Media Lens, London, 18 January 2012

News that a fourth scientist in two years, Mostafa Ahmadi Roshan, had been assassinated in Iran by an unknown agency generated minimal outrage in the press.

Patrick Cockburn notedin the Independent:
‘While the identity of those carrying out the assassinations remains a mystery, it is most likely to be Israel’s foreign intelligence service, Mossad…’

The Sunday Times published a meticulous account of the planning and execution of the attack provided by ‘a source who released details’ on the actions of ‘small groups of Israeli agents’ operating inside Iran. (Marie Colvin and Uzi Mahnaimi, ‘Israel’s secret war,’ Sunday Times, January 15, 2012)

Julian Borger’s article in the Guardian warnedagainst ‘Goading a regime on the brink.’

We wonder if the Guardian would have described the Iranian assassination of scientists on US or Israeli streets as ‘goading’. We also wonder if Borger would have described these as terrorist attacks.

Using the media database Lexis-Nexis we have been able to find just one example of a UK journalist describing Roshan’s assassination as an act of terror – New Statesman’s senior political editor Mehdi Hasan writingin the Guardian. Otherwise, almost all references have been limited to the use of the word by Iranian officials behind scare quotes. (After challenges from Media Lens and other activists, Borger did publisha rare example of non-Iranian use of the term.)

By contrast, in October, the US accused Iran of recruiting a used car salesman, Manssor Arbabsiar, as part of a terrorist plot to assassinate the Saudi Ambassador in a restaurant in Washington, DC. In that case, journalists had no qualms about using the word terror without inverted commas. Karen McVeigh reported in the Guardian:
‘Manssor Arbabsiar, a naturalised US citizen, was arrested last month, and stands accused of running a global terror plot that stretched from Mexico to Tehran.’

The Daily Mail:
‘An extraordinary terrorist plot has been foiled – which would have seen the Saudi Arabian ambassador to the U.S. murdered on American soil.’

The Telegraph:
‘Iranian government officials were accused by the Obama administration of plotting a string of deadly terrorist attacks on American soil.’

On Salon.com, Glenn Greenwald postednumerous similar examples from the US media. The alleged Arbabsiar plot was subsequently debunkedby analyst Gareth Porter.

As Greenwald observed, ‘accusing Israel and/or the U.S. of Terrorism remains one of the greatest political taboos’. Responding to a Media Lens reader who had suggested, not unreasonably, that ‘a terrorist is one who brings terror to another person’, Channel 4′s Alex Thomson wrote:
‘Your definition of a terrorist as one bringing terror is nonsensical as it would encompass all military outfits’ including ‘the Royal Fusilliers [sic]’. (Forwarded to Media Lens, February 25, 2005)

Is that really so absurd? After all, following the murderous firebombing of Dresden in February 1945, prime minister Winston Churchill wrote to Bomber Command:
‘It seems to me that the moment has come that the bombing of German cities simply for the sake of increasing the terror, though under other pretexts, should be reviewed.’ (Blitz, Bombing and Total War, Channel 4, January 15, 2005)

Presumably, then, one can argue that the RAF is a terrorist organisation.

Returning to last week’s assassination, while no-one has yet suggested that Iran is now obliged to bomb Washington, Borger argued:
‘If Americans had been killed in the Georgetown restaurant that was supposedly the target [of the debunked Arbabsiar ‘plot’], the Obama administration would have been obliged to respond militarily.’

In similar vein, the aptly-named James Blitz asked in the Financial Times:
‘But even if an immediate military conflict… is averted, this still leaves a wider question: how much longer can Israel and the US wait before they bomb Iran’s nuclear sites?’

The day after Roshan’s killing, Andrew Cummings, formerly an adviser on the Middle East and US affairs in the UK cabinet office national security staff, commented in the Guardian on ‘the risks’ of ‘this audacious approach’ – he meant the murdering of scientists. The sub-heading explained:
‘The death of another Iranian scientist has led to criticism of such actions, but Tehran’s refusal to co-operate leaves little alternative.’

Cummings clarified:
‘What many people fail to recognise, though, is that a covert campaign, while rife with physical, diplomatic and legal risks, is the lesser of many evils.’

And yet, as Patrick Cockburn noted, ‘the US has found no evidence Tehran is trying to make a nuclear bomb, though US politicians [and US-UK journalists] often speak as if this was an established fact…
‘The US National Intelligence Estimates on Iranian nuclear progress, the collective judgement of all the US intelligence organisations, said there was no evidence Iran had been trying to build a bomb since 2003. The Defence Intelligence Agency concluded that Iran’s nuclear weapons programme at that time was directed against Saddam Hussein’s Iraq and when he was overthrown by the US, it was ended.’

Compare this with Blitz’s version:
‘Some western intelligence agencies believe Iran will bide its time a little longer and enrich more uranium – but will not take the big strategic decision to race for the bomb in 2012. Still, in every other respect, the auguries are not good.’

Again by contrast, Greg Thielmann, a former US State Department and Senate Intelligence Committee analyst, toldveteran investigative journalist Seymour Hersh last year: ‘there is nothing that indicates that Iran is really building a bomb’.

Readers might respond that Cummings and Blitz are entitled to their baseless views, and the Guardian and FT are perfectly entitled to publish them – that’s what free speech is all about. We agree.

But a problem arises when we try to imagine the Guardian publishing a piece justifying the Iranian killing of a US scientist on a US street one day after he had been murdered. And try imagining the FT hosting an opinion piece that asked: ‘How much longer can Iran wait before launching its bombers against the US and Israel?’

And on Christmas, a rainy and great wind swept over the West Bank and East Jerusalem. Trees bent and roofs rattled but the wind couldn’t carry away the suffering, vulnerability and the long 365 days of humiliation.

