Daily Archives: July 23, 2009

Jerusalem impasse threatens Obama peace plan

Jerusalem impasse threatens Obama peace plan
By Tony Karon, Time, July 23, 2009

Last summer, in the course of a campaign speech reaching out to pro-Israel groups concerned about his commitment to the Jewish state, then presidential candidate Barack Obama declared, “Jerusalem will remain the capital of Israel, and it must remain undivided.” Those words, which he later qualified, may now be coming back to haunt the President as he seeks to restart the moribund Israeli-Palestinian peace process by getting Israel to freeze all construction outside its pre-1967 borders. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has drawn a line in the sand over Jerusalem, vehemently rejecting Washington’s demand that he halt a construction project in the Arab eastern portion of the city that was occupied by Israel in 1967. Israel claims sovereignty over all of Jerusalem, and Netanyahu told his Cabinet on Sunday that this claim was nonnegotiable.

Although the U.S. has routinely opposed Israeli construction in East Jerusalem — President Bush’s Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice called it “unhelpful” — Netanyahu appears to be betting that by very publicly challenging Obama on Jerusalem, he can rally support from those Jewish leaders in the U.S. who have lately expressed disquiet over the President’s Middle East policies, and also from Christian conservative supporters of Israel. And the Israelis are plainly looking to make a campaign of it, with the mayor of Jerusalem being dispatched to the U.S. to rally opposition to the Administration’s position on the city. [continued…]

Take the case
By John Dugard, New York Times, July 23, 2009

A request is pending before the International Criminal Court in the Hague into whether international crimes were committed during the Israeli operations in Gaza in December 2008.

Over 1,400 Palestinians were killed, including at least 900 civilians, and over 5,000 wounded in the offensive. Some 3,000 homes were destroyed, as were many government buildings, schools, universities, mosques, hospitals and factories.

Several investigations — including one by the Arab League Independent Fact Finding Committee (I.F.F.C.), which I chaired — have found considerable evidence that serious crimes were committed in Israel’s offensive. [continued…]

Israel doesn’t see U.S. limiting loan guarantees
Reuters, July 23, 2009

Israel does not expect the United States to limit use of loan guarantees despite a dispute with Washington over building in East Jerusalem and in West Bank settlements, Finance Minister Yuval Steinitz said on Thursday.

“I don’t see any limitations on the horizon. It’s not time to be concerned about that,” Steinitz told reporters. [continued…]

Israel’s barrier to progress
By Seth Freedman, The Guardian, July 22, 2009

In many parts of the West Bank, Israel’s much-vaunted separation wall is conspicuous by its absence; Ha’aretz reports that only around 60% of the barrier has been completed will come as no surprise to those who spend time in the area around the project’s proposed route.

In places such as the South Hebron Hills, the only obstacles separating thousands of Palestinians from Israeli communities are sporadic flying checkpoints thrown up by the army, or flimsy, unguarded wire fences ostensibly keeping the terrorist hordes at bay. If mainstream Israeli thinking is to be believed, the “security” wall is vital for the safety of Israel’s citizens, the implication being that scores of would-be bombers are daily banging their heads against a concrete wall as they try desperately to reach Israeli cities to unleash carnage on unsuspecting women and children. [continued…]

Israeli PM says West Bank barrier there to stay
AFP, July 22, 2009

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Wednesday that Israel’s controversial separation barrier in the occupied West Bank would not be pulled down.

“I hear today people who say that because the situation is calm in the West Bank we can dismantle the security barrier, but it is in fact because of this barrier that there is calm,” he told a session of parliament.

“It is because of this barrier and because of a certain improvement on the part of the Palestinian security services that the situation is calm,” Netanyahu said. “The barrier will stay.” [continued…]

Senior Fatah official: We won’t recognize Israel
By Ali Waked, Ynet, July 23, 2009

As the Fatah movement prepares for its upcoming leadership convention, a senior group member says the event will be used to display Fatah’s commitment to the armed struggle against Israel.

Preparations for the convention, scheduled for August 4, are in full force at this time. During a series of preliminary meetings ahead of the event, senior Fatah official Rafik al-Natsheh said that the group will not be recognizing Israel.

‘We will maintain the resistance option in all its forms and we will not recognize Israel,” he said. “Not only don’t we demand that anyone recognize Israel; we don’t recognize Israel ourselves. However, the Palestinian Authority government is required to do it, or else it will not be able to serve the Palestinian people.” [continued…]

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Don’t worry so much about Iran’s nukes

Don’t worry so much about Iran’s nukes
By Joe Klein, Time, July 23, 2009

“We all have been harmed. Today more than ever we need unity,” said former Iranian President Ali Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani during Friday prayers at Tehran University on July 17. It was a crucial sermon and, in the manner of many things Persian, purposefully and delicately opaque. Some thought Rafsanjani’s speech was a direct threat to the Ahmadi-Khamenei regime. He demanded the release of political prisoners, an end to violence against protesters, the restoration of Iran’s (intermittently) free press. Others thought Rafsanjani, speaking with the approval of the Supreme Leader, was trying to build a bridge between the opposition and the regime. For me, it brought back memories of a less opaque Friday-prayers sermon I’d actually seen Rafsanjani deliver in December 2001, in which he spoke of the need for an “Islamic bomb.”

