebre" for terrorists. It has infuriated Muslims in our own
countries, including the London bombers of July 7. By distracting forces
and attention from our original, legitimate mission to extirpate al-Qaeda's
bases in Afghanistan, it has allowed the Taliban to regroup and come back
in force there. It has turned a militant, Islamist Iran into a regional
influence, increasing the likelihood that it will try to develop nuclear
weapons. It has made the United States more unpopular around the world than
at any time since reliable polling began and dramatically decreased the
United States' capacity to get its way. North Korea, for example, cocks a
nuclear snook at Washington. So much for "the world's only hyperpower."
Oh yes, and there's the cost. Nobel prize-winning economist Joseph Stiglitz
has estimated that the total eventual costs of the Iraq war, "including the
budgetary, social and macroeconomic costs, are likely to exceed $2
trillion" -- that's 2, followed by 12 zeroes!! -- or $2,000 a head for each
of the world's poorest billion people, who live (and die) on less than $1 a
day.
It's not too soon to suggest that the American-British invasion and
occupation of Iraq has proved to be the greatest strategic blunder of our
time. So what can we honestly say to that grieving mother or father? "Your
son (or daughter) died in vain?" Brooding on this, my thoughts have strayed
to the Hungarian revolution of 1956.
Both stories started with joyous crowds celebrating round the toppled
statue of a tyrant (Stalin in Budapest, Saddam in Baghdad). In both places,
celebration turned within weeks to bloodshed and misery. Virtually all
Hungarians would have acknowledged three years later that the revolution
ended in defeat. Many said it had ended in disaster and subsequently
embraced the course of pragmatic "realism" steered by Janos Kadar, who
authorized the execution of the revolution's leader, Imre Nagy.
Of course the cases of Hungary and Iraq are quite different. Unlike British
and American soldiers in Iraq, the Hungarians were fighting directly for
the freedom of their own country. But the point of comparison is simply
that our judgment of such dramatic events will change over decades,
depending on their long-term consequences and also on our own policies.
Given a fortunate turn of history -- if democracies can learn from their
mistakes -- even a defeat can be a milestone on the path to victory.
Fifty years on, after what is -- let's call a spade a spade -- a major
defeat in Iraq, can we again learn from our mistakes? Can we accept that
this "war" against terrorism, like the Cold War, will never be won by
military means? Do we have the confidence to engage diplomatically with
everyone in the region, including Iran and Syria? Can we work with Arab and
Iranian dissidents and intellectuals to craft policies of "offensive
detente" toward both the states and societies of the Muslim world and
sustain those policies over a generation? Or will the United States simply
cut and run, retreating into its own vast carelessness? If the former, we
may yet in decades to come have some honest words of comfort for the still-
grieving soldier's mother. If the latter, there will be no honest
consolation.
(For more information, see the author's website at:
www.timothygartonash.com This article was edited and abridged for the
Friday Magazine.)
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7. BOOK REVIEW: AMERICA'S "WAR ON TERRORISM" by Michel Chossudovsky
[Global Research -- 2005]
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AMERICA'S "WAR ON TERRORISM" by Michel Chossudovsky
ISBN 0-9737147-1-9 (2005) 387 pages.
(This book is now available in PDF format for U.S. $8.25)
In this new and expanded edition of Michel Chossudovsky's 2002 best seller,
the author blows away the smokescreen put up by the mainstream media, that
9/11 was an attack on America by "Islamic terrorists."
Through meticulous research, the author uncovers a military- intelligence
ploy behind the September 11/01 attacks, and the cover-up and complicity of
key members of the Bush Administration. The expanded edition, which
includes 12 new chapters, focuses on the use of 9/11 as a pretext for the
invasion and illegal occupation of Iraq, the militarization of justice and
law enforcement and the repeal of democracy.
According to Chossudovsky, the "war on terrorism" is a complete fabrication
based on the illusion that one man, Osama bin Laden, outwitted the $40
billion-a-year American intelligence apparatus. The "war on terrorism" is a
war of conquest. Globalization is the final march to the New World Order,
dominated by Wall Street and the U.S. military-industrial complex.
September 11, 2001 provides a justification for waging a war without
borders. Washington's agenda consists in extending the frontiers of the
American Empire to facilitate complete U.S. corporate control, while
installing within America the institutions of the Homeland Security State.
Chossudovsky peels back layers of rhetoric to reveal a complex web of
deceit aimed at luring the American people and the rest of the world into
accepting a military solution which threatens the future of humanity. The
last chapter includes an analysis of the London 7/7 Bomb Attacks.