Israeli border soldier stands guard during repeated clashes with Palestinian demonstrators in the West Bank town of Qalandia in 2011

IN the so called Middle East’s only democracy, they do not do guillotines. But there are other innovative rituals of humiliation, designed to reassure the Palestinians that every New Year could well be their last in the land of their ancestors, .. the land of olive trees. As the wind calms down everything returns to normal, but not for the Palestinians, they don’t.

As years go by, the land shrinks, the hope smothers and the despair and humiliation prevail in what is left of Palestine or what is known as the west bank.

Israeli human rights organization B’Tselem may be best known for is its camera project, which started in 2007 when the organization began distributing video cameras to Palestinians living in the occupied West Bank, East Jerusalem and Gaza.

These cameras are often the only object Palestinians can “arm” themselves with in the face of discrimination, oppression and violence waged against them.

In 2011, volunteers in B’Tselem’s camera project filmed over 500 hours of footage in the West Bank. These are two minutes they collected and edited from it, depicting life under occupation and military rule, as a way to sum up the year that passed.

Striker Mohammed Ghadir puts Israeli anti-racism to the test

By James M. Dorsey

Maccabi Haifa striker Mohammed Ghadir believes that he and Beitar Jerusalem, the bad boy of Israeli soccer, are a perfect match.

“I am well suited to Beitar, and that team would fit me like a glove. I have no qualms about moving to play for them,” Mr. Ghadir is quoted by Israeli daily Ha’aretz as saying. Beitar has a large squad, a significant fan base, wide media coverge and lacks talented strikers, he says.

There is only one hitch: Beitar doesn’t want Mr. Ghadir. Not because he’s not an upcoming star and not because they wouldn’t need a player like Mr. Ghadir but because the striker is an Israeli Palestinian. “Our team and our fans are still not ready for an Arab soccer player,” Ha’aretz quotes Beitar’s management as saying. The club prides itself on being the only top league Israeli club to have never hired a Palestinian player in a country whose population is for 20 per cent Palestinian and in which Palestinians play important roles in most other top league teams.

The Beitar management may be right in its approach, not because the team has a point in picking its players on racial grounds but because it prides itself on its bad-boy racist image and is under no pressure to change its ways despite Israeli legal restrictions on discrimination in the work place, the Israel Football Association being the only Middle Eastern soccer body to have launched a campaign against racism and Palestinian tax money contributed to the funding of this year’s refurbishing of Jerusalem stadiums.

Beitar has argued that it has broken no laws by not having hired Palestinian players because no Palestinian has ever solicited at the risk of being a target of the club’s racist attitude. Mr. Ghadir’s desire to play for Beitar puts paid to that argument.

“Now an extraordinarily courageous Arab player has stood up, and fearlessly indicated that he is not afraid to play for Beitar. The Jerusalem squad did not assent to his request – not because he lacks sufficient talent, but because he is an Arab. This is a mark of Cain for Beitar Jerusalem and its fans, and also for the city of Jerusalem, the state of Israel and its legal system, the Israel Football Association and also for the media, which continues to cover this soccer team. Day by day, we reinforce and popularize this loathsome form of racism,” said Ha”aretz columnist Yoav Borowitz in a recent article entitled ‘Kick racism out of Beitar Jerusalem soccer team.’

Established in 1936 and supported by Israeli right wing leaders such as Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Beitar traces its roots to a revanchist Zionist youth movement. Its founding players actively resisted the pre-state British mandate authorities. Its fans shocked Israelis when they refused to observe a moment of silence for assassinated Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin, who initiated the first peace negotiations with the Palestinians.

Beitar has the worst disciplinary record in Israel’s top league. Since 2005 it has faced more than 20 hearings and has received various punishments, including points deductions, fines and matches behind closed doors because of its fans’ racist behaviour. Beitar’s matches often resemble a Middle Eastern battlefield. It’s mostly Sephardic fans of Middle Eastern and North African origin, revel in their status as the bad boys of Israeli soccer. Their dislike of Ashkenazi Jews of East European extraction rivals their disdain for Palestinians.

In some ways, Mr. Ghadir’s interest in transferring from Maccabi Haifa to Beitar has an element of going from bad to worse. Israeli police said in October that it suspect militant right-wing Jewish fans of Mr. Ghadir’s own team of painting slogans reminiscent of language used by Jewish settlers on buildings in the town of Bat Yam and Muslim and Christian graves in Jaffa, the formerly Palestinian part of Tel Aviv that today is home to both Israelis and Palestinians. The slogans asserted that “Maccabi Haifa doesn’t want Arabs on the team,” “Death to Arabs,” and “Rabbi Kahane was right,” a reference to the late leader of the outlawed extreme right-wing Jewish Defence League (JDL) who was assassinated in New York in 1990. The perpetrators signed the slogans as “Haifa supporters.”

Militant soccer fan racism is encouraged by far-right wing politicians such as National Union deputy Michael Ben-Ari, a proponent of expelling all Palestinians from Israel, who this year proposed legislation that would require members of Israeli national sport teams to sing the national anthem and recognise Israel as a Jewish state. The latter demand is rooted in an Israeli desire backed by Mr. Netanyahu to impose recognition of the Jews’ historic right to settle Palestine and block recognition of Palestinian rights to return to lands within Israel’s pre-1967 borders.

Mr. Borowitz noted that “Jerusalem mayor, Nir Barkat, who cultivates an image as a tolerant, modern public servant, has yet to utter a word on this topic. He has done nothing to alter Beitar’s racist, discriminatory policy. Avi Luzon, chairman of the Israel Football Association, also remains inert on this issue; and the association’s court has never lifted a finger to challenge Beitar’s racism. Meantime, Israel’s media continues to cover the team’s games, and barely addresses the racism issue. Could an English or French soccer squad get away without putting a black or Jewish player on the field throughout its history? How would its fans respond to that? Would football associations in such countries countenance such blatantly racist policy?”

