Daily Archives: November 19, 2009

Obama’s word — a fire that has turned to ashes

Little behind Obama’s tough Mideast talk: analysts
By Lachlan Carmichael, AFP, November 18, 2009

The Obama administration is hardening its tone against Israel, but analysts warned Wednesday the tough talk was mere bluster hiding the lack of a viable plan to revive the Middle East peace process.

“You’ve had three ‘no’s’ to an American president in his first year,” Aaron David Miller, who has served as advisor on Middle East peacemaking to previous US administrations, told AFP.

President Barack Obama is now “faced with the default position, which is words,” said Miller from the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars.

“And the louder they shout, the more there is a paradox. The tougher the words are, the weaker we look.” [continued…]

Editor’s Comment — In an interview with Barbara Walters on Tuesday, Sarah Palin said: “I don’t think that the Obama administration has any right to tell Israel that the Jewish settlements cannot expand.”

Americans for Peace Now quickly shot back: “Gov. Palin may not be aware of it, but every American president in the past 40 years — Republican and Democrat alike — has opposed West Bank settlements. They have done so because settlement expansion is bad for American national security interests and because they have cared about Israel’s well-being.”

It’s curious at this juncture that anyone would think the best way to press the argument against settlements is by citing the consistency of Washington’s opposition — opposition that for 40 years has proved to be utterly ineffectual.

To consistently oppose settlement growth while settlements relentlessly expand suggests that Washington is either convinced that it possesses no leverage, or, that its opposition is disingenuous.

Early on, the Obama administration signaled to Israel that it would distinguish itself from its predecessor by saying what it meant: there would be no contradiction between its public and private declarations.

What Obama now needs to grasp is that the greatest asset he held when he came into office — the power of his word — is a fire that has largely turned to ashes.

There may be a few embers in there, but the only way to rebuild the fire is for the president to show the world what he can do. We no longer have any interest in what he has to say.

Israel building Jewish homes with one hand, destroying Arab homes with the other
By Nir Hasson, Haaretz, November 19, 2009

The World Likud movement held a cornerstone-laying ceremony yesterday for the expansion of the neighborhood of Nof Zion, despite – or possibly because of – American pressure against building in East Jerusalem. The Jewish settlement is in the middle of the Arab village of Jabal Mukkaber. Meanwhile, the Jerusalem municipality razed two Palestinian homes in East Jerusalem yesterday.

The plan is to add to Nof Zion 105 new apartments to the 90 ones that are already there, most of which are already occupied. The neighborhood is considered “prestigious,” but the developers ran into trouble a few years ago after they failed to sell the apartments to Jews from overseas. About a year ago the developers changed their marketing strategy to target the local national-religious market – and the apartments began selling quickly. The developers expect the same for the new part of the neighborhood.

The World Likud’s announcement of the ceremony said the neighborhood was near Jabal Mukkaber, “bounded by terraces and with olive trees and grapevines.”

In fact, however, Nof Zion is in the middle of the village, near Palestinian homes. In September Haaretz reported that the family of the late actor-comedian Shaike Ophir criticized the municipality’s decision to name a street in Nof Zion after him.

A group of American Jews interested in buying apartments in Nof Zion attended yesterday’s ceremony. New York State Assemblyman Dov Hikind, who is considered a staunch supporter of the settlers, headed the group. Continue reading →

Facebooktwittermail

Why has the left in Israel vanished?

Why has the left in Israel vanished?
By Yitzhak Laor, Haaretz, November 19, 2009

he threats uttered against a possible Palestinian declaration of independence by our leaders Benjamin Netanyahu, Avigdor Lieberman and Ehud Barak let the Israeli sanctimony (usually tedious and belabored) drop to the floor for a moment, like a woman’s slip. It exposed the ugly skeleton of force that gives only us freedom of speech – we’re permitted, you’re forbidden. We are allowed to reiterate Israel’s Declaration of Independence over and over. You are not allowed to do so with yours.