An excerpt reads: "Millions of people have been misled regarding the causes
and consequences of September 11. When people across the U.S. and around
the world find out that Al-Qaeda is not an outside enemy, but a creation of
U.S. foreign policy and the CIA, the legitimacy of the bipartisan war
agenda will tumble like a deck of cards."
Across the land, the image of an "outside enemy" is instilled into the
consciousness of Americans. Al-Qaeda is threatening America and the world.
The repeal of democracy under the Patriot legislation is portrayed as a
means to providing "domestic security" and upholding civil liberties.
The 9/11 Commission Report destroys the historical record of U.S. covert
support to international terrorism, while creating the illusion that
America and "Western Civilization" are threatened. In turn, the various
terrorist warnings and code orange alerts have created across America an
atmosphere of fear and intimidation.
Blair speaks on immigration to UK- integration
Conform to our society, says PM
__._,_.___
Mr Blair urged the public to embrace multiculturalism
People entering the UK must be prepared to be tolerant or not become
part of society, Tony Blair has said.
In a speech at Downing Street, the prime minister said that tolerance
was "what makes Britain" and warned "we must be ready to defend this
attitude".
The threat came not from "generalised extremism" but "a new and
virulent form of ideology associated with a minority of our Muslim
community".
The Muslim Association of Britain said Mr Blair's speech
was "alarming".
Wars 'not helping'
A spokesman said the prime minister should be "investing in our
society" to help the deprived, rather than investing "millions and
billions in illegal occupations" which had "not helped to promote
multiculturalism in this country".
If you come here lawfully, we welcome you. If you are
permitted to stay here permanently, you become an equal member of our
community and become one of us
Tony Blair
"Rather than standing up and lecturing us, it's time he puts his
money where his mouth is," the spokesman said.
Mr Blair also used the speech to reiterate a crackdown on funding for
religious and racial groups, saying in the future they would have to
prove they aimed to promote community integration. This measure was
recently announced by Communities Secretary Ruth Kelly.
Conservative community cohesion spokesman Dominic Grieve said the
speech was a "remarkable turnaround".
"Many of the problems in relation to the issues he addresses are at
least in part the consequence of a philosophy of divisive
multiculturalism and political correctness that has been actively
promoted by the Labour Party over many years at both national and
local government levels."
Funding crackdown
Liberal Democrat communities spokesman Andrew Stunell said: "We must
ensure that the voices of moderation have their say, but support for
organisations must not be distorted by government-driven targets or
Tony Blair's personal agenda."
HAVE YOUR SAY
Multiculturalism makes our country more diverse, but does it actually
make it any better?
Jamie Vaide, London
He said: "The right to be in a multicultural society was always
implicitly balanced by a duty to integrate, to be part of Britain, to
be British and Asian, British and black, British and white."
Mr Blair said "multicultural Britain" should not be dispensed with,
adding: "On the contrary, we should continue celebrating it,"
But he said the suicide bombings in London on 7 July last year had
thrown the whole concept of a multiculturalism "into sharp relief",
the prime minister said.
"The reason we are having this debate is not generalised extremism.
It is a new and virulent form of ideology associated with a minority
of our Muslim community.
"It is not a problem with Britons of Hindu, Afro-Caribbean, Chinese
or Polish origin. Nor is it a problem with the majoirty of the Muslim
community."
'Essential values'
But he said there was a "problem with a minority of that community,
particularly originating from certain countries".
The failure of that part of the community to integrate did not mean
multiculturalism was dead, said Mr Blair, but it would be useful to
define "common values" all citizens were "expected to conform to".
"When it comes to our essential values - belief in democracy, the
rule of law, tolerance, equal treatment for all, respect for this
country and its shared heritage - then that is where we come
together, it is what we hold in common."
Mr Blair also said: "If you come here lawfully, we welcome you. If
you are permitted to stay here permanently, you become an equal
member of our community and become one of us.
"The right to be different, the duty to integrate: that is what being
British means.
"And neither racists nor extremists should be allowed to destroy it."
Race equality
Mr Blair said the Equal Opportunities Commission would be looking at
concerns about women's status inside Muslim communities. It will
report in the spring.
He also praised Tory leader David Cameron, saying it was "not
conceivable in my view" that he would seek to exploit immigration to
win votes.
Labour MP Keith Vaz MP has criticised the newly formed Commission for
Equality and Human Rights for taking just one of its nine
commissioners from a background in working for race equality.
Only chairman Trevor Phillips had this experience, he added.
Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/uk_news/politics/6219626.stm
Published: 2006/12/08 16:19:32 GMT
© BBC MMVI