Mr. Borowitz notes further that Jerusalem’s 280,000 Palestinian residents contributed to the NIS 100,000,000 ($27 million) in taxpayer’s money allocated for stadium renovations this year. “Yet this contribution does not entitle the city’s Arabs to representation, even of the most minimal sort, on Jerusalem’s sole team in the nation’s top league,” Mr. Borowitz said.

The importance of Palestinian players to Israeli soccer was driven home to Israelis in 2005 when Abbas Suan, a devout Muslim who refused to sing the Hatikva before a game, achieved for a brief moment what politicians in more than a half-century had not: he united Israeli Jews and Arabs by securing with a last minute equalizer against Ireland Israel’s first chance in 35 years to qualify for a world cup. The game earned him the nickname The Equalizer and made him an Israeli hero; his cheery face and toothy smile featured in ads for the state lottery.

That sense of unity was short-lived. When Suan set foot on the pitch in Israel a week later as captain of Bnei Sakhnin, an Israeli Palestinian team, Jewish fans of Beitar Jerusalem, Israel’s most nationalistic club, booed him every time he touched the ball. “Suan, You Don’t Represent US,” blared a giant banner in the stadium. Fans shouted, “We hate all Arabs.”

James M. Dorsey is a senior fellow at the S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies at Nanyang Technological University in Singapore and the author of the blog, The Turbulent World of Middle East Soccer

Published on Saturday, September 24, 2011 by CommonDreams.org

by Claudia Lefko

We’ve been here before, confronting this question of children’s art, and why it creates such a stir. I wrote about it in May 2006 when Brandeis University cancelled an exhibit of Palestinian children’s art. This cancellation seems even more egregious because the museum in question is specifically a children’s museum.

Who objects to children’s art in a children’s art museum? And, what should we make of a children’s museum that allows the concerns of those constituents to censor the views of children, denying their right to expression? I’m talking about the Oakland Children’s Museum (MOCHA) and its decision to cancel the exhibit A Child’s View of Gaza, which was to have opened there this week, on September 24.

One can only conclude that those who have objected to this exhibit are troubled by the content. For whatever reason they want it buried, out of site and out of mind. They must be a powerful group. They succeeded in convincing the museum’s board to ignore its stated goal of “…advocating for the arts as an essential part of a strong, vital and diverse community”. And, they have put the museum in the uncomfortable position of denying Palestinian children their rights as guaranteed by Article 12 of the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC): the right of every child to express his or her views and to have those views given due consideration.

“The artist’s job is to be a witness to his time in history.” said the artist Robert Rauschenberg, and so it is with our young artists. Seeing, as we know, comes before words. A child looks and recognizes people, places and things before she or he can speak; “views” are developing from the moment of birth. So, imagine the views taken in during the long, wide-eyed hours of childhood in Palestine or in Baghdad on in Afghanistan. Imagine the tension, worry and preoccupation on the faces of the adults; imagine the looks on the faces of the of soldiers as they patrol the streets, or search homes. Imagine the hundreds upon hundreds of violent scenes that could and do play out in front of children living in war zones. This is their world. It surrounds them day in and day out. And oftentimes, they have not only no words, but no opportunity to tell us what they think and feel about this.

Taking crayon or pencil in hand, a child speaks out on his or her own behalf: this is me, my situation, this is what my life looks like. It isn’t easy for adults to bare witness to these stories. I’ve seen exhibits of children’s art from Hiroshima, from Spain during the Civil War, from Viet Nam, from Darfur, from the concentration camps in WWII and from Iraqi children. What we see in some of this art is the human cost of war, the terror and agony of being a child in an unpredictable, dangerous and violent world, a world gone inexplicably mad. A world where you are not safe, where even your parents cannot protect you.

This art is not about politics, it is about the human condition. If we cannot look at it, if it is too painful, it is because the world we have created, full of violence and conflict, is not one that is good for children. The famous 60’s poster with one giant flower said it all: War is Not Healthy for Children and Other Living Things.

We have a legal as well as a moral obligation to let Palestinian children, and all children express their views freely and to give those views our due consideration. If we are disturbed by children’s images from war zones, we should work on their behalf to create a better, more just and peaceful world , a world where children are truly valued and where their care, protection and overall well being is a social, economic and political priority. To do anything less is to deny the significance of children as the future of our planet.

Aldous Huxley wrote this, in his introduction to “They Still Draw Pictures! A collection of 60 drawings made by Spanish children during the war” (1938): The most that individual men and women of good will can do is to work on behalf of some general solution of the problem of large-scale violence and, meanwhile to succour those who, like the child artists of this exhibition, have been made the victims of the worlds collective crime and madness.

The museum, in canceling the exhibit has dealt yet another blow to children and their rights; surely a children’s museum, of all institutions, can do better than this.

To see examples from this exhibit: mocha.org

Claudia Lefko is the founding director (2001) of The Iraqi Children’s Art Exchange in Northampton MA. She is a long-time educator, activist and advocate for children.

Given the recent deaths of film makers Tareque Masud and Mishuk Munier, this powerful affirmation of the power of film can be an inspiration to us all

And hip hop used as never before: Believe me this is one you don’t to miss.

Subscribe to ShahidulNews

By Suheir Hammad

I will not
dance to your war
drum. I will
not lend my soul nor
my bones to your war
drum. I will
not dance to your
beating. I know that beat.
It is lifeless. I know
intimately that skin
you are hitting. It
was alive once
hunted stolen
stretched. I will
not dance to your drummed
up war. I will not pop
spin break for you. I
will not hate for you or
even hate you. I will
not kill for you. Especially
I will not die
for you. I will not mourn
the dead with murder nor
suicide. I will not side
with you or dance to bombs
because everyone else is
dancing. Everyone can be
wrong. Life is a right not
collateral or casual. I
will not forget where
I come from. I
will craft my own drum. Gather my beloved
near and our chanting
will be dancing. Our
humming will be drumming. I
will not be played. I
will not lend my name
nor my rhythm to your
beat. I will dance
and resist and dance and
persist and dance. This heartbeat is louder than
death. Your war drum ain’t
louder than this breath.