The simplest explanation for our privileges, and one that is becoming increasingly significant, is the religious one – the land is ours, from God, not theirs, so we’re allowed to declare independence or harm civilians. The simplest explanation offered by secular people of those privileges is force – we’re strong. These two explanations are the axis of consensus. In the name of this consensus, the military rabbis and officers in the Israel Defense Forces, equipped with equal amounts of hysteria, set out to incite the units on their way to kill in Gaza. Continue reading →

Facebooktwittermail

From Gaza to Obama: An open letter

From Gaza to Obama: An open letter
By Professor Haidar Eid, Ma’an, November 15, 2009

Mr President,

The whole world celebrated your election as the first African-American president of the US. I did not. Neither did the inhabitants of the concentration camp where I live. Your sympathetic visit to Sderot—an Israeli town which was the Palestinian village of Najd until 1948 when its people were ethnically cleansed—three years after your first visit to a Kibbutz in northern Israel in support of its residents, and after your pledge to be committed to the security of the State of Israel and its “right” to retain unified Jerusalem as the capital city of the Jewish people—to give but few examples—were all clear indications of where your heart lies.

Another reason for the writing of this letter is shock at the indifference and arrogance with which Secretary of State Hillary Clinton dismissed Palestinian concerns about Israel’s illegal Jewish-only settlements in the West Bank. Only a few weeks ago you made the admirable statement that all Jewish settlement must halt, and you made it clear that this included expansion of existing settlements as well as the construction of new settlements. However, when Netanyahu let it be known that he had no intention of stopping settlements, you missed an historic opportunity to draw a line: no more billions and no more weapons for Israel unless and until this condition is met. Now Clinton has the Herculean task of pretending that your position on Jewish settlements has not changed, although it is clear you have chosen not to use the very real power at your disposal to bring Israeli policy into line. [continued…] (h/t Rob Browne)

Barack Obama rewards big donors with plum jobs overseas
By Jeanne Cummings, Politico, November 19, 2009

He may have promised to change Washington, but President Barack Obama is continuing one of its most renowned patronage traditions: bestowing prized ambassadorships on big donors.

Of the nearly 80 ambassadorship nominations or confirmations since Obama’s Inauguration, 56 percent were given to political appointees and 44 percent have gone to career diplomats, according to records kept by the American Foreign Service Association.

The latest nomination came this week, when Beatrice Wilkinson Welters was nominated to serve as ambassador to the island nation of Trinidad and Tobago in the Caribbean.

Welters, a longtime advocate for underprivileged children, and her husband, Anthony, an executive with UnitedHealth Group, generated between $200,000 and $500,000 in donations to Obama’s presidential campaign and an additional $100,000 for his Inauguration, according to the Center for Responsive Politics, a nonpartisan group that tracks political giving. [continued…]

The gaffes of Hillary Clinton
By Michael Crowley, The New Republic, November 16, 2009

Though none of these comments had a tangible impact on U.S. foreign policy, the same can’t be said about two episodes in which Clinton veered away from the White House’s message on the Middle East peace process. The first came in May, when Clinton revealed at a press conference that Obama’s call for an Israeli settlement freeze included any “natural growth” within existing settlements. The circumstances remain murky, but two sources with detailed knowledge of the U.S.-Israeli relationship say that the Obama team was not yet prepared to make public this departure from Bush-era policy. Rather than leave his secretary of state twisting in the wind, says one of the sources, Obama wound up repeating her formulation a few days later, touching off months of tension with the Israelis. [continued…]

Facebooktwittermail

Is Iraq shifting to Iran?

Is Iraq shifting to Iran?
By Gary Sick, The Daily Beast, November 16, 2009

Are we witnessing a historic shift in the balance of power in the Persian Gulf, with Iran assuming dominance over Iraq? A recent fact-finding trip to Baghdad and Najaf suggests that such fears are exaggerated.

In 2003, the United States overturned the secular but predominantly Sunni Arab regime of Saddam Hussein and then presided over the installation of a more representative Shiite government in Baghdad. This was a huge gift to Iran—itself a Shiite state—and represented a historic shift. Although Iraq is a majority Shiite state, never in more than a thousand years had a predominantly Shiite government ruled there.

The U.S. invasion removed an implacably hostile enemy of Iran that had invaded it in 1980, fought a brutal eight-year war against it in the southern marshes, and created a Sunni Arab coalition with the intent of overturning the Iranian revolution. In an apparent fit of absentmindedness, the G.W. Bush administration succeeded in removing both of Iran’s key rivals—the Taliban was similarly routed in Afghanistan—effectively elevating Iran to the position of a regional superpower. [continued…]

Facebooktwittermail

The Afghan speech Obama should give (but won’t)

‘This administration ended, rather than extended, two wars’… The Afghan speech Obama should give (but won’t)
By Tom Engelhardt, TomDispatch, November 19, 2009

Sure, the quote in the over-title is only my fantasy. No one in Washington — no less President Obama — ever said, “This administration ended, rather than extended, two wars,” and right now, it looks as if no one in an official capacity is likely to do so any time soon. It’s common knowledge that a president — but above all a Democratic president — who tried to de-escalate a war like the one now expanding in Afghanistan and parts of Pakistan, and withdraw American troops, would be so much domestic political dead meat.

