March 2010

Netanyahu remains defiant

by Paul Woodward 03.15.2010

As Bill Clinton famously said about Benjamin Netanyahu in 1998, “Who the fuck does he think he is? Who’s the fucking superpower here?” Twelve years later there is no sign that Bibi’s hubris has been tempered. In the midst of what Israel’s ambassador to the United States, Michael Oren, has told the country’s diplomats is [...]

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Israel is putting American lives at risk

by Paul Woodward 03.14.2010

In Foreign Policy, Mark Perry describes an extraordinary Pentagon briefing on Israel’s impact on conflicts across the Middle East. Here is an excerpt and following some comments of my own, the author has provided me with additional background on his reporting. [Important update: A senior military officer told Foreign Policy by email that one rather [...]

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Obama gets kind of tough with Netanyahu

by Paul Woodward 03.14.2010

The Los Angeles Times says: “a dispute this week between the Obama administration and Israel has ballooned into the biggest U.S.-Israeli clash in 20 years.” Tom Friedman says: “what the Israelis did played right into a question a lot of people are asking about the Obama team: how tough are these guys? The last thing [...]

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Washington’s cult of narcissism and Iraq

by Paul Woodward 03.13.2010

Tom Engelhardt writes: Hubris? We’re bigger than that! We’ve now been at war with, or in, Iraq for almost 20 years, and intermittently at war in Afghanistan for 30 years. Think of it as nearly half a century of experience, all bad. And what is it that Washington seems to have concluded? In Afghanistan, where [...]

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Why did Joe Biden insult America’s friends?

by Paul Woodward 03.13.2010

In an interview on CNN, Hillary Clinton was refreshingly blunt in saying that Israel insulted the US: But now that’s been clearly stated, why did Joe Biden have to cap the first insult by adding another when he said: “the United States has no better friend in the community of nations than Israel”? That’s not [...]

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Poll: Half of Israeli high schoolers oppose equal rights for Arabs

by Paul Woodward 03.13.2010

Haaretz reports: Nearly half of Israel’s high school students do not believe that Israeli-Arabs are entitled to the same rights as Jews in Israel, according to the results of a new survey released yesterday [Thursday]. The same poll revealed that more than half the students would deny Arabs the right to be elected to the [...]

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CIA drone attacks produce America’s own unlawful combatants

by Paul Woodward 03.13.2010

Gary Solis, an adjunct professor at Georgetown University Law Center, writes: In our current armed conflicts, there are two U.S. drone offensives. One is conducted by our armed forces, the other by the CIA. Every day, CIA agents and CIA contractors arm and pilot armed unmanned drones over combat zones in Afghanistan and Pakistan, including [...]

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Afghan tribal rivalries bedevil a U.S. plan

by Paul Woodward 03.12.2010

The New York Times reports: Six weeks ago, elders of the Shinwari tribe, which dominates a large area in southeastern Afghanistan, pledged that they would set aside internal differences to focus on fighting the Taliban. This week, that commitment seemed less important as two Shinwari subtribes took up arms to fight each other over an [...]

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In early tally, tight Iraq race deepens splits

by Paul Woodward 03.12.2010

The New York Times reports: Iraq’s major coalitions were locked in a surprisingly close race on Thursday, in initial results from elections that deepened divisions across a fractured landscape. Candidates were quick to charge fraud, heightening concerns whether Iraq’s fledgling institutions were strong enough to support a peaceful transfer of power. The day was the [...]

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Dubai tells spies to clear out

by Paul Woodward 03.12.2010

Newsweek reports: Police in the Persian Gulf emirate of Dubai have advised all foreign spies to get out of town—and preferably out of the region—within a week. Although it is widely known in international spy circles, news of the expulsion threat has received little circulation beyond media in the Arab world. However, Gulf News, a [...]

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Time for George Mitchell and the US to step aside

by Paul Woodward 03.12.2010

Among commentators unable to see beyond the bankrupt perspective that the United States has the indispensable role of mediating a Middle East peace agreement (if such an agreement is ever to be reached), much is being made about Joe Biden’s tough words “behind closed doors”. Laura Rozen quotes from a Yedioth Ahronoth report: People who [...]

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Cornel West points out Obama’s hypocrisy on Israelis and Palestinians

by Paul Woodward 03.11.2010

Watch the clip above as Cornel West responds to this question: The Obama administration talks about a new era of engagement. You spoke earlier about a “friendlier face of empire”. What does that mean? Is that just marketing? Or is there actually a change in US foreign policy these days? Watch the whole 23-minute interview: [...]