`Go, Mubarak go!’  USA’s tottering user-friendly tyrants…

By Rahnuma Ahmed

Having grown up amidst popular uprisings, such as the Civil Disobedience movement in 1969, and much later, having participated in mass uprisings, foremost among them, the one against general HM Ershad’s regime in 1990, witnessing scenes of the unfolding peoples’ revolt against the US-bolstered 30-year old Mubarak dictatorship in Egypt, relayed live, courtesy of al-Jazeera television, is, well…, just great!

Every passing moment contributes to our history on earth, but some moments are crucial for they change history, writes Ashraf Ezzat, medical doctor and political analyst, from Alexandria. What the world now witnesses in Egypt, is not only the crumbling down of a dictatorship that stifled Egyptians for decades but “a whole age of authoritarianism in the Arab world.”

It all began in Tunisia. Mohammed Bouazizi, 26, a vegetable-seller, set himself on fire on December 17, 2010 after police confiscated his unlicensed produce stand; he died on Jan 3. Protests against unemployment, police brutality and the regime’s corruption increased, leading to the toppling of president Zine al-Abidine Ben Ali’s regime, a dictator who had ruled for 23 years, was re-elected president five times, each time winning 99.9%-89.62% votes, who amended the constitution in 2002 to allow the president (read, himself) to stay in power until the age of 75, to be re-elected unlimited times. After a 29 day popular uprising, Ben Ali, who headed “one of the Arab world’s most repressive regimes” (Guardian, January 15, 2011),  who was a “stalwart US ally” (Foreign Policy, February 5, 2011) was forced to flee, to take refuge in Saudi Arabia. Prime minister Mohamed Ghannouchi took over as interim president as soldiers guarded ministries, public buildings and the state TV building, as security forces were authorised to fire live rounds.

“Freedom is expensive and my brother paid the price of freedom,” said Salem, Bouazizi’s brother. “My brother has become a symbol of resistance in the Arab world.”

So true he was, as instances of self-immolation followed soon. An Egyptian man set himself alight near the parliament, a Mauritanian in front of the presidential palace in Nouakchott, the capital, while four unemployed young men reportedly immolated themselves in Algeria.

America’s bout with democracy in the Middle East (and also, in Asia, Africa and Latin America) since World War II has led to nations being ruled by “user-friendly tyrants” (George E. Irani, April 29, 2003). Since the Tunisian revolution, some Middle Eastern and North African tyrants are busy declaring measures aimed at pre-empting civil unrest.

On February 2, president Ali Abdullah Saleh of Yemen who has ruled for 32 years, announced that he would step down in 2013, that his son Ahmed would not succeed him. But that did not quell the protests, demonstrators gathered for a “day of rage” on Friday February 4. US military aid to Yemen had averaged $20 million a year during the Bush era,

but under the Obama administration, US intelligence and security roles have expanded, military aid to Yemen is expected to reach $250 million this year. (Los Angeles Times, January 28, 2011).

In Algeria, Abdelaziz Bouteflika, president since 1999, on February 3 promised to end the state of emergency “in the very near future,” to adopt measures for job creation, to lift restrictions on state-controlled media. Opposition leaders, human rights groups, unions, students and unemployed workers however, plan a march on February 12. Algeria forged “intimate links” with the US after September 11, 2001 voicing support for the US-led international `coalition against terror.’ Close cooperation reportedly exists between Algeria’s counter-terrorism and intelligence networks and the FBI and CIA. According to Israeli security experts, they were working with the Algerian military and national security sector (2002).

The Algerian parliamentary elections held at the end of May 2002 were, according to the US, evidence of the “development of democracy.”

In Jordan, despite the Financial Times’ optimism that “internal tensions between different factions in society” make a unified uprising “less likely” (January 17, 2011),  thousands of demonstrators took to the streets recently shouting, “Rifai go away, prices are on fire and so are the Jordanians,” and banners, “Send the corrupt guys to court.” It has led King Abdullah—who has the power to appoint governments, approve legislation and dissolve parliament—to dismiss his cabinet, to appoint Marouf Bakhit as prime minister in place of Samir Rifai. But Bakhit, a retired major-general, prime minister from 2005-2007, earlier, national security advisor and ambassador to Israel, has not been welcomed by many, including the Islamic Action Front (IAF), the Muslim Brotherhood’s political wing and Jordan’s largest opposition party. Bakhit, deemed to have “a history of oppression and corruption” was the mastermind behind the rigged 2007 elections. ”There is no reason to stop the protests now,” says IAF head Hamzah Mansur. Public anger at high inflation, unemployment and rampant poverty is coupled with resentment at a “rubber stamp parliament.” Rifai’s recent announcements of a $550 million package of new subsidies for fuel and staple products (rice, sugar, livestock, liquefied gas), pay rise for civil servants and security forces were swept aside by rising protests including the right to directly elect the prime minister, to a demand for changes in “how the country is now run.” Jordan, a key CIA counter-terrorism ally, is the second-largest recipient of US foreign aid on a per-capita basis, it has received more than $6 billion in development aid since 1952, the reward for having “pursued one of the most consistently pro-American foreign policies in the Middle East” (Foreign Policy, January 31, 2011).

While the US secretary of state Hillary Clinton, at a high-level security conference in Munich warns of a “perfect storm” enveloping the Middle East if leaders do not implement political and social reforms to meet the demands of their people (al-Jazeera, February 5, 2011), tensions have emerged within the US administration and on Capitol Hill over the CIA and other spy agencies failure to warn president Obama adequately (Washington Post, February 3, 2011). Intelligence officials insist they had warned of “instability” but did not know what the “trigger mechanism” would be. As the National Security Council spokesman put it, “Did anyone in the world know in advance that a fruit vendor in Tunisia was going to light himself on fire and start a revolution? No.”