This everyday bit of engrained Washington wisdom is, in fact, based on not a shred of evidence in the historical record. We do, however, know something about what could happen to a president who escalated a counterinsurgency war: Lyndon Johnson comes to mind for expanding his inherited war in Vietnam out of fear that he would be labeled the president who “lost” that country to the communists (as Harry Truman had supposedly “lost” China). And then there was Vice President Hubert Humphrey who — incapable of rejecting Johnson’s war policy — lost the 1968 election to Richard Nixon, a candidate pushing a fraudulent “peace with honor” formula for downsizing the war.

Still, we have no evidence about how American voters would deal with a president who didn’t take the Johnson approach to a losing war. The only example might be John F. Kennedy, who reputedly pushed back against escalatory advice over Vietnam, and certainly did so against his military high command during the Cuban Missile Crisis. In both cases, however, he acted in private, offering quite a different face to the world. [continued…]

Facebooktwittermail

Fine and inquiry possible for Blackwater successor

Fine and inquiry possible for Blackwater successor
By Mark Mazzetti and James Risen, New York Times, November 19, 2009

The international security company formerly called Blackwater Worldwide is facing large government fines for unlicensed arms shipments to Iraq, as a key Congressional committee is asking for a separate investigation into whether the company bribed Iraqi officials.

In talks likely to result in millions of dollars in penalties, executives from the company, now known as Xe Services, are negotiating with government regulators over years of violations of export laws. According to government officials and former company employees, many of the violations involve arms shipments to Iraq, to outfit company security guards operating inside the country.

In addition, former company officials say that other penalties could result from violations of licensing requirements for the transfer of other forms of military technology and training expertise to foreign countries.

Senator John Kerry, the Massachusetts Democrat who is chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee, wrote in a letter on Wednesday that his committee was told by a top State Department official that the company had engaged in “broad violations” of export laws and that the unlicensed shipments “went beyond weapons for personal use.” [continued…]

Facebooktwittermail

Hasan’s supervisor warned army in ’07

Hasan’s supervisor warned army in ’07
By Daniel Zwerdling, NPR, November 18, 2009

Two years ago, a top psychiatrist at Walter Reed Army Medical Center was so concerned about what he saw as Nidal Hasan’s incompetence and reckless behavior that he put those concerns in writing. NPR has obtained a copy of the memo, the first evaluation that has surfaced from Hasan’s file.

Officials at Walter Reed sent that memo to Fort Hood this year when Hasan was transferred there.

Nevertheless, commanders still assigned Hasan — accused of killing 13 people in a mass shooting at Fort Hood on Nov. 5 — to work with some of the Army’s most troubled and vulnerable soldiers.

On May 17, 2007, Hasan’s supervisor at Walter Reed sent the memo to the Walter Reed credentials committee. It reads, “Memorandum for: Credentials Committee. Subject: CPT Nidal Hasan.” More than a page long, the document warns that: “The Faculty has serious concerns about CPT Hasan’s professionalism and work ethic. … He demonstrates a pattern of poor judgment and a lack of professionalism.” It is signed by the chief of psychiatric residents at Walter Reed, Maj. Scott Moran. [continued…]

Facebooktwittermail

CIA secret ‘torture’ prison found at fancy horseback riding academy

CIA secret ‘torture’ prison found at fancy horseback riding academy
By Brian Ross and Matthew Cole, ABC News, November 18, 2009

The CIA built one of its secret European prisons inside an exclusive riding academy outside Vilnius, Lithuania, a current Lithuanian government official and a former U.S. intelligence official told ABC News this week.

Where affluent Lithuanians once rode show horses and sipped coffee at a café, the CIA installed a concrete structure where it could use harsh tactics to interrogate up to eight suspected al-Qaeda terrorists at a time.

“The activities in that prison were illegal,” said human rights researcher John Sifton. “They included various forms of torture, including sleep deprivation, forced standing, painful stress positions.”

Lithuanian officials provided ABC News with the documents of what they called a CIA front company, Elite, LLC, which purchased the property and built the “black site” in 2004. [continued…]

Facebooktwittermail