The signature foreign policy initiative of Barack Obama’s presidential campaign was his desire to begin negotiations with Iran. It was ridiculed by John McCain and by Hillary Clinton, now his Secretary of State. Obama persisted, with reason: it was a good idea. How he proceeds now, after Iran’s brutal electoral debacle, could be the most important foreign policy decision of his presidency. As Clinton made clear in a speech to the Council on Foreign Relations two days before Rafsanjani spoke, the Obama Administration has not wavered in its desire for talks. And yet, the body language has changed. [continued…]

U.S. may put up ‘defense umbrella’ over Mideast
By Paul Richter, Los Angeles Times, July 23, 2009

In raising the possibility of a “defense umbrella,” Clinton insisted that she was not abandoning the current U.S. policy toward Iran, which involves a combination of diplomatic outreach and sanctions. Even so, her words suggested that U.S. officials are looking ahead in case the approach, which faces formidable obstacles, proves unsuccessful.

Although President Obama has pushed hard to draw the Islamic Republic to the negotiating table, some U.S. officials and many outside experts have doubts that outreach efforts will succeed. And the likely next step, an effort to organize tougher international economic sanctions, faces strong resistance from Russia, China and India. [continued…]

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Iran opposition leader plans large-scale social movement

Iran opposition leader plans large-scale social movement
By Borzou Daragahi, Los Angeles Times, July 23, 2009

Iran’s political crisis intensified Wednesday when the nation’s main opposition figure announced that he would create a political organization to “lay the groundwork for a large-scale social movement” stemming from his disputed election loss to President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

Many supporters of Mir-Hossein Mousavi had feared the announcement would amount to a disavowal of the civil disobedience campaign that has sprung up since the June election in which the government has been accused of massive vote fraud. Instead, Mousavi explicitly praised the protest movement as a cornerstone for change in Iran.

In his most extensive remarks in weeks, Mousavi said that “power is always inclined to become absolute, and only people’s movements can put a hold on this inclination.” Several other opposition figures, emboldened by high-ranking clerics and unbowed by the severe government crackdown on protesters, have also issued challenges to the authority of supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and his ally Ahmadinejad. [continued…]

Amid crackdown, Iranians try a shocking protest
Time, July 22, 2009

Street demonstrations erupted in Iran once again on July 21 as thousands of people gathered in small pockets around central Tehran on the anniversary of an uprising in 1952 in which government security forces refused to fire on the crowds. This time, the Basij militia and members of the élite Revolutionary Guards were less kind, chasing protesters with batons, firing tear gas to disperse the crowds and, according to reports, arresting dozens in the process. One source said that the underground Haft e-Tir subway station was teargassed. Two Revolutionary Guards were seen with bandaged noses around Haft e-Tir Square; the exact toll of the violence was not immediately clear.

In retaliation, the government shut down mobile networks, and for perhaps the first time since the June 12 presidential election, the Internet was disconnected for several hours late Tuesday night. But protests appear to be coordinated and to be taking other forms apart from street action: on Tuesday, for example, thousands of disgruntled Tehranis tried to bring down the electrical grid at 9 p.m. by simultaneously turning on household appliances like irons, water heaters and toasters. Streets lights in the eastern suburb of Tehran Pars reportedly went off shortly after this, but electricity was not interrupted in central Tehran. [continued…]

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Group plans lawsuit to unveil the CIA’s ‘Pentagon Papers’

Group plans lawsuit to unveil the CIA’s ‘Pentagon Papers’
By Ryan Singel, Wired, July 21, 2009

The CIA and other agencies are sitting on a trove of documentary evidence of actual and suspected wrongdoing under the Bush administration, and the Electronic Frontier Foundation plans to file a lawsuit Wednesday to force the intelligence community to come clean, the group says.

At issue are the misconduct reports the spy agencies are required to file with the Intelligence Oversight Board, a board of private citizens with security clearances who oversee the spy agencies and report to the president. The board is tasked with evaluating the self-reported malfeasances of intelligence agencies, looking at the agencies’ responses, and forwarding on the worst to the attorney general when it believes criminal prosecution is called for.

The CIA is among the agencies that failed to respond to the EFF’s Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests for copies of the reports. Given the unfolding controversy over the CIA’s apparent failure to notify Congress of a secret agency assassination program, the withholding of these documents takes on even greater importance, according to EFF lawyer Nate Cardozo. [continued…]

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U.S. judge challenges evidence on a detainee

U.S. judge challenges evidence on a detainee
By William Glaberson, New York Times, July 23, 2009

The Obama administration has until Friday to decide whether to continue to defend the six-year imprisonment of an Afghan at the prison at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, who was a teenager when he came into American hands.

The decision was prompted by Judge Ellen Segal Huvelle of Federal District Court, who last week criticized the government’s case against the detainee as “an outrage” that was “riddled with holes.” Judge Huvelle’s comments, made at a hearing in district court in Washington, were not reported at the time.

The detainee, Mohammed Jawad, has drawn international attention because of questions about his treatment as one of the youngest prisoners at Guantánamo. [continued…]

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U.S. citizen admits al Qaeda ties

U.S. citizen admits al Qaeda ties
By Amir Efrati, Suzanne Sataline and Evan Perez, Wall Street Journal, July 23, 2009

A U.S. citizen pleaded guilty earlier this year to attempting to kill American soldiers overseas and providing material support to al Qaeda, including information about the New York transit system, according to court documents unsealed Wednesday in Brooklyn federal court.

Bryant Neal Vinas, 26 years old, born in the New York borough of Queens, became an al Qaeda militant after receiving training from the terrorist organization outside the U.S., according to criminal charges brought by Benton J. Campbell, the U.S. attorney in Brooklyn.

Mr. Vinas is cooperating with authorities and provided them with information about possible terror plots on rail targets in New York, according to a person familiar with the matter. Also, an affidavit Mr. Vinas has provided is expected to be entered in court in Belgium as part of a different terrorism case. [continued…]

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