President Obama’s high-sounding advice to Mubarak to listen to what is “being voiced by the Egyptian people,”l his own message to the Egyptian people (a televised address following Mubarak’s address to the nation), “We hear your voices“ is nothing more than a rhetorical ploy, one that evades the unequivocal language in which Tahreer square protestors speak, “Obama needs to be clear…either he stands with Mubarak, or he stands with the Egyptian people” (al-Jazeera, February 4, 2011).

Or, as Hasan Mohammad, Egyptian living in the US, demonstrating outside the White House and the Egyptian embassy in Washington put it, the US should ask Mubarak to “get out now” for Egyptians can do “everything else themselves.” He added, “He [Mubarak] wants to destroy Egypt before he leaves. He thinks he inherited Egypt from his parents, he thinks Egypt is his. No, Egypt is everybody. Egypt is Egyptian; it is not Mubarak.” Other protestors want an end to US military aid to Mubarak, a placard outside the White House read, “Dictator made in the USA.” Another bore a sign equalling $30 billion in military assistance to Egypt with 30 years of dictatorship.

The US, writes Paul J Balle, has kept Mubarak in power, it gave his regime $1.5 billion in aid last year “mainly because he supported America’s pro-Israel policies, especially by helping Israel to maintain its stranglehold on Gaza” (`The Peoples Revolt,’ February 6, 2011).

Israel blockades Gaza on one side, while Mobarak blockades it on the other. Johan Hari writes of watching Egyptian soldiers refusing to let out sick and dying Palestinians for treatment which they cannot get in Gaza’s collapsing hospitals (The Independent, February 4, 2011).

But there is no reason for the US administration to begrudge the huge amounts of aid as much of it goes back to American defence contractors : Lockheed Martin has taken $3.8 billion from Egypt in the last few years, General Dynamics $2.5 billion, Boeing $1.7 billion (Pratap Chatterjee, Egypt’s Military-Industrial Complex, February 4, 2011). For the Egyptian people, however, there are solid grounds for resentment : US economic aid to Egypt in 2007 amounted to $455 million but translated to only $6 per capita. The total economic aid in 2010 of $200 million provided less than $3 per capita income.

Further, injury is heaped on these insults as tear gas canisters fired by Egyptian security officials in Cairo last week reveal they are manufactured in the US (ABC TV), as 12-gauge shotgun shells show “Made in USA” stamped on their brass heads (Sydney Morning Herald). Hillary Clinton’s “perfect storm” brewing warning conveniently overlooks these when she intones, we condemn in the “strongest terms [the Egyptian government's] attacks on peaceful demonstrators.”

Her slick denunciations also overlook allegations that Egypt’s near-total internet blackout was enabled by a California-based technology company’s sale of equipment which allows the Mubarak government to track online activity, as she urged the Egyptian government to “ensure journalists ability to report on these events to the people in Egypt and to the world,” to not “violate international norms that guarantee freedom of the press.”

And, as the US resists calls to cut military aid to Egypt, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Admiral Mike Mullen, in an ABC TV interview, speaks of “plenty of [US] military presence throughout the region,” of the defense department’s “higher state of awareness.” The military, he said, is ready to provide any “response or support” in the crisis. This was later clarified, the four-star admiral had meant the US military’s readiness to evacuate American nationals.

As for Mubarak, he too, he says, is “fed up.” “After 62 years in public service, I have had enough. I want to go.” It is only the fear of Egypt falling into chaos which prevents him.

Fed in corruption over and above his head and ears is more accurate. Tyrants user-friendly toward the US are known to amass huge personal fortunes, and, as Pepe Escobar writes, “According to a mix of United States, Syrian and Algerian sources [Mubarak's] personal fortune amounts to no less than US$40 billion – stolen from the public treasury in the form of “commissions”, on weapons sales, for instance. The Pharaoh controls loads of real estate, especially in the US; accounts in US, German, British and Swiss banks; and has “links” with corporations such as MacDonald’s, Vodafone, Hyundai and Hermes. Suzanne, the British-Irish Pharaoh’s wife, is worth at least $5 billion. And son Gamal – the one that may have fled to London, now stripped of his role as dynastic heir – also boasts a personal fortune of $17 billion” (Asia Times, February 4, 2011).

Kaan tanle matha ashe, a Bangla proverb, meaning if you pull the ear, along comes the head. Egyptian calls for putting Mubarak on trial, must be supported globally. For pulling the dictator’s ear, will serve us the military-industrial head that breeds and furbishes authoritarianism in the Middle East.

More, next week…

By Rahnuma Ahmed

The release of US diplomatic cables by WikiLeaks on 29 November—dubbed the “9/11 of world diplomacy” —was immediately criticised by America’s political and military leadership. WikiLeaks will cost (American) lives, said Bill Clinton.  Sarah Palin blasted Obama for WikiLeaks.

Similar denunciations had occurred earlier. When WikiLeaks released the Afghan War Diary in July this year, a cache of 91,000 documents, covering the war from 2004 to 2010. When WikiLeaks released another cache in October, nearly 400,000 secret US files on the Iraq war, the largest classified military leak in history. When it posted a video on its website in April, showing a US Apache helicopter killing at least 12 innocent people, including 2 Reuters journalists, in an attack in Baghdad in July 2007.

Robert Gates, the US defence secretary said he was “appalled” while the Joint Chiefs Chairman Admiral Mike Mullen said, WikiLeaks “might already have on their hands the blood of some young soldier or that of an Afghan family.” The Afghan War Diary was denounced by human rights organisations too, including Amnesty International. The international press freedom organisation, Reporters Without Borders said, it was “irresponsible,” it sets a “bad precedent for the Internet’s future.” The names of Afghan informants had not been redacted, leaving them vulnerable to Taliban retaliation.