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The peace-process masquerade falls apart

by Paul Woodward 03.11.2010

It turns out that at least when it comes to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict the difference between the Bush administration and the Obama administration is this: team Bush had better choreography. The Guardian now reports: The US vice-president, Joe Biden, today attempted to salvage the Middle East peace talks after the Palestinians announced they were pulling [...]

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East Jerusalem in a Jewish stranglehold

by Paul Woodward 03.11.2010

Isn’t it time that the “two-state solution” be regarded as an object of the imagination no more real than the Tibetan kingdom of Shambala? At the heart of this Middle Eastern fable is another Shangri-La: Jerusalem, capital of the Jewish state and a Palestinian state. In reality, Jews in an unremitting march of expansion are [...]

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The wrong kind of green

by Paul Woodward 03.11.2010

Johann Hari writes: Why did America’s leading environmental groups jet to Copenhagen and lobby for policies that will lead to the faster death of the rainforests–and runaway global warming? Why are their lobbyists on Capitol Hill dismissing the only real solutions to climate change as “unworkable” and “unrealistic,” as though they were just another sooty [...]

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U.S. changing focus of Iran policy

by Paul Woodward 03.11.2010

The Los Angeles Times reports: After keeping a careful distance for the last year, the Obama administration has concluded that the Iranian opposition movement has staying power and has embraced it as a central element in the U.S.-led campaign to pressure the country’s clerical government. Administration officials and some allied governments believe that a combination [...]

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OECD is ushering Israel in too easily

by Paul Woodward 03.10.2010

Seth Freedman writes: Despite all the diplomatic disquiet over Israeli policy towards the Palestinians, actions speak far louder than words when it comes to Israel’s international status. In May, the country seems set to be ushered into the OECD, following years of campaigning from successive Israeli governments. Such a move would be another step in [...]

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Jewish lobbying fails to stop EU support for Goldstone report

by Paul Woodward 03.10.2010

On Tuesday, a headline for Haaretz declared: Jewish lobbying sways EU against support of Goldstone Gaza report The article said: Members of the European Parliament have backtracked from their plan to pass a resolution demanding implementation of the Goldstone report, in response to pressure from European Jewish leaders, Haaretz has learned. After leaders of all [...]

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Biden late for dinner

by Paul Woodward 03.10.2010

The Associated Press reports that after the Israeli government humiliated the US Vice President Joe Biden, the minister responsible says he’s sorry: Israeli Interior Minister Eli Yishai, whose office announced the latest construction plans in east Jerusalem, apologized Wednesday for disrupting Biden’s visit. But he said the problem was merely about timing, not substance. “We [...]

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The price tag for Israeli intransigence

by Paul Woodward 03.09.2010

The day before Vice President Joe Biden arrived in Israel — supposedly on a mission to help kick-start peace talks between Israelis and Palestinians — the Netanyahu government made its contempt for the Obama administration clear by approving new settlement construction. They were quick to take offense — they being the Israelis! “While we welcome [...]

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What the Dubai assassination reveals

by Paul Woodward 03.09.2010

Robert Baer considers some of the wider implications of the assassination of the Hamas commander, Mahmoud al-Mabhouh, in Dubai in January: If Mossad was indeed responsible, it means that blame for Mabhouh’s assassination can be put at the doorstep of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. Israel’s Prime Minister has historically approved hits staged in countries with [...]

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The Marjah mirage

by Paul Woodward 03.09.2010

Gareth Porter writes: For weeks, the U.S. public followed the biggest offensive of the Afghanistan War against what it was told was a “city of 80,000 people” as well as the logistical hub of the Taliban in that part of Helmand. That idea was a central element in the overall impression built up in February [...]

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Fresh Middle East talks hit a wall

by Paul Woodward 03.09.2010

Al Jazeera reports: Israel’s move to expand illegal settlements in the occupied West Bank has threatened to sabotage newly agreed indirect talks with the Palestinian Authority before they can even begin. George Mitchell, the US envoy to the Middle East, announced on Monday that the two sides had agreed a day earlier to begin indirect [...]

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The reconstruction blame game

by Paul Woodward 03.09.2010

At Mother Jones, Daniel Schulman writes: After years of a US presence in Iraq and Afghanistan, rebuilding and stabilization projects remain disjointed and chaotic, resulting in wasted taxpayer dollars and, potentially, the deaths of soldiers and civilians. Meanwhile, the nearly six-year-old State Department office that was supposed to coordinate these efforts isn’t even fully operational. [...]

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