Initial denunciations have now been replaced by harsher calls centering around the whistle-blowing website’s founder, Julian Assange, 39 year-old Australian journalist, publisher and activist. Variously described as “charismatic,” possessing “an exceptional ability to crack computer codes” and “mercurial in interviews,” demands to hunt him down just like al-Qaeda (Sarah Palin), to declare WikiLeaks a terrorist group and prosecute Assange (Representative Peter King) —are being replaced by murderous ones. He should be tried for treason and executed if found guilty (Republican presidential hopeful Mike Huckabee) . He should be hit by a drone (political commentator Bill O’Reilly). He should be assassinated (professor Tom Flanagan, adviser to Canadian prime minister).

On December 1, Interpol issued a Red Notice for Assange. He was wanted for questioning in Sweden over alleged sex offences. Assange had visited Stockholm in August to defend WikiLeaks’ decision to publish the Afghan War Diary; while there, an arrest warrant had been issued by Swedish authorities against allegations of rape and sexual molestation. The charge of rape was later dropped, the warrant too was hastily withdrawn. The accusations had separately been brought by two women, sex had been “consensual” but Assange seems to have violated a Swedish law against having sex without a condom; he had used a condom on one occassion but it had split, on another, he had not. One of the women, afraid of catching STD wanted him to take a medical test, which he reportedly refused. He was finally charged with something called “sex by surprise,” this carries a fine of $715. Assange admitted having sex but the charges are “without basis.” The timing was “deeply disturbing.” It was aimed at smearing him. It was possibly initiated by the CIA or Pentagon.

Interestingly, the recent WikiLeaks release mentions Sweden’s close ties to the US military which, as the American ambassador to Sweden notes, “give the lie to the official policy” of non-participation in military alliances. This should remain a secret, he wrote, or else it would open the way for “domestic criticism.”

The rising hysteria over Assange/WikiLeaks has led many among the western public, including well-respected figures known for their opposition to the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, to extend their support. Pentagon Papers whistle-blower Daniel Ellsberg, the target of a White House hit squad in 1972 himself, has said, Assange is serving American democracy and the American rule of law precisely by challenging secrecy regulations. He called for a boycott of Amazon after it terminated hosting the WikiLeaks website. WikiLeaks must be protected, writes John Pilger; the Afghanistan war logs and the hounding of Assange prove that there’s never been a greater need to speak truth to power than today. Anti-war activist Cindy Sheehan, whose son was killed in service during Iraq war, and Medea Benjamin of Code Pink: Women for Peace, urge US cities to offer Assange sanctuary. The government should desist in prosecuting Assange, or pressure Sweden in doing so, or sabotage WikiLeaks servers. Republican senator Ron Paul, often in opposition to fellow members for his libertaran beliefs, argues that the WikiLeaks founder should get the same protection as the media. Scoffing at the idea of an Australian being tried for treason in America, Paul asks, “why don’t we prosecute The New York Times or anybody else that releases this?”

But there are others, equally courageous and just as passionately opposed to the wars in Afghanistan, Iraq (and Palestine), who view WikiLeaks and Assange, differently. Who argue that what has been presented has been cherry-picked, that the data presented is selective. That the consistent absence of particular actors is more telling than those who have been presented on the world stage through the leaks.

In other words, do the releases benefit anyone, if so, who? Cui bono?

Alan Hart, author, a former ITN and BBC Panorama foreign correspondent specialising in the Middle East writes, if a visitor from Outer Space studied the WikiLeaks revelations of the first two days, she or he would come to the conclusion that,

“The main message is clear. Iran is the biggest single threat to the peace of the region and the world and not only because the Israelis say so. Arab leaders agree with them.  The secondary message is that apart from the Arab leaders who say they share Israel’s assessment, other Muslim leaders, those in Turkey and Pakistan especially, are not to be trusted.”

Cui bono? Hart says, the Zionist state of Israel. It is possible that Assange has been “compromised” in some manner, that he is open to “manipulation.” Assange’s denial of 9/11 truth is surprising—“I’m constantly annoyed that people are distracted by false conspiracies such as 9/11, when all around we provide evidence of real conspiracies, for war or mass financial fraud”—given the “irrefutable evidence” that the Twin Towers were not brought down by the planes and their burning fuel.

Hart, and also others, point toward similar suspicions raised by Zbigniew Brzezinski, president Carter’s National Security Advisor. In a recent interview to PBS, Brzezinski said, “The real issue is, who is feeding Wikileaks? They’re getting a lot of information which seems trivial, inconsequential, but some of it seems surprisingly pointed… It’s a question of whether Wikileaks are being manipulated by interested parties that want to either complicate our relationship with other governments or want to undermine some governments… I have no doubt that Wikileaks is getting a lot of the stuff from sort of relatively unimportant sources, like the one that perhaps is identified on the air. But it may be getting stuff at the same time from interested intelligence parties who want to manipulate the process and achieve certain very specific objectives.”

Perceptive bloggers have pointed out how Israel is unharmed by the leaks, how Mossad and RAW are noticeably absent despite being very active in occupied war-torn Afghanistan and Iraq. Others have wondered why both the Guardian and The New York Times chose to leak the portion about Iran first, out of the 200,000 documents. Interestingly enough, the NYT article was co-authored by David Sanger, a “major conveyor” of American administration propaganda before Gulf War II.

The leaks seem to be a result of systematic work, purposively intentioned, says the Turkish president, while the deputy prime minister asks, “Documents were released and they immediately said, `Israel will not suffer from this.’ How did they know that?” A columnist for a pro-government Turkish newspaper writes, some people want to “drive the Obama administration in a different direction,” they want to “adjust the relations of many governments with the US.” They want to corner Turkey both in domestic and international politics, to show that Turkey is “alone” in defending Iran in the region. The cables, writes another columnist, seem to be part of a psychological campaign. In China, the English-language tabloid Global Times which belongs  to the ruling communist party’s newspaper, the People’s Daily, asks in its lead editorial, “Is there some tacit understanding between the Web site and the US government?” implying actual government complicity in the leaks.

Gordon Duff, senior editor of Veterans Today, wonders why no one has found the magic Wikileaks “treehouse” with dozens of elves sifting through documents, when the NSA and a dozen other agencies can pick the stroke on his computer the second they hit, can tap 200 million telephones, kidnap a woman off the streets of Karachi with a two minute phone request. Is it plausible?

It is widely believed that Wikileaks got the classified video of US troops killing Iraqi civilians in Baghdad and 260,000 pages of confidential diplomatic cables and intelligence assessments from Bradley Manning, a 22 year-old American soldier stationed in Baghdad who, as an intelligence specialist in the US army, had access to these, read them, became disillusioned about his country’s foreign policy and “used blank CDs to download classified information while pretending to be listening to Lady Gaga.” Manning was caught because he boasted of the leaks to a former hacker, who turned him over to the US authorities. He has been in custody since May, has been charged with transferring classified data; if convicted he could face a prison sentence of between 50 to 70 years.

The PBS interviewer had tried to sell the Bradley Manning `myth’ to Brzezinski, “But a lot of these documents have been in the hands—haven’t they been in the hands of WikiLeaks for some time?” His reply was, “We don’t know that for a fact.” When she said, “… because of— because of this private who is in jail and accused, Army private?” the other interviewee on the program Stephen Hadley (National Security Advisor to George W. Bush) responded, “We don’t know it!”

The more important question is, is there any evidence that anyone else—besides Wikileaks— has accessed US government’s classified  files? Former AIPAC foreign policy chief Steven Rosen, in a civil lawsuit filed in March 2009, reportedly fired for being caught spying against the US, says his actions were common practice at AIPAC. That masses of classified information come to AIPAC and Israel continually, that Washington’s major pro-Israeli lobbying group receives it approvingly, that it praises and financially rewards those who handle and channel it. Another former AIPAC employee, Douglas Broomfield, who was chief lobbyist says, AIPAC is not a classified information bazar, rather, a covert foreign agent for governments bent on thwarting US brokered peace deals. This makes them, Duff writes, “suspect #1 for being the source of Wikileaks.” Wikileaks are nothing but “the scraps, the chickenfeed, left over from a major spy organization that accessed real secrets, nuclear weapons, war plans.” He adds, Wikileaks will never release any of the highest number of classified White Papers to have been written in the Pentagon, `How Israel is Endangering the United States.’

Assange’s role model for world leader is… Benjamin Netanyahu, Israeli prime minister. Speaking of him approvingly, Assange said, “leaders should speak in public like they do in private whenever they can.” Netanyahu returned the compliment, “Israel has not been damaged at all by the WikiLeaks publication.”

Not only is consent manufactured, in the present world, dissent too, is manufactured. There have been color `revolutions,’ courtesy of billionaire George Soros, and now, we have the lone ranger resurrected, suitable to fit the needs of a technocratic age: a whistle-blowing, crusading truth-seeker, hacking computers to `out’ deceptions in the high echelons of world power. Welcome to the dis-information highway.

Published in New Age Monday December 6 2010

Subscribe to ShahidulNews

YouTube clip shows IDF soldier belly-dancing beside bound Palestinian woman

IDF orders immediate probe after Channel 10 airs clip on national TV.

By Haaretz Service

A video uploaded to YouTube shows an Israel Defense Forces soldier wriggling in a belly dance beside a bound and handcuffed Palestinian woman, to the cheers of his comrades who were documenting the incident.

The IDF’s internal investigation department ordered an immediate probe into the matter after the Ch. 10 television program Tzinor Laila caught wind of the clip on the internet. The full clip and the details behind the incident will be broadcast on the show just before midnight on Monday.

A number of IDF soldiers have over the last year faced investigation and penalty for documenting themselves performing questionable acts in front of Palestinian prisoners or while on patrol.

In August, former soldier Eden Abergil raised controversy by posting pictures of herself beside a bound and blindfolded Palestinian prisoner on her Facebook page.

Days later, three IDF soldiers were arrested taking photographs of themselves alongside cuffed and blindfolded Palestinian detainees using their cellphones.

Photographs uploaded by Abergil and labeled “IDF – the best time of my life,” depicted her smiling next to Palestinian prisoners with their hands bound and their eyes covered.
A comment attached to one of the photos of the soldier smiling in front of two blindfold men and posted by one of Abergil’s friends read “That looks really sexy for you,” with Abergil’s response reading: “I wonder if he is on Facebook too – I’ll have to tag him in the photo.”

A comment allegedly added by Abergil to her Facebook page later that wee said that she would “gladly kill Arabs – even slaughter them.”

“In war there are no rules,” Abergil allegedly wrote on the wall of her profile page.

Other soldiers faced disciplinary action over the last year for uploading video of themselves stopping a patrol in the West Bank to dance to American electro-pop singer Kesha’s hit Tick Tock.

The video “Batallion 50 Rock the Hebron Casbah” shows six dancing Nahal Brigade soldiers, armed and wearing bulletproof vests, patrolling as a Muslim call to prayer is heard. Then the music changes and they break into a Macarena-like dance.

The video was uploaded over the weekend, and quickly spread across Facebook pages and blogs before it was removed by those who uploaded it.

Subscribe to ShahidulNews

“The average person believes implicitly that the photograph cannot falsify. Of course, you and I know that this unbounded faith in the integrity of the photograph is often rudely shaken, for, while photographs may not lie, liars may photograph.”

Lewis Hine 1909

Photographers often get defensive when reminded that many of them resort to ‘digital manipulation’ using the new tools currently available. Discussions about the limits of what is permissible regularly sparks off heated debates, particularly in contests. Jobs have been lost, awards cancelled, and credibility undermined when photographers have digitally manipulated photographs to create the image they have wanted.

Sadly, the arguments raised have largely dealt with issues of technique rather than issues of ethics. One school of thought suggests, ‘if it was doable in a darkroom, then it can be doable in a computer’. Others claim that conventional darkroom techniques, such as dodging, burning, or changing contrast are acceptable, but inserting, taking away, or displacing visual elements are off limits (though these too were, and had been, done in the darkroom). More ‘artistic’ criteria suggest that the essential ‘mood and character’ of the original image must be preserved. None of this addresses the central issue Hine had brought up in 1909. Is the photographer lying?

I believe the discussion needs to shift from ‘how’ the image was altered to ‘why’ it was altered. Indeed, photographers have ‘enhanced’ their images by using filters to darken skies, dodged and burned in the darkroom to change relative emphasis of visual elements, sometimes even eliminated visuals that distracted from what was considered central to the photograph. Subtle changes in tonality and gradation altered the ‘feel’ of an image, affecting the emotional response one might have to the visual experience.  In the analogue days, the skill sets required hand-eye  coordination to a far greater extent than is needed today. The modern photographer needs to learn about pixels, paths and plug-ins. The software used, the amount of RAM and processor speed are the new vocabulary that replaces darkroom tools of yore. But even in the digital age, the skill of the practitioner often determines whether the change is detectable.

There are those who subvert the process and deliberately play on detectability of the process, confronting the viewer with their interventions, questioning her perception of what is acceptable, stretching her boundaries of credibility. Indeed, on occasions, flaunting these very norms to raise uncomfortable issues of how images are read. Early theorists like Professor Fred Ritchin, currently at Tisch School of The Arts, New York University, have eloquently analysed how this ‘manipulation’, instead of undermining the credibility of the photograph, has returned the onus of authenticity upon the integrity of the author rather than the acceptability of the tools (human or mechanical).  One believes a photograph, as one believes a word, based on the reliability of the source, rather than the mode of production. The hugely talented pioneer of digital photography, the Mexican photographer Pedro Meyer, playfully, intelligently and skillfully, toyed with us, shaking the pillars of our age old beliefs, forcing us to question the process of seeing and believing.

Of course the photograph still retains the characteristic of being the primary source. “I was there. I saw it with my own eyes. I have photographs.” It is precisely because the photograph or the video, is seen as an unmoderated fact, that it is so powerful. It is precisely the reason why lying through a video or photograph can be so effective.

In this age of spin, rhetoric and hyperbole, does the liar, by shaking our confidence in the medium, undermine the veracity of the one source that we still implicitly trust? In some ways of course it does, but by doing so, the liar does us a favour. It reminds us to question, not merely the medium but also the source.

Buddha, Moses, Jesus and Mohammed were believed because they were trustworthy. They had established their credibility. They had a track record that gave their word a respectability that others who said otherwise did not have. I have no way to vouch for the veracity of the incredible claims that they made. That is the basis of a very different discussion. But it is undeniably true that centuries after they have gone, there are people who live by their ideals and are prepared to die for them. The lives that they lived, made their words believable. We believed their actions, which led to us believing their words.

That brings me to the point of this article. The video of the attack on the flotilla. People have correctly pointed to the technical errors in the released videos. The fact that there were white frames inside the sequence, that consecutive frames did not match, that crude alterations revealed the manipulation where people are seen to be walking through metal pylons, the amateurish display of a catapult by turning towards a camera on a tripod and holding it high, in the middle of an attack by armed soldiers, the fact that a voice inserted in the video is that of a woman on another ship, all make the video a laughable piece of ‘evidence’. Indeed, the detection of the tampering is what is being used as evidence of lies being told.

My argument is elsewhere. What if the Israelis had produced the perfect video, backing up their claims. What if their technicians had been more skilled, their computer animations more realistic, their actors more adept and telling their version of the story. Would that have validated their version of the story? I would like to return to who is telling the story. The veracity of the source.

Lies are more difficult to protect than the truth. If the version they had presented had been genuine, there would have been no need to confiscate all the visual material, releasing selective segments, with obvious tampering. If they had nothing to hide there would have been no need to jam the communications at the moment of attack, or to erase the audio from certain segments of the video. There would have been no reluctance to make all the evidence available and let the viewers decide. Suspicious behavior gives rise to suspicion. For a nation known for manipulating the truth at all levels, casting doubts on authentic data, vilifying honest citizens, persecuting every hint of dissent, it is the fact that the source is Israel that is the greatest reason for disbelief.

If a time were to come when Israel had a change of heart and for once spoke the truth, like Matilda in her burning house, there would be none to believe her. That fire is imminent and Israel’s house of lies might well be close to burning.

———————ENDS————————–

Other points of view.

BBC Panorama Video 1

BBC Panorama Video 2

“>Al Jazeera Storming of Gaza aid convoy

Legal assessment of Gaza Flotialla raid

Related links:

Military ties between India and Israel

In Defense of Helen Thomas

Human Rights Council Condemnation of Israeli Attacks

Adopted by a recorded vote of 32 to 3, with 9 abstentions.
The voting was as follows:
In favour: Angola, Argentina, Bahrain, Bangladesh, Bolivia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Brazil, Chile, China, Cuba, Djibouti, Egypt, Gabon, Ghana, India, Indonesia, Jordan, Kyrgyzstan, Mauritius, Mexico, Nicaragua, Nigeria, Norway, Pakistan, Philippines, Qatar, Russian Federation, Saudia Arabia, Senegal, Slovenia, South Africa, Uruguay;
Against: Italy, Netherlands, United States of America;
Abstaining: Belgium, Burkina Faso, France, Hungary, Japan, Republic of Korea, Slovakia, Ukraine, United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland: